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door with a bag of cookies and treats for Edgel, which were packed up in a shopping bag that dangled from her right wrist. In her right hand were the house keys. She pulled the knob with her left hand, snugging the door tight against the jamb, then locked the deadbolt with the key in her right. I continued to rock and Mom stood quietly until Dad flicked the burning butt of his Marlboro into the yard, the tacit signal that he was ready to go.
    On this Sunday, the first in June, he pitched his cigarette when he saw the rattletrap, red pickup truck begin its ascent from Red Dog Road, groaning and throwing stones as it strained against the steep drive. It was my brother Virgil, who had called collect the previous night to say he was coming home for the day. Virgil had worked through the night tearing down a carnival in Parkersburg, West Virginia, and had a day off before heading to a festival in Huntington.
    I had never gotten along with Virgil. The truth is, I couldn’t stand to be around him. He was very much like my dad, bitter and always angry at the world, and as a brother seven years his junior, I had proved to be the perfect punching bag on which he vented his myriad of frustrations. From what I could tell, Virgil had never made a single mistake in his life. To listen to him talk, you would have thought the entire world was involved in a sinister, conspiratorial plot to make his life a living hell. Virgil had always been my dad’s favorite. He and Virgil got along, in part, because they seemed to share a soured outlook on life and a mutual lust for alcohol and fighting. Dad couldn’t control Edgel and thought I was a momma’s boy because I didn’t like to go looking for a fight.
    Virgil took the back seat behind my dad and immediately bummed a cigarette and the old man’s lighter. The car’s undercarriage scraped on the gravel as it dropped onto Red Dog Road, and Virgil settled back in his seat, his elbow resting on the knee of his filthy jeans. His sinewy forearms and hands were black with grease that was ground deep into the pores and lines of his hands. Beneath the grime on his right forearm, I could see the faint outline of where Virgil had tattooed himself with a needle and ink and had given himself blood poisoning when he was fifteen; the tattoo was of a misshapen skull and crossbones and the words, “Born to Die,” which Virgil always said was his motto. His fingernails were caked with dirt and grease, and a rim of shiny black oil ran around the cuticles, outlining the tiny bit of visible pink beneath the nail. When he saw me staring at his hands, he asked, “What are you lookin’ at, junior?”
    â€œNothing.”
    He held up his hands and twisted them so I could see every line of filth. In his heavy, southern Ohio twang, Virgil said, “Them’s the hands of a working man, but you wouldn’t know nothin’ ‘bout that, would ya?”
    â€œYes, I would. I’ve got a job this summer.”
    He smiled and chuckled. “Really? Doing what?”
    â€œMr. Monihan hired me up at the truck stop. The county’s making him clean up all the truck tires he’s been rolling down over the hill all those years. Must be twenty years’ worth—a couple thousand of them by now, I bet, and he’s going to pay me ten cents for every one I haul up and stack.”
    He dragged on his cigarette. “When you decide to trade in that snatch and get yourself a dick and balls, let me know and I’ll get you a real job.” He blew smoke in my face. “That’s pussy work.”
    â€œNo it’s not.”
    â€œIt ain’t a man’s work.”
    â€œWell, at least I’m no carnival jockey who looks like he hasn’t had a bath in a month.”
    Virgil’s eyes turned to slits and the skin drew back around his mouth. “You best shut your mouth, boy, or I’ll bust your head, and don’t think I