Send Me Down a Miracle Read Free

followed him to the front door. Adrienne kept talking, saying how this was all ridiculous and how she was not there to cause trouble but to live quietly, undisturbed, for a month or so. Daddy wasn't listening. I could tell 'cause he was jingling the change in his pocket the same way he did anytime someone tried to say something he didn't want to hear. He opened the front door, and we heard the sound of gunshots blasting. Daddy stepped outside and stood there jingling his change as fast as he could, waiting for Adrienne to leave.
    Adrienne stood in the doorway and looked out to the end of the driveway. "What is that man doing out there? What's going on?"
    We were so used to old Mad Joe, we hadn't given him a thought. I watched as he took aim and fired another shot into the road. "Oh, don't worry," I said. "That's just Mad Joe. He likes to shoot worm bellies. 'Course, it being so dry this spring, it's probably just ants or something."
    Adrienne nodded. "Ah yes, a quiet, God-fearing town."

2
    I had to wait a whole week before I got to tell Sharalee about Adrienne, what with Sharalee's new job at the Food World and all. We had planned to meet in the barn back of the Marshalls' house, only Sharalee was still eating dinner when I got there, so I had to wait out in the barn by myself for her to finish up. I had taken the shortcut, stepping through the hole in the back some cow once made and then got her head stuck in.
    I looked around and shivered. The barn was all shadows, and empty except for the coffins. Mr. Marshall makes coffins—just the shells, not the satin and brass accessories—and stores them in the barn. They were lined up so straight and still, every one of them oozing out death like a leak of black oil. I couldn't keep from looking at them, watching them, thinking any minute one of the lids might start to creak open. I tried not to think about it. I busied myself by setting out the food I had brought over, which I always had to do 'cause Sharalee's mama had Sharalee on a diet and wouldn't let her have anything with flavor. Then finally I heard Sharalee's kitchen door slam and her flip-flops slapping at the dirt, and I relaxed and watched for her to step through the hole.
    "Hey, girl," she called out, walking toward me and yanking down on her T-shirt. "What kind of dessert you bring me?"
    "Nothing much, just some hush puppies left over from dinner."
    Sharalee looked them over and gave them a sniff like some old coon dog. "Well, who made them, you or your mama?"
    "I did. Mama's gone off to that birdcage convention, remember?"
    "She's still gone? I thought that only lasted a week." Sharalee popped a hush puppy in her mouth. "Don't it last just a week?"
    "Yes, but she's gone visiting and such. She's gone to Tennessee," I said, repeating what I had said to just about every nosy-body in town.
    Sharalee popped another hush puppy in her mouth, even though she wasn't through chewing down the first one. She shook her head. "Weird," she said.
    "What's weird?"
    She shrugged and licked the grease off her fingers. "Your mama. It's like she puts all her living into one week of convention and the rest of the year she's just—well, kind of—you know."
    "No, I don't know, and anyway, what a thing to say!"
    "Well, it's not me that's saying it. I heard Miss Tuney Mae Jenkins telling my mama that what your mama needs is more frequent hydration."
    "So what is that supposed to mean?"
    Sharalee shrugged like what she was about to say didn't mean anything, but I could tell by the gleam in her eyes that she was getting ready to say something cutting.
    "It's like she's a prune all year, you know, all dried up, and then come springtime and the convention she turns into a plum. Least that's how Miss Tuney Mae put it." She popped the last hush puppy in her mouth.
    "Well, what does she know?" I said, trying to push away the memory I had of Mama the day she left. I could still see her dressed in all that green. Green pants and a