Page 53 of On the Land, We Shoot Straight

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here was enough in the harvest to run them on the two shifts, and Grady lamented not sleeping together.

Cole must’ve felt it too because he rolled his eyes at Grady when Grady came walking out of the house at dusk to take the night shift and Cole was coming back in.

Cole smiled at him, sly under the summer sweat and his hair in that bun.

He put his hand on Grady’s chest, pushed him until he was walking back and falling down on the couch.

And, all right, Grady thought as Cole got his pants open, this was one way to ensure they got some time.

It happened on a crossover a few days later, Cole heading out at dawn while Grady was coming back in, when they heard a car in the distance.

Grady turned to the sound and felt Cole doing the same, felt the morning elation at seeing one another drain away as that sound came closer, came on until Grady could see with perfect clarity the white sedan.

“Well, I’ll be,” Grady said and stood on the porch, Cole frozen a little ways behind him.

“I ain’t—”

Grady glanced at Cole, at the paleness that had taken over his face, the terror, and he wondered how in the hell he hadn’t put it together before.

“You ain’t got nothin’ to worry about is what you ain’t,” Grady said and turned back at the same time as he heard the car door slamming.

“Grady,” Tom said, cheerful in a way that solidified Grady’s rage. And then he was looking right past Grady and smiling so sleazy it was like Grady could feel it sliding under his skin and making him dirty.

“Jesse Cole,” Tom said, smile wide and threatening. “You thought any more on my offer?”

Grady stepped forward, leaned against the post, crossed his ankles and spat.

“Cole,” Grady said.

“Yeah…” Cole’s voice broke. He cleared his throat and said, “Yeah?” again more firmly.

“Why don’t you go on down to the basement and get my granddaddy’s shotgun,” Grady said.

“Yes. Yessir,” Cole said, and Grady heard him opening the door.

Tom raised his palms, smile widening, but there was uncertainty in it now. “Whoa, Grady. We’re all friends here.”

“The shells are sittin’ right by the whiskey,” Grady called.

He could hear Cole belting down the basement stairs and knew he’d heard him.

“What’s that boy been tellin’ you, huh?” Tom gave him an Aww shucks, kids? What can you do? look. “’Cause I can set the record straight. What me and that boy had—”

“I reckon you better stop talkin’ before I decide to shoot you in the nuts instead of the head,” Grady said.

Tom blanched and lowered his hands. “You can’t be serious. Over that whore?”

Grady could feel Cole behind him, standing at the door and listening.

“What’d you pay him?” Grady asked.

Tom raised both eyebrows, balking at the question before he even answered. “What do you mean what’d I pay him?”

“You be callin’ him a whore. Whores be gettin’ paid, last time I checked. So, what’d you pay him?”

“It wasn’t that kinda deal, Grady,” Tom shook his head like Grady was an errant child in this scenario, or some old man on the land who just didn’t get it. “We made a deal. Young Jesse knew the score—”

“So.” Grady recrossed his legs and spat again. Then he looked back at Tom. Head on. “What you’re sayin’ is you struck a deal with a minor for sex.”

“It wasn’t—”

“Have you met my ex-wife?”

“What?”

“My ex-wife. She’s lawyerin’ in the city. I called her up on account of you.”

“Now, Grady, I think that there boy’s been fillin’ your head with his bullshit.

He’s good at that, real fuckin’ good. He ain’t just a whore.

” Tom looked fit to bursting now, and here was the insufferable prick Grady had always known lurked not too far from the surface with this one.

“He’s got a real colorful imagination. You take my meaning? ”

“What I take, Tom, is you lookin’ at a long stretch inside, gettin’ your ass pounded in the showers.” Grady looked over his shoulder. “You got my gun there, Cole?”

Cole came out, and Grady was pleased to see his face set and his fury on full display.

“Here you go,” Cole said as he handed it over. “I done loaded it for you.”

Tom put his hands back up, and Grady checked the barrel. Locked and loaded, all right.

“Hold up, now just fuckin’ hold up,” Tom was saying.

Grady lifted the shotgun and pointed it right at the center of Tom’s head.

“Whaddya reckon, Cole?” Grady asked.

“I reckon he’s a rapist fuckin’ piece of shit who sells young boys so he can make money outta useless cunts who don’t know no better!”

Grady looked at Cole from the side without moving the gun or his line of sight from his target.

“Good to hear you finally openin’ up,” Grady said.

Cole laughed, surprised. “Ah, fuck off.”

Grady nodded and looked back at Tom. “Your call, Cole.”

His finger pressed down on the trigger as he listened to Cole’s breaths moving in and out of his chest beside him.

Tom’s eyes flicked from the gun to Cole, lips parted like he was about to speak, but nothing was coming out.

Grady applied some more pressure on the trigger, just waiting for the word, his eye tracking a drop of sweat trickling down Tom’s forehead.

“He ain’t worth it,” Cole said.

Tom looked between them, so genuinely panicked, Grady thought he might piss himself.

“I dunno, I reckon I’d like to take the shot.”

“Tell him! Tell him, Jesse! Tell him it wasn’t all like that!” Tom shrieked.

Cole crossed his arms over his chest. “It wasn’t like what? You blackmailing me and selling me off to your friends?”

“You fuckin’ enjoyed yourself! You loved it! You fuckin’ lying slut!”

Grady shifted the sight and shot the ground right in front of Tom’s crotch so the dirt exploded, showering him.

He pulled the fore-end to the rear of the gun, ejecting the used cartridge, cocked the hammer, reloaded the next shell in the chamber, pushed the slide forward in rapid movements, ready to fire again.

“Nice fuckin’ shot!” Cole sounded delighted, and Grady smiled.

“You were sayin’, Tom?”

“You’re fuckin’ crazy,” Tom hissed.

“I reckon you owe my man here an apology,” Grady said.

“Man?!” Tom screeched.

“Yeah.” Grady shifted his sight to Tom’s crotch. “And I reckon you got ten seconds to make it, or you ain’t gonna have no claim to that title yourself.”

“Not that you got one anyway,” Cole said.

“Fuck, okay, look, I reckon there’s been—”

“Eight seconds.”

“Right, fuck!”

“Seven.”

“I’m sorry, okay! I’m fuckin’ sorry!”

“For what?”

“For, for...”

“For rapin’ my Cole here,” Grady gritted out, “for thinkin’ the likes of you even got the right to look at him, let alone be touchin’ him.”

Tom was nodding. “Yes, all right. Yes.”

Grady brought the gun down. “Get the fuck off my land. And if you ever come near Cole or me again, you’re dead, you hear me?”

Tom was nodding. “What about, what about the lawyer?”

Grady leaned on post, the gun loose in his hand. “I need to think on it. Maybe the police be comin’ round one day soon.”

Tom shook his head. “No, we gotta make a deal.”

Grady brought the gun up again and fired another round to Tom’s left. Tom danced like a Looney Tunes character, and Cole lost it laughing.

“I want you to hear me real good now, Tom. Real good,” Grady said and reloaded, fired to Tom’s right for good measure. The rapid succession of bullets chased each other in an echo of claps thundering across the landscape as Tom tap danced around and held his head.

“You listenin’?”

“Yes!”

“We don’t make no deals with the likes of you, ya hear?

Maybe Cole gonna decide in a few years this here was a crime he can’t get past and you need to be meetin’ retribution.

Then we be comin’ for you, and you’ll die.

Or maybe we decide to get my ex-wife and press charges and the police be comin’.

Point is, you don’t get to decide, ya hear?

Cole decides. And you get to live the rest of your life waitin’ on that day. ”

Tom nodded, and Grady saw he’d pissed himself.

“Now go on and get in that there car and get outta here before I change my mind and decide to end this right now.”

Tom turned and ran for his car, his gaze flicking over his shoulder and his eyes skittering over to where Grady kept the gun trained right on him. Grady left it on him as he started the car, made a U-turn and tore out of there faster than Grady thought was possible.

“So, you know, then,” Cole said as the sound of Tom’s car faded.

Grady brought the gun down. “I mighta had some thoughts on it.”

Cole was nodding, his eyes down. “Did you really call Charmaine?”

“I did.”

Cole nodded again. He sat on the porch step like all the life just left him.

“I ain’t makin’ no moves without you, I just wanted to know what the score was in case you wanted to be dealin’ with it that way.” Grady leaned the gun on the porch railing and sat.

“It ain’t that,” Cole said and shook his head. He looked askance at Grady. “I’m, you know”—he waved a hand—“glad you believin’ me enough to even be makin’ a call.”

“I know you,” Grady said.

Cole nodded and looked into the distance at the bright pinks on the horizon staining the sky and escorting the sun’s arrival.

“What is it, then? You look like a dead man.”

Cole looked down at his hands and blew out a long breath. “I just didn’t want you to be knowin’ all that.”

Grady nodded. “I can understand that, but it don’t change nothin’. You done nothin’ wrong.”

Cole shook his head and grimaced. “I did, though. God, but I was so fuckin’ stupid.”

“You were a boy.”

“Yeah, but I shoulda, I dunno. It was so fuckin’ stupid.

You know how it started?” Cole glanced at Grady, his face torn in shame.

He looked away and went on without waiting on an answer.

“Harvest Festival. I had a crush on this city boy who was with the band. One of their kids. We were both fourteen, and we’d been flirtin’ all day, you know?

And then I asked him to meet me at the bathrooms, and we kissed and then, and then—”