Show Me (Thomas Prescott 4), Nick Pirog [classic children's novels .TXT] 📗

been chugging along in a straight line for close to half a mile. I looked back over my shoulder and saw Randall off in the distance, hands on his hips, just watching.

I whipped the steering wheel around and cha-chunked my way back in his direction.

“Was Eccleston Fuzz?” I asked out loud. “Or it could have been anyone in the Tarrin Police Department. Someone who owed Will Dennel eighty-three thousand dollars. But Bree said Will was pretty lax when it came to collecting, that he didn’t threaten people with baseball bats. But still, eighty-three thousand dollars. How had he even let someone get that deep into him? Maybe it was because the guy was a cop. Maybe Fuzz told Will that if he didn’t let him keep betting, he would shut down his whole shop.”

A minute later, I came abreast of Randall.

He was covered in sweat, leaning on the shovel, belly laughing. “Where were you going, buddy?”

“I got distracted.”

“Thinking about Wheeler can do that.”

My eyebrows jumped.

“Oh, I saw how you were looking at her.” He chuckled. “And I don’t blame ya for one second.”

We both laughed, then decided we’d earned a break. We walked toward the farmhouse. There was a mountain of grass, weeds, and brush piled three feet high.

“Is it legal to burn that stuff?” I asked.

“No, but everybody does. We’ll do it at night. Nobody will even notice.”

We entered the house, and Harold and May scampered forward and pawed at both our legs.

Randall asked, “Why did you have me fix the pigpen it you’re just gonna let them live in the house?”

“They like it in here.”

“You like them in here.”

I shrugged, then grabbed two beers.

Out on the porch, each of us resting in one of the new rocking chairs I bought the previous day, Randall said, “I just want to thank you for hiring me.”

We clinked bottles, then I asked, “So were you born here in Tarrin?”

“I was born in Alabama. My dad moved us up here when I was twelve.”

“What part of Alabama?”

“Montgomery.”

“How was that?”

He took a long swig. “I was born in 1970, so I was brought up at the tail end of the Civil Rights Movement. My dad was a preacher and he was pretty active.”

“What about your mom?”

“She died the year before we moved up here. Brain aneurysm.”

I told him I was sorry, and he waved it off. “You said your dad was a preacher?”

“Still is.”

It took me a moment to connect the dots. “Your dad? He wasn’t—”

“Sure was.”

His dad was the preacher at the revival. He had a little bit of white in his hair, but he didn’t look nearly old enough to have a forty-six-year-old son.

“How old is he?”

“Sixty-three.”

Without prodding, Randall said, “He was seventeen when he had me.” He didn’t make me ask, going straight into the story. “My mom was two years younger. Only fifteen. When she turned sixteen, they got married.”

“You can get married at sixteen?”

“In Alabama you could. Still can, I think, if your parents consent, and both of theirs did. Hell, they demanded it.” He paused, then said, “Anyhow, they had two more kids after me. Stayed married for eleven years until she died.”

“Wow,” I said. “It’s rare those marriages work out.”

He nodded.

I asked, “Why did your dad move you guys to Missouri?”

“A guy my dad knew from the Movement was opening a church up here and offered my dad the pulpit.”

“So he’s been preaching at the church—”

“For going on thirty-four years.”

“That’s pretty cool.”

He smiled and took a swig of beer.

“How was it moving from the South to the North?” Before he could answer, I added, “Was Missouri part of the North?”

“The Mason-Dixon line actually goes right through the middle of Missouri, just north of St. Louis. During the Civil War, Missouri was claimed by both the Union and the Confederate, and sent soldiers to both camps.”

“So it was both?”

“Geographically, yes. But emotionally, I’d say your average Missourian would say it’s part of the South.”

“How bad was the racism here, compared to Alabama?”

He scoffed, “That’s like asking how the crab cakes are compared to Maryland.”

“It was that bad down there?”

He nodded, but said nothing.

There wasn’t anything he could say that could make a white boy from Seattle understand.

“What about in Tarrin?” I asked.

“It was a different sort of racism. White kid might call you a nigger, but they weren’t gonna throw a rock at you when they said it.”

“How many other black kids were there?”

“There were three other black kids who went to my middle school. About ten at my high school.”

I punched him lightly on the shoulder and said, “That’s enough for a basketball team.”

He laughed, then said, “My dad’s church was actually one of the biggest reasons more black people started moving to town.”

“They all moved here so your father could yell at them?”

He chuckled.

I did my best impression of his father. “On these hot summer nights, keep your dicks in your pants you horny little beasts.”

He slapped his knee and nearly spit up the last swig of beer he drank. When he composed himself, he said, “Pretty much.” Then he was laughing again.

If Randall recorded his laugh as an MP3, I could listen to it for hours.

“How many black people went to your high school?” he asked.

“Probably a few hundred, but my school was pretty big, a couple thousand kids.”

“You get along with the brothers?”

“I played basketball so I was buddies with a lot of them.”

“You any good?”

“I had a pretty good jump shot. I walked on at the University of Washington, but I quit after the second practice.”

“Why?”

“The coach called me a lazy sack of shit. Then I told him his wife thought I was all hustle.”

He laughed again, then said, “So when you say quit, you mean—”

“I was impolitely asked to leave practice by two assistant coaches and a security guard.”

“I bet you were a cocky little shit back then.”

I grinned. “Thank God that went away.”

He smacked me on the shoulder.

I asked, “Did you play any sports?”

“Football.”

“Let me guess, offensive tackle.”

He grinned, impressed.