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  Because he was usually on the giving end and not the receiving end of meanness, Greg was a happy kid. Notice I said “usually.” The one frustration in Greg’s life was that mule I told you about.

  We’d named him Dirty Harry because he squinted like the actor Clint Eastwood did in the Dirty Harry movies. Grandpa bought Dirty Harry about the time Greg started school, and the animal took an early dislike to the boy. That mule would let Grandpa work it all day long on jobs that were too much trouble for the wheezing old tractor, jobs like dragging wagons full of hay or hauling loads of firewood. But let Greg try to get Dirty Harry to do anything, and that mule would refuse to move or bite Greg’s fingers or swat him in the face with its tail. Once, it even pooped where Greg was standing. Greg was barefoot at the time. Why he’d be standing barefoot on the wrong end of a bad mule I don’t know.

  Now, Grandpa might’ve been old but his mind was as sharp as that razor of his that I cut myself with trying to shave when I was nine. He knew what a pain Greg was and how much that mule annoyed Greg. Every chance Grandpa got, something like this would happen:

  “Greg! Go hitch up the mule to that wagon load of feed. Take it on down there to the south pasture and give it to them cows before they go and starve themselves to death trying to eat that wire grass.”

  “Aw, Grandpa!”

  Then Greg’s mother would speak up. “Gregory Matthew Wilson, go do what your grandfather said this minute!”

  “I’m going,” Greg would say and stomp toward the door cussing under his breath and thinking nobody could hear him.

  Just as Greg’s hand would touch the doorknob, Grandpa would say, “Son, you better watch what you’re saying before I have to turn you over my knee and wash your mouth out with soap. I may be old, but I’m still big enough to do it.”

  “I wasn’t saying nothin’.”

  “Yeah, and I’m the King of England. Now go on and get.” Grandpa would stand at the window and watch Greg struggle with the mule. For the rest of the day, Grandpa would smile a lot.

  But it was Grandpa himself that told Greg what the mule’s weakness was. I’m sure Grandpa never meant to do it, like I’m sure that if Grandpa had known what was going to happen because of a slip of his tongue, he might have washed his own mouth out with soap.

  The revelation came one day while Greg and I were leaning on the pasture gate and watching the veterinarian treat some of the farm’s livestock. The vet looked over the cattle, then checked Dirty Harry. When the vet finished, he took off his University of Alabama ball cap long enough to wipe sweat off his bald head and turned to Grandpa.

  “Y’all ever ride this old mule?”

  “Ride him?” Grandpa chuckled. “Naw, he can barely stand having a blanket on his back, much less people. I don’t know what he’d do if somebody tried to throw a leg over him. He might have a heart attack or something, walk a few feet and drop down dead.”

  A look of evil glee came over Greg’s face. I figured he was concocting again, so I slipped away and went in the house. Once there, I looked out the window and saw Grandpa walking toward the house and Greg talking with the vet. Then the vet left and Greg came inside . . . and sat . . . and watched TV . . . and poked fun at the cartoons the way he always did. Nothing else happened.

  After a while, I relaxed enough to go outside with Greg, Daryl and Pinkney Usher, a boy from across the road, to play World War II with slingshots loaded with BBs. I should’ve known Greg was up to something, though, when he volunteered to be part of the German army. Usually, Greg wanted to be an American because the Americans won the war and he insisted on winning. Somehow his new attitude went right on by me like one of his fastballs. Anyway, he was a German and he made Daryl be a German, while I and Pinkney were the Americans.

  I felt sorry for Pinkney. How two parents who seemed to love him the way they did could name him the gosh-awful name “Pinkney” or any other name that would saddle him the initials “PU” I never understood. Mamma allowed as how “Pinkney” was an old Southern name. I allowed back at her that it’s best for some old things to die off.

  About a half an hour later, Pinkney’s mother hollered across the road for him to come home and try on some new shoes she’d bought him. The rest of us declared a truce and rested in the grass. I was the only one with a BB wound, and Greg volunteered to go in the house and bring out a bandage for me. This time his generosity set off an alarm in my thick head.

  When he came back and handed me a Band-Aid, I asked him, “Greg, how come you’re being so nice?”

  Greg was spared the need to decide whether to tell the truth when Pinkney ran over to show us his new leather slip-ons. We just nodded at them and he looked hurt. Pinkney was raised in a house full of girls, and I wondered if he expected us to carry on about those shoes of his like girls would have. He was strange that way.

  “Hey y’all,” Greg said, “you want to really have some fun?” He yanked a big, red bandana from a back pocket of his jeans.

  “Yeah, sure!” Pinkney said. Pinkney was a bit dim as well as strange. Daryl and I gave each other a narrow-eyed “what’s Greg thinking?” look.

  Greg led the way to Dirty Harry, who was standing at the pasture gate nibbling at the thick grass that had so far escaped the lawn mower. Dirty Harry stopped munching, looked past Daryl, Pinkney and me as if we weren’t there, fixed a cold eye on Greg and went back to nibbling.

  “Y’all stay here a minute,” Greg said. He clambered over the gate rails and disappeared into the nearby barn. He emerged carrying a feed bag in one hand and that bandana. The evil glee was back in his face when he stared at Dirty Harry and said, “Here, you old jackass, you hungry?”

  He climbed the rails again to get high enough to reach the top of Dirty Harry’s head and slipped the strap of that feed bag over that old mule’s ears. Dirty Harry shook his head only once in protest before attacking the feed in the bag. The mule was so happy at having an unscheduled snack that he forgot he was meantempered. Greg tied the bandana over Dirty Harry’s eyes and pushed Dirty Harry’s body parallel to the gate rails, but Dirty Harry didn’t even snort.

  Greg looked at the three of us. “The vet told me about blindfolding and feeding an animal to get him to do what you wanted. OK, now y’all climb on.”

  “Climb on what? That?” Daryl said, his face frozen in an expression of disbelief that could’ve been lifted off a comicstrip page.

  “That’s right. We’re going to sit on ole Harry.”

  “He’s really tall,” I said in my way of trying to say no without actually saying no and risking a pounding. “How are we supposed to get on?”

  “Climb up the rails and swing a leg over the old puke’s back, that’s how,” Greg said.

  Daryl shook his head. “I don’t think Grandpa wants us riding his mule.”

  “We ain’t going to ride him. We’re just going to sit on him a minute, all four of us.” When Daryl didn’t start moving, Greg added, “And if you don’t hurry up, I’m going to slug you one.” Daryl climbed. So did I.

  That left Pinkney on the ground. He held up a hand about head high, his face pinched. “Greg, I can’t go climbing fences in these new shoes. My mother will kill me if they get scuffed.”

  “Well, take them off, stupid.” Greg paused, his expression changing to a sneer. “That is, unless you’re yellow. Pink, you ain’t yellow to sit on a mule’s back, are you?”

  “N-n-n-no.”

  “Then climb up!”

  Moments later, we were all on Dirty Harry’s bare back. Daryl was in front because Greg ordered him to sit there. Greg was right behind Daryl so he could hit him if necessary. I slid on behind Greg. Dirty Harry’s back was so wide that stretching my legs over it made my muscles hurt. The mule’s backbone, which stuck up about three inches from everything else, poked my underwear into places it shouldn’t have been. I looked down fr
om that mountain of a mule and saw the ground about a half mile away. I got dizzy and grabbed hold of Greg’s belt loops.

  “What are you doing? You ain’t scared, are you?” Greg said.

  “No, I’m fine,” I lied. I was about to lie again and say how much fun this was when Pinkney got on behind me and locked his arms around me. It was hard to breathe for a while after that.

  Daryl turned so he could talk in our direction and said, “We’ve sat on him, now let’s get down.”

  “Give me my bandana first,” Greg said. Daryl hesitated before untying the bandana and handing it back to Greg. Dirty Harry shook enough to make me and Pinkney holler, then settled down.

  “All right,” Greg said, “push the feed bag off his head.”

  “I ain’t going to do that,” Daryl said. “That’ll really make him mad. You know better than to take food away from a big animal.”

  Greg jerked forward, and I heard the sound of a fist hitting flesh. Daryl yelped. “Now do it or I’ll hit you again, you chicken.”

  I peeked around Greg and saw Daryl push the feed bag until the strap slipped off the mule’s head. The feed bag hit the ground with a thump. Dirty Harry shook again, snorted, looked back at us and bent its head down to nuzzle the feed bag.

  “You’ve fed your face enough, you big old pig,” Greg yelled. “Now geddup!” He kicked his heels into Dirty Harry’s flanks. The mule brayed.

  “Hey! Stop it, Greg,” Daryl yelled.

  “You said we weren’t going to ride it!” I yelled.

  “So I fibbed,” Greg said and kicked again. The mule brayed louder and took a few steps. “Yeah, now go, stupid, and drop down dead.”

  At Greg’s third kick, Dirty Harry sprang forward like a whole nest of hornets had stung his rump. He headed across the pasture at gallop.

  “Yeehaw,” Greg yelled. “Grandpa said he’ll be dead in a minute. Ain’t this great?”

  Greg was welcome to his opinion, but I thought I was being beaten to death. Dirty Harry’s strides were throwing me into the air and dropping me onto that sticking-up backbone as Greg and Pinkney slammed into me from front and back. All the spankings I’d ever gotten put together wouldn’t have been that bad. After fifty yards of mule ride, about the only parts of me that weren’t numb were my head and feet.

  Worse, I was losing my grip on Greg’s belt loops. Once I thought I’d lost it altogether because my hands flew in the air. Then I realized that they were still hanging on and went in the air only because Greg did.

  I’d heard about people becoming paralyzed with fear, and before getting on Dirty Harry I thought I knew what that meant. But I hadn’t. Now I did; I couldn’t seem to make anything work. I couldn’t move unless the mule made me move, and I couldn’t decide whether it was better to stay on or jump off. Staying on meant pain. Falling all the way to the ground that was blurring past the toes of my tennis shoes also meant pain.

  “I thought you said he’d be dead by now,” Daryl said.

  “Shut up!” Greg hollered.

  The mule went faster and turned to run along the pasture’s west fence. Barbed wire, fence posts, trees and undergrowth whipped by a few feet away.

  Pinkney screamed, “I’m going to wet my pants!”

  I found my voice. “No you’re not, neither. Not on me.”

  From in front, Daryl hollered and Greg let out a string of swear words, some of which I didn’t know he knew. At first, I thought Greg was mad at Daryl. But the pitch of Greg’s voice got my attention. He wasn’t mad. He was terrified.

  I couldn’t help but stretch tall enough to see what would make Greg show fear. I wished I hadn’t. A few feet inside the fence line was a huge oak. One of its limbs was slightly more than mule-head high off the ground, and Dirty Harry was running straight at it. In a few seconds, that old mule was going to use that limb to flick us off his back the way he’d use his tail to flick flies off his backside.

  “Turn him! Stop him! Do something!” I yelled, but I’d already decided it would have taken God himself to make that demon mule change his mind or his direction.

  When we were maybe thirty feet from the limb, Dirty Harry ducked his head to make sure he didn’t get knocked cold. But Daryl was holding onto Dirty Harry’s mane, and got pulled forward and down enough to put his head into line with that limb. He screamed and I didn’t blame him. I could also see that even if we didn’t all get our heads knocked off, we were going to get some broken ribs or busted insides from getting hit by that limb or flying boys. I had figured out what I had to do when Greg confirmed it.

  “Jump! Jump!” he yelled.

  Daryl was the first one off. He catapulted into space like a rock from one of our slingshots. Greg probably threw him off. Greg went next, slinging his arms to one side to give him momentum, but I still had my fingers wrapped around his belt loops and Pinkney still had me around the middle. I felt enough of a jerk to pull me sideways, then my hands were free and Pinkney and I were coming off the mule in slow motion.

  In the air, I heard lots more screaming, felt Pinkney let go and thought how tall the grass looked as it came at me. I hit so hard on my stomach that my ears rang and I couldn’t breathe or see or even feel much for an instant. I knew I slid forward and rolled over once, maybe twice. My body started working again and I felt pain all over as if I was one, boy-sized bruise. My face was stinging, and when I touched it I pulled away a bloody hand. I whimpered as I tried to find out where the blood was coming from, and I didn’t care who heard me.

  But I doubt Daryl and Pinkney could have heard, because Greg started shrieking. When I saw him I knew why. His left forearm, which should have been straight, had a bend in it between his elbow and wrist that looked like the bottom part of an “S.” Eyes bulging, he held that broken left arm in the right one and ran toward the house, his ripped belt loops flapping.

  Daryl was on all fours, tears running down his face and groaning, “My butt’s broke. My butt’s broke.” He tried to stand, fell on his side, yelled and flopped over on his front.

  “What happened to Greg?” I called.

  “He musta landed on his arm,” Daryl replied.

  “Try to stand up again,” I said. “If you can, you’re butt ain’t broke.” He struggled upright and was able to limp over to where I was.

  “You know you’ve got a bloody nose and a busted lip?” he said. I nodded.

  Pinkney was behind me crying, but not from pain. Daryl and I investigated and saw that of the four of us, he had the fewest wounds, at least to his body. His pride was much worse off. The back of his shirt, his arms, his neck and the seat of his pants were caked with wet, smelly manure.

  “Eeeuuuuu! Guys, get this stuff off me.” He gagged and I moved away in case he threw up. He didn’t. When all of us were on our feet, we started toward the pasture gate. Daryl and I made sure to keep Pinkney downwind of us.

  Dirty Harry headed toward the gate, too, since the barn was in the same direction. A few yards ahead of us, he stopped, turned, snorted and caught us in that Clint Eastwood crooked squint as if daring us to ride him again.

  I looked at him, feeling like the punk the real Dirty Harry had whipped. “I guess we went and made your day, huh?” I told him. Dirty Harry threw his head back and brayed until we drew even with him. Satisfied, he trotted off toward the barn.

  By the time the three of us reached the house, Greg had already left with his mother to go to the emergency room to get his broken arm set. Grandma, Grandpa, my mamma and Pinkney’s mamma met us at the gate. Grandma already had a wash cloth and a bucket of water, and after making sure Daryl wasn’t cut up or broken up, started cleaning blood off my face. Mamma and Grandpa stood side by side, staring at us boys. Mamma shook her head in disgust while Grandpa choked back a laugh.

  Pinkney’s mother, seeing he wasn’t hurt, yelled at him for losing his new sho
es. He was trying to tell her he’d left them in the grass by the gate when she got a whiff of him. She turned pale and led him to the backyard hose pipe to wash him down and strip off his fertilized clothes. Grandpa brought soap.

  Greg spent the rest of the day in the emergency room and came home with a plaster cast that ran from his knuckles to his shoulder. That, an old-fashion belt whipping and two months of being on restriction kept him out of mischief for a while. He wasn’t deprived, though. After two days at school, he had signatures all over the cast and the phone numbers of three girls who felt sorry for him. I never did understand girls.

  Daryl got a stern talking-to for having gone along with Greg. He didn’t get a whipping because Grandpa allowed that the boy had had enough punishment.

  Mamma lectured me while driving me to the emergency room to have my lip seen about. The doctor gave me two stitches.

  Poor Pinkney had to walk home wearing only his now-wet underwear and a blanket Grandma threw around him so he wouldn’t be indecent out in public.

  Dirty Harry won the battle of the ride but lost a bigger battle—the one between the sexes. Not long after our misfortune, a friend of Grandpa’s had a female draft horse for sale. Grandpa bought her so he could keep up with his plowing and such when Dirty Harry wasn’t in the mood to work, which was often.

  I guess because old Harry hadn’t shared the same pasture with anything close to his own kind for so long, he decided he liked her, even if she was bigger than he was. But she, being a good judge of character, wanted nothing to do with him. If he came too close to her she’d snort and bite and kick at him. After a couple of weeks of that, Dirty Harry kept to himself and sulked.

  That made me feel sorry for him, but only a little.

  Mommy Darlin’

  by

  Debra Dixon

  Were they really there, whispering wordless encouragement to her, or was this part of her dream? “Whether you are there or not,” she murmured sleepily, “good night—and thank you.”