Kinfolk, page 1
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Dedication
This book is dedicated to the little eleven-year-old boy whose father shot himself in the garage of his brother’s house. The little boy who played music from age three. The little boy who eventually grew into me.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
The Beginning
Book 1 Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Book 2 Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Book 3 Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
A Note from the Author
Discussion Questions
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Praise for Sean Dietrich
Also by Sean Dietrich
Copyright
The Beginning
This is the wrong way to begin a novel.
Novels are supposed to begin with suspense, romance, explosions, intrigue, boy meets girl, or a car chase. But this story does not begin with a car chase. Truthfully, the author wishes this story could begin a different way. But we must start at the beginning, or nothing that follows will make sense.
The man was forty-two years old. He was handsome. Smart. Funny. A farmer. A father. A Baptist. A pipe smoker who always smelled of Cavendish and sweat. He had red hair and long limbs, and his clothes were always hanging from his frame like a tunic.
He was trembling when he removed a 10 gauge from its canvas case. His heart was beating quickly, like a Sousa march. His hands were shaking. He wasn’t unfamiliar with firearms. He was a gun person. This was his rifle. He knew how to operate it. How to clean it. How to disassemble it. The weapon was an extension of his body when he was hunting deer, turkey, or boar with his eleven-year-old son. He taught his son all about the safe handling of firearms. Sometimes his boy, Jeremiah, borrowed this rifle and went hunting on his own. His boy would come home with several squirrels or a coon. Maybe a rabbit or some quail. His son was always so proud of his kills, no matter how puny. Such a male.
He would miss his son most of all.
The man sat on the floor of the walk-in closet, cross-legged, beneath hanging clothes, nestled beside a stack of old Saturday Evening Post magazines, cradling the rifle, attempting to work up the courage.
His life was falling apart. But then, the whole country was falling apart. It was a heckuva year in America. Warren G. Harding was the twenty-ninth president. Labor uprisings were happening everywhere. There was a race massacre in Tulsa. China was now communist, and there were rumors of the same cancer spreading here. Babe Ruth hit his 138th home run. Everything was changing. Especially the tobacco industry.
Sixty-five percent of the country now smoked like riverboats. Tobacco companies were raking it in with both hands. But it wasn’t enough for tobacco tycoons. Tobacco prices plummeted when companies started gouging the market and underpaying growers to increase net gains. Simply put: the modern way of doing business was changing. It was low-down and crooked. And it was making a lot of executives rich by killing the tobacco farmer.
This man was one such farmer.
He didn’t even have enough money to buy his son shoes. He worked from dawn until eventide, yet his family lived on poke salad and hominy. And as of last night, he had defaulted on his mortgage. After the weekend, bankers in suits would show up on his front lawn, and they would haul his belongings away.
The shotgun smelled like gun oil. His back was positioned against the wall. The man closed his eyes and prayed for strength. Which seemed sacrilegious at this moment, to be asking God to help him do something that was so awful. But he didn’t know what else to do. Maybe God would step in and stop him from this wicked act. Maybe a miracle would happen. Maybe his problems would go away if he just had enough faith. Maybe his transgressions would be forgotten, if not forgiven. Maybe God would figure out a way to save him from his own bad decisions.
Maybe.
“Please, help me,” he said between sobs. “Please.”
But nothing happened. No bright lights from on high. No angels with curly blond hair came to prevent him from doing the unthinkable. No sacred choirs. No nothing.
He’d tacked a note to the closet door.
Do not come in here, Jeremiah. Call the sheriff.
He had also written a letter to his wife and son that he’d left on the kitchen table. The note included all the usual stuff. I’m sorry. I love you. This isn’t your fault. I couldn’t take it anymore. I’m sorry for all the sorrow I caused so many people. You’ll be better off without me. Blah, blah, blah. But all his words sounded like a pitiful excuse.
Then, just to be sure his son wouldn’t barge into the bedroom, he’d barricaded the door with a dresser. He’d walked into this closet, spread bath towels on the floor, and here he sat.
There was nothing left to do. No loose ends left to tie up. It was now or never. He was doing this for his family, really. It was all for them. With the father out of the way, the wife and child would have a chance at life. The man was doing the whole world a favor.
The man steadied himself with a few deep breaths. He positioned the rifle in his mouth. His big toe was in the trigger guard. His last words were muffled. But they were heard.
“Christ forgive me,” he said as he wept.
The blast blew a hole into the ceiling, destroying the plaster above him, frightening birds from nearby treetops, probably forever. The perfect silence was ruined. He was gone.
It was Thanksgiving Day 1921.
And that is where our story begins.
Book 1
Chapter 1
In Alabama, “Drive safe” is code for “I love you.” There are different versions of this phrase, of course. But the words all mean the same thing. They all carry the same spirit. In central Alabama, one variation of this phrase is, “Be careful, the cops are out tonight.” In northern regions of the state, people say, “Y’all be safe going home.” Others might say, “Watch out for deer.”
Either way, the specific words are inconsequential; they all convey the same meaning: You matter to me. You’re important to me. Keep your high beams on. Keep both hands on the wheel. Deer are homicidal. Eavesdrop at any Alabamian get-together, from women’s Bible studies to Veterans of Foreign Wars halls, from Boy Scout rallies to bunco games, and at the end of the night, you won’t hear I-love-yous uttered. Not even among families. You will, however, hear the “drive safe” invocation used about fifty or sixty times.
Nub Taylor nudged open the steel door of the Legion Hall, his cousin Benny following close behind. The old sponges at the bar bid him farewell.
“Careful on the roads tonight,” said one man.
“Be safe,” said another.
Nub wished them all a happy Thanksgiving.
The ancient soaks returned the favor with a chorus of laughs and mumbles.
Thanksgiving. November 23, 1972. The world was going to pot in more ways than one. Violence and idiocy ruled the culture. The hit movie was The Godfather, which featured two hours of sustained gunfire interrupted only by boobs. Don McLean’s “American Pie” governed the radio waves, a two-chord song that was approximately the same duration as veterinary school. Nixon was in office, so there was that. The Vietnam War was still in full swing, and everyone was either protesting it, protesting the protestors, or protesting Jane Fonda. Meantime, in Alabama, Governor George Corley Wallace, the same man who once shouted from podiums for “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever,” was head honcho. The world was a mess. And now 1973 was on the horizon, and Nub wasn’t nearly drunk enough to face it.
“Good night,” said Nub.
The door slammed.
Nub and Benny began their trek across the parking lot. That night the parking lot of the Legion Hall was covered in a quilt of snow. The American Legion’s annual Beer and Bird Supper was the highlight of their holiday year. Leigh Ann went to painstaking trouble to cook for the bachelors in town. She was the only one who would. The food was pricey, but worth it. For six bucks you got all the bird you could eat along with all the trimmings, including collards and hocks, dressing, and a homemade peanut butter pie that was good enough to qualify as adultery. After feasting, all the codgers played their annual tournament of Hold’em until they were either broke or naked. Or both. When the night was over, they were good to go for another 365 days.
Nub’s and Benny’s footsteps made crunching sounds in the snow crust.
“You really think there’ll be a blizzard tonight?” Benny asked.
“The news said there would be.”
Nub and Benny moved cautiously across the parking area, one step at a time. Benny walked with great difficulty. His recent stroke had left half of his face paralyzed, his left leg gimpy, his speech slurred, and his body off-balance.
“I ain’t got no firewood at my house,” said Benny.
Nub fumbled his keys from his pocket. “Well, now, there’s a big surprise.”
“I hate chopping.”
“I’ll bring you some wood in the morning.”
“I don’t want to put you out, Nub.”
“Oh, but you’re so good at it.”
Benny clutched his cousin’s arm. “What would I do without you, Nub?”
Nub threw open his door and helped his cousin into the vehicle. “You’d lie in bed and freeze to death in your own urine. Now get in the truck.”
Benny crawled into the cab with a laugh and closed the door behind him. Nub climbed into the driver’s side of his rust-colored F-100. The truck’s front end bore a large dent as though it had run headfirst into a municipal dam and lived to tell. Nub fired the engine, then placed both hands over the warm air vents and tried to work feeling back into his fingers.
The two old men were silent as they watched flurries fall.
“When was the last blizzard in Park?” said Benny.
“What last blizzard?”
“We’ve had blizzards before, ain’t we?”
“You’re confused. You must think you’re in Minnesota.”
“I remember back in ’21 we got eight inches.”
“That’s not a blizzard. Guys on the radio are calling for eight feet.”
Benny stared out the window. The whole sky seemed to be filled with uncertainty. “Scary, ain’t it? All that snow. People trapped in their houses.”
“Sure is,” said Nub, throwing the truck into gear. “We run the real risk of running out of beer.”
“They’re calling it Snowmageddon.”
“I’ll bet they are.”
The vehicle rumbled with automotive emphysema as Nub eased onto the slickened roads. Mounds of snow, some two feet high, were already forming against the curbs. The trees looked like yogurt-covered pretzels. Before wheeling out of the Legion parking lot, Nub’s vehicle grazed two trash cans, one mailbox, and a pile of cinder blocks.
“You sure you’re okay to drive?” said Benny.
“I’m great.”
“You had a lot to drink tonight.”
“Thanks for noticing, Tammy Faye.”
Nub flipped on the radio. Barbara Mandrell was singing “Tonight My Baby’s Coming Home” as they motored past the happy houses on Camellia Drive, Fillmore Street, and Sycamore, where flocks of cars with out-of-state tags were congregated in driveways, about to get snowed in for the holiday weekend. The exiles were back in town. Nub flipped the station to a weather forecast. The radio weather people were all chewing the same cud. They said temperatures were going to sink lower than they ever had in Alabama history. Eight feet of snow. Worst storm in history. Chicken Littles, every last one of them.
They motored through the portrait-perfect streets of Alabama’s smallest county. The snowcapped world looked like a Norman Rockwell.
Park, Alabama. Population 1,302. Ash County, the smallest county in the twenty-second state. A county about half the size of Maryland. With no major cities, no major landmarks. No notable citizens unless you counted one third baseman who played for the Cubs in 1915. It was Podunk, USA. Once upon a time, everyone knew where Park was. Passersby had to drive through the town on Highway 31A to get to Birmingham. But now there were bypasses. A new interstate had been built. Park became a no-name place like all the others. Wilsonville. Meadowbrook. Brantleyville. Just words on interstate signs.
When they neared Fifth and Bellville, Nub braked at the four-way stop. Before them was the largest home in the city. At one time, Park, Alabama, had been six hundred thousand acres of peach orchards. This house had been the overseer’s home. Today it was where Nub’s heart lived.
He gazed out the window of the truck.
The Greek Revival pillars, the gracious windows, and the wide porch were magnificent. Several cars were parked in the driveway; a line of them snaked down the street. The place was thumping tonight. Everyone in the western hemisphere was at this house celebrating the holiday. Everyone except him.
His daughter, Emily, walked past the window and he felt a sharp pain beneath his sternum. Her red hair was pulled back. Her slender, pale neck showed.
“You’re spying,” said Benny.
“So what?”
“So, spying ain’t friendly.”
“And?”
“And we didn’t have to eat at the Legion. We could have gone to Emily’s for dinner.”
Nub lit a cigarette. “We aren’t wanted in the big house.”
“She invited us fifty times.”
“She was just being polite.”
“She’s your daughter, Nub.”
“Thanks for the reminder.”
Emily’s living room faced the street. Through the monstrous windows Nub saw his ex-wife, Loretta, sitting on the sofa, legs crossed, wearing her sphincter-like facial expression. His grandson, Charlie Jr., sat in the corner, looking sullen, like all teenagers do. Nub saw a bunch of other people he didn’t recognize, who were probably Episcopalians, just like Emily. She had converted from a Baptist and become a ’Piskie when she married because now she could afford it.
Emily’s chimney was pumping plumes of purple smoke into the darkness. Everyone inside was having quite a time.
Nub muscled the gearshift into first and drove onward without speaking.
“You’re not going to go wish her a happy Thanksgiving?”
“No.”
Benny shook his head. “Too poor to paint, too proud to whitewash.”
Nub hated this holiday. It was the worst day of the year.
“I’m sure she’d like to see her father on Thanksgiving.”
Silence in the truck cab.
The stereotype of absent fathers is that they are careless and selfish. But sometimes the opposite is also true. Sometimes absent fathers care too much. Sometimes they’re drunks. And sometimes drunks know they’re drunks. Sometimes, contrary to what you’ve been told, drunks don’t want to screw up your life. So they stay away.
They reached Clairmont Avenue, where they had a clear shot of the water tower in the distance. The tower was lit by newly installed exterior lights and bore a fresh coat of powder-blue paint. The tower had been painted as of this morning. Nub knew this because he and Benny had been the ones who painted it. Eighty-three gallons of blue paint it had taken, and it had taken them three weeks dangling in nylon positioning harnesses, some 140 feet off the ground. They finished two weeks behind schedule. The tower looked nice except for the Big Mistake.
When Nub was painting the town’s name, he had forgotten to paint the right leg of the R. Namely, because he had been hammered at the time. He spent most of his life that way. Thus, the letters on the tower read “PAPK.” He planned on fixing it, but with the blizzard of the century approaching, it was simply too dangerous to go back up there. The town would remain Papk until further notice.
Nub and Benny were the unofficial maintenance men of Ash County. They were the county grunts. The ones who hung Christmas decorations each year, cut the courthouse lawn, painted fire hydrants, and built stage sets for the community theater production of The Music Man. One year Benny even played Mayor Shinn.
When the truck pulled into Benny’s driveway on Chestnut Drive, Nub threw the gearshift into Neutral and yanked the parking brake. The motor idled like a guy choking to death. Benny didn’t wait for Nub’s help. He kicked open the door and attempted to ease out of the truck himself. But he failed. The old man floundered out of the cab, falling face-first into the snow. Nub swore, then jogged around the vehicle to help his cousin off the ground.
