A Second Helping Read online

  He wiped his forehead and shook his head. Demons and politicians. You could never trust them.

  As the family gathered about the table for Thanksgiving dinner, George made a point of complimenting his wife on the colorful centerpiece of dry corncobs, brown stalks and red pyracantha berries. He loaded his plate with slices of turkey, Em’s special spiced stuffing, mashed potatoes swimming in gravy, and cranberry sauce.

  He passed the plate of deviled eggs without taking any.

  Thursday Night at Pins and Pub

  John Weagly

  “There wasn’t enough gravy,” Waylon said.

  “No?”

  “No. There never is. There’s never enough gravy.”

  Billy Weston and Waylon Preston were at Currie Valley Pins and Pub, Currie Valley, Illinois’ third nicest bowling alley and the only practical place for them to hang out together on a crisp Thanksgiving evening. There were twelve bowling lanes, each with a forty-two inch screen to reflect scores. There was also a separate room that had video games, a jukebox, two pool tables and a bar. Waylon and Billy were at the bar. The whole establishment smelled of fried food, even though no food was served.

  A couple of families took up lanes here and there, but Pins and Pub was mostly empty. Billy was nursing his first Rolling Rock while Waylon was on his third bottle of Stella. John Cougar Mellencamp’s version of “I saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” played on the jukebox and, every now and then, the clatter of bowling pins punctuated the night.

  “You must like gravy,” Billy said.

  “I put it on everything,” Waylon agreed. The Formica bar top managed to feel both moist and sticky under his elbows. “Turkey. Stuffing. Mashed potatoes. Peas. Corn. Carrots. Everything!”

  “Pumpkin pie?”

  “Okay,” Waylon smiled. “Not everything.”

  Currie Valley was a small town where everyone knew a little something about everyone else, and most of the time that little something wasn’t true. Waylon and Billy had become friends in grade school because their last names sounded alike. Their friendship endured the next fifteen years because their ways of thinking were similar and, also, because that friendship was a habit.

  “The springs in this stool are making my butt go numb,” Billy said.

  Waylon nodded.

  Bart the bartender, whose last name was Conway and who everybody in Currie Valley called “Bart The Bartender” because of his chosen profession, wiped a spot on the bar next to Billy and Waylon. “Need anything, boys?”

  “We’re okay, Bart,” Billy said. “Stuck working on Thanksgiving?”

  “I don’t mind,” Bart said. “I’ve got nowhere else to be.”

  “Neither do we,” Waylon said. “Neither do we.”

  “Thanks!” added Billy, then turned his attention back to Waylon. “Where was this horrendous gravy-less meal?”

  “My sister-in-law’s. Not only does she not make enough gravy, but the food is always bland and cold.”

  “That’s not very Thanksgivingly.”

  “No,” Waylon agreed. “It’s not.”

  “I ate dinner at McDonald’s.”

  “That’s not very Thanksgivingly, either.”

  “No,” Billy agreed, “it’s not.” Billy thought for a moment as Waylon took a pull on his beer. “I still think my best Thanksgiving was senior year in high school. I started in the morning and watched the entire Godfather saga, all three films. And it wasn’t just watching them back to back to back, I rented this package that re-cut all the scenes so that they were in chronological order. It took me over ten hours with bathroom and snack breaks. The whole time my mother cooked so the house smelled real nice.”

  “I remember. I called you a couple times. You got pretty annoyed at me for interuptin’.”

  “I know.”

  “I used to love Thanksgiving,” Waylon said. “But the meals just aren’t as good.”

  The two of them thought about that for a moment as bowling pins tumbled and a teenage girl in lane three squealed about making a strike. Billy took a final swallow of his beer and stood up from his bar stool. “I should be headin’ home,” he said.

  “It’s only 9:30! Let’s shoot a game of pool.”

  “I shouldn’t…”

  “We could play Galaga. You always love playin’ Galaga.”

  “I’ve got to be at the mall at four a.m. tomorrow. I’m the first Santa on the first day of the holiday shopping season.”

  “You almost sound like you’re proud of that.”

  “I’m not,” Billy said. “Believe me, I’m not. But I needed a job and the mall’s Santa Service were the only people that would hire me. I got to appreciate it while it lasts.”

  “Okay,” Waylon said, throwing a few dollars on the bar for Bart. “I guess I’ll take off, too.”

  “You need a ride?”

  “No. Thanks. I’m gonna hit the head before I go, then I’ll just walk.”

  “Okay,” Billy said. “Happy Thanksgiving.”

  “You, too.”

  Billy went out to his truck and John Cougar Mellencamp changed to Bruce Springsteen’s “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.”

  “It’s too early for Christmas Music, Bart,” Waylon said. “You should at least put it off until tomorrow.”

  “I’ve just got it on the jukebox,” Bart said. “It’s one of those families that played it.”

  “Okay, I guess,” Waylon said, heading to the bathroom.

  When he came back out eight minutes later, Waylon noticed that his and Billy’s spot at the bar had already been taken by Jerry Tyberion, a grey-haired somewhat reclusive retiree in his late-sixties. Waylon nodded at him on his way to the exit.

  “Everything okay tonight, Waylon?” Bart the bartender asked before Waylon could get to the door.

  “Everything was fine.”

  “Nothin’ wrong with the service?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You usually leave me a pretty good tip, that’s all.”

  “I left you a tip. A sizable one, you havin’ to work on Thanksgiving and all.”

  Bart looked around the bar top. “It’s not here.”

  Waylon walked back over to the bar and looked for himself. Then he turned his eyes to Jerry.

  “Where’s the money I left?”

  “What?”

  “Did you steal the tip I left, Jerry?”

  “What?”

  Waylon took a step closer to Jerry’s stool. Jerry smelled like piney deodorant with old man smell underneath. “Come on, Jerry. Did you steal it?”

  “Maybe you stole it!” Jerry said.

  “Why would I do that? If I didn’t want to leave Bart a tip, I wouldn’t have put any money down.”

  “I don’t know what you did or why you did it,” Jerry said, his voice getting louder.

  “Calm down, Crazy Jerry.”

  Jerry stood up. “Don’t you call me that!”

  “It’s theft, you old coot! Burglary! Larceny of the highest degree. Did you steal my tip, Crazy Jerry?”

  “Don’t you call me that! You can call me anything you want, but don’t you call me that!”

  Crazy Jerry’s was a former business on Hampshire, next to Tri-State Furniture, a couple of blocks from the Mississippi River. The front of the establishment was faded yellow brick. There were no windows, just an old, red door next to a hand-painted “Crazy Jerry’s WOOW Peepshows” sign. Next to the WOOW sign, another advertisement boasted “X-rated Magazines, Films, Books and Novelties.” Neither Waylon nor Billy nor even Bart The Bartender could remember when this den of iniquity was actually open.

  As for Jerry Tyberion, he was not the “Crazy Jerry” of peepshow fame, but actually a retired tractor salesman. Unfortunately, as the most talked about Jerry in town, he was saddled with the unfortunate nickname.

  Waylon stepped closer to the old man. Jerry’s eyes were wild. “Did you?” Waylon asked. “I put five dollars right there on the bar. Did you steal my tip…” Waylon paused.
He and Jerry looked at each other across a thousand miles of small town rumors. “…Crazy Jerry!”

  That was enough. With all the strength his sixty-seven year old body could muster, Crazy Jerry Tyberion swung his right arm around and punched Waylon Preston in his left ear.

  Bowling pins clattered and fell.

  “Hey!” Bart the bartender yelled.

  Waylon grabbed the side of his head and, without even know he was doing it, pulled back his right hand and punched the senior citizen as hard as he could in the stomach. Crazy Jerry fell to the floor, gasping for breath.

  Bruce Springsteen changed to the Brian Setzer Orchestra singing “(Everybody’s Waitin’ For) The Man With The Bag.”

  “Cool down, fellas!” Bart said. “Cool down!”

  “Christ!” Waylon said, shaking his head to clear his surprise and sting. “I’m sorry, Jerry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

  Jerry didn’t respond. He just laid on the floor looking up at Waylon, barely moving and barely breathing.

  “Did you… Did you kill him?” Bart asked.

  “I sure hope not.”

  The temperature in Pins and Pub seemed to go up fifteen degrees. Sweat broke out on Waylon’s forehead.

  Jerry didn’t move.

  “I’m calling 9-1-1,” Bart said.

  “Hold on…,” Jerry managed to muster.

  “Did I knock the wind out of you?”

  Jerry nodded.

  “Christ! I’m sorry!”

  Jerry spoke between struggling breaths. “All I wanted was a nice turkey dinner with plenty of gravy… That lunch place down by the river didn’t give me enough gravy…”

  “I know how that is,” Waylon said, kneeling down and helping Jerry into a sitting position, then joining him on the floor.

  “You’re a…gravy man, too?” Jerry asked.

  “Born and bred!”

  They sat for a moment, Jerry catching up with his breathing.

  “You want a beer,” Waylon asked.

  Jerry nodded. “Dos Equis.”

  Waylon helped Jerry up off of the floor and onto a bar stool. When their beers came, they each took a long pull, then sat in silence for a moment.

  “Thanksgiving just isn’t as good anymore,” Jerry finally said.

  “No,” Waylon agreed. “It’s not.”

  “I did steal your tip.”

  “That’s okay,” Waylon said.

  Justice for Elijah

  Earl Staggs

  People shouldn’t have to work on Thanksgiving day, but a sheriff’s office, even in a small Texas county, can’t shut down completely. If you happen to be the sheriff, you let the rest of the staff take the day off and you “man” the office, as they say. If you happen to be a woman, they still say that.

  Fortunately, I didn’t have to worry about preparing Thanksgiving dinner. My husband Lilburn does the cooking in our house. When he retired, he bought a computer and took online cooking classes. I can cook, but to me, it’s work. To him, it’s art. He promised one of my favorite side dishes would complement his traditional menu of turkey, green beans, cranberry sauce, and sauerkraut: sweet potato casserole with broccoli, liberally seasoned with a special mixture of spices he kept secret, even from me.

  That’s why I was on duty when Elijah came in the station. I only had twenty minutes to go before my chief deputy came in to “man” the office and I could go home. I was hoping the phone would remain quiet and no one would come in. I certainly wasn’t hoping to see a redheaded, freckle-faced boy who looked like he hadn’t had a bath or a change of clothes for a month. He stood there stiff as a fence post at first, then looked around, spotted me, and made his way through the reception area to the doorway of my office.

  I gave him my nice lady smile. “Can I help you?”

  “Is this the sheriff’s office?” He looked pale and scared and spoke with a deep south accent, not a Texas one. I guessed Georgia or Alabama, maybe Tennessee.

  “Yes, it is. What can I do for you?”

  “Uh, can I talk to the sheriff?”

  When I said, “I’m the sheriff,” I got the blank stare. I’m used to it. Most people are surprised when they learn a county in Texas has a female sheriff. We’re not all Wyatt Earps. I held the nice lady smile. “My name is Mollie Goodall, and I’m sheriff of Watango County. What can I do to help you?”

  He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, crossed his arms then dropped them to his sides, and took a deep breath. “Sheriff Goodall, ma’am,” he said, “I come here to tell you you got a murderer living in your town.”

  The boy was dirty and probably a runaway, but there was no one else there to talk to him. No getting around it. I’d be late for Thanksgiving dinner.

  “Come in and sit down,” I said. After he made his way to the chair beside my desk and settled in, I asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Elijah Curry, ma’am.” He ran his fingers across his forehead to swipe a handful of red hair back behind his ear. He needed a haircut two months ago.

  “Okay, Elijah, why did you say I have a murderer in my town?”

  “Because it’s true. My stepfather shot my mom, and he lives here. I come to see he gets put in prison for what he done.”

  The population of Watango County includes a few hundred teenagers. I’ve dealt with many of them, and I’ve learned one thing. They don’t look you in the eyes when they lie or make up a story. This boy’s deep brown eyes were locked on mine, wide open, as serious as any I’ve ever seen.

  “All right, when and where did it happen?”

  “Six weeks ago, ma’am, in Memphis, Tennessee. That’s where I’m from.”

  “How’d you get here?”

  He shrugged. “I walked mostly, got rides once in a while.”

  “All by yourself?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And how old are you?”

  He hesitated too long before he said, “Eighteen.” He averted his eyes from mine to look down at the floor. He wasn’t telling the truth, probably because he knew he had to be eighteen to be out on his own.

  I leaned toward him. “Elijah, I have a twenty-year-old daughter and I work at the youth center at church, so I’m pretty good at guessing the ages of young people. I’m betting you’re fifteen, sixteen at the most.”

  He squeezed his eyes shut. His cheeks flushed. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I lied. I’m sixteen.” He opened his eyes but turned his head away from me. “I ain’t never been good at lying.”

  “No, you’re not very good at it, but you know what?” I reached over and patted his arm. “That’s not a bad thing. We’re not going to worry about that now. Why don’t you relax and tell me what this is about.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He didn’t look at me, but took in a lungful of air and let it out slowly. After a moment of silence, he began. “I was in school that day. My mom was home by herself. He came and shot her. When I got home… I found her.”

  His voice had faded to barely a mumble. I knew it was painful for him to talk about it, but I had to know. I gave him a few seconds before I asked, “What did the Memphis police say about it?”

  He cleared his throat and turned back to me. “They didn’t say nothing. They didn’t have no evidence against him. Her purse was missing and she got paid that day, so they said it was just a robbery and anybody could have done it.”

  “What makes you think your stepfather did it?”

  “I just know, that’s all. He’s the only one who would hurt her. Everybody else liked her. She throwed him out three months ago because he was a lazy no account and wouldn’t work. That’s when he moved here. She kept his favorite hunting rifle and some other stuff for all the money he took from her, and he came back to get it and shot her. I know he did it because his rifle and everything else went missing the same day.”

  “Did you tell the police about that?”

  “I told them, but they didn’t do nothing.” His voice went soft again. He was trying to hold back his feelings,
but talking about his mom’s death brought them to the surface. “He claimed he took all his stuff when he left Memphis three months ago and said he ain’t been back there since.”

  “And you think he’s lying.”

  “I know he is. Most of his stuff was junk, but he wanted that Remington rifle real bad. He said it was worth a lot of money. I helped my mom put it all in the shed after she throwed him out, and now it’s all gone. He broke the lock on the shed and took it.”

  “But you can’t prove anything.”

  “No, ma’am, I can’t.” His voice cracked. He looked up at the ceiling. I could see he was fighting to keep from crying like a little boy.

  “Elijah, if the police in Memphis couldn’t come up with anything against him, what makes you think coming here will make any difference?”

  “I figure if you arrest him and I tell what he did in court, he’ll get what he deserves.”

  “I have to be honest with you, Elijah. Even if I had a reason to arrest him here, the Memphis police have jurisdiction, so that’s where he’d be tried. He’d tell the same lies all over again. It’d be your word against his, and without any proof….”

  His eyes met mine again. A moist glaze covered them. “Please, ma’am. Will you just try?”

  Oh, boy. I think my own eyes glazed over a little. They do that sometimes. Allergies. I didn’t know if I could do anything to help Elijah. I didn’t even know if what he said was true. I did know that if an adult came in with an accusation like his, I’d be duty-bound to check it out. I had to do the same for a teenage runaway. Especially one on the verge of crying in my office.

  “Tell you what, Elijah. First thing tomorrow morning, I’ll go talk to him. Then, we’ll see.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” He turned away from me again, sniffed, and rubbed his eyes with both hands.

  With that much settled, I had a new problem. What to do with Elijah.

  “Do you have a place to stay tonight?” I asked.

  He looked down at his feet. “Yes, ma’am. That ain’t no problem.”

  Well, that was that. I couldn’t let him go knowing he’d sleep under a bush or behind a dumpster somewhere. Since he was a minor, I could call Child Protective Services, but it was a holiday weekend, and they’d be closed till Monday. Anyway, they’d put him in that foster care home in town. That place is so shoddy, I wouldn’t put a dog I hated in the place. Or, I could call Judge Wheeler and ask him what to do. He’d probably tell me to put Elijah in a cell until CPS opened on Monday.