Mark Dunn - We Five

Neither of the girls had had more than a cat nap. They had spent all of the previous two nights in the I.C.U. waiting room as Carrie received continuous updates on her mother’s precarious condition. Sylvia Hale had suffered burns over fifty percent of her body, and the doctors had thought it best to induce medical coma to spare her from excruciating pain. What the doctors hadn’t been able to do was offer any kind of assurance that Carrie’s mother would recover. It is always impossible to know such a thing in those critical first few days. Every patient is different, the doctors had said, and every patient’s immune response to severe bodily trauma unique.

What was additionally difficult for Carrie to bear was that she’d been denied the chance to see her. “Oh goodness mercy! Why would you even want to, child?” was what one of the I.C.U. nurses had said to her (somewhat callously, though the harshness of the statement was softened somewhat by the woman’s honey-sweet Delta drawl). “She won’t know you’re there and she’ll be a fright to look at. Spare yourself, sweetie.”

It was almost as if her mother were already dead.

Molly didn’t know what to say that would be of any comfort to her friend. She only knew that Carrie needed her. And she’d be there for Carrie for as long as was necessary. Mr. Osborne had also made it clear that Carrie could stay with Molly and him if she liked, an offer repeated by three of her sisters. Ruth would have asked her too, but Ruth hadn’t room in her tiny trailer to, as Jane had colorfully put it, “swing a dead cat.”

The two young women wandered in silent head-shaking bewilderment through the remains of the house, its destruction caused by a short in its aging electrical wiring. When Carrie finally found her voice, she mused aloud, “In times like these it does make you wonder why people collect so much stuff. Although I hate it that we’ve lost all the photo albums and the scrapbooks.” Then Carrie turned to Molly and said, “But I’d gladly give up everything I own to have Mama back the way she was.”

Molly nodded, though she was having a little trouble understanding the logic behind such a hypothetical tradeoff. At that moment her eyes fell on the black carcass of Carrie’s violin. “Oh, your fiddle!” she announced sadly.

“Oh, I can always buy another one when I want to start playing again. It’s not like it came from Cremona.”

Molly didn’t get the Stradivarius reference, but she nodded and smiled nonetheless.

Carrie picked up a few things for Molly to take home and keep for her, and then the two left.

As Molly was driving them back to the hospital, Carrie said, seemingly out of the blue, “Do you know if Will’s been asking about me?”

Molly gave Carrie a curious look. “You know I haven’t been back to the casino, Carrie.”

“But you talk to Jane and Ruth and Mags. Did he say anything to them ?”

“If he did, they didn’t tell me about it.”

“Oh,” said Carrie, staring contemplatively into space. Then she said, as if to herself, “I liked him.”

“Will Holborne should be the last thing on your mind right now, Car.”

Carrie shook her head. “He’s the only nice thing I have left to hold on to.”

Molly gripped the steering wheel tightly. “First, that isn’t true. You have your four sisters. We’re always gonna be there for you. Second, you need to stop thinkin’ about Will. He’s just like the others. We were just fun little pieces of ass to them.”

“You sound just like Ruth,” said Carrie, swiping a handkerchief across her swollen eyes. She half groaned/half sighed. “I could sleep for days.” She slumped down in her seat. “I wish the doctors would put me in a coma. And if I’m lucky I’ll never wake up again.”

“You stop talking like that.”

“Will is different,” said Carrie groggily, her eyes now closed.

“Uh-uh. They’re all the same,” responded Molly, giving no ground. She took a deep breath. Then softly — so softly, in fact, that she didn’t think Carrie in her present, half-somnolent state could even hear her, she said, “Except for Pat. He’s the only exception.”

Coincidentally, at that very moment Pat was very much the outlier — but only in the sense of physical proximity to his four Ole Miss frat buddies. Because while he was helping to hose out the casino’s parking garage (not in his job description, but who respects job descriptions in the non-unionized American South?), Pat Harrison’s four friends were all waiting together on the arrivals pick-up deck of Memphis International Airport, each man having driven one of Lucky Aces’ four courtesy vans. They were waiting for the appearance of a large party (four entire vans’ worth) of Atlanta Woman’s Club members, who were treating themselves to three days of gambling and one night of the Jordanaires at their favorite Mississippi River casino. The plane was late. The four men had gotten tired of automotive circling, and one of the airport cops had eventually given them permission to stand.

“I hate this fucking job,” said Jerry Castle through a cloud of cigarette smoke.

“It was supposed to build character,” said Tom Katz, “although in your case, Castle, I always knew that was gonna be a nonstarter.” Tom turned to Will. “So, are you gonna call her or what?”

“What do you care?”

“You don’t care?”

“Course I care. But just how am I supposed to do this? Her phone’s probably a glob of molten plastic.”

“Then go see her at the hospital. Ms. Colthurst said they’ve got her mother in the Baptist in Southaven.”

Will, who was also sucking smoke, exhaled his own thick cloud and shook his head. “Eh — I don’t think so.”

Cain unfolded his arms. He’d been leaning against the Unloading Zone sign cemented into the sidewalk, counting the number of times the same woman in the same blue Dodge Colt was making the “loop” while waiting to pick up whoever it was that was supposed to be flying in around this time. Cain wanted to tell the woman it would be much better for the environment if she’d just park the damned thing, eat the two dollars it would cost to leave the car in the short-term lot, and go inside.

Seeing no need for preamble, Cain said, “I think it’s time to end the game, y’all. Now that Will’s decided to remove himself from competition—”

“Who said Will’s removing himself from competition?” hurled Will, straightening up. After flicking his butt to the ground and then mashing it with the tip of his shoe — it was a black cowboy boot, actually, the closest thing Will could find to go with the livery provided by Lucky Aces — he took a couple of steps in Cain’s direction. “Where’s the rule that says I gotta be stuck with ‘The Warbler’? Besides, I’ve already made big plans for my weekend with Tommy’s friend’s Maserati, and if any of you even tries to blow this for me, I’ll fuck you over real good.”

Jerry Castle hooted. “Being awfully cocky about your chances, ain’t ya, Willy-Boy? Seeing’s as how the girl you wound up with doesn’t have much time for anybody these days ’cept her medium-to-well-done mawmaw.” Castle cawed with laughter.

Cain looked him coldly in the eye and said, “Why do you talk shit like that? After what happened to that woman. And maybe you haven’t noticed, Castle, but until this did happen, you were the only one of us who didn’t have a date lined up for this week. In fact, you left such a favorable impression on Mags, you’d probably be lucky to get her inside the same county with you.”

The fingers that comprised Jerry’s right hand curled into a tight fist.