Family Thang (42 page)

Now a worldly lifestyle was behind him, in his past. He’d seen the light. He’d had an out-of-body experience. No, he’d experienced something grander than a floating sensation. He’d experienced a…
What did the white folks call it?

He walked farther and then it struck him: an epiphany!
Yes! An epiphany!
He’d stared into the grim reaper’s eyes, two black holes, and--Kabooom!--
an epiphany!

Now he had to find Shirley, beg her forgiveness and, if she was willing, marry her. The right thing to do, the epiphany had told him, shortly after the shotgun blast had stopped ringing in his ears. “Marry Shirley!” Loud and clear.

Of course, he realized, Shirley might still be pissed. No matter. Once he told her about his epiphany--though not the part what led up to it--she would just have to forgive him.

He loved her. She was the only woman he needed, the only person who had stuck by him in good times and bad. Why hadn’t he realized this a long time ago? Amazing how an epiphany can clear the fog shrouding true love.

The sun was a reddish-orange sliver above the horizon when he came up to Robert Earl’s Datsun and a gray Lumina. Three trails, less than a half block apart, led into the woods.
Which one?

Pick the wrong one and he might be lost in the woods a long time. Was he pushing his luck? Eventually Shirley would come home. Wouldn’t it be more romantic if he begged her forgiveness and hand in marriage in a public place?
Yes. A lot safer, too.

Darlene had said Shirley planned to camp in the woods a couple of days, which didn’t make sense because Shirley wasn’t the outdoor type.

He had to make a choice. Go up or go home? “I’m a man,” he said to bols
ter his confidence. “A man who
just experienced an epiphany.” Then he started up Hot Springs Trail.

The canopy of branches above the trail extinguished the light. Total darkness. A tad cooler. He tried to remember what he’d learned in his brief stint in the Cub Scouts some twenty-three-years ago.
Be ready, was it? Don’t go if you d
on’t have to, more than likely.

Mosquitoes attacked his hands, neck and face. One contented itself with simply buzzing around his ear.

He kept walking, hands held out in front to avoid walking into a tree. Suddenly he stopped, certain he’d heard something…something moving, something heavy.

Two nights ago Shirley
told him about a raccoon she’d seen in the backyard rummaging through trash. A raccoon, she’d explained, didn’t come out in daylight and bare its teeth unless it was rabid. A raccoon can easily rip open an aluminum can with its claws. In an attack, a raccoon goes straight for the eyes.

Why the
hell did she tell me all that?

She could have simply said, “I think the raccoon in the backyard has rabies,” and left it there. No, she had to provide an encyclopedia of information on raccoon behavior.

He slapped at the mosquito buzzing around his ear. His right leg started shaking. A long time he stood there thinking about that damned rabid raccoon.

I’m spooking my own ass
, and took a step forward. The noise sounded again. He stopped…
What the
hell is it?

Squinting, he looked right to left and saw nothing but darkness. A mosquito bit him on the exposed flesh where his silk shirt had been torn.

Another noise, like claws sharpened against a rock, sounded directly behind him. He whirled around and the noise stopped.

Something’s out here with me
.

He could feel it watching him, waiting for him to move again so it could match his footsteps…and then it would jump on his back and sink its rabid fangs into his neck and scratch his eyes out with its aluminum-can-ripping claws.

Scriccccccccck!

“Damn this!” and took flight. Just as he was approaching cruising speed, his left foot touched down on a loose rock and he went sliding down the trail, face first.

“Eric,” a woman said, “don’t run. It’s me.”

He lay perfectly still on the ground.
Me who?

“Eric?” The voice came closer: “Eric, I can’t see you. Where are you?”

He placed the voice. “Here…here I am!”

A dark figure approached and knelt beside him. “Eric, are you all right?”

“I’m all right.” He rubbed his knee. “I slipped. Mrs. Harris, what you doing out here?” She smelled of vinegar.

She took a while to respond. “The same thing you’re doing.”

“Body-surfing down rocks?”

She laughed, a pretentious chuckle. “Take my hand, I’ll help you up.”

He couldn’t see it. “Here,” she said. “Right in front of you.”

He yelped, snatching his hand back. “Shit!” Something she was holding, something sharp. Flexing his hand he felt a thick liquid…
Liquid?
…“You cut my damn hand!”

“I’m sorry.” 

“Sorry, my ass! I’m bleeding like a stuck pig! What you got in your hand?”

“A knife.”

“A knife? What you need with a…?”

He experienced the same bone-chilling fear as when the rabid raccoon started tracking him.

“Give me your belt,” she said, casual tone, as if she were asking him to pass the salt and pepper.

He started to say, “I don’t need a tourniquet,” but was struck with another epiphany, this one telling him to run and to run fast. Squeezing his wrist, stanching the blood flow, he tried to get up.

“Don’t!” she said. “You move I’ll cut your throat.”

A bullfrog croaked. Farther away an owl hooted. Death calls, Eric thought. He could take her. He would have to take her. She’d flipped her lid, blew it a mile high. One kick, he thought, one kick to her head.

“Give me your belt,” she repeated.

“I don’t have a belt. Don’t worry, I’ll wrap the sleeve of my shirt around it…if you let me get up.”

“Then give me your socks.”

Her head was right there; he couldn’t quite see it but from where her voice came it was definitely within kicking range.

One good kick
…“My socks are dirty. I’ll use my sleeve. It’s already torn. Let me up and I’ll do it myself.”

“You got the wrong idea. Give me your socks. I’m not asking you, I’m telling you.”

“You want the socks, you can have the damn socks.” He bent forward and fumbled with the string on his tennis shoe.

“Hurry up, please.”

“Damn! I’m working with one hand here. Maybe if I could get a little help.” The smell of vinegar grew stronger, and he kicked out as hard as he could. By the feel of it, he’d planted one to her stomach. He sprang to his feet and hurried to the figure on the ground gasping for air.

“Who got the wrong idea now?” Two more kicks. “Here are my socks! Shoes, too!” Another kick, this one with the ball of his foot, and she yelled in pain. “Cut me, will ya!” She started crawling away. “You running now, ain’t ya?”

He let her get away a bit before starting after her. No need to hurry, he now had the upper hand.

Later he would kick himself for not running away. He most certainly could have.

She was hurt, sucking air, retreating. One more kick; he just had to deliver one more kick to let her know he wasn’t someone to be played with.

His right leg reared back, posed to punt her ass at least ten yards, he heard an explosion and saw a bluish-white flame shoot straight up. He didn’t need an epiphany to tell him what it was.

Heifer has a gun!

She got to her feet, wheezing and coughing.

“You still want my socks? You can have em!”

“Get…heh heh heh…on…heh heh heh…the…heh heh heh…ground!” 

Eric sat down where he stood. “Is this regarding the ten I owe you? I swear I’ll pay you when I get it. I don’t have it now. I didn’t forget I owe you.” She didn’t respond. “Why you doing this to me? We’re almost family, you know, sort of. I’ve always considered you as family. Really!”

“The socks, please!”

Eric took off his shoes and socks and threw the socks at her.

“The pants and underwear, please!”

“What? What for? Why? Hell no! I’m not out here naked. You crazy!”

“Give them to me or die with them on!” Her tone finally shifted, enraged and impatient.

He wriggled out of his Levis and Fruit of the Loom and tossed them to her. Should he scream?
Beg? Cry? Shit? And what the hell she wants with my underwear?

“Lie on your stomach,” she ordered, “and spread your arms out!”

What?
He could already feel pinecones prickling his buttocks. “You cut me! I’m bleeding! Why you doing this to me? Why? I never did anything to you!”

“Shut up! Do what I tell you and you might live.”

Might, he thought, as he lay face down on the ground and spread his arms.
Might?

She stepped near. “Don’t be a fool!” A shoe poked his kidney. “One hand at a time, put your hands behind your back.” He felt something hard and cold at his neck. “Do you understand?”

Covering his head with both hands: “Uh-huh.”

“Not your head! On your back!” He moved his hands to his back and felt a knee weighting his fingers. “Don’t you dare move!”

With his socks or underwear, he couldn’t tell which, she wrapped his wrists together. Just then, to make matters worse, he felt something crawling in his pubic. She tied his feet together with his pants, he figured, by the thickness of the material.

Semi-naked, hand lacerated, hog-tied with his own clothes, his favorite silk shirt almost torn to shreds, a nutty witch with a gun and her knee on his fingers and a poisonous bug hatching poisonous baby bugs in his privacy, Eric started crying, hysterically.

“Sss…ssu
mthin…ssummthing…crawling…in…
my…prrrr…privacy!”

She grabbed his hair and jerked his head back. “Serves you right!” Gave his head another jerk and hissed, “You filthy whore!”

Her hand, guided by sharp fingernails, dug underneath his waist, working toward his pubic.

“There it is,” she said, and instead of pulling whatever it was off, she pressed it against his skin with a fingernail.

Eric gritted his teeth to stifle a scream.

“It’s dead,” and grabbed his penis and squeezed extremely hard. “You’re not the big man you think you are, are you?”

She released him and stood up. “Get on your feet!”

Eric closed his eyes and tried to remember a prayer. Would he be blessed with two epiphanies in one day?
One more, Lord, please!