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Show Go Love/115 own a cell phone, what is the rule on dialing the number of your drowned mother, telling the answering machine that you're standing at the front door this second, and how about goddamn opening up before you burn the frigging house down? Would that be pushing it too far? Is kicking down your mama's front door a feasible means of entry? Once O.W.'d caught me climbing in the kitchen window, dog-drunk, a bench warrant out on me for missing DWI court Mama watched him hog-wrestle me down to the linoleum She dialed Deputy Biggs Self, who handcuffed me and walked me out to the cop car. "Get help, Joey." Mama said it like a line of theater. "What do you see in that fat bastard?" "Your father. And your brother's arid sister's father." If you smell chemicals from the hot tub mixed with the smell of your mother's hair, is it acceptable to scream son of a bitch. I mean, where do you find the rules of engagement for such a moment? Traceleen drives a powder-blue Camero up beside the Pathfinder. The windows are tinted She gets out blue-faced as ever, cries when she sees my face . My sister holds her arms out "Joey." Without the glasses here eyes are deep blue, like O.W.'s or Jimmy's She makes her living taking care of insured people who are paralyzed, elderly or in some other general state of fuck-upedness She takes care of people like Mama, only with money. We hug. "Where's O.W ?" "Daddy? I don't know." Trace looks at me like and I understand that she's seeing Mama in me, and that's a jolt. Tears stream down her face. "Making arrangements, probably." Lara's shy beside me A red-headed hummingbird thrums by, hovers over Renee then hauls |