The Ninth House

There are woods where I live, I played in them when I was a boy, but they’re just wild tall gardens spared the mowing down of construction. There’s always the sound of traffic nearby to follow if you get lost, always the comfort of asphalt and concrete to lead you home.

This woods had never seen a saw or axe. It was as it had been since it first grew from wild seed, thick and dark in its own life. My feet caught every root and my clothes every reaching bramble. I clenched CeeCee’s hand, terrified that she would slip away and leave me lost. I vowed that I wouldn’t move if it happened, I would stand still right where I was and wait for the sun to show me the trail back out. And snakes. The woods was full of snakes, it had to be. CeeCee’s light was the only thing keeping them away from us and if it disappeared I would be marooned in the dark and then I would hear them, slithering in the trees over my head and across the woods floor. I would feel their weight squirming across my shoes and if I moved they would know I was there and they would take me, and no one would ever know.

(more…)

Mister Lorrin bent and whispered into Aaron’s ear. His grandson moved forward and climbed the steps to the porch. He walked over to Miz Dori and waited. She patted his shoulder.

I didn’t notice it until then. There was a well pump on the porch next to where Miz Dori sat, an old-fashioned iron thing with a lever arm. It rose from a squat stone cistern which went down through the porch floor and into the ground beneath.

Miz Dori lifted a metal dipper from where it rested on the cistern rim. She lowered it twice out of sight into the cistern and twice brought it up and poured water from it into the top of the pump to prime it.

(more…)

I startled awake to the thunder.  It was like cracking timbers. 

I was still dressed.  I had lay down on the bed with my mind wrapped around CeeCee, that she was just down the hall.  If I should go to her room, if she was waiting for me to declare myself again.  I lay there, seeking to return to that feeling from the kitchen before we drank, seeking calm. 

Through the bedroom wall I thought I could hear the ticking of the clock in the living room but I knew it must have been imagination.  The rain was drumming too hard on the roof.

That still sense from in the kitchen before eluded me.  Maybe it was the noise of the storm.  My thoughts wouldn’t settle.  The taste of the water was still in my mouth, an alkaline thing like a coating on my tongue and palate.

(more…)

I remember waking there, on the ground, in the rain. 

I pushed myself to my feet.  I sucked the wet air. 

I could not have been home.  I was here.  I couldn’t have done what I had done. 

There was a settling, as if blocks were descending into order after having been shaken from their places.  I leaned against the reassembling world, used it to steady myself.  I held still, drinking sensation, cataloging.  I felt the cold raindrops on me.  I felt the wind, the grit on my skin.  But with every heartbeat, the world seemed to shimmer, like a projection on a spider web into which a twig had been blown. 

The world receded and swelled like breaths.  Nothing around me was real.  Awake or dreaming, there was no distinction now.  And with that, no rescue.

(more…)

I am still connected to it but I am not in it.  It is an image only.  We are linked by familiarity, but nothing else. 

I follow it into the corn, this thing that is me, this thing that is my flesh and the sins it carries.  It is so heavy, I am taken that it can move at all, that its legs do not bow and splinter beneath it like planks.  Its weight dents the soil, a grasping force from the very center of the earth pulls it down, only the compressed matter of the world supports and saves it. 

I want to go to it, to take this pitiful thing in my arms and comfort it.  I feel what it feels but it’s only a curiosity, a flat projection I observe.

(more…)

The morning sun doesn’t enter CeeCee’s bedroom.  The windows face the wrong direction but there was a breeze.  It carried the warm scent of the pines just beyond the west windows to my right, of the creek and swamp beyond them. 

The breeze lifted and lowered the sheer white curtains like gently waving hands.  I lay in bed entranced by their motion, thinking how I was the only person in the entire world here to see it.  I reached through the window and brought the birdsong to me, picked out the distinct voices and held them, released them fluttering into the racket of whistles and chimes. 

The room was lines and colors and shadows and shapes, and sensation – the cool sheets, the press of the mattress, my slow breath.  I was content to lay and let it be.

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I don’t think I have said, my family is Catholic.  I learned when I asked my mother.  I had to put it down once on a school field trip insurance form.  I spelled it out in pencil in the space for it, C-A-T-H-O-L-I-C.  I didn’t know what it meant.  It was a thing, like how old I was.  A new word I had to know to go to the zoo.

Back then my mother made me go to Sunday school for a time.  I don’t think she was drinking yet.  We would go to mass sometimes, and always on Easter for the passion play and Christmas to see the nativity play.  We stopped going before I was in junior high.  I don’t know why.

Easter is the most important Christian holiday, not Christmas.  I don’t know if you know that.  Easter is when Jesus is supposed to have died on the cross and come back from the dead three days later, if you believe the story.  If you don’t, you’re not a good Christian, even if you believe and practice everything Jesus taught when he was alive.  Those are the rules.

(more…)

The New Covenant Presbyterian Church is a neat red brick building with white wooden trim and a pointed white steeple with a small Christian cross atop it.  There’s a gravel drive that wraps around it, lined with tall trees.  To the right of the church, as you face it from the road, is the cemetery, about an acre of neat green grass with grave markers set flush into the ground, so you can mow over them.  As you follow them farther into the cemetery they disappear into the grass.  Some of them had flowers set beside them, so it appeared as if the vases had been dropped at random onto an otherwise well-kept but rather uninspired lawn.

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“Good morning,” Preacher Worthy said, and I heard a few people answer him.  “I see we have some new people here this morning, which is always good, we’re glad to have you.”  He looked at each of us, I don’t know who the others were, and last he looked at me, and he nodded and smiled and I smiled back again.  I was glad I wasn’t the only new guy.  “Don’t worry, I’m not going to ask you to stand up and say who you are in front of all these people,” he said then, and there was laughter.  CeeCee patted my hand.  She was laughing, too.

Preacher Worthy said that before he’d gotten ready for church that morning, he had been out walking in his garden.  He said his tomatoes were looking good, and his snap peas and squash and cabbage, that the rain the day and night before had done them all good, and his watermelons too, which had just started to flower that very morning.  He’d been worried about them with all the dry weather they’d been having, and he thanked the Good Lord for the rain and said he knew we did, too.  He said the weather report that morning was that there would be more rain coming tomorrow, and I heard a few people say “Amen,” like they meant it. 

(more…)

The service ended a few minutes after that. We all got up and made our way to the door. Neighbors said hello and I was introduced to more people, and some asked if I was coming to the family reunion. Not everyone was because not everyone who attends the New Covenant Presbyterian Church is related to the Bass family, though the Basses founded the church, as I said.

We stood in line on the way to the front door where Preacher Worthy was, greeting everyone as they left. He was so tall I could see him from halfway back in the church. I looked around for Cai but he was gone. I guessed maybe he had gone wherever Sarabeth was. Miz Charlotte and Mister Lorrin were gone, too. CeeCee said they had gone back the house to take care of a few things before family reunion. She was with me, and Aaron too, dressed in his Sunday best with his hair combed. I wondered if he knew I had spent the night at his mama’s house.

(more…)

Most of the people were inside the fellowship hall by now.  It was full of voices and laughing, the scrape of chairs on the floor.  Sarabeth went off to help in the kitchen.  She had brought deviled eggs, which she had made.  I’d never had deviled eggs.  They’re boiled eggs cut in half with the yolks scooped out and mixed into a paste with mayonnaise and mustard and spices and then spooned back in and sprinkled with paprika.  They taste better than that.

I couldn’t believe Cai hadn’t told me he was staying.  I tried to be angry.  I felt I should be.  It was a lousy thing to do, not to tell me, but I wasn’t angry at all.  I figured I could get back home even if I had to fly.  Or I could stay here if wanted to.  I could stay.  Cai could put in a word for me with Mister Len Dawkins and I could rent a van in Jersey and drive back down with my things, now that I knew the way.  I would lose my apartment deposit but I had enough saved so I didn’t really need it.  I could find a place in Waylon, the rent there would probably be half what I paid in Jersey, and insurance too.  I didn’t know if I could sell the volume down here like I did at the Jersey dealership but with how much less it cost to live here I could probably get by. 

But I didn’t want to live in Waylon.  I wanted to live with CeeCee and Aaron.  I doubted Miz Charlotte and Mister Lorrin would be too crazy about me living with their daughter and grandson without being married. 

(more…)

The desserts were going fast. I had some of Miz Charlotte’s peach pie, she had made another for family reunion when she made Cai’s. And I had a slice of Miz Dori’s yellow cake with chocolate mocha icing, made from scratch. They could both get rich selling them.

Sarabeth had brought her guitar. She sang some hymns and some blues and country songs. CeeCee sang harmony on a lot of them. She has a beautiful voice, not good enough to sing for a living like Sarabeth, but good. She and Sarabeth have been singing together since they were little girls and they write songs sometimes, which CeeCee keeps in a little leather-bound notebook that she doesn’t let anyone read but Sarabeth.

(more…)

No one had thought it would happen at church. No one thought he would have dared, not even Cai.

They had taken precautions for years. Every day since the night that he’d tried to take Aaron, CeeCee had lived in fear that Royal might try again, even after what Cai had shown him awaited if he did. Aaron stayed with his grandparents or Miz Dori when CeeCee was gone. She locked the house if she had to leave him alone for even a few minutes. He knew what numbers to dial if his daddy came by when he was alone, or Pastor Lamm. He knew about the trap door in his bedroom closet that Mister Lorrin had made that even Royal didn’t know about, so Aaron could hide quiet under the house for as long as he had to.

(more…)

We passed Miz Dori’s and the mailboxes, the dirt road into the woods on the left.  We crossed the cement bridge over the swamp.  The road’s shoulder fell away weedy on either side to black, algae-slick water and thick cypress. 

CeeCee took the curves fast, navigating the narrow road like the girl born there.

Cai and I sat facing one another, backs against the bed walls, next to the cab, out of the wind.

“I know why you left here,” I said to him.

He didn’t answer.  There was no need.

“I want you to let me handle Royal,” I said. 

Again no reply. 

“If he’s there,” I said.  “Promise me.”

“It’s not me you need to be worryin’ about,” Cai said.

(more…)

We climbed back into the truck. The rain had arrived, cold drops spat by the wind like an inhale before the deluge, thunder growling in the distance, coming closer.

Cai drove now, Sarabeth beside him, CeeCee in the bed with me, standing, leaning over the cab. I wanted to reassure her but there was nothing to say. None of us knew what the next would bring.

(more…)

Later I learned what happened after I left with Aaron. But now I’m driving, and it feels like running away. I tell myself the four I leave behind are enough to handle Pastor Lamm, more than enough. What I want is to see him for myself. I want to meet the bastard who caused all of this. I want to put my foot on his neck and hear him beg. Old habits die hard.

We passed the old Lamm place, a big shadow in the dark to the right. Aaron was kneeling on the seat, looking out of the back glass.

(more…)

I don’t remember all of what happened next. Some of it Aaron told me later, told CeeCee, who is the only person he would talk to about it at first. He’s better about it now, now that some time has passed. But he doesn’t remember all of it either and that’s probably best. Maybe someday he will but it doesn’t really matter. I don’t even care that much about it anymore, that I need to know all the details. I know enough.

This I remember. When Pastor Lamm stepped onto the bridge I got ready to run. We would make for the road inside, to CeeCee’s house, less than a mile all told. I knew we could outrun him, and if he got into his car we’d use the woods. Once in the house we’d call the church. If Pastor Lamm was smart he’d be gone by the time Mister Lorrin got there.

I said I’d forgotten about Pastor Lamm, in the crash, until I saw him. Turning to run, I looked behind him and knew I had forgotten one other thing.

(more…)

Mister Silas sits in his chair on the porch.  Beside him sits Miz Dori.  She has moved her rocking chair away from the well pump, it is in front of the cabin door.  She is smiling and rocking, she is smiling at me.  She’s such a sweet old lady.  I feel her goodness, like constant spring. 

“You know Miz Dori don’t tell no lies, honey,” she says.  She smiles bigger, her teeth white and shining.  I am another of her children, everyone here is her child is how she thinks of us all, and she has love enough for all of us.

(more…)

It isn’t a heavy rain. It falls like a long sigh, a good gentle soaking, not even enough weight to stir the corn.

We’re on the front porch, Cai and I, on his mama and daddy’s front porch. It’s late morning on Monday. My right foot is propped up on a stool, atop a pillow Miz Charlotte made me put there. I’m supposed to keep it elevated until the rest of the swelling goes down. It doesn’t hurt much.

The rain should stop by noon, the forecast says. It’s too wet to go into the fields today but the tobacco won’t be ready to crop for another week and the corn the next month, so no harm. Cai says there’s been so much rain this season they’ve had to sucker the tobacco twice, walking the rows and pinching off the little leaf buds that grow in the notch between the mature leaves and the stalk. The bottom lug leaves are already a foot wide and nearly twice as long.

All this rain, every day I’ve been here. I can get lost in what it means or just let it be rain. I don’t think I’ve ever been as comfortable as I am now, sitting on this porch, listening to the drops fall, enjoying the cool morning. I suppose there are things to worry about but it’s only the world. I’ll walk through it when it’s time.

(more…)

It’s Wednesday morning. The hot blacktop shimmers in the glare. I bought some sunglasses at the gas station by the interstate when I filled the truck. The window’s down, radio on, traffic’s light. I should make Richmond by noon, easy.

#

The body shop did a beautiful job. They had to replace the back quarter panel but they had it in stock, they matched the paint perfectly and even buffed out all the scratches everywhere else, cleaned the interior and threw in an oil change and tune-up. They remembered Cai.

Mister Len Dawkins is retired now, his oldest son Leland runs the dealership. He’s in his forties, round and bearded and friendly. He offers Cai a job on the spot. He does the same for me when he learns I’m moving down.

(more…)

I called Dad the morning I left and told him I’d be back in town that night.  I thought I would go to my apartment and see him tomorrow, after work. 

I kill the engine.  The cooling metal crackles faint in the dusk, the yellow streetlight reflecting off the hood.  I run my hand over the dash, as Cai had done when he arrived home.  It’s a damn good truck.  Bury it when it dies.

Dad has planted the new boxwood under the corner window, like he said he was going to.  The yard’s neat as a new haircut.  It always is. 

My ankle is still a little tender.  Ten hours on the road hasn’t helped.  I left Mister Cole’s cane behind.  It doesn’t belong with me.  I don’t need it anymore.

I can see the television flickering blue through the picture window.  Dad’s car isn’t in the drive. 

I usually knock before I go in.  Dad says it’ll always be my house but I like to let them know there’s someone at the door.  This time I don’t.  It won’t change what’s to come.

(more…)

It happened so long ago no one in Covenant Spring today was alive then, except for him. There was no Covenant Spring, only woods and swamp and a dirt wagon path east to where it joined the Raleigh road, west to the Richmond highway.

Miz Dori heard it from her daddy when she was small, and it was an old story then. There’s no telling how much of it is truth. She doesn’t like to tell it even now, though she’s certain the Good Lord has forgiven him.

This is what Cai told me, that night in the hospital, what Miz Dori told him and his sister when they were old enough to hear, with the Bass family Bible open on the coffee table before them.

(more…)

Telephones came to Waylon, and automobiles. The loggers gave the county money to help pave the roads so their wagons and new trucks could get through.

There was a settlement, thirty miles east of town near Buck Swamp, land covered in old growth pine that the county promised to the loggers. No one had known people were there, there was no deed or title on record but most all of the records had been destroyed in the courthouse fire. The county was deep in the business of duplicating the lost paper, and the old Wayloners were called on to help.

(more…)

It’s easy to look back over the years and say it. It was murder. No one in Covenant Spring denies it.

I wonder if Silas Bass loved his wife as much as I love CeeCee, as Cai loves Sarabeth, as Mister Lorrin loves Miz Charlotte. I try to put my head into that place, to see CeeCee cold and dead, wrapped in a sheet at the bottom of a hole, to drop dirt on her face with no one caring that I am burying my dearest love.

I can’t go there. It’s too terrible, my heart can’t stand it.

(more…)

That’s all. It’s late, and CeeCee is waiting for me to call.

Thanks for the love – Mom and Dad, Nannie and William and Uncle C, Otis and Roxie, Sharon and Lisa, Jackie and Matt.

Thanks for the company – Alison Krauss & Union Station, Kate Bush, Neko Case, Ani DiFranco, The Dixie Chicks, Steve Earle, Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, Buddy Guy, Emmylou Harris, Kris Kristofferson, Shelby Lynne, Harry Nilsson, Joan Osborne, The Ozark Mountain Daredevils, Damien Rice, Regina Spektor, Townes Van Zandt, Stevie Ray Vaughan and Johnny By God Cash, Amen.

Thank you for reading and your God bless.

Back in the middle ’90s, the estimable thespian Jonathan Pryce starred in a series of television commercials extolling the virtues of the Infiniti luxury car line. (Note to younger readers: Mr. Pryce plays Keira Knightley’s dad in the Pirates of the Caribbean films.)

The commercials were minimalist — just the car against a white backdrop — and relied entirely on Mr. Pryce’s considerable urbane charm for the sell. Clad in dark slacks, turtleneck and blazer, with cool jazz or salsa music playing in the background, he made you feel like a Cheetos-eatin’ bumpkin if you didn’t think that car was just the slickest ride this side of Detroit. Or wherever the hell they make them.

(more…)

Okay. “Anal leakage.”

Where do we start?

Warnings for the fat substitute Olestra declare it may cause “anal leakage.” Those readers with more delicate sensibilities, please avert your eyes from the next sentence.

“May cause anal leakage” means “may cause you to crap your pants.”

(more…)

Gotta step into the wayback machine for this one.

I reckon this was produced in 1988. My fellow production pros will be interested to know that this was produced on an Otari 5050B-II two-track reel-to-reel, alternating tracks in mono. (LOVE that machine, with the splicing block stuck to the head cover and the big 10.5-inch reels with the spring-loaded chuck-type reel locks?  Oh dear, I think I feel an audio nerdgasm coming on.)

(more…)

I’ll tell you this story so I can tell you the one I really want to tell.

I wrote this bit as a parody of TV and radio commercials for a certain very popular over-the-counter medicinal product. What was funny to me was that the ostensibly “real” folks in these testimonials seemed to have no inhibitions about confessing to a national audience the fact that they suffered from skin conditions that would rot a creosote post.

(more…)

This one was written not long after Hurricane Katrina, when it became apparent that the federal government’s comparative response to the disaster was going to be about on par with — well heck, forget the snappy simile. It stunk.

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