David Wiltse - Into The Fire

"You think it was her box?"

"Of course it was her box, Rae. You normally see any boxes outside the tent after a show? Boxes don't just grow out of the ground, they don't just materialize. She put it there, she planted the damned thing so she'd be taller than me."

"Maybe someone brought it for her? One of her fans?"

"None of my fans come equipped with boxes, do they, Rae? That just isn't the kind of thing people bring with them to a show. We're not crating oranges here, you know. How come you take her side, how come you're always defending her?"

"I'm not defending her, Tommy. She certainly shouldn't have brought a box, that's for sure."

"You're on her side, ain't you?"

" 'Course not…"

"Why not? Everybody's on the side of the angel-hahhah, some pun. You might's well team up with her, too."

"I'm on your side, darling." Rae fumbled with his belt with one hand while rubbing him with the other. "For Christ's sake, lay off, Rae.

Can't you see I'm upset here? I'm too mad to fuck."

I 'I'm just trying to comfort you, Tommy."

Rae continued to work on his belt. Aural had told her of the value of discreet insistence. Any healthy man, according to Aural, could be diverted from just about anything else in life by his erect organ if a woman went about It in the right way.

"Well, I've got a little surprise coming for our sweet angel-face,"

Tommy said. He allowed Rae to pull his pants to his ankles, scarcely noticing. "She's going to have a visitor pretty soon."

"Who's that, honey?"

"let's just say he ain't her biggest fan," Tommy said, laughing. "You might call him her anti-fan."

Rae slipped her hand down the back of the Reverend Tommy'.s shorts with a conviction taught to her by Aural.

It was not a move she would ever have thought of making on her own. She wiggled her finger a few times. That got Tommy's attention.

"Whoa!" he said, but he didn't mean stop. As it turned out, Tommy wasn't too mad to fuck after all.

The next morning, after the Reverend had gone out and she and Aural were sharing coffee in her trailer, Rae told her what Tommy had said about her anti-fan. Aural had shrugged.

"What is that suppose to mean?"

"He said it like it was the anti-Christ or something," Rae explained.

"He's sicking the devil on me, is that it'? The man's been preaching too long-he's beginning to believe it himself."

"it didn't sound good, Aural," Rae said. "He laughed when he said it, but he wasn't joking. I think he's up to something. You best be careful."

"My anti-fan? Sugar, I don't know what that means, but unless it's got a couple of heads, I'm not too worried." Aural patted her boot, and when Rae wrinkled her brow in puzzlement, Aural showed her the knife for the first time. She pulled it loose from the Velcro strip and held it in her palm.

"Honey, what is that for?" Rae asked, shocked.

"Whatever is necessary," Aural said. "You can imagine."

"Well, no, I can't."

"What world have you been living in?" Aural demanded. "You mean to say you don't carry anything to defend yourself with?"

"Defend myself from what?"

"Well, the Reverend Tommy, for starters."

"Honey, the Reverend and I are getting on real well, thanks to you."

"Sure-now. That don't never last. What do you expect to do if he takes it into his mind to beat on you?"

Rae paused, considering her loyalties in the matter. It was not a fierce struggle. "He has done that from time to time. But only when he was upset."

"Figures. And what did you do about it?"

"What was I supposed to do?"

"There's lots of options. What did you do, Rae?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing? Just let him beat on you?"

"I asked him to stop."

"Rae, in my opinion doing nothing is not an option."

She held up the knife. "This is an option."

"I couldn't."

"He don't have to know that. Make him wonder. You never know, it might just add a little spice."

"He's so much stronger..

"He's got to sleep sometimes, don't he? Just remind him about the lady who cut her husband's dick off and threw it in the vacant lot."

"She didn't."

"Bless her heart, she did. It was all over the papers and teevee. You didn't see that? It just naturally perked up every woman I know. I tell you what, the good Reverend has heard about it even if you ain't. You can just bet them old boys is whispering to each other all across the country, 'Guard your pecker at night-and for God's sake don't get 'em mad!"

"

Rae tittered. "Aural, you sure do have your very own outlook on life."

"I know men," Aural said. She returned the knife to her boot and closed the Velcro strap over it. "Bring on this anti-fan. If he has balls, I know how to deal with him.

Cooper awoke to barking. A savage-looking dog, part Doberman, part mutt, stood just outside the car door, feet planted solidly as if to give full purchase for barks, as if the sheer volume of its noise would send it scooting across the ground like a loose cannon if it didn't brace itself. The dog retreated a step when Cooper's head appeared in the window, then held its ground once more and unleashed a fresh volley of yaps.

It took Cooper a moment to realize where he was and what was going on.

Last night he had parked the car in the lot behind the Dairy Queen so he would be there as soon as the girl showed up. The dog had found him and taken offense at his presence-they always did. Cooper didn't trust animals and they returned the sentiment, dogs in particular. They howled at him as if he were an invading wolf come for the sheep in their care, following him on the street, snarling and barking, sometimes lunging at his leg. Cooper had seen other people calm strange dogs with a word, watched with amazement as they knelt before the snapping beasts and offered a hand to smell and then petted them as easily as if the preceding frenzy of aversion had just been a charade. Cooper could not believe it, it was as if they had something magic to say to the dogs that Cooper could never hear. People had told him that dogs could hear things that humans couldn't, and he wondered if some people knew how to speak in that language. Whatever the trick, Cooper didn't know it and the dogs knew he didn't know it. He would yell at them to leave him alone if they got too close, and when that didn't work, he would kick at them. Sometimes, when the dogs were large and unusually insistent, he would run from them, but that never worked as it seemed to make them all the more furious at him.

Cooper was hungry and he wanted some breakfast but he was afraid to get out of the car as long as the dog was there. He lay back down on the seat, hiding, but the animal continued to bark and bark. It took a long time for Cooper to realize he could just drive away.

In the late afternoon Cooper returned to the Dairy Queen and parked in the same spot where he had spent the night. The dog started barking as soon as he got out of the car, but this time the sound was distant and Cooper realized the dog was fenced-in now in some neighboring yard.

The girl was working behind the counter, and Cooper waited until she was finished with her customer, standing by the video games and pretending to play. Two animated characters on the screen were kicking and punching each other and although they fell down, neither seemed to get hurt. That did not accord with Cooper's experience of violence. When he hit someone they got hurt, they didn't bounce up again. They stayed down and begged him to stop and sometimes they cried. The characters in the video game wore bandanas on their heads the way a lot of brothers did in Springville, but the characters weren't brothers.

Cooper couldn't figure out what they were supposed to be.

When the girl was free, Cooper stepped up to the counter.