The Stones of Summer  by Dow Mossman
Excerpt Part III

But Dawes Williams thought Ratshit's mother, who was sitting in a chair near the window, who was obviously not leaving for anywhere at the moment, was one of the most striking older women he'd ever seen. The dense fall light fell through her premature platinum hair. Dawes remembered talking to her one Saturday about Martin Luther. He had sat back, judg­ing her ideas about Martin Luther, becoming the real snob in the piece by deciding she was really quite intelligent, but in the middle she had destroyed the whole mood anyway by pausing and intoning:

"Dawes, you sound like such a nice, reasonable boy. Is there any way you could...that is, is there any way you could use your influence to see that Harrison is not called Rat's...Rat's shit any more do you suppose?"

Dawes Williams promised he would try his best, but nothing had come of it.

Later, after stealing the car and making long circles through the town and returning, reparking the whole thing on its chalk marks in the driveway long after the Rawlingses had left, they sat in the kitchen and drank straight warm bourbon from wine glasses and tried not to wince. Travis and Dunker took theirs down in two large gulps and then looked out of the window for a long time. When they looked back, their eyes were still slightly flushed. They all drank two apiece and sat on the kitchen floor talking in the late, drifting shadows. Dawes Williams said:

"By God, I think I'm drunk," and they all began laughing, and looking at each other closely as if they were supposed to see something they had never seen before. The early fall evening began wafting the walls of Mrs. Rawlings' kitchen without even a voice. The Rawlingses would be home soon. It was time to roll the underground up and call it a day. They got up and headed for the porch. They hung around for awhile and said goodby to Ratshit. Travis turned the other way. Eddie, Dunker and Dawes walked to the corner. They turned. The pale light grayed in the bare trees, drifted off like a boat in the cold autumn limbs. Travis was already down the block.

"Hey, Travis," they said, "we'll be seeing ya."

"That's right, you will," he said, turning. "Damn right. I'll be seeing ya. And don't let your meat loaf," he called after them down the quiet street.

It had been a good day, a day already slipping into memory, gone down the long edges of boulevards full as houses with dark elm and white cedar.

"What's up tonight?" Dunker was saying.

"I'm taking Georgia down by the hedges on Ben Franklin Field and wrestlin' her for it," Eddie said.

"Wrestle her for what?" Dawes Williams said, turning off, calling be­hind himself, moving up the hill for home, drunk on the air.