‘The Roy boys,’ as was often how their neighbors spoke about them, were considered dangerous.

Both boys were physically good looking, were usually together as they trawled the residential streets, looking for something to hock, usually something that belonged to someone else.

When they moved to Mt. Pleasant, Texas, Grandpa Roy was living in a trailer park near there, and the boys spent a couple hours each afternoon after school at his home until their mother got out of work from her hotel cleaning job. 

Grandpa Roy lived in a rougher end of the trailer park, if that’s possible. Old men who were long-time residents did nothing much after they were too old to do physical work, but sat under a small grove of trees which provided shade in the afternoons. Old men played checkers and poker on the picnic table, betting their change after their VA checks were spent, still optimistic they would win this time around.

Many of Grandpa’s friends, who now lived there, were petty thieves, but some were professional shoplifters. The Roy boys were model students, and brought their extended grandfathers gifts: a pack of cigarettes, a can of beer, hard liquor in the small bottles that fit in an inside pocket of their jackets, as their multiple grandpas’ taught. 

The boys worked together. One would distract the owner while the other brother filled his trousers with new gifts for multiple grandfathers.

(Back to the church parking lot)

The Roy boys left the church with a handful of lists of possible bounties. They stopped under a streetlight while Stone held up each list to the light.

“Hey, Donny, here is the shop teacher’s name, Mr. Brennan. He lives on the next block. Let’s walk this way. We’re still headed in the right direction for the smoke shop. I just want to see how hard it will be to get his DNA.” Stone pointed towards the sidewalk and Donny followed without question.

Mr. Mattis Brennan’s house was built with the garage directly under the house, but the entrance inside was only accessible by climbing up a set of cement steps which led to the front door. The house was built with a red brick facade at least sixty years ago. The yard was manicured around the three sides of the house, clearly trimmed with border bushes that provided privacy from the neighbors. A sliding glass door was the only entrance to the back of the house through a cement patio. 

Looking up at the picture window from the sidewalk they saw that the light from the television was the only light source in the room. Mr. Brennan was relaxed in one of those recliners that when one pushed the lever all the way back and up, the chair raised Brennan’s body into, “full relaxation posture” where one’s toes were higher in the air then one’s head. 

Mr. Brennan still wore his khakis from work, but had taken off his dress shirt. He only wore his sleeveless cotton undershirt. The shirt that he must have worn that day, was draped on the edge of the straight back chair. There was a stain on the front of the t-shirt, a stain that could be coffee. Or, it could be beer from one of the two crumpled beer cans the boys could see on the side table. The television remote was resting on his stomach. He appeared asleep.

“Donny, just stay here while I check out around the back.” Stone started up the cement steps, careful not to misstep or to make a sound with his sneakers. Donny watched Stone move up each step while also watching the sleeping man. Stone disappeared in the dark. He checked the sliding door and it was open.

“Be careful,” Donny called out. Mr. Brennan’s mouth was slightly open. He snorted like he needed to grasp the air and pull it down his throat to breathe. Gurgling sounds as he breathed in, then he wheezed. He snorted again, and he took in another big breath through his mouth. Spittle formed along the bottom lip. His arm jerked a little. “He must be dreaming.” Donny whispered to himself in the dark. Stone had moved out of sight.

Donny waited impatiently, standing so the maple trees hid his 6’ 5” frame. He was getting nervous. He needed to see Stone soon. “Where are you?” Donny whispered, straining into the night’s shadows. Stone told him to wait, so he must do what Stone told him, but where was he? Donny paced back to the tree then to the bushes along the driveway again.

Donny wished that they had stopped and had gotten a pack of cigarettes first. He really needed a smoke right now, but he waited, peering in the dark to see Stone appear. He was supposed to watch from the sidewalk, so he stayed below the steps looking up at the sleeping teacher. Mr. Brennan had taken his socks off and his feet were bare. His toes had black hairs growing above the knuckles. His too-long toenails reminded Donny of Halloween and the fake stick-on nails of a witch. He shivered.

“There you are. What do you have?” Donny reached for the paper bag Stone held up with one hand. In his other hand he held a toothbrush and a comb.

“You took his beer? Old Matty is going to wake up and wonder where he put the rest of his six-pack.Then he’s going to get ready for bed and can’t remember where he left his toothbrush. In the morning he’s going to reach for his comb and it’s disappeared.

“Let’s hit the 24/7. I really could use a cigarette right now.”

Stone reached into his jacket and pulled out a pack of Marlboros.

“You stole his cigarettes?” They both started to crack up, laughing ‘til Donny held his ribs and bent over. Donny pulled the red line that tore open the cellophane on the pack and unfolded the silver paper to open, tapped the pack on his wrist and a cigarette popped its filter tip. He bit the filter with his teeth, flipped the lighter’s top. Two orange dots lighted their silhouette as the boys each opened one of the beers and leisurely strolled towards the strip mall.

“We just made $2,000 tonight.” Stone inhaled deeply and smiled that smile that Donny recognized as Stone planning something. His cigarette smoke mingled with the dust in the air as the smoke rose towards the sky. The night air and the increasing humidity held the chill of the night. Both boys zipped up their Varsity jackets. Football weather. The season opener was a week away.

“Ha! Mr. Brennan is our first bounty.” Donny raised his beer can to the shop teacher that they had just secretly robbed of his DNA.

Donny admired his brother’s tenacity to push all barriers to get what he wanted. His lies could maneuver the gray line as far as Stone could push his father and now the Sheriff. And maybe the minister, now that Moses was part of the Roy brothers personal trinity: the adults who controlled his and his brother’s driving permits.