Welcome to Braggsville (31 page)

Louis had decided that each bra cup had its own gravitational field, its own personality, and they were indeed different—the left one larger and boxy; the right one smaller and bubbly. He named them Mary-Kate and Ashley.

Tell me, Ashley, what's life like in Kate's shadow?

Daron laughed. It was hard not to smile at that one.

Mary-Kate was shy, unaccustomed to attention. Ashley was perkier and more outgoing. Mary-Kate ate carefully but was known to binge. Ashley ate whatever the hell she wanted and never gained a pound. Mary-Kate was a baritone, Ashley a soprano. Mary-Kate liked to be pinched; Ashley, sucked. Mary-Kate liked the sun, Ashley avoided it. Daron knew this because Louis was the voice of Mary-Kate, and Candice, miraculously, that of Ashley, and neither one of them, to hear the two tell it, could wait to ride Medusa and set Ishi free.

When they were slow to answer, Louis tapped them with his pen and made a noise like that of drumming a live microphone. And all Candice did was laugh an encouraging laugh. Back in their room later that night, Daron had expressed his shock that Candice let Louis get away with that.

Why not? One piece of advice my uncle gave me and made me swear never to share is the secret to women. Try this: Talk to them
like they are regular people, prime the pump with a question or something, and then shut up and listen.

That's it?

Yeah.

And first class isn't going to L.A., either.

Okay, maybe there's more.

Well?

Like I said, it's a secret. He made me promise not to share it with anyone.

Screw you.

First class wasn't going to L.A.: their code for secrets not worth keeping, but kept nonetheless. Or, for lies of necessity. It was from a joke Louis had admittedly stolen:

How's the pilot get the stubborn Southerner who crashed first class to go back to coach?

What?

A Southerner on a flight from Lower Alabama to Los Angeles sees an extra seat in first class and cops it. The seatmate warns him off, the flight attendant gives him the old bartender's last-call line: you don't have to go home but . . . , the head flight attendant leans into him pretty hard. He stays put. You know. Southern pride or whatever. They call the pilot, who whispers something to the passenger that makes him pop up hotter than burned toast and sprint back to coach. What does he whisper?

What does he whisper?

First class isn't going to Los Angeles.

Daron had laughed at the time, and probably would again. He'd laughed at every joke Louis told, even if it was two days later and the chortling erupted while he was in line at Togo's or taking notes or on BART. If Louis could make that joke again, he would change Southern pride to something like These Colors Don't Run or another one of the bumper stickers he had tweeted. Daron, though, wasn't sure
that he would find it as funny. First class was going to L.A., or New York, or Atlanta, or San Francisco, or wherever coach was going. The Southerner would end up in the same queue as everybody else, whether he knew it or not, whether they wanted to or not, peanuts in the same pod.

T
he summer before ninth grade was the sweet spot. Nervous as he was, D'aron nevertheless expected the best. High school could not possibly be worse than middle school. Ninth grade would mean AP electives, competitive academic teams, and more choices at lunch. He would be allowed to set his own schedules, so he would be liberated from the lockstep of banality and mediocrity. Like many kids, he had often fantasized that his real parents would arrive and whisk him away to another planet where his unique skills would be in high demand, most notably his power to restore the undead, or destroy them if needed. That fantasy was over, but there was still high school. That life would be better demanded little proof, he need look no farther than that summer before ninth grade.

It was well before his cousin's first extended stay at hotel vo-tech. That May, Quint had been, Fuckin' finally released from thirteenth grade for good behavior. He had time to spare. Until then, Quint had paid him scant attention, but that summer they hung daily, jouncing along the former county line road in Quint's B210, Black Sabbath in the backseat compliments of a speaker he'd liberated from the cafeteria. Afternoons at Little Gorge, under shadow of spruce, watching girls stretch their limbs across the water, hoping, praying, imploring the gods to whisper into Krystal Rae Foldercap's bejeweled ear:
Backstroke. Quint occasionally inquiring about an unfamiliar doe in D'aron's class, Quint's friends stopping by to enjoy the view, and no one saying a single unkind word to D'aron all summer.

Marking noon with a formal twist of wrist, Quint would tip a grill lighter up to knight his pipe and intone wisdoms like, Imagine if everyone was your dentist's hygienist. And if you didn't immediately Eureka! he'd accuse you of poor imaginating, doing his best impersonation of the Captain in
Cool Hand Luke,
What we've got here is failure to imaginate.

It was like that again now, Quint four-wheeling over after dark, taking the back ways, and toting Daron out to his place to ice bourbon, or watch
American Idol,
or sit on the porch and count crickets. Quint also took him to Rock-n-Bowl 2-fer-Tuesday, some distance from home, fifty miles to be precise, still a few people did a double take while they were in line exchanging their sneakers for the brightly colored shoes everyone wore as if they were all part of the same team (except the cook, Jose, according to his name tag). One night between sets, Daron told his cousin that the Faculty and Student Review Board had met without him. He could return in the fall, on provisional status. Provided he took no further action to discredit himself or the university, he would be restored to normal status after one semester.

Quint congratulated him, but looked doubtful. He pulled at the frayed hem of his T-shirt, which read
I DIDN'T MEAN TO PISS YOU OFF—THAT WAS A BONUS
! It's good news if you wanna go back. But it sounds like they want you to behave better than you do, like they'll be watching you. Besides, don't you restore things like cars and houses? He laughed. I wouldn't last a week. As soon as someone says they're watching me, I figure I got an audience, so it's time to perform. Your cellie was like that. That was one funny Chinese dude. I know—he was mad-Asian. He laughed again, louder, a big bellyful of chuckle competing with the strikes and spares, drawing the brief
attention of the bowlers in the nearby lanes. No one said anything. A look at Quint and a look away.

Even in Braggsville, no one fucked with Quint. He always said it was because he looked out for Sheriff's son when they were both away at vo-tech, in the penalty box, as Sheriff Jr. described it. But the wariness, the caution, was more than quid pro quo, or reciprocation. Everyone somehow knew Quint was as he'd described Louis, shook up. His first year at Berkeley, Daron finally felt like he was one up on Quint. But what if Quint had gone to Berkeley? He would have been a king.

After the bowling alley, they relaxed on Quint's narrow porch under a fitted sheet awning. The nylon-webbing lawn furniture was black and gold, Yellow Jacket colors. The sun was set but it was still sticky humid and every few minutes they adjusted their necks and arms to find the cool spots on the chairs' metal frames. Gnats swarmed under the porch light, so Maylene, his old lady, lit a homemade citronella torch constructed of a wick and a whiskey bottle, in the process complaining that it was amazing what all people paid for now. Soon there'll be a surcharge for someone to chew your food. Like a bird.

Daron laughed.

Yeah, that's right, she continued, like a bird. Maylene took a seat in the lawn chair farthest from the rest, avoiding Quint's eye. Quint and Maylene had been together since high school. When they first met, Quint had referred to her as one sweet lick. Within a few months he started to spit whenever he said her name, like it started with a B. It was then that they'd moved in together. They'd broken up more times than Daron could count, usually after Quint broke the law, but they always ended up back together.

She sat with them for a few minutes, letting her nails dry. Q's playing it cool 'cause you're here, but he loves a pedicure and manicure. I give him one each year on his birthday, and whenever he walks away
from a fight. And, as a treat for a few other special favors. When I rub his feet, his tongue hangs out like a hot dog's. She winked.

Daron laughed again, this time more at Quint's expression. Embarrassed, was it? But why? It must be nice to have a woman rub your feet. Why Quint would need it at his age, Daron didn't know, but it should be nice. And Daron had never before noticed, but Quint's fingernails did look buffed and shaped with professional polish.

C'mon, Lee-Lee, leave it alone now, or I'ma have to put something in your mouth. It was his usual joke, but there was an edge to his voice. Maylene had already apologized thirty-hundred-and-one times for missing Daron's welcome home barbecue on account of work. The third time, Quint snapped, He ain't deaf. And you don't have to apologize for working.

If she was working second shift, thought Daron, at least that meant more money. When he was in high school, D'aron had crushed hard on Maylene, the sharp jaw and pockmarks offset by an ample chest the perfect height for hugging. She cursed a lot and was quick tempered, but always had a kind word for D'aron and so seemed like the kind of woman that could protect you, a hard woman who melted into embraces. Like Quint said, You want a pit in the pit, and a puppy in the bed. She had also worked out of town for a spell, acquiring an exotic air. Now, she seemed coarse and gauche, which made Daron feel even more tenderly toward her as his former affection became pity. He wondered if she could sense that, because every time he had seen her lately, she went out of her way to appear ladylike. This evening she wore a skirt, which she usually only bothered about for church, and her hair was bunched in a bun with a few tendrils pulled down on either side to frame her face.

Maylene asked Daron about a Berkeley science professor who had a new theory about dinosaurs as herd animals and a business professor who won a Nobel in Economics. He didn't know either.

Quint sucked his teeth.

Maylene bit her bottom lip, thin, so thin, but tonight embellished with overdrawn lipstick.

Go on, then. Quint fanned the air as if after a bad odor. Tell D about your dinosaur theory.

She stumbled through an attempt at explaining how dinosaurs were more like humans than we thought, how each new theory was different in that way. First, scientists thought dinosaurs abandoned their eggs, but now they've learned they're good mothers. Thing is we're more alike than we know. She repeated that a few more times, like a mantra. Yep, she added, we're all more alike than we know.

She could start a fan club with that back in Berkeley, but it was hard to follow the overall argument. Her word choice was vague and therefore confusing, reminding Daron of one professor's choice advice: Be a word herder. The powerful intellect leashed by an impoverished vocabulary is a myth. Without a vocabulary, a language, the intellect cannot develop.

Quint stared at his feet the entire time she talked. When she went back inside, the smell of polish lingered, and for as long as it did, Daron said nothing, thinking of Candice.

Quint chucked his can. Some people shouldn't read. All it does is confuse them.

I don't think I'm going back.

Here'll drive you flat shit bat. Next thing you know, you'll be Chinese.

But there drove him crazy, too. Ever feel like you just don't fit in? Daron asked.

Nope.

They enjoyed the silence for a few minutes before Daron asked, You seen Jo-Jo lately?

Quint shrugged.

Know where his church is?

Quint grunted. Ever saw me in church? That don't even sound
right. I'll go to a goddamned gay bar first. At least they admit they're trying to screw you.

Know if they rebuilt that one back up in the Holler?

I don't keep up after that fool, snapped Quint, so Daron decided to leave it alone.

Quint lived at the very edge of town. His father built the house right before he went off to Operation Desert Storm with Daron's father. Good thing too, because he never came back. It was a covenant broken. Forty-two soldiers from Braggsville fought in Vietnam. After the war, forty-three soldiers returned to Braggsville. Frank Enders married an army nurse he met over there. As long as they volunteered, they'd considered themselves immune. Everyone asked, How can anyone take what you give? After Desert Storm, everyone in town asked, How could a war with almost no casualties happen to take one of our sons? No one had an answer. They just added Quint's daddy's name to the plaque mounted on the watchtower. They gave D'aron's father the hairy eyeball until confirming that he was stationed nowhere near his brother-in-law. It was during that period D'aron came to understand what other folks meant when they said Braggsville was a town where every wrong turn was a dead end.

Through the thin copse behind Quint's house, light glowed faint like hanging lanterns were suspended from the trees. Daron always forgot how close the Gully was.

Quint saw him looking. You wanna walk over there?

I been wondering about Otis. About what he said. He had a whole different history for Braggsville.

You were swatting at the same beehive back when you was writing those school letters, belching all about your mom's interference, kicking more racket than a drunk wingnut in a metal bucket, clicking about how you didn't remember her stories. Seems like you got in. She must have did something right. Quint raised an eyebrow. I'll tell you same thing I said then. History's personal. People are better off
keeping some things to themselves, like when they last went to the bathroom or to visit the ass doctor.

Daron chuckled. There was no point in telling Quint that he'd written a new letter, trashed the one his mother wrote. After another patch of silence, a rough one he didn't enjoy as much, Daron ventured to ask, You know anything about a militia? This Denver guy, the FBI guy, keeps asking me about the Holler.