Today is an experiment in collectivity. In an attempt to find a common story, we will be collectively writing a short offering. We have considered doing this once every couple of months, but need a test run to see if you guys buy in. Maybe it works; maybe it doesn't. Either way, We're not scared to give it a shot. So, here goes.
We will offer the beggining of a piece of short fiction. Just a snippet. We're going 1st person for our first attempt. You will fill out the story over the next couple of days with the next piece of the story. Just go to the comments section and keep the story going. The story will close at 12:00 a.m. on Sunday morning. Hopefully, it will end with the line, "And then I found $20." So let's get to work.
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Dirty deltic crossroads are a dime-a-dozen where I come from. And the Devil don't sit in the middle waiting on you with an old beat up Martin and promises of grandeur. You ain't always torn between north or west, you just go. But not today...
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A rusty ole Buick careened past, running wildly down the road, running from what? I stood choking on the ancient dust, smoking from that river-borne ground. The grove of bald cypress was the only promise of shade, so I stumbled towards the oxbow to sit, and dry my brow. I didn't want to stay there, but then again I couldn't leave.
It was the man in the bowler. Arms cradling that shotgun, opened at the breach. Fat stubby fingers shoving cartridges in. "That's the best sausage biscuit I've had in years," he shouted. He ambled down the road, coughing in the wake of the Buick.
I hate bowlers. Pretentious felt billycocks. It suited him just right. All white trousered and buck shoed, carrying his father's weapon of choice with the engravings of mallards and retrievers on the side.
There was drool dripping from the dead side of his lips. The left side of his face was like that, frozen, paused. Cheekbone caved in. He got that way fighting a dwarf bear, both of them drunk on moonshine. I sold the tickets.
In my mind's eye that's all that man was capable of; fighting a dwarf bear. Suddenly, he turned to look at me. His eyes were black as tar and his countenance struck fear into my very core. I knew this confrontation would no go well. But, Mama told me there'd be days like this.
"YOU." He delightfully growled my name and unintentionally spat bubbles of beechnut tobacca trickling across his heinous grin. Never took his stare off, like a deranged lion salivating to eat my dark soul. His approach was ominous, evil...Certainly he aimed to kill me.
You comin' or you dyin', he asked. I easily pulled the smoke from behind my ear and placed it between my dust-dry lips. I struck a paper match. I inhaled.
I heard the shotgun clink closed.
You comin' or you dying, he asked again.
I drew the burning tobacco. It still hurt my lungs. I ain't reckon I got much a choice, I said to him through barely moving lips holding my cigarette in place. I ain't reckon you give me much a choice, I said.
I stood in that cypress shade, by those scabby cypress knees and threw the match in the middle of the lips-dry ground. I stared straight down the crossroad to where the Buick was dusting out of sight.
And then a felt an aching. An aching the kind I hadn't felt since Pappa swing me over his knee and hit at me like a poor Mexican's piñata. All shreds. Painfully, my head swam. I saw color. I leaned over and lost my breakfast and most of my courage.
Yet I knew I had to go and I must. There was nothing left for me there. She'd up and gone. Left me with no words, no warning.
She'd laid my heart bare and left me in pieces. I loved her like no other and there was more than time between me and forgetting her.
How could she leave me like this? I asked myself silently once again. I stood up from my slumped position like a beaten horse wishing for its freedom. I glanced at the man, his marred face and dirty hands.
And then all I could see was her windswept hair blowing across her freckled nose. One minute we were on top of the world, the next I was wishing I was 6 feet under it.
My reality must become true. She was gone and he was calling.
So that's how I ended up mopping the floors of the Rock Salt Bayou Social Club at 3:00 am. The Social Club served as a once-a-harvest place of comfort for the share croppers to squander their hard earned sawbucks and for Little Rock lawyers to engage one more thing they could brag about at someone else's expense.
The Good Lord knows scuffling along in front of the bid'nes end of a scatter gun would be the only way I'd ever cross through that door again. Through the door where I first laid eyes on Tilly.
Tilly wasn't a picture of what you'd call traditional beauty. Her stature small, her features angular. But her face had a way of changing from night to day when she smiled.
I couldn't escape her stare when she caught me glancing her way. She seemed jovial and free. How I wanted to be. The flow of her dress across her body reminded me of the ocean I'd seen one summer growing up. It ebbed and flowed with the slow sway of the music.
Yes, Tilly moved like the Holy Spirit through the brokenhearted, and her hips got me jumpin' like Northeast Shakers at tent rival.
I shoulda never come here. Shoulda never ast her name or genuflected a second glance in her direction. She was holy - the first flower petal Eve circled around her own swollen bosom in the garden.
And I was grief since my mama's thighs - of the brood tossed out of the Big House at Creation. All I had to give this woman was a burlap sack of misery, one she'd haul on her shoulders to the next man, and the next man, and her children eventually.
Who knew the tables 'tween man and woman - Eden and Sheol - could turn so abruptly in a single night. That woman wore a disguise better than the Devil's garden party snake suit.
People will come with their questions soon enough. There's always questions. And them questions is why I left the first time. I shoulda never come here again.
But like a said already, the bin'nes end of a shotgun can make a man do things he'd a never be doin' if it was his finger on the trigger. But mine weren't. The one that was right now was owned by a fat man with half his face gone dead. How the hell did he know when to wake up and wiggle the end of that gun my way? I knowed he must be nappen at least a little behind those dark shades and bowler hat, but damned if I made the slightest move for the door, that barrel would jest wiggle a little in my direction and the lips on the living side of his face would curl up jes a little.
But, again, I shoulda never come here again.
Shotguns are a whole lot quicker than these long ass shifts at the country club.
Tilly was the best damned racehorse I ever rode. Town gets big enough, you get competition from other bear-fights. Gotta have that something extra to pull the crowd in. Even if it's putting your best roan in a dress and riding her into town to sell tickets.
At least she was the best damned racehorse I road until that night she up and jumped camp on me. She left me there, all exposed and that's when Bowler sneaked up on me. More accurately, that's when Bowler sneaked his blade up on me. Right under my ribcage on the left side. Just under my lung.
I coughed on smoke and felt that sharp reminder of Bowler's blade.
Let's get to movin, the man in the Bowler said. I reckon we got us an appointment at the Rock Salt. I reckon you got an account to account to settle.
It was only four thousand. His cut for bear killin' was half-the-house. Even though he didn't fight fair, I ain't never should'a stole his purse. I certainly ain't never should'a invested it in that card game in Helena. And then I sure as the Bowler's trigger finger shouldn'ta stashed the loot under the old stable out back of the Rock Salt. I was welcome there with Tilly. Without her, I was dead man walking.
I fealt the but end of that heirloom in the back of my head. I woke up in the trunk of that old white Cadillac, certain to be on my way to the Rock Salt. Maybe they'd serve me a shot of whiskey fore they did me in. Or Maybe Bowler'd do me in for I made it in the front door.
My mind had played tricks on me as I awoke. The taste of dust and blood in my mouth made me learn my reality. The trunks of cars rarely make for good rest. Last night was a bad dream. One full of chaos, one chased by a racehorse and tumbling into the arms of her owner, Tilly Fitzgerald. It was truly she, the heiress of the Rock Salt fortune that had put me where I lie. The man in the Bowler offered me his hand out of the trunk of the '78 Cadi. But he no sooner kicked me when I strived to gain my balance, and I fell into the gravel as he laughed and spat his chewed tobacco in my face. It was sure, no one cared and no one was looking for me, I was a no one that never mattered. And the Lord only knew how much longer I had to draw breath on His green earth. The name of the game was paybacks and I had nothing to give. I'd worked as his slave the night before, beaten senseless and taken captive. Now my true debt was owed.
I glanced up at him as he continued to laugh the sort of laugh that starts deep in your bowels before making its echo out one's mouth. As his eyes rolled back into his head upon the laugh's exit, I suddenly gained back what strength I was sure I had lost. I had a will to live. A will to see her face again and he was to provide the means.
It didn't matter what had become of my life up until now. What mattered was getting back to where I knew I belonged in my heart of hearts. Tilly or no Tilly, horse or no horse, my past would not govern my future.
No amount of lust could cover the true love I felt for Elizabeth in my soul. Tilly had been what she was and would always be. I would never have fit into her world. And she would never have fulfilled mine. The road I had been on to try and make it in life as the once stable boy husband of Tilly Fitzgerald was over. I didn't need her money to ease my life. Nothing of the physical world could be a salve to the wound left by true love. All I needed was Elizabeth's arms around me, her hair in my face and her hands clasped over mine.
So I shot up from my prostrate position. In one smooth, graceful lunge I had the firearm in my hands and now he was staring down at the business end of the shotgun barrel. The Bowler headed mongruel's grin turned to ice. He was caught at his own game. And since no one knew we were here, and no one knew we were together. There was only one thing left to do.
Then I heard the gun cock. I could smell her before I heard her footsteps. Never would forget her. Scent of Bushmill's and lilac.
"Hi, Tilly," I said.
"Shut up, dickhead," she said.
did you hear i found a $20?
well, i did.
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