Family Thang Read online

  “A man like me.”

  “Hmmph. She ain’t my momma,” Estafay said. “She oughta tend to her own heathens before she tell me anything.”

  Shirley studied Estafay. “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “No, I don’t. Explain it to me.”

  Estafay moved closer to Robert Earl. “You know, remove the heathen from thy own house before you try to influence a child of God in her own.”

  “What?” Shirley said. “I think you hide behind your so-called religion. ‘Remove the heathen from thy own house.’ Sounds like a sly way of putting my family down. What you think, Robert Earl? Is it an insult, or what?”

  Robert Earl shifted from foot to foot, stuck a finger in his ear and dug furiously. “Uh… you know… uh…” casting nervous glances at Estafay. “Kinda, sorta, if you think about it, in a way it does sound like an insult.”

  “You damn right it does!” Shirley said. “My momma didn’t raise heathens, Estafay! You picked a bad time to tell me she did. A very bad time!” Shirley stood up, her chair falling to the floor. “I strongly suggest you take the shit back!”

  Estafay moved directly behind Robert Earl. “Robert, tell your sister it’s time she leave.”

  Shirley pointed a finger at her. “You tell me! You tell me to leave! You big and bad enough to call my family heathens to my face, you tell me to leave your house!”

  “Robert,” Estafay whispered, “feel free to step in anytime.”

  Robert Earl stared at the hulking figure dressed in navy-blue culottes and realized he had a tough decision to make: attempt to protect his wife’s honor, get his butt whooped and a trip to the hospital via Emergency Medical Transport; or jump out of the way and let Estafay go for what she know, and then have her berate him for weeks for not intervening on her behalf?

  Shirley advanced, fists clenched. Robert Earl, now convinced that weeks of Estafay berating him wouldn’t hurt so much, tried to move out of the way… Estafay moved when he moved.

  “Estafay,” looking at her naked wrist as if a watch was there, “I’m waiting, and I have yet to hear you take back anything. Ten… nine…”

  “Robert, do something!” Estafay pleaded. “Say something!”

  “Take it back, Estafay,” Robert Earl said. “It’ll save us a lot of medical expenses.”

  “…seven… six…”

  “Robert, this is my house!”

  “…four…”

  “I will not be threatened inside my own home!”

  “…two…”

  Just then Ida and Leonard rushed into the kitchen. “Shirley!” Ida shouted. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “I’m fixin’ to put a foot up Estafay’s ass!”

  “Estafay?” Leonard said. “I thought you were upset with Ruth Ann?”

  “You need to leave,” Robert Earl told Leonard. “Now!”

  “He’s with me,” Ida said.

  “Momma, you can stay,” Robert Earl said. “No man who chokes me is welcome in my house. He can wait outside.”

  “Momma,” Shirley said, “Estafay called your children heathens to my face. You want a piece of her sanctified ass?”

  Robert Earl said, “Two against one ain’t fair. Y’all let Estafay call one of her church friends and make it even.”

  “Boy, be quiet!” Ida said. “Shirley, stop talking foolish. You’re a grown woman—act like it!” She frowned at Ida. “As for you, my children might not be a religious bunch, but they’re not heathens.”

  “Mrs. Harris, I didn’t mean any disrespect,” Estafay said.

  “Yes, you did!” Shirley said.

  “Robert Earl,” Ida said, “can’t you control your home? Why are you putting up with this foolishness? Boy, take charge of your home!”

  “I tried to Momma. They—”

  “No, you didn’t!” Shirley said. “You let Estafay talk about your family.”

  “Be quiet, Shirley,” Ida said. “This isn’t your house. What’s gotten into you? If you don’t like what somebody says about you in their house, go home! And what’s this mess you needing a gun?”

  Robert Earl said, “How the whole thing got started.”

  “Why you need a gun, Shirley?” Leonard asked.

  Shirley stared at the floor, then met her mother’s eyes. “Sorry, Momma, I’m popping a cap in Ruth Ann’s slimy ass.”

  “Why?” Ida shouted. “Why? She’s your sister.”

  Tears rolled down Shirley’s face. “Momma, she’s been fooling with my husband.”

  Ida moaned, stumbled to a chair and sat down. She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “Jesus… Jesus! Help me, Jesus!”

  Leonard said, “Shirley, I didn’t know you and Eric were married.”

  “We were going to get married soon.”

  “Are you sure about this? Have you talked to Ruth Ann?”

  “I went to her house and she jumped out the window and ran. I can’t catch her on foot. I need something to shorten the distance.”

  Ida moaned again.

  “She’s your sister,” Leonard said. “Remember?”

  Shirley shook her head. “Leonard, did she remember she was my sister when she slept with my baby’s daddy? Hell no, she didn’t! Ruth Ann doesn’t give a damn about nobody but Ruth Ann. As of today she’s no longer my sister. She’s nothing to me… just another…” She caught herself.

  Ida started crying.

  “Momma, I’m not gonna kill her. I’ll just give her a disability. She broke up my home, Momma.”

  “Jesus, Jesus!” Ida wailed. “I kilt my husband and now these heathens trying to kill each other. Take me, Jesus! I want to be with my husband!”

  “Did you really kill him, Momma?” Robert Earl asked. “If you did you might as well ‘fess up to the authorities.”

  “Shut up, Robert Earl!” Leonard shouted.

  “Excuse me,” Robert Earl said. “I need my money. If she did it, she did it.”

  “Shut up!” Leonard and Shirley yelled.

  “Jesus!” Ida said. “I’m ready! Take me! Right now, Jesus. I’m ready!”

  Leonard massaged Ida’s shoulders. “Shirley, you can’t shoot your sister. You shouldn’t even be thinking of such nonsense. Stop talking about it. You’re upsetting Mother.”

  “I’m sorry, Momma,” Shirley said, tears cascading down her face. “I didn’t intend for you to find out about any of this.”

  “Shirley,” Robert Earl said, “it would be very hard for you to bust a cap in your sister’s butt without Momma finding out about it.”

  Shirley stopped crying and gave him a cold look. “The first time I’ve heard you say anything that made sense.” She started to leave the kitchen; Robert Earl gave her a wide berth.

  Leonard said, “Promise me you’re not doing something stupid. Something you’ll regret, Shirley.”

  Shirley stopped in the doorway. “I’m sorry, Leonard.”

  “Grab her, Robert Earl!” Leonard shouted.

  Shirley turned slowly and stared at Robert Earl, who hadn’t moved an inch. “Don’t be a fool,” she whispered.

  Robert Earl swallowed and said, “Hadn’t planned to be.”

  Shirley walked out of the kitchen, her footsteps creaking against the hardwood floor in the living room, and then they heard the sound of the front door opening and closing.

  “Go catch her, Robert Earl,” Leonard said. “Catch her before she does something we’ll all regret.”

  “You go catch her!” Robert Earl said. “I’ll watch Momma and you run out there and catch her. She’s overweight and out of her mind—someone you give plenty of leaving alone. You heard her. ‘Don’t be a fool!’” Leonard shook his head. Robert Earl ignored him. “Momma, would you like me to get you something? Something to eat? Drink?”

  “Arsenic,” Ida said.

  Robert Earl looked at Estafay. “Honey, do we have any arsenic?”

  Estafay rolled her eyes at him. “I don’t know what it is.”
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  “What is it, Momma?” Robert Earl asked. “If we don’t have it I’ll go get it.”

  Ida muttered something.

  “Say again, Momma, I didn’t hear you.”

  “Poison,” Ida said. “Poison!”

  Chapter 25

  “You’re not going to hurt me, are you, Lester?” Ruth Ann said, regretting the question the second she’d asked it. She, while underneath the bed, was at his mercy. No way could she get out quickly enough if he decided to… Her mind raced with possibilities and stopped at the worst-case scenario: Lester setting the bed afire.

  Lester scooted to the far wall and sat with his back against it. “Is it true?”

  “No! It’s a misunderstanding. A major, misinformed misunderstanding.”

  “All those nights you said you were with your girlfriends, with your folks, you were with him, weren’t you?”

  “No, Lester. No, no, no! It’s not true.”

  “While I was here alone, waiting for you, worried something might’ve happened to you.” He closed his eyes and bounced his head against the wall.

  “Lester, honey, you got it all wrong. It’s a major misguided misunderstanding.”

  “You know what’s stupid? I convinced myself I was lucky to have you. I thought you were doing me a favor because of this scar on my face.”

  “Listen to me, Lester. Sheriff Bledsoe—I mean, we—not we… me… I… I thought…” She forgot what she intended to say. Damn!

  “Why wouldn’t you allow me to touch you months at a time?”

  “Wait a minute,” starting to crawl out. She could think better on her feet. “Let me get out from under here.”

  She was halfway out when Lester said, “I really think you should stay under there. I’m afraid what I might do if you come out.”

  Oh-oh, Ruth Ann thought as she quickly pushed herself back under the bed.

  “Today,” Lester said, “when we were making love—no, when I was making love to you, your mind wasn’t in it. I can’t remember the last time your mind was in it. Your body was there, mind wasn’t. I wonder if you display the same level of enthusiasm with Eric as you do with me. Probably not. Tell me, do you love him?”

  “Lester, please! Don’t be ridiculous! You know I couldn’t care less about that man!”

  “Then it was only about sex. You could have gotten sex from me and saved the motel fare.”

  “What motel fare, Lester? You’re letting your imagination run wild.”

  “Three months ago I found a motel receipt in the trash.”

  “Hello! We’re investigating trash now?”

  “You goddamn right!” Lester shouted. Ruth Ann stiffened. “Don’t bitch-play me! It’s not working this time! My so-called wife gone hours at a time every other night, won’t sleep with me—me, her fucking husband!—comes back all tired and wore out—you’re damn right, I’m deep in trash!”

  The silence that followed seemed more portentous than his outburst.

  Loud music from a passing car out front flowed through the window. Al Green’s Love and Happiness. How ironic, Ruth Ann thought.

  Calmer, Lester said, “Wasn’t I good to you?”

  Ruth Ann didn’t respond; yes or no, she knew, would aggravate him.

  “Busted my ass night after night pulling overtime at that damn paper mill ’cause you said, ‘Lester, I want this. Lester, I want that.’ Like that damn Expedition out there—you didn’t need it and I can’t afford it. All the while you’re fucking a fifty-cent nigger can’t buy you a nine-nine-cent burger.” He shook his head in disgust.

  “Lester, I—”

  “Shut up!” Lester snapped. “You can save the lies.” A long moment he glared at her. Ruth Ann tried to hold his gaze but couldn’t. “Tell the truth, it’s the burn mark, isn’t it?” Ruth Ann shook her head. “You a damn lie!” Lester shouted. “Don’t lie to me! You’ve lied to me enough, don’t you think? Is it the goddamn burn mark on my mouth?”

  Ruth Ann closed her eyes. No way could she answer that.

  “Would you like to know how I got this mark you detest so much?”

  No, I don’t!

  She only wanted to escape from underneath this bed, put on some clothes and seek shelter in another state or country. “If you need to tell it, Lester.”

  “Yes, I need to tell it!” He bounced his head against the wall again and then spoke in a low voice.

  “You had someone call Tina and tell her we were at the motel in Lake Village. No way could she have known where we were. You unlocked the door after I locked it. You made damn sure she caught us and she did. She left me, just like you’d planned… just like you’d schemed. At first I tried to convince myself I’d traded up, replaced my chubby, church-going wife with a hot, sexy eighteen-year-old.

  “It dawned on me I’d tossed a good woman away for a girl. Tina can’t hold a pole to you in bed, but Tina is a woman, a real woman. She listened, really listened, to what I had to say, and she cared. She really and truly cared about me. Me! When someone loves you, truly loves you, you can feel it, you can feel it in your bones.”

  He paused, tears dripping. “I realized I’d made a mistake, and I knew I had to get my wife back. I got down on my knees and begged Tina to come back. She wouldn’t even consider it. ‘A little girl, Lester! A little girl!’ was all she’d say to me. I hurt her.

  “Then she refused to see me at all, stopped taking my calls, told her family to tell me the marriage was over. When the man served me with the divorce papers, I lost it, just couldn’t take it. Somehow I had to win her back, let her know I’d made a stupid mistake.

  “My cousin George, he and I got drunk, pissy drunk, two pints of Bacardi One-Fifty-One. I got him to take me over to Tina’s sister’s house. Nell said Tina wasn’t there, told me to go home and sober up. I don’t remember bringing the gas can with me, but I had it. Told Nell to tell Tina if she didn’t talk to me, I’d drink gas and kill myself.

  “I put the nozzle in my mouth and Nell slammed the door. Sloppy drunk, I still had enough sense not to drink gasoline. I spit it out. I don’t know who started the bullshit I tried to kill myself drinking acid.

  “Nell must’ve called the police because George and I heard sirens. He helped me back into the car and we took off. I was okay then. Heart still broke, but physically I was okay. Hell, George and I were laughing. He stopped in front of my apartment and asked was I going to be all right. Yeah, I told him and picked up his cigarettes and took one out. A damn cigarette!

  “Drunk, I forgot I’d gargled with gasoline minutes before. I put a match to the cigarette and—swoosh!—a big, blue flame! I started running… screaming. I couldn’t see, I couldn’t hear, couldn’t breathe, just felt fire. When I revived I was in the hospital, head all bandaged up, tubes running everywhere.”

  “I was there by your side,” Ruth Ann said. “Remember, Lester? I was there by your side, day and night.”

  “Six weeks later,” Lester said, ignoring her comment, “after the painful surgeries, I realized I was marked for life. Each time I look into a mirror I’m reminded of the fact I betrayed my wife. I deserve this mark.”

  “I’m sorry, Lester.”

  “Sorry for what? My scar or the fact it turns you off so much?”

  Ruth Ann didn’t reply.

  “Which one is it?”

  “For everything, I guess.”

  “You guess! I don’t guess, I know for a fact I’ve ruined my life for a self-centered little girl I never should’ve looked twice at. You don’t give a damn about nobody but yourself. I always knew it, tried to pretend it wasn’t true.”

  He leaned forward and picked up Teddy. Ruth Ann watched, horrified, as he squeezed Teddy’s neck, all the while staring at her. “Is Eric his father?”

  “What? What did you say?”

  “You heard me.”

  “Whose father? What are you talking about?”

  “Shane. Is Eric his father?”

  “No! How can you say such a thing? Shane is
almost eighteen-years-old. You know whatshisface hasn’t been here that long.”

  “Then who is his father?”

  “What’s the matter with you? You know who his father is.”

  “No, I don’t. Tell me.” He squeezed Teddy harder, its head expanding to the pressure.

  “You are, Lester! You know you are!”

  Teddy’s head popped and ejected a plume of cotton. Lester tossed it to the floor. “You think I would allow a man like your father to raise a child of mine? You think I’d let my child run wild, live out in the woods like a damn animal?”

  Ruth Ann’s expression shifted from shock to anger. In all these years, Lester had never talked to her like this, had never mentioned Shane’s name, not once. If he’d doubted Shane’s paternity, why hadn’t he said so a long time ago?

  “No need of looking at me like I’m crazy, Ruth Ann. You know damn well I’m not his father. More shit you threw in my face and expected me to overlook. I did. Now the charade is over.”

  Lester got to his feet. “Part of this is my fault—I never should’ve allowed it to go on this long. This time, however, I’m not hurting myself. Not this time, Ruth Ann. Though I can’t guarantee I won’t hurt you. If I were you I’d be out of here before I come back, which should be in five minutes… or less.” He stormed out, slamming the door behind him.

  Ruth Ann crawled out from under the bed before the sound of his footsteps faded down the hallway. She snatched a pillowcase off a pillow… Where my keys?… She stuffed an assortment of bras, socks and panties into the pillowcase.

  Shit! Keys and cell phone on the cabinet in the kitchen. She was headed to her closet when she heard footsteps in the hallway. Without hesitation she rushed to the window, threw the pillowcase to the ground and dove out behind it.

  Chapter 26

  Sheriff Bledsoe poked his solar plexus with four fingers, hoping to ease the rumbling in his gut. If the commotion held in one spot, he could deal with it. It didn’t. It erupted in his gut, spewed poisonous, burning gas into his chest, throat and sinuses.

  Before Shirley smashed his polygraph machine, the eruptions were sporadic, three or four times a day at the most. Now his innards were churning out large quantities of toxic material by the hour. At this rate, an EPA inspector would soon knock on his door with a citation.