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“What changed your mind?”
“I cain’t take it no more.”
I leaned down slightly, below the top of the car door. “How you doin’, Rosebud?” I asked.
His sister smiled lazily, in a private and self-indulgent way, then her eyes closed and opened vacantly and looked at nothing.
“Your trial is in a couple of weeks,” I said to Tee Bobby.
“If I’m in a treatment program, I can get it postponed. See, a guy got to be able to hep with his own defense.”
“Talk to Mr. Perry. You can’t scam the court.”
“Ain’t no scam. I’m sick. Perry LaSalle ain’t worried about me. He worried about his family, his pink ass, his Confederate flags and portraits he got a
ll over the walls.”
“Know what’s bothered me from the jump on this deal, Tee Bobby? It’s the fact you’ve got everything else in the world on your mind except the death of that girl. Yourself, your habit, your music, your troubles with Jimmy Sty and Perry LaSalle, a kind of general discontent with the entire universe. But that poor girl’s murder never seems to enter your thought processes.”
“Don’t say that,” he said.
“Amanda Boudreau. That was her name. Amanda Boudreau. It’s never going to go away. Amanda Boudreau. You knew her. She was your friend. You saw her die. Don’t tell me you didn’t, Tee Bobby. Say her name and look me in the eye and tell me you’re not responsible in any way for her death. Say her name, Tee Bobby. Amanda Boudreau.”
Rosebud twisted against her seat strap and began to keen and slap the seat and the dashboard, her face round with fear, the corners of her mouth flecked with slobber.
“See what you done? I hate you, you white motherfucker. I hate Perry LaSalle and I hate every drop of white blood I got in my veins. I hate y’all in ways y’all cain’t even think about,” Tee Bobby said, and smashed his fists into the window glass of the back door, again and again, the glass flying into the interior, his knuckles flaying against the broken edges.
I stared at him stupidly, only now realizing some of the complexities that drove Tee Bobby’s soul.
“Perry should plead you out, but he’s not. He’s feeding you to the lions, isn’t he? Perry’s connected in some way to Amanda’s death,” I said.
But Tee Bobby had gotten behind the wheel of his car again and started the engine, the backs of his hands slick with blood. He floored his car down the road while his sister screamed insanely out the window.
CHAPTER 25
The next morning was Friday. I awoke early, rested, my mind free of dreams and nocturnal worries, the trees outside filled with birdsong. Wednesday night I had broken into the home of Legion Guidry and had probably experienced the most bizarre behavior I had ever witnessed in a human being, namely, the revelation of what I believed to be an enormous evil presence living inside a man who looked little different than the rest of us. But nonetheless, because I had been able to tell him I would pursue no personal vendetta against him, I felt freed of Legion Guidry and the violation he had committed against my person. The white worm was gone. I didn’t feel the need to drink and use.
Bootsie’s body was warm with sleep under the sheet, the breeze from the window fan ruffling her hair on the pillow. I kissed the back of her neck and began making breakfast, then noticed an unopened envelope from Reed College under the toaster, the same envelope I had seen two days earlier on the couch. It was addressed to Alafair, and the fact that she had not opened it told me what the contents were. Ever since she and I had gone on a backpacking trip up the Columbia River Gorge, she had longed to return to the Oregon coast and to major in English and creative writing at Reed. She had applied for a scholarship, then had realized that even with a grant we would still have to pay several thousand more in fees than we would if she chose to commute to the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
I sliced open the envelope and read the letter of congratulations awarding her most of her tuition for her first year. I went into the living room and wrote out a two-thousand-dollar check to be applied against her registration and dormitory fees for her first semester, placed a stamp on the return envelope, and walked out to the road and stuck it in the mailbox, then flipped up the red flag for the postman.
When I came back inside, Alafair was seated at the kitchen table, drinking coffee. She had put on makeup and a powder-blue dress and earrings. Through the back screen door I could see Tripod eating out of a bowl on the steps, his ringed tail damp with dew.
“Where you headed?” I asked.
“Over to UL. I’m going to enroll, get things started,” she replied.
“Hear anything from Reed?”
“Not exactly. I’ve decided against it, anyway. I can learn as much here as I can out there.”
“You look pretty, Alafair. When I grow up, I’m going to marry you,” I said.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she said.
“You’re going to Reed.”
“No, it was a bad idea. I wasn’t using my head.”
