Joe Read Online Free Page A

from the back and he grinned.
     
    “Goin too fast for them boys,” he said. “How come that boy to shoot him? What? Did he come over there fuckin with him?”
     
    “I imagine. Aw, I know he did. He always think he have to be fuckin with somebody. I knocked him in the head with a speaker one day.”
     
    “You did?”
     
    “I sure did. He come over at Mama’s one day, said I owed him some money. I told him he better get his ass out I didn’t owe him shit. Told him he want some money get out and work for it. What I have to do.”
     
    “Then you knocked him in the head.”
     
    “Knocked a durn hole in his head. Mama said he got shot about three o’clock. Been out there till the garbagemen found him.”
     
    “You don’t know what time y’all got in?”
     
    “Naw. It was late.”
     
    “He wasn’t out there when y’all got in?”
     
    “I don’t reckon. He mighta been.”
     
    Joe cracked the vent wider and flicked the ashes off his smoke.
     
    “Well, I’ll tell you,” he said. “Folks lookin for trouble can find more than they want.”
     
    Junior nodded and crossed his legs.
     
    “You right,” he said. “You exactly right about that.”
     
    They unloaded from the back end at Dogtown like a pack of hounds themselves and went into the store talking and laughing and opening the doors on the coolers, reaching for milk and Cokes and orange juice. Joe watched them milling around inside while he pumped gas into the truck. Cars were coming along the road with their lights on, carrying people headed to work in the factories who had to be on the job by seven. He had done that and he was glad he wasn’t doing it now. He shut off the pump and hung up the nozzle and looked at his watch as he went in.
     
    “Y’all hurry up, now,” he said. They were getting Moon Pies and crackers and sardines and cans of Vienna sausage.
     
    At the counter Freddy looked up at him with a sick smile as the men lined up in front of him with their lunches. Freddy charged their food and drinks and smokes to them each day and was paid off on Friday when Joe brought them by. He kept their tickets in little pads beneath the counter.
     
    “Hey, Joe,” he said. He stopped writing, sighed deeply and put down his pen. “You want some coffee?”
     
    “I can get it.” He found a Styrofoam cup and poured it full, then dumped in a whole lot of sugar and stirred it well.
     
    “Let’s see now,” Freddy said. He was examining Shorty carefully. “You’re Hilliard, right?”
     
    “Shorty,” Shorty said, and pointed to another man. “He Hilliard.”
     
    Freddy shook his head and looked at Shorty’s groceries.
     
    “Y’all gonna have to start wearin name tags. I can’t keep you straight from one day to the next.”
     
    “Y’all gonna have to hurry up,” Joe said. “It’s almost six-thirty. Where you got Jimmy at today?”
     
    “All right,” Freddy said. “That’s got you. Who’s next? You want a sack for that?”
     
    “Yessir. Please.”
     
    He pulled out a small bag and started putting the items inside.
     
    “Gone fishin,” he said. “I’m fixin to fire that boy.”
     
    “He told me you’d done fired him three times.”
     
    “I’m gonna fire him for good if he don’t start helpin me out some.”
     
    “Where did they go? Sardis?”
     
    “Naw. I don’t know. Off on some goddamn river somewhere. Him and Icky. They’ll probably come in drunk today and won’t have no money or no fish either, more than likely.”
     
    “You gonna see if he got any ice?” said Junior.
     
    Joe set his coffee on the counter. “Yeah. Freddy, you got any ice?”
     
    “I don’t know. He didn’t run yesterday but you can look in the freezer and see. There may be some left.”
     
    “Go see if he’s got any, Junior.” He looked at his watch again.
     
    “Y’all gonna have to get the lead out, now. It’s almost daylight right now.”
     
    “They two bags back here,” Junior called out.
     
    “Well,