THE FAMILY SAT DOWN TOGETHER, their knees close under a table covered with a fresh white cloth. The room heavy with greasy odors. The delicate aroma of yellow watermelon that grew wild in unattended winds. Cool iced tea that people drank year-round. The graveyard preacher joined the family at the reception table. Word had salted down to him. Or he had invited himself. His plain black three-piece shined the satin gloss of a raven’s wing. Small, but a big horse head and face of a man. Processed hair flowing manelike. He found it easy to blend his religion and his appetite. (He wiped his mouth with a paper napkin after every bite.) Gracie matched him word for word. Angels angled out in their speech.
Sister, the preacher said, you know your Bible. His chin hung close to Gracie.
I try. She stirred with the start of a laugh.
Yes indeed.
The preacher’s mouth smelled like money. Hatch had already endured two preachers that day. Now a third. Preachers troubled him. And the presence of this one strengthened his inclination to spit in every preacher’s eye.
The preacher led the family in prayer, rising on food steam to heights invisible to the eye. With his paper napkin, he wiped the prayer from his lips.
Keep the faith. By and by God reveals his divine plan to man. And with that, he heaved himself up from the table and quit the house.
I HAD TO PUT THE GUN ON MR. BUCK, Dave said. I asked him, What you call my mamma? I told that motherfucker. Say it again. Big Judy screamin, Dave, it ain’t worth it. Shit, it’s worth it if I say it is.
The earth cooled. A heat-hushed night. The heavens low-hanging. Moonlight soft-showered the window. You rested under the white bedspread, translucent from use, safe now, the wire screen having been checked and double-checked so that no bat would fly through the open window on a dark breeze.
Jesus, you sure it closed?
Yeah.
Check it again.
I already did.
Them bats bite you in the neck. Flying rats.
Pale moths and bright mosquitoes yellow-revolved around Big Judy’s single porch light. John, Lucifer, and Dave, ghost-gray men in the night carrying their gin and beer, sat rough on Big Judy’s metal folding chairs and lit up the dark with their cricket talk.
Uncle John blew magic lamp smoke from his mouth and nose. Why didn’t you tell me that Fulton is a dry county?
I did tell you.
You ain’t tell me shit.
Nigga, you got cotton in yo ears, that’s all.
And what you got in yours?
Lucifer, you better tell this nigga.
He can’t tell me shit.
Nigga, I’m older than you. Talk to me wit some respect.
You ain’t sayin nothing.
Say what I got to say.
Say it then.
I’m gettin ready to.
You gon make us wait.
Did I ever tell you bout that time—
The men spoke brick upon brick, sharing mellow-golden stories — some about Sam, about And (who Hatch knew only as Beulah’s former husband who visited her every free chance), about Spin, Spokesman, Dallas, Spider, Ernie; some about men Hatch didn’t know (he hung on to their names); some about Bataan and Okinawa, where And, Sam, and Dave had fought and claimed blood, and others about that yellow-green place where Lucifer and John had done the same — building backwards, word after hard word.
WHY, SHEILA, THIS MUST BE YOUR DAUGHTER.
You know that ain’t my daughter. That’s Gracie.
Gracie? The drunk’s red eyes widened in mock surprise. The drunk and Gracie sat squeezed tight together on the yard swing. The Gracie I used to know?
Cut that out, Mr. Man, Gracie said. You knew it was me.
I thought it looked like you but I knew you couldn be lookin that good after all these years.
Stop that, Mr. Man, Gracie said. You still a fool.
You still know how to love a fool?
Stop that, Mr. Man.
When had Hatch last seen Gracie show such girlish energy and exuberance? (Never in John’s presence. Never.) Ready to lift her skirt and flirt.
When you going back home?
Why?
I’m gon drive up there to West Memphis to see you befo you head back.
You don’t wanna do that.
You still know how to dance?
I don’t dance.
You still know how to move yo body the way you used to?
Gracie grinned at the grass beneath her feet.
Why don’t you move back down here? Why don’t you come home? Why you want to live in a big city? City life, piss in a can. Bury it.
I LIKE EM SLIM. Streamlined. Built for speed.
St. Louis woman the best type. Way down from the Gulf of Mexico.
Can’t hold a match to a Texas woman.
Who you know from Texas?
You’d be surprised.
You brought yo kids. Why didn’t you bring Jesse?
I like my coffee in the morning. Crazy bout my tea at night.
What fo? So she can slow me down.
That’s yo woman.
Like hell.
Sam should be here.
You know what he told Koot after Mr. Footy died?
What?
He said, Koot, you got to have somebody on the vine. Had to say it five or six times cause you know Koot deaf. Koot say, Sam, that ain’t no vine. That a jimsonweed.
Well, I’ve given up chasin women.
I leave you there.
But I’ll still go to a bar—
Dave, damn if we don’t know that already. You a drinkin fool.
— have me a taste and talk to the womens. They’ll give you some too, if you know how to talk to em right.
HE DIED TEN YEARS AFTER SHE CAME BACK.
No, it was fifteen.
You can’t never get nothin straight.
Look who’s talkin.
We can look at the death certificate.
Why don’t you go get it.
I would if you hadn’tah lost it.
I ain’t lost nothing.
That ain’t what I recollect.
I don’t give a damn—
Yall stop that arguin, Beulah said in her usual shrill voice. All yall do is argue.
You always agree with her, Gracie said. You always have.
I ain’t tryin to take nobody’s side.
You jus like Lula Mae. Take Sheila’s side in everything.
Shut your damn mouth! Sheila said. All that happened a long time ago. What can I do about it?
THE ROAD HISSED under the black tires. They rode in the black limousine, silent as the dark they traveled through. The sun had fallen but the heat had not let up. The dark had absorbed it like black cotton.
THEY STOOD IN THE ROAD under the failed sky. Sheila passed Reverend Blunt a tip, slipping him the money quickly.
Why, thank you. Reverend Blunt had changed into a fresh suit. He smiled into Porsha’s eyes. I’ll drop by tomorrow and see how yall doing.
Porsha returned the smile.
Good night. Reverend Blunt charged up the road.
Why you do that? Hatch said.
Sheila said nothing.
Why you give that bastard a tip?