“Folks need to know,” she pushed. “Everything you know and didn’t say.”
“Shut it down, Flannery. Zip it.”
“W-we have to tell. You have to tell what you know. I have to tell what I know. It’s a sin—”
“It’s my church now. Mine.”
“Hollis, you gotta tell—”
“Shit. They’re dead, Flannery. Nothing’s gonna change that. We can’t help them now. We have to deal with the facts as they stand. I’m not about to go putting my life, my family’s reputation—and yours—on any line because of what they did.”
“What? What could they’ve done?”
“You don’t even want to know about the shit Patsy buried in the dirt on Ebenezer. But I’m going to tell you anyway, and maybe it’ll shut you up once and for all. Her shamelessness is right out there under the elm. Buried her panties under that elm, she did. Your sainted sister? Played both me and Danny good. Do you hear me, peaches? Hear what I’m trying to tell you? If you’re smart, you’ll leave it be. For God’s sake, girl, just leave it alone!” Hollis yelled at the windshield, spit flying from his mouth.
Flannery cowered, stunned into silence, her eyes filling.
In a second Hollis reached over her knees, hit the glove box with his fist, popping it open. “Get yourself a tissue, and get yourself together for your mama’s sake.”
Flannery grabbed one from the crushed box inside and saw one of Hollis’s guns poking from beneath, a barrel of a snub nose.
Quickly he leaned back over and slammed the glove box shut. Stomping down on the gas pedal, he barreled toward the Butler house. When he didn’t pull into the drive all the way, and stopped at the mailbox, Flannery reached shakily for the door handle and looked back over her shoulder, wanting him to make it all right, wanting to say something more, not let it all just lie there.
He turned his head away. “I loved her, too. Never stopped.”
Flannery flung open the door.
“Just didn’t know quite how to back then,” he whispered, and cut on the radio and sped away.
Mama was dozing on the porch with her sewing basket at her feet and several tins of loose buttons stacked beside it.
“I’m home.” Flannery gently tapped Mama’s shoulder.
Mama startled. “Flannery . . . I thought I’d try and sit on the porch. I feel useless waiting in the bed. Was that Sheriff Henry?” Mama asked, pulling herself up from her rocker. She peered around Flannery’s shoulder. Mama cupped a hand over her eyes, stretched her neck toward the trail of smoke the sheriff’s car had left.
Hollis hadn’t bothered to come in, and Flannery didn’t fault him for it. She didn’t know what she should tell her mama, what to spill about today or what she and Hollis had left out long ago.
“Where’s your automobile?” Mama asked. “What happened to your clothes? What did you find out, Flannery?”
Flannery kicked off her muddy shoes. “Come on inside, Mama. It’s been a long day, and gonna get longer.” Flannery held open the screen door for her. “Let me get out of my wet hose, clean up, and we can have some tea and talk.”
“But what about your automobile? And the one in the river—?”
“Let’s go in. I felt a little weak, and Hollis offered to drive me. His deputy will drive my car out here later.”
“Tell me. What’s going on, baby girl? Did they find them?” Mama rushed nervously.
“Please give me a minute; let me get out of these filthy clothes, and I’ll tell you everything,” she promised, borrowing time.
“But—”
“One minute.” She hurried past before Mama could see her wet eyes and could fill her own. Flannery peeled off the jeans and her nylons beneath them, tossed the dirty clothes onto her twin’s bed. Nothing had been changed in the room since the day Patsy left. Mama’d bought new pillows and sheets, but kept the old coverlets and matching drapes. It was as if time had stopped, held its musty breath for her return.
Flannery slipped into clean stockings, a fresh shirt and pants.
Mama did little more than dust the old maple furniture. Flannery ran a finger along the lip of the dresser, then dropped to her knees in front of it and pulled out the bottom drawer. It was exactly where she’d left it and exactly how she’d left it, though Chubby’s apron was rust-spotted and yellowed some.
Flannery had lied to Mama back then about so many things, too many things that couldn’t be righted easily now. When after a few days Patsy still hadn’t come home from her prom date, Flannery’d needled Mama into letting her “quit” Chubby’s, telling her she’d find babysitting jobs. Wrecked with worry, Mama agreed to keep her younger daughter around home more.
Flannery never told Mama about Chubby firing her. As far as Flannery knew, Chubby never had the heart to tell either.
Shaking, Flannery dug out the necklace and bullet, rolling them in her hand, clinking, clapping the loose pearls against the cold, copper bullet. She wanted to give the heirloom piece back to Mama. It would be a small consolation, maybe a balm for the bad news coming. But if she gave the pearls back now, Flannery would have to tell everything—both her secrets and Patsy’s. The way Patsy lit out with the drunk Henry boys that night. Hollis’s argument and the heinous acts he’d claimed her sister did. And the pregnancy Hollis accused her of having. That is, if Hollis didn’t spark the words first and twist them uglier.
Flannery inspected the bullet, its shiny copper jacket, the pushed-in nose. The sound of clanking rose up and stole her breath, grounding today’s memory of the assistant tossing the other bullet. The one dredged up with the Mercury.
Flannery was sure Hollis knew more than what he’d told back then, that he was hiding something, maybe a lot of bad somethings. She’d have to figure a way to find out what he was hiding and if it was true what he’d said about Patsy.
Until then, how was she going to explain today to Mama?
Mama’s heart was going to break now, no matter what Flannery told her. The unanswered questions, more doubts that would soon leave her mama more heartbroken, and worse, shamed. Flannery was ripped from moment to moment. How much and what to tell her? She was sure Hollis would say anything to save his own neck.
One truth welled up. Flannery couldn’t have the town thinking her sister was a whore.
Flannery looked down at her watch and made up her mind: She’d tell Mama as little as she could get by with. Grab those fleeting seconds, like Honey Bee’d taught her long ago, fight for ’em, before the time thief snatched them up as his own.
Flannery pressed the pearls to her mouth. She tried to think through the jumble of what ifs and what fors.
Mama called for her. Flannery rolled everything up in the apron and put it back in the drawer. She’d break it to Mama bit by bit. Later Flannery would have to find a way to make Hollis tell her everything. She stuffed the only piece of Patsy she had left, the stolen shoe ribbon, into her jeans pocket.
Flannery walked into the kitchen and found Mama by the radio, her hand frozen in the air above its knob. Mama’s face was weighted, the flowery duster she wore drooping, a sleeve slipping off her slumped shoulder.
“The radio just told folks,” Mama whispered incredulously to Flannery. “Just told us they found them . . . Glass Ferry’s missing teens. Danny Henry and our Patsy. It can’t be true.”
“I’m afraid it is, Mama.” Flannery went to her side. “It’s them.”
Flannery dug out the piece of fabric that Mama had long ago tacked to her daughter’s shoe. “I’m sorry. It was the Henrys’ old Mercury down there. And our Patsy.”