Installment 4 - Motsie's great ideas

Vincent's car in Martin's yard

Motsie climbed into the back seat behind Martin and leaned up between the front seats to cock Vincent's rearview mirror where she could see Martin's face while she ran her fingers through her scraggly hair, smiling at Vincent's annoyed sigh.  Vincent elbowed her back into her seat and readjusted his mirror for longer than necessary.  Motsie whispered into Martin's hair, "Not that it's a contest, cousin, cuz we both know who'd win, but I had to see my probation officer today."  She inhaled she scent of sandalwood soap before sitting back. "Would you reach my bong out from under the seat, please baby?"    She pulled a baggie out of her bra and rested it on his shoulder where he'd have to touch her hand when he reached for it. 

"She told me I'm getting terminated unsuccessfully 'cause I got caught back in New Hill Saturday.  Bitch.  And next month was going to be my last visit, too.  I know it's not jail, cuz, but I thought you'd feel better knowing you aren't the only one who can't ever run for president someday."

"What the hell is there in New Hill to attract you?" Martin wanted to know.  "A couple o' old farms along a deserted old road, a few pitiful trailers and that haunted house."

"Oh I just deliberately detoured through there when I was heading to Wrightsville.  Those trailer-dwellin' rednecks that had shot at me the other time finked on me this time for doin' a little thing I like to call 'taking out the trash."

Martin caught right on.  "Oh, yeah, takin' out the trash! Better than rollin' the trees with t.p. stolen from the 66.  I'm definitely gonna do that to Faulkner.  Where's your litter basket, Vincent?  Let's go down Flat Ridge Road right now."

"Oh, heck no, I'm no litter-bug!"  Vincent gasped.  He pulled out of Martin's yard and aimed toward the Five Points Municipal Garden.  "Which way we heading, boss?"  He made sure to look only at Martin, not at Motsie, in case there was any doubt who the boss might be.  "Bamboo or the orphanage; not Faulkner's."

Motsie giggled at him and went on, "I just sorta chucked it out the window as I drove by their trailer, Fabulous Knobs blaring on KIX.  Last I saw it was blowin' across their pitiful excuse for a crappy yard, bottle caps glinting in the sunset in my rearview mirror.  Oh, here's a Zippo, Martin.  The police report listed a November phone bill, a prescription bottle, and a fall semester report card from ECU, all in my name and with my mother's address.  Note to self: Next time, make sure there's nothin' incriminating in the litter bag first. Hey. What's this, Vincent?"  Motsie held something metallic up to examine in the streetlight, "Why is there a pulley on my seat?"

Vincent snatched it right out of her hand.  "Never you mind that pulley, Motsie!"  He called over his shoulder, as he cranked the window down with the other hand, swerved into the wrong lane, and chucked it out.

"Whoa, Nellie! At least one hand on the wheel, man; I almost spilled the bong!  So now you're joining Motsie and me in our life of crime,  Vincent?  It's gettin' kinda cold, can you roll up the window back up?"  Martin had loaded the lucite bong and was twisted around in his seat, offering to light it for Motsie, but she waved him on and kept talking.

"He's got a bedspread back here on the floor, Martin.  Nice, it's chenille! Want it?"  

Vincent swerved again.  "Oh, no,  Motsie, it might be really dirty.  Better leave it on the floor,"   and he readjusted his mirror on Motsie, sped up a little before he raised the window glass like Martin wanted.

"Something stuck on it, like a twig, what?  Were you doing something with this in the woods, Vincent?"  She teased.  "Oh, a little ring!   Look Martin, almost like one I had when I was little, remember?  A sterling silver dogwood flower.  I put mine in my grandaddy's coffin at the wake.  Can I please have it?" She thrust it into the dashboard lights between them, and Vincent recoiled as though she were brandishing a copperhead.

"Take it, take it, please!  I don't want it!"

Staring at Vincent, Martin finished loading the bowl.  "Man, maybe this hit should be for you, Vincent.  You are way over-tweaked."

Once Motsie had adjusted the little band and was admiring the ring on her little finger as she went on talking as if there had been no interruption.  "Dad thought the trailer trash had hit the car with a shotgun blast, 'cause it was split wide open in the trunk where I'd backed up and got skewered on a reflector pole turning around at the exit ramp.  He went to file charges on 'em, but I eventually confessed to that, too.  Sorta.  I told him it happened in Five Points though.  Really I had been rockin' on the pole for ages, skewered through the trunk, spinning my wheels and burning rubber.  Four Marines stopped and bounced me til I got off, but the trunk got all ripped up."

Martin could barely croak the words out through his laughter and still not lose any smoke. "That sounds so wrong for so many reasons, Motsie!"

"Why?  Oh, I get it," she laughed.  "You're nasty.  I almost let Dad blame them, too, but bearing false witness is a sin." 

"But lying is an art," he snorted, and Motsie couldn't have agreed more as she now accepted the bong, laughing with him.  

"I loved the part where you had your dad's woody wagon speeding a hundred up US-1 in the oncoming lane, passing cars with your lights off, trying to lose the losers," Vincent recalled.

Martin continued for him, "Mason's foot pressing yours on the gas pedal, Ray Junior and the purloined pie-safe sticking partly out the back, the rednecks with rifles gaining ground on you in their Camaro, and Raymond crying all the way."

Vincent made a whiney mock of Ray Junior's girlie voice, "'just slow it down to eighty an' I'll jump out here on the roadside!'  Y'all are lucky you didn't die in a head-on!"

Motsie finished her drag and reloaded for Vincent.  "Yeah, my real crime was being stupid enough to believe Mason and Ray Junior wanted me to come out because they liked me.  What an idiot I am!  Supposedly, they were gonna streak through Shakey's and I'd be the get-away driver.  Who knew they were going to rob a pie-safe from a haunted house?  Vincent, you wanna grab this bong the way you snatched that pulley while ago?  Don't fling it out the window, though! And then the d.a. had two bailiffs actually trot the thing out into the courtroom; oh brother!  Hit this, Vincent.  And it didn't even look any good, whitewash peeling off all over it.  I was embarrassed on their behalf, couldn't even steal something pretty.  Hey, Vincent."

"Oh, sorry.  Martin, Can you either hold the bong or the steering wheel so I can get my hit?  Please?  Yeah, they shoulda just stole something little, maybe a crystal goblet or an ash tray, y'know!  That's all I woulda taken.  What about you, Martin?"  Vincent pulled a good long toke off the bong Martin was holding for him.

"Unless you count Batboy's bedroom, the last haunted place I went was Galilee Orphanage on graduation night.  I didn't steal anything.   Damn, you suck hard, Vincent! So, Bethlehem again tonight?"

"Yes.  Whatever you say, Martin.  This is your night,"  Vincent smiled.  "Just don't be ambiguous..."

Martin jerked his head around and exchanged a glance with Motsie, suddenly adding,  "But I shouldn't stay out long, Daddy being dead and all."  He reached between the seats to sqeeze her knee, pleadingly. 

She grabbed his hand, only for a quick squeeze back.  "I know," she said. " Hey, turn on the eight track, Vincent.  Got any Arrogance up there?"

"We might pick up Tom Scott's Underground Sound on KIX.  We don't all have a fancy new car with an eight track like your mama's mammoth Thunderbird, Motsie. Anyway, we're almost at the orphanage.  Look, the moon is even just about as full as our graduation night!"

"Fuller, Vincent; that night was a half moon,"  Motsie answered instead of Martin,  draping herself through the front seats again to twist the dial through screeching and scratching until KIX cam in full flare with Glass Moon On a Carousel, and everybody in the car started bobbing heads and singing the chorus with Dave on the radio. "But just like y'all's graduation night, the weed is from Cousin Garnet's again.  I think the night after tomorrow night the moon'll be all the way full; we should bring a ouija board.  Oh, look, y'all!  Is that a pack o' drunk hobos sprinting across the driveway?  I bet they saw another black cat."

Vincent let the gears drop to neutral and coasted up crybaby Lane to the decrepit building,  "Well I bet they're running 'cause there's light in the upstairs of the orphanage, look, y'all!"

Martin and Motsie followed Martin's stare, Motsie practically lying on the console and handbrake since Vincent had pulled up so close.  "Oh, cool, y'all!  Let's get even 'stoneder'  'n go up there!  This time y'all are comin' with me."