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

He sat in a chair beside the cell and shook his head and said, “No. They’re gonna put me in a cell and I’m not saying a damn thing. I’m expecting my first meal too. I know it’s a law in this state that if you arrest someone you have to feed him.”

So he sat beside the jail cell and listened to it all. He listened to Rip tell him it would be forgiven. He listened to the police officer tell him he didn’t want to arrest him over a speeding ticket. He listened to mom ask him why. But he wouldn’t come out because he knew it was not a jail, but his life. He knew he was going to stay there until the day he died.

And then there was the time my dad got into it at the NASCAR race in Charlotte. For some reason we decided to go to the race and spend some time together — just the two of us. It was like one of those trips where your dad teaches you something or other, or he gives you some piece of wisdom.

We were coming out of the race after we watched the cars crash and smash and some guy poured beer on Earnhardt after he wrecked and Earnhardt tried to climb the fence and kick his ass.

“Damn guy trying to pour beer on Earnhardt,” my dad said, distracted.

After the race was over we were walking alongside all of these drunks and all of these drunks were saying under their breath, “Holy shit I’m drunk,” and then, “I’m so goddamn drunk I can’t even see.” Of course, these weren’t even the real drunk people but the guys who were going to drive the real drunk people home.

I giggled at them and watched them and walked beside my dad. He just gave me a look like he always gave me when he didn’t approve of someone’s behavior and he didn’t want me to laugh. We kept walking out of the racetrack and out into the parking lot and then out through this field and down a side road where we parked the Oldsmobile. My dad didn’t believe in anything, but he believed in Oldsmobiles. He walked beside me and said, “Did you have fun?”

I tried to think of something to say but all I could come up with was “Yeah.”

He put his hand on my shoulder, and we walked along.

Then all of a sudden Gary Mack took off running as fast as he could towards the Oldsmobile. I’d never seen him run before. He was fast. He wasn’t normal fast — he was running back fast. I watched him run and shout, “Hey get off that car boy. That’s a damn Oldsmobile.” At first I didn’t even know what was going on, but then I saw the kid. It was this skinny kid with arms about as big around as broomsticks. He was drunk as hell. He was sitting on top of our car.

I ran behind my dad. The drunk kid was trying to get off the back of the car. The kid looked even younger when we got close up. He looked seventeen or sixteen. He was drunk and he was skinny and he had this scared look in his eyes and he was making this nervous sound in his throat like unnn unnn. Before I knew it Gary Mack was up in his face saying, “Boy, that’s a good way to get your ass kicked.”

The boy was still sitting on the car and said, “I’m…I’m…I’m sorry sir…I didn’t mean any harm. I’m just from West Virginia too and wanted to write you a message and tell you I’m from West Virginia. That’s all.”

I looked and there was a half-finished note written with his finger on the dirty back window. It said: Hello I’m from WV too. My name is Michael. How are yo…

He didn’t get the “you” finished though because there was some pissed off guy running towards him at full speed.

Now my dad said, “Well you don’t mess with a man’s automobile, boy.”

The boy said more nervous, “Well I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

But before he could get down off of the car, my dad grabbed his arm and yanked the hell out of him, down onto the ground. The boy fell with a thud and it knocked the wind out of him: HUH.

It scared the kid and it scared me.

I said, “Dad.”

But dad wouldn’t listen to me. And the boy looked up scared and tried crawling away. Then the boy was shrieking nervous now like a pig eee eee, backing away into the darkness.

There were people standing around now and watching us. And so I just looked at my dad’s face and he was a different man almost. We got back into the car and all around, the crowd was staring at us. My dad started the car and I leaned down into the backseat so no one could see me. As he drove away from the grassy field I looked up at the skinny boy’s message that said, Hello I’m from W.V too. My Name is Michael and I just wanted to say Hi. How are yo . And so I sat there and imagined the last letter U. I imagined it inside my head and read the message over again as it glowed in the lights from the race track.

But my dad was more than that. We all are. There was one time we were taking a tour through Stonewall Jackson’s home. There was this old fat woman with her two sons. There was our itty bitty tour guide taking us through the home when all of the sudden one of the sons just leaned over like he was going to pass out. The fat woman went, “Oh my God. What’s wrong with him?”

The tour guide went, “Oh my God. What’s wrong with him?”

Then they both went, “Oh my God. What’s wrong with him?”

My dad walked past them and took the boy against his shoulder and didn’t ask the boy a damn thing. Then he carried him down the stairs so the boy could go outside and get some fresh air.

And he was even more than that. He was more than the guy who scared the shit out of that kid at the race, and he was more than the guy who threw a possum further than any man had ever thrown a possum before. He whipped the possum around and around his head like it was a sling shot. Then he threw it high into the sky and the possum went up up up until it became a star. My dad was the guy from Kroger who worked in the produce department and whose whole job was making dead things look alive. He was the guy from Kroger who was always fighting rot. He was the one who sold groceries to all of the mothers in town.

And when I think of him now, I see all of my friends sprouting from the mountains like giants because he was the one who made the children grow.

And sometimes at night my mother sat up in bed with me and told stories. She told me about her Grandpa Ray who was a butcher in Beckley. And she told me how he left home when he was only sixteen years old and became a hobo. He rode all the way across the country and went hoboing for a couple of years and ended up in California, in Hollywood. After walking for a couple of days he wound up in a movie with a young Clark Gable. She didn’t know if it was true or not or what the movie was, but he even had a line in the movie. It was a western and he came into the scene shouting to Clark Gable, “The injuns are coming. The injuns are coming.”

One night years later I was with a girl I knew from school. I told her the story about Ray Smith, and we sat outside on these steps of an old building and I told her how I wanted to write stories someday. She told me if I ever wrote one to put in that line, “The injuns are coming.” And no matter where she was she’d see that line and know I was talking to her. So here it is.

The injuns are coming.

Then my mom told me about her Grandpa Russ and how he was killed in a plane crash (and how years later Ray Smith married his wife). She told me he was a pilot. His wife had sent him out to the store to get a loaf of bread and some groceries. They think he must have met one of his pilot buddies at the store. They decided to go out to the airport and fly around a bit. And they don’t know what happened really, but they think maybe Grandpa Russ had a heart attack when his buddy was in the back of the plane, and they just nosedived down into the ground. The plane crashed and they both died. And all that was left of him was a piece of his heel bone, some glass from the cockpit window, and his old watch with the hands of time burnt in it.