The Drought by Patricia Fulton, Extended Imagery

wounds were raw and fresh—the blood not yet congealed. Her stomach fluttered at the sight of wet blood. Mr. Tanner had called her at 11:00 p.m. She mentally calculated how long she took to get ready at home and added it to the time it took her to drive from Kerrville to Junction. The blood would have dried, started to congeal.
    A tingle of apprehension slid down her spine. She looked down the empty hallway trying to comprehend the thought forming in her head. Fresh blood meant he’d just finished, had been putting the final touches on the beating while she pulled up the driveway, parked the car and rang the bell—it meant he’d called her before he ever lifted the belt.
    Run Maryanne, get out now! The memory of the dead baby, its head lolling, neck snapped, emerged as sharp as a snapshot. Oh that night had been a piece of hell on earth, with the father howling like a wounded animal and the mother holding the baby, her vacant eyes staring off as dead as the lifeless baby she held in her arms. She kept cooing, “There now, he’s stopped crying, everything will be just fine. Mama’s precious little boy.”
    She’d felt trapped that night, trapped in a nightmare. The father had begged her to do something for the dead child and when she couldn’t he’d threatened her, told her if she went to the police he’d tell them she killed the baby. In the end she accepted his money and his reasoning that his wife had been punished enough.
    Out of habit she went into the bathroom, filled a pan with warm water and began to cleanse the boy’s back—she wanted to believe she stayed for the boy and not for the promised money. “ I’ll pay you double if you get here in the next two hours.”
    After she had him cleaned up, the deeper gashes sewn shut, the rest dressed in fresh bandages she felt better. He moaned a few times during her work but at no point did he gain consciousness. She would have left in the morning with a clean conscience but Mr. Tanner folded his newspaper gave her a hard look and said, “Look I need someone to watch over him until he’s up and about, why don’t you stay on until he’s better?”
    The word, “No” rested on her lips ready to be issued and then the fool man gave her a price he would be willing to pay. The amount made her swallow the word, her pride and any false morality she clung to. She said, “In cash Mr. Tanner. Half upfront, the rest when I say he’s better.”
    Maryanne brushed Barry’s hair away from his face. If he’d been awake she would have given him the phone and let him speak to his friend, but Barry Tanner had not spoken since she arrived two weeks ago. His back was healing just fine, she had seen to that. But he had checked out. She wasn’t sure if he’d found a better place or not. Sometimes he would thrash against the sheets as if he were being restrained, and cry out, “the gypsies, the gypsies have the baby.” And other times he was so calm she had to check to see if he was still breathing.
     

Chapter Eight
     
    Junction, Texas
     
    After Jar rode away pulling the buggy full of clean clothes, Suzy walked along the cracked sidewalk, pushing through the thick, afternoon heat. When she got to Faces she opened the door wide and let the bright light cut through the darkened bar. She remained in the open doorway, her figure a dark silhouette. On the jukebox, Hank Williams, Jr. was singing about family traditions and someone at the far end of the bar shouted, “Shut the damn door.” If Suzy were superstitious, she would have thought the bar dwellers were really vampires. The bar was windowless, there were no mirrors, and direct sunlight hurt their eyes. She did not shut the door.
    Murphy Jobes slipped off one of the barstools. “I’ve got to go,” he hooked a finger in Suzy’s direction and said, “the nag is waiting.” It was an endearment usually reserved for a wife but the guys took a moment from their beers to chuckle at the running joke. They all got a kick