All they had to do was get that pretty little girl and treat her nice. If anyone made trouble for them, Mr. Stagg didn’t have any problem with him or Daddy gutting them like they did Gina Byrd. Only thing Stagg said was not to mess with that Bloodgood girl. Dusty got it but had to explain that to Daddy, who damn near creamed his shorts when he got on that girl’s Instagrams. Pictures of her in her swimsuit or walking a dog in her tight exercise pants and little bra.

Daddy finished the beer right quick and they headed on into a big Popeye’s on Canal Street. They ordered a couple chicken boxes with extra biscuits and found a hard table by the window to eat and watch out for the crazy people walking past them. Daddy’s eyes lit up at one point, a chicken leg stuck in his teeth, while he saw some woman going to town on some boy with his pants ’round his ankles. Right there on the fucking street. Folks passed them by, not giving them a glance, like that woman was playing “Yankee Doodle Dandy” on some kind of magical flute.

“Ain’t never seen nothing like it,” Dusty said.

Daddy chewed his food, unable to talk, taking in all the neon, sex, and the smell of chicken grease. All of the sin being just too much for one man to take.

“Woman at the counter said it’s the Mardi Gras,” Dusty said.

Daddy didn’t answer, setting to work on his little Styrofoam cup of red beans and rice.

“This thing’s going on all weekend long,” Dusty said. “They say streets should clear out later on.”

Daddy scraped into the tub and forked up the beans and rice, chewing with his mouth open. His black eyes flicking outside the window, better than anything that old man ever seen on TV. More jiggling boobies and flesh than he saw in a lifetime of watching The Dukes of Hazzard. Daddy was right, that Daisy Duke was something else, but never, not one time in those old tapes, did she lift up her shirt and flash those titties. His old man hadn’t been in New Orleans but twenty minutes and already seen more titties than he had in his whole life. The old man going into some kind of wide-eyed state, not unlike when the spirit came over him down at the Assembly of God and he started speaking in tongues.

“Daddy?” Dusty said. “You okay?”

“Can’t figure if what I’m seeing is a woman,” he said. “Or a man.”

“Judging from that big bulge in those slick gold pants,” Dusty said. “I’d say that’s a buck.”

“Huh,” Daddy said. “But that fella done—”

“Where you want to stick that Bloodgood girl?” Dusty said. “When we get her?”