Shiner
I heard Uncle Jasper’s tractor rattle
to life behind the house; every shudder was amplified by the tin roofed shed he
stored it. It wasn’t a monster like you’d see at large farming operations
around the valley and in the flatlands. No, it was just an old John Deere that
Paw-Paw used to putter around the field and haul supplies down to the family
garden. The tractor had been part of the house and the land since before I was
born, and was the legacy given to my uncle, Jasper, and my paw, Calvin. I
suppose it was partly mine now that my paw had passed after coming back from
Viet Nam, a man changed my maw would say, and Jasper had no sons of his own.
The garden was as much a legacy
as the tractor, and Jasper out of obligation or just a chance to rekindle
memories of Paw-Paw worked it religiously every weekend despite putting in a
hard week managing a roofing crew. This time of year, the mornings heated up
quick, and since the pickings were mostly roots like carrots and potatoes, my
uncle would work it only as long as tolerated. That would be close to noon and would
give him the afternoon to enjoy some fishing.
If it were up to me, I would
probably let the roots grow a little more and go directly to the fishing. Jasper
was a man of deep work ethic, something sorely needed to work roofing across
three counties under a beating sun with a crew that rather drink a Pabst than
lay a sheet of tarpaper. This was the first summer my uncle brought me along,
and it wasn’t to lollygag. I had to put in my hours just like the other men,
but we discovered quick that I wasn’t cut out for the roof. I was helping down
at the big house adjacent to our property that was owned by The Colonel. That’s when I discovered my
notable fear of heights, and from then on out I was grounded. I was the gopher
and errand boy.
I didn’t look forward to a beer like
the other guys, I hadn’t acquired the taste, but I sure did enjoy my weekends.
I’d help in the garden if asked, but this weekend Uncle Jasper said I could go
to the State Fair with my pal, Easy. We’d made arrangements with The Colonel for a ride and I was waiting
on Easy to come skittering down from his house up on the hill. Normally, he’d
be down for breakfast before even the first egg was cracked. He sure enjoyed
the scrapple. I wasn’t much a fan, but Jasper would get it from one of his
roofing suppliers who came down from Pittsburgh.
That old tractor puttered around
the bend and towards the front of house, and I could see my uncle wave me up. I
jumped off the porch and scurried up the hill quick.
“Ray, you done good this week. I
wanted you to know that, just as hard as the rest of the men. You got your
money for working?” I nodded. “Well, here’s another five so you can have a
little extra at the Fair.”
My eyes grew to saucers at the
additional money. I knew that Jasper paid himself last on the jobs, and sometimes
there wasn’t a lot left over. “Thank you, thank you,” I said, exasperated.
“And don’t let Easy spend it all
on RC Cola.”
I laughed.
“I won’t be spending any on him
if he don’t show up soon.”
“I noticed that.” Jasper said,
looking at his own watch. “You better run and fetch him before The Colonel shows.”
I did as he said, turned tail and
ran up the hill. Halfway to the tracks I stopped and yelled back, “Thank you,
Jasper.”
***
Easy lived with his paw in a
cabin up the hill, across the tracks that run coal from the mines. The senior
Cook was named Everett like his son, but folks called him Buddy, though I
rarely ever talked to him and when I did it was ‘Mister Cook.’ While people
might call him Buddy to his face, no one I knew really considered him one. He
was a drunk, and a mean one at that. Easy said it was due to his back, that his
paw had been in an accident in the mines. He’d been on disability ever since.
If you didn’t know where the
Cook’s cabin was, it was easy to overlook as the forest around it creeped so
close that you couldn’t tell where the forest ended the cabin began. I had only
been a few times, but Easy had worn a regular trail down to the tracks and
back. He really does like his scrapple in the morning.
As I approached the cabin, I
could hear Buddy Cook hollering to the heavens. Or loud enough to shake the
trees.
“Gawd dammit, boy! Open the door
before I bust it to splinters. Do it now, Junior, or I’m gonna give you a
whoopin’ you’d not soon forget.”
It was only just passed eight
o’clock, and Easy’s paw sounded like he was already down the bottle. I could
hear him pounding on the hard wood of the door as Creedence cranked on the
player inside. The harder his paw pounded, the louder the music got.
“Boy…” I heard him give a final
warning. The feeling I felt was like the time I was up on The Colonel’s roof. The sky began to spin, and my stomach twisted
to knots. Pure fear, but there was something else. I was more afraid for Easy.
Without letting another word
thunder out of the elder Cook’s mouth, I shambled across the dilapidated porch
and through the unlocked door. Unexpected, Buddy turned with a start.
“What in blazin’ Hell’re you doin’
here, boy?”
I wasn’t sure what to say, but I
stood as firm as a fourteen-year-old could — though I suspect fear had ample to
do with my rigidity — towards a grown man fueled with liquor and hate. Before I
could formulate a response, Creedence cut out, and Easy opened the door,
pushing passed his paw. He grabbed my arm and pulled me along out the door.
We were nearly to the tracks
before we stopped to catch our breath. That was when I saw Easy straight on,
and what Buddy had done to his face.
“Lordy, look’t that.” I was
tempted to reach out and touch his eye, but Easy lifted trembling fingers to
the purple blossom. He winced.
“That’s some shiner. Did your paw
do that?”
Shame washed across his face, and
Easy nodded. It wasn’t the first mark I’d seen on Easy, but never right there
in your face — well his face.
“Buddy didn’t sleep last night.” He said his father’s name with
contempt, “Spent it in his chair drinking beer, and he must have found a bottle
of somethin’ else, too. Liquor makes him ‘specially mean. Like stirring up a
hornet’s nest.”
Easy touched his blackening eye
again, wincing while a tear snaked out.
“He cornered me on my way out.
Hit me with his own stinger.” I could see Easy turning red, “I thought I could
hop out the window, but the old bastard nailed it shut. The Hell, Ray. I was
about to break out the glass when you came riding in on your horse.”
Easy wrapped his arms around me,
and gave me a hug. “You saved me, Ray. That’s the honest truth.”
“You’d done the same, Easy.”
“That Jasper ain’t no sumbitch.
But we got to watch each other’s back, brother.”
We clasped hands in a shake, and
I noticed my watch.
“Oh, shit,” I exclaimed. “We
better haul down to The Colonel’s lest
we gonna to miss our ride to the Fair.”
And we both cantered down Easy’s
trail as fast as our legs could take us.
***
The Colonel drove an old, green
1949 Ford pickup that looked as good as the day he bought it thirty years ago,
or so he claimed. Not a spot of rust or even a chip of paint, and the only variance
was a new logo for Texaco. I don’t know if The Colonel served in an actual war,
but everyone called him that being a man of stature around valley. He had made
his money in the gas station business, owning almost a dozen around southern
West Virginia. And now he was a Texaco man, through and through. And the money
allowed him to buy the big house a half-mile down the river from my uncle, both
properties shared the same sprawling bank that hugged the Greenbrier, and
luckily for Easy and me, the same access road. Just as we came across the
tracks, here came The Colonel and his green pickup.
The rutted gravel road crunched
beneath the braking tires of the Ford, and The Colonel leaned out the already
open window. As pristine as the truck looked, it never came with A/C.
“Well, I’d ‘bout given up on you
two. You still wantin’ to see the Fair?”
We both shook our heads in
agreement, “Sure do, sir.”
With a big grin, and most of his
teeth, “Well, you better hop in back so we can be off.”
It took about forty minutes by
truck, though it was a bumpy ride to the Fair.
If you have been to a State Fair,
and maybe not all State Fairs are the same, you would know that the Fair is one
part farming, with farmers showing off their cows, hogs, sheep, and a goat or
two. And don’t forget produce of extraordinary size. I had once seen a pumpkin
bigger than my Aunt Bertie who hadn’t moved from her recliner in three years.
Then there were the crafts. Country artisans who built and made everything from
wind chimes, to mail boxes to embroidered quilts. For kids, the animals had a
lot of interests, but it was the carny side that interested Easy and me.
With the fifteen bucks Uncle
Jasper gave me burning a hole in my pocket, I bought us a couple hotdogs each
and pops to drink. Easy, missing out on eggs and scrapple this morning, scarfed
down his dogs in a couple bites. And I put short order to my own before Easy got
any ideas. The sun was already heating up the Fair, and the cool RC colas we
held beaded on the glass bottle with perspiration. With the heat, so far, I
knew we’d be needing another bottle of pop before the day was done.
“So, what to do first?” Easy
asked.
I thumbed behind us, “I don’t
know, I saw they had a shootin’ gallery.” I placed a hand on my belly, “And I
want to do the tilt-a-whirl, but maybe wait ‘til my food has set a while.”
“That’s probably a good idea,” Easy
laughed.
We turned ourselves back towards
the shooting gallery when I went headfirst into Woodrell Daniels’ chest. He
must have had the same idea about hotdogs as his white t-shirt was now a canvas
of smashed hotdog and mustard, with a flourish of ketchup. I stepped back
wiping the remains from my face, when I acknowledged Woodrell, who was with his
brother Donnie Ray.
My brain and my mouth
disconnected for a moment and all I could think about is that I ran into
“Boner” Daniels. Though, no one was supposed to call him that, and hadn’t since
he’d sprung up to the size of an oak. That boy was every coaches dream. But
that’s all I could think of when I saw his reddening face, and I’m sure my
smirk didn’t help at all. In the moment, I just remember being told how
Woodrell was a fan of singer Woody Guthrie and when he was twelve he told
everyone to call him Woody. Only the older kids, then, thought it was funny to
call him “Boner” instead. And for a while it stuck.
So, in that disconnect the words
tumbled out, “Oh, my gawd. I’m so sorry, Boner!”
As soon as the name left my lips,
I knew what I had done. All I could do is stand in shock as the six-foot-whatever
all-star turned a shade of red I didn’t know was possible. He looked like a
thermometer about to burst.
I didn’t see the fist.
I fell back before I even knew
Woodrell clocked me, scraping my elbows on the pea-stone covered causeway. Immediately,
spectators circled, making a wall around Woodrell and me. A tiny colosseum
where I was already fallen.
“I didn’t mean nothing,” I
pleaded from my backside, looking up the Goliath to my David.
“Don’t you touch him” I heard Easy
call out from behind.
Woodrell snickered.
“What you going to do about it?” Came
another voice came from behind. I recognized it as Donnie Ray, Woodrell’s
younger brother. I glanced back and saw he had Easy by the arms, all tangled up
behind and twisted in a hold of some kind. Easy attempted pull out, but with
little success.
Donnie didn’t have Woodrell’s oaken
stature. No, he was lankier with hard sharp features. If you didn’t know them,
you’d never guess they were brothers, much less related, save for their mean
disposition. My father called them Irish twins once because they were only ten
months apart. Being younger of the two, Donnie had never seen their father, who
was sent up to Moundsville and sat in the chair for killing his best friend
Tupper Laughton. I’ve been told that Tupper was a lanky fellow himself.
I figured my best option was to
stay put and not move. Woodrell was three years older and a hundred pounds
heavier, and god knows how much taller. He wrapped his thick hands around my
shirt collar, deciding he didn’t like my
option. Woodrell lifted me off the ground, and there was little I could do to
resist.
Once he had me to my feet, Woodrell
looked confused. I could tell he was attempting to form words, but all that
blood squeezed into his radish head wasn’t sending the right transmissions, and
all I got was the heat huffing from his gaping mouth.
“I got money,” I blurted, not
thinking again.
Woodrell’s face dropped a shade,
his grip lessened, and maybe a thought was knocking around after all. But then
his left fist tightened on my shirt collar and he drew back his right. He
actually started to grin.
“I’ll pound you, and take the
money. How about that?”
I heard Donnie Ray grunt, and then
saw Easy break through the wall of spectators. The younger brother was on his
knees, clutching his heritage.
Easy Cook hit Woodrell Daniels
like a cattle rod, pure force hammered from a piston. Unstoppable. They toppled
to the ground, Woodrell shocked, unable to comprehend what had happened, as
Easy flailed his fist with mindless accuracy. It was all the larger boy could
do to protect his face.
I was on my feet, and Donnie Ray
was still on his knees contemplating his fatherhood. I could see that Easy was
nowhere near ready to stop, but it had to stop. I grabbed at his arm, and yanked
him off Woodrell.
Easy’s eyes were filled with rage
as he stared up at me, but I held my gaze and he snapped to, and clambered to
his feet as well. I gave him another tug and we ran, breaking through the human
arena. I glanced back only for a moment to make sure that the “king of the
field” was still moving, and I saw him press his meaty hands against his bloodied
face. Seeing he was alright, I urged
my legs to keep moving, my hand still tethered to Easy.
***
Deciding it wasn’t the best idea
to hang around the Fair, we found The
Colonel’s old Ford, leaving a note to say we were going to walk home up the
tracks. It’d take us all afternoon, and I’m sure we would be thinking about
those cold RC bottles before the afternoon was over.
“What made you do that?” I asked.
We hadn’t really spoke or even
stopped to think about what consequence our run in with Woodrell might have.
He shook his head uncommittedly.
“I don’t know. I mean, I knew
that I wanted to stop him from pounding you. I couldn’t let him hurt you over some
stupid accident.”
“Yeah, but you could… I don’t
know… just knocked him down. You hurt
him.”
He nodded.
“I wanted to hurt him.”
I knew then that it wasn’t
Woodrell he was hitting. All those strikes were hitting someone else.
I hugged him. He pushed me off
and looked me in the face. And laughed.
“What?”
“You got a shiner too. We’re
brothers.”
With all the adrenaline, and the
nonstop flight, I hadn’t even considered the pain gnawing under my left eye. I
didn’t dare to touch it. And a queer notion came to mind.
“Yeah, the Shiner Brothers.”
“Maybe, we should go on the road?
Be bigger than Woody Guthrie.”
“You know how to play guitar?” I
asked, “’cause I can’t sing a lick.”
We laughed. If we’re lucky we’d get
home by supper.
I wonder what Uncle Jasper will
think about the adventures of the Shiner
Brothers?
-End-
Bio Nestled in the
foothills of West Virginia, Ron Earl Phillips lives with his wife, a daughter,
a dog named Freya, and one too many cats. He is the publisher and managing
editor of Shotgun Honey, an online crime flash fiction magazine and small
press. Outside of a mundane day job and building a crime fiction empire, he has
been known to write on occasions. This was one of those occasions.
There was an old man from Nantucket...
ReplyDeleteShiner -- Good one!
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