by Colin Kersey
“I figured he was a smart boy.” Stu glared at me. “What am I supposed to do, hold his hand? Maybe I should have sent Patsy out there with him. The damn dog has more sense.”
“It was my fault. I could feel the tires starting to slip but kept going until it was too late.”
Virgil nodded. “Meet me by the tractor tomorrow before breakfast. Stu, you bring the bull and some logging chain.”
Stu shook his head. “I knew you were a piece of work the first time I saw you.”
Virgil picked up the television remote. “I am taking the cost to repair that sod out of your paycheck, Stu. Next time—well, there better not be a next time.”
***
“Spartan” was the first word that came to mind when examining the one-room cabin. A thin mattress rested on a metal cot that sat snugly against one of the rough-sawn and sweet-smelling cedar plank walls. Light came from an overhead bulb and a small reading lamp from a nearby desk and chair. What looked to be a closet proved instead to be a miniature bathroom, not unlike the head on a sailboat. It included a shower area barely large enough to stand in and draw the curtain around your body, and, in a nod to efficiency, a toilet and sink were set in such close proximity that it was possible to sit on the john and brush your teeth over the sink at the same time. A clothes rod ran a short distance along the wall over the bed and, above it, a shelf for clothes or books. In my current mental state, where extraneous clutter was not an easy thing to sort through, the cabin seemed virtually ideal. The exceptions were the lack of a driveway and the small, plastic heater which produced an odor of cooked dust when I turned it on high to combat the pervasive, damp chill.
With the first hint of heat, I felt exhaustion overtake me. It was all I could do to walk back to the truck and lug the bag with my clothes down the hill. I forced myself to shed my dripping clothes and Velcro bandage to take a hot shower, the hard spray like tiny arrows attacking my tender ribs and muscles. Then I wrapped a large towel around me, turned off the light, and lay down on the unmade bed.
As I curled into a ball, I recalled lying next to Heide, the satiny feeling of her skin, her scent as I kissed the back of her neck. That life, with all its simple pleasures and silly dreams, was gone. My last thought before falling into unconscious slumber was that I had found a refuge from the violence and imminent danger that stalked me and would do my best to hang on to it, no matter the cost to my body. Or soul.
***
Listen. You can hear the rain falling on the cabin roof, the deck, and the pond. Beneath that, there is the sound of his breathing, soft and regular.
My body quivered with excitement and fear, my heart beating so loud in my ears that I had to wait for it to quiet. I smelled the cedar walls and floor, the rain and sour sweat smell of his clothes, and the clean, soapy smell of his body.
I crouched beside him where he lay on the narrow cot. I reached out to touch him lightly. He was sleeping on his stomach, exhausted by the long day. I did not think he would wake. His skin was cool. He was naked, covered only by a damp towel. The wool blanket I gave him the night before when he was sleeping in his truck was probably still there in his truck.
His skin was smooth, covered by fine hairs. He had taken off the bandage he was wearing around his middle. I played with his hair. I drew my knife from its pouch and used it to cut off a lock to take back with me.
Vonda said his skin color is brown like a Hershey chocolate bar. I do not know what color is exactly, but Momma taught me that there are some colors you can taste, like blueberry blue, orange orange, and vanilla white. It makes me wonder what Gray tastes like. I licked his shoulder then jerk back when he moaned.
When I was sure from his breathing that he was still sleeping, I let my nightgown fall to the floor. It was cool in the cabin and my nipples were hard as cherry pits, but down there, I was moist and warm. After a while, my breath came quicker. I did not think he would hear me, but I no longer cared.
You were right, Momma. You said he would come.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I woke from an uncomfortable position on the small cot, startled by the angry pain in my ribs. I discovered a spring in the thin mattress pad I had not noticed the night before. Behind the frayed edges of the window blind, dawn emerged silent and colorless. The wool blanket I had forgotten in the truck was now covering me. Someone had evidently visited me during the night.
I was brushing my teeth when I was surprised by a knock at the cabin’s front door. “Rise and shine, sleepyhead. Ready for a cup of coffee?”
“You bet,” I mumbled through a mouthful of toothpaste. I struggled to climb into jeans and a flannel shirt and cursed my lack of a robe. Dressing in haste proved difficult, however, and donning footwear was next to impossible “Hang on.”
Some few minutes later, still barefoot and with my shirt buttoned just enough to cover the bandages, I opened the door to find Valerie standing outside holding a mug of coffee in one hand and Patsy’s harness with the other.
“Jeez Louise,” she said. “I’ve known dead people who move faster.”
I wiped beads of sweat from my forehead. “Sorry.”
“I might have spilled a little.” She handed me a half-filled mug. Like the previous days, she wore a long-sleeved top under denim overalls. Today, however, she had added a pair of gold hoop earrings. Her pale face displayed a blemish that reddened her chin, yet failed to detract from her delicate features.
“We missed you at dinner last night. You’re probably starving.”
“Ravenous.” I knelt stiffly to pet the dog and had my face cleaned in return.
“How about giving me your dirty clothes, and I’ll wash them for you.”
I stared at her. “Really? You’d do that for me?”
“Hand them over,” she demanded. “You’re meeting with Daddy and Stu in fifteen minutes. Don’t be a minute late. I’ll have breakfast ready when you’re done.”
“I’ll see you then.”
“Not if I see you first.”
It was a stale joke when I had first heard it in grade school, but, coming from a blind woman, it stopped me cold.
“C’mon, Patsy,” Valerie said. “We’ve got eggs to fry.”
I watched her walk back up the hill, carefully skirting the pond, able to traverse the uneven terrain without a cane. It now appeared more than likely that it had been she, rather than Vonda, who had been my nighttime visitor.
***
“If that was a horse, we’d probably shoot him and bury him right there,” Virgil said.
The three of us were standing, hands in pockets, by the John Deere. Virgil wore a red nylon vest over a blue plaid flannel shirt and a pair of dark green chinos stuffed into a pair of black, unbuckled galoshes.
“Nothing sadder looking than a tractor mired in the mud.” He sipped coffee from a ceramic commuter mug with a Cadillac logo emblazoned on it.
Stu wore jeans and a plaid flannel shirt under a jacket. I had on my spare jeans and shirt, but my parka and boots were still damp from the previous day even though I had carefully hung them on the chair in front of the tiny heater in the cabin.
The rain had stopped and the kind of dazzling, virgin sky that Southern Californians experience only by getting on an airliner and climbing to thirty thousand feet emerged from among towering cumulus clouds. Above the green hills, sharp-toothed mountains had been freshly dusted with snow. The air was invigorating. My stomach let out a groan.
After unhooking the mower blades, Stu had driven the orange Payloader, nicknamed the Bull, down from the barn. I held one end of a logging chain with the other end wrapped around the John Deere’s front axle, while Stu backed the Bull up. I put up a hand to indicate when he should stop, but Stu did not quit backing until the rear of the stubby vehicle rested against my legs.
“Say when,” he joked.
I looped the chain over the Bull’s trailer hitch and climbed onto the Deere.
“Put it in third gear,” Virgil ordered. “When you fe
el the Bull begin to tug, let out the clutch real slow. Make him pull you out. Don’t try to force it.”
I did exactly as I was directed, and within seconds the tractor was free.
“That wasn’t so bad,” Virgil said. He laid an arm over my shoulders. “Let me offer you a bit of advice, son, lest we have to repeat this sorry business with even worse consequences. Next time it starts to rain hard, you park whatever you are riding on. If the equipment don’t need maintaining, or the barn need sweeping, you can clear underbrush around the tree line or weed up around the house. When you get a chance, the parking area could use some fresh gravel. There’s a pile of it out behind the barn.” He nodded in that direction. “When we finally get dried out, it will be time to see to the fence. Stu can show you where we keep the lumber and the paint.
“Later today, the two of you take a shovel and rake and see what you can do to get this sorry-looking patch of earth back into shape. Come mid-April, I do not want there to be any trace that this area was ever torn up. Am I clear?”
Embarrassed by the damage I had caused, I nodded. The damp jacket and frigid air made me shiver.
“Stu, you can pick up a few squares of turf at Skagit Farmers’ Supply for the really bad spots. You will need to stake it for a couple of weeks until it gets a good toehold. Now, let’s go have some breakfast. This fresh air has given me an appetite.”
As Virgil walked back to the house, I climbed down from the tractor to unhitch the Bull. Stu met me by the trailer hitch.
“Doesn’t sound like I’ll be running out of work anytime soon…” I began. I saw the punch coming and managed to turn my head just enough to take it on the ear instead of the eye. It still managed to stagger me and stung like a bitch.
“Listen up,” Stu said. “I can promise that you will never, for one little second, run out of work as long as I’m around. From now on, you better watch what you are doing because I am not taking any more heat for your screw-ups. Give me half a reason and I will fire your ass. Are we clear?”
Still holding one hand to my ear, I nodded.
Following breakfast, I finished mowing in less than an hour with the liberated John Deere. As I drove, I watched Stu working around the three ponds where he appeared to be taking water samples. Then he tossed scoops of feed from sacks he had loaded onto the back of the Bull. The water churned where the meal landed.
My ear still throbbed where Stu had sucker punched me. But the greater injury was to my pride. New job, new rules, I told myself. If I was going to get along successfully with Stu, I needed to keep my ego under wraps and do my homework. Otherwise, I would be a constant target for abuse. But as I watched Stu feeding the trout, a seed of resentment took root—leftover from Heide’s betrayal. Every time I thought of Heide’s fateful miscalculation, I felt like smashing something. I had a hard time accepting that she had planned the heist over glasses of pinot noir with Jeff, that greedy peacock in a Panama hat.
“Fuck!” I shouted at the sky. There better not be any more punches thrown. My punch card for being victimized was now filled.
When I finished mowing, I returned to the barn to hose off the tractor and hammerknifer. Stu showed up as I was giving the blades a spin to dry them. I turned the key off and climbed down from the tractor. Stu sat on the little riding mower’s seat and watched silently as I used an old towel to wipe the tractor dry.
“Looks real nice,” he observed. “You planning on taking your date to a drive-in movie? Oh, sorry. You don’t have a date.” He smiled.
I did not say anything.
“Let’s take your truck to go get that turf and get it set in place this morning. If we hurry, you should still have time to do some mowing with the Bull before lunch or before it decides to rain again.”
Stu gave directions as I drove the battered Toyota pickup down the hill toward civilization. “Where did you find this piece of crap?”
“It was a good deal.”
“I bet,” Stu said. He opened the glove compartment and sorted through the handful of papers. “Looks like you forgot to change the title or update your insurance.” He studied the registration card. “I imagine Luis Ramirez probably doesn’t care one way or the other.” He put the card back in the glove box. “Just don’t be calling me if you get pulled over by a cop.”
How long it would take the cartel to find me, I wondered, if they found the previous owner and managed to trace the Toyota’s license. A shiver raced down my spine as I gripped the steering wheel so hard that my knuckles turned white.
Two hours later, the sod was laid in place, encircled by several stakes to which bright yellow nylon rope had been attached. The sun had managed to warm the air by at least ten degrees and the ground was now dry except where it remained in deep shadows from the trees. With the grass already cut to a reasonable length by the hammerknifer, mowing with the Bull turned out to be a relatively swift and simple process. The three gangs of blades cut a wider swath than the other mower and the Bull was faster. A governor prevented the speed from going much over twenty miles an hour, but you could cover a lot of ground at even half that speed, the grass clippings flying up behind like three rooster tails.
The only drawback as I discovered was the lack of a seat belt for the bench seat. It did not take long to find out why the orange machine was called the Bull. Riding it was like riding one of the Brahma bulls in a rodeo. I was mowing at close to full speed when I hit an unseen drainage ditch and was flung from the seat. If I had not been holding onto the steering wheel with both hands, I might have been run over by the spinning blades. As it was, I managed to strike my ribs painfully on the steering wheel. Fortunately, there was no one to see as I stopped the machine, wrapped my arms around my side, and shut my eyes against the pain.
With the Bull’s motor turned off, I heard the faint strains of music. Deeper and more mellow than a violin, it swooped and soared over the greensward of the farm like a barn swallow. For several minutes, I forgot about my ribs and everything else as I listened, captivated by the sound coming from the Van de Zilver residence. It sounded like a Placido Domingo album I had sometimes played on Sunday mornings while Heide and I read the newspaper, but without the words. Initially, I assumed it was a recording, but then I heard a bow drawn sharply over the strings as if in frustration and the music abruptly ended.
Shortly after noon, Valerie descended the hill, following a grinning Patsy and carrying a brown paper bag. I stopped the Bull and climbed down to meet her halfway. Lunch was a sandwich with bacon, peanut butter, sweet pickle, and mayonnaise.
“How do you like it?” she asked after I had taken a few bites. She was dressed in her customary overalls and long-sleeved top. Unlike Heide, her hair was long, brown, and naturally curly. Beneath her unflattering, baggy clothes, she was tiny and small-breasted with narrow hips. She was not just petite-sized—even the timbre of her voice was childlike.
“Mmmm,” I mumbled between sticky chews. “Very strange. But wonderful.”
She grinned. “On the radio, they said it was Elvis’ favorite.”
“I enjoyed your playing.”
She blushed. “Really? You’re not just saying that?”
“I thought it was a recording.”
“You’re lying.”
“I never lie,” I lied.
“Did you know Mozart played the viola?” she asked, then frowned. “Of course, you didn’t. That was stupid of me.”
Her face, which had brightened for a moment, darkened again as if one of the clouds that fleeced the sky had passed between it and the sun. “How are you getting along with Stu?”
I sighed.
She stuck the tip of her tongue out. “In case you haven’t noticed yet, he’s the world’s greatest asshole.”
“I’m not going to argue.”
She cocked her head as if to hear better. “I bet that’s the worst thing you ever said about anybody. You are nice, Gray. Too nice. Don’t let him push you around.”
“Don’t worry.”
/> Valerie studied me with that curious manner she had as if hearing much more than what I was saying.
“What are you thinking?” she asked. “Tell me.”
As I stared into her half-hidden yet amazing violet eyes, I found myself wanting to confide in her—tell her that Stu was the least of my problems. That being hunted by killers put a whole new perspective on life and its daily ups and downs. But there was no way to mention my troubles without confessing that she could be in mortal danger if the cartel discovered my location. And that could easily result in her saying something to her father, which would mean the end of my stay.
“Nothing,” I said. “Thanks for the sandwich. And the concert.”
Valerie smiled, her unseeing eyes now closed.
“After a while, crocodile,” she said. Then she set off toward the house with Patsy leading her.
After mowing, I parked the Bull in the barn. I was dead tired and sore, but found my spirits renewed. A day that begun so badly had been redeemed by Valerie and her music.
I felt extremely fortunate to have found the trout farm. When I was in dire need of a job and a place to stay, the Van de Zilvers had taken me in and, except for Stu, treated me well. With no friends or family that I could now communicate without putting them in danger and myself at risk, I was deeply grateful. I determined that I would do whatever necessary to assure Virgil and Stu, if possible, that I could handle the job even if it meant researching subjects like farm maintenance and trout rearing.
After living in crowded Orange County, there was something healing in the basic, nearly primitive life at the farm that appealed to me. I liked the smell of evergreens, cut grass, and clean mountain air. I liked seeing my breath in the morning. The rugged beauty of the trout farm was night-and-day different from the postage-stamp-sized, manicured lawns and gardens of Southern California.
As I approached the large pond that fronted my cabin, motion in the dark water near the island caught my attention. Whatever it was, it had not broken the surface. It seemed far too large for a trout, and I wondered for the second time if a muskrat or beaver had made the pond its home.