Chapter 56

Mama spun a circumstantial evidence argument in order to make her case about Maravelle and Kyle being lovers. It mostly came down to looks that they'd been observed exchanging, and this one time that Mama had seen Kyle lightly run the back of his hand across a seated Maravelle's neck.

I hadn't seen any of what she described. I knew I didn't pay as much attention to those kinds of things as I used to, but still, I thought I would have noticed something if it had all been like what Mama was describing.

"Kyle does have this reputation. Had it all through school, and right up until he married Trudy, for being a big flirt. I've never heard anyone ever say it was more than that though. He likes to show people that he could be good with getting women too. As far as I've ever known, Trudy was the only girl he's ever been serious with. He didn't even date other girls. Even during that time when they split up, he didn't date any other girls. I'd find it very difficult to believe he was having an affair. Even more so when you say its with Maravelle. She's just as angry with Kyle as she is with all the rest of my family. I might be made to believe that Trudy could do something like that, but not Vellie." Cindy seemed pretty certain of herself when she spoke.

"Believe what you choose to, dear. I'm one hundred percent convinced that I'm right. Those two are sexually intimate. I recognize all the signs. Kyle thinks he's too clever to ever get caught or found out, but his overconfidence is very misplaced. He made it quite obvious. Billy Ray's wife tried to discourage Kyle from being so obvious with his glances and that one touch, but she didn't have the will to resist him entirely. I made this known to you Kenny in the hopes that you will be forewarned if the affair turns out badly. I see potential for a serious division within the family should this become common knowledge."

"Mama, Cindy's part of that family too, and she seems willing to share what she learns with her father." Cindy gave me a look, and not a benevolent one either.

"Nonsense, dear. Cindy knows this would be harmful in the extreme. I'm sure her first loyalty lies with you." Mama reached across between the space separating her from Cindy, patting her gently on the hand. "She wouldn't betray the trust we've shown in her."

"How will Trudy or Billy Ray react if they found out?" Joyce asked the practical questions. this one had been on my own mind too. Personally, for the two couples, it could be a tragedy. For Macklinson's, given the prominent positions that Kyle and Billy Ray held in my current and future planning, I needed to know. I had to prepare a plan for damage control. We all turned to Cindy.

"I still don't believe it's true, but if it is, Kyle couldn't have chosen a more dangerous woman to have an affair with. There has been bad blood between Billy Ray and Kyle from when they were both little kids. They must have gotten into a hundred fights, and Kyle would always beat Billy Ray. Billy Ray was a wild boy, and so was Kyle. They were both dangerous wild. Billy Ray would crash his race cars, trying to make impossible passes, and Kyle would compete with him off the race track too, getting him to do even more dangerous stunts. Once they both broke their arms jumping off the same branch of a tree. Kyle jumped even after Billy Ray had already broken his arm just a few seconds before. For awhile, it looked like they were in a race with each other to see which one would be the first to kill himself.

"When Billy Ray met Maravelle, all that changed, and he settled right down. She told him he had to choose, because she wouldn't put up with any more of his foolish risk taking. She was three years older than him, but very beautiful, so Billy Ray actually eased back a lot. She made him stop racing, and she put her foot down about him accepting anymore of Kyle's challenges."

"How long ago was this, that Billy Ray settled down because of Maravelle?" I asked her the question because I wanted to get a sense of when all the wildness finally stopped.

"Billy Ray met Maravelle while Kyle and Trudy were still going together, maybe five years ago? When they started getting serious, after about a year or so, I think that was right before Kyle and Trudy had their big fight. They got married during the time when Kyle was split up with Trudy. It was after the wedding that Kyle and Trudy got back together. Maybe a month or two after."

"Well, they're both grown men now with children either here or on the way. Why do you think it would be so dangerous if Billy Ray found out?"

"Billy Ray is so in love with Vellie, and he's changed so much just so she would be with him. Even when everyone else was down on him, he always had her. Take that away from him, and he doesn't have anything left. Billy Ray does crazy wild things whenever he gets to thinking that nothing much matters. He'd come looking for Kyle, and it wouldn't end until one of them was hurt bad, maybe even killed."

"So, you think Billy Ray might actually go after Kyle, if he found out that he and Vellie were fooling around?"

"Probably go after him, but it wouldn't end there. He might try to fight Kyle, but Kyle would whip him in any regular fight. Billy Ray would do whatever it took to hurt Kyle back, even if it meant shooting him. I told you there was bad blood, and there is. Billy Ray would have to find something he could do where he would finally end up as the winner, or else he'd just kill Kyle. Nothing else would do. The way things stand right now, no one would take Billy Ray's side. They never do."

"Mama could be wrong. She's been wrong about these things before."

"I have not! Name one time when I was mistaken, Kenny."

"That time you accused Dad of having it off with Georgia Connor. You were wrong then."

"Was I? Why, because he denied it? He says I was wrong, I don't. Georgia as much as admitted it to me once when she'd been drinking and got onto one of her crying jags. Men are weak about these things. They find it more difficult to resist anything like that if its freely offered. I forgave him that indiscretion, because I knew she'd been throwing herself at him for years. He resisted longer then most men would have."

I had some trouble just accepting her word for it, but I still needed to stay on track with our current problem.

"Are you absolutely sure about Kyle and Maravelle, Mama? This could be catastrophic if we do something and it turns out that you're mistaken."

"I saw what I saw, but I didn't actually see them in bed together. I know what I saw, and I'm convinced that they're lovers. Not past lovers either. What's going on is current. Hire someone to check on it if you have any doubts. You'll see."

I had a different plan, one that was simpler and quicker as well. I'd ask Kyle. I was confident I'd be able to tell if he was lying. Even if he did lie to me and I couldn't tell, he would have to have second thoughts about continuing his affair.

In bed that night both girls were quiet and subdued. There wasn't any strap on either. We didn't even make love. I didn't sleep well, having a lot on my mind. Cindy and I left for work at seven. In the car I warned Cindy not to say anything to anyone about what my mother had claimed.

I found Kyle over at the loading dock supervising the loading of the sales teams trucks. I made it a point to be introduced to each member of the team, singling out Virgil and Lenny for personal credit and congratulations. I told the whole crew that we were pleased with their effort and expected an even better second day from them.

I also told Kyle I needed to see him privately, to discuss a situation I was concerned about, one that I wanted some advice about. He finished up with loading his team and then arranged for all of them to meet for lunch at a restaurant in Birmingham's East side.

When the sales team dispersed to go to their assigned areas, Kyle turned back to face me. He was smiling, and looking more confident than he'd been the previous evening. I looked around to make sure no one could hear us.

"Kyle, my mother tells me that you and Maravelle are fucking each other. I told her you weren't stupid enough to be dipping your dick in the family's inkwell. She said she's positive that you are. Who's right?"

That wasn't how I'd planned to do it, but it had somehow seemed like the correct approach to take at that particular moment. I was already feeling a lot of strain, and one of the causes of some of it was standing right in front of me. I felt powerless against my physical problems, but this was something I could do something about.

I saw no reason to beat around the bush with it. Perhaps, given how things turned out, I should have tried a less direct approach. Kyle made a disgusted face at me, as if I were beneath contempt, and tried to shove his way past me. It was his reaching out with his hands, to shove me out of his path, that triggered an unexpected response from me.

I punched him in the mouth. It was a reaction, and one I knew, even as it happened, was too much reaction for the provocation given. I wasn't a violent person. I disliked violence, but there I stood, committing it. Kyle jumped back from my punch, his hand moving quickly up to his mouth to check for blood or any signs of a cut. His eyes had narrowed, anger flashing hotly as he glared back at me.

"You're crazy, you know that? That's assault. I'll have you arrested, and I'll sue you for a million dollars."

Kyle was wild eyed by then, deliberately mobilizing the adrenaline for his own attack. His words were harsh and clipped, barely coherent with the rage he was building up inside. I could see he was marshaling his anger, bringing it to a feverish pitch. It was obvious that he'd be retaliating, and very soon. I doubted he was at all used to having people strike out at him like I had. After only a few seconds, he started advancing towards me. I didn't back away. It didn't seem real that I was actually going to be having a fist fight.

We both started throwing punches. It felt good to me to be engaged in something I could fight back against for a change. I savored the pain I felt from his punches landing on me, as well as the ones I managed to land back on him.

It was Kyle who finally stepped back again, after a furious fifteen seconds of a wild swinging melee from the two of us. We were both aware that neither of us had scored any blow against the other that was even close to being as solid as the one I'd landed when he first pushed me. It had been more a wild flailing of arms at each other.

"Trudy is going to be crushed, Kyle. Billy Ray will probably kill you. It will split the family wide open." I wanted him to realize that more was at stake than could possibly be settled with us fighting. He had to understand the import of what was going to take place.

He charged me again, this time too enraged to even care where he was hitting me. I absorbed his wild swings until I saw a good opening and landed my own solid blow on his cheek and jaw. He dropped to his knees, but was back up almost instantly.

Again he backed away. Trying to think of a tactic that would be more successful than what he'd already tried. I could see he was thinking. With the stress he must have been under, and the pressure, this was a remarkable feat. I knew it wasn't easy to think clearly in the heat of a battle such as this. I knew my own thinking wasn't very acute right then.

"I never touched Vellie. Your mother is crazy."

"You touched her last night, on the back of her neck when you thought no one would notice." Kyle winced, realizing that what he thought had gone unnoticed, hadn't really.

"I meant I never touched her the way you said I did. Why are you even doing this? This is stupid. Even if I was doing what you said, it isn't any of your business. What are you trying to prove?"

"I don't know. This isn't how I thought it would go, Kyle. I guess I thought we'd have a talk and I'd tell you that what you were doing was too dangerous, and you had to stop. This isn't how I thought we'd end up, fighting like a couple of children."

He charged at me again, but I was ready for it. I outweighed him by quite a bit, and while he was undoubtedly the better athlete, I took comfort in knowing that he didn't seem to have any more experience with brawling than I did. I beat him back again, although I absorbed some damage from his attack myself.

"We need to stop this, Kenny, I quit. You can run the sales team by yourself. You'll never get anywhere with it around here. It won't work without me showing them how to do it. You better keep your lying thoughts to yourself too. You even come near my wife with these lies and I'll kill you."

"You afraid she'll divorce you and take the baby? Serve you right if she does that. We're not done here yet though. You can quit if you want to, Kyle. That's your style. I didn't come down here to force you to quit, but it doesn't surprise me a bit that you'd want to. You have no stomach for real challenges, especially ones where failure is a very real possibility. Not your style. All you enjoy are sure things where you can impress everyone with how good you are. I fell for it once, but I know better now. We still need to talk, to work out how we're going to stop this thing you're doing before it tears your whole family apart."

Kyle was thinking. He was tired and afraid. The possibility of having people find out about his affair with Vellie was unexplored by him. He'd never given much thought to any of the possible consequences of them being exposed either. It was just now dawning on him that his life was about to be severely impacted due to his rash and selfish indulgence.

"Look, Kenny, I'll stop it with her right now, this minute, but you have to swear to me that you won't tell Trudy about any of this. You have to promise me, please." He was desperate, begging, pleading with me to help him with this problem he had.

"If you quit your job, Trudy is bound to have questions, she'll to want to know why. If she asks me what happened, I'll have to tell her. You better make sure she never asks."

"You don't want me to quit?" Kyle couldn't believe that's what I meant.

"I wanted you to quit fucking your cousin's wife, not quit your job. I want you to quit going around thinking that you're better than everyone else, and that all the rules don't necessarily apply to you. Quit thinking you're the Golden Boy, because you aren't. I don't think Billy Ray would ever do to you what you and Vellie have done to him. In that one way alone, he's shown me he's a better man than you are. You better hope he never finds out what you were doing with his wife."

"He won't find out, not unless you tell him. I never told anyone."

"You told my mother. Not with your words, but by your actions when you were around Maravelle. Not everyone is that easy to fool, Kyle. You better hope no one else figures out what you were doing. Cindy knows though, because Mama told her at the same time she told the rest of us. Now you have someone else to be worried about. I'm pretty sure Cindy has doubts, but I'm going to tell her you admitted it to me."

"Shit, Kenny. Shit, shit, shit. She's just going to go running off at the mouth about this. You should have just taken out an ad in the News, and saved yourself a bunch of trouble. Don't tell her I said that about me and Vellie. Tell her it isn't true, that we denied it. She'll believe you."

"She'd believe me, but only because she knows I wouldn't lie to her. That's also why I won't lie to her, because I want her to continue trusting me. What I will do is ask her not to tell anyone else."

I looked at Kyle's face, it wasn't marked up very much. Only my ear really hurt, and it felt like it was probably red. Neither of us were cut anywhere I could see or feel. I stepped aside, to allow him to go by me, giving him a chance to rush me again if he wanted to. He walked by without trying anything.

"I'm going to go see Vellie, to tell her its over."

"You get back to work. I told you I was going to go talk to her. She'll know its over. If it ever starts up again, I'll make you regret it, I swear. You might get away with it this time, but you'd never get away with a next time."

"I don't want to work for you anymore, Kenny. Just let me quit. We'll make up another story."

"Kyle, if you quit me over this, you're going to have to bear the full brunt of it. The only reason I might have for trying to help you out of this is because you're a valuable employee to me. If you quit the company, I have no incentive to try to get this settled quietly."

"That's blackmail."

"Is it? That isn't how I see it. What I see is me trying to clean up a big mess that you made. For doing that, I deserve something back in return. We can do it your way or my way, Kyle, its up to you. Do you want to go back to work and hope this all goes away, or do you want to try to take your chances, hoping that when Billy Ray and Trudy find out about what you've been up to, you can fast talk your way out of facing the consequences?"

Kyle waited before answering. I knew he was calculating his chances. He must not have liked the conclusion he came to.

"I'll go back to work. When you talk to Maravelle, tell her I'm sorry, and that I didn't mean for this to cause her any big problems."

I had the address to the cigar store where Maravelle lived and worked. I knew that Billy Ray was safely back in my office, hard at work. I'd just sent Kyle back to be with his sales team, out in the field. When I got to the address. Maravelle and her two little children were playing in her front yard.

From seeing the look on her face when I pulled up to the curb, I knew Kyle had already phoned her. I might have done the same in his shoes. In a way, it was a brave thing for him to have done. I went over and stood by the little wooden gate leading to her front yard.

"He told me already. You can go back to your company. It's all over with now."

"Did you think that was going to be all you had to say to make this all go away? I want to know why you did this to Billy Ray. We all thought you loved him. Everyone said so."

She didn't like me standing on the sidewalk discussing such private business. Too bad, I thought. She was the one who decided to choose the outdoors as the best place for us to talk. I could see she'd been crying too. Maybe it was more than just sex between them. It didn't matter. Whatever it was, it needed to end.