She tried to pull him up but he was dead weight, no, she thought, this is not fair, she got an arm under him but he still wasn’t helping her, he was so heavy, she wouldn’t be able to lift him, he barely seemed to know she was there. He was so cold he could have been a log or a rock. “Get up,” she shouted at him, her voice muted by the snow. He pushed weakly with his legs and then they were standing and she told him we are going to walk now, we are going to walk to the house.
She got him to the bathroom, set him in the bathtub in his clothes. She ran hot water into the tub and took his shoes off.
“What happened,” she said, but his eyes were somewhere else. The hot water was pouring into the tub but he stared numbly ahead. He didn’t know her. The water turned the color of mud. There was a strong odor; she wondered distantly when he had washed himself last, he had not been taking care of himself, she knew that, getting laid off from the hardware store had sent him into a tailspin, she should have done more. She had decided to let him find his own way. She had made the wrong decision. His skin was white and icy to the touch and she pushed his shoulders deeper under the water.
The steam filled the room and the scab on his neck loosened and his cuts were running and the water nearly black from dirt and blood. She was kneeling and splashing the warm dirty water on his face. His body had cooled it and she drained it partially and ran more hot in. After a few minutes he began to shiver as he warmed up. She couldn’t remember if you were supposed to warm a person this fast. She knew there was something you were not supposed to do, you warm them too fast and they die. She sat him up and wiped the scratch on his neck with iodine, the brown stain ran down into his shirt.
“Let’s get these clothes off,” she said, the soft mothering voice she hadn’t used in years. He let her take his shirt off. She undid his belt, undid the button on his filthy jeans, tried to get them off but he was holding them up with both hands—he would not let her take his pants down.
“Billy.”
He didn’t say anything.
“Let go,” she said.
He did and she took the pants off with some difficulty, careful to leave his underwear in place. The cut on his neck was bleeding again, it was straight and deep, done with a knife, she realized, like a piece of cut meat, she saw a hint of whiteness, unnatural- looking, she knew it must be the tendon or some other kind of tissue. She tried to remember if she had locked the door. Virgil had left a shotgun but she didn’t know where the shells were.
“Is someone coming after you?” she said. She shook him. “Billy. Billy, is someone going to be coming here?”
“No,” he said. He was waking up.
“Look at me.”
“No one is coming,” he said.
She saw spots in front of her. It is too hot in this room, she told herself. Her head was getting light. Next time you see him like this won’t be in this house, he’ll be laid out on a table in a hospital basement. She picked up his wet pants and began folding them, he had pissed his pants when they cut him. Now he was lying there flushed and awake and looking at his pants in her hand.
He sat up and reached and she leaned over the tub to hold him. He took the pants from her hand.
“I can wash them myself,” he said.
When she left, Poe stripped his shorts off and scrubbed himself where the bum had grabbed him. The cut on his neck stung and he remembered knowing Isaac had left him, for a second all he’d thought was fucking Isaac he left you here and then he’d felt the cutting burning on his neck. He’d felt the cutting and he’d gone loose, done what was expected of him. Would have cut me all the way, Jesus his name was, Jesus the cocksucking Mexican who is still alive now somewhere, he was not a cruel person but help me Father I’ll find him I’ll put a stick through his ankles and hoist him up and skin him. Poe could imagine him screaming and the thought of that, of old Jesus screaming as Poe skinned him alive it nearly gave Poe a hard- on or maybe he would gut him first, field- dress him, as it were, leave his guts all hanging out so old Jesus could get a long look. Christ, he thought, listen to yourself. Your fucking brain is out of adjustment. He splashed water on his face. The Mexican had squeezed on his balls so hard he’d tasted the puke come up. That was when he pissed himself.
He remembered that enormous fucking crack, though, it sounded like a pistol and the Mexican let go and Poe took off toward the door. He saw Otto, the eyes all bulged out Otto was crying blood and it was swelling from his mouth and ears. Isaac was waiting for him by the door, he was a good man Isaac no doubt about that, a fucking standup human man. Though he might say otherwise he was not sure, when the moment of truth came, that he himself could have done that for someone. He was not that kind of person, that was the truth of it. That was a thing he knew about himself. Whereas Isaac—Poe would have wanted to but he might not have been able. Might not have been capable of making his feet take him in the direction. He had always suspected that but now he was sure. Except I would have gone back for Isaac, he thought. Maybe not for someone else but definitely for him.
He knew Otto must still be right where he fell. They wouldn’t try to bury him—burying a dead body, you’re fucked if you get caught doing that. He wondered if they would go to Harris, everyone knew Harris hated bums but maybe these guys didn’t know. Maybe they would tell him and Harris would have no choice but to check it out. Went with Mom for a while. He wondered if his mother had done it with Chief Harris. There was no question about it. Bud Harris had gotten Poe out of an assault charge. Everyone knew about that—that Poe had gotten a free ride for what he’d done to the kid from Donora. This time Harris would not be able to help him.
After a time he got out and dressed and went into the living room. He was so exhausted he could barely keep his head up. The house was dark, she’d turned nearly all the lights off, but it was warm and he could tell by the singed dusty smell that she’d turned the baseboard heaters on. He felt guilty but also relieved.
She said: “Was anyone else with you?”
“Isaac English.”
“Is he okay?”
“Better than me.”
“Your father is coming over.”
“Did you tell him?”
“No. I just thought I should warn you.”
“Does that mean he’s back for good?”
“I don’t know yet,” she said. “We’ll see.”
He sat on the opposite side of the couch from her and then she pulled him over and he laid his head in her lap. His head was against her belly. He let his eyes close and he stopped thinking about the Mexican, he could hear her breathing in her belly and everything was going to be fine and he fell asleep immediately.
He slept like that for half an hour and then they heard his father’s truck in the driveway. Poe got up and his mother gave him a hurt look and he tried to smile at her but he didn’t think he could stand taking any shit from Virgil right now. He went to his room.
He could hear Virgil and his mother talking. Soon they would either be yelling or screwing. He figured the yelling would come soon enough— he’d seen enough of his father to know where this would go. But the next sound Poe heard was the maul ringing against the wedges, the sound of Virgil splitting the wood that Poe himself was supposed to split. Shit he thought shit shit shit, it should have been him going out there and doing it but it was too late, he’d fucked it up and now the old man would get the credit.
He thought about Otto again, thought you should call Chief Harris, he got you out of the last scrape, only it was too late for that, too—now they would look guilty. It was not that simple anyway. Technically, the big Swede hadn’t been doing anything. He was about to, that was for goddamn sure, but really all he’d done was toss a couple of punches. He thought about him there on the floor of the machine shop with his head all bashed in and he felt guilty. He was supposed to be in college right now, going to class, his coach at Buell High, Dick Cannedy old Dick had gotten Poe into three colleges, that one Colgate in upstate New York looked good but he wasn’t ready. No, the truth was he’d been plenty ready, if they’d left him alone he would have gone. But when everyone is shouting at you to do something… He’d flipped them all off, given the entire town the middle finger, turned down college for a job at
