“What about your wife?” asked Lyle. “Did you take her home?”
“No.” The old man laughed. “She left after the first five swings. Said she was embarrassed and would never be seen leaving a fair with a drunk anyway. Said she was not like a stuffed animal that I could win and take home with me, which of course was right. So the next day I visited her at her family farm, which was where we were married, and we milked cows together and I helped her with her other chores and she told me that I had squandered fifteen years staring at her ankles, because she was in love with me too.”
The old man suddenly got very quiet. He sucked a breath of air inside his chest and looked at the immaculate sky.
“I miss her every day like you wouldn’t believe,” he said. “I used to not believe in heaven or hell or Jesus, but now I do because it’s all I got. I got to. I got to see her again somehow.”
“That’s the best story I’ve heard in a long while,” said Lyle. He lowered his head and kicked the gravel and dust. “That is the best story,” he repeated.
They stood in the sun and Lyle admired the old man’s yellow truck. The farm report had come to a close and now country music was playing. Lyle did not recognize the singer.
“I’m sorry,” the old man said. “I hope that I haven’t kept you. Funny to me how things are joined up inside my head. How things just come out. Makes me feel like I’m about to go senile or something. I didn’t mean to go on there at the end.”
“Don’t apologize to me,” Lyle said. “Nothing to apologize to anybody about. I appreciate your company. I get so lonely out here sometimes I start talking to the fruit and deer.”
“Sure I don’t owe you nothing?” the old man asked.
Lyle shook his head. “I wouldn’t even know what to charge you. Get a deer for me.”
“Oh, I don’t shoot deer anymore,” the old man said as he slowly climbed into the truck. “I just like to watch them. They’re about my only friends.” He shut his driver-side door and drove off.
* * *
That night Lyle cut apples. He cut the apples into thin pieces. He tried with clumsy hands to pare the red peels from the apples in single helices with his knife. He put the meat of the apples in an old white bowl that had been his mother’s. He added cinnamon and nutmeg and sugar to the bowl of fruit. He even dripped a few drops of whiskey on the fruit. He searched the spice cabinets for vanilla and dribbled some vanilla on the fruit. He folded the apples into a crust and placed the dish in the hot oven that gusted at him with a single wave of heat. He closed the oven and checked his watch. He palmed an apple, walked to their bedroom, and pulling the sheets back, placed the fruit on the mattress, where he knew her feet would later be, then pulled the sheets back, smoothed them just so. He moved back and forth between the kitchen and front door, peering out their windows, looking for her headlights to swing into their driveway. He could not wait to see her.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Infinite thanks to the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where most of these stories were born. In particular, special thanks to James Alan McPherson, who taught me grace, kindness, and decency. To Marcus Burke, whose friendship, cooking, and hospitality kept me sane for those two Iowa years. When I had nowhere else to go, the Starlight was always open, and you, my friend, understood what it means to feel too much. To Scott Smith, for thousands of rounds of twelve-gauge camaraderie and civilized entertainment. And to the rest of the McPherson crew, to Kannan, Christina, Chanda, Adam, Jessica: nobody had more fun than we did. Thanks also to: Sam Chang, Ethan Canin, Michelle Huneven, James Galvin, Connie Brothers, Deb West, Jan Lacina Zenisek, Nicole Neymeyer, David Dowling, Bridget Draxler, and all my other teachers, mentors, colleagues, and fellow workshoppers.
To my agent, Rob McQuilkin, Zorro with a red pen. Thanks for tolerating all these implements of destruction.
To everyone in the Flatiron Building, but in particular my publicist, the marvelous Dori Weintraub, who always found a way to fly me home, even from Georgia—I am in your debt. To my favorite hardworking sales reps, Anne Hellman, Melissa Weisberg, and Tom Leigh: thanks for all that you do. To my buddy Matt Baldacci, who I’ll include in this Flatiron list because his friendship transcends time, space, artichoke dip, Budweiser, and war movies: thanks for having my back, amigo. And to Sally Richardson and the late Matthew Shear: long will I remember our GoodFellas dinner in the Fedora basement. Thank you for taking a chance on me.
To my mom, Bette Troolin Butler: there you go, Mom, your whole name. To my dad, my wonderful in-laws, all my aunts and uncles and crazy cousins. To my brother (sister), Lump: I love you. To my sister-in-law, Cynthia, for tolerating Lump. To Reidar and Kaitlen.
And to Regina, Henry, and now Nora: I love you bears.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nickolas Butler was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and raised in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. His writing has appeared in Narrative Magazine, Ploughshares, The Kenyon Review Online, The Progressive, The Christian Science Monitor, and elsewhere. A bestseller in both the United States and France, his debut novel, Shotgun Lovesongs, received the Midwest Booksellers Choice Award, the Great Lakes Great Reads Award, and France’s Prix Page/America. Butler graduated from the University of Wisconsin–Madison before attending the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and currently lives in Wisconsin with his wife and their two children. You can sign up for email updates here.
ALSO BY NICKOLAS BUTLER
Shotgun Lovesongs
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Epigraph
The Chainsaw Soirée
Rainwater
Sven & Lily
Morels
Leftovers
Beneath the Bonfire
Sweet Light Crude
In Western Counties
Train People Move Slow
Apples
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Nickolas Butler
Copyright
These short stories are works of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in these stories are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.
BENEATH THE BONFIRE. Copyright © 2015 by Nickolas Butler. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.thomasdunnebooks.com
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Rob Grom
Cover photographs: people © Jaap-Willem Kleijwegt/Getty Images; house and trees © iStock.com; paint texture © Evarin20/Shutterstock
“Apples” first appeared in Ploughshares; “Beneath the Bonfire,” originally titled “Underneath the Bonfire,” and “Leftovers” first appeared in Narrative Magazine; and “The Chainsaw Soirée” first appeared in The Kenyon Review Online. Those stories appear here with slight modifications. Special thanks to the editors of the aforementioned journals, in particular DeWitt Henry and Tom Jenks.
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to [email protected].
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-03983-5 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-7553-1 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781466875531
First Edition: May 2015
the Bonfire
Beneath the Bonfire Page 20