Why Dogs Chase Cars Read Free Page A

picture book to the library about the history of textiles that he’d written and published himself.
    I bought my beer, gum, and breath mints. Rufus shook his head at me. His beard swayed like a strange grandfather clock’s pendulum. I said, “Ask my dad. This beer ain’t for me.”
    Mr. Price wore his usual overalls, the legs folded up neatly to his stumps. He said, “You need a girlfriend who keeps you inside the hallways of school, son.” He spat on his own floor. “You need a hobby. Don’t end up like me. Don’t end up like everyone around here. You smart, boy. Nothing’s enough for some people. But nothing’s a whole lot less than two minus one.”
    Mr. Price liked to show off that he was a graduate of Forty-Five High, too.
    I ’D BEEN KNOWN to dig holes in my father’s backyard when I knew he’d be gone for more than an hour. And I acted thusly if, and only if, I’d awakened in the middle of the previous night to hear him grunting and cursing, burying something that he either foresaw would be valuable in the coming years—old metal gasoline-station signs seemed to be his forte—or that he thought was an eyesore. He seemedto have something against whatever Baptist preacher it was in Forty-Five who, plagiarizing roadside Burma-Shave ads, stuck BIRD ON A WIRE/BIRD ON A PERCH/FLY TOWARD HEAVEN/FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH up and down Deadfall Road, Powerhouse Road, Highway 25, and Calhoun Drive. I made a three A.M. note to myself as to where the sound emanated from so I could later find the pine straw covering the freshly dug clay and find out what it was that he deemed worthy of concealment.
    Driving back to school from Rufus Price’s Goat Wagon, I knew I’d get out a spade later in the afternoon, seeing as my dad would be somewhere over near the Savannah River all day trying to figure out what useless piece of land would later be bought up by the state for ten times its worth so a roadside park could be built, or a boat landing that dropped down to a fishless dammed lake. Maybe I would walk back to the acreage owned by the Few family trust and see if phony toxic barrels were actually standing upright beneath the surface.
    â€œ
Presente,
” I said to Senora Schulze when she called the roll.
    Libby Belcher said, “I smell beer. I smell beer coming from Mendal’s direction. Senora Schulze, I smell beer.”
    Senora Schulze said, “
Cerveza,
Libby. You smell
cerveza
.”
    Well, ha ha ha ha ha, I thought. Libby had no way of knowing that I kept the other four beers in my backseat, that I kept the door unlocked so Senora Schulze could goout there during her lunch break and down them. Libby Belcher’s head turned toward me in midspasm. I shot her a peace sign, then curled my index finger away. Senora Schulze turned on the overhead projector to reveal a slew of irregular verbs that we needed to know. I leaned over to the left and whispered to Libby, “Why aren’t you in Miss Ballard’s class with the rest of the cheerleaders and football players? Why do you think you need to know a foreign language? Are you planning on having a Mexican baby or something?”
    Oh, I could be as mean as my father back then. And I’ll give Libby Belcher this: she grew up to get a doctorate in education, then become a superintendent of schools. But she didn’t have the right answers on this particular day. She said, “I’m taking Spanish because I’m taking home ec. I need to know how to make tacos in an authentic manner.” Then she said, “I know you been drinking. And I saw your baby picture from yearbook staff. When’re you going to understand that you can’t trick everybody, Mendal Dawes? You can’t. You been trying since first grade. We all know better. We all know.”
    Senora Schulze said, “Oh, never mind,” and cut off the projector. “I doubt y’all will ever need to know