The Pistol Poets

She cleared her throat and read: "This poem is called 'Like Dust in the Wind.' "

Her eyes circled the room. She lowered her voice, soaked heavy with emotion. "My heart is a desert flower, blooming in season, sleeping through summer heat. Water it with your tears. Feed it kisses. Place petals on your dead eyes like pennies. Your breath is the hot desert wind, blowing only from the west."

Belinda bit her bottom lip, looked coyly around the circle again, and settled back into her seat and waited for the commentary to begin.

Jenks decided Belinda was one sad sorry bitch.

"Thank you, Belinda," Morgan said. "That was very moving." He scanned the faces in the room. "Who'd like to start us off?"

Half the class looked away. Jenks made a close inspection of his fingernails.

The kid next to Jenks cleared his throat. What was his name? Timothy Lancaster. Blue blazer, penny-loafer motherfucker.

Lancaster said, "The juxtaposition of the active and the static present an interesting tension in this poem, I think."

Jenks cocked an eye at him. Say what?

Morgan raised an eyebrow. "How do you figure?"

"It's a basic battle of the sexes theme," Lancaster said. "Although rather eloquently cast in nature terms. The blooming flower represents femininity, womanhood. Static and ready to receive a seed. Women have nesting instincts, roots. The wind represents the male. I think the speaker of this poem has issues with the lack of commitment males have in her life."

Belinda glowered.

Wait. What was homeboy saying, that the flower was like symbolic of some ripe cootchie? With his pencil, Jenks circled the words desert flower and wrote the word vagina next to it. Hold on. It said her heart was the flower. Jenks crossed out what he'd written. Square one.

"Look. First thing's first, okay?" It was Wayne DelPrego, the redneck dude who sat on the other side of Lancaster. "You can't say 'Dust in the Wind' in the title. People will think of the Kansas song."

They went on like this for about fifteen more minutes, Morgan nodding thoughtfully the whole time without saying anything significant. What the fuck? The guy was supposed to be the teacher. Was he going to explain this poem or not?

Not.

They went through two more poems. One was about a mother dying. The other one from a nerd guy with glasses thick as ashtrays. His poem seemed mostly to be about Star Trek. Most of the class hated it. They disrespected the nerd boy's poem, and he just sat there and took it. That seemed to be what the class was about. You read your poem, then let everyone talk you down.

Fuck that.

Whenever Morgan asked the students who'd like to comment on the poetry, the professor's eyes always landed on Jenks briefly before Jenks looked away. This wouldn't play for long. Sooner or later Jenks would be expected to speak up.

Another grad student read his poem. Jenks had tuned out. These people were all speaking some other language. His poem didn't sound anything like theirs.

"Mr. Ellis!"

Jenks blinked. The professor had to say Sherman Ellis's name twice. Jenks hadn't been listening. "Yo."

Morgan frowned. "Yes, yo to you too. We have just enough time left to workshop your poem."

Jenks cleared his throat and read:

If it weren't for family,

Sister, father, brother, mother,

How would I know when I was home?

I thank God for my family

Each one is like no other

I take them in my heart wherever I may roam.

Jenks was still working on his masterpiece, but he'd needed a poem quick. So he'd taken this one from a greeting card he'd seen in the grocery store. He looked at the professor for a reaction. Morgan had his nose all wrinkled up like he smelled dog shit. That couldn't be good.

"Well, isn't that warm and fuzzy," Morgan said.

"It is a bit saccharine," Lancaster said. "I'm not sure such an abundance of sentimentality concentrated in so few lines is the best strategy."

Jenks couldn't tell if he was being disrespected or not.

DelPrego yawned, ran a hand through his shaggy hair. "It's crap."

Oh, yeah. Jenks was being disrespected all right.

Part 2

fourteen

Deke Stubbs had the kind of scruples one would expect in a private eye.

Which is to say he didn't have any.

Stubbs leaned back in his office chair, heaved his thick, short legs upon the desk. He smiled his gray teeth, cradled the phone against his thick chunk of chin while popping open a warm Busch. He had a sucker on the line and smelled a payday. The sucker used to be a client.

But Stubbs needed a shave, a new suit, a muffler for his Dodge, last month's rent, and a blow job. And all that cost money.

"I know you paid me to take these photos of your wife," Stubbs said to the client. "But I was thinking your wife would pay more."

The guy squawked angry on the other end.

"I'm not trying to put the bite on nobody," Stubbs said. "I was just supposing out loud. That's all."

Stubbs sipped beer, listened to the client give him an earful. The guy called Stubbs every name in the book, made the usual threats. Stubbs didn't care. He took it all in, waited. He knew the guy would cough up if he wanted the divorce case settled his way. No matter how much the client paid Stubbs, he'd save money in the long run by showing his wife was doing the dirty with the family dentist. Same old story every time. The client was really yelling now. He didn't seem to want to let up.

"Listen," Stubbs said, "I don't like you talking to me like that, but I'm going to forgive you because I know this is a surprise. Maybe a little stressful. But normally I'd come over there and stick a long knife right into your fat belly. Maybe I will anyway. You ever stick a knife into somebody's belly? The blood pours out all warm and sticky. And when you twist the knife, the blood keeps coming. Sometimes the blade gets into the bowel. The bowel juice gets mixed in with the blood, smells something awful."

Silence on the other end.

Stubbs's office door creaked open. Stubbs looked at his watch. His 10 A.M. appointment was fifteen minutes early.

A man and a woman entered. Upper-middle-class. Professionals. Good citizens. About two years ago, Stubbs had decided he needed a better class of sucker, so he'd sprung for a big advertisement in the Yellow Pages. It was a great ad. He'd used words like discreet, professionalism, and state-licensed. The ad had brought in a whole new kind of clientele. Half of them turned around and walked out the moment they saw Stubbs. But the other half more than paid for the ad.

"I'll have to call you back," Stubbs said into the phone. "Think about what I said."

He hung up.

"We're the Walshes," the man said. "I'm Dave and this is my wife Eileen."

"Have a seat, folks." Stubbs waved a hand at the two rickety chairs across his desk.

They sat.

Stubbs said, "Now on the phone you mentioned something about your daughter." Stubbs pawed through his top desk drawer. He was out of Winstons. "Either of you folks have a cigarette?"

"We don't smoke," the woman said.

"Annie," Dave said. "She's missing."

The wife leaned forward, grabbed the edge of the desk. White knuckles. "It's been two weeks!"

Stubbs nodded, pulled a legal pad out of his top desk drawer. "I'm just going to take some notes, okay? You tell me all about it."

They talked. Stubbs listened.

The woman was obviously in charge. Dave would start a sentence, but Eileen would finish it. They were desperate. Annie had never gone this long without calling before.

Stubbs made concerned noises, wrote on his notepad.

When Eileen Walsh signaled she was done with her story, Stubbs set the notepad aside. He steepled his hands under his chin, looked deep into their eyes, and said, "I'm going to need some money up front."

It was two in the afternoon the next day when Stubbs left Tulsa traveling east toward Fumbee. His Dodge sounded good. He wore a shiny new black suit (on sale at Sears). His rent was paid current, and his dingus still tingled from Lola's all-night love fest. Stubbs made a mental note to buy her a dozen roses. No, make that carnations. Roses were too expensive.

He lit a fresh Winston, puffed hard and fast.

He unfolded the map, and found the little spec that indicated where he was going. Eastern Oklahoma University. The parents had given him some good stuff. A copy of her class schedule, apartment address, name of her roommate, plenty of good stuff. These were real parents, took an interest in the kid. Stubbs's mother never knew where he was half the time, and his father couldn't give a shit.

A bit harsh maybe, but it had taught Stubbs self-reliance. He could think on his feet, improvise. One lesson he'd learned over and over again was never trust anybody. Another lesson that had come in handy was never to give a sucker an even break. And maybe that meant he didn't have a long list of close friends, but it also meant he never risked having someone let him down. Sure, he'd come up hard and tough. But he'd learned.

And he'd turned out okay.

fifteen

Morgan had been grinning wide and goofy all morning since Annette Grayson had called him to meet for lunch. After two weeks of her coyly sidestepping invitations for dinner or drinks, it finally looked like he was going to make some headway. He went home before meeting her, put on his charcoal slacks, red silk shirt. He looked slick.

He searched under his bed for his belt and spotted the pistol Fred Jones had given him. He recoiled, the memory of it clenching his gut.

He stood. Never mind the belt.

Morgan had almost hypnotized himself into forgetting about Annie Walsh's cold body buried in the peach orchard just outside of town. But he couldn't quite forget the way her head tilted when she was listening or the way her eyes squeezed shut when she laughed.

Last week when Jones had been over to discuss his latest batch of poems, Morgan had almost snapped. He said he couldn't stand it anymore. Couldn't eat or sleep. He was going to the police. He'd tell everything, say he was out of his mind, that he'd panicked.

Jones had gripped Morgan's wrist with strong bony fingers, had spoken low, almost a growl. "You listen to me, Professor. Forget about it. It's handled. You get it? You didn't kill that kid. She zapped herself on pills. Why should you get tangled up in that? How's that fair?"

Morgan had listened, nodded, sluggishly followed the old man's lead. Sure, why should he suffer?

But now he couldn't help thinking about it again. About Annie.

Not now, dumbass. Annette's waiting.

He climbed into his Buick and was five minutes late arriving at someplace called The Sprout Shack.

He walked in, spotted her, and his smile fell into little chunks, bounced, and clattered around his ankles. Two other professors sat with Annette. He didn't know their names, but he'd seen them around Albatross Hall. This wasn't going to be the intimate lunch Morgan had in mind.

Annette spotted Morgan and waved him over. He sat opposite her, draped the cloth napkin over his lap, tried to smile again, and it came out like a tired grimace.

"Have you been sleeping okay?" Annette asked.

"Sure." He nodded at the two strange professors. "Hey. I'm Jay Morgan."

The two professors nodded back.

"Hello. Susan Criger." She was beefy, red-faced, hair knotted in a severe bun.

The other guy was bland, vanilla pudding complexion. Hair the color of old parchment. "Good to meet you, Dr. Morgan."

"I'm not a doctor," Morgan said. "I have an MFA."

"I'm glad you could all make it," Annette said. "I think you all know what we need to discuss."

"Evidently not." Morgan realized it had come out a bit caustic and tried to smile again to make up for it. But the muscles in his face wouldn't work. His smile was broken.

"It's Sherman Ellis." Annette toyed with her water glass, shook her head, and finally shrugged. "I don't know what to do with him or what to make of him. He's supposed to be tutoring undergrads in the Writing Lab, but, well to be blunt, he's useless. I had to explain to him what a gerund was."

The beefy woman nodded. "I suppose you've gotten the same speech from the dean we have. I was told to-and I quote-'use the kid gloves.' "

Morgan grabbed a menu, scanned it, and was horrified to find himself in a health food restaurant. "What is this? Curd? What the hell is curd?"

Annette ignored him. "I know the university is under a lot of pressure to reach out to minority students, but I'm worried about standards. I don't think-"

The waiter arrived, set plates in front of Annette and the other two professors.

"We went ahead and ordered," Annette told Morgan. "Hope you don't mind."

"No problem." Morgan looked at her plate. Annette seemed to have ordered some kind of shredded green Brillo pad surrounded by quivering blocks of pale goo.

The waiter looked at Morgan, his pen hovering over his order pad. "Sir?"

Morgan pointed at Annette's plate. "What's that?"

"Alfalfa sprouts and caraway-seed tofu cubes."

"I think I'm going to need a minute."

The waiter left. Morgan thought he might have been rolling his eyes.

"Look, it doesn't matter," the other professor said. He poked at a puddle of coarse gray gunk on his plate. "Dean Whittaker has the administration behind him. It's a public relations show now, and they don't want to have to tell anyone they flunked out an African-American student. They'll say we don't understand his ebonics or that he was culturally displaced and needed special consideration or Lord knows what. The fact that he doesn't know a Restoration drama from an episode of Mama's Family won't matter to anyone."

He stood, dropped his napkin in the chair. "I'm sorry, Dr. Grayson. I'm not sticking my neck out. It's not worth my job. Come on, Susan. I'll buy you a cheeseburger across the street." He nodded at Morgan. "Good to meet you."

Susan Criger stood, shook her head at Annette. "Sorry. Ethically, I'm on your side. You know how I feel about grade inflation, but now isn't the time for this sort of battle. Sorry." She followed the other professor to the register. They paid quickly and left the restaurant.

Annette sat back in her chair, crossed her arms. She looked at Morgan. "Well, what do you think?"

Morgan set the menu aside. "I think a cheeseburger sounds pretty good."

"Not about that!"

Morgan threw up his hands. "Well, what do you want me to say? I thought you asked me here-why did you ask me here?"

"I thought that was obvious."

"It's not. You and those other two seem to have a problem with Sherman Ellis."

"Doesn't he seem a bit odd to you? I mean, is he the caliber of student you're accustomed to?" She harpooned a tofu cube with her fork, sniffed it, popped it into her mouth. She frowned and shoved in a bale of sprouts on top of the tofu, crunched without enjoyment.

"Ellis is exactly as bad as all of my other poets," Morgan said. "Ellis only stands out in that he thinks rap and poetry are the same thing. But in terms of quality he's as bad as all of the other pinheads."

"You don't sound like you enjoy your job."

"You don't look like you're enjoying your lunch."

She stabbed another chunk of tofu, squinted at it, sighed. "I don't eat meat." She put the fork down. "But I could use some comfort food. I suppose you could talk me into a cheese pizza."

"I bet I could talk you into a pitcher of beer too."

Rico's New York Style Pizza was a pleasantly shabby place with red-and-white plastic tablecloths. The guy who owned it wasn't named Rico and had never been to New York. But the pizza was hot and the cheese thick.

Annette had eaten three slices and was on her fourth, the stringy cheese stretching from the slice to her teeth. She reeled in the cheese with a slurp and pushed it down with three serious gulps of cold beer.

"After my divorce I went on this health kick." Annette refilled her mug from the nearly empty pitcher. "I lost twelve pounds and firmed up my abs and lowered my cholesterol. The whole deal."

"Sounds terrible." Morgan sprinkled red pepper on his pizza.

"It is," she said. "I've been hard at it about three years. I sold his golf clubs and used the cash to buy this stationary bike. I do about two hours a night. I'll have to do three tonight after this pig fest." But she didn't let up, dipped the crust into a stray puddle of sauce, and ate it.

"I started doing sit-ups a week ago," Morgan said. He'd also started walking a mile a day in the evenings and laying off the bottle. So far he hadn't seen the results, but he kept telling himself to be patient.

"Yeah, well it won't make you happy," she said. "I got myself into this routine. Exercise and vitamins and sprouts and yoga and I even did my apartment all in feng shui and I guess I've prolonged my life for twenty years; but I'm not living, if you see what I mean. I've locked myself into such a rigid routine it's like I'm some kind of robot. I mean I've exercised and dieted and exercised and believe me I've got one killer body under these frumpy teacher clothes, but what good is it? It's been so long since I've"-she shook her head-"Never mind. I'm running off at the mouth."

"No, do go on." Morgan grinned, flashed his blue eyes. "How long since you've what?"

Annette leaned back in the booth, half smiled at Morgan over her beer mug. "I know professors like you. You've probably got some free-spirit poetry spiel you toss around until some big-eyed grad student decides she wants to be your prot¨¦g¨¦."

Morgan flushed and turned off his eyes. She'd caught him trying to use the same look he used on young girls. Indeed, he had been about to make his standard pitch. Foolish. That wouldn't work on Annette. She was a mature, smart woman, not a blushing twenty-year-old.

"I'm divorced too," Morgan said. "But I threw myself into self-destruction instead of health, late nights, hit the booze hard, moved around job to job."

"How long's it been?"