Filed under: fiction
Man. Wife. Boy. The Jenkins family lived on top of Toler Mountain. Eight miles by road. We managed it in two by climbing straight up and over.
Mr Jenkins was a Holy Roller who brought the message, and a good bit more, every Sunday down at a little church in Buttermilk Junction. Mrs Jenkins made cherry cobbler and nothing else when she wasn’t sitting in the front row of her husband’s church listening to him tell the congregation what they’d done wrong and what he’d done right.
Preacher Jenkins was just he right amount of odd for a man named Ennis. His clothes were tighter than they should have been and he spit shined and coiffed his hair just enough. At the altar he paired excited eyes with thin, strained lips and came off looking like a possessed race horse. Ennis Jenkins could look a man to death. If you didn’t fall out in a dead faint from the heat or the spirit or ’cause it was just what you were suppose to do, you fell out when he eyeballed you long enough.
The man did his job well.
20 Comments so far
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Hello from England. When I lived in the US, I always wanted to go to see one of these preachers. Sadly living in CA and AZ there wasn’t any to be found LOL.
Comment by Vanda 07.17.06 @ 14:38I dont know why, but the image of Karl Malden just came to mind…wow…
Comment by David 07.17.06 @ 16:11Dave.
Nail. Head. You hit it.
More than that. This is fiction. But I had a slim version of Malden in mind when I wrote it. Totally.
Comment by Buffy 07.17.06 @ 20:44“what they’d done wrong and what he’d done right” – this is why the husband doesn’t attend church, anywhere. Fiction, really? I think I know a few that would argue!
Comment by mamak 07.18.06 @ 4:21It’s too bad that I will forever associate Ennis with Brokeback Mountain. ; )
Comment by Serena 07.18.06 @ 13:03Nice imagery but I would change Buttermilk Junction to just Buttermilk.
Comment by gary 07.18.06 @ 13:07How is it you can write about such horrible charactoristics in people without a tinge of judgement? I just LOVE your style. Please publish a book. . . .
Comment by Hattigrace 07.18.06 @ 13:45Gary. I know what you mean. Something about the pace of the phrase ‘Buttermilk Junction’.
I thought about just leaving it as ‘The Junction’.
The preacher is a fictitious one…but I grew up near a place called Buttermilk Junction…and I’ve always liked the name.
We’ll see how it turns out. 
What an image…”Ennis Jenkins could look a man to death.”
Fiction or fact – I’m a bit frightened!
Comment by Jennifer 07.18.06 @ 21:05A trait common in many people standing behind the pulpits of the world.
But you knew how to say it!
Comment by Janet 07.19.06 @ 3:24My 2 cents-leave Buttermilk Junction-the odd pace of the phrase paints a picture in itself.
Comment by kim 07.19.06 @ 14:38Love your writing – know exactly who Ennis is from reading your prose
Comment by Spo 07.19.06 @ 19:18Buon luogo piacevole senza qualsiasi cosa dispari, ben progettata!
Comment by Babbo 11.04.06 @ 14:21Leave a comment
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