Chapter Ten

Aunt Shirley Helps Me Out

      Dear Aunt Shirley,

           Rusty has got a problem. I am worried but nobody can help 
           because they don't know Rusty like I do. But you understand her, 
           she is drinking and acting very strange and lazy. Please help 
           before she gets any worse.

After I got that much wrote down, I was sitting there at Eve­lyn Price's kitchen table, trying to decide how to finish it off. I heard the screen door open.

Mary Lou said, "Hi, what’re you doing?"

"Uh," I said. I looked down. "Just messing around." But what was my brain even thinking? I was trying to hide and sneak and lie, keeping secrets from my own sweetheart. So what if she didn't like Rusty, she loved me.

"It's a letter," I said. "About Rusty." I waited to see what Mary Lou's face was like, but I couldn't tell.

"I'm snitching a little of Evelyn's coffee," was all she said. She looked at my cup. "Want some more?"

"No," I said. "I already had three cups. I'm about to go to the moon without a rocket ship."

Mary Lou laughed, and her cup jiggled so she spilled coffee on the counter. She wiped it up, and come over to sit with me.

"This is to Rusty's Aunt Shirley," I said. "The letter. Want to read it?"

Mary Lou said, "No, honey." Then she said, "Well," and put down her coffee cup. She picked up my letter. When she was done, she said, "What can Shirley do about it? I mean, what do you want her to do?"

"I don't know," I said. I finished off my cold nasty coffee. "Talk to Rusty, I guess. Come talk to her and find out what's the matter."

"All the way out here?" said Mary Lou.

"She visits all the time," I said. "I could go get her and bring her back. Yeah, I'll go get her."

"In your Plymouth?" said Mary Lou. "Better take your Tri­ple-A card."

"I don't have one," I said. "Oh, you was kidding. Well, I don't have that part figured out. I'll do something."

"How about you borrow my truck," said Mary Lou, "and I take the Plymouth?"

"Really?" I said. "I can? You would do that for Rusty?"

"No, honey. For you." Mary Lou took her cup and my cup and rinsed them out in the sink. "Put your phone number on there, on the letter."

"Good idea," I said. I wrote down the phone number and then I signed the letter at the bottom.

I sealed it up in the enve­lope and I said, "Ice cream?"

"Sure," said Mary Lou. "Where do you want to go?"

"How about the Dairy Queen?" I said. "They got a mailbox there, I'm pretty sure."

"You could just leave it on the porch for the mailman," said Mary Lou. "He'd take it in the morning."

"I don't want Rusty to see it," I said. "She might think some­thing good was going to happen and screw it all up."

* * *

Five days after I sent my letter, Aunt Shirley called. Evelyn Price was the one that taUked to her, I wasn't there. When I got home from work, I was going to run upstairs and take a shower real fast. Frank had invited me over to eat supper with him and Mary Lou and Marty. But before I could hit the stairs, Evelyn stopped me.

"You got a phone call," she said.

"I did?" I said. "Who from?"

"It's on here," said Evelyn. She give me an old gas bill enve­lope, the number was wrote on the back. Real old-fashioned writing, like I guess they taught back in Evelyn's day. It just said, "Shirley," and a phone number.

"Oh," I said. "Thanks, Evelyn."

"You want to eat with me, honey?" said Evelyn. "We could call Mary Lou, if you want. There's enough."

"No, I'm going over there to eat with them," I said. "But maybe tomorrow, if you want. I'll ask Mary Lou."

* * *

The food was good over at Frank's, like usual. He made this chicken stuff with tomato sauce on it. It looked weird but it was good, with rice in it and everything. I picked out the green pep­pers, there was only three pieces in mine, and put them on the edge of my plate. Mary Lou kept sneaking her fork over to get them, she liked green peppers. I was playing like she couldn't have them and guarding them with my fork. She got two of them anyway.

Marty and Frank didn't notice the green pepper contest. They was talking about Marty's job giving piano lessons at the piano store in New Unionville. Marty wanted to get another job so he could get a nice car. Frank wanted Marty to concentrate on his trumpet for a year, and then try and get in at the state college. While I was looking at Frank and Marty, Mary Lou's fork made a surprise attack and got the other green pepper.

After we was done eating, me and Mary Lou climbed the stairs up to her room. I said, "Oh, yeah, I need to call Shirley. Well, I can call tomorrow, I guess."

"Want to call now?" said Mary Lou. "You could use the phone in Frank's room."

"Well, but it's long distance," I said.

"Just give Frank some money to cover it," said Mary Lou. "He won't care. You know how Frank is."

"That's a good idea," I said. "Where's his room at?"

Mary Lou opened the door. Frank's favorite colors must of been red and gold. Flis bedspread was red with gold threads all through it, and the rug was red too, with gold embroidered dragons on it, lots of little gold dragons going in rows. His dresser had gold-colored knobs on it, and a red runner going across the top. Frank's hairbrush and comb was laid out neat in front of the mirror, a round mirror with gold dragons holding it up on the sides. There was two picture frames, one had a pic­ture of Marty and Mary Lou in front of a Christmas tree. The other picture was of Frank and a woman, he had his arm bent and she was holding onto it.

"Is that your mom?" I asked Mary Lou.

"Yeah," said Mary Lou.

"She's pretty," I said. "Where's the phone?"

"By the bed, on the thing," said Mary Lou. "The bedside table. See it?"

"Yeah," I said. "Want to sit with me while I call?"

The phone was busy. I went to the bathroom, and when I come back I tried calling Shirley again. I wasn't expecting her to answer, I guess, cause when she said "Hello?" I wasn't ready yet.

"Hello?" Shirley said again.

"Oh, hello," I said. "It's me, it's Carol, Carol Frehardt. Rusty's friend?"

"Sure, I know your voice," said Shirley. "What's up, honey?"

"Well," I said, "the letter. Did you get that letter I sent you?"
"Sure, honey," Shirley said. "It got here. I called you, but the lady said you wasn't home."

"Well, anyway," I said, "I was wondering, you know, if maybe you want to come visit. Come see Rusty and every­thing."

"Well, pretty soon, honey," said Shirley. "Maybe in the spring."

"I was thinking maybe sooner," I said. "Rusty's not doing that good. Spring might not be quick enough. I have the Grey­hound fare for you, I could put it in the mail on Tuesday."

"I would just as soon wait till spring, Carol," said Shirley.

"No, but Rusty, though," I said. "Listen, Aunt Shirley, do you care if I call you Aunt Shirley?"

"That's fine, honey," she said.

"Okay," I said. "Aunt Shirley, if you can't come up here, then can I come visit you? In West Virginia?"

"You can if you want," Shirley said. "Sure. You know what, though, I don't know if I can help you with your problem, but—"

"Rusty's problem," I said.

"I don't know if I can help you out, Carol," Shirley said. "But a little vacation wouldn't hurt you, I bet. You want to come on down and see how the country people live? Come on down, we can visit. Sure."

* * *

Mary Lou went back and forth on coming with me to Shirley's. First, after she said she would let me drive her truck, she said, "Maybe I'll go with you. For sure Guy won't let me off work, but I'm quitting pretty soon anyway. Maybe we could make it into a little vacation, camp out before it gets too cold."

"I already slept outside once this year," I said, "in Marlene's driveway. That was plenty. But it'd be good to do something, maybe we could see a couple movies or something."

"Okay," Mary Lou said. "I'll tell Guy I'm quitting."

A couple days later, we was at the dime store in Brandville, waiting on Evelyn Price to finish up shopping. "So what did Guy say?" I said. "When you told him?"

"I didn't yet," Mary Lou said. We was standing around up front, by the big window. "You want gum?" She put a nickel in the gumball machine and twisted the knob.

"Yeah," I said. I give her a nickel. "How come? Been real super busy?"

Mary Lou held out her hand with two gumballs in it. 'Which do you want, green or white?"

'White," I said. "You still want to go, don't you?"

'Well, I'd like to," Mary Lou said. "But I been thinking, maybe I better stay here and work. We're gonna need plenty of money, starting out in Colorado."

"I'm going to sell Marlene's house," I said. "Money is no problem. Maybe you just don't feel like going? Too much driv­ing?"

"Maybe so," Mary Lou said. "It was a long trip back to Marlene's house for the funeral. Here comes Evelyn, go help her carry the sack."

A couple days later Mary Lou started in again saying maybe she would go to West Virginia with me, the mountains would be pretty in the fall.

"No," I said, "I'm going by myself. I can't take this on-and-off shit, that's what Rusty does to me. You just stay and get some money together."

"How about we take our vacation as soon as we get to Colo­rado?" Mary Lou said. "Just that first week, we could go to the movies every day and do whatever. How does that sound?"

"Good," I said. "It sounds good."

I packed the front seat of Mary Lou's truck full of my clothes and food and a carton of cigarettes. If Mary Lou would of come, she'd of had to ride in the back. I wasn't sure how long it took to drive down to Shirley's, I took enough stuff to last a week. I might get lost. Down in those West Virginia hills and hollers, a person could turn gray-headed trying to get back on the high­way.

On my way out of town, I stopped at Reed. Nobody was at the reception desk, but I waited and Marjorie come out of Mrs. Reed's office. "Hello, Carol," she said. "Can I do something for you?"

"Yeah," I said. "I've got a personal emergency. I have to go out of town for a little while. So can you just leave me off the schedule for a couple weeks?"

"That's no problem," said Marjorie. "Take all the time you need. When do you want to start back?

"I'm not too sure," I said. "I better call you."

"No problem," said Marjorie.

Everybody at Reed had treated me good since Marlene died. I didn't know if I was coming back to work there or not. Probably I was going to, if the house wasn't sold. Besides, it might take a little while to bring Rusty around. She'd have to say goodbye to her girlfriend and all that. So I better keep my hand in. It wasn't that great of a job, but I didn't feel like looking for a new one.

The best part of taking a car trip was eating in restaurants. I had took Oreo cookies with me in the truck, and BBQ potato chips, and Spam. But a person needs hot food too, and coffee. On the way to Shirley's I had breakfast at a big place called Trudy's. It was a giant huge restaurant across from a Coca-Cola plant, everybody in the whole plant must of ate there. There was eleven waitresses and two jukeboxes and the inside of the restaurant was as big as a K-Mart.

I had biscuits and gravy, and the gravy was made right, thick with lots of pepper in it. They put two eggs on top, like I wanted, and the eggs was nice and runny. The coffee was too strong but I put in milk till it tasted good.

I stopped for breakfast at a little cafe on the edge of Missouri. But when I opened up the front door, I seen six or seven old drunk guys sitting along a bar. There wasn't no women in the place. All the old guys looked me over, so I left. I got back in the truck and drove over the state line into Kentucky. There was a McDonald's in the next town, so I had two cheeseburgers with extra onions. They didn't give me any salt for my french fries.

I had a Spam sandwich for supper. I didn't feel like stopping, I wanted to get through Kentucky so I just ate in the truck. I hated Spam, but ham loaf wouldn't of kept, the weather was still pretty hot outside for September. During the day I rolled the truck windows down, but when it got dark, I put them up. I wasn't inviting some crazy man to jump in the driver's seat with me

I didn't want to spend money on a motel. When it got real late and I was too sleepy to drive, I pulled the truck in the parking lot of a church. I figured they probably wouldn't call the police on me. I moved all the stuff off the truck seat and stretched out. Well, there wasn't really room to stretch out but I scrunched up and went to sleep.

Somebody pecked on the driver window and woke me up. I felt around under the front seat for the jack handle, but then I seen the person was a woman, a woman maybe seventy years old. I sat up and rolled the window down.

"Can I help you, young man?" she said.

"I'm a woman," I said.

"Sorry about that," she said. "It's dark."

"That's all right," I said. "I can move the truck, I didn't mean to trespass."

"You can't trespass at God's house," said the woman. "Come on inside and let me make a bed up for you. You're not in trouble, are you?"

"No, I'm all right," I said. "Just trying to save money.”

The woman and her husband lived by themself in a little house next to the church. He was the minister of the church. They had two grown-up kids, I could tell by the pictures on the piano. The minister's wife took me upstairs to her son's old bedroom. His bowling trophies was still on a shelf over the bed.

In the morning they let me take a hot shower, which helped my sore back. Their restroom was real small, but it was pretty. Pink tile and the woman had fixed it up, she'd put up pictures of seashores on the wall. The towels and the shower curtain matched, they was pink with blue zigzags on them.

I come downstairs with my hair wet, but I was nice and clean. My feet felt good with clean socks on them. The woman and her husband invited me to eat breakfast. We had eggs and fried mush and hot chocolate. I thought hot chocolate was a weird thing to have for breakfast but I drunk most of it.

On my way out the door, they give me a religious tract and tried to get me to be a Methodist but I told them I would have to think about it. Then I took off. I needed a cigarette anyway, and there wasn't no ashtrays in the house. They was nice peo­ple, but I couldn't help them out.

All the different food I had ate must of mixed up wrong in my stomach, I used up a whole thing of Rolaids in one day. I didn't eat lunch or supper. I had four or five cups of coffee and two packs of cigarettes. Mary Lou's truck didn't have a radio, so it was boring to drive.

The hills started turning into mountains in the afternoon. I kept getting stuck between two semi trucks, rolling down the side of a mountain. I waited to get squished to death, but I made it across the state line in one piece. After I passed the little blue sign that said "Welcome to West Virginia," I pulled off at a little gas station. I wanted to fill the tank up one more time before I got to Skeet.

"That your truck?" said the gas station man. He had quite a bit of Vitalis on his hair.

"No," I said.

"Oh," he said. His mind settled down. "Your husband's."

I started to say something, but I was down in a redneck state. The gas station man could think whatever he wanted to. He was whistling while he sprayed my windshield with glass cleaner. After he pulled his little squeegee across and wiped it off on a wadded-up paper towel, I paid him. He said, "Be care­ful, honey, the roads is bad out here."

When I drove out of the gas station and back onto the road, the sun was sliding down in the west, shining so hard it was hurting my eyes. I flipped down my visor but the ball of red sunshine was still glaring under the bottom of the visor. I had to drive with one hand on the wheel and one hand up over my poor burning eyes.

On the edge of the next town, there was a white-and-red ice cream shack with a beat-up sign that said Dairy Palace. I stopped and got a ice cream sandwich. I got back in the front seat and and ate my ice cream with the highway map spread out on my legs. Skeet was maybe a third of the way down from the state line. Once I went through Purey and Amestown I would hit a bunch of mountains. Then when I come out of the mountains, the next town was Skeet. Shirley had said, "Try to get through the mountains while it's still light."

I measured on the map with my thumb, it looked like maybe thirty miles to the edge of the mountains. My watch said it was five minutes to seven. I figured I could make it before dark.

The mountains was wild. When I got in between the walls, I felt like something big was going to happen. It felt kind of magic but kind of closed-up. The truck was always running next to a pile of rock, with outer space on the other side. I wanted to pull in close to the big rocky wall cause the empty space on the passenger side was so scary, but then I wanted to leave plenty of room between me and the rock, cause what if I come whirling around the bend and seen the nose of a big red Mack truck?

I went around a curve and it was like the sun got turned off by a switch. I guess it went down under the horizon. I hadn't thought how slow I would have to go on the curves and turns. I could of gone faster if West Virginia believed in putting yellow stripes on their roads. I put on the truck's headlights, but they didn't do much. I needed to put on the brights, but I couldn't figure out how. I kept messing with the switch. Just for a second in my mind I pictured a school bus coming around a curve and the bus driver steering right into me. But I decided not to think nothing scary till I got out on a nice flat straight road.

But my brain started one big horror movie, the pickup flying off into the dark sky and smashing me to death or the truck motor dying in the middle of the road. So I started singing "She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain When She Comes." I only could remember three verses so after I wore those out I made up some. "She'll get to see Aunt Shirley when she comes" and "We'll take her out for pizza when she comes."

I went by two or three falling-down houses and a little feed store with two gas pumps and then there wasn't nothing else for miles and miles but bams with holes knocked in the sides. At first I thought the barns was rotting apart, but when I looked close I seen bunches of tobacco hanging down on the inside. They knocked boards out of the bam sides to let the air run through and dry the tobacco. I went by about ten or twelve of them holey bams and then the road sign said 12 miles to Hunt­ington, so I knew I had went past Skeet.

That little feed store with the gas pumps must of been Skeet. I pulled over and tried to turn around but my back wheels got stuck in some kind of a little rut or ditch or something. I wanted to have a temper tantrum but I was too tired. All around me was tobacco fields, I had not seen one car or truck for twenty miles, maybe more than that. I laid down on the truck seat, after I moved the maps and the hamburger sacks. No blanket, but I put my jacket over my legs. At least I was on the inside, not sleeping out in the truck bed and getting rained on.

When I woke up my neck was hurting me and I had to go to the bathroom so bad it wasn't funny. I heard a kind of squeaky noise. When I pulled my crinkled-up body up to look out the window, I seen somebody plowing. Not with a tractor—with a mule, a real mule pulling a squeaking wood plow. Man, if Skeet was that backwards, probably the only place I could pee was an outhouse or something.

I got a loose board out of the truck bed and put it in front of the right back tire. One time trying and I rolled up out of the rut. I kept on rolling till I pulled in at the little store. It didn't have a sign or a name or nothing on the front. They didn't need one, being the only store in Skeet. It was the only anything in Skeet.

I made a big cloud of white dust when I pulled in the store. The parking lot was just dirt. I pulled in next to a pickup parked by the front door. An old man, bald as an egg, come out of the store and walked through the dust cloud. It must happen every time somebody pulled in.

"You lost?" he said when I got out of the truck. He had on a tee shirt, the V-neck kind, and his work britches was whacked off at the knee.

"No, I come here on purpose," I said. "I'm trying to find out where Shirley—"

"Shirley?" the old man said. "You related? You're Vivian's girl, I bet."

"No, a friend of hers," I said. "Listen, I need to use the rest­room. Or whatever you got."

"Adi righty," said the old man. "Nature's the boss. Go around the back, around that way. That's where the chair is."

It sounded like he said "chair," but maybe not. Or maybe that's what they called the outhouse down here. I walked around the back of the store. Right in the open was one of them old- fashioned high-back chairs with a cane seat. Except this one had a hole cut in the middle of the cane. The hole in the seat was over a hole in the ground, a little pit maybe a foot deep. I won't say what was down in the hole but the flies was buzzing thick. "Oh, mercy," I said. Not a wall or a tree or anything to cover me up. I wished I would of peed out in the woods, it would of been more private. But either way I had no toilet paper, but like the store man said, nature was the boss. I sat down and peed a gallon.

When I come back front, there was another pickup in the store lot. The white dust was settling down on it already, it was one of them Ford trucks with the big high round front and the little short bed.

The store man must of gone back inside, I pulled open the screen door and went in. It was nice and cool in there, kind of dark too. The store man was walking around with a flyswatter. There was two big black flies sitting on top of the cash register, but the man never slapped the flyswatter at them. It didn't seem like he could see very good.

But he seen me. "Pull that door to, honey," he said.

"Huh?" I said. When I turned my head, I seen the screen door standing open. The spring part at the top was broke. I pulled the door shut behind me.

"I need to find Shirley," I said. "Can you help me out?"

"Did you not see her truck out there?" he said.

"Which one, the Ford?" I said. "That hers?"

"Yes ma'am," said the old man. "She must of gone around back."

"I just come that way," I said. "I never seen her. Unless did she go around the other side—wait, there she is."

Shirley come in and pulled the door shut behind her. She knew about the broke spring.

"Hey, Shirley," I said. "It's me."

"There you are," she said. "I just come to see if Luddie seen you pass by."

"Yep, she come in right before you," said Luddie. "I thought she might be Viv's girl, but she said no."

"No," Shirley said. She had a funny look on her face. "Did you get me any corn meal yet, Mister Luddie?"

"It'll be here next time you come," said Luddie. "The man's coming today."

"All right then," she said. "We'll see you. Come on with me, Carol."

"I better drive, hadn't I?" I said.

"Not unless you want to carry your muffler back home in the truck bed," Shirley said.

"It's not even my truck," I said.

"Then come on with me," she said. "Luddie don't care if you leave the truck here, do you Luddie?"

"No, honey," Luddie said. "Maybe the store'll look busy."

While me and Shirley was getting in her truck I said, "What about your muffler?"

She started her truck and the motor roared. "What muffler?" said Shirley.

* * *

The road to Shirley's house was a skinny rut that curved and dodged around big trees. On both sides we was squeezed in by vines and sticker bushes. The front end of Shirley's truck knocked away the vines and branches as we banged through. Sometimes we would go over a bump and I could feel the bot­tom of the truck sliding over the dirt. Shirley never slowed down a bit.

We passed by a log cabin that was partly burnt down, the stone fireplace was still standing there with the chimney poking up. Out in the side yard a Frigidaire without the door was lay­ing on its back. On the other side of the yard, two clothesline poles was leaning in toward each other, with the line sagged down into the dirt. Something white was laying on the ground, a shirt or something, still pinned to the line.

A little bit farther, on the other side of the road, there was a caved-in house. It looked like the whole thing fell in. The next place after that was Shirley's house.

It had a saggy leaky-looking roof that tipped down in front like a man's hat. The porch had floorboards stuck out all differ­ent lengths in front. It reminded me of Snuffy Smith's house.  They used to call those shotgun houses, the long ones.  It was made of wood that had got rained on and snowed on and sunshined on till it was soft gray. The wood had lots of little holes all over. A couple more holes and Shirley could of hung up tobacco in the house to dry.

"Last stop." Shirley pulled her truck up in the yard. "Hilton Hotel."

She stomped up three board steps to the porch, and two white chickens come clucking out from underneath of the porch floor. I walked up the steps after Shirley. Two more white chick­ens and a black one come out fussing and rattling their wings.

Shirley held the screen door for me and I went through into the living room. Inside it smelled kind of old and sweet, secret-­smelling like a drawer that's not been opened up for a long time. The living room windows had roller shades, pulled down so it was hard to see.

I could see better when we went in the kitchen, the sun was coming in the window over the gas stove. There was two stoves, one regular gas range and one giant black-iron cookstove. I looked up. There was strips of wallpaper hanging loose off the ceiling, but the ceiling looked like it would stay up, at least a few more months.

"You like eggs all right?" Shirley said.

"I love eggs," I said. "I could eat about a dozen. I should of got something to eat at Luddie's store."

"I guess you could of got a handful of flour if you was really hungry," Shirley said. "Luddie don't have much ready-made. I'll make us biscuits, some good old country biscuits, and eggs. And taters, we better have taters."

"Want me to do something?" I said.

Shirley give me a paring knife and a little paper sack half­ full of dirty potatoes. "Here," she said, "peel them and cut them up for me, would you?"

I sat down at the kitchen table and started peeling. I watched Shirley make the biscuits. She put a cup of flour in a bowl, then another cupful, and some salt. She reached over and got a egg out of a basket that was sitting on top of the gas stove.

"Don't you have to keep eggs in the refrigerator?" I said.

"Not when they come right out of the hen, honey," said Shir­ley. "If you put them in the refrigerator, then you have to keep them in."

"You don't even have one, do you?" I said. "A refrigerator?"

"I used to," Shirley said. "The damn thing. It got ice in it so I was trying to pry it out, you know. I poked a little hole on the inside and it let the gas out or something. So Libby helped me haul it down to the ravine, good place for the damn thing."

"Who's Libby?" I said.

Shirley got a weird look on her face. "Libby's just a neighbor lady," she said. "She'll come by, probably. She comes over and eats supper with me. I just keep my pop and all that in her refrigerator."

Shirley started setting breakfast out on the table, it looked good. She had fried up the potatoes and eggs. She put a big plate of biscuits on the table, and she said, "I know, let's get us a jar of peach preserves." She went out the back door and I followed her. Around the side of the house was a big cellar door, like Auntie Em had in the Wizard of Oz.

Shirley flipped the cellar door open and she climbed down in. I went after her, real slow cause there wasn't really steps, just four big hunks of rock pushed into the mud wall. When we got to the bottom, we had to stay hunched over cause the ceiling was so low. It looked like the cellar went all the way up to the front of the house. I didn't want to go up there, especially after Shirley picked up a big stick and started beating the dirt floor with it. I felt the whump, whump, whump in my leg bones. "Snakes," said Shirley.

There was plank shelfs along the walls, with rows and rows of old mason jars on them, some of them real dark and dusty. The jars in the front was cleaner and shinier. Shirley looked them over. "Here," she said. "Me and Libby put these up last summer." She got down a jar of peach preserves, and we went back upstairs.

The preserves was perfect, I kept putting them on biscuits and eating. I ate way, way too much food, when I was done I couldn't breathe. Shirley ate even more than me, she was still eating potatoes when I quit and lit a cigarette.

"So now, what's your problem?" she said with her mouth full.

"Rusty," I said. I smoked half a cigarette trying to decide what part to explain. "Right after we got to New Naples, Rusty was okay, acting like herself. But then after a month maybe, she started—"

"Whoa, whoa," said Shirley. "Back up some."

She made me back up all the way to when Rusty was sleep­ing all the time and throwing up cause she didn't have the money to go to Colorado. I wasn't too sure what to say about Mary Gold.

"Rusty had a friend," I started out. I lit a Winston.

'What's the matter?" Shirley said, "don't you like the one you started?"

'What?" I said. I looked down and there was one of my ciga­rettes burning away in the ashtray. I put the other one out.

"Rusty had a friend," I said. "Real dose." I looked at Shirley. She was looking me in the eye. I said, "A girlfriend."

"Yeah," Shirley said. "I know. Go ahead."

I started from Rusty fighting with Mary Gold and told every­thing up to me and Rusty driving to New Naples. By the time I got up to the part where I called Shirley from Mary Lou's house, she had finally stopped eating. We both smoked one cig- arette after the next, the whole kitchen was full of blue fog.

I was glad I finally got to tell it all. Now we could figure out how to get Rusty interested in life, and get the Colorado plans going. Shirley got up and started scraping off her plate into a pail. I got up and scraped my plate too.

I said, "Listen, so what about Rusty? What should we do?"

"We could go down and get the eggs," said Shirley. "And I need to go up and tar-patch the roof. You can come help if you want."

"Okay," I said.

Shirley grabbed a crockery bowl that had chickens painted on the sides and give it to me. "Here," she said, "we'll put the eggs in there."

I followed her out the back door and down a scraggly path to the chicken house. "So I guess you don't want to talk about Rusty," I said. "Seems like you'd care, you're her mother."

As soon as I said it, I was disgusted with myself.

Shirley was disgusted too. She turned around and give me a burning mad look. "Don't you say I don't care about Rusty. That's a lie. And Vivian is her mother."

I didn't know what to say. Shirley started walking back down to the chicken house, and I wasn't too sure if I was supposed to go with her or not. I wished I could just leave but Mary Lou's truck was back at Luddie's store. Maybe when Shirley was calmed down I could ask her to take me back. She was real mad, I could tell by her back, stiff as a board.

When we got to the chicken house, Shirley started looking for eggs so I looked too. I never found none, maybe you had to know about chickens to figure out where to look. I found chicken shit and chicken feathers, but no chicken eggs. When Shirley had a bowlful of eggs, she started walking back up to the house, so I followed her again. When we got in the house, I went in the front room and sat down on the sofa. No teevee, no books, no magazines. I wished I would of brought a Photoplay.

There was a little whumping feeling in my lap. Shirley had come in and put clothes in my lap, a tee shirt and some jeans. "If you want to get up on the roof, then you can change in my room," she said. She didn't look mad any more, but she didn't look too friendly either.

I was a lot better at roof-patching than egg-finding. I didn't have to hunt very hard for the holes and cracks, there was a crack in between every other shingle. We each had a little plastic thing full of tar and a paint-stirrer stick. We just glopped the tar onto the holes to cover them up. The tar smelled horrible be­cause it was hot. I was scared I was going to fall off the roof, a couple times a shingle came loose under my foot and flew off over the gutter. One of the roof holes had a little dead bird in it. I thought about just tarring over it, but I took the tar stick and pried the stiff body out, poor thing. I flipped it down the roof and onto the ground. I felt bad for it, even though it was dead already and couldn't feel.

It wasn't too easy to smoke while I was working, with tar on my hands. I had to take a cigarette out of the pack with my mouth. I couldn't figure out about the match, but Shirley come and put her lighter to my Winston. She lit herself a Camel and we sat down on the roof.

"You can't make somebody live," said Shirley. "If s not right, there's too many that want to live and they can't, all the ones with black lung and sugar diabetes. I just help the ones that want to live, they need help. Not the ones that kill themself."

"Rusty is sick too," I said. "Ifs her mind, maybe, but she's bad off, like somebody that has a weak leg. She wouldn't of made it this far if I didn't help her."

"Don't drag it out, then," Shirley said. "Let it go. Leave Rusty to do whatever she's going to do, and you take care of yourself. Who's taking care of you?"

"I don't need no help," I said. "There's nothing the matter with me."

"Hardhead," said Shirley, but she didn't say it mean. "Let's get this nasty tar done so we can get cleaned up. There's a good movie on teevee I want to see."

"You don't got a teevee, do you?" I said.

"Libby does," Shirley said. "We can go down the road and watch it with her."

That motivated me to get busy with the tar stick. I missed watching teevee. I didn't like to do without things I was used to. I got a little bit sloppy with the tar, but who was going to be up on the roof looking?

We had to scrub the tar off our hands with a rag dipped in gasoline. I hated how gas smelled, it made me gag, but that was the only way. I wouldn't of worked on the roof if I knew about rubbing gas all over myself. We couldn't take a shower, either, no running water. Shirley got her water from a well right be­hind the house. The well had a little roof on it, better than the one that was on Shirley's house. Shirley drew a pail of water up and dumped it in a bucket for me. I washed up in the bucket but I still smelled like gas when I was done.

Shirley drew up another pail so she could wash, and I went to wait in the kitchen. My hand shook when I lit a cigarette, in case I blew up from the gasoline, but nothing happened. Shirley come in the back door and said, "Ready to go? My movie starts pretty soon."

"Sure," I said. I started towards the front door, but Shirley said, "Back this way, we go out the back door."

"Ain't your truck out front?" I said.

"Yeah," said Shirley, "but we can walk. Libby's right down the road." We went out the back, and Shirley fastened the door with a hook and eye.

"Don't you have a lock?" I said. "Somebody could go right in."

"Maybe they'd leave me something good," Shirley said. "What have I got for them to take?"

I wondered shouldn't we call Libby and ask her if it was okay to come over, but maybe in the country people didn't need manners. Or maybe Libby knew we was coming. I just followed Shirley down the path. It looked like we was going back to the chicken house, but we went on past it and through a field. Then we went through a little patch of scrubby trees and another field.

There was a little tiny house on the other side of the field, real little. It looked like either two big rooms or three little ones. I knew it must be Libby's, cause of a big huge teevee antenna sticking up from the backyard. It was way taller than the house.

When Libby opened her front door, for a second I thought she was a man. It was because she was short and stocky, and she had on a big jacket and a feed cap. She didn't say nothing, she just stood in the doorway, holding the screen door open.

"Come on in," Shirley said to me, she went in past Libby.

I just stood on the porch for a second, looking at Libby. Shir­ley turned around. "Libby don't say much."

"Oh," I said. When I stepped into the house Libby shut the door after me, and then she went and turned the teevee on. Shirley must of told her about the movie already. We sat down on the couch, all of us in a row, and stared at the screen.

The movie had Jimmy Stewart in it. It was about him being a politician and everybody else was crooked. He gives a speech that lasts for days and days that fixes everything. I didn't be­lieve a word of it, but it was still a pretty good movie. Some­times I liked Jimmy Stewart and sometimes I didn't, but he was pretty good in this one.

After the movie was over, Libby turned off the teevee. All three of us walked in the kitchen and sat down at the table. Libby's kitchen was small but a lot more modem than Shirley's. In that little room she had a refrigerator and a gas stove and a regular kitchen sink. There was a coffee pot perking on the counter by the dish drainer. Libby must of seen me looking at it, cause she got a cup out of the drainer and picked up the coffee pot. She said something, her voice was so quiet it was hard to understand. I said yes, cause I figured she was asking if I wanted coffee. Libby give me the cup and I said "Thank you." Then she looked at Shirley.

Libby had looked at me with a friendly face, but when she looked at Shirley, it was a big change. She had the look of some­body in love. And all at once I got it. Libby and Shirley was girlfriends, not just neighbors. Shirley caught me looking. I tried to act like everything was normal but my brain was whirling around.

Libby came and sat at the table, she had Coke instead of coffee. If I had a funny look on my face, Libby didn't act like she noticed it. She had a nice round face, like Shirley, and her eye­brows went up in the middle. "You drive out here by yourself?" she said, super quiet.

When she was sitting close to me, I could hear her. "Yeah," I said.

We all just sat there, drinking and smoking. I was thinking about Shirley saying she wasn't Rusty's mother when she was. I bet Shirley give Rusty to Vivian cause of Shirley being a lesbian. Maybe somebody found out and said they would take away Rusty, or maybe Vivian thought Shirley would ruin Rusty.

Libby was saying something and I wasn't paying attention. She ended up with "Vivian's girl?"

"Rusty's back in Missouri," I said. I didn't know what she asked, I just started talking. "In a little town called New Naples, waiting. We're going to Colorado."

"She was a big baby," said Libby. "I remember she was more than ten pounds."

"Yep," said Shirley. "Almost eleven."

She was admitting it! All this time I had been trying to pry it out of her, and she just admitted it. She admitted she was Rusty's mother.

"Vivian was great big," said Libby. "That big baby."

"Uh-huh," Shirley said. "Vivian didn't like being pregnant, that was a hot summer." She looked right at me.

I don't know why it was so hard for me to believe, that Viv was really Rusty's mother. I guess Rusty thought it was hard to believe, too. I knew Rusty didn't tell me lies about it on purpose, she must of believed it too. I would of rather had Shirley be my mother, if I got to pick between Viv and Shirley.

I guess I didn't want to believe the truth, cause that meant I wasn't going to find out a big secret that would fix everything. I must of been planning for Shirley to adopt Rusty or something, come back to New Naples and be Rusty's mother. But Vivian was Rusty's mother, there wasn't no big secret. No big mystery answer. Everything was the way it seemed. It looked like Rusty wasn't going to Colorado, she probably wasn't going.

"You want to stay for supper?" Shirley said.

"What?" I said.

"We was asking you if you want to stay and eat," she said.

"Sorry," I said. "I was daydreaming. Yeah, thafd be nice." I looked at Shirley. "If that's okay."

"Sounds good to me," Shirley said.

A big porcelain pot was boiling on the back burner of Libby's stove, steam was coming out from under the lid. Libby stirred the pot with a big wooden spoon. Then she went out the back door, and when she come back, she was carrying a cabbage and a handful of green onions. I got up to open the door for her, but she just used her butt to knock it open. Shirley was already standing by the gas range, she had took the grease can off the back of the stove and poured some grease in the bottom of a skillet. Then she turned on the burner and started cutting pota­toes and dropping them down in the grease.

"What do you want me to do?" I said.

They did, too. They was a team that had worked together a long time. They never got in each other's way even when both of them was using the sink. They never talked, they looked at each other a lot, but they didn't speak. Their backs was the same shape. That made sense, they ate the same food and drank the same pop and lived on the same road. I wondered how long they'd been together. If Libby remembered Rusty being born, that would of been twenty years. Maybe Shirley and Libby even went to school together. Well, of course they went to school together, how many schools was there around Skeet? Libby set down a plate in front of me, with navy beans and fried potatoes and boiled cabbage on it. She got her plate, and a skillet of corn bread, and three or four green onions and put all of it on the table. Shirley brought her own plate and set it down

"Keep your seat," said Shirley. "We got it.". We all had a great big huge plateful, all that food and all that coffee. I was going to be up half the night.

"I should go to bed pretty early," I said. "I want to get a good start in the morning, to drive back."

"You just got here," Libby and Shirley said at the same time. Shirley waved a green onion at me. "Why, we can't let you go back so soon. You ain't seen anything yet."

"I got everything I needed," I said. "It'll be a nice drive back, if s pretty down here."

"Well, I wish you'd stay," Shirley said. "But I'll take you over to Luddie's in the morning."

After we ate, we smoked. After we smoked, Libby and Shir­ley did the dishes. Shirley washed and Libby dried. They got done fast, lots of practice. When everything was put away, Shir­ley smoked one more cigarette and said, "Well, Carol, you about ready to go on back to my house?"

"Yeah," I said. I got up and dumped out the ashtray in the trash.

Libby opened up the refrigerator. There was three bottles of Dr. Pepper on the top shelf.

Libby took them out and put them in a paper sack.

"Here you go," she said. "Take you a cold bottle of pop back."

"Don't you want to keep a bottle?" I said. "For yourself?"

Libby shook her head no, she was laughing.

"She'll be over later to get it," Shirley said.

"Oh," I said.

Me and Shirley walked back through the fields and the scrubby trees, I could not see a thing. Shirley was carrying the sack with the pop in it, and I was walking right behind her. She walked right along, no flashlight or nothing, right up the path by the chicken shed and up to the house. She lifted the hook on the back door and we went on in.

"It's hot in here," she said when we got inside. "You want to go out to the porch and sit? We could take our pop out with us. You like Dr. Pepper?"

"I love Dr. Pepper," I said. "Can I use your phone for a min­ute, though? It'll be collect, I won't put nothing on your bill."

"Go ahead, honey," said Shirley. "It's right there on the wall."

I dialed Mary Lou's number. It rung twice, then Frank picked it up and said hello."Hey, Frank," I said. "How are you doing?"

"Oh, all right," Frank said. 'Who is this?"

"It's me," I said. "Carol. I'm calling from West Virginia."

"Hi, Carol," Frank said. "Did you have a good drive down? Is it pretty down there?"

"Yeah," I said. "It is. Can I talk to Mary Lou?"

"She's not here, Carol," he said. "They called her in to work tonight. Short-handed, I guess."

"Okay," I said. 'Tell her I called, all right?"

"Sure, I'll tell her," Frank said.

"All right, then," I said. As soon as I hung up the phone, I had to pee really bad. There was no chance of a inside bath­room, but I was hoping there was more than a chair out in the yard. Shirley give me a flashlight and pointed me off in the side yard, to the outhouse. When I opened up the outhouse door, I heard little animal feet pit-patting on the floor inside. I stepped inside anyway and shined the flashlight around but I didn't see whatever it was. There was a regular toilet seat in the outhouse, and I should of sat down but I couldn't do it. Being shut in with a little animal was bothering my nerves. I come out of the out­house and walked out into the woods, and peed on the ground. I wasn't too good at it and I almost ended up with wet socks. But I did the best I could, and come back in the kitchen.

Shirley popped the caps off two of tire Dr. Pepper bottles. "Here's yours," she said. "Get the ashtray, would you?"

We went out front and sat down on the porch, in metal chairs with the backs that look like sea shells. They were kind of bouncy so I could rock back and forth in them. Mine squeaked, it was going urr-ree, urr-ree. When I quit rocking and reached over to give Shirley the ashtray, I still heard the squeaking noise, going urr-ree, urr-ree.

"What is that?" I said.

"What?" said Shirley.

"I don't know," I said. "Kind of buzzy-sounding, is your washing machine broke?"

'Washing machine?" said Shirley. "Not unless they got a new kind that runs dry. No running water up here, city girl."

"I still hear it," I said. "Whatever it is. Whoa!" I jumped up, cause something was on my leg. "Get it off me, get it off!"

"It's gone, honey," said Shirley. "Just a little cricket, it won't hurt you. That's what you hear, it's crickets chirping."

"I wasn't scared," I said. "It was just sudden. I'm all right." I had burned myself a little with my cigarette, but I wasn't going to mention it. "I know you don't want to talk about it," I said. "Don't get mad. I just want to know if you think Rusty—"

"Now, Carol," Shirley said, "if you start, I am going to get aggravated with you. You just won't listen. You can't take care of Rusty, just take care of yourself. That takes everything I got, just taking care of me. Just take care of yourself, you're the one with the big plans."

"Rusty was the one who thought up the big plan," I said. "She was the one who thought up going to Colorado."

"So," Shirley said, "who got the station wagon to drive out in?"

"Well, I was the one borrowed it," I said. "Rusty couldn't—"

"And who was the one who decided you all would go any­way," she said, "even if you didn't have the money? Keeping on with a plan is hard work, sticking with it."

"Rusty did a lot," I said.

"Hardhead," said Shirley, but she didn't say it mean.

I heard a noise in the back part of Shirley's house but I didn't jump. After the cricket and all that, I wasn't going to peep. Shir­ley turned her head and listened. "There's Libby," she said. "Done with her chores, I guess."

Libby walked through the house and opened up the screen door a little. "I'm here," she said. "I'm taking my pop and going to bed."

"All right," said Shirley.

I stared straight ahead, out into the yard. I wanted them to have a little privacy. Everyone likes privacy, whoever they love.

"I better go on in," Shirley said. "You stay out here with your crickets if you want. I have to get up for work, me and the chickens get up early."

"Work?" I said. "Ain't the farm what you do?"

"It's not much of a farm no more," said Shirley. "Daddy and Mom had 160 acres of tobacco but the government takes some acres every year, for taxes. Daddy always called them commu­nists, the government men. He used to carry on and complain. 'Communists got nine acres this year,' he'd say. Got mad and cussed them. 'Communists stole my nine acres/ They still take some for taxes, not every year but some years."

"Taxes on what?" I said. "You don't have nothing out here."

"Breathing tax, I guess," said Shirley. "They've left me enough to raise a little backy. But that ain't going to keep me when I'm old, I have to get a little bit in the bank. So I work in Hunting­ton, custodial work. And I have a little garden, there ain't room to grow nothing but what I eat and what the cow eats."

"Cow?" I said. "Can I see it?"

"If you want to get up with me," said Shirley. "I go out to the barn first thing."

* * *

I never got to see the cow. I meant to get up with Shirley, but when I opened my eyes I knew it was late. The sun was shining, and Shirley hadn't woke me up. I got up off the couch and walked around the house, all the doors was open and nobody was home. I wasn't too happy about that. How was I getting over to Luddie's store to get Mary Lou's truck? I got up off the couch and went in the kitchen to get my cigarettes. There was a note on the table.

          Dear Carol,

           I coudn't wake you up, youX needed your sleepe I guess.

           Libby took me in to wirk. Just take my truck over to Luddie store 
           and XXXleave it. I will get it after work. Come back and see me when 
           you can. Wish you could of staid longer. There's some cold biscuits 
           in the oven if you want them. Say hi to Rusty.

          Your Aunt Shirley

Shirley's biscuits was good, even cold. I put peach preserves on them, and I had three cups of good black coffee.

The coffee was a mistake. When I pulled Shirley's truck in at Luddie's store, I had to go around back and sit on the chair to pee. There was two other trucks besides Mary Lou's parked in front. I was scared somebody else was going to come around back of the store, it made it hard for me to pee.

That first day driving back to New Naples, I had a bad lunch and a good supper. The place I had lunch had looked like a good place, it said "Country Cooking" on the window. It was kind of shabby-looking, but I thought it would be cheap. I had to save enough money to fill up Mary Lou's gas tank when I got home.

The food at the Country Cooking place was horrible, they give me a fish sandwich that I couldn't even eat, the inside of the fish patty was all wet and frozen. The french fries was cooked in nasty old oil, for a salad they give me a hunk of lettuce with brown edges and a glob of Thousand Island on top.

Country Cooking didn't have a jukebox, either. They had the radio on, but it was between stations. There was rock-and-roll coming out with a buzzy sound, and a little bit of a radio preacher yelling about blood atonement. I didn't even eat the food, I just paid for it and left the waitress some change. It wasn't her fault. I went back out to the truck and started driv­ing.

When I was going over the West Virginia state line, I was eating a Spam sandwich and wishing I was home already. I wasn't too homesick for New Naples but I missed Mary Lou a lot. The Spam sandwich give me a bellyache. I didn't know if it was spoiled or what. I found half a roll of Rolaids in the glove compartment, but they didn't do me much good even when I ate all of them. So I pulled in at a burger place and got a straw­berry milkshake, and that settled my stomach down. The burger place was across from a store called Value Town. Before I knew it, I was in the store buying a transistor radio. I didn't have hardly no money left, but it was worth it. The first station I turned to was playing "I Only Want to Be with You" by Dusty Springfield. That was a good song, kind of romantic but not all sticky sweet. I always had liked Dusty Springfield.

* * *

That night when I wanted to stop and sleep, I couldn't find noplace good to park the truck. I kept thinking I might see a church, or a school, even. But all I seen was gas stations and little grocery stores and I was scared to park on private prop­erty. I didn't want some policeman giving me a hard time. I hadn't took a bath since the one I had at the minister's house, I probably looked like a bum. A cop might take me to jail and I didn't have the money for bail

I started getting sleepy, real sleepy. I give up and parked at a tire store. Then I turned the engine back on, and pulled out and looked for a better place. But I just got farther and farther in the country, and I was mad at myself. If I would of parked at the tire store, I would of been off the road, anyway. Now I was going to have to park in a field and probably get stuck in the mud again. Or park in the road and get hit.

Finally, a little dirt road come along on the left. I wasn't too sure if it was a road or a cow track, but there was a sign next to it and cows couldn't read. I turned left, the sign said Sewage Treatment Road. That was disgusting, but then it was the road to the sewage treatment plant. They couldn't call it Beautiful Flower Lane. I was just glad to get off the main road. I went about fifty feet and cut tire engine.

All my stuff had to be moved around on the truck seat so I could lay down. There was the empty Spam can and dirty socks and half a bag of Oreos. The inside of the truck looked kind of like Rusty's bed. I decided not to think about Rusty. I needed my sleep, she wasn't laying in bed worrying about me.

I put all the trash and my dirty clothes down on the floor­boards. I tried to push the ashtray back into the dashboard but it was totally full and it wouldn't go in. I lifted it out, real care­ful cause I didn't want dirty nasty ashes all over Mary Lou's truck. I opened up the truck door to dump out the ashtray, and there was a policeman.

"Whoa," I said. "I didn't see you."

"I know," the policeman said.

"I'll move the truck," I said. "Don't take me to jail, I'll move right now."

"What would I take you to jail for?" said the policeman.

"I don't know," I said. I guess he was one of those policemen that like to mess with you before they arrest you. "Trespassing, or disturbing the peace, or something. Sir."

"I can't arrest you," said the policeman. "I'm not a police­man."

"You're not?" I said. Great, a nut in policeman clothes. He probably ordered them out of a True Detective magazine, one of those ads in the back, like "Be A Private Investigator in Your Spare Time." I looked at his suit, it was pretty realistic except his badge said "Sewer Division."

"Oh," I said. "You're a security guy."

"Yeah," he said. "I need you to move up the road and park at the plant. You're blocking the entrance road."

"I'm just sleeping," I said. "I wasn't really going to the sewage plant."

"Well, sleep up at the parking lot, he said. "Just be out when they open at eight."

I was scared, what if he was lying and really he was a crazy man? He could get me up there and kill me to pieces. But he had an official truck, it said Sewer Divison on the door.  And anyway he could just follow me wherever.  I said, "All right. Just up this road here?"

"Yep," he said. "You can't miss it."

He went and got in his Sewer Division truck and tried to start it. But the engine wouldn't turn over.  He tried three or four times, I was waiting for him to flood it, but he got back out and came over to my driver window again.

"I got cables," he said. "You think I could get a jump off you?"

"Sure," I said. I got out of the truck. "If you know how, I don't know nothing about it."

"Yeah, I can get it," he said. "Pull up there, right in front of my truck." When I pulled up, he leaned into my window. "Pop your hood, okay?"

I had to hunt for the thing to pull up on, but I found it.  When I let the hood pop, the security guy put the cables on with those giant pliers. Then he got in his truck and it started right up.
He got out and came over to slam my hood down for me. "I'm all right now," he said. "Go on up to the plant and park. Lock your doors."

"Okay, thanks," I said.

About a quarter-mile up, there was a chain-link gate and a big parking lot. The lot must have been big to leave room for the trucks, cause the sewage plant building wasn't that big, about the size of Redskin Brooms. I parked right next to the building, it seemed like that was safer. I laid down on the front seat and put my jacket over my legs.

I didn't sleep that good, I kept hearing noises and waking up. But I never seen nothing. I'd sit up and smoke a couple of cigarettes and lay back down.   In the morning, my back was real stiff. I had to use my arms to sit up. It must of been about seven or seven-thirty. Nobody had drove into the parking lot yet. I put the truck in reverse and backed up, then I took off down Sew­age Treatment Road.

I didn't get out of the truck for the rest of the day, except for stopping a couple times to get gas and use the restroom. If I kept going, I could get home by maybe ten o'clock and I didn't want to sleep one more night in Mary Lou's Moving Motel. I ate Oreos and smoked cigarettes and listened to the transistor radio. I wouldn't of made it without that radio, even the com­mercials sounded good, they kept me company.

I got to Jefferson City about eight-thirty at night. I went in a little restaurant and got a pack of cigarettes and used the phone. When I called Mary Lou's house, Marty answered.

"Hey, Marty," I said. "Listen, this is Carol. Can I talk to Mary Lou?"

"If you want to wait a minute," Marty said. "She's in the restroom."

 "That⁷s all right," I said. "Just tell her I'll be over at Evelyn's about nine-thirty, okay? Nine-thirty or ten."

"All right," said Marty. "See you."

"See you," I said. I hung the phone up and went out to the truck. My body didn't want to get in the driver's seat but I forced it to sit down behind the steering wheel. I turned on the transistor radio but the music was weak, the battery was dying. I put the radio up on the dashboard, right over the steering wheel and I could just barely hear Little Richard singing "Tutti frutti, oh rootie."