A Tree Born Crooked Read Online Free PDF Page A

it only took him a second to recover.  
    “Whew-eee! Look what the cat dragged in. Been wondering when you was gonna show up.”
    James narrowed his eyes.  
    “Hello, Rabbit.”
    ~ ~ ~
    “Weren’t a bad ceremony, really. Most folks said it were real nice.”
    James grunted, but didn’t say anything. He dug the toe of his boot into the dirt, uncovering small rocks and tiny snail shells. He took a drink from the plastic bottle of vodka and handed it back. James let Rabbit prattle on while he took the opportunity to get a good look at his younger brother. Ezra Hart was three years behind James and at least a good three inches shorter. In photographs, people could tell that they were related, they had sort of the same bone structure in the face, but side-by-side in real life they looked nothing alike. Rabbit was pale, his skin almost completely devoid of color, with white blond hair and small eyes set too close together. He had long, ghostly eyelashes that blinked constantly. His eyes alone would have been enough to earn him his nickname, but on top of always blinking, he couldn’t sit still to save his life. He was forever fidgeting, picking things up and setting them back down, shifting from one foot to the other, always in motion. Even in his sleep, some part of him would be twitching. When he was four, Orville had said that he looked as nervous as a wild rabbit in a field full of hunting dogs. The name stuck.  
    Despite his small size and skinny frame, Rabbit had been a much better football player than James and never let him forget it. Though not quite living up to Orville’s fame, Rabbit had been MVP of the high school team three years in a row. He was fast and quick, feet always dancing beneath him, eyes always searching the field. He was the starting quarterback his sophomore year and those last three years of high school were the best of his life. He was popular, had girls all over him, and his teachers looked the other way and passed him so he could stay on the team. Most importantly, his older brother had left town and his cousin Delmore had just landed in the state pen. He was the only Hart boy who really mattered around Crystal Springs then, and he had relished it.  
    After high school, Rabbit had planned on being a Gator and playing for UF. He hadn’t won any football scholarships, but still thought he had a chance of making it in the big leagues one day. He drove over to Newberry on a Saturday and took the SAT, but did so poorly that he had to rethink things. His guidance counselor at Crystal Springs High, knowing Rabbit’s true academic potential, hadn’t wanted to break his heart by explaining how getting into college really worked. The counselor had neglected to tell Rabbit that he had to be smart to go to college. A buddy from school was going to Alachua Community College, so Rabbit signed up, hoping to move on to the University in the spring. After realizing, though, that he didn’t stand even a chance of passing Math for Morons or Literature for the Illiterate, Rabbit gave up on his football dreams. Fifteen years later, the bitterness, and vague sense of being cheated out of his future, still lingered, eating him up inside.
    “I thought it were right nice, myself. Course, it were a closed casket and all. They couldn’t show what he looked like on account there weren’t too much left, but there was white flowers all over the box. Mama fixed it up so it looked okay.”
    “And yet, somehow she didn’t get around to calling me.”
    “Now, I don’t know nothing ‘bout all that.”
    Rabbit stood up from the back steps of Birdie Mae’s trailer, passed the bottle back to James, and walked out into the yard to take a leak. He had come by to see if his mama could lend him fifty bucks, just for a couple of days, of course, and hadn’t been sure what to do or say when he found James standing in the middle of Birdie Mae’s trailer with a look on his face like he was about to spit nails. He and