“What do you mean you’re going to help him build a fence?”
“It’s a little extra money. Besides, he’s being picked on by the Ainkle.”
She rolled her eyes. “Has he even discussed money yet?”
“No. But he’s a friend of your dad’s. Right?”
“What does that have to do with anything? You know… sometimes you’re so…”
“What?”
“… naïve.”
That hurt. But what was I supposed to do? I was stuck between Bear, her dad, and the mystery beneath her clothes. “I gave him my word,” I insisted. “I can’t back out. If I do, he might fire me or something. Then I’d have to go back to Alice and beg that bitch for my job back.”
“At least it paid.”
“You WANTED me to work closer. Remember?”
She ended the conversation with another shake of her head and a change of subject. That was how she usually got in the last word. We were going to the movies that night; it was some western that made the Indians look all noble and the made the U.S. Cavalry look like barbarians. She wanted to watch it because it had something to do with some project in her American History class. She cried during the scene that showed an endless field of skinned buffalo carcasses. I remembered reading that Wyatt Earp had been a buffalo hunter. Pat Garrett, too. When it talked about them being buffalo hunters, it never made it sound like tragedy; and nobody I knew sat around and whined about the extinction of buffalos or mastodons or the dodo bird. The movie dragged on, but she was cuddled up next to me, holding tightly onto my hand. With her other hand she rubbed my inner thigh, giving me a painful hard on. The movie was way too long and way too forced. And Ape was way too interested when the lead, a burned out officer manning a deserted outpost, showed his ass on the screen. She and every other girl in the theater giggled like the lecherous old men who hung out at the American Legion Hall.
After the movie she wanted to go to Waffle House for coffee and pie. After that I took her home. When we got there, her dad was waiting up for us. She kissed me lightly on the cheek then bounded out of the car and bounced inside. I watched her tits bounce inside the purple t-shirt she was wearing. Then I went home, jacked off, and went to sleep.
4.
When I knocked on Bear’s trailer door the following morning I was questioning myself for agreeing to be there that early. I knocked again and lit a cigarette. I wasn’t quite awake and I was grumpy besides because Ape was still toying around with me. I was trying to be nice guy; or rather, I was trying to behave the way I thought nice guys behaved – which was the opposite of the way every other guy behaved. It seemed like they were getting everything and I was getting nothing. It wasn’t fair. What made me less that I didn’t deserve more than being teased during a horrible movie that showed some other guy’s ass? What was wrong with a good old fashioned horror flick? At least in one of those you saw a pair of tits in first five minutes. It was practically a rule. I was probably the only guy who graduated from high school and hadn’t made it past a quick feel in the church basement.
After my third time knocking on the door, it swung open. “Damn boy,” he said, zipping up his jeans. “You knock like fuckin’ cop! You’re lucky I didn’t come out here ready to shoot your damn fool head off.”
When he swung the trailer door open, I got my first view inside. It was a small trailer – one of those that people hitched up to a pickup truck and took with them on vacation. It was big enough for a small bed, a cooking area, and a tiny bathroom in the back. No wonder he ate outside, I thought. What does he do in the winter? He stood there and yelled at me some more, and I probably would’ve been worried, but I saw the reason he didn’t answer the door quickly. There was a girl in his bed, making sure to cover herself so I couldn’t see. Was she naked? I told myself she probably was. What did Bear McGee do to get a girl to stay THERE with him?
After he was done talking at me, he looked at his watch. “Oh shit, kid,” he shrugged and smiled. “I told you 8 didn’t I?”
“Yeah.”
“Sorry ‘bout that.” He stepped outside and sat down on the steps to pull on his dirty white socks and worn out black cowboy boots. Then he stood up. “You had breakfast yet?”
I hadn’t, but I really wanted to get started so that we could get as much done as possible before the heat the day. But he wouldn’t hear of it. “How can you work hard,” he asked, “if you haven’t had a good breakfast. Didn’t your mama raise you right?” The he laughed and slapped me on the shoulder, pushing me towards the table behind his trailer.
“Liza will cook up enough for both of us, don’t you worry. She’s not good for much, but she’s a nice fuck and a decent cook.” He didn’t bother to whisper. In fact, he seemed to speak as loud as he could. Like he was showing off. Or bragging.
A couple of minutes later, I saw Liza because she brought out a carafe of coffee and two dingy mugs. She was hiding her face under a mop of dark blonde hair, dressed in a long t-shirt that just barely covered her ass, pink cotton panties, and a pair of blue flip flops. She poured our coffee without saying a word. Bear didn’t introduce us, but when she turned to walk back in, he smacked her on the ass. Then he took a sip of his coffee and made a sour face. “Sorry kid,” he said. “Decent enough cook, but can’t make coffee for shit. Do you need something for your coffee? I drink mine black, but I THINK we got milk or bourbon or something.”
“No thanks.” I took a drink of my coffee. It tasted like hot, dirty water.
He talked on a little bit more about nothing in particular. He talked like someone who enjoyed the sound of his own voice. He talked about riding motorcycles and of getting into bar fights; he’d been at a bar the night before with Liza and got into it with “some pussy who didn’t like how I treat her,” he said. “Can you believe that? I let her stay here, I buy most of her drinks. And some other guy was crying like bitch because he couldn’t keep his dick up long enough to fuck her when he had the chance. “ He laughed. “And it ain’t like it was that hard. To fuck her, I mean.” He smiled at me. “Shit, even you could probably get her if you wanted to. I wouldn’t mind. I mean, I reamed her out pretty good, so you may not FEEL anything…” he laughed again. “But shit. Feel free. You smile at her the right way she’ll give you the best head you’ve ever had.”
By this time Liza came back out with two plates of food. That was the first I time I actually saw her face. I didn’t place her until after she turned to walk away, and that was only because she spoke. “I’m gonna get dressed,” she said. “I gotta work today.”
Bear waved his hand, dismissing her. He dug into his food: watery scrambled eggs, rubbery bacon, burnt toast. He looked up to see if I was eating. “Say,” he said. “Where’d you go to school?”
I told him.
“Shit.” He put his fork down. “That’s where Liza went, I think.”
I knew that. Her name was Liza Brunnel. She had been a year ahead of me. My sophomore year, she started dating this upperclassman Rusty Hinkle, and started dressing like a low rent hooker extra from an episode of Miami Vice. There was very little left to the imagination, and the only reason she got away with it was that seeing her everyday probably gave our geriatric principal the first boner he’d had in years. I used to see Liza and Rusty humping in stairwells and making out at lunch and disappearing into the second floor boys’ bathroom. After Rusty graduated, she tried to change her tune and dressed like a Catholic School teacher; but it never mattered. I’d heard that she later posed for an adult magazine called Skank. Beaver of the Week.
“You two could talk about old time,” Bear went on. “Mutual friends, shit like that.”
“Uh, that’s ok. We should probably get started on the fence, shouldn’t we?”
He shook his head and picked up his fork. “Eat first.”
I picked through my food the best I could. I didn’t have much of an appetite. After a few minutes I heard Liza get in her car and leave.
