Vernon God Little

'Silence! Let me finish,' says the judge. ' Vernon Little, I am releasing you into the care of Dr Oliver Goosens, starting Monday, on an outpatient basis. Failure to comply with the doctor's schedule of treatment, in any way whatsoever, will result in your further detention. Do you understand?'

'Yes, ma'am.'

She stretches over the bench and lowers her voice. 'One more thing – if I were defending, I'd seriously consider expanding on this, ehm – bowel thing.'

'Thank you, ma'am.'

I'll be damned. I burrow through the mess of onlookers and float out of the courthouse into the sun, just like that. Reporters buzz around me like flies at a shit-roast. I'm full of feelings, but not the ones I dreamed of. Instead of true joy, I feel waves; the kind that make you look forward to the smell of laundry on a rainy Saturday, the type of drippy hormones that trick you into saying I Love You. Security they fucken call it. Watch out for that shit. Those waves erode your goddam bravery. I even get a wave of gratitude for the judge – go fucken figure. I mean, Judge Gurie's been good to me, but – expand on the bowel thing? – I don't fucken think so.

'How do we find your turds?' they'd ask. 'Why,' I'd say, 'my logs are over there, in the den behind the bushes – right there, next to the goddam gun y'all are looking for.' To be honest, the gun ain't such a big deal. The fingerprints on the gun are my fucken problem. Thinking about it brings a whole new set of waves. I decide to ignore them, for my own safety. You just can't afford waves when you have to be in Mexico by daybreak.

The Mercury sits with two doors open, dripping ants all over Gurie Street. Mrs Binney, the florist, almost has to stop her brand-new Cadillac to get past. Mrs Binney doesn't wave today. She pretends not to see me. Instead she watches Abdini decoy some reporters on the steps, and floats right by with a fresh mess of tributes for the Lechugas' front porch.

'We happy we allow home to continue our young life,' says Abdini, like he's me, or we're fucken brothers or something. 'And we cantinue inbestigation into whappen that terryball day…'

I got me some learnings in court, I have to say. The way everybody acts, court is like watching TV-trailers; a shade of this movie, a bite of that show. The one where the kid gets cancer, and everybody speaks haltingly. The one where the rookie cop decides whether to be a bag-man for bribes, or to blow his crusty partner's cover. I personally wouldn't recommend playing that one, though; everybody ends up being on the take, like even the mayor. And don't fucken ask what show I got stuck with. ' America 's Dumbest Assholes' or something. 'Ally McBowel.'

The Mercury bitches under Pam's sandals. That's because she uses both pedals at once. 'No point having a brake pedal if your foot's a mile away on the other side of the car,' she'll tell you if you ever bring it up. I only brought it up once. 'Might as well throw the darned pedal out the door.' Camera people scatter as we lunge up Gurie Street. I see the TV pictures in my mind, the shot of my ole mutton head looking back from the Mercury.

'But, what kind of meals did you get?' asks Pam.

'Regular stuff.'

'But like, what? Like, pork 'n' beans? Did you get dessert?'

'Not really.'

'Oh Lord.'

She spins the car into the Barn drive-thru. One good thing about Pam's TV-movie; you know how the thing's going to end. That's the kind of life I want, the life we were fucken promised. A fuzzy ole show with some flashes of panty and a happy ending. One of those shows where the kid's baseball coach takes him camping, and teaches him self-respect, you've seen that show, with electric piano notes tinkling in the background, soft as ovaries hitting oatmeal. When you hear that piano it means somebody's hugging, or a woman is crumpling her lips with overwhelming joy, down by a lake. Boy, the life I could have with the right music behind me. Instead I watch Liberty Drive screen through the window, with Galveston playing in back. We pass the place where Max Lechuga sucked his last breath. He said some words, but you couldn't hear them. Heat comes to my eye, so I spark up a distraction.

'Ma home?' I ask.

'Waiting on the fridge delivery,' says Pam.

'You're kidding.'

'Humor her, she's going through a lot. No harm in just waiting.'

'That'll be one long wait.'

Pam just sighs. 'You'll be sixteen in a few days. We won't let anything spoil your birthday.'

I cushion myself in this familiar ole cream; family, with all its flavors of smell. I've only been gone a week, but my ole routines seem like a past life. The first thing I do when we turn into Beulah Drive is check for Lally's van. I try to see past a knot of reporters in the road, but then the Seldome Motel's new minibus pulls up by the Lechugas' teddy farm. Strangers lean out, take pictures, bow their heads, then the van pulls away toward the mantis market. Lally's space under the willow is empty.