Dead to the World

when the phone rang. It had a built-in caller ID, and I noticed Sam was calling from the bar, instead of his trailer.
    “Sookie?”
    “Hey, Sam.”
    “I’m sorry about Jason. Any news?”
    “No. I called down to the sheriff’s department when I woke up, and I talked to the dispatcher. She said Alcee Beck would let me know if anything new came up. That’s what she’s said the last twenty times I’ve called.”
    “Want me to get someone to take your shift?”
    “No. It would be better for me to be busy, than to sit here at home. They know where to reach me if they’ve got anything to tell me.”
    “You sure?”
    “Yes. Thanks for asking, though.”
    “If I can do anything to help, you let me know.”
    “There is something, come to think of it.”
    “Name it.”
    “You remember the little shifter Jason was in the bar with New Year’s Eve?”
    Sam gave it thought. “Yes,” he said hesitantly. “One of the Norris girls? They live out in Hotshot.”
    “That’s what Hoyt said.”
    “You have to watch out for people from out there, Sookie. That’s an old settlement. An inbred settlement.”
    I wasn’t sure what Sam was trying to tell me. “Could you spell that out? I’m not up to unraveling subtle hints today.”
    “I can’t right now.”
    “Oh, not alone?”
    “No. The snack delivery guy is here. Just be careful. They’re really, really different.”
    “Okay,” I said slowly, still in the dark. “I’ll be careful. See you at four-thirty,” I told him, and hung up, vaguely unhappy and quite puzzled.
    I had plenty of time to go out to Hotshot and get back before I had to go to work. I pulled on some jeans, sneakers, a bright red long-sleeved T-shirt, and my old blue coat. I looked up Crystal Norris’s address in the phone book and had to get out my chamber of commerce map to track it down. I’ve lived in Renard Parish my whole life, and I thought I knew it pretty well, but the Hotshot area was a black hole in my otherwise thorough knowledge.
    I drove north, and when I came to the T-junction, I turned right. I passed the lumber processing plant that was Bon Temps’s main employer, and I passed a reupholstering place, and I flew past the water department. There was a liquor store or two, and then a country store at a crossroads that had a prominent COLD BEER AND BAIT sign left over from the summer and propped up facing the road. I turned right again, to go south.
    The deeper I went into the countryside, the worse the road seemed to grow. The mowing and maintenance crews hadn’t been out here since the end of summer. Either the residents of the Hotshot community had no pull whatsoever in the parish government, or they just didn’t want visitors. From time to time, the road dipped in some low-lying areas as it ran between bayous. In heavy rains, the low spots would be flooded. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to hear folks out here encountered the occasional gator.
    Finally I came to another crossroads, compared to which the one with the bait shop seemed like a mall. There were a few houses scattered around, maybe eight or nine. These were small houses, none of them brick. Most of them had several cars in the front yard. Some of them sported a rusty swing set or a basketball hoop, and in a couple of yards I spotted a satellite dish. Oddly, all the houses seemed pulled away from the actual crossroads; the area directly around the road intersection was bare. It was like someone had tied a rope to a stake sunk in the middle of the crossing and drawn a circle. Within it, there was nothing. Outside it, the houses crouched.
    In my experience, in a little settlement like this, you had the same kind of people you had anywhere. Some of them were poor and proud and good. Some of them were poor and mean and worthless. But all of them knew each other thoroughly, and no action went unobserved.
    On this chilly day, I didn’t see a soul outdoors to let me know if this was a black community or a white community. It was unlikely to be both. I wondered if I was at the right crossroads, but my doubts were washed away when I saw an imitation green road sign, the kind you can order from a novelty company, mounted on a pole in front of one of the homes. It read, HOTSHOT.
    I was in the right place. Now, to find Crystal Norris’s house.
    With some difficulty, I spotted a number on one rusty mailbox, and then I saw another. By process of elimination, I figured the next house must be the one where Crystal