“This is no good at all,” Vera said at last. “Just look at the mess you're making!”
I looked down, but instead of pieces of broken plates, the bricks were littered with little pieces of Joe's dentures n broken stone. “Don't you hand me no more, Vera,” I said, startin to cry. “I guess I ain't up to doing no dishes. Maybe I've got too old, I dunno, but I don't want to break the whole job lot of them, I know that.”
She kep on handin em to me just the same, though, and I kep droppin em, and the sound they made when they hit the bricks kep gettin louder n deeper, until it was more a boomin sound than the brittle crash china makes when it hits somethin hard n busts. All at once I knew I was havin a dream n those booms weren't part of it. I snapped awake s'hard I almost fell outta the chair n onto the floor. There was another of those booms, and this time I knew it for what it was-a shotgun.
I got up n went over to the window. Two pickup trucks went by on the road. There were people in the backs, one in the bed of the first n two I think-in the bed of the second. It looked like all of em had shotguns, and every couple of seconds one of em'd trigger off a round into the sky. There'd be a bright muzzle-flash, then another loud boom. From the way the men (I guess they were men, although I can't say for sure) were swayin back n forth-and from the way the trucks were weavin back n forth-I'd say the whole crew was pissyass drunk. I recognized one of the trucks, too.
What?
No, I ain't gonna tell you-I'm in enough trouble myself. I don't plan to drag nobody else in with me over a little drunk night-shootin. I guess maybe I didn't recognize that truck after all.
Anyway, I threw up the window when I seen they wasn't puttin holes in nothin but a few low-lyin clouds. I thought they'd use the wide spot at the bottom of our hill to turn around, and they did. One of em goddam near got stuck, too, and wouldn't that have been a laugh.
They come back up, hootin and tootin and yellin their heads off. I cupped m'hands around m'mouth n screamed “Get outta here! Some folks “re tryin t'sleep!” just as loud's I could. One of the trucks swerved a little wider n almost run into the ditch, so I guess I threw a startle into em, all right. The fella standin in the back of that truck (it was the one I thought I recognized until a few seconds ago) went ass-overdashboard. I got a good set of lungs on me, if I do say so m'self, n I can holler with the best of em when I want to.
“Get offa Little Tall Island, you goddam murderin cunt!” one of em yelled back, n triggered a few more shots off into the air. But that was just in the way of showin me what big balls they had, I think, because they didn't make another pass. I could hear em roarin off toward town-and that goddam bar that opened there year before last, I'll bet a cookie-with their mufflers blattin and their tailpipes chamberin backfires as they did all their fancy downshifts. You know how men are when they're drunk n drivin pick-em-ups.
Well, it broke the worst of my mood. I wa'ant scared anymore and I sure as shit didn't feel weepy anymore. I was good n pissed off, but not s'mad I couldn't think, or understand why folks were doin the things they were doin. When my anger tried to take me past that place, I stopped it happenin by thinkin of Sammy Marchant, how his eyes had looked as he knelt there on the stairs lookin first at that rollin pin and then up at me-as dark as the ocean just ahead of a squall-line, they were, like Selena's had been that day in the garden.
I already knew I was gonna have to come back down here, Andy, but it was only after those men left that I quit kiddin myself that I could still pick n choose what I was gonna tell or hold back. I saw I was gonna have to make a clean breast of everything. I went back to bed n slept peaceful until quarter of nine in the morning. It's the latest I've slept since before I was married. I guess I was gettin rested up so I could talk the whole friggin night.
Once I was up, I meant to do it just as soon's I could-bitter medicine is best taken right away-but somethin put me off my track before I could get out of the house, or I would've ended up tellin you all this a lot sooner.
I took a bath, and before I got dressed I put the telephone plug back in the wall. It wasn't night anymore, and I wasn't half in n half out of some dream anymore. I figured if someone wanted to phone up and call me names, I'd dish out a few names of my own startin with “yellowbelly” n “dirty no-name sneak. “ Sure enough, I hadn't done more'n roll on my stockins before it did ring. I picked it up, ready to give whoever was on the other end a good dose of what-for, when this woman's voice said, “Hello? May I speak to Miz Dolores Claiborne?”
