Inferno

He looked again. In both photographs, Jadia was wearing long sleeves, covering up her tattoos.

"Good girl," he smiled.

From what he could decipher from her note, Jennifer had told her that he wasn't her father, but Jadia didn't care; he was her father as far as she was concerned.

"Good girl," he said again.

The letter from Jelissa had been a total surprise and he cautiously pulled the three sheets of paper out of the envelope. Obviously, Jelissa did not trust her own handwriting; the letter was printed out. He chuckled to himself; she had selected a very bold type.

"Afraid my eyes ain't what they used to be?" he asked himself.

"Dear Kenneth:" her letter started out and, even though he knew that he wasn't her biological father, her failure to address him as 'Father,' or 'Daddy,' or 'Dad' did hurt.

"So, Mother comes over and tells me you're not my father," the letter continued. "I'm sorry. I can't think of another man I would be prouder to have as my father."

He read on. The letter apologized for her actions of years past, of her disrespect, of her attitude toward him.

Sign of weakness or not, he allowed a few tears to fall as she disclosed that she was in a hospice, dying of AIDS.

"No one gave this shit to me but me," the letter said. "I shoved that needle in my arm, not you, not Mother, not Rudy, just me," the letter went on.

"Kenneth, I know I was a horrible daughter and you've never been nothing but a good, loving Dad," Jelissa wrote.

He smiled tightly; she signed it All My Love, Jelissa.'

"Dear Jelissa," he wrote.

Jelissa smiled as the nurse's aide read the letter to her; she was too weak to hold the pages in her hands, too weak to raise her head long enough to read the letter.

"Love, Daddy," the nurse's aide concluded the letter.

"Really?" Jelissa asked. "He signed it 'Love, Daddy'?"

"Right here, you can look for yourself," the nurse's aide said, holding up the letter.

"Again?" Jelissa begged. "Read it again?"

"Okay," the young woman smiled.

----

"Show me," Melissa demanded.

"Show you what?" Jennifer asked.

"Show me. Show me where the fuck you been looking; sure as God damned tooting, I was out looking for work I'd have found SOMETHING by now!" Melissa screamed.

"Nobody's hiring!" Jennifer screamed back. "Everywhere I been, they just tell me 'Thanks, we'll be in touch,' and that's it!"

"You been to Babbage's? You been to that new place, oh, what the hell is it, on Fifty two?" Melissa asked.

"Told you, they see 'F' on the application, don't even bother reading the rest of it.

"Oh, God damn, quit feeling sorry for yourself, fill out the fucking application and ask for a job, huh?" Melissa said and stomped into the kitchen. "And let me guess; now you expect me to cook your dinner too, huh?"

Jennifer eased her now quite pudgy body off the couch and lumbered into the kitchen.

"No, no, I'll fix it; what we got?" Jennifer asked.

"Been here all day, you ain't looked once to see what we got?" Melissa asked her anger quite evident.

Jennifer made quick work out of the ground turkey, and then slapped a plate down in front of her mother before fixing herself a plate.

Meal over, both women returned to the living room to watch television. Melissa purposefully selected a program she knew Jennifer would hate, a Prime Time investigative report.

"Your house, you can watch whatever you want. My house, we watch what I want," Melissa smirked and turned up the volume.

----

Kenneth held out no hope as he shuffled into the garishly lighted room. Again, he was introduced to the three people that the State of Louisiana had decided would evaluate him and his chances of leading a gainful, productive life outside of the penal system.

He sat and silently regarded the two uncomfortable looking men and the unattractive woman. The woman, even in her late sixties, still displayed the long hair of her youth and still used the horribly outdated vernacular of the bygone Woodstock Era.

He gave elaborate answers to their questions, laying it on as thick as he possibly could, knowing that there was little to no chance he'd be given a release; there were three unexplained deaths in his file folder. Actually there were six deaths that could be attributed to him, but he wasn't going to volunteer that information. But he was receiving some morbid satisfaction out of playing 'Pious Petey' for them.

"Well, sir," he said, addressing one of the men, "My mom and dad died and I wasn't allowed to go to their funerals, so I guess the very first thing I'd want to do is go visit their grave site, you know? My middle daughter? She's got AIDS; just found that out yesterday, she's not long for this world so I'd really want to see her, say goodbye. And I've got two grandchildren, two boys; I sure would like to see them."

He almost smiled; the woman was eating it up, nodding her head in agreement.

But even if she fell for all of his bullshit, she would be overruled by the two bureaucrats in their ill-fitting suits.

"Well, sir, the mattress factory? I really don't know if they'd take me back; I mean, it's been what? Nine years?" Kenneth shook his head. "Gosh, I don't even know what jobs are available. Let's see, I'm forty eight now, I really don't know what I'd be doing. I guess janitor or something's about the best I could hope for, huh?"

For nearly an hour, Kenneth answered the questions, fighting the urge to just tell the three paper-pushers what they could do with the papers and with each other and with their mothers.

"Thank you, Mr. Kay," finally one of the men said and he was led out of the room.

"Sure as shit hope you get out of here; mother it all unhealthy and shit having your ass around," Frederick Parr said, not smiling.

"You and I both know fucking good and well there ain't a God damned shot in Hell they'll ever let me out of here so don't even waste your fucking breath wishing for it," Kenneth said, walking down the dimly lighted corridors.

----

Jacy took a moment to compose herself, then gathered her laptop case and purse and got out of the car. Through the smoked glass doors of Young Insurance the, she could see a bored looking woman sitting behind a desk. The woman's blouse was a little too snug on the woman and had three buttons undone, displaying a lacy red bra. The woman also had multiple tattoos that were quite visible in the too sheer blouse.

Jacy was glad that Jadia had come to her and asked if she could borrow some money to have some of her tattoos removed.

"Not the flowers," Jadia had smiled. "Eric likes eating at the Garden."

"Too much information!" Jacy had laughed. "How much you need?"

Jacy smiled at the receptionist and felt slightly puzzled when the woman looked up, did a double-take, then returned Jacy's smile.

"Hi, can I help you?" Michelle Ruiz asked.

"Yes, Jacy Kay? Here to see Elizabeth? Elizabeth Baggett?" Jacy offered.

"Ms. Baggett?" Michelle said, mashing a button.

"Yes?" a metallic voice asked.

"Um, Jacy Kay here to see you," Michelle said.

"Please send her back," the voice said.

"Down that hall, first door on the right," Michelle offered, pointing a long brightly painted fingernail.

"Thank you," Jacy said and followed the woman's directions.

She entered the office and realized why Michelle had done a double-take. Her twin sat on the other side of the desk.

Elizabeth Baggett had long, dark, curly hair, deep brown eyes, snub nose, and pouting lips. She had a square face with a strong jaw line, quite large breasts, slender waist, and slightly rounded hips. When she stood to take Jacy's offered hand, they were both eye to eye, both at five foot six inches.

"You went to St. Thomas Aquinas," Jacy said, smiling even wider. "I remember; everyone was always asking if you were my big sister."

"I can see why," Elizabeth smiled wider. "But I'm sorry, I don't remember..."

"No reason why you would," Jacy laughed. "I was a lowly eighth grader when you were a senior."

"Go Avengers," Elizabeth smiled. "And let me see, you're here..."

"Sure you hear it a hundred times a day; I'm looking for a job. Just got out of U.L.L, Business Admin, three point nine two," Jacy said, digging out her resume.

"Have it right here," Elizabeth said, taking her seat again. "Printed out the e-mail you sent me."

"There was another girl people were always asking if we were sisters, um..." Jacy said, taking a seat.

"Madison Marcoloni?" Elizabeth asked. "Yeah, people were always getting us mixed up, even though I had real short hair back then and she had real long straight hair."

"Yeah, that's it; Madison," Jacy smiled.

"Okay, now, let's see..." Elizabeth smiled, picking up Jacy's resume. "Worked at Clark's for six years? Impressive. Seriously, I mean, I see some resumes? There's ten, fifteen jobs listed and I'm wondering to myself, 'why would I hire you? You're just going to quit in a month or two,' you know?"

"What can I say; I loved working at Clark's," Jacy admitted. "But I didn't put in four years of college to skate around in shorts in the winter, you know?"

"Oh, I know who you are!" Elizabeth laughed. "Oh wow, you're the girl that jumps those benches out front!"

"Yep, that's me," Jacy laughed.

"You ever wipe out?" Elizabeth asked.

"A couple of times; one time I had a whole bunch of sundaes and I didn't put one of them on there all the way and I could feel it slipping and tried to correct it; wound up spilling all of them all over the place," Jacy smiled. "The guys felt so bad for me, they got out of their car and cleaned it all up before I even came back with their replacement sundaes. Got a twenty dollar tip out of that."

"Well, I'm afraid it'll be a little boring around here," Elizabeth smiled.

"No ma'am," Jacy smiled. "There's the skate park out in Flowers; it's mainly for skateboarders, but I get out there and show them what a girl can do. And on Sundays, I go motocross racing. Believe me; I won't be missing out on anything."

"Motocross?" Elizabeth asked eyes wide.

----

Jacy had discovered her father's motocross trophies and had begged Melvin to tell her about her Daddy's motorcycle racing days. Then they heard that there would be a race held in Jack's Creek and Jacy begged Melvin to take her to see it.

The sun had been blistering hot, the track dusty, the concession stands had run out of sodas and bottled water, the noise level was deafening, and Jacy had loved it.

"Here's the one twenty five class," Melvin had said. "That's the class your Daddy raced in. Used to call them the 'Animal' class; bunch of dumb ass kids ain't got enough sense to know they could get hurt out there."

Jacy watched as the fourteen boys snarled around the track for three laps, kicking and clawing and screaming as they fought for position.

"Oh my God!" Jacy screamed as one biker barely missed landing on top of another biker after taking the highest jump at great speed.

"I'm going to do that," Jacy firmly told her Grandpa as they drove home that miserable Sunday.

Melvin looked at the sunburned girl and nodded his head; he knew he wasn't going to talk her out of it and her Grandmother wasn't going to like it, but she wasn't going to talk Jacy out of it either.

At first he tried to get her an old Honda one hundred. The fourteen year old girl looked at the bike, and then looked at Melvin in disgust.

"Where's the flowers and the basket?" she asked. "I mean, really; you going to get me a little girl's bike might as well get all the stuff for it, huh?"

So he relented and got her a 1998 Yamaha YZ 125.

"Yeah, it's a little bit older," he said.

"It's perfect," Jacy said, then bent to the task of helping her grandfather tear it down.

They bored out the piston, put a sleeve in the exhaust pipe, bought wider handlebars for it, bought lighter rims for it, and then waited for the next Sunday to come along.

"That was MY daughter, I wouldn't let her race in that class," the man said as they signed Jacy up.

"Well, that's why she's not your daughter," Melvin had said tightly.

Her first race, nine boys and her, was a disaster as far as Jacy was concerned. After two heats, she wound up finishing in fourth place.

"What?" Melvin asked in disbelief as a sobbing Jacy helped him load the bike onto the trailer. "What are you crying about? This was your first race! You beat six boys! You see any of them crying?"

"But I wanted to win!" Jacy cried out.

"Honey, we ALL do," Melvin said, hugging her tightly. "Baby, next time, okay? Next time you'll do better, all right?"

Kenneth was a little perturbed when he got the photograph of a smiling Jacy, holding her second place trophy.

"And would you have listened to us if we told you not to race?" Bernice wrote to him. "Oh, wait. We did tell you not to race and you still did it anyway."

His heart caught in his throat when he saw the photograph of her racing. His little girl, his baby, right in the thick of the bikes, fighting for the lead.

"Oh, my God," he wrote to his father. "I had no idea how frightening that must have looked to you, to watch me doing all of that."

"And we survived," Melvin wrote. "And we'll survive it now."

Melvin sent in the photographs of Jacy's first first place win, and Kenneth was horrified.

It had rained almost non-stop the day before; the track was pure slop by the time the one twenty five class lined up at the gate.

The boy to Jacy's left, Bobby Orrino, Jacy knew, had a sneaky habit of crowding the people to the outside of the turn. The first turn was a turn to the left, meaning he would be pushing into her.

So when the gate dropped, she edged to her left, forcing Bobby to nearly come to a complete stop.

Mud splattered into her face, her chest, and her legs. Jacy was grateful for the stupid goggles her Grandpa made her wear, and grateful for the mouthpart her Grandma made her wear.

"We spent too damned much money on that mouth of yours to let a rock knock them teeth out," Bernice fussed. "I don't care if it looks stupid; you're wearing the guard."

By the end of the first lap, Jacy had to wipe frantically at the goggles in order to see.

She was in the lead by the second lap and didn't have to wipe at her goggles; when no one is spraying mud in your face, you don't have to wipe mud from your goggles.

"You cut me off," Bobby hotly accused as Jacy wiped her muddy face clean.

"Aw, poor baby," Jacy taunted, her taunt all the more cutting in her little girl voice.

"Watch your ass next heat, bitch," Bobby spat then yelped as Melvin grabbed him and lifted him off his feet by his jersey.

"Apologize for calling her 'bitch' or I will knock out every single tooth in that smart mouth of yours, punk," Melvin hissed.

Next heat, Bobby did try to crowd her but Jacy held her ground and Bobby was the one to concede the first turn.

"A fucking girl?" Robert Orrino bellowed at his son. "You let a fucking girl beat you? Come on, God damned sissy; we're going home and putting this bike up for sale. Be good and God damned I'm paying all this money so you can let some little girl fucking beat you."

Kenneth was shocked at how filthy Jacy looked as she stood, holding her first place trophy.

The next photograph showed her unzipping the leather jacket, revealing a completely soaked, filthy jersey.

The next photograph showed her, dressed in only socks, bra, and panties, and all skin that was visible was brown with mud.

And in all the photographs, Jacy's dirty face was beaming with absolute joy.

----

"You still race?" Elizabeth asked.

"Yeah; kind of grew out of the one twenty five class; got an YZ 250 now," Jacy smiled.

"Isn't it dangerous?" Elizabeth asked.

Jacy fought down the sarcastic response; she was trying to get a job.

"Well, that's why we wear protective gear," Jacy explained.

"So when's the next race?" Elizabeth asked.

"Sunday, Turkey Creek," Jacy smiled. "Want to go?"

Elizabeth looked up sharply. Was it written on her face, could people just look at her and tell that she was in a lesbian relationship? There were no overt signals coming from Jacy, though, just a genuine warm smile.

"I don't know," Elizabeth relaxed. "Got a two year old; he might not like all that noise."

"Little boys?" Jacy laughed. "Most of them LOVE that entire racket!"

Michelle picked that inopportune time to interrupt her supervisor. Elizabeth had inherited the surly, unprofessional Michelle from the previous branch manager, had had written the girl up twice.

Michelle's sheer blouse and too short skirt, as far as Elizabeth was concerned, was the final straw. But Michelle sealed her fate by sending one of Grant Johnson's clients to Elizabeth's office instead of to Grant's office, simply because the man looked angry.

Michelle did not like Elizabeth and had a habit of sending all difficult clients to her supervisor's office out of spite.

"You ain't Grant," the man snarled after flinging Elizabeth's door open.

"Second door on the left," Elizabeth calmly told the man.

"Then why'd that dumb bitch tell me first door on the right?" the man bellowed, slamming Elizabeth's door shut.

One final question, Ms. Kay," Elizabeth asked, her anger quite evident. "Do you have any visible tattoos?"

"Um, just one, but it's only visible if I take off my bra," Jacy quietly admitted.

She pointed to her left breast.

"It's a flaming heart and inside it says 'I heart My Daddy,'" Jacy said, blushing hotly.

"Nice," Elizabeth smiled. "I don't have any, but if I ever did get one, that's what mine would say."

"I mean, my Daddy's like the most wonderful man in the world but my Mom never did love him and..." Jacy went on.

"Most wonderful man in the world, next to MY Daddy," Elizabeth interrupted.

"Nuh uh!" Jacy said in her breathy, little girl voice.

"Uh huh!" Elizabeth said, and then got to her feet.

She held out her hand and gave Jacy's hand a healthy grip.

"Ms. Kay, I am presently looking for a new receptionist, with the possibility of advancement in the future. Interested?" Elizabeth asked.

"Yes ma'am," Jacy smiled happily.

"I am sorry that you're going to kind of have to learn on the fly; I really doubt Michelle's going to be willing to help you out a whole lot when I fire her," Elizabeth said. "Could you go wait in the lunch room? It's the last door down on the left."

"Yes ma'am," Jacy smiled.

----

Jadia looked at Eric and fought the urge to burst into tears.

"So?" Eric asked, growing uncomfortable in the silence.

"Baby, yes, you know I do want to marry you, God, I love you so damned much," Jadia sighed.

"Then what's the problem?" he asked, fighting down the anger.

"Oh God, I know it's like, so stupid, but I really would like for my Daddy to walk me down the aisle, you know?" Jadia said, a small sob catching in her throat.

"Any chance he'll get paroled or something?" Eric asked.

"I don't know; I ought to ask Jacy; she keeps up with all that stuff," Jacia sighed again.

She took his face into her small hands and looked deeply into his eyes.

"Please believe me, I love you, I am so in love with you, I can't wait to be Mrs. Eric Greene, but, oh, damn it! It's probably pretty stupid, but I keep hoping, the longer that I wait, maybe my Daddy will come home, you know?" Jadia admitted.

----

Jacy let herself into her home. The house was quiet but it was always quiet without Melvin and Bernice and Pebbles there.

She had thought about getting another cat after Pebbles had passed away but it just felt like she was betraying her sweet, loving and faithful companion, so she didn't.

She sighed gratefully as she slipped her shoes off her feet. Her first day on her new job had been fun, exciting, and even a little nerve-wracking. Elizabeth had tried to help, but there were some aspects of the phone system that only Michelle had knowledge of, and Michelle wasn't there to show Jacy. Michelle had grabbed a few personal items off of the desk, slammed her keys down, and tearfully marched out of the building.