"What's that retard howling about now, Cloudy?" Skeet comes out a big truck with big wheels and black windows.
"Shut up Skeet," Uncle Cloudy says. "Y'all watch things while I walk Tank home. Come on, boy. Hold my arm. Look both ways like I told you before you cross the street."
"Okay."
"Where's your bicycle?"
"Where Fawquita pushed me."
"Why'd Fawquita push you?"
"I'm itching bad. I got the chiggers under my peter. I'm cold and wet and the chiggers are eatin' me up."
"Boy, answer me."
"I axsked if I could nurse."
"Say that again."
"I axsked if she would she let me nurse."
Uncle Cloudy hit me hard on the back of my head. "Boy, you better not be nursing from Fawquita." He hit me again. "Damnation, God in Heaven. That girl is nasty. You listen to me, boy." He stop me. "Look me in the eyes and listen to me. You listening?"
"Okay."
"You're not looking me in the eyes."
I look at his eyes. It makes it hard to listen that way.
"I hear you touching some girl's boobies I will whip you good, you hear me? Until you cain't sit no more. You hear me?"
"Uh-huh."
"Boy, quit your cryin'. Stop that cryin', now. Stop it, hush up. Your momma is gone raise Cain about this. Other people are gone treat you like a grown man not like the little boy you really are in you mind. The boy I know you are, your Momma knows you are and your Auntie Bunt knows you are." Uncle Cloudy starts shouting. "The State and that Miss Francis, that old prying bitch, been trying to take you away from us ever since you been on this earth. You do that to the wrong woman and we'll never see you again, you hear me? You just cain't do that, son. They'll throw you in Milledgeville."
I nod. He scares me.
"Hush that crying." Uncle Cloudy takes my hand and holds it tight. "Come on before you mess in your britches."
"We need to make a stop at my house first, Tank, allright?"
"Okay."
Nobody was there except me and her. It was clean and cool inside and smelled nice.
"You want something to drink? Here's a Coke." She turned the TV on cartoons. After a while I got felt sleepy.
She was naked and had big droopy boobs. Not like Momma's. She had lots of rolls and a big bottom. She took off my clothes. I was naked. "Have you ever had sex with a woman before, Tank? I don't think you have. That's why I think you've been having so much trouble. I want to help you. So you'll keep out of trouble. I know you don't understand everything that happens around you. But let me help you. Okay?" She took my hand and showed me how to rub her. She liked it. And she rubbed me. And I liked it, too. And she moaned and I moaned. And she had me lie on top of her and she put my peter in her and we moved up and down and we started breathing hard and my peter spat and she hollered and she held me and asked me to do it again and again. She was a soft, nice, big woman. I liked it. We did it some more. Then she held me and hummed and I fell asleep.
"Boy, why you be cryin'?" Momma says. "What happened to you?
I don't say.
"Well? Answer my question, Willie B. Polite."
"It Tuesday, Momma."
"No it ain't. Today Friday."
"Fawquita say."
"Everyday Tuesday for Fawquita these days. She be off her medicine again. She be needing to go back to Milledgeville again before she try to burn the church down again or stab her Momma."
"She say it Tuesday."
"You walking with her today? Uncle Cloudy say you ain't got your cruiser."
I don't say. Momma wipes my nose.
"What happened, boy?" Momma says. "Why you come home all wet and muddy and crying?"
"I fell. Fawquita pushed me down."
"Why is that? Why Fawquita push you down?"
"She got mad."
"Why? Why? Why she get mad at you?"
"My peter itches, Momma. I gots the chiggers in my pants. They's about to eat me up, Momma."
"Why Fawquita be mad at you? Whatchyou do, boy? Quit your moaning. You got snot all over your face."
"I axsked her a question."
"Quit jumping around. Get your hand out your pants." She pins my arms. "What did you ask Fawquita?"
"I asked if I could nurse some time."
Momma slaps me on the side of my head and all over my body. It stings like being hit that time in the head by them black boys throwing hard green pinecones.
Momma says, "Grown boy nearly thirty-years old cain't be touching no girls' or women's boobies. You keep your hands to your self or Gawd gone chop them off. I gone get a hickory switch to you if you be touching a woman's boobies, you hear me?"
"Uh-huh."
"What'd you say?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"You want Miss Francis to take you away forever?"
"No, ma'am."
"Quit crying. Lord, oh Lord, I couldn't live if that happened, baby. If they took you away from me, I'd die. I couldn't stand my baby being taken away from me like that."
My peter big and hard from scratching it. Momma always say not to touch it or Gawd will kill me dead. Dead. Dead. Cemetery dead. Like Grandmamma in the cemetery. She in that heaven box with her eyes closed and not moving like she asleep. She wouldn't wake up. I tried to wake her. Them men closed the door and put that box in another box and then put it in the ground and put dirt over it. Cemetery dead. I ain't seen Grandmamma since. I don't know how she gone get to heaven when she in two heaven boxes in the ground. Momma say it ain't her body that goes.
"Momma. When I was like a vegetable and the preacher put me under water to clean me for God, what did that do?"
"It washed away all your sins, baby."
"Just like a dirty potato. That what you say." Momma tap me on the nose.
"That's what I say."
"You let me wash the potatoes."
"Yes, baby."
"You smell like potatoes, Momma."
"I do." Momma laughs.
"I like to wash the potatoes."
"You a big help to Momma."
"You say sin like dirt."
"We gots to get the dirt off you now."
"God won't eat me when I die? That what you say."
"Lord, no. You ain't no potato."
"I want you to go to heaven with me, Momma."
"Jesus's Momma will take care of you for me if I'm not there."
"What's Her name?"
"Miss Mary. You remember? She be with the baby Jesus in the manger at Christmas time?
"She a nice lady?"
"She the nicest lady they ever was."
"Will she let me nurse, Momma?"
"She is God's mother. She is the Queen of Heaven. She will make sure you get whatever you need in Heaven, baby."
"Fawquita say she is a queen."
"I done told you Fawquita ain't no queen. Miss Mary really is the Queen of all Heaven. She will take care of you."
"I want to stay with you, Momma."