Chapter 21
THE HAINT
I am the phasim of Rebah Deal… help me find my way home.” The ghostly howl jolted us awake. The fire had died completely, and the only light in the cave was the weak flicker of the kerosene lamp shining off the wide whites of Buzzy’s eyes.
“Did you hear that?” I asked, unsure if it was my imagination.
“Shhhhhh!”
It came again from the woods outside the cave. “I am the phasim of Rebah Deal… help me find my way home.” It was a sad, half-human voice trailing off at the last syllable to a spectral wail.
“We gotta get outta here,” Buzzy said, panic binding his voice.
“We can’t go out the front—that’s where she is.”
“I am the phasim of Rebah Deal… help me find my way home.” It was right outside the cave now. I was terrified, ready to bolt like a frenzied horse.
“Follow me,” he hissed. We grabbed our knapsacks, sleeping bags, and lantern. I followed him to the back corner of the chamber and into the craggy opening that led to the rest of the cave. From our spot down in the crag hole we could see the entire room and the yawning entrance. A nearly full moon backlit the opening, spilling weak light around it.
Suddenly she was there, an elephantine figure silhouetted at the cave entrance. “I am the phasim of Rebah Deal… help me find my way home.” She raised her arms over her head and shrieked a forlorn howl that made us nearly shed our skins.
From outside the cave came another voice. “Levona, if you don’t shut the fuck up, I’m gonna take your ass home.” It was Petunia Wickle. Her flashlight cut the blackness of the room as she stepped around Levona and entered the Telling Cave like she owned it.
“It smells like smoke in here. Hey, who’s in here?” she called and shined her light around the room. Flashlightless Levona was a step behind.
Buzzy moved to climb out of the crag, but I held him back.
“What are you doin?” he implored. “This is our lucky night. They might leave if they think it’s deserted.”
“Just wait a second.”
Petunia shined her light on the fire ring and stopped suddenly; Levona rammed into her back. “Quit crowdin on me, Levona, I swear.”
“But I can’t see nuthin. Why do you get to hold the flashlight anyways? It’s my flashlight.”
“I get to hold it cause I’m holdin it,” Petunia said through clenched teeth. Her reply either confused or satisfied Levona; either way, she didn’t respond.
Two other silhouettes appeared at the cave entrance, a tall, big-bellied shadow and a thinner, smaller shape, each with a flashlight. “Where’d them girls get off to?” the smaller one said. His voice was familiar. They entered the cave, the big one carrying a paper bag filled with bottles that clinked every step. The thin one carried two blankets.
“Look, Tilroy, someone was kind enough to leave us a pile a wood. Ain’t that nice?”
Tilroy chuckled dumbly. I looked over at Buzzy’s fallen face, slumped shoulders—I think we both would have preferred the ghost of Rebah Deal to the flesh and menace of Tilroy Budget.
“Why don’t you get the fire goin while I make sure them girls ain’t had the pants scared off em,” the thin one said.
Tilroy put the bag next to the fire ring and grabbed his sleeve. “Don’t you be givin no orders, Skeeter,” he hissed.
Skeeter instantly lost a notch of bravado and assumed his proper bearing. “I’m jus sayin we need a fire, is all. Ain’t gotta go all mental on me, Til. You can build a fire bettern anybody I know—that’s a true fact.”
The compliment soothed Tilroy, and he began to assemble a tent of twigs over the few remaining coals. Skeeter sidled over to Petunia, who was standing ten yards from our hiding place. He circled his arms around her and kissed her neck, their flashlights crossed like swords. She giggled, pushed him away, and escaped back to Tilroy. Skeeter ran after her, laughing, leaving Levona to stumble in the darkness over the rocks back to the fire ring. Tilroy had a flicker of flame going in the coals from our fire. Soon the room was bright with light, drawing in Petunia and Levona like moths.
A beer bottle hissed, then another. Petunia spread a blanket by the fire. Levona did the same. Skeeter went immediately to Petunia’s blanket and lay down on his side. She frowned at him and sidestepped to Levona’s blanket and sat down. “Tilroy, you sit here right by me,” she said. Tilroy was putting more wood on the fire and knelt to blow into the core of the flame. Levona was a pillar, unsure what to do. Skeeter started to inch over to Petunia. “You go on and sit now, Levona,” she said. Levona moved to sit next to her.
“Not here, you idiot!”
Levona flinched as if slapped and schlumped onto the blanket next to Skeeter, who groaned disapproval. Tilroy got up from the roaring fire pit, clearly proud of his pyrotechnic abilities, and hiked up his jeans, which had begun to sag to the level of an overbooked plumber.
Petunia put her legs out in front of her coquettishly, just like she had seen that girl do in Flashdance. Tilroy lumbered over and sat down heavily next to her. He reached into the bag and brought out a beer for Petunia and opened it. “Thank you, Tilroy,” she said in her best Jennifer Beals imitation. Petunia leaned into him and put her arm behind his so they crossed. The contact made him jump. Levona waited for Skeeter to offer her a beer, but he just glared straight ahead at the shiny wall. Levona reached for one herself, mumbling about poor manners. There was a minute or so of awkward silence until Petunia said, “I don’t think Icky Buckley’s ever gonna get his Trans Am fixed.”
“That car’s a death trap, you ask me,” Levona said. “What kinda car you got?”
“Uh, Camaro,” Skeeter replied without a hint of enthusiasm.
“Camaro!” Levona exclaimed as if he had just told her he drove the USS Enterprise. “My uncle’s got one a them. See, I knew we had somethin in common.” She inched a little closer to Skeeter. “Is yours one a the ones with the stripe on the side?”
“Uh, no. Mine ain’t got no stripe.”
“My uncle, he’s got the one with the stripe.”
Petunia and Tilroy were oblivious to the patter as she took his hand in hers and moved even closer to him, until their legs were touching. Tilroy’s mouth was hanging low and his arm was shaking, as if he was holding hands with the ghost of Rebah Deal.
“When’d you get that truck, Tilroy?”
“Month ago. My uncle got a new one an gave my daddy his.”
“That’s cool. Y’all gonna trick it?”
Tilroy relaxed a bit and nodded. “It’s gonna be the shit when we’re done.”
They fell into another silence until Levona said, “Okay, now we all gotta give the Tellin Cave a secret.”
“You don’t believe that old fairy tale, do you?” Skeeter said. He was clearly resentful of his blanket partner and in no mood for jocularity. “I thought y’all was jus jokin in the truck.”
“Ain’t no fairy tale,” Levona said. “We all gotta tell else who knows what’s gonna happen.”
Tilroy, whose confidence had been building with the new truck talk, said, “Y’all know my secret, so I ain’t gotta tell nuthin to no cave.” He folded his hands behind his head and leaned back on the blanket. He figured bravado in the face of the fifty-year curse would surely get around town.
Levona turned to him, pleading now. “You gotta tell—I tole you in the car. This ain’t no time to be foolin with it. Not on no Rebah Deal night.”
Tilroy turned to Petunia. “You go first.”
She sat straight up on the blanket, perfect posture just like Mr. Paul had taught her.
“Okay, you know I live next door to the Bluelys. Well, me an him did it in the shed behind his house.”
Skeeter looked over at her with a mixture of disgust and amusement. “That’s fucked-up, girl. The Bluely boy’s only twelve.”
“Not the boy, you fool. Me an his daddy. Right there in his toolshed while his wife was cookin dinner—that’s my secret.”
“Did she catch you?” Tilroy asked.
“Mrs. Bluely? Naw, but I started howlin real loud, an Mr. Bluely, he tries to put his hand over my mouth, so I bit him, then he starts howlin, but he surely dint stop or nuthin. I can’t believe she dint hear nuthin, but she dint.” She paused and looked from Skeeter’s open mouth to Levona’s smirk to Tilroy’s quivering lips and was satisfied her revelation had produced the desired effect. “Your turn, Tilroy.”
He gathered back most of his earlier bravado along with a smug smile. “Tole you, I ain’t tellin. Y’all already know what I done.”
“What’s it feel like, then?” Petunia asked and lay down next to him. “You know, killin someone.”
Tilroy sniffed and closed one eye, as if paging through his many killing episodes the way folks flipped a jukebox menu. And amid the posturing he stumbled onto a simple truth that he had been puzzling over since that night. He finally understood what he was feeling inside and spoke of it softly, reverently. “It’s like you own the universe.”
Skeeter was looking over at his friend with a mixture of awe and jealousy. He was getting tired of the way everybody was treating Tilroy now, like he was some badass heavy metal rock star, but he also enjoyed the reflected glory, even from the likes of Levona Stiles. Levona reached for another beer.
“I got me a secret,” Skeeter said. “Got me a good one.” He went from face to face to ensure he had the group’s full attention. Petunia looked bored and Tilroy was off somewhere in his own universe, reveling in his sudden understanding of homicide.
“Go on, tell, Skeeter. Is that your real name? I bet it’s a nickname,” Levona said.