Peculiar Country

by Stuart R. West

  Surely Fate had aligned everything properly, a winning shot in a game of pool. I’d be a right fool not to act upon it. Before my brain could caution against, I acted. I grabbed the mail in the box—mostly catalogs and the urgent, no-nonsense typefaces of overdue bills—stuffed them into the bike basket beside my books, and tread down the Saunders’ pebble-covered driveway.

  Halfway down the drive, I regretted my impulse, considered turning around.

  Slowly, Mrs. Saunders stood. A breeze, one conjured by magazine photographers, drew her floral dress tight around the perfect figure eight of her body. As if saluting me, she tented her hand over her eyes and watched as I drew closer. From a small table beside her, she grabbed a tall glass, and sipped from one of those fancy straws, the kind with the bends manufactured near the neck. She sat back down. Legs that I envied, crossed. The top shapely calf firmed up with muscle.

  Near the porch, I hopped off my bike, toed down the kickstand. Nervous, I walked toward the porch, the mail offered out at arm’s length as if gifting the Queen of England.

  She didn’t move, didn’t lower her movie-star glasses. Her stoic demeanor rivaled Mount Rushmore.

  “Ma’am.” Stupidly, I curtsied. “I, um, well, I thought I’d bring you your mail.”

  “Isn’t that nice?” While not overflowing with joy, she didn’t sound quite ready to fetch the shotgun either. In fact, she didn’t sound much of anything.

  “I’m your neighbor, Dibby.” I tossed a thumb back at our house. “Next door? Dibby—”

  “Dibby Caldwell. Yes, I know.” Nearly as slim as her waistline, a smile tightened. Honestly, I didn’t know how she kept such a trim figure. Far as I could tell, she didn’t do much of anything other than sit and drink. Maybe long-term rocking had its benefits. “Why, I haven’t spoken to you since you were just a babe.”

  I had no idea she even knew who I was, let alone spoken to me before. “I reckon you’ll forgive me when I say I don’t remember meeting you.”

  She melted, just a bit. A corner of her mouth hitched up. Wrinkles rippled, the first indication she was somewhere around Dad’s age. She gestured toward the rocking chair next to her. “Of course. Join me for a sit.”

  Strangely mesmerized under her spell, I accepted, all haste to get home forgotten. Under no control of my own, my legs bounded up the three steps. Like a tummy-ache, loose floorboards rumbled. Worn but solid, the cloth bottom of the chair sagged. No doubt Devin’s chair.

  Palm up, her hand went out. It took me a tick to understand what she wanted. I handed over her mail. “Thank you,” she said.

  “You’re welcome, ma’am.”

  “Please…call me Evvie. That’s what my friends call me.”

  Again, I wasn’t near comfortable addressing adults that way, but I certainly didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth. Maybe Evvie’d just flat out tell me what happened to her boy. Seeing as how we were friends and all now.

  “Evvie, it is.” I stuck my hand out. Hers lay limp in mine, weak, cool from her ice-filled glass. “I ‘spose I oughta apologize for not coming to visit before now. Not very neighborly of me.”

  “Don’t you worry, Dibby. I imagine your pa had something to do with that. Frankly, I’m surprised he’s let you come visit.”

  “Oh, sure, Dad… Well, he just…” Tired of lying, tired of digging myself deeper, and just plain tired, I stopped talking.

  Evvie laughed, three tired, insincere notes. “It’s fine, don’t you worry about hurting Evvie’s feelings.”

  It didn’t take a detective to figure out bad blood percolated between Dad and Evvie. Bad blood I hoped to spill. “So were…are you and my dad friends?”

  “We were. First person I met when I moved here. But that was a lifetime ago.” She sucked through her straw. An ice cube clicked against the side of her glass. “People change. So do lifetimes.” She swallowed, then grimaced as if the liquid burned.

  “I surely do understand. About change, I mean. Seems like the world’s always on the move and I’m pushing on in the other direction.”

  Again she laughed: Eh, eh, ehhhh. “That’s the beauty of youth, Dibby. Live it best you can and don’t squander it.”

  Over the past several days, I’d had my fair share of strange encounters with adults, but this one took the cake. Evvie carried a mule’s load of philosophy on her back, but not a lick of it made much sense.

  I tried to ground our conversation a bit. “I met your brother the other day. Out in your cornfield. I was trying to spook away a coyote.”

  “Hm. That’s funny. Devin never said a word about it.”

  She started swinging in her chair again, the way old folks carried on at times, spouting wise and rocking away the flies.

  Unexpectedly, she jerked forward, and pressed her sunglasses on top of her blonde crown of hair.

  I nearly yelped. Bloodshot red, sorely so, her eyes looked a sight different naked. Wrinkles surrounded them, marching inward with age. Fading sunlight struck her line of vision, causing her to wince. The flesh around her eyes appeared red too, swollen from crying, perhaps. Her true age now lay revealed, nothing glamorous about her.

  “You look like her, you know,” Evvie said.

  “Pardon me?” I’d heard her, but didn’t know if I cared to hear more.

  “Your mother. Emily. You look like her.” She reached out, folded a lock of hair behind my ear. Smiled. “There. Yes… You look the spitting image.” Her head tilted, that condescending manner in which adults consider kids. “Same mouth, same eyes. Something about your…facial structure.”

  “Thanks. I guess.” She took to stroking my cheek next, a very uncomfortable feeling. I didn’t know what else to do but sit and take it. We must’ve looked quite the pair, the owner and her lap dog.

  Mercifully, she rounded up what little sense she still possessed. “Oh, my! Where are my manners?” She pulled back, dropped her hands on her knees. Her fingertips slid between her locked knees as if to keep them from getting away. “Would you like a cold beverage?” She swirled her glass. Ice cubes rattled.

  “Yes, ma’am, that’d be nice.” Actually, I didn’t want a drink, my bladder near full to bursting as it was. But I figured it might gain me entry into her house. Why that seemed important, I couldn’t say. It just felt right.

  “I have lemonade.” She frowned. “I’m afraid it’s not home-made.”

  “That’d be fine, Evvie. Could I also bother you to use your washroom?”

  I may as well have asked her if I could move in. Her face pulled and tugged as if her innards were boxing at her skin. Finally, she settled on a barely present smile. “I suppose there’d be no harm in that. But please…don’t make a mess, dear.”

  “I’ll treat it like my own washroom.”

  “That’s…what I’m afraid of.”

  I pretended the insult flew over my childish head and followed her toward the front door. As soon as I’d stepped inside, the screen door slammed behind me with an alarming firecracker bang.

  A hot wave of electricity crackled around me. Hundreds of tiny needles nipped at my flesh. Unnatural humidity pushed down. Similar to what I’d experienced during my two cornfield visits with Evvie’s son, I wondered if Thomas’ ghost had joined us.

  Something brushed my neck, a slight cool breath. I turned, half expected to see Thomas. Maybe Devin playing at being quiet and creepy. No one—or nothing—stood behind me. Just the huge ol’ mess of the room.

  Now I’ve seen clutter-bugs before, my grandpa, for one, coming to mind. But the Saunders had him beat by a country mile.

  In the front room, boxes upon boxes piled high on one another, threatening to topple if you looked at ‘em just so. Knickknacks, figurines, doilies, ash trays, miniature lamps, dog-eared paperbacks, decorative dinnerware, matching glasses, toy metal tractors, and things I didn’t recognize occupied every nook and cranny. Thick burgundy drapes captured mustiness as if the Saunders collected that, too. An errant ray of sunshine provided a stagnant pond
for dust mites to swim in.

  An odor struck me as a might bit peculiar, if not altogether unpleasant. It took me a while to place it, a memory from my childhood: fried chicken cooked to a char, the way Mom used to do it.

  This time a hand landed on my shoulder, all too real. I let out a little yip.

  “My goodness,” said Evvie Saunders, “I didn’t mean to give you a fright.”

  “I’m fine. I just…I guess I need to use that washroom.”

  “Of course, of course.” Quickly, she snatched her hand from my shoulder as if afraid she might jiggle loose my bladder. “Follow me.”

  Expertly, Evvie navigated between the clutter, careful not to bump into anything. She led me down a hallway, her ankles snapping like fingers. Along the wall, photos hung, some yellowed with age, others of a more recent vintage. None of them, not that I could see, were of Thomas.

  Evvie pushed open a door and stepped back. “I’ll be right out here if you need anything.”

  She meant it, too. After I shut the door, I heard Evvie on the other side, impatiently shuffling, her breath batting up against the woodwork. When I sat down on the toilet seat, the air whooshed out beneath me, a cushioned model. My bladder locked up. I gave the toilet a good flush anyway, washed my hands.

  Evvie practically fell onto me when I whisked open the door. Over my shoulder, she gave her washroom a peek. “We didn’t make a mess now, did we?”

  “No, ma’am, we didn’t.” I didn’t rightly understand how I could’ve possibly made a mess that’d rival the rest of the house, but it wasn’t my place to ask.

  “Very good. Let me get that glass of lemonade for you then. Follow me, this way.”

  I suppose she was afraid to set me loose, maybe fearful I’d get lost in the maze of clutter. She maneuvered back to the living room and situated me close to the front door. “Now you stay put. I’ll be right back.”

  She left, humming a tuneless ditty. Again, I felt something at the back of my neck, almost a tickle. Alive, my skin crawled, ready to move with or without the rest of me.

  Something pressed into my back. No malice, no harm, but a strong prod of a finger. I swung around, saw nothing. It did it again, this time to my belly. I took a step backward. The pokes kept coming, clearly directing me somewhere. I handed the reins of my body over to my unseen copilot. Once we started working in tandem, it became easier. The ghost corralled me toward the fireplace.

  Several framed photographs sat atop the fireplace mantle. Unlike the ones in the hallway, these had recently been dusted.

  The first photo displayed Evvie, much younger, standing next to a man in military uniform. His arm around her, his shoulders stretched near the width of Montana. He had kind eyes, but a mean-looking sort of mouth, a jaw that could crack walnuts. And I imagined that his large brow—eyebrows sewn together—might cast his eyes a turn angrier once downturned. No doubt Evvie’s husband, Hedrick.

  Next to this photo sat a smaller, sadder one of Thomas. Except for his full set of clothes, he didn’t appear that much different than how I’d seen him in the field. Posed in front of the Saunders’ home, his eyes—very much his daddy’s eyes—fixed on something in the distance. Worry troubled his gaunt face, his thin scribble of a mouth bothered. He looked lost, a little boy dwarfed by things bigger than him, things he was powerless to control let alone understand. Worse, he didn’t look comfortable at home at all.

  My heart bled for Thomas. Possibly attributable to his ghostly presence, I felt he’d had a troubled childhood, one that ended in even more troubling ways. Felt it bothering my bones.

  At the far end of the mantle, another photograph lay on its belly. Dust blanketed the back of the frame. I reached for it, hand shaking. Electricity tingled down my spine. Sudden heat flushed over me. Sweat broke out on my brow, my face clammy. I thought I might faint, chunk my head on the fireplace’s brickwork.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  My body snapped back together, limbs on the ends of rubber bands. I turned, saw Evvie holding two glasses. An obviously very angry Evvie. The whites of her eyes glowed. A feral scowl exposed clamped teeth.

  She clacked the glasses down on a rare, bare spot of property. “Get away from there now!”

  “Yes, ma’am. I…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

  “You need to head on home now.” For a woman of such natural composure, she radiated intense fury. “Go on then… Git!”

  It didn’t take a boot up my backside to get me gone. Still, I didn’t like leaving on such a downturn. At the door, I said, “Evvie, I honestly meant no disrespect. If I upset—”

  “It’s Mrs. Saunders.” She slammed the screen door, then the front door sealed like a tomb.

  Fast as I could, I hauled out of there, running alongside my bike ‘till I reached the road. On the short trip home, one thought kept niggling through my mind:

  I sure would like to know who that last photograph featured, I surely would.

  * * *

  Minus his usual Hangwell Gazette, Dad sat hunkered down at the kitchen table. Word had already reached him about my mishap at Simonson’s Drug Store.

  “Dibby…” When he raised his head, he looked like an older man. Usually his glasses covered some of the worry lines around his eyes, some of his sadness. Today he held his glasses, twirling them by the temple tips, swinging in the wind like I was surely about to do. “Please tell me you don’t smoke.”

  I sat down. “Course not, Dad. I’m no dummy. I’ll never forget those pictures you showed me. Of all those cancer victims. That was all James at the pharmacy, and believe you me, I gave him what for about it, too.”

  He just nodded, either too tired to press or taking me at my word. “Where’ve you been since then?” He looked at his watch, the one that’d been passed down through several generations of morticians. “You should’ve been home at least a good hour ago.”

  Maybe Dad saw me next door. Maybe not. But if I ever intended to leave my bedroom again, I’d better stick with the truth. In a round-about way, of course. “Well, you know I had to help Mrs. Hopkins after class.”

  “How’d that go?”

  “About as well as could be expected, I suppose. And I guess you heard that James accompanied me down through Main Street.”

  “I’ll say.” He rapped his fingers over the Formica table-top.

  “And then, when I was on my way home, I saw Mrs. Saunders… You know, next door?” Course he knew her. A little bit better than I’d ever suspected from what Mrs. Saunders had hinted at. “She hadn’t yet fetched her mail, so I thought I’d do the right thing by her and bring it up the drive.”

  Dad’s face tightened. His hands roamed through his thinning hair, drawing the sides out like a circus clown. “Dammit, Dibby! How many times have I told you to stay away from that woman? Her and her no-good brother, Devin!”

  “I’m sorry! But I just don’t understand what harm could come from bringing a woman her mail. Honestly, you won’t even tell me why I’m supposed to stay away from her! And ‘less you do, I can’t see any reason to do so! She’s just a sad lady, a little kooky maybe, but she’s just sad. Sad about her son and—”

  Thwack!

  Dad’s coffee cup jumped and I matched it, bounce by bounce. His fist came down on the table again. I’d never seen him lose his temper like this.

  “What do you know about Thomas Saunders, Dibby?”

  Bravely, I stood my ground. “What do you know about him, Dad?”

  Just like in one of those hokey ol’ westerns, we stared at one another, itching for the first person to make a move.

  Dad drew first. “Dibby… Thomas Saunders ran away from home a long time ago. In 1953 to be exact. So goes the official story.” He took in a mighty big sigh, blew it out. His attention safely focused on his coffee cup, he ran a finger around the rim. “That’s all you need to know about the situation.”

  “But…you said the ‘official story’. Like that’s not the truth.”
<
br />   “Who’s to say what really happened?” His eyes lifted, met mine. Sadness tinted them red, glimmery under the right angle. The most haunted I’d seen him since the early days, right after Mom left. “Between you, me and the walls, I’ve long suspected foul play came of the boy. But I’ve nothing to back up my theory. And that’s really all you need to know about the Saunders, Dibby. I apologize for not trusting you with…my reason for wanting you to stay away from that family. But I’m the adult here and I expect you to abide by the rules. That’s all the explanation I owe you.” He didn’t blink, didn’t move. Dang near looked like a wax figure, just like outta that Vincent Price House of Wax feature.

  “Dad…was Thomas Saunders murdered?”

  His head shook. “Dibby, I really don’t wish to discuss this further.”

  “But, what if—”

  “That’s enough.” He reclaimed himself, gestured upstairs. “Go do your homework.”

  As I hurried outta the kitchen, I heard him opening the tall cabinet—the one where he kept his not-so-secret supply of hooch.

  * * *

  “Help me! Please! Help…”

  Accustomed to practically sleeping with one eye open, I got out of bed quickly, almost routine by now. Even in a half-asleep state, I quietly flew down the steps and out the door in seconds.

  Tonight, the cornfield absolutely clamored with the ruckus of ghosts. The corn stalks seemed taller, more menacing, rattling like maracas in the agitated wind.

  “Please, help meee…”

  The moon only a sliver-full tonight, I couldn’t see beans. But Thomas’s mounting hysteria drove me toward him, his fear at a high. Hackles rose across my arms. I swung my heavy-duty flashlight up, ticked it on.

  Ahead, on either side of me, stalks stirred and slashed at one another. I hightailed down the middle, keeping to the dirt path. Thomas’s pale form dashed in front of me and dove into the opposite row. Stalks snapped and broke in his attempt to hide.

  “Thomas!” A whisper at best, but I couldn’t risk giving away Thomas’ location to his pursuer, even if history was bound to replay over and over. I turned the flashlight off. Thomas’s ghost image bounced across my eye’s memory.