Free Moody Food by Ray Robertson

all about Uncle Pen, had heard over our first beers together how Thomas, an only child, had been brought up by his uncle after both of his parents had been killed in a head-on car wreck when he was a still a baby.
    â€œRest his sweet soul, indeed he was, Miss Christine, indeed he was.”
    â€œYour uncle,” Christine said, “he’s passed on?”
    â€œTo a better world than this one almost four years now.”
    â€œI thought you said you worked on his farm this past summer picking cotton to help get the cash to move up here,” I said.
    Thomas shifted his weight from one cowboy boot to the other, lifted his eyes above the roof of the Park Plaza.
    â€œI did, I did work on his farm this summer,” he said. “It’s just that it’s not his farm any more. You see, the bank, they came in
and foreclosed on his place before he died. Two rainless summers in a row and that was that. You call some place home for twenty years and with a couple strokes of a pen by a big-city lawyer you’re working for your neighbour down the road.”
    Christine and I both shook our heads.
    â€œA family by the name of the Hannahs, they own the place now. But everybody still calls it Uncle Pen’s farm. And every summer after he had that heart attack, I hired myself out to the Hannahs so I could be close to Uncle Pen again. The morning dew on that cotton in those fields and the hot dust from the combine in the afternoon sun were as much a part of the old boy as anything else.”
    In spite of all his talk about scorching Mississippi summers, standing there on the street corner made it feel even colder than it was. Putting my hands in my coat pockets, I remembered the book Kelorn had given me.
    â€œAlmost forgot, here,” I said, handing it over.
    Thomas took the book. Stared at it.
    â€œKelorn said you wanted a copy,” I said. “For your friend, she said.”
    â€œOh, right,” he said, folding the slim book in two and sticking it in his back pocket. “Thanks. Thanks a lot. I’ll make sure he gets it. I know he’ll really appreciate it.” He reached for his wallet. “Here, let me give you some—”
    â€œYou already paid her.”
    Wallet halfway out, “I did?”
    â€œShe said you did.”
    â€œOh, yeah,” he said, pushing it back. “Now I remember.”
    â€œC’mon you two, let’s go,” Christine said. “And I hope this place you rented is better heated than Bill’s room. I almost had to wear my clothes to bed last night.”
    The big grin was back on Thomas’s face.

    â€œNo need to worry about that, Miss Christine. We’re well-heated, well-stocked, and fully soundproof. I think you’re going to find things most accommodating. I dare say y’all are going to learn to just love it there.”

12.
    IT WAS A LIVING room–sized room with a scuffed hardwood floor and there weren’t any windows. There was a pair of rickety, glass-paned French doors along the back wall that led to a black metal balcony, and hundreds of yellow, pink, and brown cardboard egg cartons had been carefully stapled to all four walls to make sure Thomas’s music stayed in and that of all the other bands in the building stayed out. There were musical instruments everywhere you looked and a Panasonic seven-inch reel-to-reel recording machine and two stand-up microphones in the middle of the floor. And there was no smoking allowed. When Christine reached into her shoulder bag as she toured her way around from drum kit to electric guitar to fiddle, Thomas was one step ahead of her.
    â€œMiss Christine, I’m sorry, but I must insist, no.”
    One hand absently rummaging around in her purse for her pack, the other running a careful finger along the body of an aged mandolin in its worn black case, Christine looked up a little startled.
    â€œSorry,” she said, pulling her hand back from the