Through the Eyes of the Misfit in “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor

Rachel Flores

ENL 10C

Blog Post #2- Prompt #1

May 13, 2018

Through the Eyes of the Misfit in “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor

            “Hey boss, we… we gotta go…now.” Bobby Lee stuttered, trying to catch his breath.

            “Son, you don’t reckon I know that?” I spit at him through my teeth. The boy had begun to become paranoid and I could see right through him. Yeah sure, he was a big fella, but it was starting to become a problem; I could see the fear sweating out his pores every time a shot was fired. It was starting to become a problem.

            “You clean up them hands of yours after you finish rollin’ those folks in the trunk and get that look off you face ‘cause you got the next ones, ya hear?”

            “Yes si-“

            “For god’s sake Hiram! Make sure to not make such a god damned mess. You got my shirt all dirty.” I could feel the heat rising to my face as I looked down at my chest only to realize that my shirt had turned from blue, to a stained dark purple. Take a deep breath. Take a deep breath. I exhaled through my nose as I pulled off the shirt as fast as a tired man could. I was never a fan of the color red.

            “We’re ready when you are.” Hiram called as he and Bobby Lee shut the trunk to the new beauty we had just acquired.

            “Alright boys let’s get going, it won’t be long till those bastards come chasin’ after us again.” I said as we hit the road once again. It was always those drives that made me think and look back on the empty, long road ahead of me. This was the way it had been for the last couple of months. I was tired of the running, the hiding, and the lack of sleep, but I knew why I did what I did and I knew that once I started, I wouldn’t be able to stop. This was a lifestyle and I knew it suited me. No doubt about that.  I began alone as plain old Alonzo Woodson, but soon enough one became two and two became three. I met Bobby Lee and Hiram within the walls of the dirtiest penitentiary and decided that we were in for all the wrong reasons; Bobby Lee was in for killing the man that had shot his little brother, Hiram served time after he got caught stealing a car for his mom, and well I was in for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. I was usually always locked up in shoe, but we found time here and there to plot out exactly how it was that we would get out. Once that free soil touches our feet, we were addicted and once that first gun was shot, it became the new gateway drug. There was no end in sight.

            Usually Hiram was the one who drove, but I had recently become a fan of deserted dirt roads; They always dragged in a new outfit. I was always careful to drive just five above the speed limit when it came to busy freeways and reckless car chases, but there was something about the quiet streets that made me want to fly the same way I flew from the penitentiary, my problems, my crimes, and myself because I was no longer Alonzo Woodson; I was the Misfit.

            Ahead of me sat a shaded hill that forced me to press down on the gas a little harder and all because a couple decided to get rowdy and scream out my newly christened name.

            “Just a little more,” I whispered to myself as we reached the top, slowly letting go of the gas only to catch my breath once more.

            “Hiram wake up,” I shook his shoulder. “Wake up! Look over yonder. Do you see that?” Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he squinted off into what lie ahead. A car flipped over and was now shaking violently after landing right side up. A woman seemed to be cradling something in her arms as she lay on the ground and two kids jumped up seemingly unharmed. An older fellow rose up and so did a man.

            “Do you see that?” I repeated as I slowed down circling the curves that would lead me straight to them.

            “Yes boss. You want to stop by?” asked Bobby Lee from the backseat.

            “You just keep those guns handy. Looks like we’re paying these folks a visit. How many you see Hiram?” I asked.

            “Looks like one..two..” he said to himself as we rounded one curve “three..six. Six sir.” He confirmed as we reached the bottom of the hill.

            “Alright. Stay put and you,” I glanced over at Bobby Lee through the rearview mirror. “You got these, got it?”

            “Yes boss.” He recited almost like a prayer as he caressed the body of his new handgun. That boy may be afraid of his own shadow from time to time, but there’s always that look of thrill before the blood and panic.

Coming to a stop, a small thud was felt as the lifeless bodies moved in the rear part of the car. I could see the loud kids from here and came to notice that what the lady cradled was a screaming baby in one arm while the other lay limply against her side. Dislocated shoulder. My eyes made their way blankly across the scene where the car emit smoke and the grandma blood out of a cut on her forehead.

“We’ve had an ACCIDENT!” the children screamed as I stood by the side of the car, cupping my eyes from the sun that so beamingly shun. Soon after Bobby Lee and Hiram followed. I could feel six pairs of eyes looking at me while one gazed. The older lady had been looking at him the same way the couple had.

“Good afternoon. I see you all had you a little spill.” I said to break to the silence.

“We turned over twice!” exclaimed the grandma. She reminded me of my own, but still her gaze made him uncomfortable.

“Once actually. We seen it happen. Hiram,” I looked back at him with a nod, “Try their car and see if it runs.” The only noises came from the sizzling of the car until the little boy began to play twenty-one questions,

“What you got that gun for? Whatcha gonna do with that gun? Huh? Huh?” he danced around me.

“Lady,” I said as I rolled my eyes over to the children’s mother, “would you mind callin’ them children of yours? Children make me nervous, especially when they start asking so many questions.”

The woman proceeded to hush up her son and with that, I had three to the side and the other three wandering to my left.

“Now listen here. I want all of you to sit right down together and member to sit tight while we handle this situation.” I said as they shuffled over like dazed zombies to the mother and her children. It wasn’t long before the man of the house was made known by desperately saying,

“Look here now, we’re in a predicament. We’re..” he was saying before the grandma shrieked and said,

“You’re the Misfit! You’re the Misfit the police after!” she said with a pale face. I felt a pull at my heart because it felt good to see just how famous I had become.

“Why yes I am mam’. Pleased to meet you.” I looked directly at her with my now famous Hollywood smile. I clicked my tongue and leaned against the car that was now useless. “I really wish you wouldn’t have recnized me. It is quite the honor though.” I winked at her with the sudden whispers that now came from the man to his wife and the tears that ran down the grandma’s face after noticing my gun and just how comfortable my fingers lay on it.

“Now now. No secrets here and you, “I looked at the grandma, “Stop that.” I raised my eyebrows not knowing what else to do. I hated when they cried. I couldn’t look at them comfortably. I looked away and gathered myself the best way I could by digging the tip of my boot in the sand the same way I used to when my momma would scold me.

“You wouldn’t shoot a lady, would you?” she asked knowing very well the answer to it.

“Well mam’ I would hate to…” I trailed off. If only she knew. If only she knew all the grandmas I’ve killed. Just like taking candy from a baby I thought to myself.

“Listen, I know you’re a good man. You don’t look a bit like you have common blood. I know you must come from nice people.” The grandma yelled through the sighs she was trying to catch in the heat of the panic that engulfed her.

“Yes’m indeed. My mother and daddy were two of the finest people and raised a very fine man. Hard working in fact and very clever.” I said having fun with the fear that rose in her eyes and trembling hands. I continued, “The most humble beings.” I whispered almost to myself. My eyes danced from face to face and ended behind them as Bobby Lee stood with his gut plummeting and an excited hold on his gun.

“Now,” I clapped my hands together as I squatted down closer to them, “I’m going to have my good friend Bobby Lee watch other these children of yours while we figure out this whole mess. Children make me nervous.” I said as I looked over at Hiram who announced that it would take half an hour to “fix” the car. All it took was one glance and we all synchronized our thoughts into one: no one would make it out alive.

Once again, the grandma pleaded for her life saying that I was a good man and I was; I am a good man, I told her. “I been in the penitentiary before, ya know? Served some time ‘cause I was accused of killing the fine man I told yous about before, my daddy. I don’t remember how, but I ended up in a prison cell for something I didn’t do.” And I had not killed my father. How could I? It was a drunken night full of my father, liquor, and a blur, but an altercation had arisen in the bar we had been celebrating in between my father and another man. It started off with a joke that became insults and later screams as everyone ran out of the bar. Bright red blood spread under the floor of the same fine man that had taught me not to cry.

“I prechate that lady,” I said coming back from that dark night. “Now hows bout your daddy goes with Bobby Lee on a walk while we take in the sun a bit more.

“I wanna go! I wanna go too!” whimpered the boy.

“Sure,” I shrugged my shoulders as the woman unsuccessfully grabbed ahold of the last time she would see her son. The woman cried and the grandma screamed out “Bailey boy, my Bailey boy!”. The little girl was mute and curious and the baby sound asleep until the sound of two gunshots was heard in the distance. Sighing, I made my way over to the mother and asked her the same question she was anticipating,

“Now all respects to you, but would you care to join your husband and son?” I said as my hand pointed at the same forest where two new bodies, a small and a large one rested peacefully.

“Yes, thank…you.” She sniffled and motioned for her daughter to follow. “Come ow June Star.” The little girl tugged at her mother’s dress as their backs slowly faded into the forest. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. Simultaneous gun shots told me that Bobby Lee had redeemed himself and that I was left with the grandma who ached and begged on her knees. Her eyes were swollen with pain and she looked up at me,

“Do you pray?” she asked as her voice shook.

“Never. That man never listen to me.” I replied.

“Jesus..Jesus” she gasped almost as if she as cursing when in fact she was praying. I crouched down once again to face her and whispered,

“Jesus ain’t here and he sure as hell is not gonna come a rescue you now is he?”

“He forgives! I forgive! You can be be one of my babies. It don’t matter what you’ve done in the past I forgive! I can take you in!” she screamed and tried to grab ahold of me. It took one electric touch from her frail fingers on my shoulder to swiftly pull out my gun and shoot her right between the same mind that led her to believe she could be saved. I pulled the trigger three times; one for her own sake, one for her god, and one for her prayers.