No Doors, No Windows

Ten: White Trash Don’t Exist

“White Trash don’t exist! Am I right?”

It was Mister Herm Cressman, startin’ in on me again, and I hunkered down near the jukebox with my slop-pail and my brush. I didn’t want Mr. Herm to see me … ’cept I knew he already had, if he was yellin’ that business about me not existin’.

I knew all right. He was wantin’ to do me ever since I come to work at the Deepwater Cafe. He was standin’ there in the middle of the cafe, with his big old sod-boot on the brass rail, and holdin’ his beer mug ’way up high. He looked like he was callin’ the most important thing in the world, and he yelled it again:

“White trash don’t eat, right?”

An’ all them bar loafers who didn’t want to get in bad with big Mr. Herm, they chimed right back at him. “You right, Herm!”

“White trash don’t breathe!”

“Right!”

“White trash just don’t even exist.”

“Yeahhh, you right, Herm!”

They had to say it; they was afraid not to, with him ownin’ the factory and all and being big besides. That would start him off. He slammed the mug on the bar, spillin’ beer all over for Poppa Jango to wipe up, then he stomped all over where I was scrubbin’ on my hands and knees. He yelled down, “White trash don’t even eat. Right, scum-boy?”

My name is Charles Bennett, but he meant me. I always knew that. I’d never answer. I’d learned.

Then, he gave me a nasty little almost-laugh like I was yellow, an’ just stepped on my hand and spit in my hair and kicked the soap-water bucket over before walkin’ away.

I knew my place, sure enough. You got to be poor and miserable all your life to know what it’s all about. If you ain’t, then don’t even try. You wouldn’t understand none of what I’m tellin’ you, how people never talk to you, they just talk at you. Like they needed all their eyesight to make you out. Like all they could see was the top inch layer of you. That’s how they all looked at me anyways, Mr. Herm ’specially. He hated me clean through. I din’t want trouble. No sir, no trouble.

I guess I was scared right from the start. Then Poppa Jango called me into the storeroom out back of the Deepwater Cafe to warn me, and he was lookin’ all frog-belly white with scare himself. “Charles,” he said, “that Herm Cressman is out for you, boy.”

“I know,” I said, wishin’ I didn’t.

Poppa nodded his head like we’d made a good start on a tough problem, and all the while his face was puckered like a new-born baby. “Good,” he said, soft-like. “But he’s settin’ Lottie on you — to fire you up!”

Then I felt surprised, much as scared, ’cause I’d always stayed far from Miss Lottie, the waitress. She never bothered me much neither, except once or twice to clean up behind the jukebox if I forgot to move it.

“What you mean?” I asked Poppa.

“You know Herm’s been cheatin’ on his wife with Lottie.” He said it like I should know it. Everyone knew it. Those two made up to each other in the back booth at the Deepwater and they didn’t care who saw it. Otherwise Poppa Jango wouldn’t of said nothing. He’s a good man who don’t spread gossip.

I nodded my head like to say yes.

“Well, Herm’s told her he’d take her to New Orleans for a week if she pushed you into makin’ a move on her. I guess he just wants an excuse to do ya, Charles.”

I didn’t wanna believe him, but Poppa was meaning it. Why, makin’ a move on Mister Herm’s woman would be just like killin’ myself sure; an’ I wouldn’t kill myself. Then Poppa told me again, real clear like, so’s there wouldn’t be no mistaking. Miss Lottie was gonna smile all over me and brush me and call me like everything till I got so hungry I’d reach at her. And she could do it too. She was like that. I seen men go almost crazy at the sight of her on some Saturday nights in the Deepwater. She’d set that brown, fluffy hair on top her head like a scoop of brown soapsuds that’s about ready to fly off, and wear those pearl things around that white neck of hers. And she was always about to bust out of her clothes. Like one of the men said once, she might be tall and slim but Lottie’s meaty in all the right places. She really got to men all right. I’ve seen them get tossed right out into the mud in the street by Mister Herm ’cause they made a grab for her skirt when she passed by. She was that bad.

“What I’m gone do, Poppa Jango?”

He looked at me like I should know how to melt and said, “Go away, Charles. He hates you. He’ll go real far to do you. Leave Deepwater — go North. You’d have a better chance there anyway. You’re a smart boy.”

I liked what he said, but I din’t believe him. And I knew he din’t believe it neither. I’m real slow, I am. Then I got all confused. I kept thinkin’ of Mam. Mam would never go. She was born in that shack what Daddy built and we lived in and she was bound to die there. That was her wish an’ she wouldn’t do nothin’ else. All she wanted was the swamp smell, the bright birds that flew over the shack, and her pint. And I wasn’t gonna foul it up none.

“No.” I shook my head. “I got to stay with Mam.”

Poppa reached down to me then, grabbed my big arm muscle high up, looked me close. “Then you got to stay far away from Lottie, Charles. She’ll do it for Herm Cressman. She don’t love him, she couldn’t love nobody, that woman — but he’s got the money to take her where she wants to go and you know how he hates you.”

I tried to stay away from her, God knows. I’d make sure I was outside when she was in, and be sweepin’ the floor or somethin’ when she was out. I’d walk a block around the Deepwater in the afternoon, instead of comin’ to work ’long the way she did. I never looked in her face none.

But she was after me, that was sure. She’d be brushing up against me when we passed. Lickin’ her lips. straightening her body with her hands, whisperin’ soft, silky things in my ear when I was workin’ — doin’ all that kind of thing. I was goin’ crazy. She was makin’ me think things, too. Things I din’t want to think. Things Mam told me wasn’t right for me to think.

I’m not made of stone, God knows. I know it ain’t right for me to want a woman, ’cause I ain’t quite as smart as most, but that went on and on and on, till I swear I finally started goin’ crazy. You got to believe me when I tell you I din’t want none of that. I’m just a person, that’s all. I just wanted her to let me be. It’s not that I felt sorry for myself, but she was doin’ somethin’ wasn’t natural, wasn’t decent and sure wasn’t right.

Then three nights ago, she got me to her house.

“I got packages I need you to carry, Charles,” she said, leaning toward me over the bar. Everybody in the Deepwater was takin’ their tenth drink of the evening — the bar was full. It was that time of night, and everyone just stopped quiet and watched what was gonna happen. Even Poppa Jango got puckered up like he does when he’s scared.

“Sorry, Miss Lottie, I gotta go straight home after work. Mam is down with the croup and I gotta …”

“I want you to carry for me, Charles,” she said, and her voice was so hard I thought sure it’d shatter.

“No, I …” I started to say no again, but I felt Mr. Herm’s big hand on my shoulder. I knew it was him. Then I knew I was gonna be in trouble. Right then was when I knew, so help me God!

“You givin’ the lady trouble, scum-boy?”

I looked up over my shoulder. I’m not real small but he was big, almost six foot five, I guess. All bigness. He had a body like dough. I knew if I ever did get a chance to whomp him — no matter where I whomped him — it wouldn’t mean a thing; he’d just soak up my fist like it was sinking in a pillow. He’d never feel it, then he’d up and kill me. He was so mean, it was comin’ outen his eyes.

“No,” I said, looking at the floor between Miss Lottie’s high heel shoes. “No trouble. No trouble at all, Mr. Herm.”

I din’t see it, but I knew they was grinnin’ at each other. I could feel it. Her with that evil smile that said, “I love doin’ bad!” and him with his all-over hate-smile, sayin’, “We gonna get you soon, white trash!”

I felt my throat like it had a knot in it, so I swallowed. I tried so hard not to let them know I was worried. If I ran fast, I could leave her packages and get away from her house quick.

“What you want me to carry, Miss Lottie?”

Mr. Herm took his hand off me, off my shoulder. I thought a rock had lifted from me. I looked up.

They was both smilin’ at each other like I thought they was.

I set the packages down on the table and started to leave.

“Wait a minute, Charles,” Miss Lottie said. She said it real low, and in a voice I knew would boil half the men that came into the Deepwater.

She was really tryin’ to get me, I was sure of that. ’Cause she’d stayed with me ever since she’d gotten off work at the Cafe. It was gonna be open till later and I had to get back, to clean up when they closed. She knew that. But she wouldn’t let me go. I tried to leave once but she called me back, told me to stay with her.

“Protect me, Charles,” she’d said, smilin’ nasty. “I don’t want none of them dirty boys to rape me when I go home.” Then she laughed real mean. I knew she didn’t mean it, ’cause nobody’d bother her with Mr. Herm being her boy friend. Besides, all they’d had to do is give her five dollars. They din’t have to force her. I’d heard tell about it from the men once.

“I got to go. Miss Lottie,” I told her. She leaned against the back door, and shrugged off her coat. It was one of them little halfie things, and she let it fall to the floor. “I got to go,” I said again, and I felt my throat ball up again. Her eyes narrowed down to real finey slits, and I could see she was tryin’ to do me. She was tryin’!

“Stay around a bit, Charles,” she said, swayin’ towards me. I stepped back and wanted to run, but there wasn’t no place to run. I din’t know her house and she’d of locked the front door. Besides, she’d just of got mad, and told Mr. Herm, and I’d be as bad off as ever. She was tryin’ to do me!

“You stay here a minute, Charles. I have to take a bath, then I’ll be goin’ over to meet Mr. Herm. I’ll want you to walk me back.” She had changed, sort of. She wasn’t as slinky as she’d been a second before. Now she was kind of businessy, like she really did want me just to hang around so’s I could protect her. That din’t seem right though, ’cause her house was only a block or less from the Deepwater and Mr. Herm could sure as not hear her yell if something wasn’t right.

I didn’t like it at all. I guess I ain’t too smart, because if she had anything planned, I sure couldn’t figure it out. But I wasn’t gonna balk her none. “Okay, Miss Lottie,” I said. I sat down in a kitchen chair.

She went out and I started to get up. Then I sat back down again. I couldn’t run off. There weren’t nowhere to run.

I heard the water running upstairs. I wondered why Miss Lottie was goin’ to all this trouble, just to do me. Why didn’t she just make it up that I’d tried to touch her or made a noise at her, then Mr. Herm could beat me up without no trouble. Why was that?

Then I thought something that scared me right up. What if Mr. Herm wanted to kill me, maybe? He’d do it, alright. He was that bad — he’d do it! What if then?

I knew right away why Miss Lottie was doin’ it. I knew why. It was ’cause she was mean. That woman was as nasty as Mr. Herm hisself, and she liked to see a man suffer. I’d heard how she married once and had a kid, but her old man was mean and beat her up, and she left him and the kid. That’s what I’d heard. I don’t know how true it was — just I heard it. But she liked to see men unhappy, that was plain. And she was fixin’ to make me unhappy. Right then, honest, I hated her worse than anything. I just wanted to be left be. I wasn’t makin’ no trouble.

“Charles!” I heard her voice come driftin’ downstairs. “Come up here a minute.” Oh, Lord, I knew she had somethin’ bad in mind, and I din’t want to go. But she kept callin’ and finally yelled she’d tell Mr. Herm and he’d stomp me if I didn’t do like she said. So I went upstairs.

I knew bad was gonna happen. I just knew it!

She was sittin’ in the tub. The water trickles were all over her body and little round drops were in her brown hair, and on her breasts, and all over. She was beautiful that way. Just a little bit pink from the warm water, and the rippling that I could see right through, see all of her in that tab. She had those long legs pulled up together, huggin’ her knees, and when I came into the open doorway, she let them slip down, slow.

I turned my face away. I didn’t want to see that. I looked all over at that bathroom. All the pink curtains and the perfumes on the glass shelf, and the fingernail stuff to file and paint and make her beautiful. I looked at all that stuff laying there.

Then I had to look back at her. I couldn’t help myself none. Ain’t nobody could blame me a bit I had to.

“Soap up my back, Charles,” she said, holding out a pink washrag.

“I — I gotta go, M-Miss Lottie …” My voice was real wavery, like it might not have even been my own to speak with. She glared at me real mad, and snapped I should wash her back or she’d tell Mr. Herm on me. I got scared, then, and took that cloth.

Her skin was warm, and like it seemed to be glowin’. When I started soapin’ the rag, she stood up, the water flowin’ off her and splashin’ on the floor.

“Now here,” she said, running her hands over her stomach. Oh God! I knew this was what she wanted. I felt my tongue get all dry in my mouth, and I started shakin’. She was a tall lady, and she had beautiful legs and body right there in front of me.

She looked at me careful-like, up and down. “My goodness,” she said, real sweetness. “I do believe you’re excited, Charles.”

I din’t say nothing, just kept running that soapy cloth over her. Once my fingers touched the skin and I felt like an eel had grabbed onto me. She was so pretty. Why was she tryin’ to do me so?

I guess I got carried away because my hand kept feelin’, even after I dropped the washrag and it fell in the tub. First with just one hand, then with both. I was lookin’ at her stomach, just feelin’ around and rubbin’ and I was sweatin’ and feelin’ real strange. I started to say, “M-Miss Lottie, you’re so pret …”

That’s as much as she let me get out. She gritted at me, the words comin’ out between her teeth. “Okay, trash, you touched me. Now get the hell outta here. Just wait’ll Herm gets his hooks on you.” She kept on like that, yet kind of ooin’ and ahhin’ ‘cause I kept rubbin’. She tried to back away but I guess I wasn’t thinkin’ because I stuck right with her, leanin’ over the tub and when she slipped and splashed in the tub, I couldn’t help fallin’ in with her, I guess.

“Get off me, scum!” she yelled, thrashin’ all about but I din’t hear her.

I guess I went bad inside, ‘cause I started unbuttoning my jeans and tryin’ to kiss her movin’ shoulders with the wet hair and like that. I don’t remember it all except I did something I never did before. We was flappin’ around in the tub like catfish in a net and for a while she stopped callin’ me “trash” and “scum” and started scratching my back and yellin’ things and moanin’ so’s I wanted to stop but couldn’t. She wouldn’t let me. She locked her legs around mine and kept splashin’ until all of a sudden I stopped and laid there like paralyzed.

I never felt like that before in my life. Then after a minute, we stopped breathin’ heavy and her little noises stopped. She tried to open her eyes but they wouldn’t stay open.

I got scared when I remembered where I was. I climbed up off her and the tub and ran down the stairs with my shoes squishin’ and drippin’ water everywhere.

I din’t want goin’ in the Deepwater like that. My clothes was all wet. I din’t know what I was goin’ to say. When I walked in, everyone just stared at me. Mr. Herm stared and Poppa Jango stared and even old Walker Drummon who was half-corked, even he stared at me like everyone else. And when I looked down, I knew darn well why.

My jeans was still unbuttoned and I was bare there.

Mr. Herm got mad in the eyes and looked like he was goin’ to ask me something. I looked at Poppa Jango, buttonin’ up and feelin’ more scared than before, when all a sudden we heard her yell. It came from down the street. I heard her and they heard her too.

“Hermy!” she screamed. “He did it! He did it, Hermy!”

I got that feelin’ in my throat again and watched Mr. Herm. His face turned all kinds of colors and he started comin’ toward me. He was mumblin’ “dirty scum” and “white trash” and Poppa Jango was wavin’ like “go.”

Next thing, I was out the door runnin’ like a hound. I was flyin’ down the street, past where Miss Lottie was standin’ on her porch in a nightcoat and runnin’ straight for the swamp.

Trees was flyin’ past me and back behind me I could hear Mr. Herm yellin’ and swearin’ and comin’ after me.

He din’t even stop to see Miss Lottie. It was me he was wantin’.

“Rotten stinkin’ white trash sonofabitch!” he was yellin’. “I’ll kill you!”

I kept goin’ fast as I could. The dark was closing in so tight over Deepwater you’d of thought the end of the world was comin’. I ran down streets and through an alley and, all the time, Mr. Herm behind me.

Maybe ‘cause he drank too much or ‘cause I’m younger and faster, I got clean away. I ran right out of town. Down the Sidehill Road and into the swamp back of Gurley’s farm. I saw car lights comin’ over the hill and down the road about ten minutes after I ploughed in, so I had to go deeper.

The swamp ain’t no place for a man. Not in the day, and never, never in the night! There’s stuff you can hear: crickets clicking in the reeds, the fish down deep, bubblin’ slow, and the cottonmouths slitherin’ through the brush. And then there’s stuff you can’t hear — stuff you know comes from Hell and don’t belong to man nor God. Like the swamp dust, like the bog-smell and the quicksand and death all around.

I din’t like goin’ in there, so help me, I din’t. But I was more scared of Mr. Herm than of all that death in there.

The mud was up to my waist but I kept swinging one leg in front the other, pushing forward till the hanging stuff was all around me, till the swamp had closed in like a blanket. Once in a while the water slithered when a moccasin went past near me. An’ once I almost stumbled out of the mud into a bog-patch of quicksand.

I moved all night — I don’t know why I din’t get tired.

I was up on a little island in the middle of the blackwater when the dawn come up. The white mist was rising and the way the island pushed out I could see everything for a hundred yards each way. It’s almost pretty in the swamp in the morning like that. The way the little wigglers skitter across the watertop. The pools are so clear you can see clean through to the bottom. And it was quiet. So quiet that when the swamp-critters was makin’ a huge fussin’, all chirp and bellow and mouthin’ at once, I knew someone was comin’.

I couldn’t move. I was too tired of it all.

I saw Mr. Herm way before he saw me.

He was comin’ through, poling a flatbottom like he wanted nothing else but to get me. A shotgun, twelve-gauge, I’d guess, was stickin’ on up and he was swipin’ them stringers that was hangin’, getting them outten his way. I knew, sudden, that man was happy as he could be. He din’t care none about Miss Lottie — he just wanted at me. Out here, with no one else around, he could beat me till I dropped stone dead.

He spotted me sittin’ on the bank, with my knees hugged to my chest — it was pretty chilly, early then. In the mist, he looked like he was walking on air or clouds. He was workin’ that pole like he couldn’t get to me fast enough.

“Bennett!” he yelled. “Bennett, you scum! I’m gonna kill you for what you done!” He went on like that for the longest time, his bellowin’ echoing through the swamp and all the while glidin’ straight toward me.

I looked around for something to swat with. But there wasn’t nothing on that muddy island. Not even a good rock. Then when he got real close, till he was so big I could hardly see around him, he grabbed the shotgun and jumped on out of that flatbottom. He came down hard on the mud and started running toward me.

I backed up but there weren’t nowhere to go. I just waited.

He took about two steps and that’s all. He just started sinking in and looking all around surprised. He yanked and strained and wanted to come after me — I was only about fifteen feet away up the bank — but he couldn’t make it.

His ankles went under. “ Quicksand! ” He screamed at me, his eyeballs bulgin’ so big and white. “Quicksand, Bennett, quicksand!”

He kept yellin’ like I should do something. I walked over slow, just as the mud sucked in around the twin poles of his legs, draggin’ him deeper. He reached out with the gun barrel, holdin’ it by the stock. “Grab it, Bennett!”

I started to but I was afraid he’d pull the trigger on me.

“For God’s sake, Bennett, grab it!”

I got scared and started backing away. And when his thighs disappeared and then his big dough stomach, he started hollering and screaming. He layed out flat like he was goin’ to swim out of it and when he seen he couldn’t, he fired on me.

The blast brought down a tree limb over my head. He tried to fire the other barrel but the mud was already suckin’ his hands in. And with all that squishin’ and suckin’ I felt funny-like. ’Cause every inch of Mr. Herm that went in, was an inch that couldn’t hurt me no more.

It was him what made me bad and do what I did with Miss Lottie. I don’t know why he hated me so. Maybe ‘cause his factory was doin’ poor and he din’t like bein’ married and he had to take it out on someone. I never talked back to him. Not once. Even now, while he was bein’ swallowed up — I never said nothing.

The shotgun and his shoulders went under about the same time, real smooth. Only his head was stickin’ out now and I watched real close. I didn’t want to miss none of that. And it was only then that I found the words.

I walked up to the edge of the darker mud. “How can I help you, Mr. Herm? You always told me true that white trash don’t eat, don’t sleep or breathe — and don’t exist at all. And if I don’t exist, Mr. Herm —” I laughed kinda “— how’m I goin’ to pull you out?”

He started to say something, but his mouth filled up with mud.

Then his head went under, went down with a sucking, puffing noise, and the bubbles came up real slow for a little bit, till the mud closed over his hair with little ripples and movements, and the top was all smooth and quiet.

I could of helped him, I guess. But I was scared and after I wasn’t scared no more, I din’t care. He hated me, Mr. Herm did, and bein’ as hate can run both ways, I guess some of it rubbed off on me. Maybe if he wasn’t always tellin’ me I din’t exist when I knew I did …

Anyway, it’s too late now.

Sittin’ with my knees pulled up like before and thinkin’ of Miss Lottie instead, I knew it’s bad what we did an’ Mam’ll be mad with me, but it felt good just the same.

In a little while, I’m goin’ back — after I’ve thought a little bit more. I hope they’ll believe me; I won’t lie none. If Poppa Jango will allow, I’ll work the Deepwater same as always. No — not the same as always. Things has changed now, I guess. Won’t no one say I don’t exist. No one — ’specially not Miss Lottie.