Summer’s End at Spirit Lake

"That big black man over in Coon Town. The one that pumps gas at the Texaco station over there," Chas burst out. "He beat me when I said I wouldn't. And then he . . . he . . . he was too strong. See the bruises on my arms . . . my legs? Then he . . ."

All four of us came shooting out of our booth—Maggie, Danny, and Thad moving toward Chas, who took a couple of steps in their direction as well—me going around them, to the door, into my Thunderbird, and roaring toward the north end of Spirit Lake.

Sam was calmly standing at the gas pumps at the Coon Town Texaco station, clipboard in hand, and checking the meters when I drove up.

"Nice ride," he said, as pulled the Thunderbird to a stop next to him. "Very nice ride. Don't see Thunderbirds on this side of the lake often. Maybe you'll give me a ride in it someday. I'll ride you and then you can ride me in that car maybe." He laughed at his own joke but then could clearly see that I wasn't laughing.

"Get into the car, Sam." I said.

"Want to give me a ride now?" he asked. "Want to go somewhere on our last weekend together and fuck like bunnies and ride around in your fancy Thunderbird between fuckings?"

"Stop that, Sam. Just get into the car. They'll be here any minute, I'm sure. We got to get out of here."

"Why? Out of here to where?"

"Does it matter, Sam? Just get in the fucking car."

He got in the car.

I took a road straight east, not a main route north toward Atlanta or south toward Macon and Athens. I'd turn north when we got closer to the coast.

"What's this all about, Lee?" Sam asked.

I told him.

He was quiet for a moment. I had expected to hear a denial from him. But I didn't.

"Sure I fucked that woman," he finally said. "She wanted it bad. Came pestering me. Pestered me every day since you came riding in with the pipsqueak at the wheel of his daddy's Caddie that day. I finally gave her what she wanted. Every day this week. You weren't here. But I didn't beat that woman. I didn't have anything to do with that. She wanted it and I wore rubbers. You weren't here and I wasn't in the best frame of mind. All you rich whites got to me. She wanted it again this weekend and I told her I was finished, that she clung too much, demanded and expected too much. But I didn't beat on the woman. I don't beat women. I don't have to beat white women to get it from them."

I keyed in on him saying he wore rubbers—at about the same level as hearing his disclaimers that he'd beaten Chas. I believed him. But Chas had been beaten. She was crazy, but not crazy enough to do that to herself. Then I remembered that LeRoy hadn't worn a condom when he fucked Chas last weekend. If there were repercussions and Chas pushed her case of vindictiveness by producing a black baby, Sam would be in even more trouble—if he hadn't already been hung from a tree by then. This was Georgia in 1956. LeRoy certainly wasn't going to step up to admit that he'd barebacked Chas, that was for sure. And I couldn't blame LeRoy for that—not even for spiking Chas. She went with any and every man, of whatever color. That was on her.

I also didn't see LeRoy as a woman beater. No, Chas had picked up one too many casual fucks and had gotten more than she'd bargained for—and then decided that Sam was her most-likely scapegoat.

Not that the Georgia boys in white sheets, passing for armor, would choose to believe that.

"It's OK, Sam," I said. "We'll be OK. I'm heading north. We can blend in in the North. I got enough under my seat to get us started and there's more where that came from."

"You got to be at college next week," Sam said.

"They have swim teams and classes in business at good colleges in the North too," I said. "I'll have no trouble getting letters of referral from Georgia U. As long as you are willing to be with me, we can make this work. And even if you don't want to be with me for long, I can give you a new start. If you want to be with—"

"What do you think?" he murmured, turning toward me, reaching a hand over and unzipping me, finding me hard. "You had planned this anyway, hadn't you? The white woman had nothing to do with this."

"Only the urgency of getting you out of town, out of Georgia," I answered. "Yes, I hoped you'd let me take you away—or take money from me to get a better start in life if you wouldn't go with me. Does that make you angry?"

There was silence for a few minutes and then, "Not at you. No, that's all good where you—we—are concerned. It's better than thinkin' you just don't want to see me lynched for fuckin' a white woman. But how far do you think we'll get in the South, a white boy with a black man in his car?"

"We'll find a lay-by somewhere to hole up until dark—when we're well away from the lake. A couple of days, driving at night, and we'll be across the Mason Dixon line. Then nobody will care. I'm not running from anybody. I have nobody to run from. I can get us through this. I only have you to run to, to run with, if I'm not being too presumptuous, too pushy."

"No, course you're not. Maybe for this daytime lay-by—I like the sound of the word 'lay'—you can find someplace quiet and real private, maybe next to a river. I like fuckin' you next to water."

"If you don't stop beating me off, I'll run this car off the road," I said, but then, quickly, I added, "not that I want you to stop."

"I think I can do one better," he said, with a laugh. "I put my head down, maybe no one will notice that you have a black man riding with you in a fancy Thunderbird in the South." With that, he leaned over, pulled my shorts and briefs down to my knees, took my cock in his mouth, and ran a finger down between my thighs and up to—and into—my puckering asshole.

We went for miles and miles without anyone seeing a black man in my passenger seat.

One thing was for sure, though, I was going to have to find a private turnoff real fast. And the other thing that hit me was that, though I'd been thinking this was the worst end to summer at Spirit Lake, I, in fact, was going to remember it as the best summer's ending I could ever wish for.