Scott McClanahan - The Collected Works of Scott McClanahan Vol. I

Sixteen.

She giggled.

Fifteen.

She giggled.

Fourteen.

She giggled.

Thirteen.

She giggled.

Twelve.

She stopped giggling. She said, “Well I’m going to be twelve in two months.”

I flipped out, and she told me it was her cousin in the picture she sent and that everybody said she was going to look like that when she grew up.

I started screaming, “I can’t be doing this. This is illegal.” I told her I needed to stop talking to her.

She got mad.

She told me, “If you stop talking to me, I’ll tell my mom. I’ll tell my mom everything about the dirty talk and I’ll show her your letter.” She read me a raunchy sentence. My heart dropped. She whispered, “I want to hear you.”

“What?”

“I want to hear you or I’ll tell.”

I hung up. The phone rang. Ring Ring.

I just let it ring and put my hand on the phone.

And even now, years later, when I see all the faces, I think, Is that her? I see women at the grocery store, and I see people outside. Is that her? And even now whenever the phone rings, guess what?

I still want it to be her.

I never knew why he did it. I was always afraid of my dad growing up, especially when I was in the 6 thgrade and we were going up Sewell Mountain with this old trellis sticking out of the back of the truck. There was my dad and my mom and me. I was holding onto my mom, trying to keep from getting sick because of my dad’s crazy ass driving, and that’s when it started. My dad looked into his rear view mirror and started slowing down.

My mother said, “What’s wrong Gary?”

Gary Mack looked into his rearview mirror and said, “Well shit. What does he want?”

So I looked back and there was a cop behind him, following behind us and flashing his cop lights.

I thought, “Oh God, don’t let anything go wrong.”

The lights flashed red, clear and blue — red, clear and blue — red, clear and blue.

My dad kept driving up the side of the mountain because there really wasn’t a place to pull over anymore and then he said, “Well where does that bastard think I’m going to go?”

He finally stopped in the middle of a nasty turn in the road.

He said, “I wonder if it’s that trellis hanging out of the back?”

My mother said, “Yeah, I bet it’s the trellis all right. It’s probably just sticking out too far and he wants you to put a flag on it. He doesn’t have any business stopping you on this old twisty turny road though.”

I looked out the back of the truck at the trellis and the cop sitting in the car writing something.

My dad repeated, “No, he doesn’t have any business at all stopping me in the middle of the mountain like this.”

The copper finally quit writing and opened up the door and got out of the car. He was probably only about 5’5” and 240 pounds.

My dad just watched him in the side mirror and chuckled to himself, “Well look at that old fatty. He’s about three foot tall and six foot around. I’d heard they kicked him out of the state police academy because he was so big around he couldn’t fit through the front door.”

My mother softly touched his arm like she always did when she was trying to calm him down and said, “Now, Gary.”

Gary just kept watching the cop. The cop walked up to the door and said in his best badass police voice, “Sir I need to see your license and registration, please.”

My dad looked at him like “What the hell are you talking about?”

The fat copper said, “You were speeding. I caught you going 65 in a 50.”

My dad said, “What do you mean speeding? I wasn’t speeding.”

I thought, “Dad, why are you doing this? Why are you doing this?”

He showed my dad the ticket and said, “You’ll have to sign this ticket, sir.”

My dad said, “I’m not signing a damn thing buddy.”

The cop grew nervous and said, “Well sir, I’ll have to impound your truck and take you to jail.”

My dad said, “The hell you will.” He threw the keys to my mom and said, “She can drive.”

“Why are you doing this dad? Why are you doing this?”

The cop got even more nervous and he said, “Well sir, I’ll have to arrest you and take you to jail.”

My dad opened up the door and said, “Well let’s go Buddy.” He got out, walked to the back of the police car, past the policeman, and opened the back door of the police car. He got in. The cop stood there and looked at my mother like he didn’t know what to do, like he didn’t know what to do with a guy who actually wanted to go to jail.

The cop shook his head and walked back to his car. One of our neighbors drove by and honked the horn.

Honk.

Honk.

She waved out the window and it looked like everybody in the car was laughing.

“Oh God mom, now everybody is going to know,” I said, trying to duck my head. So my mom slid over in the seat and tried adjusting the seat. She was so short we had to pull it up all the way. She tried telling me to settle down. She said, “Well, you know your dad.” I watched the police car turn around in the middle of the road and then my mom turned around in the middle of the road too, and I said, “Why is he doing this? Why is he doing this?”

We followed the police car down into town and towards Town Hall where the city jail was. My dad sat in the back of the police car. He told us what happened later. He said they were going down the road and the cops’ radio went off because somebody had been stabbed or shot or something.

The cop picked up his radio and said, “Sorry I can’t respond right now. I have a prisoner in the car.”

My dad laughed and said, “Prisoner in the car.”

Then he saw the town recorder coming out of the post office and said, “Well hell, there’s Rip. We can take care of this right now.”

The fat cop just kept driving though. My dad started mouthing, “I guess you’re the type of guy they only give one bullet just in case you try shooting somebody.”

They pulled in front of the town jail.

My dad said, “Dumbass.”

My mom and I pulled in front of the town jail too. I sat in the truck and waited with my mom and said, “What’s wrong with him? Why didn’t he just sign the ticket?”

I kept going, “Why is he doing this? Why is he doing this? We were going over to grandma’s to eat and now he’s in jail.”

My mom said, “Well he didn’t have any business stopping your father on that twisty turny road. I don’t see how he could have been going 65 MPH.” Of course he wasn’t. It was end of the month quotas.

My mom said, “I guess I should go inside and see him.”

So she did. She went in to check on him, but he wouldn’t come out. I went in too. My mom and I stood at the door of the jailhouse listening to the cop and the town recorder trying to talk him into just paying the speeding ticket. By this time, the cop didn’t even want to fill out the paper work. He was telling dad he was going to forget the arrest, as long as he paid the ticket. Rip, the town recorder, even told my dad, “Now Mack you can’t stay here. You got a family out there depending on you. Now I know we pissed you off, but you’ve got to go home. You can’t stay in here. Your wife and your child are waiting on you.”

But my dad wouldn’t move.

He sat in a chair and wouldn’t move.

I stood at the door of the jailhouse and tried to convince him too but he wouldn’t come out.

I said, “Please dad. Please come out.”

My mom said, “Come on Gary there’s no sense in this. Just sign the ticket and let’s go over to your mother’s. She’s expecting us.”

But my dad wouldn’t do anything.