Becky and Me
By Jenny Seay
Becky had been whinin’ for days about getting back to Florida. Really, all I wanted was to make her happy.
Copyright © 2005 Jenny Seay
Becky had been whinin’ for days about getting back to Florida . Every minute she was followin’ me around the house, steppin’ on my heels, tuggin’ on my shirt, pointin’ at underlined passages in her damn bible.
“See this, Henry?” She shoved some tiny print right under my nose, then pulled it back to read. Any time Becky read she had to follow the lines with her finger, each word comin’ out long and slow. “It says, ‘Fools make a mock at sin: but among the righteous there is favor.’ You know what that means?”
I didn’t, and I told her so.
She crossed her arms across her chest. “It means we gotta go home. All this sin ain’t doin nothin’ but puttin’ us farther from God. We gotta give up. Confess. Stop runnin’ and take some responsibility.”
I thought we had gotten about as responsible as we were gonna get. My roofin’ job was steady enough; we had our own place, a car that wasn’t stolen, a rabbit ear TV, and some peace and quiet. I was ready to settle down and live a respectable life.
But I guess none of that was part of Becky’s plan. She followed me into the kitchen - blocking the refrigerator when I went for a cold beer. I grabbed her wrist to yank her out of the way, and her skin was warm and sticky. Her eyes were all watery, and she started sniffling and scrunching up her face.
“Don’t you see? I gotta turn myself in. It’s the Lord’s will.”
Becky was real concerned with getting right with God, and after runnin’ with me for so long I can’t say I blame her. She collapsed right there on the linoleum, sobbin’ into her hands, looking so delicate and beautiful. I put my can on the counter and knelt next to her. She hugged my arm, rubbin’ her cheek against my sleeve.
I mussed her hair for a minute. “Baby,” I said, “ain’t no need to worry about goin’ to heaven.”
“But I do,” she said. “I’ll never get there if I’m locked up.”
I started wonderin’ what she might do to keep from getting locked up, wonderin’ if she’d been runnin’ around, opening her mouth about the things she’d seen with me and Ottis. The thought of her leaning in the window of some cop car - flappin’ her lips about all the robbin’, rapin’, and killin’ got me real mad, and I pushed her face away, banging her forehead against the kitchen cabinet. She yelped, and I whipped my empty beer can at her. It missed and skittered along the tile.
“And what would you say to keep from being locked up? What are you telling people? Huh?”
Becky curled up into a ball. She rocked back and forth, squeezing her knees up under her chin. “I didn’t say nothin’ to nobody.” Becky said. “I only got my own sins to account for. The wicked shall not inhabit the Earth.”
Becky started reciting all these other bible sayings, I repent this, and forgive me Lord that, all the while rocking and snifflin’ while I went back for another beer. I thought if I left her alone long enough she’d wear herself out, but she wouldn’t stop howlin’, and only got louder when I went into the livin’ room to watch some TV.
“Henreeee! You’ve gotta help me!”
Becky crawled across the brown rug, straddled my lap, lips puckered with worry. Her cheeks puffed in and out, red as candy apples, and she was breathin’ so hard I thought she was gonna hyperventilate. In all our time together I had never seen her so desperate, so needy. She hugged my neck, sayin’ the Lord’s Prayer while I looked past her to see the ball game. When she was done prayin’, she pressed her face against my chest - settling in a spot where I could smell her hair no matter how I turned my head.
Really, all I wanted was to make her happy. She was a precious little thing, the only woman I’ve ever loved, and even though I knew we had a good thing at the House of Prayer, I pet Becky’s hair real nice and told her that we’d leave tomorrow.
Our car was in no condition for a long-distance trip, but Pastor Moore was kind enough to give us some cash and a ride to a nearby truck stop.
“You’re God’s children, remember that,” he said. “The Lord will guide you back home.”
Becky gave him a kiss on the cheek. She was sad to leave such a good man, but couldn’t wait to get back to Florida . Her hair was shinin’ under the sun and her eyes were bright and you’d never know she was the same person screamin’ at me the night before.
We had some burgers and coffee in the diner, then stood in the parking lot for a couple hours, trying to find someone to give us a lift. Seemed everyone was going north or west, so at about noon we took to the road. It wasn’t long before Becky started complainin’ about the bedroll on her back.
“It’s heavy, Henry. When are we gonna find a ride?”
Plenty of cars passed us by, most of them kickin’ up sand and gravel, spittin’ exhaust as they sped along the sun-baked road. Ever so often, a young man would see Becky and slow down, but he’d lose interest as soon as he saw me a few feet up the road.
We must have seen a hundred cars by the time we made it to Demon County . Night was falling and I suggested we find a motel to spend the night. We went from one place to the next, finding nothin’ but bright buzzing NO VACANCY signs. I couldn’t see Becky’s face in the dark, but ever’ so often I’d hear her whimper.
“You okay, baby?” I asked.
“Mmm hmm,” she said.
But there was more and more footsteps between her silences, and after the fifth NO VACANCY sign I knew our best bet was the field down the way from the Bedford Inn.
People say the desert gets cool at night, but those people have never slept out in the middle of a Texas summer. Becky and I kept sweatin’, even after we unloaded our bedrolls and she stripped down to her white britches. She fanned herself with her hands while I drank a quart of whiskey.
I looked at Becky. The creases in her neck were caked with dirt, and her forehead was greasy and sun burnt. She was sort of pretty under the stars. That is, until she frowned at the bottle in my hand and knocked it loose. Some leftover whiskey trickled out, evaporating on the surface of the cracked earth.
“Why do you have to drink?”
“It’s hot.”
“Stupid devil water. Don’t you know it brings suffering?”
Becky rolled onto her side, but not before picking up my bottle and hurling it as far as her skinny arm would allow. I didn’t mind her spillin’ my last few drops, but throwin’ away a bottle we could have used for water got me good an angry. I grabbed Becky by the shoulder, pushing her flat on her back.
“You know what brings suffering? Bitches that beg for Florida for no good reason.”
Becky sucked in a breath. “Did you call me a bitch? Damn you to hell, you worthless motherfucker.”
“At least I’m not a stupid whore.”
“Well you’re a faggot heathen.”
We went on like that for a while, cussin’, arguing, sending our voices up and across that field, until finally I put my foot down and told Becky we were on our way back to the House of Prayer at sunrise.
“Bullshit!” I watched Becky’s left palm get closer and closer, not really feeling the impact when it slapped against the side of my head. After that, everything seemed to happen real fast. There was a knife at my side on the blanket. My fingers wrapped around the handle, the metal surprisingly cool against my skin, especially when my thumb rubbed the button to release the blade. It clicked out, all shiny under the evening stars, and my arm lifted and swooped across my body. Next thing I knew the blade was in the center of Becky’s chest, and her mouth was open with no sound coming out. She looked down at the red liquid flowing between her breasts, sort of set there for a little bit and then dropped on over.
I put my face close to hers, searching her eyes as they lost their light, and watched her chest rise and fall for the last time. It was different from anyone else I done. More shocking. I sat next to her for a while, with nothing but the sound of mosquitoes and the thunder of my beating heart. I might have even shed a tear, ’cause for the first time I had killed someone that actually meant something to me.
