Pistol Fanny's Hank & Delilah (36 page)

Curly took off in the church, flying around like a pigeon caught indoors. Hank staggered in behind him, the door slamming shut, the light fading with it. With the crashing of the door, all heads turned his way, and then each body went in a different direction. Hank stood still, like a flower on a breezeless day. He could only watch. He watched as one pew became two, then three, and then one again. He thought half of his body was leaning back, all because the pulpit had tilted toward him. Why else would he be standing the way he was? But he was still standing straight as a board.

Tommy ran around stuttering, shouting at the boll weevils to go away. They were attacking him, that evil flower of the south. Those monsters were invading, corrupting his core as he bounced from wall to wall, nowhere to escape their devil bites. They were whispering secrets he didn’t want to know. Straight from the graves below them, boll weevils were the telephones of the underworld.

Dylan crouched behind a pew, talking to a ghost beside him. “Sergeant Pepper,” he would whisper. They were in a gun battle together. He would occasionally lift his arm and—
pew, pew, pew—
shoot back at the perpetrators, those Godforsaken outlaws. He would then turn his face to Sergeant Pepper and say, “We almost got ’em, Pepper, almost.”

Jesse sat in a corner, his legs to his chest, wheezing. He continued to shout about all those sugar pills that were marching toward him, pitchforks, ropes, and flames in their airy hands. Jesse’s finger pointed unsteadily, trembling along with the rest of his body. Those animated pills were going to burn his throat, he screeched and gasped. “I am gluttonous for consuming too many of their kind! And gluttony is a sin if there ever was one.”

Stroke continued to have a conversation with elves while he painted the walls with his magical paintbrush. He wanted it colorful, and he wanted to meet that tiny little leprechaun at the end of the rainbow. The painting he drew promised to lead him to those big rock-candy mountains.

Curly, doubled over, laughed at nothing remotely funny, weeing on himself as he continued the fun for one. He claimed that he was watching a humorous picture show. Nilla, the thirties killa’, was running after him, but she couldn’t catch him. No suh, no way, Curly Izza Cootie was too quick for any dame. He was a monkey with fourteen arms, a bug with a hundred legs, and a nuisance with four heads of wild curly hair.

Hank started to laugh, but he didn’t know why. As he laughed, he felt his body catch fire. He was that burning bush. He had to stop the flames. Heaven Almighty! He felt like he was scorching at one hundred and fifty degrees. He flung himself to the floor, splinters piercing his skin, rocking back and forth, trying to kill the misery. He was burning way too fast on those highways she traveled.

Hank thought he saw a cool river trickling down, rushing over brown stone and glass-like pebbles. He rolled all the way to it, splashing and thanking Jesus for big favors. He rested on the wooden floor then, a big grin on his face, while a cool breeze passed over him.

As he rested in the water, he watched the day REO and Pilgrim were killed. He watched as the water turned into blood. He looked to his left and there was REO, smoking a cigarette next to him in the water. He told him something about stars and a ticket. Pilgrim said something about his family. Then he was back to clean water again.

The door to the church opened and all the guys screamed something different about the light: “I see it!” “I need it for my painting!” “Hey, I can’t see my movie!” “Don’t shoot the light, Pepper!” “Melt the pills, melt”—big wheeze —“the pills!” “Ge-Ge-Get Boll Weevils!”

Melody walked in and shook her head. “Good Lord. What happened to you boys?” She stopped when she was standing over Hank. He was grinning up at her. “You okay, Hank?”

“Yes, um, ma’am. I think we might have had a bad batch of root beer. Oh look, Spell’s missing eye! I get a dollar! Hey, Melody, where is your sister? That purty little woman of mine?”

Hank saw her then, as clear as day. He pointed at her, told her how miserable she was making him, but he loved her regardless. She was sitting outside in the fields, on a yellow and purple patchwork quilt. Her lips were pink and her head thrown back in laughter; that laugh was hard rock candy gashing through his beating heart.

She had a big hat on her head. She was bathing in the honey-colored sun. Her stomach was round, another watermelon. Thin ankles, though. Hank was terrified of those bursting ankles. Delilah was digging her feet into the dry soil. The edge of her white dress and her toes were stained brown.

“Hey, Hank,” she said so pretty and soft like, “your daddy, he always wanted to be a preacher?”

Hank reached out and rubbed the watermelon for nectar luck. “Well, uh, no ma’am. You see, my daddy, he was a bad boy. A rebel. After June-bug gotta hold of him, though, he straightened up real quick. He runs when she calls his name. He became a preacher because he said God told him she was such a blessing, he should always be thankful.”

“You seemed to do the opposite, Hank. You started out good, but a woman has turned you inside out. You sure are funny, Mississippi man.”

“Good or bad, we all do the same thing when we find the woman we love the most. We all come a-runnin’ when they call our names. Call my name, Delilah.”

“Oh, Hank…”

“See, I’m already here, darlin’!”

Hank was happy because the sugar wasn’t stopping and he was making her laugh.
Disappear, little scowl lines, disappear
, he was chanting.

“Look!” Curly pointed. “It’s them again. All those beautiful birdies, wet and in white. Oh, and there are little girls, too. Go ahead and play, girlies, go on. You’re free now, little angels. Ladies, please stay with us. Yes, keep on singing that purty little song. Oh, lift that hem a little higher. A little higher. Uh, huh, just right.”

Hank sat up on his elbows, blinked his eyes. He saw them now, too. He looked around the room. Melody was staring down at him. The guys all stared toward the door, where those women filed in, all wet and in white. They were humming, singing together a haunting lullaby. They rocked their hips back and forth, their bodies glistening with water droplets. The water slid down their sleek legs, burst when the drop hit the floor. They’d stop for just a moment to slap their hips and stomp.

Hank’s head fell to the floor. He watched as their dirty bare feet filled the church.

Slap, stomp. Hank was in church; everyone dressed up for Sunday mass. Boots and women’s heels, slacks and pretty flowered dresses. Slap, stomp. Lewd women running their fingers through those boys’ hair. Slap, stomp. Resist sin, give thanks, and poke your husband’s eye out with a pitchfork if he roams. Oh, look, its Spell’s eye. Slap, stomp.

“Melody, how’s my Louisiana girl?” Hank said, his voice not really sounding like his own, floating right out the door to that field full of white snow on the tan ground.

“Oh, you know.” She grinned. “She’s about to go off the deep end.”

“That’s nice. Real nice. You see, we had to drive all the way here, all the way to the end of the road. I have pickles and root beer in the van for my darlin’. And those old-time candies she loves. But don’t give her the root beer. I think it’s bad. Oh, but it was so good. The best thing I ever tasted, apart from your sister, you see.” Hank sighed. “Why did she come here?”

Melody kneeled beside him and whispered in his ear, “She needed some remindin’ is all.”

“Can you please knock that catfish away from my foot? Thanks. She didn’t marry that guy, did she? God, please tell me she didn’t. If she did, I hate to say this in church, when there are so many good folks around, but I’m going to kill him and then walk away from her. It’s suicide, you see? If I walk away from her, it’ll kill me. I won’t be able to breathe anymore. Asphyxiation. Did you really just say the baby ain’t been sleepin’? That’s funny, because I bet that watermelon is keeping that poor Louise Anna girl up all night. Her poor ankles.”

“Hank, I think you need to take a little nap and then get out of here. For once, listen to somebody,” Melody pleaded, but it was strange, because it wasn’t an actual plea—more like a demand. But it seemed like the same thing for some reason. Maybe she was trying, but she couldn’t get it across.

“I’ll be damned if I do. I’m not leaving here without seeing her. I’m going to take her home with me, and I’m going to marry her. I love your sister, Melody. I love her more than she could ever know. If she were here, I’d sing the sunshine song to her to prove it. Here’s Spell’s eye, you can have the reward. I have enough pickles.”

“Which sister to do you love, Hank?” Melody whispered.

Hank stared his glossy eyes into hers. She twitched. “Delilah Mae.”

“What about the other one?”

“I just want to save her. I’ve been trying to say that all along, but I think it keeps coming out wrong. All wrong. I’m a man. Sometimes we’re just so simple, we’re complicated. Jo really hates me, and now I’m thinking she really doesn’t hate me, she hates complicated. Well, we finally have something in common. Where is your sister?” Hank rocked his way to his knees, leaning over the pew. When the room stood still for a moment, he rose to his feet, staggering a bit. “I have to see her. Is she here?”

“Oh, she’s here all right. Thank God for a spell. If you were to see…”

Hank covered his ears. He thought she was shouting. Just like one of those women who were born again and full of the spirit do. But she had actually whispered it. When her lips stopped moving, he cleared his throat. “That’s the same thing Spell said. He kept saying, you see…and I think he might have said I wish I could see…”

Hank wobbled to the door, opening it, shining light in the darkness. He covered his eyes with one hand, reaching out to move the sun from his eyes with the other.
Just keep on movin’, you old sun
, he kept repeating, trying to slide it away with the force of a finger.

A strong wind breezed past, moving all the cotton from left to right. Gnats and pieces of drifting cotton and loose earth danced in the shadow of the glowing light, creating a spectacular show of their freedom.

Stronger gusts of wind blew, and he knew she was coming for him. She appeared out of the cotton fields, in all white, a soft dress draping her shoulders. Hank imagined her stepping right out of a cotton plant, so beautiful, like an angel of the warmest breezes. A slit ran from her thigh down to the ground. Had it caught on one of the bushes and tore? Her feet were bare, stained with dirt, as she made her way toward him. Her leg was bleeding, tainting her pure white dress crimson.

The wind blew against her, around her, the world swayed behind her, back and forth, forth and back, rustling, clack, clack, clack, fluttering, a-whistling and a-crying.

Hank took a step down, held on to the church for support. She twitched, but he wasn’t sure if he recognized this woman. She was different; voluptuous, her breasts full, her hips wider, her stomach rounder. Did she have Delilah’s face? A different body? One more akin to Pistollette’s? Hank’s mind took off—they made their outfits to fit this one’s body style—then it came to a complete halt as she moved in even closer.

Heaven help the world, there was no controlling this woman. The storm clouds in her eyes. Hank looked up. Heat lightning split the sky. Clouds started to move quick and fast, gathering in big patches, white and black, rolling straight over the blue sky.

The wind started to pick up, whistling and crying, twisting and turning. It was all behind her, step, step, storm’s coming, storm’s coming, storm is chasing behind her, step, step.

Hank held on even tighter. Her eyes were brighter than the greenest of fields, as sweet as the honey straight from the comb, as blue as the iciest of oceans. The rings were missing. They had gathered, moved out, and were out of control.

She turned her eyes down. A small tornado started to kick up dust where she stared. She smiled just a little. “Hello, Hank Huckleberry Rivers. Do you recognize me? Am I the woman that you love?”

“God Almighty,” Hank whispered, just before he collapsed on the steps.

Blood Red Murder and High White Cotton

Delilah Mae

S
tanding in high cotton, I watched as heat lightning shocked the black sky gray. Hazy dark clouds covered that big old yellow moon. Those giant puffs rolled by like a steamer, just as fast as they could. The wind whistled, rustling the cotton rows around me, like bright white powdered sugar on a charred piece of toast blowing away with the strong mouth of the wind. A storm would be coming soon.

The wind carried so much. It carried the sound of voices toward me. Elvis was singing “Little Sister” on the radio while Mama laughed because Uncle Ham was singing to her. It carried their secrets, and every ounce of revenge they had planned. The wind carried the smell of sweet buttermilk biscuits and liquid-gold honey straight from the comb.

The house was lit up like an old lantern, while moths and gnats played underneath the porch light. I watched from my spot as she finally gave in and started to dance with him.

“Come on, Sissy, move those little legs. Somewhere out in this big world a table is missing its legs ’cause you went and stole them for your own! You got sticks, girl.” He laughed.