August

by Callan Wink

  August wiped the sweat beading on his forehead with the back of his sleeve and settled his cap down. “Most likely, buried under rocks way up there, nothing would mess with it.”

  “I suppose not. That thermos with my old man’s ashes will definitely outlast me and my time. If I ever had kids, probably theirs, too.”

  “Those Stanleys are bombproof. What’s that thing they were always saying in science class—matter can’t be created or destroyed, just changed. Right?”

  “That seems familiar. Apply that to a person and you might be tempted to call it immortality.”

  “Or eternal imprisonment,” August said.

  Ancient drained his beer and crunched the can against the pommel. “All of that depends on what side of the bed you woke up on in the morning, I guess.”

  “Probably true.”

  They didn’t say anything for a moment, and in this period of quiet Chief released a burst of wet flatulence. Ancient laughed and shook his head. “That’s what ol’ Chief thinks about our philosophizing. You done with that? Hand me the can. Okay. Well, I’ve got to get on. I’m headed up to that rise to sit for a spell with my back to the juniper tree, ponder eternity, and survey my holdings. Keep up the good work.”

  * * *

  —

  Later that night August made tacos. He stirred a packet of store-bought taco seasoning into a pan of ground beef and waited for it to brown. He chopped a small white onion and put a stack of soft corn tortillas in the microwave. It was a mild evening, and he had the bunkhouse window open, hoping to hear the yodeling of the coyote pack that seemed to hunt frequently in the low hills behind the house. When the meat was ready he spooned it onto the tortillas and sprinkled on the raw onion, eating standing over the stove so that whatever fell from the tortilla landed back in the pan. He’d forgotten to buy salsa or cheese, and the tacos were dry and bland. He ate because he was hungry, but when he was full he considered the ground beef left in the pan and tried to imagine it reincarnated as leftovers. He ended up scraping the whole mess into the trash. When he was at the sink washing his dishes in front of the open window, he heard a voice, indistinct and soft, coming from the corral.

  He opened the bunkhouse door slowly, wiping his hands dry on his jeans, stepping barefoot out onto the small patio. Standing at the corner of the bunkhouse he could see around to the far edge of the corral. Ancient was there, sitting on the top fence rail, facing away from August. He wore a white undershirt and jeans. He sat with slumped shoulders, his back curved in an unnatural arc, the knobby ridge of his spine protruding. A sickle moon cast the yard in dim light, everything matte, monochromatic, except for the bottle of vodka—on a post next to Ancient’s right hand—which glowed as if lit from within. Chief was standing close and Ancient was reaching to stroke his muzzle.

  Ancient was talking, but August couldn’t make out the words. The horse was making a strange grumbling whinny and nodding its head, reaching for the apple half Ancient had in his outstretched palm. There was the sound of appreciative horsey chewing, then Chief blowing and shaking out his mane. Ancient tipped the bottle so that, from where August stood, it appeared that the moon had become imprisoned within the glass itself and Ancient’s drinking was nothing more than an attempt to reach it—as if, when he finally gulped the moon to his lips, he was going to take it in his mouth and spit it back to its rightful place in the sky.

  August was done for the day. He was drinking a beer on the porch when his father called.

  “You finally thawing a bit out there?” his father said.

  “Yeah, it’s been nice.”

  “You got a cold? Your nose sounds stuffed up or something.”

  “Allergies, I think. The cottonwoods by the river are putting out a lot of pollen.”

  “You taking an antihistamine?”

  “I haven’t been.”

  “Well, you probably should. You can get the twenty-four-hour stuff over the counter now. Generic so it’s not too expensive.”

  “I’ll check it out.”

  “We didn’t get the rain we normally get in April. I’m a little worried about what that’s going to mean come summer. But then again I’ve seen it warm and dry in April and then rain every day in May and June; you never really know.”

  “Yeah, you can never tell.”

  “I put a new coat of paint on the barn and milking parlor. Haven’t done that since probably before you were born.”

  “What color?”

  “Barn is red. Milking parlor is white.”

  “So, exactly the same as before?”

  “Same as before. Just freshened it up a little. It was Lisa’s idea. Nice bright white trim on the barn. I didn’t think it looked too bad, but now that it’s done I guess I can see her point. She says that if your work environment is attractive to the eye then you go about your day a little jauntier. That may or may not be true. But take it from me, if your girlfriend is happy you’re bound to be a little jauntier yourself.”

  “I talked to Mom the other day. She says her boyfriend proposed. They’re going to get married. Did she tell you?”

  There was a pause. A low whistle. A soft laugh. “No, I guess my invite got lost in the mail.”

  “She said they’re not going to go have a church ceremony or anything. Just go to the courthouse and then have a little party after. She wants me to come down for dinner to get to know her boyfriend.”

  “Well, of course.”

  “Pretty soon we’re going to be smack in the middle of haying. Ancient isn’t going to be impressed with me asking for time off.”

  “I’m sure you could get away for an evening.”

  “You know how haying is, though. Sometimes you have to just work until it’s done or else you’ll be stuck with it laying down when it rains.”

  “Oh, you don’t have to tell me. Once when I was about your age I was helping my dad put up hay in a section we were leasing over in Mecosta. We had the whole field cut and we were just starting to bale. We had this old John Deere round baler, and the hydraulic pump that runs the little arm that feeds out the twine was on the fritz. We messed around with it and my dad finally got so pissed that we called it a day and were going to come back in the morning and get it straightened out. We’d put up about two bales out of a forty-some-bale field. That night it started to rain and it didn’t stop for nearly three weeks and everything just rotted where it lay. I think Dad was bitter about that until his death. We could have just kept filling the pump with fluid and limped it along. An expensive way to learn a lesson for sure. I hadn’t realized your mom and that guy were getting all that serious. Seems kind of sudden if you ask me.”

  “It’s been over a year.”

  “That long? Is he a good guy? What’s your impression of him?”

  “I hardly know him. She met him at the library.”

  “He works there?”

  “No, I think he works over at the university. He was just coming into the library a lot or something.”

  “I see. Well, I looked at your extended forecast out there and they’re calling for a slightly cooler than average summer with average to slightly above average precipitation.”

  “Yeah?”

  “That’s what it said. So as long as you guys get your hay up it should be pleasant and not too hot. But you never know. I’ve seen those long-range forecasts be so wrong it’s not even funny. I didn’t even realize that they were living together.”

  “They’re not. I don’t think. At least not full time, anyway. He’s got a place over in Bozeman.”

  “So is she going to sell hers and move in with him?”

  “I really have no idea.”

  “Probably she’ll just keep hers and rent it out. Or, depending on what his place is like, he’ll move in with her and then they’ll rent out his. That’s what I’d do. Having some rental incom
e is a great way to go. Okay, well, nice talking to you, son. Keep your nose clean.”

  “Night, Dad.”

  It was around noon, and August took the four-wheeler back to the house for lunch. He was standing in front of his sink eating a ham and cheese sandwich and drinking a Coke when he saw the truck come barreling up the drive, veer around the corral, and keep going, cross-country, through the pasture behind the house.

  It was an older Chevy flatbed with a green HANGING R logo on the side. August walked out the door and around the shop, and from there, he could see the truck had come to a stop at the fence line near the top of the hill. A man was out, doing something at the back. The man got back into his truck, pointed it back down the hill, and accelerated. The truck paused for a second and then came down the grade, something silver flashing in its wake. It took August a moment, but he realized that the truck had been hooked up to one of his new corner posts. The driver was roaring down the hill towing thirty yards of fence. T-posts were flopping and falling; the big pressure-treated corner post was bouncing over rocks, the wire strands singing wickedly, screeching and popping. The truck was coming fast toward the yard, and August, still holding his sandwich, ducked back into the shop. From the window, he watched as the truck came to a gravel-crunching stop in the driveway. The man hopped out, his beard a thick gray-black. Short and stocky in a baseball cap, jeans, and grimy white tennis shoes, he moved unhurriedly to the back of his truck and unhooked a tow chain from the corner post. He threw the chain into the bed of his truck, wiped his hands on his jeans, and swung back into the cab. He drove away and August watched the ragged cloud of dust follow his path all the way out the road. He called Ancient from the phone in the bunkhouse. He got voicemail once. He tried again and this time left a message.

  “It’s August,” he said. “Not sure if you’re still in Billings, or on your way back, or what. I’m at the house. I think Tim Duncan, Big Tim, just came and pulled out all the fence I built going up the hill behind the shop. Hooked it up to his truck and dragged it. Not sure what you want me to do. I’ll hang around for a while to see if you call back. Okay, bye.”

  * * *

  —

  It was well past dark when August heard Ancient’s pickup come up the drive and then keep going past the house. August stepped out to watch Ancient’s taillights bouncing up the rough track to the upper pasture. When the truck stopped and the door opened, August could see Ancient’s form crossing the headlights. He stood there, illuminated, his hands on his hips, inspecting the line of downed fence. There were coyotes singing in the draw by the creek. Ancient put his head back and let out a howl, and the coyotes went quiet. He howled again, and then a solitary coyote called back, and then another. Ancient kept it up until it sounded like the whole pack was letting loose in a frenzy of yips and yodels. August returned to his bunk, but he could hear the coyotes going for quite some time. There’d been occasions where he’d tried to join the coyotes like Ancient had, but August could never make the right sound, and so he’d always stop, feeling ridiculous.

  August had the coffee maker set on a timer, and he came awake slowly to the pissy trickling sound of the pot filling. He slipped on the same jeans he’d worn the day before, three days past due for washing, and poured himself a cup. He took a leak outside, his feet bare, the grass dew-wet, daylight just gaining strength. Back inside he put two pieces of bread down in the toaster and switched on the small radio he kept on the counter. KPIG out of Billings came in, only slightly scratchy. They did the weather; this early in the day it was a mechanized voice reading the report. More sun, no clouds forecasted. No surprise. The first song after the weather was John Mellencamp’s “Jack and Diane,” and August slathered peanut butter on his toast—wishing for jam—and ate it dry and sticky standing at the sink. He’d pinned the Polaroid from the Musselshell up on the wall there and Mellencamp was singing about two American kids growing up in the heartland, and August was looking right at them. Jack and Diane. Two ’merican kids doin’ the best they can. He poured the rest of the coffee from the pot into his travel mug, switched off the radio, slipped on his boots, and went out to gas up the four-wheeler. He had a whole line of dragged fence to rebuild.

  Another afternoon under the sun. Rebuilding something that had been torn down was never as satisfying as making new. The first fence had been truer, but in the end he was satisfied. When he came back down the hill in the evening, Kim’s Subaru was parked in the drive. Ancient’s truck was gone, but lights were on in the house. August put the four-wheeler away in the shop. He was walking across the yard to the bunkhouse when Kim stepped out onto the porch and waved him over. She was wearing overalls and yellow rubber cleaning gloves, and had a red paisley handkerchief tied around her head. “Hey, August,” she said, smiling and taking off a glove to shake his hand. “How are things?”

  “Good,” August said. “Things are fine. Just finishing up for the day.”

  “Great. Well, I’m here for the night. I had to come up and get a few things, and I decided I’d give the house a nice deep clean. Leave Ancient by himself for just a little while and it looks like a bomb erupted. He had to go up to Helena to a breeder to take a look at a bull he might lease. He’s going to be back sometime tomorrow. He told me to tell you that.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Hey, would you mind giving me a hand here for a minute? I was hoping to get this elliptical machine on top of my Subaru. It will be a little cumbersome but shouldn’t be too heavy. Maybe you can help me get it secured?”

  August followed her into the house, and together they carried the machine, rearranging themselves a couple of different ways to get it out the door and hoisted onto the low roof of the Subaru. She had ratchet straps, and August went to work getting the bulky thing secured. When he was done he gave it a hard shove, and it didn’t budge. “I guess that will do it,” he said. “I’d probably keep it under a hundred on the highway, though.”

  “I’ll definitely do that. Thanks for your help. I’m going to make some dinner soon. You probably want to get washed up, but after that, come on up to the house and eat with me.”

  “Oh, that’s okay,” August said. “You don’t have to go to any trouble for me. I’ve got stuff I can eat in the bunkhouse.”

  “It’s no trouble. I’m cooking anyway. We both need to eat; no sense in doing it separately when we can share. It’ll be ready in about an hour.”

  * * *

  —

  Dinner was overcooked boneless, skinless chicken breasts. Undercooked baked potatoes. Canned green beans.

  “Thanks for doing this, Kim,” August said. “The chicken is great.”

  “Happy to do it. I marinate the chicken in Wish-Bone Italian dressing. That’s the secret. Gives it a really nice flavor, I think.”

  “Never would’ve thought of that.” They were sitting across from each other at the large dining room table. The house was silent around them, empty, with shadows gathering. She’d turned the chandelier lights lower. “Mood lighting,” she’d said with a laugh. She opened a bottle of wine and the room was dim. He’d have preferred it to be brighter.

  “So,” she said. “How are you liking it up here? I haven’t seen you in a while.”

  “I like it. It’s beautiful country.”

  “I can’t argue with that. The country is impeccable. Have you been meeting any of the locals?”

  He chewed his chicken. Kept chewing. Chased the swallow with water. “A few,” he said. “People are pretty nice around here, mostly. I think they kind of keep to themselves. Everyone’s got a lot of work to do.”

  “I suppose. It’s funny; for how empty and vast it is up here, it can really feel pretty damn crowded sometimes. I’ve actually been surprised by how much I’ve come to enjoy Billings. I’m not going to get into things with me and Ancient. I’m sure you really don’t care about it anyway. But living up here, I’d have to drive
a hundred miles to go to a damn yoga class, or get a decent piece of pizza, or see a show. Everything is so far.”

  “There’s good things about that, though. No traffic. You don’t have to lock your doors.”

  “Sure. I appreciate those things. When I moved here I was looking for some out-of-the-way place where I could just live my life. And then I met Ancient, and he is different from some of the people around here, in a good way. But he’s also one of them, too. Do you admire him? Just a question. I’m curious what you think of him.”

  “Ancient is fine. I like him fine. He’s good with cattle. Good at what he does.” August was trying to eat more quickly. He wanted this, whatever this was, to wrap up. He longed for the simple, empty confines of the bunkhouse.

  “Sure, but what do you think of him as a person? Is he someone you might ever model yourself after?”

  August said nothing. He gave a small shrug and focused his attention on his potato.

  “I’m sorry. I guess that’s not really a fair question. He’s your boss. It is what it is.” Kim had refilled her wineglass several times. Her chicken was still mostly intact. “Let’s change the subject,” she said brightly. “So, tell me, have you ever been in love?”

  August’s every inclination was telling him to shrug and be noncommittal. To dodge and mumble his way out of this meal, out of this dining room, and out from under this awkward woman’s inquisition. He’d worked all day and he was tired. Instead, he found himself putting his knife and fork down on the plate loudly. “I have,” he said. “Have you?” He looked at her directly for the first time. Something on his face seemed to make her smile falter. She sipped her wine.