Chapter One

If you drive up there near the state line, on the border of Tennessee and Georgia, you just might pass through my hometown, the Chattanooga suburb of Hixson. But you might not know you passed it, not unless you take the time to read the sign hanging near the highway. Most people only stop in Hixson for the cemeteries and the old Civil War battlefields around Chattanooga. I grew up thinking a trip to Soddy Daisy was living the high life. But it was beautiful country, no matter what Mama says. I remember the back roads mostly, and the trees. When I was small, I’d spread my arms out as far as I could and I’d try to reach as wide as a tree’s branches. I’d dance in the wind, partner to the limbs of the old oak and the sugar maples. Trees seemed to be all the poetry I’d ever need.

Country living in Hixson wasn’t always peace and quiet though, with so many highways going every which way. But back where I lived, the back roads were all over. They were mysteries that flirted with my sense of adventure. I never could walk by a back road without wanting to follow it. There wasn’t anything finer to do with an afternoon than walk a road I’d never walked before. The narrow ones around Paradise were some of my favorite; they curved and twisted up into places that I could keep hidden from everybody else. I’ll always think of country roads like that, seducing me onto nature’s unknown paths. Sometimes those country roads led me back where I began. Sometimes they took me so far away I’d have to hitch home.

When I was a young girl, I never could sit still. Why, I’d be damned if I didn’t ruin the best pair of fruit boots I ever had running through Miles Canyon Creek, jumping over brambles that scratched the shit out of me and left my legs looking like I’d shaved for the first time and done one hell of a bad job. Nearly fell and broke my neck every time, especially when ole Horace was shaking his fist at me. Mean old man Horace “Toothless” Mooney. Goddamn son of a bitch almost caught me too. But I could outrun that skinny old man same way I could run circles around Tommy, my slower-than-molasses-coming-out-of-a-jar brother. Shit, for a girl, I could run one hell of an eight-minute mile.

Tommy and me were always getting caught stuffing old man Mooney’s meat jerkys into our back pockets. Only time I ever had a well-done piece of meat back then is when I picked a jerky right out of Mooney’s display. Hell, he used to have a whole jar of them sitting on the counter of Mooney’s Market. He had boxes of the damn things in his back room. Seems he could have spared a couple for Tommy and me.

“If I catch you two looting my jerkys again, I’ll string you up by your feet and hang you over the sinkhole by Cratson’s Corners. You hear me?” old man Mooney would call out.

“I’m addicted to jerkys.” I’d giggle and try to intercept Mr. Mooney as he made his way after Tommy. Poor Tommy would slide into the magazine rack and scoop up all Mama’s favorites.

“We’re good for it, Mr. Mooney,” I’d say as I ran backward and zigzagged a bit so he couldn’t catch me. “You have more jerkys than you need.”

Mooney would be out there on the street shaking his fist, his face as red as Mama’s nails.

I still get a kick thinking back on it. Old man Mooney would come hollering to my daddy after he’d caught me and Tommy with our hands in his jerky jar.

“Your kids are up to no good again, Tim Place.”

Mooney’s lips were as thin as thread and whenever he came by to complain his lips would disappear altogether. But Daddy never paid him any mind. He knew how much me and Tommy loved our meat jerkys. And besides, Mooney needed my daddy ’cause he was the best damn mechanic in all of Hamilton County. Mooney drove a piece of junk that wound up breaking down every other damn week. Mooney would huff and puff and then he’d say, “You keep your kids away from my jerkys, you hear me, Tim Place?” And my daddy would say, “Yeah, yeah, Horace. I’ll make ya a promise. I’ll tan their hides for it. Sure enough.” And that would appease the old bastard, and he’d go off in his jalopy. My daddy would crank his spark plugs for nothing but a quarter the next time he pulled up in that hunk of tin he called “a classic.” A classic piece of shit, that’s what I called it.

Eventually, we outgrew stealing Mooney’s jerkys. Tommy went his own way once he discovered that girls thought he was hotter than fire. But by that time I had me my own distractions—more boyfriends than I even wanted—and not a damn one of those boys were worth any exploration of my secret garden.

I guess that was because I had had me more lessons than I needed in deviant male behavior so I didn’t think I’d be fooling with anyone anytime soon. My granddaddy chased me around my bed more times than I like to recall. Then there was my encounter with Jeb Oates. I don’t like to think about that night either, but some things don’t ever become the memories too far gone to reach. It’s hard to forget when a good day turns bad. I was eighteen then, just turned, and I had graduated high school only weeks earlier. I started working in my daddy’s mechanic shop to earn some money, but Mama made short work of that. She didn’t like her baby girl covered in grease. She insisted I get myself something better suited to a lady. Hell, I liked working on those old cars but Mama put her foot down. So I found myself a job at Graves Motel on Highway 75. I was going to be waiting tables and taking tips from all those cheating sons of bitches who pretended to be on business trips but were really out there grabbing ass.