SHOE

Dorey Wilkens died a few weeks ago. I went to her funeral. She lived at the end of Gaskill near Carroll Street. Everybody on Gaskill knew her. They called her Do-ray. They called her The Old Lady That Lived in The Shoe. And then for short they called her Shoe. She had seven children and seventeen grandchildren. Six of the seven children were in the state pen when she died. One on death row in Jackson.

Her two daughters commited murder. Dolene kill her husband Petey Sty with a butcher knife. She cut his fingers off first to let him know what was coming and then she hit him square in the head. There were so many cops on Gaskill that night you couldn't even step foot on that street. Dolene's younger sister Mabelene killed her boyfriend D'Andruw. She shot him three times with a Remington 870 pump shotgun. It was July Four and noone even noticed the gunfire. Thought it fireworks. D'Andruw bled out all over the kitchen lino before the cops got there. Said Mabelene set there at the kitchen table drinking a beer filin her nails, bare feet danglin in his blood.

Four sons, Prentice Wilkens Sr., Prentice Wilkens Jr., Horace and Rufus Wilkens, committed armed robbery, possession/distribution illegal substance (methamphetamine), double homicide respectively. Prentice Elder and Younger rob the Save Rite on Atlanta Street over by the zoo. Manager cowboy it and wouldn't give them the money and Prentice Elder opened his raincoat and pulled out a goddamn antique burp gun and sprayed the place. Didn't kill noone, but fucked up the merch pretty good. Cowboy manager got concussed. When Elder open fire he fell into the register and knock himself out. Horace, he known as Bad Boy round town. Bad Boy dealt crank for years and then once dealt crank to undercover. He busted the dude's face open with brass knucks before they cuff him. So add assualting an officer to that too. Rufus "Red" AKA "Lil Boy" Wilkens killed two women with hedge trimmers and put them in the trunk of his Ford Tempo and lit it on fire. Only their teeth could ID them. Lil Boy on death row in Jackson.

Pastor Toby gave good sermon. Everyone cried. Even the ones in orange jumpsuits and leg shackles. When it was over Pastor Toby invited everyone to stay on the grounds for lunch and he grilled up hotdogs and Kroger Old Fashioned Loaf and served them on plain white bread with mustard and ketchup. He had big bags of Save Rite cheese doodles and a cooler full of strawberry Kool-Aid. Runt and I stood out in front of the church eating and talking and looking at Shoe's kids. Runt told me he'd painted the doors kelly green and put duct tape on them in the shape of cruciform to get the outline. Said he did that 20 years ago. He remember Toby wanted to give him ten dollars but he said that was part of his "good works." He laughed about it.

Shit I need somethin get me into the big house up ways, he said.

We looked at the kids and ate.

You see them, he said. Girls look sight meaner than the boys. Lookit Dolene. She look like a pit bull with a wasp nest stuck up its ass. Whoo wee.

We laughed. But they were scary looking. They looked a lot older than they were. Lots of lines on their faces. Lots of gray hair. Lots of tattoos. They had those teardrop tattoos under their eyes. The boys had the cobwebs on their elbows. That means something, Runt said, but I done forgot it.

There Mabelene. Shit give me chills. I memeber that night. She shot poor boy with slugs and put holes in him. Like snake holes. I member peekin in the house an seein him lay there with them black holes in him. All the blood done bled out. Shit give me chills.

I can't tell the boys apart, I said.

Po lease cant neither. Ever time they get a tip about it bein so and so Wilkens son they rest the wrong one. Figger it out when they print em. Aint that some ass backwards bullshit.

Everybody was smoking. There was cigarette smoke everywhere. Pastor Toby came up to Runt and asked if he could get a light.

Aint got no lighter, Runt said. Gave it up years ago.

Lighting cigarettes? Pastor Toby said.

Yessir, if that the way you want to say it, Runt said.

Pastor Toby smiled at me and elbowed me in the ribs and laughed this wheezing laugh that made him sound terrible. He went all red in the face and started coughing.

I look round at all the children and I know Do-Ray at peace, he said.

She in a better place, Runt said.

Do-Ray was good people, Toby said. But these children and their children?

Toby shook his head.

They aint good, Runt said.

They good at bein bad I known that, Toby said. They worry Do-Ray so much she come to me and ask if God take people no more. If God just pick them up and take them up to him. She said she ask Dolene such and she said Dolene tell her Mama I can send you to Him. I can send you to him with a bullet. Toby sighed and held his thumb and pinkie to his head. They on the phone thing at the jail when she tell her that.

Toby fumbled through his pockets and pulled out a matchbook and lit his cigarette and dragged on it and looked at the front of the church.

Still look good, Runt, he said. But them crosses crooked ways you think? Shoulda never given you no money for that. Toby laughed and wheezed and elbowed me in the ribs, his teeth big and yellow and like a dog's.