You Don't Scare Me

Chapter One The first time Mama brought Crow Tillman around to the house, about three weeks after she'd met him, it was clear she already was head-over-heels. He hugged her a lot and gave her little kisses that had her simpering and said how glad he was to finally meet us. Us being me and my brother Jimmy. This was October, and about three years to the day they'd put Daddy in the ground. I didn't know what to think of Crow Tillman at first. Didn't much care for his name, that was for sure. "Crow." Wasn't short for anything, or if it was, he never said. That's the name went on their marriage license later on. Too soon to suit Jimmy and me. Anyway, he was tall, maybe six-two. Raven hair that he wore like an Indian, combed straight back and down over his shirt collar. Thick enough that he didn't have to gel or spray it. Said he had Choctaw blood. No reason to doubt him. He was plenty good-looking. The black eye patch didn't detract from his looks. He was lean and looked strong. A sharp dresser except for a ratty Richard Pettystyle rancher's straw with a couple kitchen matches stuck in the band. He wore starched pressed Wranglers and rattlesnake-skin boots. There were little gold chains across the insteps. He wore gold chains around his neck and three gold rings. Only one tat, unless there were others in places I'd never see. But that tattoo was scary. What happened to your eye? I asked him right off. Mama just took a deep breath and held it. But I'd always spoke exactly what was on my mind, and at fourteen I wasn't about to change. Lost it when I was ridin bulls in the PBR, Crow said. Did I say he smiled a lot? Too much, I was thinking. People who smiled all the time, in my estimation, didn't have a lot of humor in them. As we all learned later, that went double for Crow. And, as I heard later, he never was a bull rider. It was the point of a bowie knife in a bar fight that took out his eye. That's the way we learned about Crow, too late to save any of us: bits and pieces, rumors vague and rumors far-fetched. But they were all Jimmy and me had to go on; he wasn't forthcoming about any aspect of his life. What's the patch for? I said. Don't you have a glass eye? Now Chase, Mama pleaded. Crow's smile got bigger. Surely do. Want a see it? Jimmy and me both nodded. Mama halfway turned her back. He raised up the patch. Now that was the damnedest sight I'd seen in a long while. Jimmy gasped. It was a round glass eye; not much eyelid to cover it. So the eye just stared at you. The pupil was yellow. And on it, like a white scar, there was a bolt of lightning engraved. I looked at Mama like, Get rid of him, fast. I mean what kind of man spends money on an eye like that? Same kind, I suppose, has a coiled rattlesnake tattooed on the back of his left hand. That moved like it was fixing to strike when he made a fist a certain way. Mama looked anxious to get Crow out of the house now that the formalities were out of the way, go someplace where she could dote on him in private. I knew he had to be screwing her silly. Maybe I was only fourteen but I already knew how it went. I felt cold in the pit of my stomach thinking about that rattlesnake hand on her. What kind a work do you do? I asked. I own some properties, Crow Tillman said. Pays me a tidy sum. If it hadn't dawned on me before this, I sure had him pegged now. What he really wanted with Mama, what he truly was looking for. Turned out I was only half right. Before they went on their way for a night of line dancing at Cowboys and then to whatever motel Crow was staying at, we had to go outside to see his new truck, then admire his damn dog thaFarris, John is the author of 'You Don't Scare Me', published 2009 under ISBN 9780812584080 and ISBN 0812584082.