PIGGS - A Novel with Bonus Screenplay by Neal Barrett Jr Read Free Book Online

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    Cecil hadn't ever hit on his girls.   If he had, Gloria would know in about a minute flat.   Which didn't mean he wasn't starting now.   Guys like Cecil, he was halfway done.   One little feelie, that was the foreplay, that was romance.   Onto the good part, bingo!     Roll on off and take a nap.   It is plain irritating, she thought, that I got to be first.   How about Laura and Maggie, why's he got to start with me?
    There was no way out, she knew that.   Jump out the door, Cecil would get her right back.   Gloria Mundi, both legs broken, crawling down the road.   Back in the car, Cat Eye and Grape, putting on a splint, Cecil feeling her up again.
     
    C at Eye was driving, Cat Eye who scared her half to death, a mean-ass grizzly with a minus IQ, the wheel buried somewhere in his lap.   Grape there with him, squeezed in somewhere, crushed against the door.
    The A/C was high as it would go, cold enough to freeze an Eskimo.   Not high enough, in Gloria's mind, to mask the ghastly essence, the stink and the stench, that hung in heavy layers in the car.   All it did was make the Frito farts and the taco breath, the belches and the sweats, the day-old doughnuts and cigarette butts, smell cold.
    Jack McCooly had told her once:   "Gangsters smell worse than anyone else.   The Learning Channel did a whole show on it, that's a scientific fact."
    And Gloria thought:   Jack McCooly doesn't have a lot of sense, but he is dead on right about that.
     
    T he rain passed quickly, leaving scarcely any mark behind, moving on south to disappoint a hundred Texas towns.   The night began to fade, giving way to pale bands of lavender, peach and dirty gray, worn and tattered colors, washed too many times,   left out to dry in the hot and unforgiving summer day.
    A traffic light blinked on Crockett and Main.   Cat Eye ran it, drove through town in a minute and a half.   Dark farm houses after that, the single harsh glare of a 7-Eleven store.   Two more miles down the empty highway.   Cat Eye made a hard left, stopped too fast, gravel snapped beneath the tires.   And, for an instant, the headlights swept across a sign, hanging, dangling at a tilt, battered, sun-peeled, weathered and cracked, rusted and pocked by shooters passing by, the words so faded they might have been purple, red or black, a sign, if you took the time to read it, said:
    BATTLE OF BRITUN
    FAMILY FUN PARK
     
    A gate blocked the way.   Cecil leaned up and said, "Grape, get out and get that."
    "Now you don't need to," Gloria said, "I can do it just fine—"
    Popped the door and slid out fast, one foot quickly on the ground.   Cecil stretched out a hillbilly hand, gently pulled her back.
    "Hey, I won't have that.   I don't see a lady home, leave her walking in the dark."
    His fingers felt cold and the dark was just fine.
    "It isn't any trouble, I do it all the time."
    "We haven't had a chance to talk."
    "We ought to do that.   We ought to set a time."
    "Right now's just fine for me."
    "It is awful late, all right?"
    "It's awful early's what it is.   You got any coffee up at your place?"
    "I am real tired, Mr. Dupree."
    "Cecil."
    "What?"
    "You were going to call me Cecil.   We talked about that.   I said, you don't have to call me Mr. Dupree.   You said, all right, that'll be fine."
    "It is awful early, Cecil, could we do it some other time?   Don't take offense I am simply too tired."
    "You'll feel better," Cecil said, "you get off your feet a while.   The dance is a demanding profession, you don't have to tell me that.   I've known dancers all my life.   I know how much you're giving of yourself."
    She didn't look at him, didn't try again.   Knew there wasn't any use in that.   The way his words came out said Cecil was tired of being nice.   Tired of acting like someone had a say but him.
    She stepped out on the road.   The days were too hot to let the night cool down.   After the car, the hot smelled clean.   Dry yellow grass,