The rooster at the dairy next door hasn't crowed yet, but I can feel it's almost morning. Half-past four, and I can't sleep. My son sent home a drifter tonight. The fella told him they had the same first name, and that seemed reason enough for Stevie to tell him to come over here and say he was to sleep on my couch for the night. My boy didn't even think to leave that old roadhouse himself to make the introductions!

Well, this one did look pretty tired, all dusty from the road and no spark at all in those big brown eyes when he looked up at me from the front stoop. Stevie had vouched for him, he said. And they even had the same name, and he didn't have a mama of his own. Sure, son, I thought, that is just like you. Go ahead and leave your old ma alone with a drifter!

I let the boy in anyway. What was I supposed to do, him all hungry-looking, not an ounce of fat on those bones, as far as I could tell through the dirt. I got a soft heart for motherless ones, especially if they got the same name as my boy. Kind of funny he didn't want pie when I offered it, just asked for a blanket, then curled up on that scratchy old Herculon couch like it was a featherbed.

I went back to bed, but I couldn't sleep, picturing that fella all warm and drowsy in the next room. Then I got to thinking that maybe that same-name thing was a lie. So here's what I did. I unlocked my bedroom door and walked out like I was going for a snack or something. When I passed the back of the couch, I said, 'goodnight, Stevie.'� He didn't say a thing, which if Stevie was his name, he'd naturally say goodnight right back. After all, it's my couch he's lying on. My pie he turned down.

So that's where we stand: he lied about his name. Which means he probably also lied about not being a murderer or a rapist or who knows what all, if my son even thought to think about that and ask around before sending a strange man home to his mama's couch. Well, I just don't think it's smart to go to sleep. Nobody here but me to protect myself.

Haven't had a real man here for years. Haven't needed one till now: I got money of my own, and I keep my money nicely hid. Even Stevie doesn't know where it is. My Stevie, not the drifter Stevie, though if that one knows where the money is I sure can't imagine how. I never leave the place long enough to give anybody a chance to look for it. That boy of mine'd drink it up in a couple of months, and that's the truth. My Stevie has a lot of growing up to do, I'll tell you that much.

The things you think about, waiting for the rooster! Right now, I'm about thinking somebody needs to be taught a lesson. This boy, this new Stevie, comes in here and plays possum till he thinks I'm asleep, and he's fixing to rape me and murder me? Not hardly! I ought to give him a dose of his own medicine, that's what I ought to do.

And that's what I will do. I got some foolishness in the bottom of the dresser, under the winter nightdresses, and I can put some of that stuff right on me and go out there and just see what his intentions really are. I can put on my good housecoat, right over it, keep it unbuttoned, casual, put my fishing knife right there in the pocket. I can do that right now. Then if everything's OK, or my Stevie comes home early, I can just button up and nobody's the wiser.

Too late to be early, now isn't it, almost five in the morning! The boys from Sears siad they'd be here to deliver the new mattress at eight, so I don't have much time left to get some sleep. And a gal my age needs her sleep. There's only so many years you can take off with a Clairol rinse, and those crow's feet creep right up a gal's face if she stays up nights worrying about strangers in her house. So it's now or never, put up or shut up.

This red one ought to still fit, it's loose, all floaty and see-through, enough folds in it to cover my own bellyfolds. I look sorta like a little red hen, all fluffy and ready to make the cock crow! Can't help but let out a little smile, thinking about that rooster next door. Yeah, not too bad for a gal almost fifty, in this light, anyway, and crow's feet be damned! Now, where is that fish knife? Right here where I left it, in the drawer of the cherry nightstand my own Mama left me.

If that isn't something! I think he got so tired playing possum he fell asleep for real, and there he is, all splayed out on his back in his little whiteys, cute as can be! Must have felt pretty cozy here, to let Mama's quilt slide off him like that. And he's not so dusty looking now he has those jeans off, and that old torn t-shirt's all puddled up on the floor next to them.

Looks like he's packing something in those drawers, too, so I wasn't half wrong thinking he was intending to rape me. I wonder what kind they are, looks like writing on the waistband. I wonder if his mama buys him the same kind I buy, from the catalog. Oh, but then he did say he had no mama, that's right. All alone in the world, he said, when he looked at me with those eyes of his, out there on the stoop.

Same kind. Mighty soft cotton, like he's had them a long time. Not so soft underneath, since I started checking to see what kind they were. Well, he has his nerve, still playing possum, and then he thinks he's gonna catch me out here off guard and rape me!

There, that ought to hold him, I sat right down on that pole, my red nightdress and my good robe covering up those downy legs and that hard belly of his. I'll ride him till he tells me the truth. Nobody's going to come into my house, use my hospitality, and then lie to me about his name, that's for darn sure! Stevie, my tailbone!

I hate that sound men make when they're finished, so I shut him up real good with the fish knife. Kept him hard a little longer till I could finish too, so it was two jobs done at one time. Three, if you count the fact that he can't kill me now that he's dead.

Good riddance to bad rubbish, Mama always said. He weighed a lot more than he looked, dragging him across the linoleum to my bedroom. His arm got caught on that loose piece right at my bedroom doorway, so that was another mess. Cutting the seam on the old mattress and making room for his sorry sack of bones inside, then making some nice clean whipstitches to close it up again, on top of all the rest of it, well, that was another job and a half! Never mind cleaning up the couch and the floor.

That formula 409 works great on blood though. They don't tell you in the television, I just thought I'd pass that fact along.

My Stevie didn't come home till lunchtime, long after those boys from Sears dragged the old mattress out to their truck to take it to the dump. And he didn't say one thing about his so-called friend with the same name. So there you have it, my boy never did tell that fella to come over here, after all!

There's that old rooster, finally, and here I am feeling like I could sleep for a week. But a woman has to keep her wits about her in this day and age, never let up. I can tell you right now that red nightdress is going right back in the bottom of the dresser, and that's for damn sure, or my boy's name's not Stevie.

Want to comment on this Short Stories? Sign up to Edit Red and you will be able to comment on Short Stories and get access to: Upload your own stories and poems, get readers and their feedback, promote your work...