{"id":26512,"date":"2015-08-13T17:35:37","date_gmt":"2015-08-13T22:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=26512"},"modified":"2015-08-20T15:26:32","modified_gmt":"2015-08-20T20:26:32","slug":"cherry-in-magnolia-part-6-take-me-to-the-river","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/cherry-in-magnolia-part-6-take-me-to-the-river\/","title":{"rendered":"“Cherry in Magnolia”- Part 6: Take Me To The River"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CherryInMagnolia_webheader\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd now Mama doesn\u2019t seem to wanna do much of anything<\/em>…\u201d<\/i><\/span>\u2013 Bobbie Gentry
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

As Cherry\u2019s cab followed the Monte Carlo away from the cemetery and toward who-knew-where, the ah-coor-deen<\/em> player kept a keen eye on his prey: through the windshield of the taxi, the distance between the vehicles, into the of the bird-dogged Chevy and past the mess of floral arrangements that Charlene had taken from the funeral and stuffed inside the car.<\/span><\/p>\n

The windows of the Monte Carlo were open and clumps of petals and leaves flew out as it rolled west, some sort of commotion in the Chevy flaring up a half-dozen miles past the graveyard on the approach to the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge, rose blossoms sailing past.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"MemphisArkansasBridge-older_GRAY\"<\/a>Halfway across the Mississippi, brake lights\u2014the Monte Carlo stopped dead.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cRight here,\u201d said Cherry, paying the driver with money he\u2019d made that morning busking on the boulevard, tipping the man generously and adding an extra ten for the cabbie to remain stopped behind the Monte Carlo for as long as possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Slowly approaching the driver\u2019s side, Cherry saw Willie and Charlene in violent argument, his brother recoiling from a barrage of slaps, trying to protect his face with a wreath of red and white carnations as Charlene\u2019s woe-is-me Baltimore accent echoed between the bridge and river and back again.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI should have known better than to get mixed-up with a pussy like you\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Cars behind the taxi began to honk, Cherry just behind the driver\u2019s door and about to yank it open when Charlene bolted from the car with one of the bouquets, barely missed being hit by a car headed in the other direction, ran to the side of the bridge and dove some 112 feet into the Mississippi River, her halter giving way as she clutched the flowers so tight her knuckles turned white.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCHARLENE!\u201d cried Willie, running to the rail, staring down, watching her float downstream as her body sank below the rushing water.<\/span><\/p>\n

A rubbernecker stuck in traffic, talking to himself: \u201cYou see that? Lawdy, lawd, that ole flyin\u2019 whale gotta be halfway to Tunica by now.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"TaxiBetter_GRAY\"<\/a>The cabbie pulled around the Monte Carlo and sped away as Cherry got behind the wheel of the idling Monte Carlo and drove it off the bridge and into the rear of a Kroger supermarket. He parked it between a station wagon and a dumpster, locked his satchel and concertina in the trunk, put on his hat with the brim pulled low and headed back to the bridge.<\/span><\/p>\n

There, police had stopped traffic and a cop was asking Willie questions.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cBaltimore,\u201d said Willie. \u201cWe came down for the funeral. I don\u2019t know her last name.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou drove a thousand miles to Elvis\u2019 funeral sitting next to a woman whose name you don\u2019t know?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMinner, I think,\u201d said Willie, rattled beyond rattled. \u201cI don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Cherry kept his distance\u2014making sure Willie didn\u2019t see him\u2014as State Troopers arrived and the river patrol began searching the water, the bridge blocked off to further traffic.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMY CAR!\u201d shouted Willie as the cop led him to a police cruiser. \u201cSOMEBODY STOLE MY CAR!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"1977-Pontiac-LeMans-Enforcer\"<\/a>A trooper spoke into his two-way radio: \u201cWe might be going to the hospital instead of the barracks.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Blending in with the small crowd that had gathered as a traffic cop guided cars off the bridge, Cherry walked past the cruiser where Willie sat in the back seat, nodded to his brother through the window\u2014Willie\u2019s eyes popping, unable to hear the question the cop just asked\u2014and kept walking, no one paying him any mind.<\/span><\/p>\n

As the police car drove Willie away, the teenager in mourning, agitation, and shock\u2014Charlene drowned, his car gone and his brother appearing like a ghost\u2014all the cops asked about was narcotics.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat was she on, boy? What are you on? Can you describe this phantom vehicle you say you drove here from Baltimore and no one seems to have seen?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Cherry walked back to the Kroger\u2014biding his time before attempting to rescue his little brother\u2014and saw that he had somehow grown a wart on a knuckle of his left hand, the one he had maimed when he drove an ignition-popping screwdriver through it while trying to open an oyster ten years ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

And began to put together a song about a penny and a wart.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cRub-a-dub-dub,\u201d he whistled. \u201cSpend that pretty penny on flub-flub-flub \u2026 rub-a-dub-dub \u2026 two men in a gold-and-black tub.\u201d \"The<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Part 1: Who Died and Made You Elvis<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Part 2: Getting There Is Half The Fun<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Part 3: Wednesday, August 17, 1977 – All Hopped Up and Ready to Go<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Part 4: Thursday, August 18, 1977 \u2014 Sixteen Coaches Long<\/a> <\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Part 5: Smooth, Fast & In High Gear<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cAnd now Mama doesn\u2019t seem to wanna do much of anything…\u201d\u2013 Bobbie Gentry As Cherry\u2019s cab followed the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":249,"featured_media":26513,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[96,332],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-creative-writing","category-elvis"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Cherry-Part-6-FEAT.jpg?fit=620%2C349&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/249"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}