C4 antho - Chamber Four

~198~ The Chamber Four Fiction Anthology
And had he not run under the Versatile, splitting off from the
rest of the sheep would have proven a wise move. He considered
it a huge oversight on the part of James Carl for him to
think a lamb running from dogs pointed to low intelligence.
Sweating, Billy climbed back into the Versatile. It had
been a dry year. A drought if you listened to farmers. Farmers
couldn’t be trusted when it came to weather, though.
They’ll tell you it’s either too wet to get the wheat up or too
dry for it to grow. Billy had never met a farmer yet who had a
good year where weather was concerned. But it was dry that
morning, that’s for sure. The wind had blown all during the
night before and dried the ground to a powder by daylight.
Dust puffed in through the cracks of the cab. Billy tied a
bandana around his nose. Soon it was too soaked with snot
to be of use. He took the bandana off and leaned over the
gear shifts. Eyes squinting and nose dripping like hydraulic
fluid, he thought about James Carl. He had never known a
tougher man. For years he’d heard his father talk about the
James Carl Henry who could lift Hemi blocks without a
cherry picker and who stepped over gates instead of opening
them.
When Billy was six, he and his father were fishing a
roadside pond when he first saw James Carl. At that time the
man wore a thick black beard. He was looking for Billy’s father
in order to trade him a beefalo for a .223 Remington
rifle. Billy saw him step out of his Chevy one-ton and walk
toward them.
Billy said, “Daddy, there’s a really big man coming.”
“What do you think that man wants?” Billy’s father
asked, casting his line.
“I don’t know. He looks mad.”
“Think we ought to run or fight it out?”