0:00
/
0:00
Transcript

SCRIBBLER -- STORIES, AFTER EIGHT is a FREE publication. To join the fun behind the PAYWALL, consider becoming a paid subscriber for just pennies a day.

vii

By the time we left the hospital, it was past seven o’clock. The sun was setting slow, but it still looked bright in a clear, cloudless sky. There was a slight breeze coming up from the south, or somewhere — not that I really knew my North from my South then, or do now. It took more than hour and a half for Lloyd to get his cast made though, and I wondered how Daddy was feeling not being able to work on his upcoming sermon. He gave Louise and me a dime each, and told us to go to the store and buy ourselves a drink. Daddy was always generous with his money that way--even if it meant he had to go without for a time. After we finished the soda we bought ourselves, there wasn’t much else for us to do, so we walked through the narrow halls, peeking into rooms and generally being the nosy girls we were.

There wasn’t much to the hospital — I don’t think there were more than one hundred beds total — and we only found two operating theatres that we could see. Most of the rooms we peeked into were empty, and those that had anyone inside, the people were usually sleeping, or else they just plain ignored us. It was the most depressing place I’d ever seen, and I told Louise that.

“You want it should be fun?”

“But there’s hardly any patients here."

“I guess hardly anyone gets sick here ‘bouts.”

By this time, we’d made our way back to the waiting room, and Daddy was sitting with Lloyd. You’d think the boy was his own son, the way the two of them looked, sitting there like that. Lloyd was talking to Daddy, smiling even, and Louise put a hand out and stopped me from interrupting them.

“That sure ain’t like Lloyd to talk to no adult.”

“Why?”

“At school, he don’t talk to no teachers, no matter what they ask him. He just clams up — even if they hit him.”

“What do they ask him?”

“Usually, they ask him stupid questions, like why he’s late, when anybody lookin’ at him can see plain as day his daddy done beat him up before sendin’ him off to school.”

“How do you know that? I mean, he coulda tripped an’ fell — just like he did with his arm.”

Louise looked at me and shook her head.

“If that’s how you’re goin’ to tell ever’one it happened, you might as well just tell 'em the truth.”

“Honey? Is that you?” Daddy was leaning forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees, looking down the hallway.

“Yes Daddy?” I peeked around the corner.
“What are you two doing? Hiding?”

“We aren’t hiding. We just thought, maybe you an’ Lloyd might want to get to know each other a bit better.”

“I’m sure Lloyd wants to get home,” Daddy said as we stepped around the corner.

“Yes sir, I’m sure you’re right.”

“I’ll bet he does too,” Louise smiled.

Lloyd watched as we came down the hallway, but he didn’t say anything. He stopped talking altogether as soon as he saw Louise. There was an uncomfortable moment of silence that seemed to hang over all of us, and Daddy ended it by saying that we’d best get a move on.

Daddy tried asking Lloyd more questions, but Lloyd didn’t answer with anything, except one or two word answers. I think Daddy just assumed Lloyd was shy in front of us girls, but I knew it had more to do with Louise, and how she broke his arm. Maybe Daddy thought Lloyd had a crush on Louise.

Like I said, by the time we left the hospital, it was late. Daddy asked Lloyd where he lived, and kept asking him when to turn. Lloyd would just say left, or right, and sit back quietly. He seemed to sink back in his seat once we rounded the corner and drove down the street he lived on.

I think Lloyd was embarrassed that we saw where he lived, because it was littered with truck parts, and the rusted out shells of old cars; they’d been there for years I figured, because of the grass growing up around them, and through them. There was a tattered Rebel flag hanging limp on a wood pole in the middle of the packed clay yard, and most of the grass around the pole was dead, or else just bare patches of dirty clay because of the dog that was chained to the pole. I don’t know what kind of dog it was, but it was big, and straining at the chain so that it was up on its hind legs, barking.

“Don’t mind ‘im. He can’t get ya.”

“What's his name?” I asked.

“Bear.”

“Does he bite?”

“Sometimes. But only if Daddy lets him loose. He only does that when Niggers come ‘round though. They don’t come ‘round here much,” he added with another laugh. I think it pained him to smile though, and he was quiet for a moment more.

“Your Daddy sets the dog after Niggers?” Louise asked.

“Only when they come pokin’ ‘round. They don’t come round here too much," he said again. “No one comes ‘round here much.”

We pulled up to the front of the house, and Daddy waited for a moment before he shut the car off. The curtains of the house were drawn closed, and one of the windows was broken, with a wooden shutter hanging down from it. The window was fixed up with a piece of water stained cardboard, and tape, and it looked like a giant spider web crisscrossing the front of the glass. The front door was wide open, and I could see straight through the house to the back door where the trees that bordered the cemetery behind the Church stood. Daddy stepped out of the car and ran around to the other side so he could open the door for Lloyd.

“What’n the Hell’re you fuckin’ doin’, Preacher?” A man stepped out of the shadows as if he’d been laying in wait for us. I remembered Momma was to have come out and spoken with him earlier. A part of me felt sorry for her. It was one of the men Daddy had stopped beating when he helped Root. He’d been sitting in the shade of the front porch, drinking beer, and was on his feet the moment he saw Daddy step out of the car.

“What the fuck did ya do to my boy?” he asked. “Did he hurt you boy?” he asked Lloyd.

“No sir.”

“What’d he do to yer arm?” And for a moment, I thought he was going to reach out and shake Lloyd like a rag doll.

“Nothin’,” Lloyd said quickly, stepping back. “He took me t’ the hospital t’ get it fixed.”

“He has a broken arm,” Daddy explained.

“I know what he has. I can fuckin’ see that. Some bitch come by earlier an’ tried t’ fuckin’ tell me what ya’ll did t’ yerself," he said, lookin’ back down at Lloyd.

“Nobody did nothin’ t’ me.”

“That’s not what I said, boy. Are you lyin’ t’ me again? I tol’ that bitch I din’t believe a fuckin’ word of it, an’ I fuckin’ tol’ her so, too — just like that; just like I’m fuckin’ sayin’ it t’ ya now. Skitterish woman” he laughed. “Her an’ that dummy’s Momma come by some time ago. They axed me if I wanted a ride t’ the fuckin’ hospital, so’s I could see t’ ya m’self —”

“That was my wife. I sent her here to tell you what happened. But there’s no need for you to talk like that with children present.”

“Was I fuckin’ addressin’ you, Preacher? Did you see me addressin’ you in any fuckin’ way? No? I din’t fuckin’ think so. When I do address you, you’ll fuckin’ know.”

“Look, I’m sorry about what happened earlier.” Daddy was speaking slowly, shuffling his feet, and squinting up at the sun. I thought he was going to walk toward the man and offer him his hand. Louise wanted to ask me what happened, but I shushed her.

“What happened earlier?” Edgerton was scratching at his chest through his dirty tee-shirt with his beer bottle. “Oh, you mean ‘bout you attackin’ us an’ all? Well, think nothin’ of it, Preacher. A man sees three men beatin’ up a fuckin’ Nigger, well, it’s just plain an’ simple he should stop an’ do what he can for the man. I mean, if a man’s a fuckin’ Nigger lovin’ Preacher, that is. That’s what you are, ain’t it? A fuckin’ Nigger lovin’ Preacher?”

“I love all men equally.”

“An’ I’m sure you do.” Edgerton laughed strangely, and Daddy grew red in the face; Edgerton laughed even harder when he saw that.

“I mean, I don’t judge a man by the colour of his skin, but by the contents of his heart.”

“I’m sure ya do. So why’d you break my boy’s fuckin’ arm?” Edgerton asked through his laughter.

“I didn’t break his arm.”

“Oh, you saw him on the side of the road, an’ bein’ the good fuckin’ Samaritan y’are, ya’ll stopped an’ took ‘im t’ the hospital?”

“He was in the backyard. At the Church.”

“The Church? An’ what was he doin’ there? Was he tryin’ t’ steal somethin’? I’ll beat ya within an inch of yer fuckin’ life boy, if ya been stealin’ again,” Edgerton said, turning to look at Lloyd who was backing away from him.

“I never took nothin’. I din’t do nothin’ wrong.”

“Then what’d ya do?”

Lloyd looked at us before he said anything, and I saw his daddy turn and look us over carefully.

“I fell.”

“You fell?” It was obvious he didn’t believe a word of it.

“I landed on a big root. It was kinda stickin’ up outta the ground.”

“An’ am I s’posed t’ fuckin’ believe that?”

“But it’s the truth!”

“I’ll get the fuckin’ truth outta ya soon enough, boy, don’t ya worry yerself ‘bout that.”

“It is true!” I called out, and shrunk back in my seat when he levelled his gaze at me.

“Maybe ya’ll should learn yer little girl t’ speak when she’s called on t’ speak, an’ not ‘til then,” he said, looking at Daddy. “It ain’t right for her t’ be callin’ out fuckin’ lies like that.”

“And what makes you think she’s lying?”

“She’s a fuckin’ kid, ain’t she? They all lie t’ pertect themselves, even when there ain’t no need t’ be fuckin’ worryin’ ‘bout anythin’. I’ve raised me six kids enough t’ know that. Ever’ God-fearin’ one of ‘em fuckin’ lied through their teeth at me. I s’pose they all ‘spected they’d get away with it, too.”

“Well, my girl doesn’t lie, because she has no need to. Perhaps if you were more...” Daddy stopped talking, and shook his head as he walked around the car and opened his door.

“Maybe if I was more what?”

“Never mind. It won’t make any difference one way or the other.”

“What won’t?”
“I’m sorry. It’s not my place to tell you how to raise your boy, anymore than it’s your place to tell me how to raise my girls.”

"No. It fuckin’ ain’t, ain’t it?” He took a step forward now that Daddy was in the car. “It ain’t yer fuckin’ place no place ‘round here. Yer a fuckin’ Nigger lovin’ preacher, an’ there ain’t no one gonna side wit’ ya’ll in a town like this. I’ll fuckin’ see t’ that.”

“I’m not lookin’ for anyone to take my side,” Daddy said as he turned the key in the ignition.

“You stay away from my fuckin’ boy! Nigger lover!” he called out as we drove off. Louise and I turned in our seats and watched him through the rear window. He was standing in the middle of the road, laughing, and threw his beer bottle as we drove off. I watched the bottle flip over lazily, the beer droplets catching the sun before the bottle shattered on the road behind us — a million bits of amber crystals lying in the sun.

Leave a comment

Discussion about this podcast