The Black Ace Gang

MEET THE GANG: < SKETCHES FROM THE BOOK> First BOB, who is talking----

    My family had just moved about twenty-five miles. In this day and age that does not seem like much of a distance. But to those of us who had lived in an area called Fred's Creek, where relatives houses were scattered about since many years before the Civil War, it was at least a long way culturally to now be living near the banks of the Ohio River, in a town called Boaz, among other residents of an almost completed subdivision. Traveling down from the ridges and hills, away from Fred's Creek, was in many ways a big move.

    We had been in our new home all summer but today was the first day of school; my first day in a new school. Mother and I had earlier in the summer made a trip to enroll and meet the principal. He looked at my grades from Fred's Creek. They were not good at all but they seemed to make him happy. He told mother about the great strides education had made. How the new educator must be able to meet the children's needs on different levels,teaching each according to their abilities.

Next is JERRY JOE> This morning I turned the loose and somewhat bent doorknob at Jerry Joe's house and went in without knocking, knowing he would probably be asleep on the gray couch in the house's only room, except for the dirty green doors each leading to either the bedroom or toilet, in the rear, over the water.

    He lay sound asleep where I expected. He was in the habit of staying awake for extended periods that ended abruptly by lying down about anywhere and falling into a deep sleep. I pulled a stained handmade quilt from a long body that was wearing holey jockey type underwear. Looking up, his wide mouth spread into a grin and saying nothing he came up gracefully from the couch that spouted stuffing and had a mildewed odor.

    He pulled on the pair of new blue jeans that he had been wearing for a couple of weeks. They had yet to be washed for the first time. Then he added a tee shirt that didn't quite cover his belly button. He walked to his mother's purse that was sitting on the table in what could be called the kitchen area and unsnapped it, to dig until he pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Putting one in his mouth and one behind his ear he moved to a black cooking grate that was attached to the wall and found a kitchen match that he swiped on the wall. It made a distinctive popping sound when the head ignited. He held the flame a couple of inches below the cigarette until it lit, while at the same time he was moving to a position in the middle of the floor. Then puffing smoke, while closing one greenish blue eye, he aimed and dropped the still burning match cleanly through a knothole between his feet and into the river.

    "You stay out a my purse Jerry Joe!" said a woman's voice from behind the bedroom door.

    "I'm only gettin' a cigarette. Don't have a shit-fit for Christ's sake."

    "You heard'er," a man's voice said.

    "Shut up Cecil or I'll take a tire iron to your dumb ass!"

Now MIKE> Ahead, uphill, behind a Texaco Station that was located close to the school; we could see, sitting on a wooden pop bottle storage case turned on end, a person who hated school as much as the two of us. Mike's usual ambition was to be a juvenile delinquent but today he looked to be waiting for us and he was.

    Mike was wearing a long sleeved white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbow. New dress shoes and slacks, both black. He wore longsleeves the year-round because he was not happy with his skinny arms and combed his oiled dark hair straight back on the sides of his head. The style was called by most a "D. A." Short for "duck's ass." You could see the comb markes swept back like wings to meet in the back. On top, his hair was short and stood up uniformly straight, creating a flattop that remained in place by a wax specially designed for that purpose.

    We negotiated the path up the hill. Mike rose to his feet, fell in beside us and walked toward the school with a sour look on his face that was caused by pimples and family pressures, along with general teenage angst. Mike's problems stemmed from the fact that it was hard to be a tough guy when your father is a trauma surgeon and your mother is a high school English teacher. He had managed to get into enough trouble to make some headway in that direction. At ungarded moments he displayed a gentle smile that would have embarrased him had he been aware of it.

And KAY>At one end of the pool, sitting in a small wooden Adirondack chair, was Kay with Dalmations lying one on each side, sprawled like throw rugs. Their raised heads looked at our approach but we were of little interest so they reclined again.

    Describing Kay is difficult; short, not quite four feet tall, and his spine curved decidedly to one side and that kept one shoulder perpetually higher. His brown shoes has flat soles like baby shoes, were high topped, and they stayed untied most of the time. He had long fingers. His thumbs were undeveloped, useless, and jiggled when he walked with his waddle. His hand held a pencil between the first two fingers as he wrote; more like scrawled, some words on the paper held by a clipboard. What caught the attention first was a large prominent forehead that showed tiny blue vessles forking beneath delicate white skin. His light brown hair was combed forward and cut into bangs.