Matthew Jones - A Single Shot

A whoosh of dust-filled air exits.

John reaches in and runs a hand through the closet’s sparse, dangling contents—two pairs of dress slacks, his one suit coat, half a dozen skirts or dresses left behind by Moira. He exhales pantingly, then shuts the door. He turns back to the bed. He thinks about looking under it but even in his revenant state thinks he won’t find anything significant in the couple of inches between the floor and two-by-four-raised spring. On the radio, a promo for the upcoming County Fair ends. A loud whinny sounds from the front of the trailer. Diablo’s uncharacteristic skittishness reregisters itself with John. He walks over to the radio, on which a Garth Brooks song now plays. He switches it off. Through the window, from the deck, he hears a sharp, dual-toned whistle like somebody calling a dog or remarking on a pretty girl. The sound repeats itself. John moves over to the curtain, pulls it back, and sticks his head out.

Standing on the deck behind a limp-looking Abbie, one of his hands holding a clump of her hair and the other a long knife against her throat, is Waylon. “I give you three seconds ’fore I make her look like the Hen, John,” he calls out. “Have you seen the Hen lately?”

John doesn’t say. His gaze is intent on Abbie’s languid face with its closed eyes and slack mouth.

“Offers me buried treasure for drugs! I go along as a favor to him—even dig the shit up for him ’cause he’s afraid a’ snakes or some damn thing, then I give ’im his merchandise and when I come back for my money, not only is it gone, but my girl, too, and when I see the Hen about it, he can’t understand how it’s his problem and I tell him he’ll understand if I don’t get back the cash or the drugs in seventy-two hours—I even offered to let him keep Ingrid, who anyway was getting to be a pain in my ass.” His speech is high-pitched and staccato, the clipped words running wild and tripping over each other in their hurry to get out, and listening to it, John is furious at the dead girl for being infatuated with insanity.

“Three days later he tells me the drugs are sold, he hasn’t got the money, my girl’s been shot by a haybale, and basically, ‘Fuck you, Waylon,’ and that’s what I get for trusting a guy I met in prison!”

“Why ain’t her eyes open?” hollers John.

“What?”

“Abbie’s eyes ain’t open!”

“Choker hold’ll do that, John.”

“She ain’t dead, is she?”

“She’ll wake up when I start carving on her.”

“I’ll give you the money,” says John.

“Of course you’ll give me the money, you stupid cowdonged son of a bitch. Now drop the pistol and get your woodchuck ass out here!”

Waylon’s handling of Abbie has a ritualistic quality. He lowers her to the chaise longue, then gently rolls her on her back. Watching from the kitchen doorway, John thinks of the dispassionate way his father’s home health aides, their eyes slyly diverted, would hoist and turn his cancer-ridden body that to them might have been a side of pork or a car lodged in a ditch. “Gotta hand it to ya,” says Waylon, straightening up and pulling from his belt a 9-millimeter pistol. “Not every half-assed dirt farmer seen a chance like what you did would take it.”

He waves John out onto the deck. John steps outside. His hunter’s eye automatically probes the muscular torso in front of him for its weakest link. He thinks it might be the knees. Waylon signals him to a stop ten feet from where he leans against the rail, facing the valley. “Tell you the truth, at first I didn’t believe Obadiah when he swore a woodchuck had stole my money and murdered my Ingrid—figured he had or they were in on it together.” He’s wearing dress chinos, a jersey marred by briars, and what look like brand-new L. L. Bean hiking boots. White froth stains his beard and armpits. He smells lathered up, like an exercised horse. John guesses he’s bushwhacked through the woods from where he’s dumped Obadiah Cornish’s pickup. “Time I’d sliced off his nose, though, he’d convinced me.”

“Was an accident.”

Waylon smiles. “Which? Stealing my money or shooting her?”

“I took her for a deer.”

“A deer? She didn’t look anything like a deer.”

“Was a mistake.”

Waylon slides the knife into a sheath on the other side of his belt. “That crazy son of a bitch really dump her in your bed?”

John nods.

“Where is she now?”

“I buried her,” says John, suddenly not wanting Waylon ever again to cast his eyes on her. “I dug a hole up in the woods and put her in it. I can take you there.”

Waylon waves at him. “I don’t like corpses. They give me the creeps.” He frowns. “I’m just wondering, though, John, did you fuck her?”

“Did I what?”

“If you didn’t, you really missed out on something. That girl was three rolled into one.” He shakes his head. “Was ’bout all I could do to hold on her once she took to bucking.”

“Wrote in a letter how she loved you,” John angrily says.

“What?”

“Said you was going take her to Hawaii.”

Waylon glances curiously at him. His black, dilated pupils suggest oil splats in saucers of thick, heavy cream. “You read my Ingrid’s mail, John?”

“Was tryin’ to put a name to her. Was you gonna?”

“What?”

“Take her Hawaii?”

“Oh well, you know how women like to hear about sand and water, John. Now let me ask you—did you fuck her before or after you shot her?” He rolls his head exaggeratedly. “Or d’ya try her both ways?”

John rushes angrily forward. Waylon thrusts his pistol straight out. John comes to an abrupt halt three feet from the end of its barrel. “Come over here, John,” says Waylon. Moving a few feet sideways along the rail, he points at the spot he’s just vacated. John walks over to the spot and stops. Down on the pond, half a dozen ducks float motionless as decoys. Two oaks on the water’s far side cast dark shadows on half its surface. The air smells like tansy and wild violets. “Put your hand there on the rail, fingers spread.”

“What for?”

“If you don’t, I’m going to shoot the girl in both knees.”

“Ain’t we gon’ go get the money?”

“No. You’re going to go get the money. I’m going to stay here with the girl—what’s her name?”

“Abbie.”

“She and I are going to stay here for the two minutes you’re gone.”

“It’ll take more than that.”

“More than what?”

“Two minutes.”

“I’ll give you ten, then I’ll cut off one of her kneecaps.” He nods down at Abbie’s placid-looking face, which suggests she might be dreaming pleasantly. “Another five, another kneecap. A joint-to-joint thing, get it?”

John says, “I’ll go as fast as I can.”

“I know you will, John. Now, where exactly is it?”

“On the mountain side the trailer. Up in the woods.”

“You’ll point me there so that I can sit here with Abbie and watch you go up and come back.”

“You’ll have to move the far end the deck, past the trailer’s edge.”

“That’s not a problem. Now, John, where’s your truck? I’m told you have a truck.”

“Up there with it.”

“You’ll bring it down for me, won’t you? So that I can borrow it?”

“Yes.”

He reaches into the sheath with his free hand and pulls out the knife again. “I’m not like the Hen, John, who gets off on cutting people up, okay? I admit, I’m not at all pleased that you killed Ingrid—she was a sweet kid and a tremendous fuck—and because of it I don’t think you and I could ever be good friends, but you say it was an accident and that you gave her a proper burial and I accept that. So, about Ingrid, bygones are bygones.” He nods at the rail. “Fingers splayed, John, like I asked. Unless you’d prefer I take an eye. Would you rather I take an eye?”