Scoot followed him out the door, past the empty bottle, and to the truck where Poocher climbed into the driver’s side, paused, then slid to the passenger side, and began hard hand cranking down the window for a second before giving up.

“I woulda got the electric kind,” he muttered.

Scoot hopped in next to him. “Sugar’s?”

“Track first.”

Poocher rooted around in Scoot’s dash, found a pack, and limply dropped a smoke between his lips.

Scoot revved up and pulled away out of the drive, the cabin filling with smoke.

“Roll down the window,” Scoot said, terse.

Poocher complied and the wind flew in, carrying away smoke and ash and Poocher singing J.D., aping a microphone in his hand.

He was excited to go to the track. Head leaning out the window, mouth open. He could run a little bit and sweat it out. Get a warm up going. Stretch it. He’d be ready for tomorrow morning.

Senior year, Poocher finally got to leave home when the track team had gone up for a meet to Washington, D.C. He’d stolen one of twenty some bottles from his dad and the boys cleared it and sneaked out of the hotel. Found a bar nearby that let them in. Four girls. One for each of them, since this was two weeks before he met Maggie in the junior science class that he’d had to take and she had tested into. The girls said they were college students though they looked a little older to the boys. They drank all night together. Even got them back into the hotel room after Poocher threatened his roommate with a late night castration. Poocher had his whiskey, got his hands full and dirty, and then woke up and beat ass in the 5,000 meter. He threw up immediately afterward. He remembered looking around in the stands to make sure the girls hadn’t seen him retch in the grass, but they hadn’t come. Still, first place. And that was three miles. More.

It was just a mile, now. He’d be fine in the morning.

“Almost there,” Scoot said, and Poocher tossed the burning butt.

“I shouldn’t have said alla that shit, I know…”

“They were all in your house. You don’t even know those ladies. You know those ladies?”

“Hell no. I told Maggie, I said, do nothing for that old bitch. Said it right there in the living room, too. She did something for that old bitch.”

“She should have listened.”

“Damn right. But old Maggie, she don’t ever listen. Just does things she feels.” He lit another one, blew smoke.

“She’s a bitch.”

Poocher punched Scoot in the face.

For a moment the car fishtailed, almost careened off the road. Scoot slammed on the brakes, tires bit asphalt, and the thing managed to stay in line.

He shouted something that sounded like “What the fuck!” though Poocher couldn’t be sure. His hands covered his mouth where the blood poured.

Fists clamped to Scoot’s collar, he pulled him close. A little blood dripped from his face and onto Poocher’s hands.

“You don’t say that shit about her. You don’t.”

For a moment Scoot thought Poocher was going to hit him again, and so did Poocher, but instead he let go and clambered out of the truck cab. As soon as his boots hit the ground a wave of nausea soared up from Poocher’s stomach to his throat and mouth. He stood blinking in the beams of the headlights, waiting for it to pass. It always passed.

Poocher vomited hard into the dirt, covering his boots in the acidic slickness.

Scoot leaned out of the window to yell. No way in hell he was climbing from that truck. “I’m sorry I said that, but that was totally effed, Pooch!”

He’d never heard Scoot shout like that before, and seeing that the blood was much more than he had wanted it to be, he began to feel a little awful about hitting him.

“I was sayin’ what I thought you wanted to hear. Commiseratin’ man! Come on…” He trailed off, wiping crimson on the front of his flannel.

Poocher wanted to hit him again. He had to hit something. He knew he’d regret it the next day though, hitting Scoot. He grabbed the antennae and bent it.

“Pooch, man!”

He turned his pockets inside out looking for a knife or keys or something. Everything was at home. He body slammed his elbow into the car. He kicked the bumper. Heavy chrome, holding firm. He decided to beat it. He kicked it again and again until the bumper was hanging, abrading the cement, and he felt something click in his bones, and pain shot up his leg.

“Fuck you, Pooch! You fuck yourself, man!”

Scoot gunned it. Peeled out. The lights disappeared down the road after him. Poocher looked at his ankle. It was already swelling. Something in it was messed up, he knew.

He tried walking on it but it couldn’t handle weight. It was a drag only type of scenario.

An hour later he limped into the house. It was dark now. The drinks had started to wear off and he was wondering if the ladies were angry at him. How angry Maggie was with him. Scoot could… They’d figure it out.

He poked his head into the bedroom. Maggie sleeping peacefully. He tried to smile at her. After he closed the door to the hallway she opened her eyes to the darkness.

He sat down in the living room. The pain was growing. The swelling, too. Neither one looked to quit. The old woman sucked and clicked in the shadows, holding on, remembering everything for them.

 

Graham Bowlin lives in a small town in North Carolina. He has been writing for a long time and publishing for slightly less. His work has appeared in Thuglit, Shotgun Honey, and Typehouse. He is currently shopping a novella and completing a new novel.