JACK Read online

  I nodded.

  Elliot spoke around a bite of sandwich. “Do you want to call Emma?”

  “No.” I didn’t want to call anyone. I pulled out a chair across from him.

  “She’s gonna worry about you.”

  “I don’t care.”

  Mikey came over with a cup of coffee and sat down next to Elliot. I couldn’t help but be jealous. Mikey had everything I wanted. Who I wanted. The day I tried to kiss Elliot and he refused to let me was the day it dawned on me I wasn’t really a boy.

  Like I said, Momma never told me otherwise. I took a bite of sandwich and tried not to let my envy show. The older I got, the harder it was to deal with my feelings. I mean, who would kiss me? Who would ever want to? I had boobs and no cock, just a blank space which looked wrong.

  Mikey watched me and I could tell he wanted to say something. He had expressive eyes when he wasn’t hiding them under his bangs.

  “What is it?” I said.

  He fumbled with the bread on his sandwich. “What if she calls the police?”

  “Who?”

  “Emma. What if she calls the cops and they come here looking for you?” Mikey had a right to be scared. He still walked with a limp from a run in with the cops up north where he was from.

  Elliot watched Mikey for a moment and then said, “It’ll be fine. Why would the cops come looking here anyhow?” It was obvious why they would look here. Everyone in town knew he was my best friend. El pushed my plate closer to me. “Eat your sandwich.”

  I didn’t. “He’s right, I should go.”

  “And where are you going to go?”

  Yeah, where? No money. No transportation. I sat there with my hands in my lap trying to figure out what I could do.

  I looked at Mikey, and then Elliot. They was so happy. In spite of all the hardships they was perfect. They had each other and I had no one. The only person who’d ever loved me, understood me, was buried in the Sunshine Hill Cemetery. I was alone now and I did not want to be alone.

  I stood up and so did Elliot. “You’re leaving?”

  “Yeah, Mikey’s right. I better get home before Emma sends the law out. I don’t want you to get in trouble.” Knowing Emma she’d make trouble.

  Elliot followed me to the door. “You don’t have to.”

  “I do.”

  Elliot’s hand touched my cheek and his worried gaze begged me to confide in him. I used to confide in him all the time when we were younger. I don’t think he realized how much time he didn’t have for me since he’d met Mikey.

  “What do you want me to do with the dress? I don’t think it can be saved.”

  Tattered, torn, stained, I didn’t think it could be saved either. I didn’t want the dress, even if it could be made good as new. “Burn it in the trash barrel.”

  Outside a light mist fell, clinging to the grass and trees, forming tiny wet diamonds. The cool air tamed the heat in my cheeks. I stopped at the top step and the planks sighed behind me. Elliot’s hand brushed my shoulder. “Are you going to be all right?”

  No. How could I? “Yeah.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “You should probably go back in. He’ll be worried that you’ll talk me into staying.”

  “I want to talk you into staying.”

  “I shouldn’t.”

  “It doesn’t mean you can’t.”

  “He just worries about you.” Because Mikey loved him.

  “I know.” El kissed me on the temple and sighed into my hair. “God, Jack. We’re a messed up bunch, aren’t we?”

  He was right. We were. I stepped off the porch and headed toward the road.

  Chapter Two

  There was a police car in the driveway when I got home. Lights were on in the living room. Gold puddles spilled out on the gloomy porch. At the end of the porch there was an empty space where momma’s bench swing used to be. All the hanging baskets that used to hang from the roof had been stuffed into garbage bags. Emma left the hummingbird feeder. I didn’t understand how she could have something against flowers and not birds.

  I saw Emma through the door. She was clinging to Jonathan, while Bill Straus scribbled in a notebook he held. Billy graduated the year I started high school and went into the force before the ink dried on his diploma. He was so short and scrawny his uniform looked like a sack on him. Billy was lucky Sheriff Berry let him carry a gun. If Billy ran into any bad guys he’d need it to protect himself.

  The screen door creaked when I opened it and everyone in the living room looked my way.

  Emma made a strangled sound and flung herself at me when I stepped inside, sobbing and petting me. “Oh my God, where have you been? I was about to file a missing person’s report.” She fondled my hair and picked at my shirt. Her eyes flashed and anger made her gaze hard.

  “I assume you’re okay then, Ms. Jacqueline?” Billy said.

  “Jack. And yeah, I’m fine.”

  His smile faltered and his gaze went to Jonathan, who watched me with a mix of boredom and anger.

  Billy closed his note book. “Well, since she’s home, I’m going to head on out.”

  Emma sniffled and wiped away her fake tears. “How can we ever thank you, Officer Straus?”

  He tipped his hat. “I’m just doing my job, ma’am.”

  “Are you sure you won’t stay for dinner?” She didn’t mean it. Emma couldn’t even cook.

  Billy smiled, flashing the gap between his teeth. “No ma’am, that won’t be necessary. I need to get back up the road. Palmer’s cows got out again and are wandering all over the highway.” Billy’s gaze came to where I stood at the bottom of the steps. His grin softened into a smile. “In spite of the circumstances today, I thought you looked very pretty.”

  I stared at my muddy feet.

  “What do you say, Jacqueline?” Emma took a step toward me. I could see her fingers itching with the urge to pinch me good.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Bill cleared his throat and straightened his hat. “So we’re good then? No more running off?”

  “No sir.”

  “Good girl.”

  Phillip and Emma saw Billy out and I escaped upstairs to my room. I flopped back on my bed, trying to lose myself in the folds of the quilts. I pulled a pillow over and buried my face in it. All I wanted to do was go to sleep and never wake up again. At least in my dreams momma could be alive and well.

  My bedroom door opened and I sat up. Emma walked in and shut the door.

  I glared. “Don’t you know how to knock?”

  “Where is your dress?”

  “I don’t have a dress.”

  “Don’t be smart. You know what I mean. The dress I bought you. The dress you wore to Momma’s funeral.”

  “I took it off.”

  “Where is it?”

  “I lost it.”

  “That dress cost me fifty dollars.”

  “I never asked you to buy it.”

  “I bought it for Momma, not for you!”

  “And Momma would have never made me wear it!”

  I thought for a second or two she was gonna hit me again.

  Emma’s gaze scanned my room. “Maybe we should go to the mall.”

  “What?” It took me a second or two to realize what she’d said. “Why?”

  “You need a new bedroom suite. Something to soften up this space.”

  “I don’t want a new bedroom suite.” I liked my dark blue curtains and mahogany furniture. Momma and me picked it out.

  “Something light green or maybe peach colored. We could get some of those white sheer curtains to let the light in.” Emma walked around touching my things with a dreamy expression on her face.

  I wanted to poke her eyes out. “Didn’t you hear me? I don’t want a new room!”

  “We could get your hair done while we’re out. You’d be amazed how wonderful and beautiful you can feel after a trip to the salon. You could even get a manicure.” She laughed and I thought of hyenas. “We could
make it an all day thing. Just you and me. My treat.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “Saturday will be perfect!” Her hands came together with a clap.

  “I’m busy.”

  “We’ll go early. Get to the mall first thing. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if they’re having a sale and we could find you a few new dresses?”

  New dresses? She never listened and when she did listen she never heard me. I jumped off the bed, ran out of my room to the hall bathroom, and locked the door behind me.

  Mall. Beauty shop. Nails. Hair.

  I didn’t want a stupid day out with her. I didn’t want any of those things! All I wanted was my momma back and my life to be happy again.

  Emma jiggled the doorknob and said my name.

  “Go away.”

  “Come out here right now, young lady.”

  Lady. I’d show that bitch. I’d show all of them. I’d make her never want to take me to the mall. Never want me to wear a dress. Never call me a girl.

  I jerked open the drawer under the sink and grabbed the hair cutting scissors Momma kept inside.

  “Jacqueline, what are you doing in there?”

  “None of your business!”

  Emma called for Jonathan. Her voice faded away and her footsteps made soft thumps against the hardwood.

  The scissors felt heavy in my hand. I opened the handles and the gleaming blades whispered. I gathered up a wad of brown curls on my head and chopped it off, getting as close to my scalp as possible. I kept going until the only thing left was a butchered mess of bangs. Skinned in some places, longer in others, I looked like I had a bad case of the mange. Momma had really liked my hair and that was the only reason I’d ever let it grow long.

  Emma knocked on the door again. “Jacqueline?”

  “I told you to go away.”

  The door knob rattled again. “Open this door right now, do you hear me? Right now!”

  “No.”

  This time it Phillip knocked. “Jacqueline, you’re upsetting your sister. Open this door right now and come out here so she won’t worry.”

  “Fuck you!”

  “Don’t you dare talk to your sister or me that way!”

  “Leave me alone, both of you. Just go away!”

  Jonathan’s tone turned cold. “This is your last chance, young lady. If I have to break down this door, so help me I don’t care how old you are, I will take a belt to your hide!”

  I yanked open the door.

  Jonathan’s froze, fist raised in mid knock. He and my sister wore confused expressions like they couldn’t quite figure out who I was.

  Emma’s gaze went from my head to the sink, then my head again. I could tell she didn’t want to believe what I’d done. A high pitched sound preceded Emma’s words. “What did you do? Oh my God! Jacqueline! What did you do?”

  I pushed past both of them. “I told you no dress. Now leave me alone.”

  “Jonathan, do something!”

  As if he could. Phillip stared at me, dumbfounded and then disgusted.

  Emma wailed. “We should call a doctor, right now, a doctor, right this minute.”

  Phillip waved a hand at me. “For what? She’s cut her hair. A doctor can’t fix a haircut.”

  “She isn’t right! Can’t you see that? We need to call a doctor!”

  I curled my hands into fists. “I’m not seeing a doctor.”

  Emma grabbed my arm and her nails bit into my skin. “You’re sick. It isn’t your fault. We’ll send you somewhere there are doctors who can help you. Somewhere they will take care of you.”

  I knew what kind of doctor she was referring to. Emma wanted to send me to someone who would pick apart my brain and tell me all the things about me that needed to be fixed.

  But I wasn’t broken.

  I tried to twist out of her grasp. “Let go of me!”

  “It’s okay. I’ll call someone tonight,” she said.

  “Leave me alone, you bitch!”

  “All right, that’s enough!” Jonathan’s big hand landed on the back of my neck and he pushed me into the floor. He pointed one of his thick fingers in my face. “I will not have you talking to your sister like that. You will respect her in our home.”

  “This is Momma’s house!”

  “And your mother is dead!” He all but spit the words at me.

  How dare he say it like that? How dare he say it at all? It was like getting slapped all over again.

  Phillip made a grab for me and I kicked him in the knee. He staggered into the rail, cursing. I scrambled to my feet. Emma tried to get in my way and I shoved her aside and ran down the stairs. The echo of the screen door smacking shut followed me across the field.

  I didn’t slow down until I reached the edge of the pasture. Up ahead at a fork in the road there was a few old log buildings and among them a small convenience store. Claycreek Grocery had a phone they let folks use for local calls.

  I went in. Todd Jones sat at the counter reading the Weekly Saver. Sagging shelves, dark walls, cracked linoleum floor, the inside wasn’t much to look at. But the gas was cheap and the bread was always fresh. The bells jingled on the door when it closed behind me and he smiled.

  “Jack!” Todd’s gaze lingered on my head. His mouth twisted up. “You cut your hair.”

  “Can I use your phone?”

  He sat there a minute, unable to peel his gaze off of me.

  “Todd?”

  “Sure, sure hon, you go right ahead.” He set the phone on the counter. The cord was a wad of curly-Qs at its side. I cradled the receiver next to my heart and dialed Elliot. I worried he might not pick up and then he did.

  “Hello?”

  “It’s me.” My voice cracked.

  “Jack? What’s wrong?”

  Until that moment I wasn’t sure why I’d called, but I knew now and I felt sad because of it.

  My breath shuddered, rattling the speaker. When I glanced up Todd’s cheeks were pink. He said something about checking the freezer and went to the back.

  Elliot said my name again.

  “I’m here.”

  “Did something happen?”

  “She wants to send me away.”

  “Away?”

  “To a hospital.”

  “A what?”

  “She says I’m sick and I need help. She’s gonna send me somewhere they can make me better.”

  “She’s just talking. She’s just trying to scare you. You know how she is.”

  “I love you, El.”

  “I love you too, Jack.”

  “But not that way, and I’ve always loved you that way and I wish I’d been a boy so you’d kiss me. And maybe I would be the one holding your hand. It’s not that I don’t like Mikey but he’ll never love you as much as I do.”

  Elliot sniffled. “Just come back to our place.”

  “I gotta go now.” My sigh sounded tired.

  “Go where?”

  “Fishing.”

  He was quiet for a moment. “What do you mean you’re going to go fishing?”

  “Bye, El, I love you. Don’t ever forget that.”

  *** *** ***

  My destination was the old train tracks five miles down the road.

  A train hadn’t come through Union in over fifty years, but the track still divided the town. After they’d stripped all the minerals out of the ground the train had been turned into a passenger car for tourists. There was nothing in Union to see so it went bankrupt a few years later.

  The history of the train station was something my English teacher could go on about for hours. She’d rode on the train once when she was a child and you’d thought she’d gone to the moon. What did I know? I’d never ridden a train. Maybe it was like going to the moon.

  Gravel popped on the road behind me. Slaps of red and blue flashed against the skeleton of the bridge. The rumble of an engine followed me up the path then fell silent.

  A car door slammed. “Jacqueline?”

  I w
alked faster.

  “Jacqueline, your sister is riding around looking for you.”

  I glanced back.

  Billy stared at my head. His mouth hung open a little. “You cut your hair.”

  “Yeah, what of it?”

  “Nothing, I just thought…”

  “What? That it was pretty? I don’t care about pretty, Billy.” I started walking again.

  “Wait now. Just wait a minute. Emma said you ran off.”

  “Obviously.”

  “She’s worried about you.”

  “Yeah, well tell her there is nothing to worry about.” I climbed up the barrier with its warning signs and big red Xs. You weren’t supposed to fish here, but everyone did. A worn spot in the concrete where hands had rubbed against the surface made a dip and white scars marked the side from feet searching for purchase.

  “Whoa there, sweetheart. That thing is there for a reason. Come down from there before you hurt yourself.”

  Gravel bit into my heels when I dropped to the other side.

  “Jacqueline?”

  I ignored the path going down to the river’s edge and walked up the hill. The ground around the tracks was steep. I dug my toes into the dirt and made my way to the top.

  “Honey, please come down from there.” Billy scrabbled over the barrier. Gravel crunched under the soles of his shoes as he jogged toward me.

  I narrowed a look at him. “Why don’t you just get back in your car and leave? Tell them you couldn’t find me or something.” I climbed out onto the steel structure. Streaks of rust stained my hands.

  Three days of rain had transformed the river from a thing of beauty into a horrifying vision. Even several yards back I could see the flashes of white where the rocks cut eddies in the water. The area under the bridge was calmer. Wrinkles slithered along the surface, and were the only evidence of an undertow. Swollen edges dug out ruts in the bank.

  Five years ago three local kids tried to tube the river from Blood Mountain to Woodsman’s Gap. They made it halfway before the water swallowed them up. Their bodies washed up a few days after they went missing, bloated and white, like shells bleached out by the sun.

  After that I promised momma I’d never fish here after a storm.

  “Jacqueline, please.”

  “Quit calling me that!”

  “Okay fine. What do you want me to call you, honey, just tell me.”