TAMMY’S CAMPFIRE TALE

FEATURED ON EP #56

Social Club by Jordan Miller

If there was one thing in her fourteen years that Tammy Bates learned about men from her father  it was that you could only ever really know part of a gamblin’ man, because most of what a gamblin’ man had he kept to himself. Privacy came with the territory, and Tammy’s father loved to toss the dice. She had been told many times that gambling was a sinful and detestable thing, but she believed her father to be a good person all the same. Gambling just happened to be one of his favorite things.  It made her wonder what other bad things a good person like her father might enjoy. What secrets everyone she has ever met might be hiding.  She thought about herself and the stash of cigarettes hidden in her backpack.  She imagined a world of good people with bad secrets, doing all they can to keep secrets from each other for the sake of some collective illusion of goodness. 

This idea kept Tammy up some nights, but mostly she found comfort in the fact that most of what her father showed her was kindness and love.  She supposed there was bad stuff in him too, dark and rotted things lurking under the surface, because that was the kinda stuff people kept to themselves. Those were the kind of things people just weren’t meant to know about. In the case of her father, anyway, she believed that good greatly outweighed the bad and so most days that idea didn’t bother her. What did bother her was that the men were back and they were talking about horses. 

Several months ago her father started having what he called his social clubs, in which some of his friends would come over to drink and talk, while Tammy sat in her room to read. Pretend to read is more accurate, as many times she would stay up and listen to them talk, and horses were all they ever wanted to talk about. The races were big in that part of the country. It was the mid 1970’s and dreams of winning bets at the Kentucky Derby dominated the thoughts of any serious Southern gambler as the Summer winded towards a close. 

From her room Tammy listened to which horses were damn sure and which ones were going to shit the bed. Which ones would make them fuckin’ rich and which ones would fuck them over.  After a couple months, Tammy had accumulated quite a colorful new vocabulary which she was excited to try out at school. 

She would lie in her bed with her book on her chest and listen as her father and his friends spout off some of the most bizarre names she had ever heard. Blinky. Standalone. One-In-A-Million. Steve McQueen Jr. The list went on, and she could never tell which ones were supposed to be the jockeys and which ones were the horses. Either way it amounted to the same thing; money lost or money earned.  She could tell which was which from the expressions on the men’s faces and how they walked when they left the house late at night, getting into their cars and swerving drunkenly back into the thick Kentucky darkness. 

One night after the men had left and her father was asleep she had snuck into the kitchen and smelled from one of the bottles the men had left behind and thought it smelled like gasoline. She didn’t understand it, but those gamblin’ men were true men of the south and coveted whiskey above all other things. All things but the horses, of course. 

The men would gawk at brown bottles that others would pull out of their jackets like magicians pulling a rabbit from a hat. Every week someone different would bring some to share. Tammy saw it as a sort of fine potion that ensnared a person and showed the world some of their truest nature, even if it was ugly. Most of the time, Tammy discovered, it was. 

Those social club meetings went on the same for about four months, her father’s friends drinking and getting louder as the hour drew late before they all set out again into the hot night, sometimes smiling and whooping and other times sunken and defeated.  This was how things went on, until the fancy man joined the club. 

Tammy thought of him as the fancy man because while her father and his friends dressed very casually, this man always wore a grey pinstripe suit and the nicest shoes Tammy had ever seen on a man. Probably from Italy, she thought wonderingly. Upon his lapel was pinned a fascinating red brooch in a shape she didn’t recognize.  He was clearly a man of means and was always polite, but Tammy immediately disliked him. 

Behind the fancy man’s thin rimmed glasses stared a pair of wide set eyes like that reminded her of the dry ice she had learned about in science class: mysterious, freezing singularities that were dangerous to the touch.  She was certain that if those eyes set on her for too long, that gaze would be so cold it would burn. A gamblin’ man only showed you part of what he had, that was true, but of the fancy man even that seemed too much. 

She wasn’t sure where her father and his friends had met the fancy man, and looking back at it from her adulthood she would have been surprised if any of them could have told you either.  The important thing was that he started showing up to every social club, and the men started winning. The social clubs turned into uproarious celebrations, her father and his friends counting out their winnings from their most recent bets.  Then out would come the brown bottles and the drinking would go on for about an hour until everybody was good and toasted. All the while, the fancy man would watch and grin, offering curteous conversation and congratulations whenever appropriate.  After the drinking began to settle, the fancy man would step up and inform the men on their next lucky horses.  This part of the meeting was always very quiet, and as hard as Tammy listened, she could never make out much that was said.  After about ten minutes of this there was some laughter and clinking as the men tipped back their final night caps and went home.

One thing Tammy appreciated about her father’s drunken social club nights was that it was a wonderful night to sneak a cigarette or two.  She sometimes bought them from a friend at school and had taken it up as an occasional thing to do.  On social club nights she figured if her dad could enjoy his vices, why shouldn’t she? They were always too busy to notice on those nights anyway.  

After the last of the taillights disappeared into the night, she stepped outside for her secret smoke.  She lit it and took her first long puff.  She didn’t exactly think they tasted great at this point, but she was starting to get the appeal.  She exhaled a plume of smoke when she realized there was still someone there.  The thick trees surrounding the property cast most of everything into black shadow, but standing in a lone island of moonlight was the fancy man.  She blew out the rest of her smoke and hid the cigarette behind her back but when she looked back up at the fancy man, now temporarily the moonlight man, was smiling.  She didn’t know what to make of that smile. It was the kind of smile you could show to a thousand people, and they would all tell you it meant something different.  Then the fancy man brought his finger up to his lips and gave her a playful wink.  His smile widened and with a couple long steps, he was gone, leaving only the diminishing sound of those impressive shoes. 

Tammy brought the cigarette back out and took another puff, staring curiously into the night.  She had always imagined the fancy man behind the wheel of a fancy car, but she had just found out something interesting. When the fancy man went out, he walked.  

Her father was in a great mood those months and would frequently treat her to ice cream or an extra few dollars of spending money for the week. He either didn’t know or didn’t care if she knew those things were bought with winnings from the track, and she never brought it up.  That week she used her extra spending money not just on a couple lousy cigarettes, but a whole pack.

About a month later her father had another of his social clubs and Tammy had begun to feel less uneasy about the fancy man. Something about him still made her uncomfortable, but he hadn’t told her father about her smoking, and she felt that had to count for something.  

That night the meeting ran long and it was well past two in the morning when the men stumbled out to their cars. Once she was sure they were gone she snuck out for a smoke.  She was a few puffs in when she heard something rustling nearby. Her first thought being that it was her father, she stiffened and hid the cigarette behind her back.  She was not anxious to find out how her father would react to her smoking, especially while he was drunk.  She relaxed slightly, seeing that the silhouette approaching was too slight to be her father.  Her next immediate thought was that it was the fancy man again. She was wrong on both accounts and out of the darkness stumbled the man she called “Uncle Ray”. 

Uncle Ray wasn’t her real uncle, that’s just what they called him. Her father had met Ray Dobbs in the service, discovering coincidentally they were both from the same town, even the same side of town, less than a mile from each other as a matter of fact. After their time in the service and being that neither of them were killed in combat, they stayed friends. Being that he lived so close, Uncle Ray also often walked to social clubs instead of driving. That night he had stopped for a long whiskey piss in the bush before heading home, falling behind the rest of the herd.

“What you hidin behind your back there, little missie?” Uncle Ray slurred.

“Nothing. You just scared me, Ray, that’s all”. Ray looked around, as if only now realizing where he was and how late it had become. 

“Oh, yeah well I guess I did. You’re daddy know you been smokin them things?” Tammy pulled the cigarette reluctantly from behind her.

“Busted.” 

“I can smell a stoge burning from a mile ont, givit here.” She handed him the cigarette and he took a long deep smoke. As he exhaled he lost his balance, adjusting his footing to keep from toppling over. 

“You won’t tell him will you?” She asked.

“Nope. it’ll be our little secret”. He took another long drag and tossed the cigarette. 

“Thanks, Ray. I’ll see ya” Tammy said, but before she could turn to leave she felt Ray’s hand close hard around her arm. “Ow, let go!” He was squeezing especially hard and without her support he would have certainly fell drunkenly into the dirt, but even so he stared at her with the look of a man who knew full well what he was doing.  

“C’mon now, I’m promisin to keep this secret for ya, and all I get is thanks Ray? I know your daddy taught you more mannersen that”. 

“I gave you the rest of the cigarette, now get outa here Ray you’re drunk. Just get on-” But before she could finish her sentence Ray hit her hard in the face, knocking her into the ground. Wiping a thin stream of blood from her mouth, Tammy looked up at Ray, who now resembled some kind of ghoul from the midnight monster pictures.  He was swaying back and forth and shambling forward like the living dead, with a long stream of drool forming in the corner of his mouth.  He was the living dead, she thought, because just like the zombies in that film Uncle Ray wanted flesh.  He took another step towards her and unlatched his belt. His pants were halfway down when a gentle hand fell on Ray’s shoulder.

“Now, Mister Dobbs, this hardly seems an appropriate way to treat the lady of the house.” the fancy man said. Ray spun around, his drunken ghoulish face sharpening into a pallid expression of fear. Tammy found that she was afraid too, because there was a coldness in the fancy man’s face that she had never seen before and never wanted to see again.

“I wasn’t up to nothing, no sir! I was just--”

“What you were doing, Mr. Dobbs, was slobbering over this frightened young girl like a filthy fucking dog.”

“I wasn’t! I--”

“You were, Mr. Dobbs. I think it’s time you go home, and perhaps tomorrow morning you take the long way to work” the fancy man said. Uncle Ray scurried into the night holding his pants around his knees, falling face first into the dirt before getting to his feet and hobbling out of sight. The fancy man turned to Tammy and it was like he was a different person, his expression now soft and kind. “I do apologize for the regrettable behavior of Mr. Dobbs, he is a simple man with very little to offer the world. It is most unfortunate.” He extended his hand but Tammy got up on her own.  At this the fancy man smiled another unreadable smile.  

“Thanks. He was just drunk.”

“Don’t waste your energy apologizing for a man like him, this wasn’t the first time he has behaved in such a way. But excuse me, we’ve never formally met, my name is Roman”. He extended his hand. Once again she did not take it, and once again he smiled.

“Where are you from, Mister Roman?” Tammy asked.

“Now that is a good question. You know, in all my time here not one of this group, your father included, has asked me that question.” Roman mused. “I’m a man of the world, and yet I have nowhere I call my home.”

“So what are you doing here? And how do you know which horses are gonna win?”

“Again with the good questions. You are a bright girl. The horses are simple, but a good magician never reveals his secrets and all that. The members of our little betting party have seemed satisfied with the results, never bothering to ask how or why. This is a trait more common in man than you think.”

“What is it you want then?”

A wide smile crossed Mister Roman’s face, as if he is recalling some distant and fond memory. “Simply to interact. To wander.  To ask my own stubborn questions of the universe, questions like what if and what would happen then? A game of consequences, the results unknown even to me. That is the fun. To upset the natural order, you could say”. Tammy could only stare up at him like a deer in the headlights. “Come on, then, say what’s on your mind”.

“Are you the devil?” Tammy asked, to which the Roman (she still thought of him as the fancy man) actually laughed.  It was a most bizarre thing, watching him laugh, and it made her stomach turn.   

“No, ma’am, not the devil, even in the way you think of him. I have met him, though, and he is a most misunderstood being, let me assure you, as are all angels. I am just a traveler, and it’s looking like it’s about time I start traveling again. Before I go, I have something for you.” With a true magician’s flair, he pulled a small ornate box from behind his back and held it out. 

“What is it?” Tammy asked, her eyes fixated on the box and it’s design unlike any style she had ever seen.  

“A gift worthy of a girl of your intelligence and curiosity, I promise you.” Tammy reached out timidly as the fancy man placed the box into her palm. With his other hand he conjured a small key which he also gave to her. “After all, curiosity is a virtue that I value above all others”. Tammy inspected the box and it’s key and then slipped it into the keyhole.

The fancy man held up a long finger. “Not so hasty, now. This gift comes with some instructions that should not be taken lightly”. Tammy pulled the key back out and put it into her pocket. “Before I tell you what’s in the box we need to get one thing in line between us. You asked if I was the devil, which as I said I am not, but I promise you that I am most certainly not human. To know me as a devil is perhaps the closest definition in which you can know me, and in any case the details are not important. What is important is that you believe me, for in order for you to believe what I am to tell you about the box, you must believe what I’m telling you now”.  

Tammy looked from Roman down to the impossibly lavish box in her hand, then back up to him. The fancy man, not Roman. She no more believed Roman to be his name than she believed the face smiling back at her was his true face. They were illusions. Magic tricks. “I believe you.” She said. 

“Excellent.” The fancy man said, and smiled again.  “What’s in the box is truth, my dear. Nothing more and nothing less. Once you open the box your eyes will be open always. You will see into the core of any man with which you interact; knowing intimately their deepest truths, desires, fears and their darkest secrets. Men wear masks when facing the world, I believe you know this much already. This gift will let you see through those masks as naturally as you draw breath.” 

“Even dad?” Tammy asked.

The fancy man’s smile widened. “You would know him better than he knows himself, I would imagine”. Tammy looked at the box and frowned. “But this gift is yours and yours alone. Anyone else who looks into the box will see nothing, because there will be nothing. It exists only for you and all you have to do to open it is use that key”.

“Why are you giving me this?”

“I told you I play a game of consequences.”

“But why me?

“I like you, I suppose. Do I need more reason than that?”

Tammy didn’t believe the fancy man to be the sort of man that really liked anyone. She felt that his smile was a cracking dam, holding back a flood of contempt that could drown a herd of elephants. “And what are the consequences... of knowing stuff like that?” Tammy asked.

“I assure you, I have no idea.” the fancy man said with his cold grin.  “You are a most curious girl, and a smart one. That is all I know. Don’t think I wasn’t aware that you like to eave drop on our little meetings”. Tammy looked away, embarrassed at her own transparency.  “Don’t feel bad. It only serves to reaffirm my position that what’s in that box would be most appealing to you. The perfect gift, that’s all”.

“And what if I decide not to open it?” Tammy asked.

“Then that is your decision. The box is yours, after all”.  And then was gone. Evaporated into the night like an ice cold mist. No sound of footprints echoing through the humid dark. No sinister echoing laughter. Just gone. Silence. Tammy sat for a long moment listening to the chorus of tree frogs and crickets, looking at the box in her hands and feeling the shape of the key in her pocket. 

She thought about the story of Pandora and her fateful box, wondered if Pandora would have kept the damn thing shut if she had really known what was waiting inside.  It was nice to think Pandora would have had enough sense for that at least, but somehow she wasn’t so sure. 

The next day someone called the house to tell them that Ray Dobbs was dead.  According to his wife Nancy, he woke up for work hungover, which wasn’t unusual, made himself a cup of coffee and spoke only a single sentence. 

“I think I’m gonna take the long way in to work today” and then Ray was in his car and off, his half drank coffee left on the counter.  He then drove into the Pike County Rock Quarry and directly off the edge of a forty foot cliff.  When his car hit the rocks below he must have been screaming, because the force of the impact sent his face into the steering wheel, tearing off most of his head. When they found him his lower jaw was still attached to his neck, his tongue lolling out like a dead fish. Her father was devastated. He drank alone that night, talking and telling stories of old Ray, their time in the war and how the world had lost a great man. An American hero. 

Tammy didn’t open the box but kept it on the dresser across from her bed where she often found herself staring at it.  The key she kept in a drawer in her nightstand.  Her father’s social clubs continued for a bit, but never with the winning streaks they had while the fancy man was in town.  One night her father’s friend Hank left the meeting stone drunk as always and drove his car into a telephone post. After that her father seemed to lose interest in betting on the horses and when the Derby came that September there was no social club and not a bet was placed. This was fine with Tammy who never much cared for the clubs anyway and was much happier spending many of those nights watching television and playing cards with her father. 

Sleep became elusive and thin, leaving Tammy with many nights with only the darkness of her room and the sound of the night. The treefrogs and crickets playing their never-ending song. On those nights she would look across her room, where moonlight outlined the small ornate box, unopened, pregnant and waiting. Her mind would go to the key in her drawer and she would imagine it’s weight in her hand, how good the ancient brass would feel against her skin.  

She thought of lock and key as two fairy tale lovers wanting only to be united, and she the tyrant queen who kept them apart. For the sake of the kingdom it was her responsibility to keep them apart and she didn’t dare shirk that duty. She knew it was not curiosity that killed the cat, but the madness that came after. That madness of knowing. And so she kept watch, keeping lock and key apart, all the while knowing how good it would feel to let lovers love, and fearing that one day that temptation would be too much to resist.