Death By The Riverside Part 24

I couldn't say that. I remembered Ben, Alma, and David going off to Ma.s.s every Sunday.

"Guess we ain't got much in common no more," Ben said.

"A lot of good memories, Ben," I answered.

"Yeah, that counts for somethin', I guess. That's all we end up with, a bunch of memories," he replied, a sad look crossing his eyes.

"Things change. They always do. Us kids have to grow up and sometimes it seems we grow away. But...but I still have that little wooden horse you carved for me. It reminds me of you and my dad. I'll never grow so far away as to forget that."

"Thanks, Micky. Little Micky. What your dad always wanted for you, more 'n anything was for you to be happy."

"I am, Ben," I said, knowing it wasn't really true, but also afraid that we were too far apart for me to admit my uncertainty.

"I hope so. I guess me and your dad was so happy with our * 162 *

families, wife and kids and all. Well, it's hard to see someone bein'

happy without them connections. I hope you are," he finished.

"I am, Ben," I repeated. "At least as close as I can get," I added, touching the truth.

"I guess I pictured that seein' as ol' Ben failed havin' a family, that little Micky would succeed. Life's never what you figure it to be," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "I think it's fixed. Try it," he added.

I got in, leaving my door open, and turned the ignition. The engine hummed smoothly, all the usual clanking sounds gone.

"It's great, Ben. Sounds better than it ever did. Thanks." I turned off the ignition and got out. He flashed me a grin and gave his thumbs-up sign. A memory of the younger man in bright suns.h.i.+ne, flas.h.i.+ng that same smile and same gesture to a novice crab catcher caught me by surprise. "You didn't fail," I said. "You had it taken from you. You loved Alma and you loved David and you were the best friend a tomboy growing up could ever have had. You didn't fail. Don't ever say that."

"Thanks, Mick," he said, then turned to look over the unchanging marsh. "It weren't your Dad's fault. I didn't know to tell you or not what really happened. Not your Dad's doin'. There was someone else on the road that night. His fault." His voice broke. "That son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h.

That son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h drunken driver. Why did he leave me behind?"

"I don't know, Ben," I tried to answer.

"Maybe I shouldn't of told you."

"It's okay. I knew."

"Ol' Jones Johnson tell you?" he asked.

"Who?" Then I started to remember Jones. The town drunk with whiskey breath and old clothes that always scared away kids like me.

"I remember him."

"He found the wreck and called the cops. He told me 'bout the other driver there. Jonesy saw him lyin' on the road 'fore they took him away. A tragic mistake, they said. Four people die and other people alive but with no lives left and it was jus' a tragic mistake. The other driver was from a rich family. Money buys a lot of things, don't it?

Murder turns into a mistake."

"I'm sorry." Holloway money. Cordelia's father. I could again hear Th.o.r.eau's words from the dinner party. The cracks were widening on my shaky ground.

"That son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h didn't go to jail. I did. I didn't have no reason * 163 *

to go home, no wife and kids there, so I stayed out, drinkin', and angry.

A fight here and there. It didn't matter. Nothin' mattered."

"Ben, I'm sorry," I repeated still aware of how hollow and inadequate the words sounded. I stepped toward Ben and put a hand on his shoulder, unsure of how to comfort a man who had always before comforted me.

He glanced at me, quickly wiping his eyes again. "At night, lots of time, I lie awake," he said. "Thinkin' how it might be. Alma and me with four or five kids. David in high school, maybe college. Sometimes he's a football star. Sometimes the real smart one, gla.s.ses and good at science. Robert, or Paula if she was a girl, our next kid, oh, all sorts of things. I was so proud of them kids." He paused, clumsily brus.h.i.+ng at his eyes. "Them kids that ain't here. You must think ol' Ben's crazy, dreamin' like that." He glanced at me, quickly wiping his eyes again.

"No, I don't," I replied. "I sometimes wonder...wonder what it would be like if Dad were still here. If he were here for me to visit, not just this...s.h.i.+pyard."

"Oh, Jesus," he sobbed. "They should all of 'em be here." He covered his face with his hands to hide the tears he didn't think he should shed.

"Go ahead and cry, Ben. It's all we can do now," I told him.

Tentatively, I put my hand on his other shoulder and held him in an awkward embrace. I was too aware of the barriers between us to completely reach out to him. How can a promiscuous lesbian hold a Catholic family man? If he really knew me, knew who I had become, he would hate me, I found myself thinking. No, he wouldn't. Ben is better than that, I countered. But the uncertainty lingered, stiffening my embrace of him, scaring me away.

Ben rested his head on my shoulder, harsh sobs racking his body.

I felt a tremendous emptiness, not only for those who weren't here, but for the distance between Ben and me. We were inexorably linked by memory and tragedy, but it was an intersection we had both traveled beyond; I wondered if any road could ever take us back.

Ben returned my hug, as shy and stiff as I was. We stood, no longer a young man and a child, but as an uncertain woman with an older man, trying to connect. Then his hand moved, not much, really just a change in pressure. Meaning s.h.i.+fted. His arms tightened about me. I tensed.

* 164 *

Ben broke away, probably as startled and embarra.s.sed as I was. He hastily wiped his eyes, then shoved his hands in his pockets, and walked a few yards away from me. There was a deep, heavy awkwardness in the air, secrets best buried floating about.

"Yeah, I really admired your dad," Ben said to remind us both who I was. "Honest as the day was long. And a real hard worker. Yeah, he was a good man."

"It's okay," I said, getting over the shock. Desire doesn't fit into a neat compartment. It looms unexpected and messy and had caught me unaware and unprepared at times. Now Ben. That was all, I told myself.

But it wasn't the simple act of desire that had taken us so aback. That Ben could think of wanting me, however fleetingly, meant that I had grown from a girl into a woman, irrevocably beyond innocence. Who were we now? And could those people connect or would we be left with only the tag ends of recollection?

"I'm not really offended," I added, though still unsure of my feelings.

He looked at me, discomfited with my mentioning what had happened. "Certain things a man and a woman ought not to talk about,"

he finally replied, retreating into the man talking to his partner's child.

"Like I said, I got a lot of admiration for your dad and I won't do nothin' that would upset him."

"It's okay," I repeated, "we're all adults here," a line my father used at times.

He kept his hands resolutely in his pockets. "I may not be real good at keepin' out of fights in bars, but I ain't gonna start pawin' Lee Robedeaux's daughter. G.o.d can take me right now before I do that."

"I know. I trust you, Ben," I said.

"Maybe you shouldn't," he answered, walking still farther away.

"You're a nice girl. There's certain kind of low-life you better stay away from."

I could accept that statement and we would both walk away from each other. But maybe if I could break this barrier, the others wouldn't be so hard. Let's talk about who we are now, I thought. If we can do that, perhaps we can talk about death and black nights of the past. Maybe I could finally have a friend from there meet me here in my present.

"You're not low-life. Besides, I'm almost thirty. Don't think of * 165 *

me as some blus.h.i.+ng little sixteen-year-old." Not that I ever blushed at sixteen.

"Don't tell me nothin' that'd make your dad shamed of you," he broke in, trying to cling to the past.

"I'm not a virgin," I stated.

"Don't tell me that," he said angrily, slamming down the barrier.

"You wouldn't tell your dad that."

"Yes, I would," I countered, angry at being rejected and confined by what he wanted to believe about me.

"That's nothin' he'd want to hear. You not married. You'd break his heart. Just like..." He stopped, confused and hurt, seeing more of his world crumbling.

"Just like my mother. And you're wrong. Dad would understand.

He'd want to. He wouldn't have married her if he couldn't."

"You don't know your dad like I do, young lady. You just shamed him. Is that what you want?"

We stood glaring at each other, the grown-up child and the grown old man.

"Let's not..." I said, not wanting this battle, with no winners.

"I don't know. I just don't know no more," Ben mumbled, shaking his head sadly.

"The world changes, doesn't it? Too quickly for both of us," I answered, trying to get back to the small common ground we had.

"Yeah, I guess, I guess so. I'm sorry if I got out of hand. Ol' Ben's been out of touch for a while and, yeah, I guess things've changed. You got a right to live your life, Mick. Don't need Ben's approval."

"No," I replied. "But I would like your friends.h.i.+p. Is that possible?"

I extended my hand. He turned and looked at me, then took a few hesitant steps in my direction. He reached out and took my hand. We shook hands solemnly, like the time we had shaken hands when I was eight and Ben had agreed to give me a secret ride into town so I could get a birthday present for my dad.

"'Course we can be friends. I'd never turn my back on Lee's daughter."

"And I would never turn my back on Dad's partner and best friend."

We had run into a wall, a barricade, that I could see no way past.

* 166 *

But in some small s.p.a.ce we could be friends, some small, confined part of the past.

"You can stay out here, if you like," I said as we let go of each other's hand. "No electricity, but there's still running water. Key's still hidden..."

"In that ol' hollow stump. Some things never change," he finished for me. "Thanks, Mick. I might take you up on it. I got me some work at Bob's Catfish Shack. Doin' odd jobs and stuff. Get my meals there. I need to be headin' that way now."

"Let me give you a lift," I said.

"Naw, it's okay."

"Got to try out the engine and make sure it's really fixed," I kidded.

"Well, now, that's true," he agreed with a grin.

I quickly put the tools away. Ben was staring at the unchanging marsh when I came back.

"Hop in," I said. I started the car and drove out of the s.h.i.+pyard.

The car's engine ran smoothly as we picked up speed on the road into Bayou St. Jack's.

We came to the curves where the accident had happened. I must have slowed because Ben noticed and said, "It happened here. I guess you know that. I was takin' a boat to Pascagoula. I found out when I stepped on the dock. Took a bus back here. But...but they was dead and ready to be buried by the time I got here. So I got drunk and come out here and just sat, only a skid mark and some broken gla.s.s left to see."

"Yeah, I know," I replied. There seemed so little to say.

"How do men like that live? How do you kill women and children like he done?"

"I don't know, Ben. I don't think there is any answer."

Ben shook his head. "That's what they want you to think, them rich folks. But I know better. Jonesy come and saw me in jail. He sobered up and got religion, then got cancer. He wanted to set things right, he told me, before he met his Maker. He'd stole the wallet out of that man's jacket and when the cops come, he'd just shoved it in his pocket. Then some big-shot from the city give him money to forget everythin' he heard and saw that night. So Jonesy drank a lot and forgot a lot. But after he got sick, he wanted to set things right, so he found me and told me what really happened. So I started askin' some more * 167 *

questions. You ask enough, you finally get the answers you want. Now I know his name. Holloway. No connections, so he could kill other folks' families," Ben answered, still trying to make sense of it after all these years.

"I wish it were that simple," I said knowing differently.

"Sometimes it is," Ben answered, slipping into lecturing the kid he had known.

"Fate's a funny thing. I met his daughter a little while ago."

"You kiddin'?" I shook my head. "She tell you she was?"

"No, something she said," I replied vaguely.

"That son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h. He had a daughter, but he still went ahead and murdered my wife and kids. And your dad. d.a.m.n him. Just d.a.m.n him!" He paused for a moment to get control, then asked, "How'd you meet that daughter?"

"Danny Clayton. The Claytons' daughter. I guess they went to graduate school together," I answered, not wanting to go into the details.

"You didn't tell her, huh?" he asked.

"No. I didn't want to get into it."

"I would've. I got hold of Ignatious Holloway. That was the big-shot that give Jonesy the money. Jonesy saw his picture in the paper and remembered. It was his son that did it, his drunken son. Told him who I was. Told him I knew what really happened that night. That drunken b.a.s.t.a.r.d. No stain on the Holloway name. Not them. He'd give me money, a job, if I would just let the past be. I told him I didn't want no job, no money, not from him. He lied and said that his son was dead.