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“Paper or plastic, Julie?” Peggy pulled a few items from the cart and began to punch the prices into the almost antique cash register.
Kill a tree or choke a fish? That was the question Peggy would have preferred to ask this large human in the checkout line. Julie Lucas lived directly across the street from the store. She came in at least twice each day to buy some more groceries. She had four kids and Karen, the oldest, was on the track team with Peggy and if she had a best friend, Karen was it. The kids were skinny and it looked like mom was the reason. Peggy couldn’t help but grin as she watched this three hundred plus pounds woman wrestling with a purse that would have held all the groceries she had just purchased. Peggy glanced down at her own white apron wanting to pull it aside to display the slogan written across her T-shirt in big black letters. It said, “PLANTS AND ANIMALS ARE BEING DESTROYED TO MAKE ROOM FOR YOUR FAT ASS!” Gus, the storeowner, thought it was a cute T-shirt but requested that Peggy keep it covered. Almost all three hundred of the Weston citizenry were bible thumping, God fearing Methodists and Gus was not emotionally equipped to argue religion. To Gus all environmental concerns were just a kind of religion.v
“James Paul was in here just a while ago. He asked about you. He’s over on the lot checkin’ the water pump ‘cause the tower is low. He said he’d be a little late for lunch.” Gus had two sons and James Paul had been mooning over Peggy since they were in Junior High together. His other son Max had married and moved away to Dallas. The last she heard he was working as a policeman and going to school. Good for him.
She just listened to Gus ramble and absent-mindedly wiped the counter with an old worn out sponge. First of all Aunt Mary would not allow any boys around Peggy. She always told her to wait a little while longer. Secondly, James Paul was one boy that Peggy did not mind the put off. She considered him to be the ultimate jerk. Aunt Mary told her that all boys were not worth the trouble of even thinking about when they were young. Peggy wasn’t thinking about her Aunt or James Paul at that moment. She was imagining the face she had seen for the first time only yesterday. It happened once at the track meet and again at the barn. He had freckles on his nose and the whitest teeth she had ever seen on a human being. He constantly pushed his long straight hair out of his face. Looking at him made her cock her head to the side. She had never before cocked her head at anyone.
She looked at her watch. The store would close for the lunch break in a few minutes and as always; Peggy would go next door to Gracie’s restaurant and help with the lunch run. It was out of one apron and into another.
It was visiting day at the hospital and at four-thirty the routine would commence. Peggy would arrive at her house. Aunt Mary would be dressed and her face covered with a sample of just about everything that Max Factor produced. Then would come the ten-minute car ride to the Cameron County Mental Health and Retardation Center. Peggy and Mary would ride up the elevator to the third floor.
“Peggy! Are you all right?” Gus gave her a concerned look. Peggy was just standing behind the cash register and staring into space.
“Uh, oh I’m fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She found herself daydreaming more and more lately.
The lunch run at Gracie’s was always the same people. Most of the nineteen bodies that showed up were county road crews. They spent most of their days standing around leaning on shovels along the back roads. The holes they stared into must have just mysteriously appeared because no one could be found who actually saw one of them dig. The others were farmers, mechanics, and the lady who just moved into town to open a gift shop. She was known only as Kim and right now she was the most talked about person in town. What kind of person would go to the trouble to open a gift shop in Weston?
They all got in within five minutes. They all ate the special which on Friday was always sliced beef and gravy, mashed potatoes and gravy, a dinner role usually pulled in half and covered with gravy, and whole kernel corn. Peggy suspected that most of these patrons put gravy on the corn also. They were finished eating in about thirty minutes. And then they were gone. Peggy wiped down the last table and said about the only words she had ever spoken to Jeanette after lunch for the past three years.
“See you tomorrow Jeanette.”
Gracie owned the restaurant and she did the cooking. She was born, raised and had never left Weston, Texas. Everybody suspected that she was gay or was a real hermit who lived her life alone and loved it.
Jeanette was the only waitress and was there at breakfast and lunch. The cafe was not open for dinner. Jeanette was enjoying her senior citizen status. She did the waitress thing as a hobby. She loved people and particularly loved to make them happy. She was also a good ear. When the good old boys were having trouble with their wives, their dogs, their trucks or their bosses, Jeanette was always there to sympathize and offer some motherly advice. She was almost proud of her “town gossip” status. If there were facts to be repeated or even to be fabricated on dull days, you could depend on her. At sixty-six years she still was a handsome figure. Her younger days were filled with dreams of being an important, rich, New York model. Then small town Harry came along, she fell in love, had and raised his four kids and now she was just enjoying the passage of time. The locals not only liked talking to her but she had the biggest breasts in town and her waitress outfit did wonders for her chest. She got a kick out of making the red necks blush.
It was exactly two miles from the store to the farmhouse door. Peggy almost always walked. She preferred to walk because the close confines of a car made her nervous. She remembered the thrill of her first car and she got a hardship license when she was fifteen. The 1993 Toyota was still sitting at a very low mileage in the garage.
The first three-quarters of a mile toward home took her out of town. The scenery didn’t change much. There was the town hall, which was actually an old wood frame church. It still looked like a church was it not for the sign out front and the slot near the front door that said, “PAY WATER BILL HERE.” The old building had been saved with some county money, which paid to restore the structure, but the town was so small that it was not currently needed for any function. The new Baptist church was just next-door. The education wing of the sanctuary was the most used public structure in town. There were only two sets of functions available within miles. The school activities were held in the school auditorium and all the rest were conducted at church.
Peggy fell into a steady rhythmic trot. As she neared the corner a pained expression crossed her face because she knew what to expect.
“Hey sweets!” James Paul screeched from somewhere in the bowels of Smith’s Automotive.
The storefront was almost completely hidden by the bumper-to-bumper junked pick up trucks lined up around the property. There was no grass or plants of any kind on the entire corner. The dirt was covered with a hard coat of oil, grease, various petroleum products and, Peggy suspected, urine and feces of the employees that had been put down and spread out over the years.
“Hey darlin’! I won’t be wearin’ nuthin’ under that robe tonight! I’ll give you a free peek!”
Peggy could hear his voice getting closer. She picked up the pace. James Paul began to yell.
“Be sure to look at the top of my hat!”
He stood at the edge of the road. He appeared skinny and bent. His jeans looked a lot like the oil, dirt, and secretion covered ground on which he stood. His blue and oil colored shirt was tucked in at the back and flying free at the front. Peggy was amazed that in the presence of that entire petroleum product he could still light up a cigarette and not blow the entire corner to kingdom come. She put distance between her and that nasty person in that nasty place. His voice trailed off as he spoke more softly thinking she was too far away to hear. But, she could hear him as if he were standing next to her.
“Yeah you slut bitch! I’ll show you somethin’!”
Peggy passed the last house and the road started to angle up hill. The breeze blowing across the cornfields smelled so good that Peggy smiled. The fence stopped and the trees began. It had always been known as Cleburne’s Wood. There was almost exactly one mile of trees that met the road between here and her farm.
The sky was clear and blue. The temperature was in the high eighties, which was normal for this part of Texas in late May. Peggy knew she was early enough before visiting her mother to take her usual short cut. The barbed wire fence was five strand and a little over five feet tall. Peggy took one quick glance around before she jumped and cleared the fence with a foot to spare. It felt good to run and jump. She trotted down the post-oak shaded path. She felt strong and the more she moved the better she felt.
“Snap!” The sound was almost inaudible.
Peggy stopped and went into a crouch in an instant. Her long legs had coiled into a spring. Her muscles tensed and her breath came in short silent gasps. She scanned the surrounding undergrowth with her head fixed and only her eyes moving. She ceased to think and her every move became entirely instinct.
The cottontail rabbit had frozen in place. It was aware of a presence. They were both waiting for the other to move and give even the slightest indication of the other’s location. The rabbit twitched his nose. Peggy sprang to a full speed dash in less than a heart beat. She closed the fifty-yard distance between her and the prey just as the rabbit made his third hop. Peggy grabbed him in mid-air and brought him quickly to her mouth. There was a bite, a crunching sound, and the rabbit went limp in her hands. She took it away and just stood there and stared. There was a dead rabbit in her hands. She had killed it. She did not want to eat it. She felt suddenly overcome with guilt that turned quickly to grief. She had questions. Why did I do that? How could I be fast enough to catch a wild rabbit? Why did I bite it in the neck? The answers did not come but the tears did. She knelt slowly amid the dead leaves, sticks and branches. She cradled the limp animal in her arms and wept loudly. Only yesterday it had been a small gray fox. Earlier in the week a raccoon had met her deadly grasp. She had no idea how many animals had succumbed to her blinding speed and quick death actions.
Her thoughts turned to the hospital. Her mother was in a tiny section of high security. The letters on the entrance door chilled her to the bone. She could see the letters clearly in her mind.
M.R. It was not spelled out but she knew. It stood for Maximum Restraint. The tears went away almost as quickly as they had come. She laid the rabbit on a dead log and backed up quietly. A hungry predator would soon find the easy meal and nature would once again make its move to maintain the delicate balance. Peggy moved back onto the path and set an easy pace toward the house. She found herself counting the rhythmic sounds of her bare feet slapping the smooth asphalt of the Farm-to-market road as she ran. The trees broke away and she trotted onto the thin gravel road that led from the road to the gate. It was almost five o’clock. There was just enough time to shower and dress for her visit. There was no thought of the rabbit. Her mom would be glad to see her. Maybe.
They rumbled down the drive and out onto the farm road for the eleven-mile trip to the Carter County Mental Health and Retardation Center. It was just hot. Aunt Mary was in her lecture mode and talked non-stop about the virtues of patience and chastity. Peggy wanted more than anything to open a window and let the breeze filter her Aunt’s rambling. The road seemed to go on and on as well as the one-sided conversation. Peggy was happy in the fact that this would be a short, hurry-up visit, because she had the get ready for her big night. Her perfect 4.0 grade point average put her in the spotlight and she was the Lincoln High School, Class of 1996, and valedictorian.
Aunt Mary guided her big red Jeep Cherokee through the wrought iron gated of the compound. The guard had seen them almost every day at about that time for the last two years. He always had the same smile, nod and pass-on-through hand signal.
“Care for a warm-up young man?” Jeanette began pouring even before he could answer.
Lester sat in a booth at Gracie’s. He had been sitting in this spot since his brief encounter with Peggy at the corral. He already did not care much for Aunt Mary. He could only think of that petite girl with flashing green eyes, an almost smile, and a ponytail that swayed when she talked. He no longer wanted a newspaper photo, he wanted Peggy.
“So, you just passing through?” Jeanette watched too much television. Western bartenders were already famous for that question.
“I’m a news reporter out of Dallas. I’m here to do a story on your big track star.”
“You mean Peggy?” Jeanette straightened her back and glanced over both shoulders.
Lester was, after all, a student of human behavior. He braced himself and prepared for some enlightenment.
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