Promises
So I says to her "Gimme the guns, Margaret." I always called her Margaret when she was being unreasonable. "Gimme the guns, Margaret and let's just forget all this nonsense about killing someone and go home. It ain't you talkin', it's the tequila." And she says "Don't call me Margaret and I ain't forgetting nothin." And she's blinking her eyes real hard like theys really hurting her and I know they are 'cause they are all red and swollen from the cryin' and the tequila.
"Where'd you get them guns anyway?" I says and she says "It don't matter where I got them Goddamn guns, but just for your information I stole 'em from my brother." She looked them over and says "They're nice, ain't they, Mud?" See she's called me Mud since we first met in first grade; did I tell you we went through first grade together? Yep both times we did. So anyway then she says "They're nice ain't they, Mud? If you ain't the one to die here today, you can have 'em if you want. They was stolen anyway so it's not like my brother can make ya give 'em back or nothin'."
"I don't want any Goddamn guns," I says "And besides, no one's gonna die here today." See by this point she's starting to piss me off with all this foolish talk about killing me or killing herself so I decides it's time to get firm with her so I says "Maggie Thompson you give me them guns right now; you know you ain't gonna kill me and I sure ain't gonna let you kill yourself, though I ought to cause you're a damn fool."
And it was right then at that very moment that something in her eyes told me this time was different. Sure she'd acted like a fool before and plenty of times the liquor'd made her crazy but I never seen a look in her eye like I seen right then. She looked real wild like one of them trapped tigers you see on TV when they back up in the cage and their ears are pinned back real tight and low and their lips are curled back and you know they are spittin' mad cause they are in that stupid cage and they don't wanna be. You can see it in their eyes. Well anyway, that's what her eyes reminded me of so I figured that maybe the tough approach was not the best this time and that maybe I should try being nice.
"Come on girl," I says, nice and sweet as I could be. "We promised 40 years ago not to fight over a woman, remember?" And she nodded. We was both in the fourth grade together, remember how I told you we went through first grade together? Well when we was nearin' the end of first grade and I heard the teacher telling Maggie's mother that she should repeatagrade cause she couldn't read or write too good, so I decided right then not to read or write too good too either so I could repeatagrade with Maggie. So anyway, that's why we was in the fourth grade together and when we was in the fourth grade we both fell for Jenny Lou Baxter. Me and Maggie never liked boys. No siree, never did. We knew we liked girls better even back then. So we both fall hard for Jenny Lou and we decided we had to fight over her cause we figured that would be the way to win her heart. And after we was all done fightin' and all the pushing and scratchin' and bitin' and kickin' was done wouldn't ya know it but dang Jenny Lou walks home with fat little Jimmy Lewis. So we decided right there and then that no woman would ever come between us again. And no woman ever did.
Until this thing with Laura.
"You stole her from me," she says with that wild look in her eye but for some reason she ain't blinking no more. She's just staring at me hard and sort of like a dead fish would. "Oh Maggie, for cryin out loud," I says, "I didn't steal her from you. Did I tie her up and kidnap her?" "No" she says. "Okay, then I didn't steal her. It was over between you two and you know it. You was always fightin' anyways. You told me your very own self that she was lazy and a good-for nothin' c-word, you used the c-word. Them was your very own words? Right Maggie? You told me that and don't even try to tell me you didn't."
"Yeah, maybe I did" she says, "but I didn't mean it. I loved her Mud. You know how much I loved her. For eight years I loved that woman."
"Ah come on Maggie," I says cause by now I'm tired and just want to get the guns and bring Maggie home so she can sleep it off and so's I can go home and go to bed. I'm thinking Laura's gonna be mad enough at me coming home this late and she's not gonna believe that Maggie has two guns and is talking about killing me or killing herself. And I'm thinking about how tomorrow Maggie is going to have the worst headache that she's ever had and that someday we'll laugh about this. But right now we ain't laughin'.
"Okay," I says "I'll tell ya what: just gimme the guns and you can have Laura back. I swear to you that I'll never talk to her again. No woman is worth ruining our friendship. Heck Maggie, we done went through all eight grades together that counts for something don't it?"
"Too late for swearing Mud; you should've thought of that before you kissed her," she says to me.
"Kissed her!" I says back to her, "You know how bad I was bit by the tequila that night Maggie. YOU left me passed out in the corner after playing pool and you know that she sat on my lap and she was the one who started kissing me! Heck Maggie, it's not like I even remember kissin' her that first night, so that shouldn't count against me or nothing."
Then Maggie gets kinda quiet and looks out the window and sorta whispers, "Then you should've thought of that before you started screwin' her." Well she had a point there; maybe I should've and I didn't know exactly what to say to that, but I thought they was through with each other. Honest I did; at least that's what Laura told me.
So after a while I says "Maggie, it's late. Let's get some sleep. Tell you what, I won't go home to Laura. I'll sleep right here. And tomorrow, tomorrow I'll tell her it's over between us. Just like that. Okay? Just give me the guns. She ain't that good. There ain't no woman worth losing my best friend for 40 years over. We can both get another woman Maggs."
"Mud, there ain't no other woman like Laura," she says.
Right then she takes another swig of tequila and that tequila's looking pretty good to me by now cause I'm awful dry from talking so much, but I didn't say nothing 'cause she started staring at the guns and talking real low and slow and she says "Mud. Mud I made a promise to myself that tonight I was either gonna kill you or you was gonna kill me or I was gonna kill myself because I can't live anymore with the thought that my best friend stole my Laura from me. And you know I always keep my promises."
And that scared me bad, her saying that, because she did always keep her promises.
So right about then I'm trying to think real hard and real fast cause she's got me real nervous. "Well," I says "Maggie, if you do keep the promise that you made today then you'll be breaking the promise we made 40 years ago never to let a woman come between us, so I guess you don't always keep your promises do you?"
She thought about that for a few minutes then says, "So if I break one promise Mud, one promise in an entire lifetime, is that so bad?"
I didn't know what to say cause one promise broken in an entire lifetime is not so bad so I says, "No Maggie, it ain't so bad, but if you're gonna break one then break the one you made today. I mean it is the newest one. Don't break the oldest one."
"No," she says, "I want to keep that one."
Then for the first time all night she smiled and then that's when she tossed the gun to me. She threw it in the air and it was spinning and I caught it and I said "Jesus, Maggie!" It scared me to touch it 'cause I sure don't like guns. They scare the heck outta me but I caught it and that's when she says "Okay, Mud; the time has come" and she took another swig of the tequila.
And this is where she stares me right in the eyes and pulls the gun up that she's holding and points it right at me and says "Mud, either you shoot me or I shoot you; what's it gonna be?" And I tell you that if you could only have seen the look in her eyes then you'd believe me that she was not joking around and I says "Maggie, I can't shoot you." So she says "Okay, then I guess I'll just have to shoot you" and her finger is twitching like it's itchy or something on the trigger. "NO!" I screamed at her real loud. "Come on Maggie, quit this. It ain't funny no more!"
"It ain't suppose to be funny," she says.
So by then she's having trouble talking and swallowing real hard like she's real thirsty or something and her tongue is slowly wandering around lips like it's confused and it can't remember if it belongs inside her mouth of out of it.
"Okay," she says, "Then we'll let Jesus decide. My gun has six bullets in it. Yours only has one. When I count to three if you don't pull the trigger, I will. But if you pull the trigger and Jesus wants me to live then the gun won't go off and I will live. So you don't have nothing to say about it, Mud, okay? Jesus will be making the decision."
"But promise me one thing," she says "If it is me that goes tonight, then promise to tell Laura that I loved her more than I ever loved anyone or anything in my entire life, okay? Will you do that for me Mud?"
And I'm thinking real hard and trying to think real fast about what to do and what to say but I'm having trouble thinking because the God damn pounding in my head right here on the sides by my ears won't stop and then she says real loud and real slow...
"ONE."
"Maggie, No!" I says and my gun is pointing at her and hers is pointing at me and our eyes are both opened way wide and we're staring at each other. Her face is all red and the veins in her neck are bulging out and she starts cryin' again and the tears are making her cheeks all wet and the snot is running down her nose but she wasn't wiping it and a tiny bit of white foam had gathered around the edges of her mouth and it kinda spit out when she talked and her finger was shaking a little, tapping against the trigger like it was nervous or something.
By then I couldn't even talk because of the painful lump in my throat that was squeezing and throbbing just like the pounding in my head and I suddenly got all sweaty under my armpits and my hands got all hot and wet and sweaty and then they started to shake...
"TWO."
And that's when I started to pray to God. And I prayed to Mary and Joseph, but mostly I prayed to sweet baby Jesus. I prayed as hard and as fast as I could and I promised if they'd give me luck with the bullet right then that I'd trade all the luck I'd ever have for the rest of my life...
"THREE!"
I closed my eyes and pulled the trigger.
You may not believe me but that is exactly the way it happened.
I promise it was.
