his jeans. He threw up behind a mimosa tree in the woods back of Patty’s. Contemplating his grandmother’s cooking in the grass, he began to wonder if he could ever live his body down. He did not question Theo’s sneering or Freddie’s disgust; he shared both, and couldn’t understand what had made him melt at that moment—his heart bursting like a pump for a wounded creature who a few seconds earlier had been a feast he was eager to gnaw. If he’d found her in the street, his reaction would have been the same, but in the company of and part of the pack who put her there—shit! What was that thing that had moved him to untie her, cover her, Jesus! Cover her! Cover her up! Get her on her feet and out of there? The little mitten hands? The naked male behinds convulsing one after another after another after another? The vegetable odor mixed with a solid booming bass on the other side of the door? As he put his arm around her and led her away, he was still erect, folding only as they stepped together out into the cold. What made him do it? Or rather, who?
But he knew who it was. It was the real Romen who had sabotaged the newly chiseled, dangerous one. The fake Romen, preening over a stranger’s bed, was tricked by the real Romen, who was still in charge here in his own bed, forcing him to hide under a pillow and shed girl tears. The trumpet stuttering in his head.
3
STRANGER
The Settlement is a planet away from One Monarch Street. A little huddle, a bit of sprawl, it has claimed the slope of a mountain and the valley below since World War I. No one uses its name—not the post office or the Census Bureau. The State Troopers know it well, however, and a few people who used to work in the old Relief Office have heard of it, but the new employees of the County Welfare Office have not. From time to time, teachers in District Ten have had students from there, but they don’t use the word “Settlement.” “Rurals” is what these strange unteachable children are labeled. Although they infuriated ordinary students from decent farming families, Guidance Counselors had to choose some socially benign term to identify these children without antagonizing their parents, who might get wind of it. The term proved satisfactory, although no Settlement parent ever appeared to request, permit, observe, consult, or complain. Notes or forms placed in their children’s unsoaped hands were never returned or responded to. Rurals sat in class for a few months, sharing textbooks, borrowing paper and pencils, but purposefully silent as though they were there to test, not acquire, education; to witness, not supply, information. They were quiet in the classroom and kept to themselves, partly out of choice and partly because they were carefully avoided by their peers. Rurals were known as sudden fighters—relentless and vicious. It was common knowledge that sometime in the late fifties a principal managed to locate, then visit, the home of a Rural named Otis Rick. Otis had loosened a child’s eye on the playground and had not understood or obeyed the expelled notice stuck in his shirt pocket. He had come back every day, his victim’s dried blood still on his sleeves. Not much is known of this official visit to demand Otis’s permanent absence—except one vivid detail. When the principal left the Rick property, he had to cover the whole length of the valley on foot because he had been given no time or chance to get back in his car. The DeSoto was towed back to town by State Troopers because nothing could make its owner go back to retrieve it.
Very old people who were young during the Great Depression, and who still call that part of the county “the Settlement,” could describe the history of its inhabitants, if anyone asked. But as their opinions are seldom sought, Settlement people have it the way they want it: unevolved and reviled, they are also tolerated, left alone, and feared. Quite the way it was in
1912
when the jute mill
But he knew who it was. It was the real Romen who had sabotaged the newly chiseled, dangerous one. The fake Romen, preening over a stranger’s bed, was tricked by the real Romen, who was still in charge here in his own bed, forcing him to hide under a pillow and shed girl tears. The trumpet stuttering in his head.
3
STRANGER
The Settlement is a planet away from One Monarch Street. A little huddle, a bit of sprawl, it has claimed the slope of a mountain and the valley below since World War I. No one uses its name—not the post office or the Census Bureau. The State Troopers know it well, however, and a few people who used to work in the old Relief Office have heard of it, but the new employees of the County Welfare Office have not. From time to time, teachers in District Ten have had students from there, but they don’t use the word “Settlement.” “Rurals” is what these strange unteachable children are labeled. Although they infuriated ordinary students from decent farming families, Guidance Counselors had to choose some socially benign term to identify these children without antagonizing their parents, who might get wind of it. The term proved satisfactory, although no Settlement parent ever appeared to request, permit, observe, consult, or complain. Notes or forms placed in their children’s unsoaped hands were never returned or responded to. Rurals sat in class for a few months, sharing textbooks, borrowing paper and pencils, but purposefully silent as though they were there to test, not acquire, education; to witness, not supply, information. They were quiet in the classroom and kept to themselves, partly out of choice and partly because they were carefully avoided by their peers. Rurals were known as sudden fighters—relentless and vicious. It was common knowledge that sometime in the late fifties a principal managed to locate, then visit, the home of a Rural named Otis Rick. Otis had loosened a child’s eye on the playground and had not understood or obeyed the expelled notice stuck in his shirt pocket. He had come back every day, his victim’s dried blood still on his sleeves. Not much is known of this official visit to demand Otis’s permanent absence—except one vivid detail. When the principal left the Rick property, he had to cover the whole length of the valley on foot because he had been given no time or chance to get back in his car. The DeSoto was towed back to town by State Troopers because nothing could make its owner go back to retrieve it.
Very old people who were young during the Great Depression, and who still call that part of the county “the Settlement,” could describe the history of its inhabitants, if anyone asked. But as their opinions are seldom sought, Settlement people have it the way they want it: unevolved and reviled, they are also tolerated, left alone, and feared. Quite the way it was in
1912
when the jute mill
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