Creepers (2 page)

***

Sheila woke with a start, bound and gagged.  She was groggy, and her body seemed to be like lead.  Try as she might, Sheila couldn’t seem to move a muscle.  The bindings were painfully tight and burned into her skin, yet it seemed that her hands were still free.  She just couldn’t move them.  She couldn’t scream either.  There was a gag, but it didn’t seem to be enough to keep her silent.  She just couldn’t move her mouth or her tongue.  All she could do was stare dumbly upward, or wherever her face happened to be pointing.  Sheila finally realized that she was somehow paralyzed.

There was also that hazy feeling.  Sheila was fading in and out of consciousness, like she was just passing out from a good buzz.  Only this was not a good buzz at all, and Sheila was terrified.  Through cloudy moments in a dream-like state, Sheila believed that she was being dragged.  She was positive that she was on the ground and being dragged toward the woods just past the end of her trailer.  She could feel sharp edged rocks dig into her back and legs and shoot splinters of pain through her body.  But Sheila could do nothing.  Frozen by both terror, and whatever paralytic she had been exposed to, Sheila could only struggle in her mind. 

In this dreamy reality, she was dragged through stands of sweetgum, dogwood, and silver bell that made up this area of the Homochitto National Forest.  Deeper into the forest she was pulled, until the canopy above hid any trace of light from the stars or moon.  In the total darkness that enveloped her, Sheila could make out no shapes or forms.  Her mind clearing, but still unable to move; she was sure that she was deep in the woods where no one would ever find her.  Sheila could feel that she was lying on a bed of leaves, their prickly edges poking her in odd places.  She could smell the dank forest floor and decay in the earth, mixed in with sweeter aromas of kudzu and dogwood blossoms.

All around her she could smell the fragrances of the woods, and feel the textures of the vegetation.  However, she could not hear another living thing except for the subtle rustle of leaves and occasional snapping of branches.  There were no hoots or whistles, none of the typical sounds of the woods.  Not even a cricket chirped.  It was as if the forest was as paralyzed as she was, frozen in fear.  All was silent.  Well, not totally silent she decided.

Someone or something moved in the vegetation around her, just out of sight.  It was her captors; she was sure of it.  She could feel them tighten her bindings even more, almost beyond what she could bear.  They dug into her flesh, and she started to feel the blood trickling down her skin from the gashes they inflicted.  They squeezed tightly around her baby bump and for just a moment, Sheila thought of someone else besides herself.  But that thought only lasted a minute.  The pain was excruciating, and she screamed out in her mind.  Panic welled up in her again, and she fought in vain to move.  All she could do was lie there, just lie there and feel what was happing to her.  In utter agony and powerless to move, all Sheila could do was endure.

The air was damp with mist, and when Sheila breathed it in, it burned her lungs.  It stung her eyes too, and the bare parts of her skin.  The stinging quickly grew into a burning.  It became a fire like nothing she had ever felt before.  Not only was Sheila’s skin on fire, her insides seemed to be burning as well.  She could feel her lungs get heavy with fluid, and her breathing became labored.  How her lungs wanted to cough out the onslaught, expel the tainted air being thrust into them, but they couldn’t.  All she could do was breathe it in.  Just breathe it in and let it do its damage.  But the mist was damaging her skin as well.

More and more blood and fluid began to ooze from her flesh; she could feel it running down her skin.  It was no longer just seeping from the gashes caused by the bindings either; it was free flowing from everywhere.  Soon her vision became blurry, and Sheila felt as though hot pokers had been jabbed into her eye sockets.  Then the pokers became liquid, pools of molten lead, melting its way into her brain.  The pain became more than Sheila could bear, and she passed out.

For hours, she languished in and out of consciousness, blind and alone in the dark.  She could feel parts of herself slide away onto the ground.  Bits and pieces of her flesh turned gelatinous and could no longer hold its shape, so it just dropped off.  Fingers and toes and skin, all of it began to liquefy.  Terrified and in unbearable suffering she laid there, slowly dissolving.  Finally, Sheila’s lungs collapsed, and she could no longer breathe.  At last, sweet death had taken her.  All the while, through her torment, her captors never said a word.  The last thing Shelia heard before she melted away was the far off and impossible sound of gospel music.

Jesse Johns enjoyed life; he always had.  Life was a beautiful gift from God and was only as right or wrong as you chose to live it.  At least that’s what Jesse believed.  Whatever happened to a man was God’s will, and only God knew why God did what God did.  His will was not for the likes of Jesse, or any other man to figure out.   So Jesse always faced each day with a smile.  Whatever befell Jesse each day was God’s will.  When his first wife had been raped and murdered by the Klan in the summer of ’65 that was God’s will.  When his second wife and son died in child birth in ‘68, well that was God’s will too.

It’s not that those losses didn't sadden Jesse; they did.  It was just that for reasons known only to God, He had taken them.  They were in His glory, and Jesse was happy for that, happy for them.  However, Jesse never tried to marry a third time; it seemed that was not to be his life.  His life, it appeared to Jesse, was to be devoted to God.  So it was in the summer of ’69 that Jesse had become a preacher.  Every Sunday you could find him at the White Apple Baptist Church, saving the souls of the good and not so good folks of Lusaoka Mississippi.

Not to be confused with the Southern Baptist Church on White Apple Road, Jesse's church was a poor church.  Jesse’s congregation was primarily black, while white was the predominating color at Southern.  That didn’t bother Jesse; folks liked to be around similar folks.  As long as there was a church in there somewhere, well, Jesse figured that was okay too.  Southern Baptist also had a lot more money and a beautiful new brick building with a paved parking lot.  Jesse was okay with his little one room church and the grass field; it was still God’s house.  Jesse knew that times were bad, and Lusaoka was a poor area.  It had been ever since the railroad left, and most of the townsfolk left with it.

Even Jesse found himself taking on the occasional border just to make ends meet, or trade a place to stay for some work on the Church building.  Jesse liked it to tell the truth; it was the closest thing to family the Lord had seen fit to give him.  His current tenant had been staying on and off with Jesse for the last four years, and was the closest thing to a daughter the man had ever known.  She was the daughter of the only white people that had ever attended his church, and chose to stay with Jesse when she came home from college for the summer or a visit.

Jesse had never questioned why Terri would rather stay with him than her family, but he had his suspicions.  It was not his place to judge, which was for the Almighty, but he wasn’t blind either.  He could imagine what home life must have been like for Terri Dixon.  Growing up in abject poverty and ignorance is like a disease that infects your very soul.  It defines the kind of person you become, or you let yourself become.  It taints you with its foul odor such that it literally exudes from your pores if you let it.  Jesse knew it was illogical, but he could actually smell the poverty of some people, and the Dixon’s reeked of it.  

Jesse knew the Dixons weren’t the only desperately poor family in Lusaoka, far from it.  He could just see what old man Dixon had allowed himself to become because of it.  Donald Dixon was one mean S.O.B., and about as poor white trash as Jesse had ever seen.  It was only after he had met Sarah, Terri’s mother that he displayed any semblance of humanity.  She somehow brought out whatever good remained in the man, and he struggled mightily to make her happy.  He even took his family to church, an all-black church, because Sarah Dixon wanted to bring her family up Christian.  It always made Jesse smile a little that his was the only church within walking distance to the Dixons. 

Shortly after Sarah died, Donald quickly returned to his old ways and his old hatreds.  That’s when Jesse had seen the changes in the Dixon children as well.  Ricky seemed to want to follow in his daddy’s footsteps, and was soon every bit white trash as his father had ever been.  Terri, on the other hand, had resolved to make her life better, to climb out of the hole in which life had put her.  Terri worked hard in school and would often come to Jesse’s for help with homework or just a quiet place to study.  Jesse frequently worried about her, about how driven this little girl was, so driven that she had no life outside of school.  Terri had very few friends and seldom did anything that didn’t revolve around her studies.  Then Jesse realized that maybe she didn’t have much of a life at home either, at least not one with which she  wanted any part.

So Jesse had decided to help the best he could, and do what little he could do.  He provided a safe home and a friendly ear when Terri needed it.  He arranged transportation with some member of his congregation when he had to, and fired up his old Buick when he had the gas for it.  Jesse helped Terri with her classes and made sure she had what she needed to get her through high school.  Then he helped her apply to different universities, and fill out her financial aid paperwork. In many ways, Jesse had become the father that Donald never was, and Terri became the daughter he could never have.  In all his mysterious ways, God had given Jesse the family he had always wanted.  So it was with a father’s pride that he had put her on the bus to Memphis, to attend the University of Memphis.

Now here it was nearly six years later, and Terri would be graduating soon.  You wouldn’t think Jesse’s smile could get any wider, but it always did when he thought about Terri.  Right now, that infamous smile was ear to ear and filled with nearly perfect white teeth.  A stark contrast to the darkness of his skin, Jesse had always had a fantastic set of chompers.  All thanks to the Lord of course.  His smile had always been his most disarming feature; it was such a part of the man’s charisma it made you want to please him just to get a glimpse of it.

All of a sudden Jesse’s eyes welled with tears.  They were not only tears of joy and love; they were the tears of a proud father.  Jesse pulled the dishrag from his shoulder and wiped his eyes dry, then continued upward to wipe the sweat from his bald head.  He placed the dishrag back over his shoulder and continued on with the breakfast he was cooking for Terri and himself.  With the bacon done, Jesse plopped it onto a paper towel to soak up some of the fat.  Then Jesse broke open a couple of the fresh eggs he’d collected that morning and dropped them into the skillet with the remains of the bacon grease.  Just as he was beginning to swish them around with a fork, Terri padded softly into the kitchen.

“Grab them biscuits out of the oven child,” Jesse said without turning around, “and grab some apple butter out of the fridge.”

“Mmm, smells good,” Terri replied as she did what Jesse had asked.  “But you shouldn’t be eating that, it’s not good for you,” she scolded.

“I’ve been eating bacon and eggs every morning for near to seventy years now, and I’m as healthy as a horse.”  He replied.  “This here is as natural and organic as any of those fancy restaurants in Memphis serve,” he continued, “and twice as tasty!  Organic this and something free that.  That’s just something for the rich folks to think they’re getting better than the rest of us.  It all comes from the same place.”

Terri smiled to herself and set the biscuits and apple butter on the table.  She would let it go today.  It had been a long drive down from Memphis, and she wasn’t in the mood for a debate with her da…Terri caught herself in mid-thought, Dad.  She supposed that was what she was thinking.  Terri had always thought of Jesse as more of a father than her own.   She cared more about him than she did about her own dad too.  Terri realized just then how much she loved the old man.  So she walked up behind him and gave him a hug.

Jesse turned off the burner under the skillet full of eggs and gently patted the small hand wrapped around his mid-section.  He felt Terri bury the side of her face into his back, and he smiled.  God had given him a daughter after all, he thought, and he couldn’t have asked for a better one.  Jesse moved his hand from hers and wiped away a tear that was trying to form in the corner of his eye.  He sniffed once and cleared his throat as if to speak, but only stood there silently basking in God’s glory.  Jesse was happy. After an awkward moment, he pulled Terri’s hands from around him.

“We’d better get to this breakfast before it gets cold,” he said.  “I wish you had been able to make it down for the services yesterday,” he continued, “I ain’t never heard the choir sing the gospel like they did yesterday.”

Terri smiled and said, “I’ll be here all summer Jesse.  You know I will be at the rest of your services, right?”  She thought for a moment and then added, “I just had to take care of stuff before I could come down.”

Jesse smiled and nodded.  “I know,” he said, “They just had the spirit in them yesterday, that’s all.  Now let’s eat.”

***

Donald Dixon was a grubby little man in a grubby little house at the end of a grubby lane.  The years had not been kind to Donald, but then Donald hadn’t been that kind either.   He had always been an ill-tempered cuss, and the one time he had tried to be an upright citizen, well the world up and spit on him again.  It had taken the only love Donald had ever known and replaced her with a bitter seed.  The only things left in life that Donald gave a crap about were his smokes and his beer.  So while Terri and Jesse dug into their scrambled eggs and bacon, he was on his way to yet another liquid breakfast. 

Donald opened the door of his grubby, half empty refrigerator and peered into it.  There wasn’t much there, but he didn’t need much.  He had a sixer, and that should get him through lunch, he decided, and there was half of an old roasted chicken that should get him through dinner.  So he yanked a can from the six-pack rings, popped the top, and let the cold liquid bath his tongue.  Donald finished the beer in five or six big gulps then grabbed another one before he finally closed refrigerator door.  He casually tossed the empty can into the sink and turned toward the kitchen table.

“Damn,” he muttered as he kicked out a chair to sit in, “where is that boy?”  Then Donald let his scrawny ass slip down onto the chair, and he opened the second beer.  His stomach somewhat full from the first one, he sipped a little more gingerly from this can.  He rubbed the back of a gnarled old hand across his cracked thin lips then let out a gut busting belch. 

“Damn,” he muttered again as he lit up a half-smoked Pall Mall.  Donald took a couple of deep breaths of the cigarette then followed it with another swig of his beer.  He always knew that Ricky was a useless turd, but he had always brought him his weekly supplies.  The dumb-ass might have missed bringing them on Friday, even show up with them late on Saturday or even Sunday.  But here it was Monday morning, and old shit-for-brains still wasn’t here.  Donald wondered then if that whore he was shacked up with might not have something to do with it. 

Donald had tried to call his trailer several times but had never gotten an answer.  He finally called those idiot Unger boys and even Yancy, but the last time they had seen Ricky was Friday night.  Maybe that Sheila had finally caught him putting his dick in someone else, he thought.  Donald had heard that Ricky was a tail chaser, so surely the little bitch knew.  Then he thought better of it.  That little skank didn’t have the balls to lose her meal ticket, such as it was, not with a baby on the way.  No, something must have happened to Ricky he finally decided.  Either that or the two of them just took off.

That made some sense to Donald.  As rotten as his life had been, he could still remember a time when he would have done that for his Sarah.  She had been everything to Donald, but just like everything he loved, the world found a way to rip it from him.  Tears tried to fill his eyes, and he fought them back.  No.  Not today.  He wasn’t going down that road today.  Donald Dixon didn’t have the patience for tears anymore.  He’d used up all he was going to and refused to shed another one.  Not for Sarah.  Not for a son that the best part of had run down his Mama’s leg.  Not for a daughter who would rather run with niggers than her own family, and certainly not for anyone else. 

So he forced his mind back to his predicament.  He was low on beer and cigarettes, and he had no idea where his worthless son was.  He was getting pissed at Ricky, and he wanted to hold onto that mad.  Mad felt good.  Mad felt right.  It was the one thing that Donald had a good grasp of.  It was the one thing into which he could sink his rotten yellowed teeth.  It’s not so much that Donald liked being mad, he just didn’t know how else to be.  He’d spent the better part of his life mad, with the exception of a short detour he’d taken with Sarah.  Mad was comfortable.

***

Yancy Clower was worried.  Well, he was worried a little.  Old Man Dixon had called him looking for Ricky.  As far back as Yancy could remember Old Man Dixon had never called him for anything.  That was weirdness number one; he decided.  Weirdness number two was that he hadn’t heard from Sheila either.  She usually called him a couple of times a day just to talk, mostly about what Ricky was doing.  Sometimes she complained about being pregnant or how horrible she was feeling.  Mostly she complained about money and Ricky.  Yancy sometimes wondered if she called just hear herself talk.

He didn’t like listening to her complain any more than Ricky or Tom and Toby Unger for that matter.  He was just more polite about it than any of them and couldn’t say no.  So Yancy figured she just didn’t have anyone else that would listen.  Her life revolved around Ricky, and none of her high school friends had stayed friends for very long after she’d hooked up with him.  Most of the townsfolk didn’t like Ricky.  Well, maybe like wasn’t the right word, not by itself at least.  The majority of the town was also afraid of Ricky.  Yancy was too, as were Tom and Toby, even though none of them would admit it.