Cry Baby Hollow (22 page)

Joe laughed so hard tears appeared in the corners of his eyes and he actually slapped his leg.

“What’s so funny?” Aubrey asked, sitting up straight.

“What a bastard,” he finally gasped. “John was born with six fingers on his right hand. That scar is from where he had the extra one removed when he was a baby. This may be the only lake in all of Tennessee that doesn’t have a single snapper or snake. There’s something in the water from the spring they don’t like. That’s why we have more than our fair share of frogs. There’s not much around that eats ‘em here.”

Aubrey looked at him as if he had just announced that they had declared peace in the Middle East.

“Are you sure?” She asked.

“Positive,” he promised.

Aubrey jumped up and ran into the cabin, leaving Joe and Drake to stare quizzically after her. She was back a moment later, her sopping running clothes exchanged for a little black bikini.

“Does Vina still have her boat?” She asked Joe breathlessly.

“It was in the shed down by her dock last I looked,” he told her, distracted by the change in her mood, but even more so by the swimsuit which covered only a tiny fraction of her body.

“Wana take it out with me?” She asked, forgetting that she was still suspicious of him.

He raised his eyebrows in shock. Clearly he had expected a less hearty welcome.

“I’ve got a bunch of beer and there’s room for a cooler on board,” she cajoled.

“I don’t know how to drive anything that doesn’t have a motor,” Joe told her apologetically. “I can call down and see if Charlie or Armistead can spare their bass boats for the day.”

Aubrey put her hands on her hips.

“I spent over a decade in the US Navy,” she reminded him. “I’ve docked carriers. I think I can manage an eight foot sailboat.”

“You go call Vina and tell her we’re takin’ it out,” Joe told her gamely. “I’ll go get changed and pack the cooler.”

So Aubrey, Joe, and Drake spent the day on the water. The sail on the tiny craft was old and musty, but functional and its fiberglass hull was sound. Aubrey handled the little boat with a deft hand and taught Joe the basics as they glided down the lake one way and then tacked lazily back. Drake loved the feeling of the wind in his wet fur and would dive in as soon as he started to get dry. Joe would scream, “Dog overboard!” and they’d both have to struggle to get him back aboard without capsizing. They finished all the beer and sandwiches Joe had packed, and by the end of the day Aubrey was as brown as a nut in spite of the SPF 30 she continually applied.

“We gotta get back and change if you still wanna go out tonight,” Joe finally told her as the sun began to sink below the mountains.

“Where are we going?” She asked, letting her hand dangle in the water as they drifted.

“If you don’t know, I can’t tell you. Hasn’t anyone told you about the first weekend in August?”

“Are we going to watch the naked girls cavort? Because I already saw their warm up and I have to say I’ll pass.”

“Naked girls?”

Aubrey filled him in on her encounter with the girls in the woods, embellishing a little to make the girls sound even nastier than they actually had been, in case he got any ideas.

“This is why I don’t go out walkin’ alone at night,” Joe told her seriously. “These woods bring out the strange in folks.”

“You were out walking alone the night I met you,” Aubrey reminded him, “and carrying a sledge hammer.”

“A sensible precaution, I think you’ll now agree,” he nudged her leg with his foot playfully. “So are you up for an outing?”

“No naked girls involved?”

“That’ll be entirely up to you,” he said, the mischievous twinkle back in his eye.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Aubrey no longer
felt any pang of guilt. Clearly, Joe was willing to let bygones be bygones and not hold the accusations again
st her. For her part, Aubrey was determined to find some other explanation for the missing pictures. Whoever had done it, it couldn’t be Joe. She slid into the little ensemble from Agent Provocateur without a moments hesitation and decided that the tan she’d acquired after a day of sailing only heightened the effect of the white satin and lace against her skin. She pulled on a light blue sundress and made sure that nothing untoward showed through. By the time Joe came back for her she had her hair curled into submission and had applied a light layer of mascara and lip gloss, her glowing tan making anything else unnecessary.

Joe rang the doorbell and when she answered he took one look at her, closed his eyes and pointed to the truck.

“If you don’t get in the car right now, I’m afraid we won’t make it anywhere tonight,” he told her gravely. It was the nicest compliment Aubrey had gotten in a very long time and she was glad his eyes were closed so he couldn’t see the effect it had on her. She grabbed her bag and slid past him out the door, making sure to linger just a tad too long as their hips touched and delighting at the tiny sound in the back of his throat her move provoked.

“Come on, Drake,” he called, jiggling the door handle to make sure it was locked before pulling it closed.

Drake, worn out from a day of swimming, looked up from his bed at the sound of his name.

“We’re taking the dog?” Aubrey asked, suddenly wary. “Where are we going, Joe?”

“It’s Friday night, baby,” he told her, letting down the tailgate so Drake could hop in the back of the truck and then walking around to open the door for her. “We’re goin’ to Walmart.”

Aubrey laughed and hopped in the truck, making sure to let her sundress hitch up a bit as she slid onto the bench seat. She looked back at Drake.

“You think he’ll be okay back there?” She asked.

“He rode all the way from the farm in Georgia to Knoxville back there when I went to pick him up,” Joe informed her. Aubrey hadn’t realized he’d gone to get the dog himself. Joe started the truck and pulled out onto the road. Drake put his front paws up on the wheel well in the bed and leaned forward into the wind, obviously loving every minute of the ride.

“You’re sure he won’t jump out?” She asked.

Joe smiled and looked over at her indulgently. “I’m positive.”

They drove through downtown and everyone they passed waved at Joe. When they started to approach the highway, Aubrey looked over at him uneasily.

“Where are we going, Joe?” She asked again.

“Walmart,” he told her again.

She looked over at him in disbelief, but as they drove over the highway overpass, past the Waffle House, the Family Inn and the BP, she realized that he must be telling the truth, because that was the only thing left on the road.

“Relax,” Joe told her. “We’re just poppin’ in for supplies.”

“I’ll stay in the car and make sure Drake stays put,” she told him.

Joe looked at her quizzically as he parked.

“My mother will disown me if I go in there,” she explained reluctantly.

“Come again?”

“My mother has told me, on numerous occasions, that if I go in a Walmart I will be disowned.”

“Seriously?” Joe asked, incredulous.

“She’s always serious.”

“She one of those people who thinks its destroying small town America?” Joe asked.

Aubrey sighed.

“No, she’s mad at Sam Walden for not marrying her.”

“Your Ma dated Sam Walden?”

“No.”

“They knew each other though?”

“No,” Aubrey gave up. There was no point in shielding him. If they were going to be together for any length of time he was bound to find out anyway. “She had a dream that he married her and she’s never forgiven him for not making it come true.”

“I think he’s dead now,” Joe told her reluctantly.

“Yeah,” Aubrey agreed.

“But you still can’t shop here?”

Aubrey shook her head.

“So she’s holdin’ a grudge against a chain of stores because the dead guy who founded it, who she never actually met, didn’t find her and marry her like in a dream she had?”

Aubrey nodded.  “She’s insane,” she told him. “She seems perfectly normal in all other regards, but about this, she’s insane.”

Joe laughed.

“All Melungeon women are insane,” he assured her. “That’s just the most interestin’ presentation of it I’ve ever heard.”

He got out and called Drake who leapt from the bed and up into the cab. Joe rolled down the window halfway.

“Guard the radio, boy,” Joe told him and shut the door.

Joe walked around and helped Aubrey out.

“I won’t tell her you were here,” he promised. “It’ll be our little secret.”

Aubrey reluctantly hopped down.

“How do you know about the Melungeons?” She asked as he cranked her window down to give the dog some more air and then took her arm to lead her into the store as if they were a courting couple on their way to a big dance.

“I know all kinds of things about Melungeons,” he told her. “I know the women are all crazy and can give you the evil-eye so you aren’t supposed to look at ‘em and I know that their children are often born with extra fingers and toes. The Indians called that the mark of the beast. They likened it to dew claws on dogs.”

Aubrey looked down at her hands.

“I guess I should be glad I’m only half.”

“That only runs in certain families,” Joe assured her.

“How do you know all that?” Aubrey asked. Her mother and grandfather, Vina and most of the people in the cove were all at least part Melungeon, yet she’d never heard any of it.

“Most of my work is tracking big population migrations, but I’ve always enjoyed the little isolated groups that nobody can figure out where they came from. There’s a surprising number of ‘em all over the world. When I started teachin’ at UT and heard about the Melungeons, it was like a present. A great big mystery right in my own back yard. So I started going up to Newman’s Ridge, that’s where most of the Melungeons were centered, but they’re not really isolates anymore. They’ve all integrated into normal society, which makes things harder from a genetics point of view.” He selected a cart and pushed it into the store, making sure Aubrey was still following him. “Then I heard there were a bunch of families that broke off and came down here, so I tracked ‘em down.”

“Does Vina know this?”

“Sure, she gave me a gene sample along with everyone else in the hollow. Course I didn’t tell ‘em right away. Mountain folks aren’t too keen on other people pryin’ into their affairs and Melungeons are a particularly secretive bunch. The older ones still remember when the south was black or white, and they were sorta brown. The paler ones tried to pass and were usually caught and the darker ones were stuck in a sorta segregation limbo.”

“Why are you buying a camp chair?” Aubrey asked, looking at the deluxe model Joe had thrown in the cart. It had arm rests and a cup holder. “I’m not dressed for camping,” she pointed out.

“Don’t you trust me?” He asked, putting another chair in the cart and moving on.

Aubrey hoped that was a rhetorical question, because she had no idea how she would answer it.

Joe seemed to sense her unease and went back to the previous topic as he wheeled over to the candy isle. “First time I came down I just stayed for a week and poked around town,” he told her. “The next time I went over to the hollow and had a look. I figured out pretty quick Vina was the ringleader and asked if I could fish off her dock. She said no, but I keep comin’ by and pestering her. Then I see she’s havin’ trouble with her yard man and offer to cut the grass in exchange for fishing the rest of the day. Next thing you know, once a week we’re settin’ up the grill and havin’ the whole hollow over to eat my catch. They’d talk and tell stories and I’d just listen. Pick some candy.”

Aubrey thought about the extra laps she’d run that morning. “I don’t really want any candy.”

“Pick some anyway,” he insisted.

She grabbed a box of Junior Mints and tossed them in the cart next to Joe’s giant bag of Sour Patch Kids. He veered over to the grocery section of the store.

“So the next summer I come back and let slip that my hotel is raisin’ the weekly rate and I might not be able to stay long, and Vina offers to let my use the cabin. That felt like a bit much to me so we settle for me parkin’ my trailer in its driveway. The next summer she agreed to sell me the lot across the lake, where I am now, but only after I cleaned her gutters.”

“You are a very deceitful and patient man,” Aubrey told him, but she was grinning.

“After that I let ‘em know I was in the area lookin’ for Melungeons, and I’d come because I heard there were some in the next cove over, but they wouldn’t ever talk to me.”

“Did you try to interview the Mosleys?”

“Hell no,” Joe blurted. “Those people are so crazy they give crazy a bad name. But by then Vina and the girls all liked me, and they knew that if I went pokin’ around the Mosleys I’d get into trouble, so they confide that they’re as Melungeon as they come and let me take DNA and interview ‘em. I guess they thought I wouldn’t come back the year after that, but I still do. The hollow kinda grows on ya, and I’d taken a likin’ to fishing all summer. By then I was divorced and comin’ up a lot more often.”

Joe wheeled to the checkout and told the girl he also needed two bags of ice. As he paid, Aubrey looked around. She had been so absorbed in his story she hadn’t paid much attention to what was going on around them, but it suddenly occurred to her that not a single person had greeted Joe. She caught several people looking at them, but no one so much as waved. When he had collected the ice and they headed out to the truck, she asked him why.

Joe just shrugged. He helped her into the cab and put Drake back in the bed, tossing the ice into an already loaded cooler and placing the rest of the supplies at Aubrey’s feet.

“So where to now?” She asked as he pulled out of the parking lot and headed back toward town.

“Parrotsville,” was all he’d say.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Aubrey searched her
memory. Parrotsville was a tiny hamlet just on the other side of the river. They passed Dixie Highway without turning and snaked through the hills. Houses tended to be small and gardens huge. As they drove along sedately, Joe pointed out the various inventive ways people had found to grow pole beans.

There were teepees of bamboo poles or branches, frames of PVC, and at one particularly m
emorable plot, an old swing set with all its swings removed and a net hung from the top. Aubrey stared at it as they passed, half expecting to see a crazy old woman playing on it like they had at the Mosley’s.

They passed fields filled with giant round hay bales and even more filled with cows. Aubrey noticed for the first time that nearly every herd had at least one donkey in it. They also passed an emu and alpaca ranch and a little cinder block house with lines of boxes behind it and a huge flower garden off to its side.

“That’s Wiley’s place,” Joe told her, pointing. “He rents his bees out to the local farmers for pollinatin’.”

They turned off on a side road and Aubrey felt like they were going back the way they’d come. She looked up the shape of a familiar hill.

“Aren’t we just on the other side of the lake?” She asked.

“Kinda,” he admitted. “The Mosley cove wraps around the hollow like a horse shoe, so they’re between us and the lake, but you can’t get there from here.”

Aubrey saw a strange field set up on a hill. It was surrounded by chain link, which was rare, and filled with rows of dog houses.

“Is that a kennel?” She asked.

“They raise fightin’ roosters. That’s how Cocke county got its name.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“To fight ‘em it is, not to raise ‘em. They sell ‘em down in Mexico.”

In all the summers she had spent here as a child, Aubrey had never realized what a hotbed of illegal activity it was.

“Why don’t you get to see your son?” Aubrey asked suddenly, surprising herself almost as much as Joe.

“His mom got remarried and moved away. It was only supposed to be for a year but they’ve been gone three,” he told her sadly.

“Shouldn’t you still get to see him?”

“I’m supposed to on Christmas and summer break, but it seems like every time I try, somethin’ gets in the way. This year it was soccer camp. She puts him on the phone and he begs me to let him stay home for the summer so he can go with his friends. He’s eight. What am I supposed to say when he begs not to have to see me?”

Aubrey felt a hot surge of anger.

“You’re supposed to say, ‘Put your mother back on the phone, please,’ and then inform the manipulative bitch that if she doesn’t deliver your son at the appointed time you’ll have her in court for custody violation. Then you remind her that she signed the legal papers, not your son, and it’s her legal responsibility to adhere to them. You might also tell her that by encouraging your son to make summer plans when she knows he isn’t going to be there, she’s undermining your role as his father, and later in life the boy will probably understand how she’s used him and hate her for it.”