Somethin’ to Croon About by Carly Berg

“What happened was… He went a-midnight kissin’. Then he went a-woo-woo-missin.’”

Mama wiped her hands on a dishtowel. She just come in from the garden.

I reckon the cop on our door-stoop knew Mama’s answers was from songs her and Daddio played in the honky-tonks around town. Most folks here in Maud, Oklahoma knew the words. Standing behind Mama in the front room, I silently added Shoobie-doobie-do. Shoobie- doobie-doobie-do-woo.

The cop made a tough-guy face. He slicked back his pompadour, hands covered in spiderweb tattoos. I reckon he missed the memo that you cain’t be the fuzz and a hepcat at the same time.

Maud is the hometown of the Queen of Rockabilly, Wanda Jackson, who I was named in honor of.  Miz Jackson shrieked like a hellcat and wore barely-there clothes, back in the 1950s when it shook the nation. Mama said nowadays you couldn’t even get that much attention if you dressed like the Pope, except nekkid from the waist down, like that one girl we saw in a college art parade on the TV.

My parents first met at the farmers’ market here, where local bands still play on Saturdays. Since half the town shows up, it’s a good way to get notice. Mama was belting out “Honey Bop,” over by the watermelons. Daddio dropped his drum sticks, rendered stickless by her sweet, smoky voice and ample bosom, in that cherry print dress she thinks still fits.

They got married, had me, and started the Ginchy Moon Howlers Band, which paid for our dented-can food, Goodwill clothes and Depression shack, with its two-burner countertop stove, chemical toilet and mice. Mama said crooners like her cain’t have no soft life anyhow. She had to have her somethin’ to croon about.

The trouble started the summer before that Halloween. The good jobs left Maud all at once and half the town moved away overnight. Then Rockabillies swarmed in from all over, cat-eye-sunglassed gals and duckass-headed cats, in their colorful big-fin cars. They snapped up deep-discount houses, then filled them with black and white TVs, record players in wooden consoles, and old vacuum cleaners with fire-hazard cloth cords.

Betties in gingham, pearls, sleeve tats and doo-doo rolls on their heads dotted the streets.

They walked coiffed poodles, smoked Lucky Strikes and yelled at their kids. “You are cruisin’ for a bruisin’, Elvis Presley Schneithorst.” And “Jimmy Dean Wisniewski, watch your mouth or I’ll get the soap.” Zombified June Cleavers in stilettos, with their butt-swinging walk; sexy, sassy, contradictorily submissive. They planted gardens and hung laundry, skull earrings swinging as they snapped their bubblegum. Come evening, “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” wafted out open windows, atop the riff of porkchops frying.

Out on the door-stoop, Hepcop yammered on. Mama chewed her long red fingernails, a sure sign he was steaming her corn. He said, “Mrs. Bingham. You still maintain that Mr. Bingham just beat feet out of his whole entire life, in the early morning hours after Halloween?

Directly after that big rattle the neighbors called us out here for, when you whopped him upside his head with that jug of pumpkin vodka. And now, a whole month later, nobody’s heard a peep from him. Hmmm?”

“That’s right. I told him, you keep a-walking, with that sweet-a-talking. I ain’t a-singing the blues no more.”

Shoobie-doobie-do.

Bam-bam!

Hepcop’s peepers widened. “What’s that? Sounds like drumming, to the rhythm of them song lyrics you keep saying. You got somebody in there, besides you and little Wanda?”

Mama blew a big pink bubble, then popped it, making a mess of her bright red lipstick. She said, “I’m a-gonna say it out loud. A-one, a-two, a-three is a crowd.”

Shoobie-doobie-do.

Bam. Bam-bam-bam!

It gives me the creepy-crawlies when Daddio joins in like that. The heebie-jeebies.       

Finally, Hepcop scrammed, shaking his pompy head.

Mama and Daddio was cranked at first, when Rockabillies like us filled the town. They’d all have cocktail parties and I got to play with their kids. Mama was especially gassed to make friends with Miz Amber, the Rockabilly dolly next door. But Miz Amber became Daddio’s friend too and Mama didn’t like her no more.

From my bedroom, after our Halloween bash, I heard my parents talk about a new baby that was on the way. I was on cloud nine, until Daddio started crying and Mama started screeching. Then I understood. My mama wasn’t having no baby. I kept my head under the pillow.

Anyhow, after Hepcop left, Mama sank into our ratty couch, face in her hands. She looked up and her dark, dark eye makeup was everywhere.

Trusting my mama as only an eleven-year-old can trust anybody, I said, “Don’t worry, Mama. Who would ever even think to dig up the garden?”

Mama said, “You dreamed that,” her face all smudged, like a Halloween ghoul.

She fixed my favorite, hamburger steak and mashed potatoes. Then I got to watch TV until ten. It seemed like my birthday or something, even before she said, “How ’bout some chocolate milk before bed?”

I said, “Yes, ma’am. That’d be swell!”

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After Christmas, Miz Amber approached the fence. Mrs. Bingham worked in her garden.

“Hi there,” Amber said. “How have you all been?”

“There ain’t no more ‘us all.’”

“No! Really?”

Mrs. Bingham heard the tingle in Amy’s voice. She added, “He’s run off with a floozy.”

She watched Amy’s face fall, watched Amy hug her indeterminate middle, in her faded coat. She savored it.

“Well. Say, look at you, gardening in December. Tough lady!”

“Thought I’d add a new section, for an herb garden in the spring. The floozy and him’s probably in Mexico by now, all cozy!” She threw her hands up. “They took little Wanda with them, you know.”

“Oh! Terrible! Listen, I hate to cut this short but I’ve really got to run.”

“Bye, now,” Mrs. Bingham called. Go away, girl. You’re just a throwaway girl. A blow-away girl, cha-cha.

Shoobie-doobie-do.

Bam-bam.

Carly Berg

Image: spade dug into the earth from Pixabay.com