The Kingdom on the Bayou

Chapter 1-BIENVENUE EN LOUISIANE

Soon after the sun frighteningly untangled its body from the sky, the authority of darkness prepared to descend on the corner of Sabine and Beauregard. It was the night of Annette's twen-tieth birthday party, and she invited every devil she knew to her father's household. She had even summoned to the celebration the Bourbon Street Jester; whose mind was terribly bruised. The man appeared on the Doucette family's front-porch just hours after spending his morning unfastening the guts of twelve-year-old twins, Edra and Evette, before hurling their severed remains into the

Mississippi River. Annette's mother, Aldora, always teased her baby about preferring her company to be as seasoned as her food. As long as they praised her, Netty collected low-down people like stray dogs.

"Oh, yes indeed, Lawd! This ole raggedy thang can perform!" Annette swung her hips around the living room to the enchanting voices of The Delfonics.

"Ya really like it, Netty?" Nanny Mo, the neighborhood Record Man, asked with a wide rotten toothed smile. Annette's honey-colored eyes glazed towards the ceiling as his question marinated in her spirit. Nanny Mo had given his word that he'd find Annette a new record player before her birthday party that night.

But the machine Nanny Mo brought her was very old, wooden, painted black as soot, and noticeably burned all over, due to the many attempts to destroy it.

"Do I like it!?" Annette blurted out as if his question was idiotic. Each second the needle on the Record Player dragged over the

vinyl, Annette heard some beautiful complexion of French horns, bass guitars, drums, saxophones, or keyboards that laid on top of her ear like a warm blanket in the wintertime. The Record Player truly had an otherworldly sound. It was like nothing Annette had ever heard before or would, sadly, ever hear again.

"Mo' I can't even lie—this thang is out of sight! It sounds so good! But why it look like it's 'bout to fall clean apart?" She shook her head and peeled a piece of ash off the blackened chipped wood.

"Oh yeah, baby, it don't sound like what it's been through! It ain't gon' fall apart on ya! Trust and believe." Nanny Mo laughed.

"Mmmph, yeah, it bet not!" Annette hummed hard and smiled sweetly.

"But look, ima tell you like this hea, Mo, LET this Record Player act up when you leave this house! I dare it. I works too hard for my money, and I ain't tryin' to buy no foolishness ya hear me?" Annette cut her eyes at him and pointed her light pink long fingernail in his face.

Nanny Mo swallowed hard and nodded his head.

"I'm serious. Money too scace these days! Just let it skip one too many times Mo, and it's gon' be me and you. Soon as you get up the road good, I'm gon' run round dat corna' with my bat and bust ya right on top of ya head. I swear to Gawd," Annette threatened.

"Girl you know you is a nut!" Nanny Mo shouted and bent his small body over in laughter. Every single hole in his dirty brown shirt bent right along with him, too.

"Call it what'cha want!" she snapped.

"Tell me Netty, what I got's to lie for? I been grooving to this thang since Sunday, and it ain't miss a beat one time. It work! I ain't gon' cheat'cha baby." Nanny Mo shook his head at her endearingly.

"Hmmmph." Annette hummed and twisted her lips in disbelief.

"Well..." She sighed and rolled her eyes at him.

"If it really work, I guess I got to thank ya Mo. I'm happy you came through for me cause them suckas coming tonight gon' need to hear dat funk, or they gon' be draggin' for me till the cows come home, and you know it!"