Sweet Everlasting

by Patricia Gaffney

  “Hello, Broom,” said Eppy. She looked plump and pretty in her brown winter coat, like a little mama rabbit.

  “Hi, Miz Odell.” Broom backed away, shy as a turtle, not able to look her in the eye.

  Eppy gave a little shake of the head to Carrie, which she knew meant, That boy, I’ll swear. “What brings you into town so late, Carrie?” she asked.

  She started to fumble in her pocket for her notebook and pencil, but Broom found his courage and spoke up for her. “Her dog got hurt, and she took it to the doc’s house, and now he’s curing it.”

  “What’s that? You took your dog to see Dr. Wilkes?”

  Carrie spread her hands. I had to, she wished she could say. She was hurt so bad, I couldn’t help her myself.

  “For goodness sake.” Eppy looked like she wanted to laugh, but Carrie thought the expression on her own face must’ve told her not to. “You mean the dog’s there now?”

  “Yeah, the doc’s curing her,” Broom answered, shuffling his feet, one wild wrist flying.

  “Well, I declare.”

  Carrie put her hand on her stomach and raised her eyebrows, asking Eppy how the new baby was.

  “Oh, fine, we’re fine. I saw Dr. Wilkes myself yesterday, as a matter of fact, and he says October. I told him it better be a boy this time, or Frank’ll leave me for sure.”

  Eppy laughed, and Carrie smiled, enjoying the sound. Eppy had the best laugh of anyone she knew. And of course she wouldn’t really mind another girl—her fifth—and Frank Odell wouldn’t leave her in a hundred years. Mr. Odell owned the town newspaper, the Clarion; except for Dr. Stoneman, Carrie thought he was probably the smartest man in Wayne’s Crossing.

  “Carrie, there’s a covered-dish dinner this Saturday in the church basement, and Frank and I want you to go with us.”

  She nodded thank you and shook her head no.

  Eppy clucked her tongue. “That’s just what I told Frank you’d say. Why not?”

  She shrugged, smiled, shook her head again.

  “Well, it’s too cold to stand here arguing with you. Where’s your coat, anyway? You get on home, it’ll be pitch-dark before you get there as it is. Have you got a lantern? Go on, and Broom, it’s time you got home, too. I’ll talk to you again, Carrie, about Saturday,” she warned, waved good-bye, and bustled off toward Truitt Avenue.

  Carrie slapped Petey into motion and moved on, thinking how grown up and bossy Eppy was to be only twenty-six years old. Most of the time she acted more like Carrie’s mother than her friend, and she guessed that suited both of them fine.

  “Is Miz Odell gonna have another baby, Carrie?” Broom wanted to know, jogging along beside her again. “Let’s you and me have one, okay? We could keep it at my house so Artemis couldn’t get it. Want to? Let’s, Carrie, let’s get one of our own. You could take care of it, and I could …” He stopped talking to think, which was rare, and Carrie couldn’t decide if she felt like laughing or crying. Because neither one of them was ever going to get a baby.

  All at once Broom stopped in his tracks, and she looked up Cumberland Street to see what he was staring at. Three men were walking toward them, swaggering and laughing, bumping up against each other like overgrown puppies. Even though it was almost dark, she could tell the one in the middle was Eugene Starkey just by the way he moved. She didn’t know anyone else who walked like that, as if he owned the whole town, or maybe the whole world. “Uh oh,” said Broom. “Uh oh, uh oh, uh oh.” He was talking to himself; he didn’t even know she was there anymore. Run away, she wanted to tell him, run away before they see you.

  “Hey, Fireman!”

  Too late. The two young men on either side of Eugene broke into jerky runs, mimicking Broom, and before he could flee they had him surrounded, with the wagon at his back.

  “Hey, Fireman,” Lee Burney taunted him, “you put out any big ones lately?”

  Henry Sheffler twitched his arms and waved his hands in Broom’s face, hooting with laughter.

  Carrie had seen it so often, suffered something like it herself more times than she could count. She bit her lips, helpless, wanting to shout. Finally she banged her flat hand against the side of the wagon, over and over, until the boys left off tormenting Broom and looked up at her.

  “Hi, Carrie,” they said in singsong voices, nudging each other.

  Eugene came up behind them. “Evening, Miss Carrie.” He tipped his woolen cap and grinned at her.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Broom backing away; at the first chance, he whirled around and ran as fast as he could down Broad Street.

  “What do you say?” prompted Eugene. “How’s Miss Carrie Wiggins today? You’re looking mighty pretty. Can I go home with you?” They all guffawed.

  Carrie slapped Petey’s reins, but Eugene reached out and took hold of his harness, stopping him. “What’re you doing in town today?” he persisted, coming toward her, patting Petey’s rump on the way. “Come on, write me one of your little notes.”

  She frowned at him and shook her head, mad, pointing at the mule. Let me go, Eugene.

  “Henry, you and Lee go on ahead, I’ll catch up,” he instructed without taking his eyes off her. That started them to snickering and teasing, but he ignored them. “Go on, I’ll see you at the Duck in a minute. Go on, now.” The “Duck” was the Blue Duck Tavern, where Eugene always went after work. The boys joshed him for a little longer but then they obeyed, as she’d known they would. Eugene was their leader: they always did whatever he said.

  When they’d gone off, he moved in closer and laid hold of her right shoe with his hand. “Boys didn’t mean nothing with ol’ Broom, Carrie. Honest. Come on, they didn’t hurt him, did they?”

  She pinched her lips together, disapproving. He looked as if he couldn’t decide whether to keep being nice to her or get mad and say something nasty. She just waited, for it always came to that between them eventually, one way or the other.

  “Aw, come on, gimme a smile.” He gave her worn old shoe a little shake.

  Shame on you, she told him with her eyes; but he kept on grinning, trying to charm her. She knew there were lots of girls—Teenie Yingling, for one—who thought he was handsome, and she supposed he was in a way. He was tall and strong and brawny, with thick brown hair he parted in the middle and a wiry mustache he put wax on sometimes. When he wasn’t working at the Wayne Tool and Die, he wore fancy clothes that he went all the way to Chambersburg to buy. Eppy said he was “well turned out,” which meant, as far as Carrie could tell, that he spent a lot of time in front of the mirror.

  “Guess what, Carrie, I got promoted today. You’re looking at the new turning department assistant foreman.” He stuck one hand through his belt and puffed out his chest. “I’m making more money right now than my daddy made farming all his life, and I’m only twenty years old.”

  She smiled and nodded; but she must not have looked impressed enough, because he finally got the belligerent look on his face that she was much more used to. “What’s your old man make?” he demanded, surly. “When he’s not falling down drunk, that is. I heard they don’t even let him near the saw anymore at Bone’s Mill, because they’re afraid he’ll cut himself in half, or somebody else. That is one worthless son of a bitch, Carrie, you can’t deny it.”

  No, she couldn’t deny it; but she wasn’t going to agree with him, either. She pulled her shawl tighter and gave the reins an impatient shake.

  “Whoa, now, not so fast.” He reached for the lead leather again and held it. Stared at it for a few seconds, fingering it, scowling and tongue-tied. Carrie couldn’t have been more surprised when he blurted out, “Will you go with me to the Wolf’s Club social on Saturday night?” And when his face got dark and mottled-looking, as though he might be blushing, she couldn’t believe her eyes. “You could meet me there, or I could come up the mountain and get you, whichever you want. Starts at seven. So, will you go with me?”

  She looked down at her hands, then back up at Eugene. Slowly and gen
tly, she shook her head.

  “Why not?”

  She shrugged, then pulled her notebook out of her pocket! Her fingers were stiff with cold, and it took awhile to write, I just can’t. Thank you for asking.

  He folded the paper up after he’d read it and stuffed it in his coat pocket. She thought he’d turn ugly now, but he said almost kindly, “Nobody’d make fun of you, Carrie. You’d be with me, and I’d take care of you. Come on, you’d have a good time.”

  She shook her head again; it was out of the question. But thank you, she tried to say with her smile.

  “Okay, don’t.” He dropped the leather and stepped back. “I don’t give a damn, it doesn’t mean shit to me.” He slapped Petey’s rump hard, and the wagon jerked forward. The reins slipped off Carrie’s lap, and she had to make a fast grab for them before they could slide over the footboard. “Go on home to your daddy,” he called after her. She twisted around in the seat, but he was striding away, big arms swinging, and he wouldn’t look back. Why, why was it always like this between them? He could never stay nice for long so why didn’t he just leave her alone? She blew out a frosty, discontented sigh, and turned the mule toward Dreamy Mountain.

  “It’s beautiful there,” Dr. Wilkes had said. She’d known he was a good man before that, but if he thought Dreamy was beautiful, that meant he was also smart. People who lived in town or on farms in the valley liked to make fun of those who lived on High Dreamer, calling them backward and stupid and no account. There were pockets of shiftlessness and ignorance on the mountain, no doubt about that, but if she had a choice she wouldn’t pick anywhere else to live. It was the prettiest place in the world, and except for Artemis’s bad times it was always peaceful. Nobody bothered her because, if you didn’t count the Haights, nobody lived nearby. Best of all, she had her wildlings to take care of, which meant she was never lonesome. Well … sometimes, maybe. But it never lasted long, for there was always work to be done; she didn’t have time to be lonely.

  She was only halfway home when it grew too dark to see the road. She didn’t bother lighting the lantern, though, because Petey could see in the dark, even if she couldn’t. He was old but he was surefooted, and he knew there were oats waiting for him at home.

  Still, if she hadn’t been late, she’d have lit the lantern anyway so she could see the woods filling up with snow. It was just a dusting now; the leathery brown oak leaves’ edges would be crinkling out of the thin white covering, and everything would be quiet except for the soft whisper of snowflakes hitting the bare tree limbs. There was a mist over everything, and the trees would look like ghosts gliding by. She loved the way her insides felt when she was alone in the woods on the mountain—breathless and sharp, but calm and peaceful, too. It sounded peculiar, but sometimes she felt that same way in the Wayne’s Crossing Lending Library, just thinking about all the books around her, free for the taking. But the snowy woods were even better because there she was alone, and when she was alone she was safe.

  She knew when Petey passed the narrow, bumpy turning to the Haights’ house, even though the snow and the mist were too thick now to see through. She couldn’t see the pale yellow firelight in the front window of her own house until she drove all the way into the yard. The silent yard—no Shadow to bark with lazy, stiff-legged joy because she was back. She unhitched Petey and fed him his oats in the dark, then gave his indifferent nose a kiss and closed the rickety lean-to door.

  She approached the cabin warily. When she smelled wood smoke, she relaxed a trifle. If Artemis had a fire going, at least he wasn’t blind drunk anymore. But if he was still mean drunk, she’d sleep in the shed with Petey tonight no matter how bitter cold it got.

  As soon as she opened the door, she knew from the smell, sour-sweet and stale, that he wasn’t drunk anymore. He’d come to the next stage, the sick, surly, silent stage, when you were safe from his violence but not his temper, and you’d better keep your distance.

  He sat hunched in front of the fireplace, his shotgun on his lap, oil can and cleaning rags beside him on the settle. “Where’ve you been?” He didn’t even turn around to snarl the question. “I had to heat up my own supper.”

  Carrie shook snow from her shawl and hung it on the hook by the door. She was freezing; she wanted to go close to the fire and thaw her stinging hands. Instead she picked up the slate from the table and wrote on it with chalk, “Town.” He looked around. She held the slate up so he could read it, but didn’t go any nearer.

  “What for?”

  She looked at him, careful to keep anger or accusation out of her face. Even sick, his brutish body frightened her, the arms too long and the legs too short. He had hair everywhere except for the top of his head, and sometimes she thought he resembled an animal more than a man. She rubbed out “Town” and wrote “Shadow.”

  He looked at the word and then back at her. His black eyes burned with some vacant kind of fire, but they didn’t give anything away. Are you sorry at all? she longed to ask. Do you even remember what you did? He turned away without saying a word, and went back to cleaning his gun.

  Broom had told Dr. Wilkes this afternoon that Artemis was her pa. She wished now she’d corrected him. He wasn’t her father, he was her stepfather, no blood kin at all. And she was getting scared of him again because his drinking was worse. In the four and a half years since they’d moved to the mountain, he’d always made sure that he got drunk away from the house—in town at the Duck, or on a friend’s front porch, or all by himself in the woods. Until today. Today he’d come home from the mill early with a half-empty jar of whiskey, and instead of falling into bed and sleeping it off like he usually did, he’d kept on drinking. After a while he’d gotten up and stumbled toward the door, to go outside and use the privy. Shadow was deaf and she didn’t hear him, she didn’t get out of his way in time. He tripped over her and almost fell. And then, in a rage, he kicked her all the way across the room.

  He leaned his gun against the wall. The butt striking the floor made a sharp thud, and Carrie jumped. Nervous tonight. She sat at the table eating cold potato soup while Artemis took down his Bible and began to read. She washed her bowl and spoon and put them away, then swept the floor and tidied up around the cabin. It was quiet without Shadow. Snow fluttering past the window in the lamplight made her feel shivery cold and scared inside, not joyful.

  The minute the mantel clock struck nine, Artemis snapped his Bible shut, went into his room, and closed the door. Without a word, of course. Every great once in a while, she felt so lonesome she almost wished he would talk to her. But he hardly ever did, except to complain about something she hadn’t done. Right now he was kneeling on his frayed rug in his underwear, saying his prayers. In ten minutes, he’d get in bed and immediately start to snore.

  She went to the cupboard and took down a small bag of hazelnuts, and another of raisins and dried apples. Next she sliced three pieces of bread and spread butter on them half an inch thick. Throwing her wet shawl over her head, she opened the door without a sound and slipped outside.

  The air smelled fresh and piney, and the only sound was the high, icy fall of snowflakes on dry leaves. Under the big spruce tree she cleared a place in the snow, which was more than an inch deep now and coming down fast, and spread out her food. It was too cold to wait, but in a minute she knew the gray fox would come, so graceful with his flowing bushy tail and his pointed nose. Then the two skunks she’d decided were married, who were coming every night now as winter dragged on and they got closer and closer to starvation. Last would come the forlorn old possum who lived under the woodshed, blundering and clumsy, surely the stupidest animal God ever made. She loved him dearly, and feared for him all the time, because he was just too dumb to survive.

  Back inside the cabin, she blew out the lamp and put on her flannel nightgown in the dark, leaving on her woolen stockings because of the cold. She pulled back the sheet that curtained the padded bench she slept on from the main room and, with cold-stiff fingers, carefully
lit a candle. By its flickering light, she fed crumbs to the motherless family of white-footed mice she was keeping in a box on a shelf over the bed. They reminded her of a child’s toys with their long whiskers and big, veiny ears, so delicate you could almost see through them. If Artemis knew they were here, he’d kill them. How much longer, she wondered, yawning, before she could open up her hospital this year? That’s what she called her secret place in the woods where she took care of the animals she found on Dreamy who were wounded, sick, or orphaned. April at least, she reckoned; otherwise the cold would kill them. She could hardly wait, and not only because her wildlings needed her. The hospital was her refuge too, a place where she could go and Artemis couldn’t follow, and she could be as free as any creature on the mountain.

  She blew out the candle and got in bed, thinking of Shadow. Was she in pain right now? Carrie didn’t want to start crying again; she thought of other things, happy times, when Shadow was young and they’d gone everywhere together. Mama had found her under the steps of the house they’d been living in in Raleigh. Someone had just thrown her away, half-grown and starving. She’d followed Carrie everywhere at first—so naturally they’d named her Shadow. Right from the start she wasn’t like other dogs; she was gentle and sweet, and she never bothered any of Carrie’s animal patients, never even chased a bird. Now that she was old, she slept on the floor in the cabin until Artemis went to bed; then she slept at Carrie’s feet on the bench. She was her best friend, even more than Eppy or Doc Stoneman, because she was always there and she didn’t care if Carrie could talk or not.

  Carrie dried her eyes on the pillow and turned onto her side. Please God, help the new doctor make Shadow well, she prayed. If anybody could, he could. “She won’t suffer, I’ll make sure of it,” he’d promised, and Carrie knew what that meant. She fell asleep thinking about Dr. Wilkes’s kind blue eyes and his strong, gentle hands.