Bent Road - Lori Roy [85]
“Evie,” Daddy says.
A light switches on in the kitchen.
“Evie,” he says again, taking a step toward her.
He fills up the small hallway that leads from the kitchen, past the basement stairs, to the back door.
“Step away, Evie.”
Evie smiles at Daddy, turns back to the window and looks up to see Uncle Ray’s face where it was dark before. She knows it’s him because he wears his hat high off his forehead, but something about Uncle Ray isn’t quite right. As Evie steps away, he steps forward. His head sways, like it’s not screwed on tight enough, and one shoulder hangs lower than the other. Pressing both hands against the glass, he says something and smiles a crooked smile.
“What?” Evie says, stepping forward again and putting one hand on the door handle. It’s cold but she squeezes it anyway. “Uncle Ray’s out there,” she says, looking back at Daddy.
Uncle Ray doesn’t scare her like he used to, like he did on the night he asked for pie, because Aunt Eve loved Uncle Ray even if one of his eyes wanders off where it doesn’t belong. She loved him so much she wanted to marry him but then she died and he had to marry Aunt Ruth. He wouldn’t even be mean at all if Aunt Ruth had died instead.
“Don’t open that, Evie,” Daddy says, taking another step toward her. “Come away from there.”
Uncle Ray looks over Evie’s head. He sees Daddy standing behind her. Daddy isn’t wearing a shirt and his feet must be cold, too. The handle is warm in Evie’s hand now. Uncle Ray isn’t smiling anymore, and in the dark, his cloudy eye is a black hole. With one hand, he knocks on the glass. With the other, he rattles the door.
“You tell Ruth to come out here,” Uncle Ray shouts through the glass. “I should have left your girl to freeze.”
Now Mama and Aunt Ruth are standing behind Daddy. All three of them creep closer, looking like Daddy and Daniel when they found a rattlesnake in the barn. Daddy snuck up on the snake with a long-handled spade. He hacked it in two and said to Daniel, “Careful, son. Rattlers never travel alone.” They found another snake coiled up in the back corner of Olivia’s stall, its tail shaking like a tin of dried beans. Daddy hacked it up, too.
“Evie, honey. Come on back to bed,” Mama says, peeking around Daddy. “You must be so cold.”
Aunt Ruth, standing at Daddy’s other side, nods.
“You know they think I was taking their girl, Ruth? That what you think, too? That why Floyd’s got his God damn dogs over at our house?”
Evie presses against the door, the knob still in her hand. She can feel Uncle Ray on the other side, jiggling the handle, wanting to come in. He shakes it harder. It sounds like the second snake when Daddy crept toward it, the dry hay snapping under his black boots. Evie frowns, imagining that Daddy is carrying a long handled spade.
“Go on home, Ray,” Daddy shouts, taking another step toward Evie. “It’s too late for this now.”
Daddy must make Uncle Ray mad because he starts banging on the door. Just over Evie’s head, his fist pounds into the glass. The door rattles in its frame. Evie knows what Uncle Ray is doing is bad. She can see it in Mama and Aunt Ruth’s faces. Their eyes are wide and they are both leaning around Daddy like they want to scoop up Evie and wrap her in her favorite patchwork quilt. Evie presses against the door. The glass shakes overhead. Uncle Ray is pounding with both fists now, probably because he sees Aunt Ruth. He wants to talk to her and to see his baby. That’s what he said in the hospital. That’s all he wants. And now the men with dogs are at his house and he’s mad about it. Daddy reaches to grab Evie’s arm.
“Go on, Ray,” Daddy shouts.
“What’d you tell them?” Uncle Ray keeps beating on the glass.
Evie pulls away from Daddy and wraps both hands around the knob. It’s so warm now, almost hot. Daddy grabs both of Evie’s shoulders. His fingers dig into her arms, like a snakebite, like a rattler bite. She cries out. Her breath fogs the glass. Uncle Ray looks fuzzy. Maybe he smiles,