As if to answer his own fear, he reached into his pocket and felt the soft length of the good luck charm. He immediately calmed enough to rub his eyes and really wake up.
The sun was resting on the Eastern oaks, which meant it was 7:00 A.M. or so. The sky was autumn blue and cloudless – later the sun would climb and warm the dew back into the air, and it would probably be in the 60s in the afternoon.
He wondered if this would be the day.
He wouldn’t have long to find out.
He had chosen to sleep in a low hollow, one of the shallow valleys just outside the town limits, and that had been a foolish thing. He had done many foolish things lately, which vaguely bothered him. Some of the memories crowded into his head, and he pushed them out, physically driving them back with his hands, making agitated sounds with his mouth.
He closed his eyes and the memories were gone.
Frankenstein, the kids in Orangefield called him, because he was big and wore shabby clothes and had rough hands and could no longer talk.
Not since–
Again he became agitated, and looked to the sun for help. It was above the trees now, free of them, climbing. In another hour or two it would show him what he lived to see.
The only thing he lived for.
That and the other thing…
The worst memory of all came into his head and now he cried out, making the same sounds Frankenstein made in that movie he saw before the Army. He could speak, then, and walk without a bad hitch in his right leg. Sometimes he almost had clear memories of the way he had been before the Army, when he drove a ’64 Mustang convertible which he’d restored himself, and smoked cigarettes and drank beer and was on the bowling team at Ace’s and there was the girl Peggy…
His loud sounds turned to mewling and he sat down facing the sun. He found his Army blanket at his feet and pulled it up around him.
He had been another man before the Army. The training he remembered, Fort Bragg, shipping out, Somalia, but all of it was speeded up like a fast-motion film with a cartoon whirring sound which got higher and higher pitched until it stopped dead on the moment his foot was resting on the antipersonnel mine and froze there, his eyes looking down and his brain screaming What the hell? even as his weight lifted off the mine and it went off, and his leg, his thigh, his hip was blown to bits.
He knew that wasn’t quite right, that there was more, but that he couldn’t quite remember…
He had a feeling if he did it would make things even worse.
Felt like someone tearing the meat up off my bones was the last rational thought he had before a piece of his own ankle bone ripped into his mouth and then up through his palate, severing his tongue on the way, stopping in his brain.
“Kid made his own bullet,” one of the field doctors said later, laughing in that sardonic, funeral parlor way MASH doctors had, and even now part of him wanted to laugh the same way when he remembered that.
Then he came home and after a while was Frankenstein.
No more Peggy, no siree, not with three quarters of a brain and no tongue and a hitch in his walk bigger than Festis on TV…
He watched the sun climb ever higher – he’d know when it was time – but already he felt it warming the wet off him, inside his blanket.
No more Aaron Peters, he’d had a tongue and a good leg and a girlfriend and a car and liked to read history books. A pretty good pitching arm, too, and not a bad quarterback for a lefty.
He became, instead, Frankenstein.
And the Pumpkin Tender.
Peggy married a guy named Turk, who laid a hand on her now and then, he heard someone say. The same someone said it was a shame, that Aaron would have made a wonderful husband.
Maybe it was his mother who said that, he wasn’t sure…
No more bowling, his kid brother took the Mustang and wrapped it around a pole six months later, walking away from the wreck but in a way The Pumpkin Tender was glad the car was gone. One thing less to think about when he looked at it, memories firing off like pistons in his broken head.
He knew they were uncomfortable when he was home so he’d started staying away as much as he could, and took care of their guilt at least in the summer and fall when old Joshua Froelich hired him to weed and tend his pumpkin patch.
“Better’n a dog,” Froelich had said, since Aaron tended Froelich’s land like a hawk on legs, killing anything – weed, insect or animal – that went after the pumpkins. Soon word about this wonder had spread, and The Pumpkin Tender found himself taking care of most of the pumpkins in Orangefield. In the winter he stayed mostly at home, making them all nervous and irritable, becoming Frankenstein, but in the spring, after the last snow, he began to wander the still-fallow fields which surrounded the town like a wreath, pulling up rocks which had been forced up through the frozen ground, cleaning out dead vines and late weeds he had missed the previous autumn, making his fields ready for planting. By the time planting came in summer he lived in the fields, tending each shoot like a baby and nurturing each budded fruit as if it was the only one in the world. The pumpkins he tended were the best grown, the cleanest, the fattest, brightest-colored, longest-lasting-after-picking, finest in all of the Northeast. Froelich, and the other growers, had customers drive two hundred miles just to buy one of those pumpkins.
The Pumpkin Tender had become indispensable.
And, perhaps, today would be the one day in the year he would be truly happy.
He thought it might be. The way the sun was rising, the cleanness of the atmosphere, the warm/cold snap in the air, gave him hope. It would have to be today, because he felt rain behind this weather, which meant that if tomorrow was the day he would lose it.
He stood up.
No, today was the day. He was sure.
He left the Army blanket in a heap and began the long, limping trek to the High Spot. He didn’t think about this. Like an animal drawn to a spawning ground, he took step after step toward his goal.
His leg began to ache after a half hour, but he ignored it. He passed Froelich’s farm stand, passing behind the building so he wouldn’t have to interact with the old man – but Froelich was in the back, unloading potato sacks from the back of his pickup truck.
“This the day, Aaron?” the old man said, stopping his work. He was overweight and already perspiring.
Aaron nodded curtly and limped on.
There was an understanding tone in Froelich’s voice. “Maybe I’ll join you up there later, after you’ve been alone with it awhile.”
The Pumpkin Tender made a sound in the back of his throat, and kept walking. Froelich had never joined him, and was just being polite.
The sun was higher now, and the sky was an achingly clear blue. The chill had dissipated. It would be even warmer than he thought – maybe up into the low 50s. Nothing like it had been in early October, but still nice for this time of year.
He brought his felt hat off his head with his left hand, mopped his sweaty face with it and pushed it back onto his head.
The ground was now steadily ascending.
Already if he turned around he would be above the valleys which surrounded Orangefield. Beyond those valleys were either softly rolling hills or a few higher spots, only one of which could be considered a mountain. It wasn’t tall enough to be named, but was high enough to afford a view of the entire area.
Halfway up the mountain, and by his reading of the sun just before noon, he stopped. His leg from the hip to his rebuilt ankle was on fire. He sat down in a hollow under a tree; the spot was filled with red and gold leaves and he was able to nest down into it and stretch his leg out.
He was thirsty and hungry, and had neither food nor water. There was a stream a little way on but he had been warned not to drink from it – the one time he had done so his stomach had been turned inside-out for three days.
The red and gold leaves reminded him of fire, as if his leg was burning in them.
Abruptly the leaves began to remind him of fi
re itself, of burning up his leg and the ripping sound of his own flesh being torn away, and he reached down and brushed all the leaves away from his legs.
He was facing away from the sun.
His leg began to feel better, a lessening of the fire, and he lay back and became comfortable in the warmth and the lessening of pain.
He closed his eyes, and soon fell asleep.
He dreamed, and for once the dream was almost a pleasant one to begin with, blue and white and he was in the clouds, flying above a flaming earth, none of the heat reaching him, it was cool and he was comfortable and floated with no effort or fear.
And then the world below him went suddenly dark and the fires went away without leaving smoke, and the clouds were gone and the sky around him became darker and darker, and he was surrounded by black and cold and was falling, trying to scream and nothing came out–
He awoke with a start, and called out from his ruined mouth. For a moment he was disoriented. He heard a crackling sound, and felt leaves behind his head, and saw his legs in the cleared-out spot.
He became very agitated – the light around him was deeper than it should be.
Alarmed, he stood up, feeling a fresh hot bolt of pain through his leg. He ignored it. He hobbled out of the hollow spot, onto the path again, and faced the sun.
It was past its height, and moving down in its arc toward the west in the late of day. And, in the west, clouds were already forming on the line of the horizon, rising like yeast to meet the approaching sun.
He had slept for hours.
He wanted to cry. He had missed the height of the sun.
Steeling himself, he turned to the upward path and limped onto it.
Perhaps it was not too late.
His leg quickly became a pure hot pain with each step. He gritted his teeth and ignored it. After a while he heard an anguished sound which fell into step with him – he realized the cries were his own loud grunts at the pace he’d set.
But he could now see the summit above him, growing closer with each burning step.
He came around a wind in the path, circumventing a stand of leafless trees, and saw the flat top of the mountain a matter of twenty yards ahead.
His leg folded under him, and he fell.
A sound like a strangled cry came from his mouth. His leg felt as if it had been dipped into acid.
He tried to get up, but fell back again.
The sun was descending toward the west, darkening with late autumn day – soon it would be twilight.
He tried again to rise, and failed.
He began to sob.
Suddenly there were hands beneath his armpits, pulling him up.
“Can’t have you missin’ your favorite day of the year, can we, Aaron?”
He was on his feet, and supported. He turned to see old Froelich’s face next to his own.
The old man looked suddenly embarrassed at the intimacy, and turned away. But his grip on Aaron was like iron. “Don’t worry ’bout it, son. Just thought you were in an extra bit of difficulty with the leg this year, when you went by the stand. Thought it was time I see this sight myself, anyways. So I took the truck up as far as I could, walked the rest. Thought you’d be up and gone by now. And if you weren’t…” He shrugged, looked Aaron in the face again.
“Let’s have us a look, shall we?” Froelich said.
With the old man’s help, the Pumpkin Tender suddenly found himself on top of the mountain, looking down at the valleys which surrounded Orangefield – the scores of pumpkin fields and patches which merged into an orange circle, a ring of fire, the sight of thousands of unpicked pumpkins in the late sun. It was even more magnificent than it would have been at noon – the deep tone of setting Sol making the fields seem to be lit from within.
“Well I’ll be damned, I will,” old Froelich said in amazement. “I had no idea it would be this beautiful, Aaron. And it’s all your doing, boy. All those clean, beautiful pumpkins yet to be picked….” He laughed. “Hell, we could sell tickets to this, it’s so beautiful.”
There were tears in the Pumpkin Tender’s eyes. His mouth opened and a little gasping sound came out.
“That’s all right son,” Froelich said, tightening his grip under Aaron’s arms. “You just stand there and enjoy it. Hell, it’s gonna rain tomorrow, and then picking in earnest will start. This’ll all be gone for another year.”
The sun sank into imperceptible twilight, and the ring of fire’s glow faded, like cooling embers.
“I’ll be damned,” the old farmer repeated, his voice fading like the light.
They stood together silently for a moment; the sun dropped into the clouded horizon, and the glow disappeared, dying light.
“Come on, son,” Froelich said, trying to urge the Pumpkin Tender to turn away. “Time we went back down. The truck’s just a little ways down the path.”
Aaron wouldn’t move. There were tears on his face, and his weight caused the old man to let go of his grip and gently lower him to the ground.
“Gonna stay up here tonight, Aaron?” Froelich asked. He knew from experience not to try to fight the Pumpkin Tender’s impulses. “All right, then. Just in case, I went and got your spare Army blanket from the spot in the shed where you keep your stuff. It’s in the truck, let me get it.”
The old man wandered off down the path, returned a few minutes later.
Aaron, on the ground, his legs folded awkwardly, felt the blanket go around his shoulders.
“You take care up here, boy. Try to rest that leg of yours.”
Aaron heard the old man’s steps retreat, heard the rumbling roar of the truck’s engine a few moments later – the protesting grind of changed gears, the crunch of tires turning. Headlights stabbed through the growing dark above his head, arced away. In a moment he heard the truck change gears again, the fading sound of its engine as it made its rumbling way down the mountain.
He was alone with the coming night. Already the line of clouds in the west had eaten the sun, were climbing up the sky, eating away early stars.
The ring of fire around Orangefield, which now blinked on its own electric lights against the night, was gone.
Tears continued to dry on the Pumpkin Tender’s face.
His hands beneath the blanket gripped and ungripped.
Inside his head the voice, the same voice which had been talking to him since Froelich had lifted him up, had continued to talk to him insistently, soothingly, with command, as he had tried to enjoy the ring of fire of his own making, still talked to him. It was the clearest thing he had heard since Somalia, and he knew if it kept up he would listen to it–
Remember me? it said.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Lists.
While he buried the headless animal, Jordie thought about all the lists he kept. There was the comic book list – his favorites, beginning with The Fantastic Four and ending, at the very bottom, with Batman. There was a lot in between but Batman was the only D.C. title in the bunch, and just barely. He had liked the movies more than the books, but there was something about the character that he just couldn’t dismiss. Maybe it was the fact that Batman was just a man with a neat suit. No super powers, no glowing rocks, no fast-motion – just a man with a mission.
Man with a mission.
Jordie kept lots of other lists: lists of what to get at the store, of what parts he needed to order for his turntables – needles, especially, he needed new needles for his cartridges, his vinyl was starting to sound a bit distorted – a list of what needed to be done around the house. That was the one he hated the most – but one, now that he thought about it, that he didn’t have to bother with anymore. Mom and Aunt Binny had worked long and hard on that one – but, well, he just wouldn’t bother with it anymore.
The animal’s torso was covered with dirt; he wondered idly if he’d dug deep enough but decided that, hell, that sounded too much like a chore so what he’d done was good enough.
“You don’t work, you don’
t go to school, you don’t do anything around the house–” his mother was fond of saying.
“Look, Ma, I’m doin’ a chore!” he answered, giggling.
Man, it was cold. He looked down at himself and saw that he was naked, smeared with blood. The sun had gone down. It had still been up when he started digging, but now it was dark and getting chilly. It had been warm as hell a few weeks ago, but now it was really October. He stood up, dropped the shovel and dusted his hands, turning toward the house.
Lists.
There was something else he was supposed to do.
He looked down on the ground, looking for the list, but couldn’t locate it.
He shrugged, walked into the house, turning lights on as he went. He had a joint somewhere, where was it? He couldn’t remember. He vaguely remembered smoking three or four in the morning, afternoon. And there had been a pint of Vodka in there somewhere, or had it been a fifth…
The house was a mess, kitchen chairs turned over, table on its side, blood smears on the white floors, walls, refrigerator, everywhere. The head of a cat stared at him from the kitchen counter, next to the toaster oven. Another, larger head was next to it. A second animal, what looked like a mouse but was actually a squirrel, lay eviscerated on the toaster oven’s open door.
He laughed at the mouse/cat thing.
The rest of the house, living and dining room, was a mess, too – some broken furniture, the couch with a burn mark in the center cushion, a scatter of feathers in the fireplace –
The bathroom, at least, was clean.
He took a slow shower, letting warm and then hot water sluice over him, scrubbing himself with Ivory soap. He still couldn’t remember what the other list had said. He knew he should, but his head was just too cloudy–
He let hot, steamy water run into his face, onto his shaggy head of hair.
Got to remember, got to–
It almost came to him, then danced off into the back of his mind again. Finally he shut off the water with an angry, squeaky turn of the handle, got out of the shower and stood before the mirror.
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