Black Oil, Red Blood

Chapter 6



Anna Delmont looked at the clock for maybe the hundredth time that evening. Where the heck was her husband? Joe Bob always acted like he could hardly wait to get out the door and get to the poker games at Dick’s house. He was never late to Dick’s house. How come he’d be late to his own party? And why in tarnation wasn’t he answering his phone?

She kept calling up to the courthouse, but all the staff had gone home by now. Maybe she ought to go up there and drag him out of his chambers with her own two hands. But what if the other guests arrived while she was gone and there was no one here to greet them when they finally got here?

Anna paced back and forth across the living room, wringing her hands. She took a detour to the window, hoping to see someone approaching the house, but there was no one there. She sighed. Had she gone to all this trouble for nothing?

She’d spent weeks picking out all the decorations. Joe Bob had never, ever let her come within a mile of one of his “guy’s night outs” before, and she was dying of curiosity to see what happened during all these poker games. She wanted everything to be perfect. She wanted all the boys to want to come back.

She’d set out the green felt-top table and bought everyone buttons to pin to their shirt. They were battery-operated gadgets with red flashing lights that said stuff like “High Roller” and “Pit Boss.” She’d also put up seventies-style beaded curtains all around the room, except they were made of strings of various sizes of red dice instead of beads. She’d also bought everyone their very own pair of green suspenders covered in diamonds, hearts, clubs, and spades, and matching green transparent visors to match. Mylar balloons decorated with cards and dice were tied to the back of every player’s chair, and she’d set up a real fancy slot machine centerpiece on the green felt table to spruce it up. Everything was looking mighty fine. Joe Bob was sure to be proud of her handiwork.

Her doorbell rang, playing the melody to Stars and Stripes Forever. Her interchangeable custom chimes were the envy of all the women in the neighborhood.

She plastered on a big, welcoming smile and threw the door wide. A little man with a big cigar in his mouth stood at her entryway, puffing foul smoke into the house. It was Dick Richardson, who she knew through Joe Bob, of course—but even if she hadn’t, she couldn’t have failed to recognize him from his obnoxious television commercials. Anna didn’t want to let him in with the cigar, but she didn’t want to be rude either, especially since this was her very first poker party. Her dismay must have shown on her face.

“What? No smoking in the house?” Dick asked.

“Well. . .” Anna said.

Dick took a long drag from the cigar, dropped it on her custom welcome mat, and ground it out with his foot. “Don’t worry about it,” Dick said. “Long as you got Jack and Coke in the house, everything’ll be fine.”

Anna eyed the ruined mat. Well, it wasn’t like she couldn’t get another one. Joe Bob always gave her plenty of spending money. And who could expect men to really pay attention to niceties like welcome mats, anyway? Men would be men.

Dick strode past her into the room and eyed the set-up. He let out a low whistle. “Wow,” he said. “You sure got the place done up.”

Anna beamed with pride. “You like it?”

“It’s. . . something else,” Dick said.

Anna couldn’t help but notice the look of astonishment on his face as he took in the balloons, pins, dice curtains, and centerpiece. That wow-factor had been exactly what she’d been going for. She felt herself warming up to Dick in spite of the whole cigar incident.

“Don’t tell me I’m the first one here,” Dick said.

“You are. For the life of me, I can’t account for everyone else. Sit down. Let me get you a drink.”

She bustled into the kitchen to pour him a Jack and Coke. She had tried to bake a spade-shaped cake, but the darn thing had burned, so there were no refreshments other than the booze.

She returned to present Dick with his drink when her doorbell chimed again.

This time it was old Judge Hooper, the town’s criminal court judge. Judge Hooper was a nice, elderly man with a kind grin who walked with a cane. He didn’t show up on her doorstep with a cigar. No siree. She ushered him in and he patted her on the back kindly.

“How you doing, little lady?” he asked, and looked around. “My goodness. Ain’t you just gone all out!”

“Nothing but the best for you,” Anna said, smiling. Really, she ought to host poker games more often. She couldn’t understand why Joe Bob had always seemed so against it.

Right then, she heard Joe Bob slam through the back door. He stomped into the living room and stopped short.

“I’ll be darned. It’s worse than I thought,” he said.

Anna’s face fell.

“What the. . .” Joe Bob muttered as he strode toward the felt-top table. “Why you got a slot machine in the middle of our playing area? What’s the matter with you, woman?”

She’d just wanted to break up all that empty green space. And after all, every good party table had a centerpiece.

“As long as real money comes out of it, I like it,” Dick said.

“Yeah, I’ve never seen you turn down a buck.” Joe Bob picked up the slot machine and dropped it unceremoniously on the sofa, then turned to Anna. “Where’s the snacks?”

Anna’s heart started beating rapidly, her lower lip threatened to start trembling, and her eyelids started to sting. She didn’t want to admit she’d burned the cake in front of all of Joe Bob’s friends. “I was expecting you to be more thirsty than hungry at this hour,” she said. “I restocked the whole bar. Can I get you a drink?”

“Don’t tell me you burned the cake?” Joe Bob said.

Anna flushed.

“Never mind,” Judge Hooper said. “I already had dinner.”

“Me too,” Dick chimed in.

“Well I ain’t,” Joe Bob said. “Anna, you run on out and get us a pizza, all right?”

“All right,” she said.

She left just as Police Chief Scott, Mayor Fillion, and a couple of other men were arriving.

Once inside the safety and relative privacy of her car and surrounded by the open road, she let a few tears fall from her eyes. Just a few. It wouldn’t be a good idea to indulge in unseemly emotions out in public.

Of course Joe Bob wasn’t the perfect husband. But he had always given her so much—he always made sure she had the best dresses and the best house in the neighborhood, and he was always sending her into Houston for overnight spa vacations and shopping trips. All the other neighborhood ladies were so jealous. So if she didn’t often receive the affection from him she felt like she needed, she couldn’t really complain. After all, he was a man, and she couldn’t blame him for bottling up his feminine side.

Really, she figured she had done pretty well snagging Joe Bob. It was too much to expect to find an absolutely perfect man. They just didn’t exist. She and Joe Bob had been married and faithful to each other for over 30 years, ever since she was crowned the Kettle beauty queen her senior year in high school. Sure, maybe she sometimes longed for a man with a softer side, but she and Joe Bob had such a solid history, and she would never throw that away or betray his trust. Even if he sometimes hurt her feelings, her eye had never really strayed. She loved Joe Bob, and Joe Bob only, and she was sure he felt the same way about her.

All that notwithstanding, she’d have some strong words for him after all the guests left tonight. He’d been late to an event he knew she’d been planning and looking forward to for ages, and then he’d embarrassed her in front of his friends. That would never do.