Abe

At seven o’clock the alarm rang. With halfhearted loathing he reached over and turned it off, and raised himself upon his elbows to turn and toss his pillow so that he could rest his head on the cool rejuvenating opposite side. Outside his home the people of the town and the surrounding country were already beginning their day. The farmers were preparing tractors and strippers and module builders, and on the area ranches, the hands were already sitting atop the sweated backs of their horses as they trotted and occasionally loped through pastures to get where they were going, slowing only to stop and roll a morning cigarette and pass the pouch of Bugler around for everyone to have. For every cowhand is a smoker in the company of his peers and early of a cool dark morning.

Abe Collard never woke before eight though. That hour, he felt, was late enough to miss the sunrise, which he found to be aesthetically anti-climactic, and therefore, depressing. It was a reminder of a time lived waking long before its rise, which would signal the commencement of a day he wished not to face. They were days lived by stubbornness to an ideal he did not believe in, but one that he could not see himself without. Days started in darkness and a heavy stomach turning meal (that was later replaced with superfluous amounts of coffee and cigarettes) that, in spite of the dependably rising sun, stayed mired in darkness to him.

This day there was no sunrise however, as it stood tucked in behind still grey clouds, as if to show itself would be too presumptuous, too farcical a gesture. For funerals on bright days seem inappropriate, and for as substantial a funeral as this one, a sunny day would be downright blasphemous. For although part of the function of a funeral is to serve as a comfort to those in grief, they do not. The people of Deasy, Texas did not want to be comforted. They wanted to stand alone with clenched teeth, and hearts of blame and confusion. They wished merely to espouse more of their indignities until at last they were exhausted. They would gather afterwards and trade quaint sayings they had already heard, and which they had no faith in. And everyone would add a story about themselves and the departed, and sometimes people would laugh, especially if it was the kind of story that everyone already knew, told by someone they already knew. And the raconteur would tell it with such ebullience and affected good-heartedness that tears would well up in his eyes (it is always a he, because in a town such as Deasy, what exploits could a “she” have that could cause such great admiration, and why would a “she” bear witness to such endeavors), not because of the memory, but because of his excruciating inability to portray his true feeling for the departed, and his tortured confusion over why someone would do such a thing. Then they would fall back on the one thing they all believed yet had no understanding of. “God works in mysterious ways… I guess.”

“He’s with God now.”

“He’s gone to heaven.” the mothers would say to their children.

“He’s ridin’ fer the Lord, probably, cuttin’ im’ out a string right now boys.”

“I bet it’s the toughest one He’s got!”

“Yeah, but it’d be the best one after he’s through, by God!”

And everyone would laugh and try to feel good about the prospect, and some really believed it. And Mary Joe would walk up to Damon, place her hand on the back of his neck and say “You know, the Lord lost his son too.”



At seven fifty nine Abe lay staring at the clock by his bed and at eight, he reached over and shut it off before it could finish one cycle of rings. He tried to remember the dream he was having. He was disappointed to wake up. A girl had been leading him from room to room of a house, presumably to be alone with him, and they were being continually interrupted shortly after reaching a new room. As he lay awake, he tried to remember the dream, but it left him. In his waking consciousness he and the girl were trying to be alone to have sex.

Abe’s bedroom was dirty, his whole house was. Not terribly dirty, just basically unkempt. His work clothes lay on the floor for a few days before he would put them in the laundry, the floors were rarely cleaned, nor was the furniture dusted. Every few months when he would feel the house was unlivable and they were going to start doing things different, he’d hire a lady to come and clean the place, and in a few weeks those plans were forgotten and the house would become dirty again. The jeans he wore the day before laid by his bed in a dirty heap with his old shirt. Wear those old jeans this morning, shower later, no need to now, just get dirty again, smell bad though, who cares, just for a couple hours. He slipped the jeans on grabbed a clean shirt and went downstairs. He went by Judy’s room; she had already left to school. Up early every morning…. like her mother…just like her mother, damn groupie, how many has she been with? Empty head, empty soul, little whore. Took nothing from me, hates me, doesn’t realize it, she does though…..can’t blame’er. Christine, my life, my heart, my soul, my love. Abe paused and sat down on the hallway floor, he was having difficulty breathing; he always did when he thought of her. How would I have done it? Gun? Probably. Pills? Where would I get them? Oh you’d find’em, find em if you wanted to. Hangin’ no way, couldn’t do it. Makes a statement though, say he asphyxiated, didn’t break his neck, hell of a way to do it, take some brass…I guess. Don’t no one know why. Humph! I know. I know why, don’t blame’im neither. Father like that. Wisht I’da had a boy. Sometimes. He paused and considered the prospect, his breath was returning. Naw, wouldn’a been no better. Abe stood up and lit a cigarette, grabbed his coat and walked out the door to his pickup.

The temperature was cool and a brisk wind blew. No birds sang this morning, and the wind blew through the bare mesquites, whose bark was a grey color as well and it seemed to Abe this morning that all the color had gone out of the world. But northwest Texas is just like that in the winter. The bright greens leave the mesquite trees, and the sparse grass turns brown. Only in the rocky cedar breaks do dark colors of those coniferous trees stay through winter. On a good rainy year, the wheat fields come alive with the thriving plant, and Mexican cattle in different varieties of color, populate them and become round and fat on the rich and nutritious grazing. But such years are rare, and as Abe drove down the dirt road by his home, he wondered about this town he lived in, and why he was still here. When he was a young man he had went to Arizona and Montana for a short stint. Those were beautiful places, he remembered. Arizona had reminded him of home, but more rugged, more intense. The rocks were larger, the trees fuller, and the mountains, how he loved those mountains. He loved their beauty and their roughness. He loved the sight of cattle running away through the trees and down into dark thick canyons, the crooked Joshua’s growing next to the tall straight pines, and the deep soulful bawl of the redbones and walkers on a lion’s trail reverberating off canyon walls. Then in Montana, the way the country would become so overwhelmingly green in the spring when the snows would melt and the rivers and creeks would run so fast and uncontrollably, and all one could see was the color green, a world brimming with life. The winters in both places, would bring snow, the wonderful white blanket that preserved life in those places through the harsh cold of winter.

It rarely snowed in Texas, and it was never a welcome event when it did. The people were unprepared and it forced everyone into homes and pickups. One winter though when Abe was still a young man, and he and Damon were still friends, they took two young horses for a ride out into the snow, because they were young and wild themselves and everyone else was inside and they felt they needed to do something to prove themselves (as young men do). So they saddled two four year old horses that belonged to Damon and laughed and yelled as the two broncs broke into crow-hop jumps in the street in front of Damon’s house, and they whipped them into a lope and headed into the pasture of a ranch they often worked for. Upon topping a rise and looking out into a canyon, Damon realized that Abe had not followed.

“What ya stoppin’ for, ya tired. Wanna go home, are you cold little guy.” Damon joked.

“Naw, I just like it here Damon, might as well let these horses blow a little huh?”

“Shit, fuck’em, they wanna buck, they can go.”

“Hell, they’re doin' all right, just got a little humpy, that’s all, it’s cold ya know.”

Damon was confused by his friend. They got off and loosened their cinches.

“Kinda like Arizona, huh?” Abe said. The snow was still falling lightly. Only a few inches had fallen, but it was enough to cover what little grass there was, and the cedars were covered with a wonderful white frosting.

“Yeah, not as big though, you miss it, Arizona?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, me too, did some wild stuff out there.”

“Miss Montana too.”

“Not me, them winters was too cold, I couldn’ hardly stand it.”

“I liked it. It always was so nice once you finally did get warm.”

“I don’t think I ever got warm while we was there. Not once.”

They stood in silence, and Damon wondered about his friend and the strange way he was acting. So he taunted him hoping it would take away his unease.

“Are we gonna go or do you need to wipe you’re pussy off first?”

Abe didn’t acknowledge him, he stared, stone faced out into the white day. “You ever think of going to church?”

“Church? No I ain’t the church kind. You ain’t neither, if that’s what you’re gettin’ at.”

“Ain’t I?”

“No.”

“I wish you wouldn’ say stuff like that, how’dyou know I’m not?”

“Cause Abe, you like to get drunk and smoke, and gamble, and cuss and fight.” He paused. “And fuck. Why you wanna start going to church, them people, they don’t enjoy nothin’, I wanna have some fun in my life, and I know you do too.

“I ain’t havin fun. I never do. Just get drunk and do stupid shit, it don’t never lead to nothin'…. nothin'. Just end up passin' out somewhere, or end up with some girl I couldn’ give a shit less 'bout, and then everybody just laughs about it nex’ day, and it’s s’posed to be funny, and then that’s who everyone thinks you are, and they call us ‘wild bitches’ and ‘wild motherfuckers’ and I’m tired of it, ‘f I hear the word wild one more time I’m liable to lose my shit.”

“Well, that’s what cowboys do Abe, we get wild, cause it’s fun and exciting.”

“Not all of ‘em. Tom Casy don’t.”

“Well he’s an old timer. They all had fun when they was young. When you get old, then you worry about church. Shit when we was kids that’s what we talked about was growin' up and doin' all that stuff, now you don’t wanna do it no more? You still even wanna be a cowboy?”

“No. I don’t know, sometimes I don’t think so.”

“I can’t believe this shit, did you do some kinda dope last night?”

“We just wanted to do all that cause everybody we knew did, just like us now. They didn’t like it neither, but they was just scared to admit, so they told us how great it was, but it wasn’t.”

“What the fuck are you talkin’ about? I can’t even understand it.”

“I’m just tired of not ever getting’ anywhere, it don’t lead to no end. Drinkin’ and carryin’ on, fuckin’ girls I don’t care ‘bout.”

“Are you a fuckin’ fag Abe, is that what you’re tryin’ to tell me? You don’t wanna fuck no more girls?” He laughed. “You wanna fuck me?”

Abe looked at his friend in disgust. He wondered if they had ever really been friends at all. “You’re gonna have a kid Damon. What about that, Jesse’s pregnant. You gonna show yer kid how to do all this stuff, and be a cowboy? By time he’s growed up, ain’t gonna be no cowboyin no more. He’s just gonna be like one a’ those silly east Texas rednecks that wears hats and drives a truck, and tells everyone how his daddy was a cowpuncher.”

“Well his daddy was a cowpuncher, by God. And that’s more than you’re fuckin’ kid’ll ever be able to say. You just mind your own fuckin’ business bout what I do.”

“Sarah, she’s pregnant.”

“Oh, is that why you’re all fucked up, now?”

“No, I been fucked up a while now.”

“You gonna marry her?”

“Got to.”

“Gonna start goin to church and havin’ a family, doin right by the Lord huh? I guess you’ll be too good for me then?”

“What’re you talkin’ bout, I’m tellin’ ya all this cause you’re my friend. I wanna help you out same as I do myself. But I can’t keep goin’ on livin’ like this no more.”

“Well this is how I live. And if you can’t cut it no more, than we ain’t friends, and if you don’t wanna punch cows no more, than might as well start now and jerk yer fuckin’ kack off my horse, and hoof it home with all the resta them town raised pussies. And if you wanna come to blows ‘bout it, that’s just fine too.”

Abe did not want to come to blows about it though. He undid his cinches and pulled off his saddle, and let it fall down into the snow, and sat down on it looking into the canyon and turning his back on his friend. Damon slipped his rope around the horse’s neck and threw Abe’s headstall at him, and rode home.


As he drove down the street a new dog ran from each house to chase off Abe’s pickup, and he drove on as if they were not there. Oughta keep’em tied, run all over the damn town, breed my good bitches, I’ll kill one’a them sons-a-bitches ‘fI ever see one around my place. The dogs never came by Abe’s house. They had been shot at with bird shot and bb guns and new better. They waited until nightfall. Twice now they’d bred Abe’s good cur bitch, and twice now he’d killed a litter of pups.

What am I doing here. Don’t like any of ‘em. Got nothin’ to say, nothin’. Don’t go in today. Go home, head to the shop. Don’t head in there. Might eat. Abe never ate in the morning. Probably ought to. Say it’s good to eat mornin’s, stead of late at night. Don. Hate him. Rick. Loser. No good, cold hearted. They’d hate me ‘f they knew me. Nothin’ to say. Nothin! Me neither. He walked through the door of the local store and grabbed a coffee cup.

“Whu you know this mornin’ Abe.”

“Take a fat dog to way a ton Rick. You reckon?”

“Shore’nuff.”

“Whu you know? Whatchew got goin’ today?”

“Aaahwww just piddlin’, you know.”

“Piddlin’! What’s that mean Rick? Mean sittin’ around?”

“He’s gettin’ purty good at it. He’s piddlin’ in here all the time.” Steve laughed.

“Bull shit!” He paused and looked shamefully away from the others. “Naw, I went out yesterday and tried to move some pipe around, you know that old pipe back there by my pens. I couldn’ hardly even bend over to get’em, they just ain’t no way.

“Man yer age cain’t be a hurtin’ his back. Shit when I was yer age you couldn’ hurt me with an axe, Abe too, we was some tough ones now. Whipped every son of a bitch I ever fought too, and had any pussy I wanted.” Don laughed.

“Yer more full a shit than a Christmas goose Don, you know that.” Steve retorted. Steve was a man of incredible stupidity, who spoke almost exclusively in regional colloquialisms and became confused when those around him did not.

“Been wantin’ to do it awhile, but been sa busy, I ain’t been able to.”

“Busy, you ain’t never busy!”

“He gets busy when ya bring out that Keystone Light!” They all laughed.

“Shit, I don’t see you steppin’ around all the time Abe, ‘cept when they’s a few Keystones around. In fact you got the dangedest timin’ I ever seen. ‘Bout five o’clock, you seem to always turn up where they’s a few beers.”

“Well man gotta be good at somethin’, and I guess the Lord just blessed me with a good beerdar.”

“A beerdar! I’ll tell you what Abe, you come up with some of the dangedest shit I ever heard.” Don said.

“Yeah, I’m gonna remember that one.” And Steve was very pleased with himself. He had another phrase to add to his vocabulary. Over the course of the next week he’d spend every conversation trying to work it in, and of course would.

“I ain’t got a place that’s paid for, so I can come and go and not worry ‘bout payin’ no bills for, I got a place to look after, an’ I always work so’s I can by my damn mortgage.”

“Well Rick, guess it’s just my good luck