aside so that I can bring salvation into your home and your heart.”
“Suit yourself, preacherman, but you’ll have to wait until Marjorie’s show is over. It’s one of those damn fool soap operas, and she’s stucked on it tighter ‘n a seedtick on a mule’s ass.”
To Brother Verber’s dismay, the door opened all the way and he was ushered inside, warned again to stay real quiet, and nudged across the room to be plopped on a lumpy sofa. On a recliner lay a bristly white sow with moist pink eyes and a drooly snout, and damned if she wasn’t staring attentively at a television set. He was so bewildered that he mutely accepted a jar filled with a clear liquid and went so far as to automatically raise it to his lips. The first sip nearly jolted him out of his daze, but it didn’t. The second sip went down more smoothly, Before too long, the jar was in need of a refill.
Brother Verber wasn’t off and running down the road he’d described to Raz, but he was well on his way at a brisk clip.
I scrunched as far as I could against the window and stared down at the endless expanse of flat, gray clouds, trying to convince myself I was traveling in an airplane rather than a time machine. We were moving forward in space, not backward along a continuum that ended in an elegant apartment (fv rms, ter, all mod con, full sec). I was going to Manhattan to rescue my mother from whatever disaster she’d brought upon herself, I was not going home. I’d done that when I walked out of the courthouse and hailed a cab for the airport.
I strained to believe the lecture I was giving myself but my ex’s face kept popping up and breaking my concentration. For the record, he wasn’t bad-looking if you like lounge lizards only one generation removed from pastel polyester pantsuits, family outings to discount stores, and forced joviality around the gas grill in a New Jersey backyard. The facade had begun to erode early in the game (we’re talking months, not years), but I’d persevered until I could dredge up the courage to confront myself with my lack of judgment, lack of perspicuity, and lack of anything remotely akin to common sense. Admitting it to Ruby Bee had been even more painful, although for once in her life, she didn’t point out that she’d told me so. Estelle did it for her, and at length.
I took out my checkbook and glumly noted the damage I’d done with the airline ticket. The pathetic figure, coupled with the possibility I’d be unemployed when I returned to Maggody, distracted me but did not enhance my spirits. Nor did the three-hundred-pound salesman from Toledo, who in theory was sitting in the aisle seat but in truth had oozed over into the adjoining one, and was now frowning as he read the bottom line in my checkbook.
“You got a place to stay tonight, sweetie?” he asked wheezily. “I’d hate to see a pretty little thing like you stay in a dirty hotel with a bunch of pimps and whores. I’m staying at the Hilton, myself, and I sure could stand to squeeze you in with me.”
“That’s real nice of you, but I’m hoping to get my mother out on bail. Either way, I can stay in her room.”
“Get your mother out on bail?”
“Murder,” I said levelly. “I’m not sure if I have enough money. If she just hadn’t gone hog wild and tried to blast her way through all those cops, she might have gotten off cheaply. But she’s a real card, my mama, especially when she’s off her medication. Say, maybe you could loan me a few hundred bucks, and come along down to the jail to meet her? Then we all could go back to your room at the Hilton and get to know each other better. Mama’s scrawny, but she’s feisty. You can ask anybody in town, ‘cause she’s taken on most of ‘em and left ‘em for dead by daybreak.”
He grabbed the plastic card from the seat pocket and began to memorize the location of all the emergency exits. I resumed my study of the blanket of clouds, wishing I were in my bed with a
“Suit yourself, preacherman, but you’ll have to wait until Marjorie’s show is over. It’s one of those damn fool soap operas, and she’s stucked on it tighter ‘n a seedtick on a mule’s ass.”
To Brother Verber’s dismay, the door opened all the way and he was ushered inside, warned again to stay real quiet, and nudged across the room to be plopped on a lumpy sofa. On a recliner lay a bristly white sow with moist pink eyes and a drooly snout, and damned if she wasn’t staring attentively at a television set. He was so bewildered that he mutely accepted a jar filled with a clear liquid and went so far as to automatically raise it to his lips. The first sip nearly jolted him out of his daze, but it didn’t. The second sip went down more smoothly, Before too long, the jar was in need of a refill.
Brother Verber wasn’t off and running down the road he’d described to Raz, but he was well on his way at a brisk clip.
I scrunched as far as I could against the window and stared down at the endless expanse of flat, gray clouds, trying to convince myself I was traveling in an airplane rather than a time machine. We were moving forward in space, not backward along a continuum that ended in an elegant apartment (fv rms, ter, all mod con, full sec). I was going to Manhattan to rescue my mother from whatever disaster she’d brought upon herself, I was not going home. I’d done that when I walked out of the courthouse and hailed a cab for the airport.
I strained to believe the lecture I was giving myself but my ex’s face kept popping up and breaking my concentration. For the record, he wasn’t bad-looking if you like lounge lizards only one generation removed from pastel polyester pantsuits, family outings to discount stores, and forced joviality around the gas grill in a New Jersey backyard. The facade had begun to erode early in the game (we’re talking months, not years), but I’d persevered until I could dredge up the courage to confront myself with my lack of judgment, lack of perspicuity, and lack of anything remotely akin to common sense. Admitting it to Ruby Bee had been even more painful, although for once in her life, she didn’t point out that she’d told me so. Estelle did it for her, and at length.
I took out my checkbook and glumly noted the damage I’d done with the airline ticket. The pathetic figure, coupled with the possibility I’d be unemployed when I returned to Maggody, distracted me but did not enhance my spirits. Nor did the three-hundred-pound salesman from Toledo, who in theory was sitting in the aisle seat but in truth had oozed over into the adjoining one, and was now frowning as he read the bottom line in my checkbook.
“You got a place to stay tonight, sweetie?” he asked wheezily. “I’d hate to see a pretty little thing like you stay in a dirty hotel with a bunch of pimps and whores. I’m staying at the Hilton, myself, and I sure could stand to squeeze you in with me.”
“That’s real nice of you, but I’m hoping to get my mother out on bail. Either way, I can stay in her room.”
“Get your mother out on bail?”
“Murder,” I said levelly. “I’m not sure if I have enough money. If she just hadn’t gone hog wild and tried to blast her way through all those cops, she might have gotten off cheaply. But she’s a real card, my mama, especially when she’s off her medication. Say, maybe you could loan me a few hundred bucks, and come along down to the jail to meet her? Then we all could go back to your room at the Hilton and get to know each other better. Mama’s scrawny, but she’s feisty. You can ask anybody in town, ‘cause she’s taken on most of ‘em and left ‘em for dead by daybreak.”
He grabbed the plastic card from the seat pocket and began to memorize the location of all the emergency exits. I resumed my study of the blanket of clouds, wishing I were in my bed with a
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