Vernon God Little

Lally switches off the engine, looks at the joints, picks one off the floor, sniffs it, and grins. Then he looks at me. 'Tch – you could've just said you didn't want to share.'

'Uh, they ain't mine actually.'

'Not for long, anyway,' he says, frowning into his mirror.

I spin around to see the Smith County truck nose onto Beulah Drive, a block behind us. Velcro fucken ant-farms seize my gut.

'Here, give them to me,' says Lally. He lifts himself up, and stashes the joints through a tear in the seat.

'Thanks – I'll be right back.' I fly across our lawn, into the house, and up the hall to my room, where I pick the cap off the ginseng. I take Taylor 's LSD pearls and poke them into the bottle. They blend right into the piss, and the cap replaces like new. I drop the bottle into the Nike box, next to my padlock key, and hide it back in my closet. As I stroll onto the porch, all nonchalant, cooled by a sweat of relief, I see Vaine Gurie, Mom, and a Smith County officer arrive in the truck. Air-conditioning blows their hair like seaweed underwater, except Mom's, which blows more like one of those tetchy anemone things. Lally sits quiet in the shade of the Lechugas' willow. I guess he turned out okay, ole Lally, in the end. 'A good egg,' as the once-talkative Mr Goddam Nuckles would say.

Fate suddenly plays its regular card. Leona's Eldorado sashays past the pumpjack, full of musty, dry wombs and deep, bitter wants. Mom withers. The fucken timing of these ladies is astounding, I have to say, like they have scandal radar or something. They foam out of the car like suds from a sitcom washing machine, except for Brad, who stays in back. He's eating a booger, you can tell. Betty Pritchard gets out and starts to strut around the lawn like a fucken chicken.

'I think I need the bathroom – I just can't be sure with this infection.'

Leona and George take the high ground by our willow. 'Hi, Doris,' they wave. I almost make it back into the house, but Vaine Gurie unfolds faster than you'd expect from the cab of the truck. ' Vernon Little, come down here please.'

'Another setback, Doris?' asks Leona, hopefully.

'Well it's nothing, girls,' says Mom. 'There's some fudge inside.'

'We don't have long,' says Leona, 'they're coming to lay the sunken patio at three.'

'Well, I thought it was the people with my Special Edition,' says Mom, scuttling over the dirt. 'I saw the car, and thought the new fridge was here…'

'Ma?' I call. She doesn't hear.

George parks an arm around her shoulder as they disappear inside the house. 'Honey, of course they'll come after him if he insists on looking like that – that haircut's the pits.'

The screen clacks shut, Mom's voice trails away into the dark. 'Well I couldn't sway him, you know how boys are…'

' Vernon,' says Gurie. 'Let's go for a little ride.'

I search her face for signs of uncovered truth, imminent apology. None appear. 'Ma'am, I wasn't even there…'

'Is that right. Makes it difficult to explain the fingerprints we found then, doesn't it.'

Picture a Smith County Sheriff's truck with me inside, sitting quiet on a road between three wooden houses. Bugs chitter in the willows, oblivious. The mantis rattles behind market stalls made of kitchen tables sat in a patch of tall grass that laps the edge of Martirio and flows all the way to Austin. Then Brad Pritchard appears at my window; nose to the sky, finger pointed at his shoes.

'Air Maxes,' he states. 'New.'

He stands with his eyes shut, waiting for me to blow a fucken kiss, or break down weeping or something. Asshole.

I lift my leg to the window. ' Jordan New Jacks.'

He squints momentarily before pointing at my Nikes. 'Old,' he explains patiently. Then he points at his. 'NEW.'

I point at his, 'Price of a Barbie Camper.' Then at mine, 'Price of a medium-range corporate jet.'

'Are not.'

'Are fucken too.'

'Enjoy jail.'

His shuffle across the lawn turns into a scamper up the porch steps. A single raised finger shines back at me through my own front doorway, until the screen cracks shut in front of it. Then, just as the officers start the truck, the screen swings open again. My ole lady bursts out, and hurries down to the road.

' Vernon, I love you! Forget about before – even murderers are loved by their families, you know…'

'Heck, Ma, I ain't a murderer!'

'Well I know – it's just an example.'

Lally shoots me a stare from his van, motioning like a camera with his hands. 'Just say the word!' he yells.

Mom stands helpless in the road behind us, and parks her chin on her chest. Her lips prime up for tears. The pain of it ploughs me over, inside out. I spin to see Lally through the back window as he rushes to her, puts a hand to her shoulder. Her ole soggy head leans toward it. He slides his shoulder under to absorb her tears, then stands tall, and stares gravely at my truck disappearing.

I can't take it. I lunge across Gurie and holler back through her window with all the air in the fucken world: 'Do it, Lally – tell 'em the fucken truth.'

Jail is sour tonight. Dead like the air between your ass and your underwear when you're sitting down. A TV buzzes somewhere in the background; I listen out for a news-flash about my i

'Don't you let me find them burgers gone, I mean it. Sure, right, it's Dr Actions Diet Revolution now, huh. All your noise about Prettykins, and now – don't tell me – it's a fuckin burger diet, right? Sure, fuckin protein, uh-huh. What? Because there is no other news except your fuckin barn of an ass…'

The man stops outside my cell. Light through the grille outlines a fuck-you pout crowded with teeth. Barry E Gurie – Detention Executive, says the badge. He sees me awake, and presses the phone into his neck.

'You ain't pullin your rod in there are ya, Little? You ain't chokin your chicken all day and night, are ya?' He laughs this smutty laugh, like Miss goddam Universe just sucked his boy or something. Even at long range his breath hits you like a solid block, just slithers down your face leaving a trail of onion-relish and lard. What a disgusting human being, I swear. If this is how much of an asshole everybody's going to be, about such a devastating fucken issue, then I better get the hell out of town. Maybe even out of Texas. Just until they get the story straight. Nana's ain't even fucken far enough, the way folk are behaving right now.

Barry continues his rounds, lingering for the rest of the night down by the TV. I lay back onto the bunk in my cell, and drift into the important and scary business of my future. Remember that ole movie called Against All Odds, where this babe has a beach-house in Mexico? That's where I can run. Mom can visit after things die down. There she is, sobbing with joy, ole spanky-cheeked Doris Little, who could be played by Kathy Bates, who was in that movie Misery. Tears of pride at the excellent sanitation, and at my decent, orderly life. See how it works? It's the future now, young Vernon has been vindicated. Now he's buying her a clay donkey, or some of those salad utensils Mrs Lechuga makes such a big deal about. The salad utensil seller would say to me, 'You want the same kind Mrs Lechuga got, or you want the Deluxe edition?' There's a fucken point up Mrs Lechuga's ass. See? That's definitely my new plan. I like the food just fine, burritos, and cappuccinos and whatever. They say money's cheap down there, hell – I could really make good. Folk must live in those beach-houses, for real.

But the pessimist in me says, 'Kid, forget vacations, what yez need is a cake wid a fuckin bomb in it.' My pessimist has a New York accent, don't ask me why. I ignore it. The question of the babe needs thought; you never see guys ru