Some Go Hungry. J. Patrick Redmond
fast do you think we can go?” Daryl asked, yelling above the sound of wind and Prince’s “Darling Nikki” blasting from the aftermarket Bose speakers and cassette radio, cows and corn passing in a blur.
“I have no idea.”
“The speedometer goes up to 160. I bet we can redline it.”
“Go for it!” I said.
Soon the Corvette was racing down the road, its engine revved like a car in the Indianapolis 500.
“Guess how fast we’re going?” he asked.
“No idea,” I said, gripping the bottom of my seat with my right hand. Ahead of us lay the curved approach to Highway 41. “Think we should slow down?” I asked.
“Naw. Watch this. My brother does it all the time.”
Approaching the curve, having no real knowledge of how fast we were going and allowing no regard for existing traffic, the car railed down the access road, shooting like a pinball across the two southbound lanes and into the northbound lanes, its speed sending the car into the highway’s median, its tires kicking up gravel and dirt behind us. Once Daryl gained control and steered the car back onto the pavement, keeping it between the lines of the inner lane, I looked behind us. Fortunately, there were no other cars—just a brown dust cloud hanging in our wake.
“That’s fucking awesome,” I said, trying to keep my voice from shaking, and still white-knuckling my seat.
“It’s like a roller-coaster turn, sort of. Like the Beast at Kings Island. My brother can take it faster in his car.”
I was scared to death. But my fear was intricately mingled with the thrill of being in Daryl’s presence, and this would be the experience against which I’d compare all my friendships and future loves.
* * *
Daryl had once seduced me. And standing there behind the restaurant, I wondered if he was doing the same with Trace. A silly thought, perhaps. I’d hoped Rosabelle’s initial uncertainties regarding Daryl’s return to Fort Sackville and his intentions, his manipulative ways and self-serving air inherited from his mamma, were incorrect, but after watching Daryl dropping off Trace and considering the ease with which a teenage boy could be drawn in by a confident, charismatic man in a vintage sports car—sports cars by design are meant to seduce—I began to reconsider her thoughts. But Trace was not yet a man. Trace had just turned seventeen. Maybe I was projecting my long-ago teenage entanglement with Daryl onto Trace. Certainly Daryl knew better than to mess with a teenage boy, right? I had to rid my mind of the thought. After all, I’d not been around Daryl in years. He was a lot of things; a pedophile I was certain he wasn’t. Was I jealous? That, I thought, is really twisted. But no, I was not jealous. Daryl was good-looking, and as a teenager myself I had been attracted to him, but we had both been teenagers. He was a man now, and so was I. Perhaps I was suspect of his newfound man of God status, which contradicted his previous actions. I guess that’s what born-again means: a delineation or separation of oneself from one’s past transgressions. Was I concerned with Daryl’s thoughts regarding our high school experience or his opinion of me today? I hadn’t thought about him until he returned, until I’d seen him that Sunday. And certainly there were rumors of my own “confirmed bachelorhood” and Rio, my former “roommate,” who now lived out of town. I was certain I had not escaped town chatter and whispers, eye rolls or comments. I could feel their eyes on my back when they passed me on the street. Even so, I never attempted to confront or confirm the chin-wags. For me, it was about conforming. Keeping talk at bay. If one conformed to Fort Sackville’s ways, one did not create complications. Keeping it out of town, as Rosabelle had instructed me years ago, had served me well. Daryl, however, was not afraid of confrontation. He never had been. It was odd, though, his taking an interest in Trace. Daryl had said he had big plans for Trace that first Sunday we spoke.
Slipping out of my thoughts and into the warm December sunshine, I turned from my spot in the restaurant’s parking lot overlooking Fort Sackville and walked toward the kitchen door. I, too, struggled to open it and then walked in, beneath the air curtain, and made my way through the kitchen’s commotion to the front of the house. According to the time clock, it was almost five p.m., the bussers were all checked in, and the line of customers along the buffet was building. It was indeed going to be a busy evening. Soon I would be lost in the bustle of another Friday night supper rush. Yet for just a moment more, I couldn’t help but wonder what Daryl was up to, why he’d really returned to Fort Sackville, and what the untold significance and implications were of his apparent and newly formed attachment to Trace. Somehow I had the feeling, as if hearing Rosabelle’s voice in my ear, that “shit was gonna hit the fan.”
Chapter Four
December
The Wednesday night before Christmas Sunday, I met Rosabelle and Mae for dinner at the Executive Inn. Even though a month had passed, it was the first opportunity we had to get together since that Sunday phone conversation when Rosabelle called to check in on me after my return from South Beach. The holidays were a busy time for Rosabelle’s and for Daniels’ Family Buffet.
The Executive Inn was a 1940s motor lodge and restaurant on the north side of town, a popular dining establishment with the upper crust of Fort Sackville society. Stepping through the front vestibule was like stepping back in time: the interior well maintained, its knotty pine paneling offered a rustic, Adirondack air, with pine-colored vinyl booths and chairs, wood tables, and a bar in which one might expect to see men in fedoras smoking cigars and drinking highballs along with men in flannel shirts smoking Camels and drinking Stroh’s beer. Rosabelle often said the clientele was more crusty than upper-crust, but that she went there because the cocktails were strong and the food was good. When I arrived I found her and Mae sitting at the bar, waiting on our table.
“Who does someone have to blow to get a cocktail around here?” I whispered in Rosabelle’s ear as I pulled out a barstool next to her.
“Sugar, you’re in the wrong bar if you gotta ask that question,” Rosabelle said, reaching around to give me a hug and kiss on the cheek.
“No shit,” I said, smiling and winking at Mae. “They got a nice crowd tonight.” I enjoyed going to other restaurants—not that Fort Sackville offered a large selection. I especially enjoyed restaurants that offered actual table service, as opposed to Daniels’ get-it-yourself buffet. Rosabelle often said, “Honey, I don’t type, I don’t swim in dirty water, and I don’t serve myself at restaurants. I want to be waited on when I go out.”
The hostess arrived to seat us. The place was packed with locals—a crowd that was not Daniels’ Family Buffet regulars. Looking around, I said, “It’s funny how there’s a whole group of people that eat out but whom I never see in our place. I guess they’re like you, Rosabelle—they want service and a cocktail.”
“What do you think about Daryl moving back to town?” Rosabelle asked me after we settled into our chairs at a table and ordered appetizers.
“It was a bit unsettling to see him in the restaurant. I had such a huge crush on him in high school, and our friendship ended so suddenly, disappeared with him right after graduation. And seeing him married with children . . .”
“Did you guys get a chance to talk?” Mae asked.
“Not really. It was all quite uncomfortable. At least on my end. He has that preacher’s air about him. You know, that almost condescending demeanor. He always was a bit arrogant.”
“A bit arrogant? A lot arrogant! He was an asshole as a teenager,” Rosabelle said. “I can’t imagine him as an adult. His mother was the same way. She thought her family money gave her permission to act like she was the Queen of Sheba.”
“I was just blind to it, I guess. Anyway, he just seems to carry himself with that God is on my side kind of attitude. I can’t stand that.”
“It doesn’t surprise me in the least. I’ve not seen any good come from anybody out of Liberty University.