53
and dug a wrench out of the toolbox and took it to him. He shook his head. “The socket son, the fucking socket.” I went back to the toolbox and got it. A little while later I was back on the bench working on my schoolwork. This time it was Joe. “Nancy! Naaancy! Come over here and hold this light would you?” I couldn’t stand that shit, but I got up anyway and went and took the flashlight from him, and he crawled underneath the truck. “Hold it still would you?” When he finished, he got up and took the light from me. “Thank you ma’am,” he said, and I went back to the bench. A couple minutes later he was calling again. I ignored him. He kept on. “Nancy! Nancy!” I acted like I couldn’t hear him, like I was real focused. I couldn’t read a damn thing. My asshole was on fire. All the sudden I seen something shining, and I looked up. It was a beer can, and it hit me right in the head, right in the eye, a perfect circle right around the ball. I jumped up and grabbed at my face, and when I did my notebook slid off my lap and into an oil pan. The pages soaked up the grease like ink. I looked at Joe, and he just stood there chuckling—a retarded drunken grin scrawled across his face. I picked up a wrench and chucked it at his stupid face as hard as I could, but somehow the drunk bastard moved out the way and started laughing even harder. “Asshole.” Daddy gritted his teeth and got up off the ground and took off the old Dale Earnhardt hat he always wore and hung it up on the mirror of the truck. He come and grabbed me by the nap of the shirt and pushed me out behind the shed. As soon as we were out in the dark he slung me forward and onto the ground. By the time I turned over onto my back he was on top of me, his forearms on the notches of my shoulders pinning me down to the ground, his face pushed right up into mine, our foreheads touching. His breath smelled like stale beer and chewing tobacco. “What the fuck is wrong with you, boy?” he said through his teeth. “With me? It wadn’t…” He head-butted me so hard my eyes jarred, lit up and flashed like heat lightning. Then he sat up and spat to the right of me, and I started crying a little bit. He shook his head and laughed, scoffed at me. “Don’t act like a big man if you ain’t one, candy ass,” he said as he got up. “And don’t make me speak to you again.” When I went back into the shed Joe started snickering, but Daddy cut his eyes at