Southern Fiction: Shane Brown & Michael Smith

ice cream front. They have a dairy farm down in close to Oxford. I don't know when his book is going to come out. He's writing it now. I don't know if it's a collection of short stories, a novel or what it is. But when it comes out, i'll let you know. The second story is called Chasing Rabbits. The author is Michael Ferris Smith, who you all have heard me read some stuff from his writing. This particular short story was his directorial debut in filmmaking. It's become

a film. I'm going to try to find it and put the link in the description if you want to watch the It's about a twenty or thirty minute short film that follows this storyline. Actually I've seen it. I went to the screening of it. It was entered in a film festival in Oxford, maybe a couple of months ago. I actually got to meet Michael for about fifteen seconds. He's real nice guy, great writer. But the second story

is called Chasing Rabbits by Michael Ferris Smith. Before we go any further, there is profanity in one or both of these stories. I can't recall. If strong language offends you, don't listen, and don't leave me a comment about how disappointed you are in me about me reading these stories. This is literature. This isn't just pulp type fiction. This is These writers are good. These guys know how to

tell a story. They're good. And if you're from the South for more, particularly from Mississippi, these stories will sound like something your neighbor just told you. You will, you will recognize the culture right away, and I think you'll enjoy these stories. If you're not from Mississippi or anywhere in the southern state, I think you should enjoy them. We have a wonderful culture of just common people down here, and I love it. And there's plenty of material to

write great stories about. So I'll shut up. I hope you guys enjoy this podcast. I appreciate you clicking on the video. All right, here we go George by Shane Brown. George stopped by the house last night, and he never did that. Last night. It was the first night, but I know it won't be the last. I didn't even really know George, but he acted like I knew him a lot. I started feeling that as we sat inside the car port and talked. I was in my chair beside the mini fridge that I used to keep extra

beer in for buddies to come over. It's always dashed with an ash tray and a candle. I like my car port. That's my favorite part of the house I think George liked it a lot too. It seemed like he felt some type of connection to me last night when I sat there and listen to him talk and sometimes cry, and all I said was, yeah, I understand, and it'll be all right. George was a little drunk. George is a pretty good guy. My beer was cold

and I was a little thirsty. After driving fourteen hours hauling a load of steel down to Gulf Shores, Alabama, my truck just got parked when George pulled up. I didn't even know George's truck until he got out and walked over with a drink and a plastic cup. I said hey to George, and George said hey back to me. I was putting down my blockers behind the tires and ready to crawl inside of my car port. He started

talking like we were old friends. He started telling me things that I knew that I didn't really want to know, and I got to wondering who he was and where he came from. I started second guessing my mind and started thinking that maybe I really didn't know George. But I was more worried about how cold my beer was and about the other ones in the cooler. I was ready to relax from my long ride and have my own time in the carport and have a few coal

ones alone. But I didn't get to be alone. George had followed me into the car port and sat down. I found out that George's wife didn't love him anymore. She had told him that she had told him that they needed to be better, that she needed to be held and told how beautiful she was, and that he needed to love her more. She also told him that he needed to quit hunting. And fishing and hanging out with all of his fucking friends. She even said that she was tired of cooking supper for him and him

not eating it because he didn't like her food. Then he didn't even wash the damn dishes, that that was his job. He thought that was bullshit. He liked her food. He was just a little drunk at night, not hungry, and then he forgot about the dishes. Sometimes George only forgot about the dishes because he had gotten drunk, because he had wanted to get drunk. It only happened every once in a while, but now it happened a lot.

It usually had only happened when she was fussing at him, and recently it happened again when he went to see Bobby. He had gone out fishing one afternoon with his little cousin, Bobby. George told me that Bobby could real good and that he always liked him going with him. They fixed and poured each other drinks and helped each other take fish off the fishing poles that they had dragged off their boat,

and patrol the waters. They talked about different things, about how nice the water was and that the sky looked pretty and then they told some funny stories about times when they were kids, and then Bobby would have to hear about George's stories too, after George got drunk, and Bobby would sit there and say, yeah, I understand, and it'll be all right too. But Bobby knew more than I knew. And then Bobby told George some stuff that afternoon that he thought George knew, stuff that made George

cry some more. George told me that Bobby told him that he thought that his wife might be cheating on him, but Bobby wasn't for sure. I had only had one beer in me by this point, and that wasn't enough for what I was fixing to have to listen to already wanted another beer, just to try to catch up to my day and to maybe feel even sawyer for this son of a bitch than I already did, and for maybe being a little annoyed as I wasn't able

to go inside yet and be with Audrey. Now. Bobby wasn't for sure, but he was kind of for sure because there was a truck that had come over to George's house when George was gone. Bobby had only noticed it the last couple of weeks when George had been gone. It was a red truck, and then Bobby said it was late at night, he'd only seen it on his ride home when he passed George's house, and that he knew George wasn't at home because he was at the

deer camp. George said he started getting mad and screaming and cussing. He said that he started throwing things, and that even through his fishing pole in the water that his wife had bought him for Christmas when they had first started dating. He said he yelled at the fishing pole as it sank in the water to drown bitch. And then Bobby told George that maybe he didn't need to fix him another drink and that they should get home, but George said, fuck that and the fish, and that

he'd be all right. George didn't want to go home, and then Bobby fixed George another drink. I didn't know what to do but sit there and drink my beer and listen. That's what I did. George was mine now. And then he cried and he started saying some more stuff about her and him, and about how she didn't love him, and about how he loved her so much. He took a few drinks and then kind of smiled at me. He had quit crying and then asked me if I cared if Charlie got out of the truck.

I asked him who Charlie was, but he smiled bigger and pointed to his truck and said that his dog was in the truck. He looked back at me and said that that was his wife's dog too. I said hell now that I didn't care, and ask him why he had Charlie locked up for this long. George laughed. I hadn't seen George's life all night. He went to go get Charlie and I went to get another beer. After I got a beer, I turned to walk inside,

but turned back around and grabbed another one. I was going to go inside real quick and check to see what Audrey had us for supper, and to tell her that I was coming inside for good soon when George left, and to see if she wanted a beer. She usually drank wine, and usually all of it if it was in the house, so she probably didn't want any of my cheap beer like I like to drink. I came in the kitchen first, and supper hadn't even been cooked. But it was laid out over the counter ready to fry.

It looked like she was getting ready to make us some deer meat. She knew that deer meat was MY favorite and that I liked eating in a lot. I came through the living room and one single lamp was on in the corner of the room, and the TV was on but muted. She wasn't in the living room,

so I kept down the hallway to our bedroom. I looked in there and she was propped up on the bed with an empty glass laying in her lap, and her head was pointed down, and the cigarette was hanging out of her lips, and she was in a deep sleep. The cigarette had gone out, and I took it from her mouth and put it in my pocket. I grabbed her glasses and sat it on the night stand beside our bed, and pulled her and her pillows down and

lowered her on the bed. But she moaned softly a little bit and mumbled something I didn't understand, and I tucked her in the bed, and I kissed her forehead, and I cut the light out. I knew then I'd be cooking supper. As I slowly lingered down the hallway and on my way back to the car port, I'd been getting used to that. I started to make my way back outside, and I glanced through my kitchen window and I see George just standing in the carport beside

the chair that I gave him to sit in. But he's holding Charlie like a mama would hold her new born baby. A leash angles from the dog's neck, and George is dancing. He's shaking his hips and he kind of does half of a spin with his hips and his legs as he's looking down at Charlie and smiling and saying something to him. I turned up my beer and I finished it, and I threw it in the trash can and opened the one I had for Audrey.

I turned it up and finished it too, and I started thinking that I already knew what was going to be for supper. I walked outside and grabbed another beer, and I smiled at George, and he's really smiling big at me. I could tell George was a little drunk and feeling pretty good. He asked me if I'd like to hold Charlie, and I told him I would later on, and then I sat down in my chair. George walked over next to me and leaned on the brick wall.

He was smiling and holding and loving on Charlie and telling him that he was his best friend and that he didn't know what he was ever do without him or where he would be. Charlie looks scared to me, like he was saying for me to save him, but I didn't know how to save him, and Charlie didn't know how to save me. George laughed and smiled and then walked over to the chair I had gotten for him, and he sat down again. George's plastic cup was back full,

and I asked him what he was drinking. He told me it was four roses with half a bit of Diight coke. He sipped it after I asked, and then he turned the rest of it up and he finished it. He put Charlie on the floor of the car port and started tangling his leash up in some twisted way around one of the arms of the chair, and I started to worry about Charlie. I'm thinking that it's maybe a knot that he has tied. Charlie just stared as I did. Hell, Charlie didn't care. I didn't either. George

doesn't even know if he cares. George's truck is still running. Heastel engine has been loud on our talk since he pulled up to my carport. I say something about the truck running well. He laughs and tells me he's sorry that it's been on and ask if he needed to cut it off. I told him I didn't care. He said he had been keeping the truck crank for Charlie to stay warm while he's been talking, and he didn't want Charlie bothering anybody, and he had forgotten to cut

it off. When he got Charlie out, George got up to crank the truck off and to tell me that he was going to make another drink. I knew then that Charlie and I were fucked. George's truck was finally not making any noise. It's a lot quieter now. I'm hearing tree frogs and bugs trying to sing to us. It's one of my favorite sounds. They bring some kind of peace to me that I probably learned at a young age. I sat there and listened, and I enjoyed it. It's always a good moment that I enjoy, and I

use have that in my core. Port and what I wanted before George showed up. Then George starts back up, talking again about his goddamn wife. I look at Charlie and he's looking at me, and I'm feeling sorry for Charlie and this guy. But I've got my own two to worry about. I've got stuff I wouldn't tell him, stuff like why I ain't got fried deer meat for supper. It's stuff he don't even want to know about it. It's stuff that makes me angry because I have worse

problems in his fucking marriage. I wanted to scream at him and tell him to fuck off and get away, but I didn't. I can't, so I listened to him as he was fussing again. He told me about the money that he has to spend to buy his daughter or a car, money that he doesn't have. And he told me that she's sixteen now that she has to have one. His wife wants one that's real nice for her, but George just wants one that runs, one that maybe

has a nice radio. He told me he lost his job three weeks ago and he doesn't know if she'll get a car. George started crying again. I started drinking another beer and wondering if Audrey was gonna wake up. Audrey wasn't gonna wake up, and that's okay. I had just hoped that she was resting. I hope that she was not dreaming or waking up and thinking about the baby. Damn, that was bad. I tried not to think of it much, but sometimes when I'm out in the carport alone and

it's quite I do. But I couldn't because George was still talking. He wasn't upset at that moment, but telling me about his step son, who's a really good bowler. He said he was on a high school team and that he has his own bowling ball, something about maybe getting a scholarship to college because he can throw a bunch of strikes. He said he doesn't even use rails anymore. Well,

I'm listening, but I'm still worried about Audrey. I told her that I was going to be home early, but a highway trooper in Meridian stopped me and brought in the Department of Transportation to check my rig out. I stood on the side of the road for ninety two minutes for six citations and a lecture from some little weasel right out of camp. I knew I couldn't drive fast enough to get home when I left Meridian, or that I should. I didn't need any more trouble with

the law. I didn't like the law, and the law didn't like me. I knew she'd start drinking and wondering where I was. I knew Audrey loved me, I didn't know George would come over. George was still talking and I'm grabbing another beer. That's when I decided I didn't want any dear meat for supper. I had looked down at my phone and saw that it was still kind of early in the night, and I knew Audra wasn't going to get up anytime soon. So I decided that I was just going to sit in the carport drink

a few more beers with George. As I drank my supper, he was getting a little bit better about laughing and listening to a few stories that I told him, instead of fussing and crying. He would laugh and agree and carry on, but I could tell with his eyes that he was really wanting to talk more about him and maybe her. He kept quiet, but was drinking faster, and I started thinking that I needed to drink faster too. I didn't think that I could catch up to him,

and I couldn't. Well. That's when George started screaming and shouting, and I got up from my chair and I tried to calm him down, but it didn't help any He knelt down on the car port on both knees and looked up to the sky and he started mumbling something about a duy and that she was leaving him. I still didn't know what to do, but I listened, and I sure as hell was wishing Audrey wasn't waking up. I looked over at Charlie, and the motherfucker was looking at me, and I wanted to un his leash and

let him run. I had thought that maybe he could go one way and I go the other. Maybe we could both get lost in the woods long enough that George left or looked in the wrong place. So I grabbed George and I picked him up to his feet, and he told me that he was sorry, and I told him that it was okay now. I looked over at Charlie and he wouldn't look at me. When I woke up this morning, my head was hurting pretty hard.

I had stayed up too late with George and drunk right up till about the sun was about to come up. And when George had finally left, I watched the sun rise a little bit before I walked inside. That was actually my only time to enjoy my car port, because I was already feeling guilty helping him climb into his truck and wondering if he could make it home. Well, I felt bad, but damn, I was ready for bed. And I also knew that I wasn't getting into bed early enough to go to church with Audrey, and I

felt bad because of that too. He told me he only lived about a mile down the road at his deer camp. He said that he was gonna probably live there forever. Now. As I was laying in bed, I started feeling guilty for a lot of things, A lot of things I just couldn't help, but a lot of things that I could help. So I got up and got in a shower. I found a pot of coffee kind of warned that Audrey had left, and put it

in a thermos. Now I got in my truck and I decided to drive to the cemetery while Audrey was at church. I saw some wildflowers on the side of the road on my way, and I stopped and picked them as I grabbed a beer out of my cooler. Sundays were always tough on me when I visited his grave, but they sure wasn't like Audrey's day. Every day she lived with all the pain. I could get away more than she could. She couldn't, and she didn't unless she had some whiskey, and then her pain was gone until

she woke up up. She didn't wake up much. She hasn't been awake since we lost the baby. She was never at fault, but she thinks she is. It was just something natural, something that the doctor said was a big heart for a small baby. She still thinks it's her fault. Audrey ain't gonna wake up. When I make it back home from the cemetery, I notice how high the grass is in our yard, and I went inside

to check on Audrey. She was in the bathtub, and I know she'll be in there for a while, and I tell her that I'm going to get on the lawnmower and cut the grass and fire up the grill later for some steaks for supper. She thanks me, and she tells me that she will see me after a while. Her voice through the door is softer than it should be. I know she's upset with me for not coming home

early enough yesterday and not going to church today. But I knew if I get the grass cut real quick and hit the grill, then she would come out to the car report with some wine. And I like when she did that. He usually led to some good talks and laughter and eating some good food and the sex. After all, that was amazing. Well that's what we used to do, but we don't anymore, not when Audrey doesn't

wake up. I was getting close to finishing cutting the yard and I thought it was George's truck pulling up, and it was. I looked over to my car port and Audrey's standing there, smiling and waving at me. She had a glass of wine in her hand, and she looks pretty. Her shorts are high showing her nice tanned legs, and her blond hair dangles in front of her blouse. I looked back over across the yard and George is

walking up over the grass. Now I'm about to finish shut I ate my lawnmower his way and he stops, and I got up to George and I shut the lawnmower off. He smiled and asked me what I was doing, and I told him that I was just trying to finish up some yard work before I hung out with Audre and some steaks. He's standing in the tall grass and scratching at his knee. His whiskey spills out of his plastic cup. He has socks up to his knees

with flip flops on. He has a plain white T shirt on, and he's smiling like he was last night. I got off the lawn morn I walk inside the carport to grab a beer. George following me into the car port and sat down, and I saw Charlie sitting on the dashboard of George's truck, scratching at the windshield. I knew what I'd be eating for supper, and I knew then, too, that Charlie and I were fucked. Chasing Rabbits by Michael Ferris Smith. Rachel crawls out from under

the bed. She takes a rope from the hook on the closet door. She had awakened in the middle of the night and heard the voices outside the house, then heard the back door forced open and she slipped out of bed onto the floor, stirring under like an insect. She listened as they ransacked the kitchen and living room, their movements loud and uninhibited, as they believed they were alone. After half an hour, they left, but she hadn't moved, lying motionless, afraid to blink. Her nose inches from the

box spring. She eventually unclinched her jaw and relaxed. Then she slept her body straight and still, as if in a coffin. Now she moves toward the bedroom door in the gray morning light, wary of what she'll see on the other side. In the kitchen, the drawers are out and emptied onto the tall floor. The cabinet doors are ripped off the hinges, The kitchen table and chairs are overturned, the refrigerator doors opened and its few contents splattered onto

the wreckage and salad, dressing and leftover spaghetti. In the living room, a knife has ripped the cushions of the sofa and the recliner, and small chunks of foam littered the room like dirty snow. Picture frames and lamps are broken, and the television in VCR gone, and on the walls of both rooms. She finds creations in black spray paint, four letter words, and cartoonish private parts. Rachel tiptoes carefully through the fragments of broken glass to the telephone on

the kitchen wall, somehow still on the hook. She dials the sheriff's office and asks for her brother Stephen. Gone to early, ain't it? He answers, I need you to come out here. Somebody broke in and trash the place. Jeez, not again. That's a third one this month? How bad? Is it? Pretty bad? And you I'm all right? They say goodbye, and Rachel picks up the kitchen chair and sits down. It'll take fifteen minutes for Stephen to arrive. The Sheriff's department on the other side of the county,

with many bins and many narrow roads between them. Outside, the sun creeps higher, and the gray light becomes yellow, and the light growing through the kitchen window above the sink and shining on Rachel's bare leg. It's warm, and she opens her robe and slides her other leg into the light. And she sits still and closes her eyes,

can almost feel the sunshine penetrating her skin. She keeps your eyes closed and imagines this warmth finding her somewhere else, a hotel, pool, a long walk, and her mind wanders until Stephen pulls into the driveway. Where were you? Stephen asks? He stands in the middle of the mess with his hands on his hips. He shakes his head and bites his lip. Little punks. Rachel stands in the living room, leaning against the paneled wall. I hadn't been here long.

I worked late last night. Let me guess Dale was a here? She shakes her head. How long has he been gone this time? Day or two? I see the car's not here, so he got it. Mary picked me up for work. That ain't the point. Stephen kneels and looks more closely at the covered floor. He picks up a coupone that drips with Italian dressing. Then he stands and walks to the back door and examines where the dead bolt splintered the frame. How many did it sound like,

he asks? At least three? I think any ideas? I figure it's some board high school kids. They don't usually take anything, just do it for the hell of doing it. If your car would have been here, they'd have probably kept going. They took the TV in the VCR. Stephen takes a notepad from his shirt pocket makes some notes. Wearing steakers. Now with a robe, she walks across the living room, past Steven and out the back door. He follows her. She sits down on the blue chest under

the car port and asks for a cigarette. They smoke together, Stephen with his back to her, looking out across the overgrown acreage surrounding the small brick house. No one lives within sight, and he's relieved they didn't know she was there, that she stayed put and didn't play hero. From here, you could scream and scream, but it would be the same as a whimper. He flicks a cigarette into the yard, and then he turns and says, I'll give you the money to get up there, Rachel. Just pack up and go.

Mama's told you a hundred times you could stay with her for a while. I know. Then go this afternoon, take the bus. When Dale gets back, I'll come out here and take the car from him. Me and the kids will clean up. I'll think about it. My god, Rachel, he says, don't mind God me, Stephen, I said, I think about it. Let me have another cigarette mine or lost in there He gives her another and takes one for himself. The morning is cool and clear and quiet.

They had grown up with mornings like these. Their mothers helped them make sandwiches, and they walked across the damp fields to the woods and down to the stream. Stephen took a hatchet. They built forts and later skipped rocks as they waited for the day to warm up. Then they stepped into the spring fed water, waiting downstream to where their feet came out from under them, and they dove for the bottom, grabbed a clump of mud, and hurried up with it dripping between their fingers, to prove

they'd made it all the way down. Now the fields are overgrown, and on Sunday afternoon, Rachel had gone into the woods and looked for the path to the stream, but it was also gone, and so was their mother, living with a man neither of them have ever seen, somewhere in Ohio. What's Dale up to this time? Stephen asks Rachel, shrugs the road falling from her shoulder. She gives it a tug and says, he's been talking with this guy over at Hattiesburg about buying and selling buffalo.

It's supposed to be the new Hamburger A buffalo farm. Huh? Will this be like the Lama farm he had out here in the backyard. At least he's trying, trying, is working, not running all over the place digging for goal. Rachel stands from the cooler size and doesn't know what to say about Dale, or about the mess inside, or about anything I need to clean up, She says, Instead, I got off at Ford me and the boys will come

out and help. You. Got to work today tonight. She moves to go inside, and Steven says, think we shed call mom and let her know. Rachel runs her hand across her forehead and then answers flatly no. She goes in, and Stephen walks to his car, looks back at the house, and then the radio calls out a wreck on the highway, and he drives away. The windows are down and the music is up, and the beer sits between Dale's legs

as he drives a long highway ninety eight. Pattiesburg has been what he expected, and both the cooler and the gas tanker full a buffalo farm is on its way to southeast Mississippi. He met the man with the money who had friends down from Birmingham with more money. They piled into a pickup truck and drove into the Forest County countryside and saw the acreage. Met with the men who attend the herd, walked around with their hands on their hips. Dale couldn't afford what they were asking, but

he talked like he could. So the men with the money bought his dinner and drinks, and later he danced with the red head and then a brew Net shook hands firmly, almost believe he was the big shot he pretended to be. When they left the last bar at two in the morning, he lifted the twenty dollars bill that was left for the tip, and that gave him money for gas beer for the ride home. He slept in the back seat of the small nie sign at the city park and awakened with a terrible catch in

his neck. With cigarettes and tacos and a clear highway later, the day seems to open its arms, and going home empty handed. As an afterthought, he finishes a beer and tosses the can out of the window. The starfoam cooler sits on the passenger seat. He takes another from it. He looks around at the inside of the car and thinks he might stop, give it a vacuum, maybe even wash it, give Rachel something to smile about. Along the side of the highway, old men sell watermelons and peanuts

and sweet potatoes out the back of their trucks. He waves to them as he passes, wonders what kind of money they make, wonders if any of them need a partner. He hasn't held a job since the textile plant laid them off. But Dale, unlike the others who set small fires and tosses rocks through windows on their life, Dale work, wasn't upset by it. He figured the Severn's pay was good enough and would give him time to think, to

figure out how to work less and make more. All he needed was a catchy phrase on a T shirt or a gadget that no housewife could live without. He'd been thinking now for almost three years, and the best he'd done was a booth each year at the county fair selling giant pandas, which he didn't like because he didn't make enough to hire someone to do the actual work. He was smart enough to know Rachel never complained as much as she wanted. They live in her mother's house,

square and small and free. The Nissan is Rachel's, passed down from Stephen. Dale keeps the grass mode and the dishes washed her uncle bush hogs of twenty acres twice a year. Every once in a while he cooks dinner, and if she wants more out of him, she hadn't said it, or at least she hasn't said it loud enough. He anticipates the day when he can tell her to quit her a waitress job at the truck stop, and that we're moving up in the world. How about a

week in in Gulf Shores. To celebrate, he tosses another empty can out the window. The men from Birmingham said he needed twenty thousand dollars to get a piece of the herd. Said he could turn around and make twice that once the buffalo matured and went on the market, and then you were set turn it over and turn it over and watch the money grow. You have to spend money to make money, they told him. Heck, everybody knows that, Dale said, and laughed big. But they might

as well have asked for millions. As the twenty bucks Dale swiped at the bar. Was it anywhere? A few miles down the road, he passes another old man with another pickup truck, and in the back of it sit giant Winnie the poos. Dale slows to get a closer look at the huge yellow heads is bigger, bigger than his white face pandas the old man waves and Dale shakes his finger at him and then yells out the window, don't even think about bringing your tail to the fair.

Rachel rests on the shredded sofa, still in her robe, her forehead moist with sweat. See salvage little from the kitchen floor and emptied what was left in the refrigerator into a garbage bag. The cabinet doors were ruined and they lay in a pile by the side of the road. The tile floor was mopped and the living room vacuumed. She tried to scrub a three foot middle finger off the kitchen wall, but the black paint only smeared and formed a circle of gray clouds hollow in the center.

She will need paint for the kitchen, and she doesn't know what for the wood panels of the living room. There won't be money to replace an entire wall. She's happy the television is gone, and she wonders what Dale will do now. The place still stinks, so she gets up and opens windows. It smells like urine, but she checked the carpet for damp spots and found nothing. She hopes Dale will show up before she has to go to work and help move the furniture out to the road.

She found her cigarettes and she lights one as she gazes out of the kitchen window. The grass high and healthier cross the fields through the summer has been dry. She leans on the counter, wonders where the smell is coming from. She envies the people who did this, the young, careless voices that scared her underneath the bed while they raised with careless intentions. She tried to remember what it was like to not give a damn. She wanted to

not give a damn right now. Like Dale. She knew that he would walk in the door, shrug his shoulders and say it ain't so bad, Say why don't we cook out tonight, Say we need to go to the pawn shop and get another TV, and she'd go along with it. She figures it'll be weeks before the four letter words are painted over, weeks before the smell disappear, weeks before she gives up on him doing anything to help those little pricks. She imagines them sleeping late, comfortable

in the black and white dreams of apathy. Dale hasn't always been this way, and she can't think of anything from before they were married that warned he was a rabbit chaser. The year's worth of severeigns pay they spent in a few months, taking weekends in Memphis and Jackson and drinking without asking prices and dancing until the lights came on. Then, seeing the end of the road, she began picking up double shifts at the truck stop again.

But instead of looking for work, Dale started talking schemes, quick fixes, early retirement talk that she listened to and smiled at and figured it would wear off. It began with Dale sitting up all hours of the night watching infomercials, making notes, writing descriptions of typical people with typical needs that weren't being met to the fullest with their typical

household products. He would draw sketches of new inventions, rough childlike sketches that were often as simple as triangles on top of squares or circles inside of triangles, sketches only Dale could understand. Then he began naming the sketches red light radar detector, solar powered can opener, chandles, shoes that transform into sandals, into easy steps, movie in a box.

He'd stand in the kitchen for hours, staring at the appliances, going through the motions of cooking dinner for six imagining cleaning corners that had never been cleaned. He bought stamps and envelopes and wrote elaborate letters to invention companies. They didn't answer. He called the eight hundred numbers from the infomercials, hoping to speak to the man in charge, but the operator only processed orders. He asked Rachel about her domestic needs.

It's about how her feet felt after ten hours of filling coffee cups and bussing tables. She was too tired to help, so he turned his attention outside the house. They had twenty acres, plenty of space to turn, plenty of profit. He fenced off three acres and bought lamas, though he never understood what he was supposed to do with them. The lamas bade all hours of the night and ate without ceasing. Several of them hopped the fence

and were found as far as ten miles away. He finally gave away the few that had an escape to a petting zoo in Hammon, Louisiana. To cheer him up after the Lama fiasco, Rachel took him to the county fair. They rode the ferris wheel and ate cotton candy and threw darts of balloons. But Aldale could say during the evening was why couldn't I been the guy who thought up fares. The next year, he set up a giant

panda booth, and he discovered people loved giant pandas. But the fare is only a month out of the year, which returned him quickly to nowhere. Buffalo Buffalo, Rachel says and laughs. She doesn't understand why Dale needs the big score. He never says what he might do if he hits. She figures they will live right where they live, know the people they already know, Maybe eat better, build a pool,

drive faster. Steven has been after her for the last year to leave him and sell the house, go to Ohio and stay with mom, do your own thinking, get away from the sorry piece of you know what. But she doesn't want to think or leave, and something inside her can't help. But smile when a new idea pops into Dale's head. Like a child entertained by a burning match, she drops her cigarette into the sink and walks into the bedroom, kicks off her sneakers and drops her robe.

She looks into the closet and doesn't like anything. And she looks around the room and doesn't like anything. Her naked body looks back at her in the mirror. It doesn't like anything either. She puts a rode back on, and from the night stand drawer she takes out the house insurance policy, two credit cards she keeps hidden from Dale in a small photo album. She picks her purse up from the floor, and then she walks back into the kitchen and lights another cigarette. She stands in the house.

She is known as a child, as a teenager, as an adult, but she's like a ghost in a ghost town, and it surprises her how easy it is to walk over to the shredded sofa and drop a lit cigarette. Rachel sits on the ground by the road, leaning against the mailbox post. She watches the fire through the windows as it spreads from the sofa to the carpet and begins to crawl up the walls. Of the living room. Smoke seeps from underneath the closed windows in a slow exhale.

It isn't long before the flames spread to the other rooms of the house, the kitchen to her left, the bedroom, and the bathroom to her right. More smoke drifts out up, and she watches it trail away into the clear morning sky. She stretches her legs out, unties the robe and lets it fall open. She hopes the road will remain quiet, that the distant neighbors are all at work, so that

she can watch it burn to the ground. In a few minutes, the roof of the living room caves in and a gust of black smoke shoots up through the burning hole. That'll do it, she thinks, somebody will see that. No, it isn't trash burning. The flames grow, and a breeze brings us warmth to her bare skin, and she closes her eyes again and imagines lying next to a hotel pool, kids flapping in the shallow end. Mother's reading tan stranger

asking if she wants a beer from his cooler. She here's a car coming, and she closes the robe and stands. She sticks her purse and the mailbox and then prepares herself to appear frantic, but there is no need, as the car is her own. Dale making his way home, he stops next to the road and hurries out of the car and over to Rachelne says, are you all right? She nods, what happened? Have you called the fire department?

It's okay, Dale, I'd to go on, nattiesburd He looks at the house and then back at her, and he grabs her firmly by the shoulders. Honey, you're in shock. Sit down. She brushes him off and says, I'm not in shock. Dale, I lit the thing myself. He sits down, his mouth open as he watches the blaze. Chunks of roof were caving in from side to side, and the heat makes waves high into the blue sky. She sits beside him and says it's kind of pretty in a way,

isn't it. Dale looks at her, his mouth still open, and back at the fire. Says, you always have something to say, some sails, pitch something, describe what you feel in twenty words less, and I'll open my robe. He hasn't noticed until now that she is in her robe barefooted. What are you doing? He asks. She grits her teeth, suddenly impatient with him. What are you doing? Huh? Tell me that, Dale, what are you doing? A large section of the roof caves, glass shatters, and something pops like

a pistol. The growing heat pushes toward them, and Dale says, let's move back. But when he tries to stay and she grabs his arm and says, sit down, have you lost your mind? Sit down and tell me what you're doing. What happened in Hattiesburg? Tell me and you can get up. He gives in and leans back on his elbows. Nothing happened, Nothing ever happens. You should know that by now. No buffalo. Well there's plenty of buffalo, but they want on a

twenty grand investment minimum. He sits up in huffs. One thing's for sure. There ain't no gimmicks. Money makes money, not some wild eyed nineteen ninety nine gadget thought up in the middle of the night. She takes his hand and holds it. He keeps his eyes on the ground in front of him. Unaffected by her softness. She moves his hand away and feels the heat on her face. She will call Steven and ask him to keep quiet. About the break in. She'll give Dale the money wants,

the insurance pays for the house. This, she'll sell the land, and they'll move close to the buffalo so they can keep an eye on their investment, maybe even help with the herd wherever. That means they will buy a house of their own with an alarm system, and she'll get a job and he'll get a job in case there's a buffalo plague. This will be part of the deal. This is her plan, and it comes to her simply as if someone had handed it to her on a note card. If nothing else, she thinks it will be

something different. She will tell him about it, but not now. She stands and takes his hand and leads him around the snapping fire behind the house and into the tall grass in the shade of a cluster of pine trees. She takes off her robe and lays it on the ground, and then she brings him down with her, and the wind blows smoke across them, and Dale raises his head and says, I think I hear a siren, And then she puts her hand over his mouth and tells him to stop talking.