The hellion

CHAPTER SIX

They went to Catfish Corner, a tin-roofed shanty out in the country at the intersection of two county roads off the Huntsville Highway. They took his car, and he drove it exactly the way they all said he did-too fast, too carelessly, and always with that everlasting cigarette crooked through one finger. Yet Rachel felt safe with him.

At Catfish Corner the crowd was mostly black, friendly, and vocal. "Hey, Tommy Lee!" someone shouted as soon as they entered the smoky, low-ceilinged room. "Been wonderin' when we'd see y'all around these parts again. C'mon over, boy, and bring yer lady with ya!"

Tommy Lee waved at the gregarious black man whose backside was twice as wide as the red plastic seat of the bar stool, but he took Rachel's elbow and guided her to a table instead. "If it's all the same to you, Eugene, I'm gonna keep my lady away from a sweet talker like you. No sense takin' chances."

A chorus of laughter went up from the group at the bar, while Tommy Lee directed Rachel to a vintage kitchen set with chrome legs and gray-marbled plastic seats amid a group of others much like it. He pulled out her chair, then seated himself across from her. Beside the table a crude window tilted outward, hinged at the top and propped open with a stick of wood. The trees pressed close to the building and insects worried themselves against the screen. A potted candle in a red glass snifter sent flickering light up to join that from the neon beer signs around the bar and the weak splashes of color from bare gold bulbs overhead.

When they were seated, Tommy Lee grinned teasingly. "Well, there's one thing you can't accuse me of, and that's trying to impress a lady with atmosphere. I brought you here because Big Sam fries the meanest catfish this side of the Mason-Dixon Line. And I don't know about you, but I worked up an appetite swimming."

Rachel studied the handwritten menu to cover her disappointment with his choice of restaurant. "Mmm… me, too." But she felt she needn't put catfish in her mouth to taste it-the smell was everywhere, mixed with a strong odor of onions and grease.

"Rachel?"

She met his eyes and found him still grinning, one shoulder pitched lower than the other as he leaned back against the chair. "Don't judge until you've eaten, okay?"

Before she could answer, a buxom woman appeared, her breasts the size of cantaloupes, earrings the size of handcuffs. She laid her hand familiarly on Tommy Lee's shoulder. "Well, I declare, if it isn't the most handsome honky to put foot in Catfish Corner since the last time he was here. What you mean by stayin' scarce all this time?" And she shamelessly leaned over and kissed Tommy Lee full on the lips.

Rachel watched, shocked, as his hand rested on her hip while her breasts brushed his chest. She checked to see if others were watching, but just then the man behind the rectangular window dividing the main room from the kitchen bellowed, "Hey, Daisy, you leave off kissin' the customers so's they can order catfish, you hear?"

Everyone at the bar laughed, and Daisy slowly raised her head, cocked a wrist on one hip, and toyed with the hair above Tommy Lee's ear. Her eyes appeared hooded and sultry as she looked down into his smiling face and drawled, "We want him to come back, now, don't we?"

Rachel was horrified. Never in her life had she seen a white man kiss a black woman, yet Tommy Lee did it with obvious relish.

When Daisy finally disengaged herself, he belatedly reminded her, "I've got a lady with me tonight, Daisy. Meet Rachel."

Daisy turned laconically, still with one hand on her hip, the other cocked at the wrist. "Don't pay no never-mind to me, honey. I been kissin' your man since before there was catfish in that creek outside. He's like a son to me."

Tommy Lee gave her a nudge and ordered, "Get out of here, Daisy, and bring us two orders of the usual, and a glass of lime water for the lady."

"Lime water! What you think we runnin' here, a fruit stand?"

"Just ice water then. Now, scat."

She turned away with a chuckle and sauntered off while Rachel watched her bulging backside wriggle in tight cerise pants. When her eyes returned to Tommy Lee, she found him smirking at her.

"Just like a son, huh?" she repeated dryly, cocking an eyebrow.

"That's right."

Rachel pulled a hard paper napkin from a metal dispenser, held it between two fingers, and cocked her wrist while handing it to him. "I think you'd better wipe that shiny purple lipstick off… son. We wouldn't want it to get in your food and poison you."

Tommy Lee laughed while rubbing the garish lipstick off his mouth. "Don't think anything of Daisy. She's Big Sam's wife-that was him hollering through the porthole from the kitchen."

"His wife!" Rachel was shocked at the familiarity the woman had just displayed under her husband's nose.

"She kisses all the customers that way. And every time she does, Big Sam hollers through the kitchen window, and everybody at the bar laughs on cue. That's how it is out here. We're all friends."

But Rachel couldn't help harboring reservations about his choice of friends.

During their wait for the meal, Tommy Lee had two drinks, then another while they ate. The food was exceptional, and served in such sumptuous portions that Rachel barely put a dent in hers. Tommy Lee eyed her plate and asked, "You all done?" At her nod he inquired, "Mind if I clean up the rest?"

While he did, she thought about his eating habits, probably fasting all day, living on alcohol and ice, then feeding on fatty foods in periodic spurts of excess. It was no wonder his physique had suffered. After some consideration she asked, "When was the last time you ate a decent meal?"

He glanced from his plate to her and back again.

"Oh, I didn't mean including this one," she said. "It's delicious, really. I just have a feeling your diet is rather slapdash."

He only shrugged, wiped his mouth, and lifted his eyes to find her studying him contemplatively. "You don't like it here, do you?"

"Oh, the food was wonderful!" she replied brightly, but coloring.

"You don't have to say it. I know what you're thinking. But I wanted you to know where I've been, who my friends are… no secrets."

"Why?"

"Just so you'll know. I find people like these far more genuine than the bigots in town." He tossed his napkin onto his plate. "The country club set -you can have 'em."

Just then a small black boy bounded up to the table and flung himself across Tommy Lee's lap. He looked to be no more than seven years old, had a front tooth missing, and wore a stretched-out T-shirt with a picture of Darth Vader on the back.

"Hey, Tommy Lee, Tommy Lee, where you been, huh? Been savin' them rocks like you said to, so you'n me can show Darla she ain't so hot! Got a-a-a-little these." He dumped a double fistful of rocks on the tabletop. "See? They just as flat as pee on a plate."

Tommy Lee's face lit up with laughter, ending with a grin as he gently scolded the youngster, "Hey, hey, mustn't talk like that around a lady." He roughed the child's hair and asked, "Where have you been hiding?"

"Mama, she wouldn't let me come out till you was done eatin'.was The boy reached up to loop an elbow around Tommy Lee's neck. "You reckon we can make eleven?" He beamed into the man's face with excitement and obvious hero worship.

With one arm coiled around the little boy's waist, Tommy Lee looked across at Rachel and explained, "Darrel and I are trying to find the perfect stone that'll skip eleven times. So far the best we've done is nine. But his sister, Darla, claims she's done ten."

"She ain't done no ten-I know she ain't! She lyin!" spouted Darrel. "And besides, lookit these what I found."

Tommy Lee sifted through the collection of prize stones, nudging them around the table while his dark wavy head bent near the much smaller one of black close-cropped curls. "Whoa! This one looks like a prize!" Tommy Lee held it aloft.

"Can we go out and try it now?"

Tommy Lee smiled down at the boy. "Reckon it's too dark to see tonight."

"You come back on Sunday? Then we c'n show Darla? Please, Tommy Lee?"

"Today's Sunday," he reminded the child.

"But I mean next Sunday, like we used to. And you can stay for dinner after church and we can all play ball and..."

"Come to think of it, I do have next Sunday free. You tell Darla she'd better be ready to put her money where her mouth is." He affectionately swatted the boy's backside and watched him barrel off toward the kitchen. "He's Sam and Daisy's boy. A bundle of dynamite." At last he dragged his eyes back to Rachel, who wore a slightly amazed expression. "Something wrong, Rachel?"

"No…" Rachel sat up straighter. "No." But after adding it all up she queried, "You come out here and go to church with them on Sundays?"

He deliberated silently for some time and finally answered, "Sometimes. They've got a nice little white clapboard church out in the pines about a mile from here. Well, you know what those little Baptist country churches are like. Peaceful. I prefer it to the brick one downtown."

She studied him silently for a while. Then it all came clear.

"Your surrogate family, Tommy Lee?" she questioned softly.

He reached for a cigarette, took some time to light it and blow out a cloud of smoke, then studied her thoughtfully before answering, "I guess you might say that."

Rachel's heart wrenched with pity. He had children of his own; yet he came out here to play ball and skip pebbles. He had a church of his own; yet he came out here to attend theirs. He had parents of his own; yet he shunned them, though it obviously cost him much to do so. She pictured Gaines and Lily Gentry. Did they long for their son while he gave his affection to a black family who ran a catfish restaurant by Bear Creek? How terribly they all must be hurting. Suddenly she wanted that hurt mended, for everyone's sake.

"Tommy Lee, why don't you go see your mama and daddy?"

He carefully ironed all expression from his face and snorted through his nose.

"They're getting old," she reminded him. "If I can forgive, why can't you?"

But again they were interrupted. "Beg pardon, ma'am." It was Big Sam, standing beside their table with four green bills in his hand. "Tommy Lee, got the next installment for you on that loan." He proudly peeled off and laid down four five-dollar bills, counting carefully. "Five, ten, fifteen, twenty dollars." He beamed at Tommy Lee. "You write that in your book like always?"

"You bet, Sam. And how's the dishwasher running?"

"Runnin' slick as a skinned eel, Tommy Lee. And Daisy, she comes around snugglin' the end of a hot day like this, just thankin' me for not havin' to wash them dishes by hand like she used to."

Tommy Lee laughed, reached for a napkin, and wrote something on it, then handed it back to Big Sam. Sam glanced at it, then looked up. "It say the same like it always say?"

"Yessir. Received of Samuel Davis twenty dollars on dishwasher loan. And I put the date there."

"Good." Big Sam pocketed the napkin carefully in the breast patch of his sweat-soaked shirt, then patted it. "See you next Sunday. Darrel say you comin' to dinner. You bring the lady if you want to."

"Thank you, Sam. That's up to her. This is Rachel, a girl I used to go to high school with."

Sam bowed from the waist three times. "Miss Rachel, how was the catfish and pups?"

"The best I've ever eaten," she replied truthfully, warming to the big man who hovered self-consciously beside the table.

"Got to get back to the kitchen. Y'all come back. Tommy Lee, you bring Miss Rachel back, you hear?"

"I'll do that, Sam. And would you fix me one for the road?"

"I sure will. Comin' right up."

When they were alone again Tommy Lee reached for the check as if to leave, but she covered his hand on the tabletop. "You lent him money to buy a dishwasher for this place?"

His eyes remained carefully noncommittal as they met hers. "He tried to get it in town, but the bank took one look at this tin heap and decided he didn't have either enough collateral or enough education to merit approval of the loan."

Neither of them had to say that as president of the bank, her father was its chief loan officer. Their eyes held while the knowledge flashed between them.

"But how much money can a dishwasher cost?"

"Six hundred dollars," he answered, rising from his chair, dropping enough bills on the table that Rachel didn't have to count them to realize they included a more than generous tip.

"Six hundred dollars? And he pays you back twenty dollars at a time?"

"When he can. Sometimes it's five, sometimes ten. He m/'ve had a good week. Should we go?"

She was still trying to digest what she had just learned about her father and about Tommy Lee, as the latter stepped politely behind her chair. On his way out, he picked up a drink from the bar. It had been mixed in a plastic tumbler, which he lifted in a good-bye salute as he opened the door for Rachel.

Outside it was black. The soles of their shoes crunched on the gravel as they made their way to the car, which was parked beneath the thick overhanging branches of a catalpa tree, nosing against the high bank of Bear Creek, which snuffled along through the darkness. The sound of hundreds of crickets undulated through the night while the scent of the damp creek bank rose up to meet the dust of the dry gravel lot.

After Tommy Lee had politely seen her to her side of the car she watched him in the glow of the overhead light as he slipped behind the wheel, his face introspective now and grim. She found herself evaluating this side of him, which nobody around Russellville saw. The interior of the car went black and she heard the key slip into the ignition. She reached out to touch his warm, bare arm -and immediately felt the muscles tense.

"I'm sorry, Tommy Lee," she said softly. "You were right. I was judging them. I had no right."

"I suppose it's inevitable that you and I do that occasionally-judge people. We are, after all, our parents' children. But I try my damnedest not to anymore."

"Meaning I'm like my father in a lot of ways. Is that what you're saying?"

"It's been so many years, Rachel, I really have no way of knowing that. But I hope not."

"He's not altogether bad, Tommy Lee, no matter what you think."

"Probably not. But he'd never take the time to make a run out here and order a platter of catfish to see what the place staked its future on, and to see how damn hard Sam and Daisy work, and that they're the most honest people on the face of the earth."

"Tell me something," she said, curious, but at the same time sure of what the answer would be even before she asked. "Do you charge them interest?"

But Tommy Lee mistook her reason for asking. She was every bit Everett Talmadge's daughter, he thought, and it rankled that he couldn't help loving her.

With a flick of his wrist he started the engine. "Rachel, do you have to be told what it does to me when you lay your hand on my arm that way?" She jerked her hand away and clasped it in her lap. He gave one humorless chuckle and said coldly, "That's what I thought," then threw the car into reverse and peeled out of the lot, spraying gravel twenty feet behind. When he straightened the wheel the car fishtailed, and Rachel released a quiet cry of fright. By the faint dash lights she saw him glance her way, then let up on the gas until they'd slowed to a nearly reasonable speed. But as he studied the path of the headlights, which cut a golden cone through the narrow opening between the close-pressing trees, he added offhandedly, "Don't worry. If there's anyone in this world I'd never want to hurt, it's you."

Her head snapped around and her heart lifted. All day long he'd been doing that to her, making her emotions vacillate until she was utterly confused about her feelings for him. He had two distinctly different sides, and she was attracted to the one and repelled by the other. Back at Catfish Corner she'd found herself drawn to a Tommy Lee who was both virtuous and vulnerable. But here she was, another in a long string of women, riding along with the Tommy Lee who'd had more than his share to drink, who was even now sipping something that smelled of pine needles while he wheeled nervelessly down a dark country road, brooding. A man who hadn't the emotional wherewithal to bind the frayed edges of his life and make something more than a financial success of it. A man who was a three-time loser at marriage and had rightfully gained one of the most unsavory reputations in the county.

Rachel dropped her head back against the seat, letting her eyes sink shut, while wondering for the hundredth time that day what she was doing here. She heard him light a cigarette, and then they rode in silence, locked in their own thoughts.

Just before they reached the turnoff into his place, he lowered the window and slung his empty glass out into the weeds. Rachel sighed and straightened in her seat, looking away. His car negotiated the twists and turns of his driveway, and when he pulled up behind Rachel's car and killed the engine, all was silent.

He propped an elbow on the open windowsill, gripped the edge of the roof and stared straight ahead while Rachel sat hugging herself. Outside the night sounds buzzed and chucked and the smell of cedar was thick. Tommy Lee took a last drag from his cigarette, then set it spiraling in a red-tailed whorl before expelling a last breath of smoke that clearly told of emotional exhaustion. Almost angrily he reached for his door handle and lurched out. She followed suit, and they met near her car, both apprehensive and wary.

"Thank you for everything, Tommy Lee."

Though it was very dark she sensed how tense he was, standing with feet apart, hands buried in his back pockets, keeping a safe distance from her.

"Will you come again, Rachel?" he asked tightly.

"I… I don't know. It probably isn't such a good idea."

He released a rush of breath and ran an exasperated hand through his hair. "So you're going to put me through it all again. Is that what you're saying?"

"I never meant to put you through anything. You say it as if I'm guilty of some gross social misdemeanor, Tommy Lee!"

"I don't know about social misdemeanors, but I do know about feelings." Suddenly he captured her upper arms and brought her to her toes. "Goddammit, Rachel, I love you. I've never stopped loving you, don't you know that by now? Did you think you could sashay into my life for one afternoon, then sashay out again as if you'd done no damage?"

Her heart raced at his touch, but she was frightened by the mere fact that it did.

"I didn't know I was under any obligation when I came out here."

"Oh, didn't you?" he bit out, almost nose to nose with her. "So you thought you'd just toy around with good old Tommy Lee for a few hours, see how far you could push him. Do I count so little to you?"

"You're not being fair, Tommy Lee. That's not why I came out here and you know it."

"I don't know anything, least of all why I can't get you out from under my skin." His fingers tightened, and her heart clamored harder.

"Let me go. There's too much in our past to… to…" But she stammered to a halt and his voice turned a shade softer, silkier.

"To what, Rachel? To start it again? That thing that's been on both of our minds all day long?" Already he was drawing her close. "This…"

His open lips came down on hers with a soft, firm pressure, and immediately his tongue came seeking.

"Don't!" She twisted her head to one side and pushed on his chest.

"Why?"

"Because everything is different now. I'm different, you're different, our life-styles are totally incompatible."

His mouth followed her jaw as she arched fiercely away from him. "I can change. I will… for you, if..."

"I said, don't! It won't work and we'll end up hurting each other." She tried to twist free, but his hold was too sure and his fingers dug into her arms.

"I would be anything you wanted me to be, don't you know that, Rachel? If it meant having you back again… Rachel, please…" His hands cradled her head and drew her once again nearly onto tiptoe for a deep, thorough kiss. But as his questing tongue entered her mouth, it brought the aftertaste of gin. Angrily she pushed him away and stepped back.

"Don't you dare kiss me with your sixth drink of the night still foul on your lips!"

"Oh, so you've been counting?"

"Yes, I've been counting. All across the lake in the boat and tonight through supper and on the ride home!"

He loomed before her but made no further move to touch her while she stood with fists clenched, angry that he couldn't see what he was doing with his life.

"I can stop drinking any day I want," he stated belligerently. "Just give me a reason to!"

She ran a hand through her hair and twisted aside. "Oh, Tommy Lee, you fool. Don't you see, nobody can give you that reason but yourself? And it isn't just the drinking. It's the way you live. In that…" She flapped a palm toward the house. "That beautiful, sad, unkempt mansion where you sleep on your dirty laundry!"

His shoulders wilted slightly. "Rachel, I didn't know you were coming or..."

"It shouldn't have made a difference. For God's sake, Tommy Lee, you weren't raised in squalor. How can you live that way? And don't blame it on our parents! It's not our parents who ruined your life, it's you! You've become content to just… just drink yourself into oblivion and… and atrophy! But it's not too late to do something about it if you really want to. You could start by going in there and cleaning up that place, or if you don't want to clean it up yourself, at least hire some help to do it for you. And while you're at it, make it somebody who'll cook you something besides greasy fattening foods!"

He stiffened and pulled back while she felt heartless for striking at his most vulnerable spot. But if she didn't try to make him see the light, who would?

His voice was tight with suppressed anger as he invited caustically, "Well, don't quit now. You're on a roll."

At his words she felt a rich, roiling rage that he had so blithely profaned both the body and spirit of the Tommy Lee she had once loved and been so proud of.

"All right, you asked for it," she shouted, and pointed into the woods. "Go walk back a mile down that road and pick up the litter you threw out the car window, and stop throwing your trash in the lake." Her hand fell to her side and her fists bunched. "And stop driving by my dress shop fifteen times a day and coming in to buy red earrings for your women!" She was nearly in tears as she finished.

"Anything else?" he snapped.

Her lips were trembling and she knew in a moment she'd be crying. It was terrible, finding herself falling in love with him again while admitting a thousand reasons not to be.

"Yes! And water your plants!"

He did a silent double take. "What?" His head jutted forward and his face scrunched up.

She felt foolish for having brought up such a picayune grievance, which had nothing whatever to do with anything, and to make matters worse, the tears were beginning to flood her throat and eyes. She spun away from him and began to pace. "Oh, don't you see, Tommy Lee, we've grown so different than we used to be. All the time I'm with you I find myself wondering what people's reaction would be if they knew." She faced him and spread her palms helplessly. "All right, so I'm a snob, but I can't help it. I'm… you've changed so much… You… you're..." She pressed her lips tightly against her teeth and turned away, not wanting to hurt him any further.

"I'm what?" He stalked her, his voice coming from just behind her shoulder. "That whoring, drinking, fast-driving no-good son of a bitch our parents made me into when they forced you and me apart and made us give up our baby? Do you think that's what I want to be, Rachel?" She was suddenly whirled around, and she found him bending above her, gripping her arms again. "Do you think I don't know what the whole town calls me? That hellion, Tommy Lee Gentry." She tried to escape his hands, but he jerked her erect before him. "But you know something, Rachel? I don't give a damn about what they think or say. All I care about is you. Why do you think I didn't take you to some classy restaurant in Florence tonight? Why do you think I asked you out on my boat instead of someplace in town where we could be seen? Do you think I don't know how shocked the residents of Russellville would be if they saw the prim and proper Widow Hollis in the company of that hell-raiser Tommy Lee Gentry? But I can change, Rachel. You just watch me. Because no matter how you try to hide it, there's still something between us. I could see it in your eyes today when you didn't think I was looking. I could see you wondering if it would be as good as it used to be, and if we could make it over the hundred and one hurdles we'd have to face if we decided to go public and announce to the world that we were going to pick up where we never should have left off twenty-four years..."

"You're wrong. You..."

"Shut up, Rachel, and get it into your head that you're not done with me yet. Not by a long shot. We will pick up again, only it won't be where we left off because we've both learned a lot since then-about life and about what to do in the back seat of a car."

"Let me go, Tommy Lee! I don't want..."

"I said shut up, Rachel, because you're going to be kissed whether you like it or not, and I'll be back to get the rest later-daddies or no daddies!"

He hauled her up against him, took a handful of her hair to tip her head back, and crushed his mouth to hers while his tongue writhed against her tightly sealed lips, trying to force them open. Her heart thrust mightily against his chest as she wedged an elbow between them, gripping his shirt while the heel of one hand bored into his chest. But he was powerful in his anger, and she was as defenseless as a doll in his arms. He felt her muscles strain and quiver while she fought him, but his arms and tongue were relentless until the ferocity of his kiss gradually mellowed. And only then did she slowly, cautiously begin to relax against him, allowing herself to feel what it might be possible for them to have again. The silken circles he drew over her lips at last unlocked them, and her body rose up slightly to accommodate his, while the hand clasping his shirt rested easy, just short of caressing. Somewhere in the depths of her mind it registered again that he'd grown taller, for her head tilted sharply back. His chest was fuller beneath her palm. And he'd learned a thorough and sensual technique of kissing that soon raised responses, as his tongue explored the interior of her mouth while one hand prowled beneath her elbow to boldly caress her breast.

But the contact had scarcely begun before Tommy Lee abruptly pushed Rachel away, spun around, and stalked to his car. He yanked the door open and threw himself into the driver's seat, then slammed the door with uncontrolled vehemence. The engine was already gunning before Tommy Lee realized he wasn't going anywhere.

Rachel stood where he'd left her- trembling, angry, aroused. Suddenly the engine died and the car door was flung open again. It slammed into the night stillness and he faced her with that same hulking stance he'd presented earlier.

"Well, what're you still doing here?" He took a single ominous step her way. "Git! If you know what's good for you, Rachel, you git!"

She turned and ran for her car, her heart raising a furor in her body. And this time it was Rachel who tore all the way back to town.