Jeffery Allen - Holding Pattern - Stories

From her place in the ditch, she could no longer see or hear the white Jaguar. Dim screams. Coughs. Gagging. Feet trampling branches and brush. The smoke thinned. Someone gave a shrill warning cry. She watched it all, immediate and remote, tactile, a viewfinder picture. Face rimmed with light, Chitlin Sandwich was bent forward, both hands gripping the steering wheel, eyes almost touching the windshield, teeth tight in a pained smile.

He looked ridiculous. She smothered an impulse to laugh. He sped by, every eye watching, peeled, and crucified.

The Jaguar turned, tires crying. She pushed herself up from the ground. The car came gunning forward, half-slanted in the ditch. She dusted clean her bright summer dress and presented herself to him, memory and substance, mission and will. The car flipped over, rolled down the ditch, and slammed against a tree, then half rolled back up the ditch and fell on its hood, all four wheels topside, like a trained dog’s paws. Without pause, red hands edged out of the cab and searched the flattened grass. Hands and body, Chitlin Sandwich crawled from the cab and turned onto his back, still, breathing, opposite the Jaguar’s spinning wheels. Sun slanted into the ditch. Chitlin Sandwich. Breathing and bright. The gold watch had broken from gold vest chain. Nowhere in sight. The brim of his fedora directed at the treetops.

Damn, Angela said. Damn. Motherfuck!

The wind carried a blend of dust, exhaust, and blood.

Are they dead?

Crazy bastard.

The motor’s hum in her ears, Sheila approached Chitlin Sandwich with fists formed. Like a retractable cup, he rose in circles from the folds of his baggy slacks. Mouth open. Pieces of fractured windshield embedded in his cheek. In one motion, he removed his fedora, his eyes squinting, and swung it in a wide curve. She watched it beyond time, counting the revolutions, aware of the exact moment the sharp brim caught her forehead. More startled than hurt, she sighted what she could of his eyes and gave him her meanest look. He held his hand up for the fedora’s return. Caught it. At the ready. Like crude professional wrestlers, Frank and Angela tripped and pinned him to the ditch.

Damn! Motherfuck!

It’s okay, Frank said. It’s okay.

The Poors were kneeling over Chitlin Sandwich like priests attending the dying. He pedaled his legs like a trapped fly. Mouth gurgling.

Are you all right? Frank both speaking — to Angela? to her? — and holding Chitlin Sandwich in place.

Numb, Sheila touched her forehead. A dab of fresh warm blood on her finger.

Are you okay?

She raised her dress hem — blinded, exposed — and cleaned blood from her forehead.

Are you okay?

She let her dress fall. Yes.

Are you sure?

Yes. I’m fine.

You sure?

Yes.

You know him?

She know him! Angela said. Damn right she know him! She slapped her cloche, with a blast of dust, against her hip.

Conviction, Sheila moved forward in their direction. She did not rush. Her feet could not feel the ground. She seemed to be walking on her ankles. She came to where they kneeled. She bent at the waist and picked up Chitlin’s fedora. Slapped the dust off her bright summer dress. Reshaped the crown between her fingers. Stiffened the brim. Empty gestures. Indulgent. Vain. Taunting, perhaps. Challenging. In sum — she judged herself — too little too late, but telling all the same. The Poors seemed to understand. Synchronized, they took to their feet — twins, reflective forms — leaving Chitlin Sandwich unattended. Eyes wide, unbothered by sun, he did not try to rise.

The driver takes a quick and cautious glance at me in the rearview mirror, then returns his calm but vigilant gaze to the highway. Though there’s no traffic, he keeps the minivan at a crawl, both hands on the steering wheel, his foot pushing into the hum of the engine. His hair is short and neat, slightly longer than a boot-camp cut. And he is a long-limbed fellow, slim and strong in a long-sleeve cotton shirt and jeans, his skin smooth and bright, milky innocence. “A little town in East Texas. I doubt if you’ve heard of it.”

“No. I don’t think I have.” I lean forward a bit on the wide seat to hear him better, the joints of my shoulders sore from the plane ride.

“Well, I had never heard of the university back home.”

“No?” Dr. Hallard says. The crown of his head rises above the seat cushion in front of me, as bald and pointy as a chess bishop’s, a few remnants of hair here and there on his brown wrinkling scalp. He is a professor back East, specializing in Russian history, if I heard him correctly. He rocks about in his seat, trying to make himself comfortable. We’re both long in the leg, and the minivan is much smaller than it seems, plush cushions meant to foster the illusion of space. What we both must be thinking: A white boy chauffeuring two black men down a Mississippi highway.

“Not where I’m from. It’s kind of isolated. I think my mom was there once. She and my stepdad are driving up next weekend to help me build a shed for one of my professors.”

“You keep busy.”

“Yes. I’ve had to since I lost my scholarship.”

“Do you still train?”

“I try to find the time.”

“You really must. Sixteen feet.” Dr. Hallard sighs in astonishment.

“Yes. My best jump.”

“Wow.”

“There were a couple of other guys back home who could make that jump. One went out to California. One went to New York. He made the U.S. team. I came here and had a good first year, but then I seemed to fall off. I don’t know what happened. I was training hard, as hard as I ever had, as hard as I could.”

“Yeah, well—” Dr. Hallard shakes his head with the same cheerful resignation he had earlier, on accepting the mishap with his luggage at the airport.

“So, have you been on any digs?” I ask.

“Yes, several. We have quite a few sites right here in Mississippi.”

Bleak sunshine. The shuddering windows reveal heavy foliage under an overcast early spring afternoon. Vertical trunks and tightly positioned leaves chart our progress toward the town.

“That’s right,” Dr. Hallard says. “There are Civil War battle sites throughout this area.”

“Several big companies have been constructing strip malls on many of them.”

“You don’t say.”

“Yes.”

“Such a shame.”

“Quite a few people have been trying to stop them.”

“That’s good. A railroad used to run right along here.” Dr. Hallard points to the grassy roadside beside the opposing lane. I take a long and thorough look. Think I see the ghostly outline of railroad tracks. “They would run their transports up and down here.”

“Yes.”

“So there were always plenty of raids and acts of sabotage, not to mention actual battles. Oh man. I can’t even name all of the battles that happened down here. Let me see.” Dr. Hallard taps his fingers on his scalp, sorting through a mental index. “There was Holly Springs, and Corinth. Shiloh, of course. And Tupelo—”

“That’s where my family is from,” I say.

“Oh yeah?” the driver says. “That’s about forty miles east of here.”

“Well, not exactly. They’re actually from Fulton. Houston.”

“So you’ve been down here before?”

“Used to come all the time when I was a kid to visit my great-aunt. That’s been, what, thirty years? Then again, I was here ten, twelve, years ago for her funeral.”

“You might want to drive over while you’re here.”