The Escape of Bobby Ray Hammer, A Novel of a '50s Family

  "I've always been confused about Lenny's funeral. And for a long time, I was willing to just not let it bother me. But now Charles Kunze is back in town. He's told me that people lie about what happened to Lenny. Seems to me it would be better to know the truth than worry about it the way I do."

  "Okay, Ray. Okay. You've convinced me. But you should stay away from all the Kunze's. That's a piece of advice I can give you. Now just shut up a minute. Can you do that? Just shut up? I'm going to tell you what I know. It isn't much, but I'll tell you, if you'll just give me a little time. There's a reason I'm going to tell you, but I can't tell you what it is. Not yet anyway. Just promise me one thing. You won't tell Louise and Hershel that we've talked about Lenny. Particularly Hershel. God, I don't trust that brother of mine."

  "What do you mean? What is it that you're not going to tell me? Why all this secret stuff?"

  "Don't press me on it, Ray, or I'll run you off right now. Kick you completely off my place. Don't press me."

  "Okay." I never thought I would hear her say that and me not run out the door.

  "So here's what I know about Lenny, and I know it's the truth cause I saw him myself. And it's not much. All I know is that he was desperate. Before he got killed, the very day he got killed, he was desperate."

  "You saw Lenny the day he died?"

  "Don't you start jumping to conclusions. I didn't have anything to do with him getting killed. Everybody wants to know what happened to Lenny and what I did to him. Even the police were here. I could have shot that cop, Brock, myself. Him probing into my life like that. Why should everybody think I know? Sure. Lenny came over here. He was like an outlaw on the run. He was mad at your papa. Madder than I ever knew Lenny could be. I've never seen a boy so intent on disaster. He came asking for advice. Can you imagine that? I know what I am, Ray. And he was desperate enough to come to me for advice. No one else he could turn to, he said. And me in the shape I'm in. I failed him, Ray.

  "What did he need advice about?"

  Her voice gets real quiet and raspy now, almost like a whisper, and she turns to look at the door like she thinks someone might hear her. "About killing someone. He wouldn't say who. He wanted to know if it was ever okay to kill someone. I never even told the police about this. Brock didn't need to know it cause Lenny never hurt anyone. But it's as true as me sitting here. Lenny wanted to kill somebody."

  CHAPTER 14: Trish Has Some Answers

  I'm standing in front of the mirror with my shirt off. First I flex one pec then the other. Curt is standing next to me giving me some serious shit about my hair, but I don't have time for his cutting up. I have Charles on my mind plus I have a date tonight. I put my comb in my back pocket and fold the very top of my new Levi's over one more time. Even with all the belt loops cut off, the little fold just won't stay down, but when it does, it surprises me how good it looks.

  At school today, Bev was looking at me all through the pep rally. We were in the gym and I was sitting in the front row. She's leading the cheers and every time she came over in front of the senior section, she just stared daggers at me. She knows I'm going out with Brenda tonight.

  Charles wants me to go out drinking with him sometime. "Do some serious drinking," he said. I have a little beer now and then, but I don't go in for drinking a whole lot. I don't want to come home drunk. I don't know what Papa would do to me if he caught me drunk. I don't know which would be worse, being out with Charles or drinking.

  I bend down and feel the cuff of my pant leg where Mama ironed it flat for me. Just an inch folded under so that the crease scrapes my shoe top. I'm worried about the thick seams straightening back out. Sure enough, one is hanging down a little on the inside. Mama may have to iron them again. Curt's giving me the play-by-play treatment.

  "There he is, reaching for his comb. Will he comb it again? You bet he will. Combs it one more time. Back on the sides now, back, back, back. Runs the comb straight down that duck's ass."

  "Mama 'll have your butt if she catches you talking like that," I tell him.

  He leans back a little, looks through the washroom to the kitchen. "Louise has her arm stuck up a dead chicken's ass. And she's talking to Aunt Loretta. She's not listening to what I say. Louise can't talk to Loretta and do anything else at the same time."

  Aunt Loretta came over here wanting to talk my leg off again. She's really a cuckoo bird. I thought I was never going to get out of the kitchen in time to take my shower and get over to Brenda's. Mama may be occupied with Aunt Loretta right now, but Curt shouldn't be calling her by her first name anyway.

  "You keep talking so much like a wise guy," I say, "they just might let you skip being a freshman next year. All you learn the first year is that you need a big mouth."

  "Louise won't do anything to me, Bobby Ray."

  "Well, you let Papa find out you've been calling Mama Louise, and Curt will end up getting Bobby in trouble. Cause I'm not just standing by while he beats you again."

  "You're right. Hershel, he's another story. Not a very smart story, but another story."

  "You keep selling him short, he just might surprise you." Then I remember something. "Hey. Listen to me, Curt. Come over here close."

  Curt backs off like I'm going to pull a trick on him.

  "Let me tell you what she said about Lenny."

  "Get serious. Mama doesn't talk about Lenny."

  "No. Aunt Loretta. I'm serious. This is important."

  So he makes a move toward me, but he's still expecting to get popped by the towel I have in my hands.

  "She told me that..." and now I know I've made a mistake. Curt's not ready to hear this. I've just had it running around in my head for a while and it needs to come out. But Curt's not the one to tell. I look at him a little strange. "I don't think you need to know this. Maybe now's not the time."

  "You've got tell me now or I'll be wondering all night. I have to know about Lenny."

  Just as he said that, Trish walked by the bathroom door. Curt said "Lenny" a little loud and I think she heard it.

  "What you two jawing about?" she asks, coming through the door.

  "This doesn't concern you," I say, "so just keep on walking."

  "You said something about Lenny, and I want to know what."

  "Why don't you just mind your own business," is what Curt throws in.

  "He is my business. He was my brother too. What was it, Bobby Ray?"

  "I have to know if you can keep that yap of yours shut about this." I shut the bathroom door that goes to the kitchen.

  "I can keep my mouth shut just the same as Curt."

  "No you can't. You're just like me. I wasn't even going to talk about this, but I can't keep my big mouth shut."

  "So what's the difference if you tell me?" 

  She might have a point there. "Two people, that's the difference. Okay, but you've got to promise to keep your yap shut."

  "Want it written in blood?"

  "Not a bad idea. Go get a butcher knife, Curt."

  He takes off like he thinks I mean it.

  "Get back here," I tell him. Now I have both of them looking up at me like baby birds in a nest all ready for feeding, so I've got to deliver the goods. "Shut the door to the hall, Curt." Then I tell them. "Lenny wanted to kill someone the day he died."

  "Really," says Curt, his eyes bugging out like big marbles.

  Trish rolls her eyes, backs off like she's leaving. "No way, Bobby Ray. Your imagination has gone off the deep end."

  "Come back here. There's more."

  "Put on a shirt. I don't want to have to look at you."

  I give her a biceps flex.

  "Do that one flex she hates so much. The really ugly one," says Curt.

  "Who told you that about Lenny?" asks Trish, like she's a little more concerned now.

  "Aunt Loretta."

  "Okay," and now she's laughing. "I believe that, and it explains everything. The two of you together are really something else."

  "Tell her abou
t Charles," says Curt.

  "She already knows too much. I shouldn't have told her anything."

  "Charles who?" Trish asks and when she asks, she reminds me of the way Papa asked, like she is already mad at me.

  "Charles Kunze."

  And now Trish is serious and she comes up close for me to tell her.

  "Charles is back in town," I tell her. "He says people lie about the way he died."

  "How does he know different?"

  "He was there."

  "So that's why you think Aunt Loretta is telling the truth?"

  "Come on, Trish. She wouldn't know how to tell a lie."

  "Do you remember who Charles is?" asks Trish.

  "Sure. He was Lenny's best friend."

  She laughs at me again. "He may have been, but do you remember what he did at Lenny's funeral?"

  "No."

  "He shot Lenny's dog."

  "Charles did that?"

  "Don't look so surprised, Bobby Ray. Surely you remember how Rascal hated Charles."

  "But why would Charles have a gun? Why would he bring a gun to Lenny's funeral?"

  "I don't know, but he had a pistol in his coat pocket. Rascal bit Charles twice, so he pulled out that pistol and started shooting. Papa started chasing him and cussing. I thought Charles was going to turn that pistol on Papa."

  "So how did the funeral end?" I ask.

  "With Papa and Karl shouting at each other. Papa told Karl that the next time he saw Charles he was going to kill him."

  "Over him killing Rascal?"

  "I don't know. Seems like they were shouting about a lot of things. I couldn't make any sense of it."

  "It doesn't seem like that's enough to kill someone over."

  "Tell her about the car," adds Curt.

  "You want me to tell her everything?"

  "All of it, Bobby Ray," says Trish.

  "I saw Lenny's car passing in front of the high school during lunch hour a while back."

  "How do you know it was Lenny's?"

  "Cause it's the only '48 Hudson around here. Gray on top, blue on bottom. Always was the only one." I take a quick look at my watch. "You two get out of here. I'm late." And I throw the bathroom door open. "Go on. Get out of here."

  "Come on, Bobby Ray," says Curt, "give her the hunchback. That'll get rid of her." Curt's talking about the way I can hunker over and flex my lats, pecs, biceps and abs at the same time. Kid at school showed me how to do it by bringing my arms in at my sides and hunching back a little to tighten my abs. I catch Trish just as she hits the door. She stops to look.

  "Mama, you ought to come see this kid of yours in here. He's deformed. Needs surgery. Maybe brain surgery." She walks off, her words coming back from down the hall. "I think you should make him shave his armpits, Mama. At least make him wash them. Looks like he's growing moss under there."

  "He already combs his underarms, Trish," says Curt. "I know cause he just did it."

  "Shut up and get out of here, Curt." And I mean it because I'm tired of him.

  "Got the comb stuck in there too. Now he'll have to go to the game with a comb stuck in his armpit. Brenda's going to really like it though."

  "Shut up, you little shit," I say quiet as I can so Mama won't hear. But his mouth just keeps running. Then I hear Trish coming back again, like she forgot something.

  "One thing Brenda really likes," says Curt, "is a guy with a comb in his armpit." Then he says something real low, like it is just for me. "That doesn't mean he'll get anything from her though."

  I grab Curt, get him in a choke hold. He starts squirming on me and calling for Mama. Trish is back now and sticks her head in the door.

  "If what I hear about Brenda is true," she says, "you won't have to worry about getting something from her. You'll just have to worry about how to get rid of it."

  I tighten my hold a little so Curt can't say anything. He starts kicking me in the shins. I throw him, so he hits the door frame, ends up on the floor. I guess I was a little rougher than I meant to be. I see tears in his eyes.

  "God, Bobby, you're going to kill him," says Trish acting real serious.

  "Get out of here, Trish." And now I am mad. "Get out of here and shut up or I'll break your arms off and stick them down your throat."

  I hear the telephone ringing off in the kitchen.

  "That's Eugene," yells Trish. "I'll get it Mama."

  "Bobby Ray," and now it's Mama on me with the rest of them. "You watch how you talk to your sister."

  It always ends up that way. Everybody on me. I shut up, put my new shirt on that Mama just finished sewing for me, roll my sleeves halfway to my elbows, stand my collar up in the back, fold down the sides. Shirttail in my Levis. A profile shot. Elvis wishes he looked so good.

  CHAPTER 15: Leroy and His Uncle Jesse

  I'm a little early for picking up Brenda, so I stop off to see Leroy. Their house is at the corner of Alameda and Fourth Street. Has a wire fence around front grown up in weeds. Some old bald headed man with a mustache, some man I have never seen before, is sitting out on the front porch drinking a beer with Leroy's Uncle Jesse that lives with them. Jess is bare-chested. It's chilly out for no shirt. He has tattoos all over his arms that he had put on while he was busy getting his dishonorable discharge from the navy. His skin is so brown it looks like leather because he chops cotton and does other odd jobs for farmers around abouts. Always out in the sun. As I walk up, he says something to that old man and then laughs, something about me I think, but I can't hear him.

  "Hi, Bobby," he says, when I get closer. "You and Leroy going to tear hell out of Chowchilla tonight?" He always shakes my hand like I'm a grownup. Makes me feel like I'm somebody. Kind of embarrasses me though.

  "No," I tell him, "I've got a date tonight."

  "Whoa," he says, and backs off like he's afraid of me, like he's going to run. "Now there's something I don't know anything about. Women. But if you keep your pants zipped, you'll be all right. You tell Leroy to keep his zipped too, ya hear." He has a tattoo just above the white bud of his nipple on the left side of his chest, a bright red heart with a crack down the middle and writing in dark blue just above that says "Loretta."

  "If I can find him. He inside?"

  "In the shower. Went in there some time last month. As soon as the State of California runs out of water, he'll be out." Then he turns to the old man. "This here's Jake, Shirley's brother." Shirley is Leroy's mother. "Might as well get to know him cause he got laid off at the Oil Mill and planning on staying with us for a spell."

  Damn if Jake don't stand up and shake my hand too. Up close, he doesn't seem as old as I thought. I guess it was the bald head that fooled me. Jake looks embarrassed too and just sits back down on the porch, turns up that can of Colt 45. But then he asks me a question. "You Lenny Hammer's little brother?"

  I haven't been called that in a long time and I don't like it so I don't answer him. But Jess does.

  "Yes, but he's a better kid than Lenny."

  "Oh, I don't know about that, Jess," says Jake. "I liked Lenny and that other kid, Charles, that he used to run around with. They were always hitting me up to buy a little liquor for 'em."

  "You stay away from that drinking, Bobby," says Jess. "Don't get tied up in this stuff," he holds up the can of beer he's drinking.

  "I liked Charles. When he was little, he was always going for broke," says Jake.

  "He's back in town now," I say.

  "That a fact? You see him, tell him to look me up."

  Jess is standing there shaking his head no.

  "What do you mean, Jess," says Jake. "There's nothing wrong with me seeing Charles."

  I walk on in the house but I can still hear them talking.

  "You'd lead the pope to a whorehouse."

  "Ah, come on..."

  It's dark inside because they don't have any lights on yet. Leroy has brothers all over the house. I've never stopped to count how many he has. Leon is the oldest. He quit school before graduation and
has been out a while. He's over in the corner of the living room sitting on a foldaway that looks like it hasn't been made in a week. He's talking on the telephone and his girlfriend is sitting on his knee. She has a swelled up stomach like maybe there's a baby inside, and she's whispering something and nibbling on Leon's ear. Two other little ones are fighting over marbles spread out on an old coffee table. The littlest has on a dirty diaper and waddles up to me whining and holding up an empty milk bottle like I'm his daddy. I walk on through, down the hall, knock on the bathroom door.

  "I told you," and Leroy's shouting, "I'll be out in a minute."

  "No you didn't," I say, and he jerks the door open.

  "Get in here and shut the door before Daddy sees you." All he has on is his Jockey shorts and there's so much steam I can't breathe real good. Leroy wipes the mirror with a towel.

  "What's wrong with your daddy seeing me?" His daddy has always liked me. I'm taking shallow breaths because the steam has Leroy's smell all over it.

  "I need five for tonight, Bobby. Can you loan me five?" He's trying to comb that straight black mop of his with this long rattail comb but can't see much in the mirror. I don't see any muscles on him, all he has is bones covered with skin and all this black hair starting to grow everywhere.

  "You know I've got a date. No telling how much I'll need. I've never been out with Brenda before." I pull my comb out of my pocket, push him over a little to get a corner of the mirror, use the towel on it again.

  "Where'd you get that shirt? Your mother been sewing for you again? Five don't mean much to you. Not like it does me. Daddy says things are slow at the auto shop just now. If you need something done to your car, take it to him. He could use the business."

  "I need all the money I have. We might end up in Merced or somewhere. Who knows." I can see he has a problem though. And he didn't get that date he wanted with Phyllis either. The sonofabitch. It wasn't really Phyllis. It was Bev. "Why don't I just give you a couple of bucks? That's all I can spare."

  "Come on, Bobby. Have some consideration." And he has to spit some toothpaste. "God, you got on new Levis too. You always have money."

  I don't say anything. I'm not giving all my money away.

  "Okay. Give it to me. That'll be enough for a six-pack. Maybe Wayne will have some."