Read Online Going Nowhere Fast by Gar Anthony Haywood - Free Book Online
Authors: Gar Anthony Haywood
Ads: Link
expect, but that was just too bad. I hadn't brought Dog and his four siblings into this world alone, I reminded my husband; I had help. So Joe got to play our son's shadow first. I kicked him and Dog out of our hotel cabin only minutes after Dog's second interrogation of the day and told them both not to come back for at least two hours, so that I could nap in relative peace. I hadn't treated myself to a decent midday snooze in over three days, and exhaustion was catching up with me. I collected Joe's key to our room, tossed a handful of guidebooks and sightseeing brochures in his direction, and closed the door on all his and Dog's objections.
Two minutes later, I was asleep.
Less than ten minutes after that, however, I was awake again.
Somebody was knocking on the door, lightly but incessantly. Making a very polite nuisance of themselves. I thought it might be Joe, until I realized the knocking had been going on for some time now, and the door was still on its hinges. And I knew it couldn't be Bad Dog, because I had yet to hear a single "Yo, Moms! Wake up in there!"
So I got up to see who it was.
There was no peephole in the cabin door, but by peeking through the drapes at one of the windows flanking it, I was able to see two men standing out on the porch, young, well-dressed white men I did not recognize. One appeared to have a camera dangling from his neck.
"Who is it?" I called out, trying to sound like an angry grizzly roused from hibernation.
They both turned toward the window at the sound of my voice, and instinctively I withdrew from it. One of them actually came over to the window and pressed his face to the screen, trying to get a look at me, but when he realized he couldn't, he quickly backed away again.
"Mrs. Loudermilk?" someone asked tentatively.
"I asked, who is it?" I said again, turning up the grizzly in my voice.
"We're reporters, Mrs. Loudermilk. We'd like to ask you and your husband a few questions, if we could. Would that be all right?"
Reporters. Of course.
Ever since the news of Geoffry Bettis's death had begun to circulate about the Canyon's trailer park two days ago, Bad Dog, Big Joe, and I had been besieged by an army of these bloodthirsty, soulless media creatures. In the beginning, we accommodated each and every one of them as best we could, answering what questions we had the answers to and graciously declining the rest. We saw no harm in it; what did we have to hide? But then the questions became more and more invasive and crude, and all the attention we were receiving began to lose its charm. When one of the local papers finally ran a story on us with a headline that read, "CANYON MYSTERY COUPLE LIED TO AUTHORITIES"—making a federal case out of the fact that I had told Detectives Crowe and Bollinger I was fifty-one, and Joe had told them he once played varsity basketball with Elgin Baylor back in high school—that was it. We all stopped talking to reporters altogether.
(Oh, and by the way—Joe's lie was more outrageous than mine, and by a wide margin. He and Baylor shared the same graduating class in high school, all right, but Joe was cut from the junior varsity basketball team after only three practices. The closest he ever came to actually playing with Baylor was, in his later role as the team's locker room attendant, flipping Baylor a towel in the shower room.)
Anyway, after a while of getting the Loudermilk cold shoulder, the vultures got the message and stopped circling about us. I figured our celebrity status had worn off for good.
But no. Here they were again. Two fresh new faces, at least, but insidious newshounds just the same. I knew that if I talked to these jokers, they would ask nothing but embarrassing questions, and distort my answers to those questions, and generally just make a mockery of what I had to say in tomorrow's morning paper.
So why did I go to the cabin door and open it? you ask. Because I liked having reporters scurry after me like paparazzi
Two minutes later, I was asleep.
Less than ten minutes after that, however, I was awake again.
Somebody was knocking on the door, lightly but incessantly. Making a very polite nuisance of themselves. I thought it might be Joe, until I realized the knocking had been going on for some time now, and the door was still on its hinges. And I knew it couldn't be Bad Dog, because I had yet to hear a single "Yo, Moms! Wake up in there!"
So I got up to see who it was.
There was no peephole in the cabin door, but by peeking through the drapes at one of the windows flanking it, I was able to see two men standing out on the porch, young, well-dressed white men I did not recognize. One appeared to have a camera dangling from his neck.
"Who is it?" I called out, trying to sound like an angry grizzly roused from hibernation.
They both turned toward the window at the sound of my voice, and instinctively I withdrew from it. One of them actually came over to the window and pressed his face to the screen, trying to get a look at me, but when he realized he couldn't, he quickly backed away again.
"Mrs. Loudermilk?" someone asked tentatively.
"I asked, who is it?" I said again, turning up the grizzly in my voice.
"We're reporters, Mrs. Loudermilk. We'd like to ask you and your husband a few questions, if we could. Would that be all right?"
Reporters. Of course.
Ever since the news of Geoffry Bettis's death had begun to circulate about the Canyon's trailer park two days ago, Bad Dog, Big Joe, and I had been besieged by an army of these bloodthirsty, soulless media creatures. In the beginning, we accommodated each and every one of them as best we could, answering what questions we had the answers to and graciously declining the rest. We saw no harm in it; what did we have to hide? But then the questions became more and more invasive and crude, and all the attention we were receiving began to lose its charm. When one of the local papers finally ran a story on us with a headline that read, "CANYON MYSTERY COUPLE LIED TO AUTHORITIES"—making a federal case out of the fact that I had told Detectives Crowe and Bollinger I was fifty-one, and Joe had told them he once played varsity basketball with Elgin Baylor back in high school—that was it. We all stopped talking to reporters altogether.
(Oh, and by the way—Joe's lie was more outrageous than mine, and by a wide margin. He and Baylor shared the same graduating class in high school, all right, but Joe was cut from the junior varsity basketball team after only three practices. The closest he ever came to actually playing with Baylor was, in his later role as the team's locker room attendant, flipping Baylor a towel in the shower room.)
Anyway, after a while of getting the Loudermilk cold shoulder, the vultures got the message and stopped circling about us. I figured our celebrity status had worn off for good.
But no. Here they were again. Two fresh new faces, at least, but insidious newshounds just the same. I knew that if I talked to these jokers, they would ask nothing but embarrassing questions, and distort my answers to those questions, and generally just make a mockery of what I had to say in tomorrow's morning paper.
So why did I go to the cabin door and open it? you ask. Because I liked having reporters scurry after me like paparazzi
Similar Books
