Scary Rednecks & Other Inbred Horrors (11 page)

“Yeah, lucky,” said
Enus
.

He ignored the cooler and grabbed the earthenware jug.
 
It was one of Daddy’s specials —
- The Sweetness
, they called it, and the taste lightened his feet.

Half an hour, six beers and an empty jug later, they were cruising the highway again.
 
They called it
rousting
.
 
Their daddies did it and their daddy’s daddies had done it.
 
It was family tradition and besides the guarding of the still, it was all they ever did.

Their hunting ground was a road that ran between the dark forests of Ooltewah and Cleveland, Tennessee.
 
Travelers had two choices.
 
They could take the newer Interstate 25 or the old highway.
 
Zeb
and
Enus
preferred the less traveled highway and concentrated their rousting there.
 
Besides the occasional cheerleader who dumped her date, or the young boy who ran away from home because his mommy and daddy cut his Sega-time down, the only people who traveled it were leftovers.

That’s what daddy called them.
 
Leftovers, those folks who had already wasted their chance and were merely waiting for Darwin to exert himself.
 
Zeb
and
Enus
were Darwin’s messengers, and in the battle of survival of the fittest, they were always on top.
 
It wasn’t as if they threw the leftovers away.
 
Leftovers were special ingredients that made everything taste better.
 
You never knew what you were
gonna
find.
 
Daddy said it was the mystery that enhanced the taste.

It had been a slow night and just as they were about to head home, the headlights illuminated a solitary figure walking along the side of the road.
 
Zeb
immediately slowed, the sheep skinner gripped in his left hand.
 
They could tell by the walk that it was a man and
Enus
laughed loudly.

“Like you said,
Zeb
.
 
It’s your turn.”

Zeb
shot him a look that was meant to kill, but it only succeeded in making
Enus
snort white-lightning through his nose as he laughed hysterically.

“Big bad Zebulon,” continued
Enus
.
 
“
Rouster
of men and a closet homosexual.”

He dodged the half-full can of beer and grinned wider as it flew through the open window.

“Hey, don’t get mad at me.
 
I offered to help, but you said,
Nooooo
.”

The sheep skinner rose and sank between
Enus
’ legs, impaling the seat.
 
A little of the moonshine spilled from
Enus
’ shaking hands, hiding any piss that may have inadvertently escaped due to the proximity of the razor sharp blade to his manliness.

The pickup pulled just ahead of the walking man and stopped on the wide shoulder.
 
Enus
opened his door and leaned out.
 
The light had been removed several years ago, a solution to too many hitchhikers who bolted.

“Hey, Man.
 
You
wanna
ride?” Yelled
Enus
.

Their target was dressed in a black leather duster that hung all the way to the red clay dirt on the edge of the road.
 
His hair was likewise black and flowed halfway down the back.
 
Enus
thought of the hippie and hoped this one would scream the same way.

“I said, do you
wanna
ride?”

The man stopped by the back of the truck, his face and eyes cast in shadow.
 
His hands were clasped solemnly in front of him.

“Yes,” came a voice like a serpent’s hiss.

Enus
glanced at
Zeb
, who indicated the sheep skinner in his hand.
 

“No problem, stranger,” said
Enus
.
 
“You got any bags?”

Zeb
cracked his door and began to slide slowly out.

“Do I look like I have any bags?” asked the dark man.

“Well, no,” said
Enus
, letting the insult slip.
 
He’d have plenty of time to make the fucker pay.

“Come on in then, we need to get going.”

“I don’t think so,” said the voice.
 

“Then I guess I’ll just have to kill your sorry ass right here,” said
Zeb
from behind the man.

Zeb
lunged, the glistening blade held in a practiced hand, falling fast towards the unprotected back of the stranger.
 
Suddenly, his target wasn’t there.
 
Zeb
almost castrated himself on the follow-through, barely correcting in time.

“Behind you,” yelled
Enus
.

Zeb
spun around to find his target and cursed as the stranger raised its head.
 
The eyes were solid white and the mouth showed twin fangs, descending.

“Fuck.
 
It’s one of them,” said
Zeb
.

“One of what?
 
A faggot?”

“Worse.
 
A fucking vampire,” said
Zeb
with resignation.

The pickup wound through the hills and finally skidded to a stop as the road dead-ended in an unmarked cul-de-sac.
 
Kudzu covered trees surrounded the half-circle like sentinels and cicadas sang in the darkness.
 
Two men stood in the beams of the headlights, shotguns trained at the windows.

Zeb
and
Enus
jumped out, the latter carrying the Styrofoam cooler.

The men lowered their weapons, but still held them at their hips, just in case.

“What you boys bring us?” asked the one in the newer looking overalls.

“Sorry Dad,” said
Enus
.
 
“It was a bad night.”

“
Whatya
mean it was a bad night,” asked the other, much older gun-toting man.

Zeb
lowered his head and answered his Grandfather.
 
“We killed another one.”

Both men lowered their barrels to the ground and simultaneously spit out streams of ugly, brown tobacco juice.

Enus
shuffled forward and opened the cooler.
 
Within, lay a steaming black heart, their latest ingredient.

His father glanced inside and jerked his head behind him.
 
Through the trees,
Enus
saw the intricate pipes and pots of the family still.
 
The contraption hummed and rattled as heated air created the
Whitmire
family’s special moonshine.

“That’s a big one,” said the boy’s father, inspecting the heart.

“I’m getting sick of the taste, though.
 
Bloodsucker Special used to be a hot seller.
 
Now it’s like that Coca-Cola crap.
 
Everybody drinks it,” said the Grandfather.

by David Whitman

“My god do I hate fucking clowns,” Judd said, sipping his Budweiser from a Styrofoam cup, already feeling quite drunk.
 
How they had managed to get him to the circus in the first place, he had already forgotten.

“That’s because you’re afraid of them,” Max snickered.

Judd snorted.
 
“Yeah right.
 
They annoy the hell out of me, that’s why.
 
Look at that one with the blue hair.
 
He keeps looking at me and beeping his horn.
 
He does it one more time, I’m going to go down there and stick that fucking horn up his ass.”

Kenny Joe studied the clown as if imagining the scene Judd had described, a big, goofy grin brightening his chubby face as he brought the beer cup away from his lips.
 
The foam made his van dyke mustache look gray.
 
“That would be funny as shit if you started a clown riot, bro.”

“I must agree,” Bailey said, giggling like a child at the antics of the clowns.

The clown with the blue hair shot a cocky glance up at Judd, held his horn in the air, and tooted it three times.

“Oh my god, that’s it,” Judd said, leaping up from his seat and climbing down the bleachers, fists clenched tightly to his side.

“Go on, beat that clown’s ass!” Kenny Joe screamed after him.

Max was excited.
 
“I can’t believe he’s really going to do it!”

Judd got to the bottom, jumped over the small gate, and threw himself upon the clown.
 
The other clowns, as if sensing their comrade in trouble, ran to his aid, leaping into the kaleidoscopic pile one after another.

Soon, Judd was entangled in what appeared to be some sort of clown insect, gigantic shoes and rainbow colored gloves jutting and shifting around in every direction, a cloud of dirt balled around them like an insanely drawn cartoon.

Max, Kenny Joe and Bailey might have helped had they not been literally rolling out of their seats in laughter.
 
The sight of their good friend getting his ass beat by a gang of clowns was just too much for them to bear.
 
Kenny Joe found it particularly delightful, his big belly shaking up and down convulsively as he roared so hard he could not breathe.
 
Other spectators also found it amusing, judging by the barrage of hilarity erupting around the ring.

Judd felt as if every multicolored fist that slammed into his face was accompanied by a laugh track.

After a five-minute beating, the clowns heaved Judd out of the ring where he fell hard, gasping in pain.
 
The clown with the blue hair leaned over Judd, honked his horn three times, and ran back to join his colorful comrades.

A portly security guard waddled up to Judd, leaned forward and said, “I would arrest your sorry ass, but I’d say what just happened to you was punishment enough.”
 
He shook his head and walked away.

Judd closed his eyes and wished he would die.
 
When he opened them again, his friends were standing around him in a circle.

“Oh my fucking God, that was funny,” Max said.

“I must agree,” Bailey added, nodding his head.

“‘I’m going to go down there and stick that horn up his fucking ass,’” Kenny Joe said, imitating Judd’s voice, then falling back and erupting into giggles.

Judd struggled to his feet and pointed at each of his friends.
 
“Fuck you, fuck you and fuck you.
 
Get me out of this tent.”

By the time they made their way back outside Judd’s mood had improved considerably.
 
They bought some more beer and walked around taking in some of the sites of the circus.
 
The Butler brothers lost twenty bucks each trying to toss a basketball through a hoop while Max and Judd ate corn dogs.

“Max,” Judd said solemnly as they walked, his face still swollen from his beating.
 
“Do you think things will ever turn around for me, man?”

“You take things too seriously, Judd.
 
You just know when we’re two old bastards, sitting on the porch drinking whiskey we’ll be laughing at this shit.”

Judd smiled, then winced as his bleeding lips cracked.
 
“The way things are going, I
ain’t
gonna
make it to be no old man.
 
I agree with you, though, on one thing.
 
This shit is probably be
gonna
be a lot funnier after some years go by.”

Max snickered.
 
“I think it’s funny now, man.
 
You just got your ass beat by a clown posse.
 
Publicly
, I might add.”