Quiver (4 page)

He saw a buck in the row, coming right at him. The deer cut left and he lost it. He ran right, saw the buck appear again and disappear, zigzagging toward him. He was running along the edge of the cornfield. Luke heard the deer and saw it taking down stalks as it charged toward him. He tried to draw the bowstring, but his hands were shaking and he couldn’t breathe. He felt like the strength had been sucked out of him. The deer was close now. Twenty yards. Ten. And then it went left and ran by him, darting into the woods.

Luke felt helpless at the moment. And stupid. He took a breath and tried to relax. He couldn’t believe it. Maybe the best chance he’d ever have to shoot a whitetail, and he couldn’t do it. His dad had mentioned it, a condition called buck fever
that afflicted hunters and now he knew what it felt like.

His hands were steadier now and he sucked in air. Regained his strength and pulled the bowstring about halfway to see if he could do it. And there, coming down the row right at him, was another buck, a bigger one, and he remembered his dad saying, “Deer are color-blind, but they’re good at picking up movement. So when you get in your stance, be as economical as you can. Don’t move any more than you have to. Pull straight back.”

And that’s what Luke did. Stood balanced, in full draw now, centered the buck in the crosshairs of his sight. He saw his dad closing in behind the deer, just a glimpse before he released the arrow and followed its trajectory, hitting the animal in the meaty part of his upper body above the shoulder. The whitetail stopped running, stumbling now, staggered a few yards and fell over. Luke ran toward the deer, pumped, excited. As he got closer, he could see it was still alive, trying to get up, but couldn’t, laying on a bed of trampled cornstalks, black eyes watching him. He looked for his dad, who had been close behind the deer, but didn’t see him.

Owen could see the buck struggling to get up as Luke approached, not knowing it was bleeding to death, the broadhead having gone through its heart, blood pumping out, a dark purple-red. The deer had about five minutes before everything would shut down.

Owen wasn’t in much better shape, sitting in the dirt, propped up by cornstalks, the ground cold and wet under him, a corncob digging into his back. It was strange: he didn’t feel the arrow that had gone through the buck and somehow had hit him, the carbon shaft buried in his chest up to the white fletching. His shirt was soaked with blood and more blood bubbled out of his mouth as he tried to breathe. He knew he was in trouble.

Luke saw him now and ran over, falling to his knees, too stunned to comprehend what he was seeing. He dropped his bow, slipped off his backpack. “God, what’d I do?”

He had tears coming down his face.

Owen said, “Luke, listen to me. It isn’t your fault. Just get help. Tell ’em they’ve got to bring a helicopter in.”

Luke got up and took off, running.

Owen looked at the whitetail that would’ve dressed out at about two hundred pounds, the animal still trying to find its legs, movements becoming less pronounced, and then no movement at all.

How odd was this? After racing cars for twenty years going two hundred miles an hour in the tight confines of the racetrack, he’d only been in three accidents and wasn’t hurt too bad in any of them. Although Kate would most likely have disagreed, taking care of him for three months while his injuries healed after Talladega in ’94. She said it was the grumpiest she’d ever seen him. He said, “What do you expect, I’m missing a third of the Cup season.”

Owen remembered it like it was yesterday. He was on lap 256 when Dale Senior came up behind him and must’ve taken the air out of his spoiler. Dale may have nudged him a little, too, but didn’t bang him intentionally. In any case, Owen spun into the wall at about 205, rolled four times, smashed into the catch fence and landed upside down near the entrance to pit road. He was airlifted to the hospital. Broke his right ankle and his left wrist and was in a coma for two days. When he opened his eyes, Kate was sitting on the edge of the bed next to him, a look on her face like the day Luke was born.

He said, “You like watching people sleep, is that it?”

She said, “I must,’ cause that’s all I’ve done for two days.”

He thought he was in his bedroom at home till he looked around and said, “Where in hell am I?”

“Citizens Baptist Hospital, Talladega, Alabama,” Kate said. “Remember hitting the wall and then rolling four times?”

He didn’t. Not then. But it came back to him within a week. It also helped to see it on videotape replay, confirming what he suspected. Big E’s black Monte Carlo coming up fast behind him, Dale trying to make up for penalties for driving too fast on pit road and having too many crewmembers over the wall on a pit stop.

Owen was leading at that stage of the race, but didn’t get into another racecar for three months, and did it over Kate’s protests.

“Are you out of your mind? You’re lucky to be alive. Here’s what’s left of your car, in case you forgot.”

She handed him a picture that showed wheels and tires, pieces of sheet metal and a roll cage—the thing that saved his life.

“And here’s what’s left of you,” she said, indicating his casted limbs and hospitalized condition.

Owen remembered saying, “I’m a racecar driver—this is what I do.”

His third wreck involved an altercation with a young aggressive driver named Teddy Hicks. Owen was going into turn three at Martinsville Speedway, lap 127, when Teddy’s Ford banged his rear fender and sent him spinning. Owen did two 360s, spun off the track, but got it under control and kept going. He’d been in second place and finished eighth. Hicks was black-flagged and disqualified for rough driving.

After the race, Owen confronted Teddy in the pits. “I don’t know what you’re doing out there, but if you can give me a reasonable explanation, I’m willing to bypass this whole deal and move on,” Owen said, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

“What I was doing was taking you out of the race, old man.” Teddy grinned.

Owen stepped in now, threw a big left hand with some weight behind it, caught Teddy full on the side of his face, wiping the grin off and sending him down on the asphalt drive. Owen figured that was the end of it and started walking away. He didn’t see Teddy pick up an impact wrench, but he felt it break his collarbone that took a year to heal. Owen didn’t press charges, but Teddy lost his Cup ride, got booted off the circuit. No one would touch him after the
assault. He heard Teddy was driving on the dirt tracks for a while and then disappeared from racing.

Owen was tired. He closed his eyes now and hoped when he opened them he’d see Kate sitting on the edge of his bed.

Celeste put the bottle of Cold Duck under her arm, holding the handles of the plastic bag in one hand, opening the car door with her other hand and getting in.

Teddy said, “Get my candy bar?”

Celeste said, “What do you think?”

“I knew,” Teddy said, “I wouldn’t be asking.”

Celeste opened the bag, reached in, grabbed a Nestlé Crunch, handing it to him.

He slid the sleeve off the candy bar and peeled back the tin foil, broke off a piece and put it in his mouth. Now he put the Z28 in gear, hit the gas and pulled out of the parking lot, tires squealing.

Teddy said, “What the hell took so long?”

“I had some trouble,” Celeste said. “Man forgot his manners.”

“Teach him a lesson, did you?”

“Let’s just say he’s going to have one whopper of a headache when he wakes up.”

Teddy finished the candy bar, rolled the tin foil into a ball and threw it in the backseat. “Want to tell me what happened?”

Celeste heard a siren and said, “Think you could go a little faster?” They were on 94 passing City Airport outside Detroit.

“What’s the matter?” Teddy said. “You got to go tee tee?”

He didn’t catch on real fast.

Teddy said, “Give me a beer.”

Celeste opened a minicooler on the floor next to her feet, took out an ice-cold can of MGD dripping water, and handed it to Teddy. She wiped her cold wet hand on her jeans. He popped the top, took a long drink and put it between his legs.

“Anyway,” Celeste said, “I was standing in line waiting to pay for a bottle of Cold Duck, this rude dick with ears steps in front of me with a couple six-packs like I wasn’t there.”

“What’d he look like?”

Celeste said, “Just a normal-looking redneck in Levi’s and a wifebeater, could’ve been your twin brother.”

“Didn’t look anything like me,” Teddy said. “I seen him get out of a red Dodge 4 × 4, go in the store.”

She liked messing with him, pushing him to a
point where he’d start to get angry and then ease up. A Wayne County sheriff ’s deputy blew past them going the other way, Ford 500, lights flashing.

Teddy looked over at her. “You do something back there?”

His little brain was starting to catch on. “That’s what I was getting to, if you’d let me continue.”

Teddy fixed his attention on the rearview mirror, watching the cop car.

“I said to him—”

“Who?” Teddy said.

“Redneck in the party store,” Celeste said. “You got the attention span of a fucking gnat.”

“If you weren’t taking all day to tell this exciting story, maybe I’d be able to follow you.”

“I said to the redneck …” She looked at Teddy. “Still with me, or should I go slower?”

Teddy gave her a dirty look.

“I said to him, ‘What am I, invisible? You don’t see me standing here?’

“Know what he said? Nothing. Ignored me.”

Teddy brought the beer can up to his mouth, finished it, squeezed the can almost flat and threw the empty over his shoulder into the backseat and glanced at Celeste. “Another one bites the dust.”

She opened the cooler, took out a can of MGD,
gave it to Teddy, reached over and wiped her wet hand on his T-shirt.

He said, “Hey, you’re getting me all wet.”

“I was standing behind him. Gripped the Cold Duck bottle with two hands, swung it like a baseball bat, hit him on the side of his head, and believe me I got all of it. Would’ve been an off-the-wall double. The bottle exploded and he went down, crashing to the floor and didn’t move. The skinny geek manager behind the counter whose name was Jerry asked if I could find everything okay? And was there anything else I needed.”

Teddy drank some beer and played air guitar to “Lookout Mountain” by the Drive-By Truckers, looking over at her occasionally, grinning.

“I said, ‘Jer-Bear, I need two packs of Marlboro Lights, some Juicy Fruit, a couple of Nestlé’s Crunches, a twelve of MGD and a bottle of Cold Duck.’ And while he was getting everything together, I thought, what the hell. He put it all on the counter, looked up at me and I said, ‘There is one more thing—I’ll take your money, too, all of it, including the big bills under the tray.’ I had the.38 Ruger pointed at him. He cleaned out the register and asked me if I wanted a bag. ‘No, dumbshit,’ I said, ‘I’m going to walk out of here, let everyone see the money
I just robbed.’ Know what he said then? ‘Paper or plastic?’ You believe it?”

Teddy’s eyes were glued to her now. “What kind of dumbfuck stunt was that? You don’t go in, rob a place by yourself—you don’t know who’s in the back watching you on a video monitor, come out with a shotgun.”

“It just happened. Police would’ve come one way or the other. I figured I’d take advantage of the situation. What’s the problem? You’re going to get half of what’s in the bag and it was a piece of cake.”

“You don’t do that,” Teddy said. “We got rules.”

The car was drifting over the center line now, heading for an approaching SUV.

Celeste said, “We got rules on the highway, too—you keep your car in the lane, don’t run into somebody head-on like you’re about to do.”

Teddy looked up, swerved right, went too far, and overcorrected, the Z28 sliding off-road on gravel. Celeste thinking they were going into the ditch, but Teddy surprised her, got it under control, and they were back on the highway, cruising like nothing happened. He’d said he was a racecar driver—and maybe he was.

“Don’t say nothing,” Teddy said. “Don’t say a fucking word.”

They rode in silence, Celeste staring straight down the road listening to the Truckers doing “Hell No, I Ain’t Happy”:

Teddy trying to sing along, getting a word right here and there like he knew it—in a voice that didn’t understand tone or style.

After a time, Celeste said, “Want me to drive, let you enjoy your buzz?”

Teddy looked over and grinned. “Tell me why I shouldn’t haul off and pop you?”

“ ’Cause if you do, I’ll leave you.” She pulled the Ruger out and aimed it at him. “Or maybe I’ll shoot you.”

“Go ahead,” Teddy said. He looked at her with a lunatic grin and started turning the wheel back and forth, the Z28 doing slalom turns in the lane, going wider, tires making contact with gravel.

Celeste said, “What’re you doing?”

“What’re you doing?” Teddy said.

“Fucking with you,” Celeste said.

“Me too,” Teddy said.

Celeste put the gun back in her shoulder bag.

Teddy stopped turning the wheel, put the car back on course.

He had the hair-trigger temper of an adolescent, like somebody put him to sleep when he was fourteen and woke him up yesterday. Give him shit, he’d give it back to you harder.

“Before I get any more pissed off,” Teddy said, “tell me how much you got?”

Celeste took the money out of the plastic bag, a pile of bills in her lap and started counting. When she was finished, she looked at Teddy and said, “Guess.”

“It’s never easy with you, is it?”

“Want it to be easy, get yourself somebody has no imagination, does what they’re told.” She reached over, slid her hand slowly, gently, along his inner thigh, fingertips gliding over his jeans. She reached between his legs, felt the bulge of his manhood, fondling him, teasing him, holding him and tightening her grip, Teddy squirming, looking down at her hand with red nails painted a color called Passion Punch.

Teddy saying, “Easy.”

A look of concern on his face now, not sure what she was going to do, but wanting more.

Celeste said, “Ou okay?” in her baby-talk voice. “I’m not hurting widdo Ted, am I? Should we get him out, have some fun? Or should I count the money? Decisions, decisions.”

In spite of their differences—and there were a couple thousand of them—they’d been together three years. Teddy had a few hang-ups, which wasn’t surprising for a guy who grew up an only child on a farm in Perks, a little town in southern Illinois.

Celeste said, “Where exactly is Perks at?”

Teddy said, “South of Carbondale, east of Cape Girardo.” He laughed, Jesus, bent over like it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard in his life.

Celeste said, “Okay, I give up.”

“Cape Girardo’s on the other side.”

Celeste said, “Other side of what?”

“Mississippi, dummy. What do you think?”

Celeste got it now: you’d have to cross the river to get there, and you’d probably get wet. She guessed that’s what he was saying. She gave him a fake laugh. In his hick farm-boy way, Teddy was being funny. She wanted to say, “Don’t quit your day job to be a comedian just yet,” his day job involving smoking weed, drinking Jack, and robbing liquor stores.

Celeste asked him what they grew on the farm.

Teddy said, “Corn and soybeans. We also raised sheep—Hampshires and Suffolks.”

Celeste said, “You know what you call a guy with two thousand girlfriends?”

Teddy looked at her and said, “Huh?”

Celeste said, “A shepherd.”

Teddy grinned.

“Ever have your way with one?”

Teddy grinned bigger. “Matter of fact, I lost my virginity to a 120-pound Hampshire ewe named Winky.”

Celeste was surprised he was so open about it. She’d’ve thought he’d want to sweep that one under the rug. “What was it like? You know, making it with an animal?”

“Winky was better than some of the farm girls I’ve done. And I didn’t have to take her out or sweet-talk her.”

“What do you need me for?”

Teddy got a big grin on his face and said, “I can’t tell you.” Then he started laughing and couldn’t stop.

Celeste searched her mind now, trying to remember what she saw in this hick clown to stay with him for going on three years. He was nice-looking. He thought he looked like Billy Ray Cyrus. They did
have a mullet in common. Teddy’s looked like it had 10W-30 motor oil on it half the time, Teddy not being a guy who liked to shower. He didn’t mind being clean; it was the process he didn’t care for—getting wet and cold and shaving and getting soap in his eyes. Not showering much wasn’t a deal breaker, ’cause Celeste liked the gamey smell of unwashed man. It turned her on.

She met Teddy at a Hank Williams, Junior, concert at Pine Knob. Started talking in the beer line; Teddy behind her, checking out her behind. It sounded like the title of a country-western love song.

He said, “Hey there, good-looking, got an extra dube you could part with?”

Celeste had rolled a couple of bad boys and this nice-looking guy—with an honest-to-god mullet—sounded like he could really use one. She said, “Buy me a beer, I’ll fix you up.”

Teddy handed her a twenty-ounce Miller High Life and they sat on the grass together, smoked weed and listened to Hank Jr. do “I Really Like Girls.”

Teddy said, “What’s your name?”

“Celeste.”

“Celeste what?”

“Celeste Byrnes.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Teddy. I’d like to get out of
here, take you back to my place, but first I got to hear ‘Country Boy Can Survive.’”

Celeste said, “I’m with someone.” She was out with this show-off ad guy named Ronnie Rockman; a friend had fixed her up. Ronnie had been speed-rapping her about his accomplishments since he’d picked her up. He’d just won a Clio, an Effie and a One Show, the equivalent of an advertising hat trick, not bad for a week’s work, huh?

Celeste had no idea what he was talking about but gave him a fake smile when he looked over at her, beaming. Then he told her about his car, the BMW M5 they were riding in, Ronnie quoting its horsepower rating—394 SAE at 6100 rpm and zero-to-sixty in 5.3 seconds. He said he could afford to drive any car but chose the M5. Know why?

Celeste’s brain hurt this guy was so boring.

“ ’Cause, for the money,” Ronnie said, “it’s got everything: handling, performance, comfort—you name it.”

It wasn’t a conversation; it was a monologue.

Teddy said, “You having a good time with him?”

Celeste said, “Not really. Who’re you with?”

“I’m flying solo.”

“You went to a concert by yourself?”

“Far as I know, that’s not a crime, yet.”

Celeste took out her cell phone and called Ronnie, who was sitting in row two in his pressed jeans and peach-colored Polo shirt. She said, “Ronnie, this is Celeste …”

“What the hell happened to you?”

“I’m leaving,” Celeste said. “Just wanted to let you know.” She hung up as he started to say something. Fuck Ronnie and his BMW M5.

Teddy’s full name was Theodore Monroe Hicks. Celeste got a kick out of that after she found out where he was from—a hick named Hicks. What was that called? She thought it was irony, but had quit after her junior year at Walled Lake High to go to beauty school, so she didn’t trust herself to be right.

They got in Teddy’s Ford Ranger pickup with the rebel license plate on the front and went to Teddy’s rented house, a dump in Clawson, and spent the weekend in bed, Teddy making her watch
Predator
, his favorite movie, stopping at a scene with a big muscle-bound dude firing a machine gun in a dense jungle setting at an alien you couldn’t see.

Teddy said, “Know who that is?”

There was an element of pride in his delivery, like they were related or something.

Celeste said, “Someone from the WWF? An ex–football player?”

Teddy grinned now. “That’s Jesse-damn-Ventura, governor of Minnesota’s who that is.”

Celeste felt bad for the citizens of Minnesota now. They had it tough enough with forty-below winters and summers that lasted about three weeks. And now they had an action hero actor guiding their fortunes.

What did she see in Teddy? The question popping back in her head. Celeste believed it came down to some kind of chemistry thing, some weirdo attraction. It certainly wasn’t his intellect. One time she asked him if he believed in love at first sight.

He looked at her and said, “No,’ cause blind people can fall in love, too.”

Sometimes he surprised her.

Celeste counted the money, stacking the bills on her lap. When she finished, she locked her gaze on Teddy and said, “How much you think? Guess right, it’s all yours.”