I swallowed as heat crept up to my cheeks.
“Don’t worry about it; everyone’s parents yell at them. My dad yelled at me all the time.”
“Yeah, maybe.” My stomach growled.
Buck wrapped an arm around my hunched shoulders. “Yup, they do. Let’s get some lunch. Nan made stew.”
Though the rain was cold, my heart warmed in his embrace. Buck always made me feel safe back then, even if it was only an illusion.
I pull my hand from the window, straightening. I might’ve been eight or nine when that happened. Buck was a year or so older and my best friend in the world. My only friend.
I brush off the memory.
He’s a scab inside my soul, I can’t stop picking at it and opening the wound. The pain’s still sharp enough to remind me why I shouldn’t want to see him. I should avoid him at all cost. Yet, I keep coming back to it, drawing fresh blood every time it starts to show signs of healing.
It’s been like this for years.
When he first took off to California, chasing his dream of being a Hollywood stuntman, it crushed the eighteen-year-old me. Eventually, I ran from the memories waiting around every corner. Every tree we climbed. Every blanket I took with us to our fort in the woods for picnic lunches. Every creek bed we waded through, with our jeans rolled to our knees and fishing poles over our shoulders.
Joining the Marines was a good decision. It got me away from pointing fingers and whispers as I walked through town, away from the stigma of being my mother’s half-breed daughter, and away from memories of Buck—
A string of curses pulls me out of my daydream. I follow Aunt Delores’s profanity outside, down the stairs, and under the house. The heat of the day wafts around me, even in the shade it’s carried on humid air. A trail of water runs out of the storage room and across the concrete floor of the parking space beneath the house.
Great. What now?
As I approach the enclosed space, moisture seeps into my tennis shoes.
Aunt Delores’s voice raises another octave. “Damn it! Now, Lord, you know you didn’t give me a dick. How do you expect me to do the things a man should do with no dick? If you wanted me to fix this house you shoulda given me a pecker!”
Oh my.
I wade into the room, prepared to duck out if she starts throwing shit.
My heart lurches.
She’s on the top step of the four-foot ladder, with one hand steadying herself against the ceiling. She rips out sopping, filthy insulation from the hole in the crumbling sheetrock above her head.
I rush to the ladder, taking hold of one of her calves. “What are you doing up there?”
She looks down at me over the rim of her glasses. “There’s a leak. That man, I swear, I’m gonna piss in his ashes when I get upstairs. Why is it that every time I turn around, I have to fix something he did halfway?”
I pat her leg. “Come on down from there before you hurt yourself. Let’s get someone else to fix it.”
I can almost hear her eyes rolling as she says, “Well, Missy, unless that coochie you’ve got spits out gold, we’re screwed. I can’t afford it, and neither can you.”
With a small giggle and a shake of my head, I say, “No. No gold from this coochie. But you’re going to fall and break your neck, so get down. I’ll fix it.”
Aunt Delores lets out a sigh, exasperation clear in her tone. “You—fix it? Like you fixed the plumbing under the sink last fall? No. Thank you, Dearest. Go find someone with a dick to fix this thing.”
“A dick?”
Her one eyebrow quirks, as though she thinks I’m dense. “You know—a man.”
“I’ll look up a plumber. But, for the moment, get down. I can’t leave you here on this sad ass excuse for a ladder. You’re gonna fall.”
“Girl, I’ve been taking care of myself since long before you were born, I’m fine. Now, be gone—go next door and fetch Buck. He should be able to fix this.”
Buck?
No.
No way. No how.
“Why don’t I call Frank?” I can handle Buck’s granddaddy. But Buck? Not ready to see him again so soon.
She steps down one rung. “Selma told me Frank threw his back out three days ago. He can’t do it. Go get Buck. I’m pretty sure God gave him a dick. You can ask him.”
I don’t have to ask. I know all about it. And that’s one reason I don’t want to go fetch him.
Aunt Delores holds my shoulder, and I grasp her arm, as she steps into the standing water.
She shakes me off and turns me around, pushing me toward the door. “Go on. Find Buck. Tell him to bring tools.”
THREE
A knock pulls everyone’s attention from the pile of sandwich makings in the middle of the table. I add more shrimp to my po' boy as Nan gets up to answer the door.