Into Nowhere & Beyond
She’d park her black Coupe Deville at the bottom and start her confident gait towards homes that looked like barns, trailers with no underpinnings, rusted siding and splintered wood all sharp and ready as cacti needle. No one ever shot a woman in pearls. You opened the door and took her in– her high pitched giggle and memorized speech like cursive butter full of features and guarantees. When you saw her beehive bopping up a trail all you could really do was prepare to be charmed. Startling as it was, like a real life commercial come to life, she promised you the work was already done. Before you knew it, she’d stain your carpets and clean them so bright you’d see them for the first time over. It was a magic trick that left immaculate threads like new bedsheets. You might feel tempted to lay down against the soft fresh floor and rest awhile. With sales pitches like storytelling, Naomi Ratcliffe was a stout five-ten of cloudy salt-and-pepper hair and low heels. She’d walk right in with her long pencil skirts and pantyhose, the collared shirts with the severe shoulder pads, all her rings and scarves and sunglasses. Like a movie star, she’d track that red clay in and smile and smile, even when someone remembered her husband. She’d sell two to all who knew the stories of how he’d whisper like an astronaut into the vacuum hoses, how he turned a knife on the family, convinced he was the hero of the story. But it was her who’d hiked up all those holler gravel paths. It was her who waved her arm until it hurt. She swore she knew all’you’all’s mommas’andem until she’d charmed the whole of Pike County, until she had to start cooking the books. But even God forgave her for that in the end.
