Tempest of Tennessee (Episode 1): Tempest of Tennessee Page 2

  Actually, what Billy wrote was, “Sell the land at auction and get a lawyer to fix it so her fucking Daddy can’t take her money.”

  To Mister Battles, Tax Assessor, I asked, “How long do I have to remove his belongings?”

  “I would suggest as soon as possible. As you know, severe budget restrictions have forced the county to reduce its law enforcement arm. Because of the mandatory publishing of an obituary, I have no doubt that criminal elements will visit the property to plunder anything of value.”

  He had that right, especially down around Sweetlips. I don’t know how the community got that name, but Sweetlips had more than its share of criminals, mostly unemployed meth-heads and common thieves.

  To ditch a worry, I asked, “Do you have to inform my parents about my inheriting his land and stuff? Do they need to know about the escrow thingy?”

  “No Miss Fuller. It is not our duty to inform them but this is a small town. Everyone knows everything about everybody. I’m sure your parents will find out.”

  I left the building with a slip of paper with the attorney’s address. Henderson is a small town with nearly everything adjacent to the mile-long stretch of Main Street. His office was only two blocks further west.

  The attorney, James Hecht, was with a client and I had to wait nearly an hour in his waiting room. His receptionist, a handsome brown haired, blue-eyed twenty-something male offered me a Coke while I waited.

  The attorney wasn’t much older than his receptionist was but the money showed in the length of his belt. I gave him my copy of Billy’s hand written will. Reading it, he burst out laughing, making his jowls bounce.

  Finishing, he laid the paper on his desk and said, “Mister Westover certainly doesn’t hold back on expletives, but between all the profanities and his condemnation of government, his instructions are clear. My fee will be thirty percent of any funds received from the sale. That’s after taxes of course.”

  “That includes the escrow thing?”

  “Yes, absolutely, but let’s discuss the tools and vehicles. Mister Westover stipulated that the items are yours and yours alone to keep or dispose of as you please. Let me put it this way. If you make a case that you want to keep the tools and vehicles for use in a future occupation to earn a living, no one can take them from you. If you decide to sell them, your father has the right to the money.”

  I nodded, “Thank you. Er, I came here because Mister Battles recommended you. Thirty percent seems high. Twenty-five percent, or I go shopping.”

  “Seeing as how this is simple no-contest instrument, I will concede that. On your way out have my receptionist make a copy of the will. The papers will be ready for signing next Monday. It usually takes a minimum of sixty days to schedule an auction.”

  He gave in too easy. I should have gone for twenty percent.

  Leaving his office, with no intention of going to school, I wandered from the buildings comprising the government offices. Walking back to the four-lane where Main Street began, I tossed the plastic bag of ashes into a sidewalk trash bin.

  The ashes weren’t Billy. His earthly being is gone. What’s left of him resides in my mind. Besides, I wasn’t going follow his wish for me to go to Nashville and stuff them up the governor’s ass.

  A quarter-mile before the four-lane, I passed by my high school and then the county library. Not being in any particular hurry, I went inside.

  There used to be more books on the shelves. After the Civil Disturbance, a pretty name for a sporadic civil war that ended back in 2028, Tennessee libraries and schools, under the ruling of the newly formed Mental Health Protection Corps, purged the shelves of ‘so-called’ poisonous literature. Anything considered liberal, progressive, sexy or anti-Christian, slowly and then rapidly disappeared from society.

  Over eight-thousand people perished between 2024 and 2028. At the beginning, liberals and immigrants were unprepared for the organized militias who took up arms to take back their country. The ‘Snowflakes’ found out pretty quick that rocks and bottles of piss were no match for live ammo. The first time the Alt-Right opened fire, they killed a hundred-twenty-three counter-demonstrators.

  Anti-Fa, the name used by media to identify a loose assortment of progressive elements took to social media to organize and coordinate counter attacks.

  It wasn’t a war of battlefields, fights broke out anywhere “Take It Back’, the name the Alt Right fought under, would designate as a rally point. It could be at a government complex or a park in any city. Often they would gather in a rural area, a national park or campground.

  They advertised their gatherings well in advance, always with the taunt, “Snowflakes bring it on.” There were only three instances of liberals advertising rallies of their own. All three were false-flag announcements to lure patriots into traps.

  The early battles waxed and waned with neither side gaining an upper hand until the “Snowflakes” wised up and initiated the use of sophisticated long-range weapons.

  Rifle bearing militiamen faced a rain of improvised mortar and rocket attacks along with explosive-laden drones exploding overhead to riddle those gathered below with steel pellets.

  That, along with the feds finally initiating round-ups of leaders from both sides brought the chaotic period to a fuzzy end… fuzzy, because the war continues. Murders carried out against members of opposing sides of the political spectrum are commonplace, occurring almost weekly in the news.

  There’s not much of that happening down here in the south. The patriots have just about cleared out the liberal minded… actually, most of them left voluntarily because, except in the big cities, southerners only recognize state, local, and religious law.

  The libs might own the cities like Atlanta and Memphis and Birmingham, but elected conservatives controlled the states. Conservative down here in the southern block translates as Evangelical Christian, hence, the dearth of books on library shelves.

  I don’t much care about politics or religion. The book purge didn’t touch what interested me. I spent the next two hours studying pictures of mushrooms. I knew and harvested the common edible ones that grew near home, but wanted to expand my ability to recognize those which grow in other areas.

  The best of the books had glossy photographs to aid in identifying not only where and how they grow in their habitat, but also close-ups of gills, stems, spores and other data. Best of all, if a mushroom had a close lookalike it had photos and information to tell em apart.

  That book I slipped into my large shoulder bag. I could have checked it out but I didn’t want the hassle of returning it. Judging from the crispness of the binding and pages, and the fact its printing was ten years ago, no one else in Chester County was interested in the knowledge it contained.

  I didn’t feel guilt about taking the book. Two years ago, using money I made selling scuppernongs and pecans at the farmers market I bought a used smartphone.

  I couldn’t make calls with it, but there were places in town where I could surreptitiously connect to the internet. This was despite the fact Tennessee passed a law that prohibited possession of a device by anyone under the age of eighteen.

  The law is another aspect of the MHPC, or as I call it, ‘the mind police’. Seems access to the internet can corrupt young minds. Corruption of young minds is the business of Evangelical Christians.

  Anyway, as I said, I had an illegal phone. A student at school saw it in my bag and reported me to the teacher who promptly confiscated it.

  The school is part of Chester County. The library is part of Chester County. Chester County stole my phone, so I steal their books. I paid eighty bucks for the phone, but I figure pain and suffering for my loss entitles me to take as many books as I like. To hell with em, I’ll add the mushroom book to my growing collection of survival literature.

  Out on the four-lane, with my thumb out for passing motorists, my thoughts turned to my inheritance. I knew that Billy’s old travel trailer, workshop and sheds were worthless to a prospective buy
er. Land near our property was bringing between two-thousand and twenty-five hundred. I thought pessimistically I might see a fifteen-hundred an acre after taxes and lawyer fees.

  Billy’s tools and seventy-five hundred would speed my plan along. What I wanted was a piece of isolated land of my own to build a cabin and become self-sufficient, to get to where I don’t need anything from anybody. The minute I turn eighteen I want to walk out Daddy’s front door and never look back.

  The sound of an engine approaching brought my arm up, thumb extended. Thinking about Billy’s tools reminded me of his weapons, two of them unsecured… actually all of them unsecured because all a thief needed to do was use Billy’s hand truck to load the gun-safe onto a truck. I needed a ride quick.

  The approaching vehicle, a small electric car wasn’t the vehicle that alerted me. The woman at the wheel didn’t even glance at me as she passed. The big, older model Dodge Ram behind her was the noisemaker. The driver, an elderly man wearing a cowboy hat tossed his hand at me and pulled onto the paved shoulder.

  Opening the door to climb into the cab, I said, “I’m only going as far as the turnoff for the city dump.”

  The man smiled, his crevassed lips displayed toothless gums. “I’m going to the dump if you’re making the turn.”

  “Yeah, thanks, that’d be great. I like your truck.”

  “She a beaut all right, bought her new in twenty-twenty right off the lot. She’s twelve-years with over a quarter-million miles and still purrs. Take care of her, yep, take care of her better than I did my wife.”

  It wasn’t a proud statement. Behind his words was nothing but regret.

  “Is your wife dead?”

  “Maggie dead…? I wouldn’t know. She left me ten years ago and I ain’t heard from her in seven. My boys don’t write or call. Back then, I drank a lot. Reckon I quit drinking a few years too late. Born again, I am. Are you blessed with his blood, girl? Have you found the Lord Jesus?”

  I wasn’t walking down that trail. “Yes sir,” I lied, trying for a pious tone. “I’m baptized in the Lord’s name.”

  He gave me another gummy smile. “Amen. See that you live your life the way our lord writes. Be a good wife and bear your husband as many get as you can. The lord’s army needs soldiers.”

  All I could say was, ‘Thank God, halleluiah,” Silent in my mind, I finished, “that the dump isn’t far,” He turned into the entrance and stopped to let me out.”

  “Thank you for the ride, mister, and for your words. Bless you.”

  From the dump, it was a straight ten-mile shot to the Sweetlips Community. Five miles past Sweetlips road was the turn that would take me to my road. Billy’s place was right on that corner.

  I didn’t feel like a hypocrite for leading the old man on about my salvation. I learned early that it was a losing game to argue religion. Always best to let em hear what they want.

  Instead of hanging in the smell of the dump, I began walking with my ears peeled for the sound of an engine. I wasn’t too concerned about the silent electric’s, from my experience hitching rides, those people seldom stopped.

  That said I hadn’t walked a quarter mile when a blue, Japanese ‘Leap’, slowed and stopped.

  It was Bella and John Causley, with Bella in the driver’s seat. John opened his door and wiggled from his seat, and then leaned back in to fold his seat forward.

  “Let me move some things to make room.”

  Bella said, “Where are you coming from, Tempest, honey? Don’t you know begging rides is a way to get yourself killed, or worse.”

  I didn’t know what was worse than ‘getting killed’ and wasn’t going to ask, and I didn’t want to tell about Billy and my inheritance.

  “I went to the library.”

  “Did you pick up Billy Westover’s ashes?”

  So much for subterfuge, it sure didn’t take long for news to travel. I wondered if they knew about my windfall as well. Crawling into the tiny space behind John’s seat, I said, “Yes mam; before I went to the library.”

  She said, “Be sure to put on the seatbelt. What does Billy want done with his ashes.”

  Squirming around in the tiny back seat to hook the seatbelt was harder than getting in, but it finally clicked in place.

  “I already took care of them. I threw them in the trash bin in front of ‘Big Star’ grocery

  “No you didn’t.”

  “Yes mam. I felt horrible doing it, but that’s what he wanted done with em.”

  John cleared his throat and said, “That’d be Billy for sure.”

  Sitting behind them in the quiet that followed, it occurred to me that while I’d visited with the Causley’s a few times, initially lured by Bella with an offer of cookies and milk when walking past their place to Billy’s, none of the rest of my family associated with them.

  Their home once belonged to the farmer who owned most of the land around us before he died and his children sold off the land in parcels. The barn still stood a hundred yards behind their house. I’d never seen the inside of it, but asked, “Is your barn full?”

  “Full of what,” John asked.

  “No, I mean is there any room in it.”

  “Practically empty, a few bales of straw, some old burlap sacks. It’s a mess in there, but we haven’t bothered clearing it because we don’t use it.”

  Bella asked, “Why do you want to know, honey?”

  “Billy left me all of his tools and things. We don’t have a big enough place to put them. I can pay you some rent.”

  Bella said, “What do you think, John?”

  John cleared his throat again. “I don’t see why not, but she won’t need to pay rent on something we’ve no use for.” Then speaking to me, “Billy has a great deal of stuff there on his property. You’ll probably need to use his ATV and trailer to move it. If you come in our driveway, you’ll wear a path in our lawn getting to the barn. See if you can find a way through the woods to the back of it. That’d be better.”

  “Thank ya’ll. I’ll find a way.”

  Bella said, “You know your Father’s gonna want to rummage Billy’s belongings to see what he can sell off.”

  “It’s my inheritance.”

  “But you’re a minor in his household. You can’t stop him.”

  I figured John must have a frog in his throat, because he cleared it again. Maybe it was just a habit to announce he was about to speak. “If she sold it all to us and gave us a bill of sale, he couldn’t touch it, but he could take the money from the sale.”

  “But I don’t want to sell it.”

  Bella cleared that up. “What John means is that it’ll be a pretend sell. Do you have any money?”

  “I have a little over three-hundred saved up.”

  Pulling into Billy’s driveway, Bella chuckled and said, “You don’t want your daddy to have all of it. We’ll make the sale for one hundred-dollars. He’ll take that from you and call us robbers.”

  I have to say their attitude mystified me. “I don’t understand. Why are you helping me like this?”

  Bella said, “We have friends all over the county, many of them farmers. Let’s say a lot of them aren’t pleased with the Federal Food Distribution Agency, or the heavy handed way that your father decides what constitutes excess production for the county to grab… grab at prices so low it almost doesn’t pay to plant.”

  John joined in, “Grease your dad’s palm with a little money and everything goes different. I don’t know what you father does with the take. Your family’s lifestyle for dang sure doesn’t reflect it. Your mother might want to watch he doesn’t up and disappear one day; waltz off with a ditty younger than her.”

  I have to admit that was news to me. All we ever heard from Daddy was how broke we are.

  The Causley’s moaned and groaned their creaky old joints out of the car and then I wiggled my way out of the cramped back seat.

  I said, “I didn’t know how you felt about Daddy, but I will take you up on the offer. Ther
e’s some stuff I want to bring over right away… today if it’s okay.” I pointed to the bags of groceries John had moved to make room for me. “Let me carry those for you. Ya’ll go on in.”

  It took two trips to bring in their bags. Then Bella insisted I have iced tea and a slice of pecan pie… “Made from pecans you sold us last fall,” she said.

  John went out the kitchen door and left the two of us at the table.

  Bella took a swallow from her glass and said, “Hon, we weren’t at the ‘Piggly Wiggly’ more than a minute before someone told us about your inheritance. Those folks at the county office love to spread everybody’s private business. Your Father will know soon enough that Billy left you the property as well as his belongings. Mark my words; he’ll try to find a way to weasel it from you.”

  I nodded over a bite of pie, swallowed and said, “I know he will, but I have a lawyer. The property will sell at auction and the money goes into an escrow account until I’m eighteen. That’s only two years and then I’m out of there.”

  Shaking her head, Bella said, “I hope it’s that simple. Hon, Billy had all those tools and he has the car, his tractor and his pickup truck. It’s true they’re all old, but your Father is going to spitting-mad that you sold it to us so cheap, he might even try to sue.

  She paused and then said, “Let him sue. As long as you stick to your guns, as the legal owner your bill of sale will stand in any court. We’ll give you another bill of sell returning everything back to you for one-dollar. The date will be blank for you to fill in whenever you want to reclaim it.”

  I left the Causley’s by way of their barn. Like our place, the rear of their property bordered government land. I walked to my new property, staying just inside the edge of the hardwood forest, encountering only two places where clumps of softwood pines and cedar made thickets. Those I could work around by going deeper into the woods to get to Billy’s place… rather, my property until the auction. It’d be a bumpy ride with the four-wheeler and trailer, but doable.