by Ron Rash
“No,” Carson said. “Most things just get harder.”
The last thing was calcium and antibiotic shots, but Carson doubted his hand capable of holding the needle steady. It could wait a few minutes. The men sat on the barn floor, weary arms crossed on raised knees as they waited for the calf to gain its legs. Carson leaned his head on his forearms and closed his eyes. He listened as the calf’s hooves scattered straw, the body lifting and falling back until it figured out the physics. Once it did, Carson raised his head and watched the calf’s knees wobble but hold. The cow was soon up too. The calf nuzzled and found a teat, began to suckle.
“There’s a wonder to it yet,” Darnell said, and Carson didn’t disagree.
They watched a few more moments, not speaking. The lantern’s wick burned low now. Carson resettled his hands, let his fingertips shift straw and touch the firmer earth as he leaned back. Only when the flame was a sinking flicker inside the glass did Darnell raise himself to one knee.
“Now let’s see if we can get up too,” he said.
Darnell grunted and stood, knees popping as he did so. He reached a hand under Carson’s upper arm and helped him up, Carson’s hinges grinding as well. Darnell lifted the lantern, turned the brass screw until light filled the globe again. He set the lantern down and walked over to the barn mouth, only his silhouette visible until a match rasped and illuminated his face a moment.
“So you’re smoking again,” Carson said.
“Nobody around to argue against it,” Darnell answered. “Funny how you miss even the nagging.”
“That’s true,” Carson said, and stepped over to the barn mouth and leaned against the opposite beam.
The stars sprawled yet overhead, though now Venus had tucked itself in among them. Though no more than a dozen feet apart, the men were mere shadows to each other. Carson watched the orange cigarette tip rise and hold a moment, then descend. A shifting came from the barn’s depths, then a lapping sound as the cow’s tongue washed the calf.
“Doris was a fine woman,” Darnell said.
“Yes,” Carson said, “she was.”
“Four months now, ain’t it?”
“Almost.”
“It does ease up some, eventually,” Darnell said.
He stubbed out his cigarette. Something between a sigh and a snicker crossed the dark between them.
“What’s tickling your funny bone?” Carson asked.
“Just curious if the widows are showing up with their casseroles yet.”
“No,” Carson said. “I mean none since the funeral.”
“Well, it won’t be long and once it commences you’ll think you’re in the Pillsbury Bake-Off.”
“I’m not looking for another wife,” Carson said.
“I wasn’t either but they came after me anyway. We’re a rare commodity, partner. The one time I went down to that senior center, it was me and Ansel Turner and thirty blue-haired women. One of them decided we should have a dance. Soon as the music came on I got out of there and ain’t been back, but poor old Ansel was in his wheelchair so couldn’t get away. He was remarried in six months. They finally gave up on me but you’re fresh game.”
Darnell paused.
“I ain’t making light of your loss.”
“I know that,” Carson said. “I’ve had plenty enough grieving words and hangdog faces. The sad part I don’t need any help with.”
He was rested enough now to give the shots, but waited. Except for speaking to his son and daughter on the phone, Carson hadn’t much wanted to talk with people of late. But tonight, here in the dark with Darnell, there was a pleasure in it.
“The stars don’t show out in town like they do here,” Carson said.
“I’m not down there often of a night to know,” Darnell answered, “but it’s nice to look up and see something that never changes. When I was in Korea, I’d find the Big Dipper and the Huntress and the Archer. They hung in the sky different but I could make them out, same as if I was in North Carolina. There was a comfort in doing that, especially when the fighting got thick.”
“I did that a couple of times too,” Carson said.
Darnell lit another cigarette and stepped outside of the barn, listening until he was satisfied.
“They ain’t yapping about it,” Darnell said, “but they could still be out there.”
Carson half stifled a yawn.
“I can put us on a pot of coffee.”
“No,” Carson answered. “I’ll be on my way as soon as I give the shots.”
“Back in Korea, we’d not have figured it to turn out this way, would we?” Darnell said. “I mean, we’ve gotten a lot more than we ever thought.”
“Yes,” Carson replied. “We have.”
Carson went back inside, gave the shots, and packed up. Darnell lifted the lantern in one hand and the medicine bag in the other, led them back down to the pickup. Darnell opened his billfold and offered five ten-dollar bills that, as always, Carson refused. They shook hands and he got in the truck. As Carson bumped down the drive, he looked back and saw the lantern’s glow moving toward the barn. Darnell would hang the lantern back on its nail, maybe smoke another cigarette as he stood at the barn mouth, attentive as any good sentry.
Acknowledgments
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the publications in which the following stories first appeared: “The Trusty” in The New Yorker; “Something Rich and Strange” in Shade 2004; “Cherokee” in Ecotone; “Twenty-Six Days” in the Washington Post; “A Sort of Miracle” in Ecotone; “Those Who Are Dead Are Only Now Forgiven” in The Warwick Review (England); “The Dowry” and “The Woman at the Pond” in The Southern Review; “Night Hawks” in Grist; and “Three A.M. and the Stars Were Out” in Our State magazine.
About the Author
RON RASH is the author of The Cove and of the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award finalist and New York Times bestselling novel Serena, in addition to three other prizewinning novels, One Foot in Eden, Saints at the River, and The World Made Straight; three collections of poems; and four collections of stories, among them Burning Bright, which won the 2010 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, and Chemistry and Other Stories, which was a finalist for the 2007 PEN/Faulkner Award. Twice the recipient of the O. Henry Prize, Rash teaches at Western Carolina University.
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Also by Ron Rash
FICTION
The Cove
Burning Bright
Serena
The World Made Straight
Saints at the River
One Foot in Eden
Chemistry and Other Stories
Casualties
The Night the New Jesus Fell to Earth
POETRY
Waking
Raising the Dead
Among the Believers
Eureka Mill
Credits
Cover design by Steve Attardo
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
NOTHING GOLD CAN STAY. Copyright © 2013 by Ron Rash. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-220271-0
Epub Edition © MARCH 2013 ISBN: 9780062202734
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