Fred’s dad was drunk. I really shouldn’t know this, but my mother talked about him. She loved to talk about him. She would ask me to fetch the cookies from beneath her bed and talk about him. She kept a steady supply of Danish Wedding cookies under her bed along with potato chips and some chocolate weight loss candies called Ayds. I remember one day I was in the front yard playing with Percy the monkey and my mother came outside, which was unusual. She was not an outside person. It was late afternoon, maybe 4PM. She said she came to get me because Fred’s dad should be driving down the street soon and he would be drunk. Of course, she was in a nightgown and wearing a wig. Our mother had naturally dark hair and the wig was blonde, which I think upset Percy. He leaped on top of her and snatched the wig from her head and instantly climbed the tree in his yard. And sure enough, Fred’s dad rounded the corner in his old red pickup truck, driving slowly and swerving. He made it home safely. She glared at him as he drove, and she seemed to get angry that he made it home.
Distraught over her wig, she went inside screaming about Fred’s dad and Percy and how they ruined her day. I went to the tree and begged Percy to come down with the wig, but he didn’t. Aunt Miriam even came out and pleaded with him. But he ignored us and sat on a branch and tore the wig to shreds.
Bill Webb, Jr. 