Chapter 18

17:00 August 27, 1983

Winner, Winner, Steak Dinner

The girls all called home to get permission to stay until after the news tonight. Especially when they heard that Granny had bought her first Lottery ticket ever. They wanted to see if she would win on her first try. Granny told them she would because I’d dreamed she’d won, the same as I’d dreamed that I’d save Amaryllis. I didn’t contradict her, the only real dream I’d had about Amaryllis’ attack, I’d been beaten senseless and watched them hurt her.

But hey, no one but her Dad knew about that dream. What happened last time hadn’t happened this time, so it didn’t matter. Especially knowing she was going to be here on the farm at the time she’d killed herself last time.

Both Mrs. Crookshank and Mrs. Snodgrass just asked if Pap-pap would bring them home in the truck and not let them ride home on their bikes. He promised he would.

Mrs. Hornsby was so happy that Tabitha was out with friends for the first time in a year, she was all but crying for joy on the phone. She asked to speak to me before she agreed. Thanking me once again for trying to help her daughter recover. Then she asked if I would please come with Tabitha so Sammie Jo could see her big brother before she drove them all crazy. I assured her that I would and that maybe if she and Mr. Hornsby were okay with it I could take Sammie to get an ice cream at the DQ so she’d feel special too. Just her and I, and of course my Pap-pap who’d be driving us all.

Dianne thought that was a marvelous idea as she knew Sammie Jo would brag about it all week. I also told her that anytime I wasn’t in school and Sammie Jo wanted me to come and play I’d try and make it. Again, I could hear the appreciation in the voice of the mother, that I wasn’t just focused on the older dating-age daughter, but was as willing to spend time doing age-appropriate things with the youngest too. Then she dropped the bomb I knew would go off one day.

“I wasn’t too sure about you when I realized who your father was. I thought this was just another way to keep tabs on us. But my husband told me what they’d overheard in the Diner. Did your father really tell everyone you weren’t his son anymore because you beat up those terrible boys?”

“Not just that, I also refused to let him beat me anymore when he tried, for putting them in the hospital. I wasn’t exactly respectful when I told him he’d never lay hands on me again, Ma’am, but along with my life rules, I have some personal changes I was making and the biggest one besides getting fit and strong was to never let someone strike me with belt or fist or whatever came to hand again. So, when he tried to punch me for ending the high school championship football season before it started, I stopped him and threatened to send him to the same hospital. If that makes me unsuited for spending time with your daughters, I fully understand.”

“He beat you often?”

“I don’t talk about this ever, Mrs. Hornsby. But to simply answer your question, any time he had too much to drink or got mad, I was the focus of his anger. I’m thinking now that a lot of that was when he had to do things like he did to your family. Yet instead of refusing to do them he came home and drank. Then he took his frustration out on me. It happened more than it didn’t, until two days ago when I finally stopped him and said he’d end up next to Kent, Todd, and Aaron if he ever tried it again.”

“I’m sorry he hurt you but to know that you didn’t stand up to him until the same day you stopped another girl from going through what Tabby went through is a plus in my book. That ‘regardless of the consequences’ thing is real, as is all the rest for you.”

“Yes, Ma’am it is.”

“Tell Tabby I’ll see her when she gets home and try and have fun today.”

I laughed. “I’m not sure how much fun she’s gonna have playing farm girl for a day. We’ll be loading and unloading hay bales all day. It’s hot, dirty work.”

“Well, maybe it will give her something else to think about for a change.”

“I’ll try and make sure it does. Maybe I’ll teach her to drive the tractor.”

Dianne laughed out loud at that. “Now that I’d pay to see. Good luck Harrison, with those three girls together you’re gonna need it.”

I looked over at all three grinning faces and said. “Yes, Ma’am I think I just might.”

She was laughing still when we said goodbye and I got the distinct feeling it was the first time in a year since she’d laughed, as well.

I told Tabitha I was ordered to escort her home to see my little sister. She nodded. “She’s gonna have you wrapped around her fingers just like she has Daddy, you know.” I didn’t even think about it and sang words to a song not yet released. “I’m a Barbie girl in a Barbie world

Life in plastic, it’s fantastic!”

“Tabitha laughed out loud this time, no giggle. “What?”

“Just something I thought of that seemed appropriate.”

Aw hell, I thought, that song didn’t even come out until the nineties.

Julie joined in laughing “Well come on Farm Barbie, let’s get working. I want to learn to drive the tractor too.”

The other two just nodded

Yep, this was going to be an interesting day for sure. Three farm fresh beauties in daisy dukes and tube tops learning to drive the Farmall big red tractor with its super bouncy, spring-loaded seat. Yeah, my day just got 300% better. Thank you, pink-haired bartender, wherever you are.

As expected, I think I had more fun watching the girls each take a turn driving over the bumpy fields as I tossed bale after bale on the flatbed. I was where I could get a view part-time of the side and watch those tube tops dance or on the trailer stacking while watching those Daisy Dukes shimmy. Either way, let me just admit it was the worst stacking I’d ever done. If Pap-pap hadn’t been trying to hide his laughter at my three female helpers and the lack of real help they were, he’d have had my ass for the sloppy job I was doing.

I’d have called him on it too if he had. He might be old enough to be their grandpa but there wasn’t a red-blooded American farmer anywhere that would have complained about any of the views that day. Least of all a Parker farmer old or young. Damn, but I wished I had time to convince my first girlfriend this go-round to help me try out the two bales Pap-pap had gifted me for sparkin.’

He finally took pity on me at five o’clock, telling me to pull the tractor into the big barn. We’d finish unloading it in the morning. It was time for supper and the evening news. More importantly, the Lottery drawing after the evening news. No one wanted to miss that tonight.

Granny had gone all out tonight. Pulling out steaks and cooking them up in her trusty cast iron skillet with browned home-churned butter instead of lard. With real baked potatoes topped with the same butter, real bacon crumbles, not those new fancy fake bacon bits, and sour cream. The final main dish was creamed peas from her garden and today’s fresh cream. Then to finish it all off, she’d made two sweet cherry pies. Again I looked at the three girls and even though I knew one of them was completely off-limits, lyrics to another nineties hit came to mind. “She tastes so good, make a grown man cry, sweet cherry pie.” I shook my head to remove the thought. I shouldn’t, no strike that, couldn’t, think that way about any of them. Not for quite some time. Because that way lay dangerous feelings and temptations. I’d just promised my Pap-pap that morning I’d resist for at least another year or two. But damn, was it hard after watching the bouncing Betty, Veronica, and Josie show all day. Which was which? Who cares? All three of them were hot enough to make me sizzle like that bacon Granny had cooked up for the potatoes!

And then it was time. We all gathered around the TV set in the living room and watched as the news anchor came on reminding us that tonight’s Jackpot was four and a half million dollars, and to make sure if you didn’t win, to fill out the back and turn your losing ticket in for the second chance drawing held at the end of every month. Then the pretty girl of the night got to draw the six numbers. This meant she turned on the machines and lifted each tube opening allowing one single ball from each machine out. Granny had the ticket in her hand with the girls on either side of her on the couch. Me and Pap-pap standing behind her so we could all see the ticket. Then the balls started to appear. The Newscaster began to call them out. “The first number tonight is nineteen, followed by number twenty-six, and third is number thirty-nine” The girls started bouncing and Amaryllis was saying “oh My God, OH MY GOD!”

“The fourth number is forty-three, the fifth and final number for tonight is fifty-eight,”

The girls were all squealing by now knowing that five numbers was a winner, just not the jackpot winner. Then after a dramatic pause, the announcer again reminded everyone that five numbers was a winner of one hundred thousand dollars. “Don’t forget now if you didn’t have those five numbers, fill out the back of your lottery ticket and turn it in for a chance at our second chance drawing at the end of the month. And now for the Powerball Jackpot winning number” The girls all looked at the ticket and nowhere else.

“The Powerball number tonight is lucky number sixteen. Once again those numbers are nineteen, twenty-six, thirty-nine, forty-three, and fifty-eight and the Powerball is number sixteen. If you have those six numbers then you need to go to the Lottery office closest to you in the next ninety days to claim your prize. If there isn’t a jackpot winner tonight, next week’s drawing will be worth seven million dollars. If there are winners tonight then we start over at one million. See you at the same time next week. And remember all proceeds from the sale of lottery tickets go to Kentucky Education. Which makes us all winners.”

The girls were screaming and dancing up and down. “Granny, You won! YOU WON THE LOTTERY!”

Granny just nodded and fanned herself with the ticket before Amaryllis grabbed it from her. “Don’t, you don’t want to tear it. You need to call my Uncle Joseph and get him to go with you to the lottery office tomorrow. Everyone will know by tomorrow evening that someone bought a winning ticket and where. So don’t wait. I’m calling him now.”

She ran to the phone and called her uncle. “Aunt Linda? Is Uncle Joseph at home or still in the office? Oh good, I need to talk to him, please. It’s urgent. My boyfriend’s Granny just won the Powerball Lottery!”

She was shaking her head. “No, this isn’t a joke, I swear. We just watched all six of her numbers get pulled in order, she just won four and a half million dollars. She’s gonna need him to represent her interests.”

Then Joseph must have come on. “Uncle Joseph, you need to come out to the Parker Farm right now. Granny just won the Powerball. Her first ticket ever had all six numbers in the right order. She just won over four million dollars. Yes, I’m right here and saw the ticket and the drawing. I’m telling you she won. Okay, I’ll have her do it now, hold on.” Rhyll laid the phone down and grabbed a pen off the phone table. She handed it to Granny. “Uncle Joseph said to sign the ticket right now, that way no one else can claim the money but you.” Granny nodded and took the pen and signed. Rhyll walked over and picked up the phone. “Okay, she signed it. You don’t sound as shocked as I thought you’d be.” Then she looked at me and her eyes got wide. “WHAT??? ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW?”

She turned to me. “Harrison, Uncle Joseph says that he talked to you about this the night you saved me. That your Granny bought that ticket for you because you DREAMED that she won with those numbers. Is that true?”

The other two girls whipped around to stare at me. I shrugged. “It was just a dream but it seemed so real, I had to ask her to buy the ticket with those numbers. I paid the dollar in case it wasn’t just a dream. I didn’t know it would win.”

“Oh, stop being modest, Harrison,” Granny spoke for the first time since the numbers were announced. “You knew it was real. Just like the one about Amaryllis, you had at the same time. You used that one to change the future, just like you did this one.”

Amaryllis looked at me, “You dreamed about saving me?”

I closed my eyes and shook my head. “No Rhyll, I dreamed I didn’t save you. In my dream, Kent, Todd, and Aaron did to you what was done to Tabitha. In my dream, you didn’t tell anyone what they’d done. What I’d let them do. Instead, you begged your Dad to leave Angel Falls but wouldn’t tell him why you hated it here. You killed yourself two days later. When I met you, I knew I had to save you. I couldn’t have lived knowing I let you die.”

She said, “You need to come out here Uncle Joseph, and help Granny plan how to cash her ticket. I need to go love on my boyfriend. He risked everything for me when he fought those boys. He thought he was going to lose and he still did it.”

Then she hung up and rushed around the couch and wrapped her arms around me. “You gave up so much for me, risked so much. I love you so much, Harrison.”

I shook my head “Amaryllis, I love you too but you don’t understand. Even if you never loved me or wanted me for a boyfriend, I’d have been there behind the Circle K. I had to save you Rhyll, don’t you see? I. Had. To. Nothing else mattered. If I’d dreamed about Tabitha last year, I’d have been there for her too. I wish I had. Every day since Henry told me what happened I’ve wished I’d known about her last year. I would have stopped them then.”

Tabitha looked at me then, tears running down her face. “You mean that don’t you? You would have tried to stop all five of them.”

I shook my head “No Tabitha, I wouldn’t have tried to stop them. I would have found a way to stop them. Just like I did with Rhyll. I’m sorry I didn’t know about you. I’m so very sorry.”

She shook her head. “You meant it last night, didn’t you? It wasn’t a trick like I thought, just to get into my pants. You want to protect me now. Why? I still don’t get it. I believe you now, but I don’t understand why you are willing to protect me.”

I looked at Pap-pap and he nodded. “Tell her Harrison, tell her why.”

“Tabitha, I owe your family my protection. The man from the Savings and Loan, the one who threatened you after the fact and paid your Dad. You know about that right?”

She just nodded.

“Did you ever hear his name?”

She shook her head “Daddy won’t talk about him. I remember what he looks like. Why? What’s that got to do with anything?”

“It has everything to do with it. Because, when your dad described him, I knew who he was. I used to look up the table at him every day. That man’s name is Robert Parker, and until yesterday I called him Dad. That’s when he disowned me for putting his boss’s kid and his friends in the hospital. My family owes you a debt I can never pay, no matter how much I try. But I’ll make sure you get out of school without anyone ever hurting you again. After school, if you ever in your life need my help, you call and I’ll be there as fast as I can. That’s all I can do to make up for the shit my father has done to you.”

She shook her head. “That’s not on you. That’s on him. Would you have done what he did?”

I shook my head. “I’d rather be without a home than do what he’s done. I’m positive that yours isn’t the only family he paid a visit with a check and a warning to. He claims I’m not his son and I agree with him. He doesn’t have a son and I don’t have a father, just a sperm donor.”

Granny gasped. “HARRISON BENJAMIN PARKER!!”

“I mean it, Granny. He isn’t the only Parker unwilling to be related. I refuse to be related to him either. Nothing in this life or any other life will change that fact. I told Mom yesterday and I meant it then just like I mean it now. If he was on fire I wouldn’t piss on him, even to put it out.”