Triptych

by J. M. Frey

  “I know what you meant,” Mark said. He walked away, back to the other side of the barn and Basil wondered if this was supposed to be an exercise in futile movement rather than the torture of physical labour. So far all they’d done was pace. “You’re willin’ to fight me back, that’s what’s important.”

  “I, well, uh…yeah,” Basil said, his usual verboseness stymied in the face of Mark’s natural stoic demeanour. For the first time in his life it felt rather foolish to be so wordy. Basil debated whether or not to follow Mark back to the far side of the barn, warily eyeing the rear ends of the cows and their slapping tails, their powerfully heavy hind feet. But none of them seemed to be kicking Mark. Basil shrugged and followed. He watched the cows carefully, though, for any signs that they thought it would be fun to play kick-the-Welshman. It wasn’t like the walking would be bad for him — he could do with burning off a few extra calories, especially if Evvie was thinking of serving them that strawberry rhubarb pie Basil had spotted cooling on the counter in the kitchen.

  He did like that about Gwen’s parents being rural. Fresh pie. Mmm.

  Everything Basil’s mother had served when Gwen first met her had come from a shop. Not that Basil was embarrassed that his mother couldn’t cook — it was really rather better that she just not try at all, especially on a day when Basil wanted to impress his then-girlfriend — just that he felt a bit cheated of a staple childhood memory. Everyone’s mother is supposed to be able to cook better than one’s wife, and well…Basil would have taken Gwen’s cooking over his mother’s any day. Basil would have taken fast food over his mother’s, honestly, which was probably why he fancied the chippy down on the corner of their street so much. Probably also why his tummy wasn’t quite as toned as the other Specialists’, who had to do just as many laps around the gym as he every morning. Luckily, Gwen found his beer-pooch cute.

  Mark stooped to lift two pitchforks — actual, honest-to-god pitchforks! — and tossed one in Basil’s general direction. He managed to catch it out of the air, but just barely. His hands were made for writing equations and finagling electronic systems, not so much for catching things. Fine motor skills, Basil excelled at. He was a wiz at the art of the video game controller. Gross, not so much.

  Without a word, Mark turned to the first stall to his left, prodded the cow inside gently on the hip, inciting it to move over, which it did with no more than an ear flick, and went in for the first paddy.

  “Oh, no,” Basil said miserably. “Seriously?”

  “Either this or we send ‘em to the field and do the whole stall.”

  Mark lifted his pitchfork and emptied its congealed burden into a waiting wheelbarrow. The bin of it was already crusted with proof that it had been used for this purpose for many, many years. Basil debated holding his breath against the pungent warmth of the stink, but that would require sucking in a big one to start with — if it was through his nose, he would smell it, and if it was through his mouth, he would taste…

  Gagging slightly, Basil pulled the collar of his tee-shirt up over his nose with a delicate pluck, cursing himself for wearing the one with the thready holes along the seam, and turned to nudge his own cow out of the way.

  The stubborn thing didn’t move.

  “Oi!” Basil said, poking it harder. “Shift.”

  The cow, a great spotted black and white beastie, craned its neck to stare at Basil over its shoulder. Basil thought cow eyes were supposed to be big and wet and docile, but this one looked annoyed. It chewed ominously.

  “Say, uh, Mark,” Basil started.

  Mark looked up over the back of his own cow and frowned.

  Basil hastily muttered, “Never mind.”

  Reaching carefully around the cow’s legs with the tines, Basil set to work. The cow pats were heavier than he expected, and before long he started to sweat. Basil didn’t relish the idea of rubbing at his forehead with gloved hands or arms that had brushed cows, so he let the salt sting his eyes and frowned. He looked over. Mark wasn’t sweating at all.

  Bastard.

  “So,” Basil said, trying to break the monotony of the repetitive action of stooping and scooping, filling the silence the only way he knew how: chatter. The top of his shoulders and the bottom of his spine were already starting to pull and ache. “Uh…so, it…I guess that’s it, innit?”

  Mark grunted, and Basil fancied he heard a question mark at the end of the sound.

  If he didn’t, he was going to keep talking anyway. The silence was slightly eerie. “I mean, for thirty years you’ve known, more or less, what the future held. Gwen was gonna grow up, be Fall Fair Queen, do her Masters, lie and get in a fight with you, and travel back in time. And that’s it. Now all of that’s over, and the future is just… blank.”

  Mark grunted again, this time in affirmative.

  “It would drive me bonkers,” Basil admitted. “I like knowing what’s coming.”

  “Who says I don’t know?” Mark asked, turning for a moment to readjust the position of the wheelbarrow closer to the new stall he was moving to.

  Basil gawped. “What, have you had more visitors? Did we come back and bug you again?”

  Mark grinned mischievously and waggled a glove-clad finger. “Temporal Time Directive.”

  Basil’s mouth fell open, then he scowled. “You’re putting me on, aren’t you?”

  Mark said nothing, only bent again to his task, his shoulders shaking with something that Basil suspected was suppressed laughter.

  “No, seriously, it doesn’t bother you?”

  Mark sighed and paused again. “Bay-zil, I’ve never known the future. I’ve known a couple things, but your trip back didn’t tell me everything. Gwennie was in a car accident once, you know that? Busted her knee. Thought she was gonna die.”

  “You weren’t sure that the future we’d come from would happen?” Basil asked, following Mark’s logic to its endpoint.

  Mark shook his head. “After that, we just took it as it came. ‘S what I’ll do now.”

  Basil nodded to himself. It made sense, of course. Yes, Basil would be going bananas, but not Mark. Not solid, steady Mark. Mark, who was making him do a shitty job to repay an equally shitty video player.

  Basil groaned.

  By the fourth stall, the small of Basil’s back ached sharply and his palms were sore, and he’d let the tee-shirt drop back onto his chest because it was just making him hotter, breathing into his own clothing. He could see the damp vee forming down the front of his chest and stomach. Mark, on the opposite side of the concrete walkway that ran between the two rows of stalls, had finished nearly ten more stalls than Basil and had already gone outside to empty the wheelbarrow twice. Basil wanted to be the one to take it outside, get the breeze and the fresh air, but then he’d just have to turn right back around and come inside to the close, damp stink, so maybe it was better to stay here, where he was getting accustomed to the smell. Besides, it looked heavy. Even Mark grunted when he lifted the handles.

  Basil stood straight and popped his back, the vertebrae snapping satisfactorily all along his spine. He was going to have to beg Gwen for a massage tonight. She’d learned a wonderful technique for getting at the knots that Basil cultivated under his shoulder blades from Kalp and —

  Oh.

  Basil cupped the top of the pitchfork handle with both hands and rested his chin on top. Kalp would have loved the farm. The low steady thrum of the machinery, the slow pattering of cow hearts, the relaxed lows that sometimes broke the air. The whole barn felt lazy and comfortable. Basil could see Kalp right there, standing at the end of the row, crouched down to stare into the face of a heifer and her calf, stroking his finger pads down a long, velvety nose, smiling fit to split his face open when the calf sucked on the hem of his shirt…

  Kalp would have liked cows.

  Kalp would have liked Mark, too, Basil thought. And vice versa. Men of few words, both of them, but communicative all the same, sure and steady and expr
essive in their slow movement. Kalp had always been able to make himself understood, even if he hadn’t the words for what he wanted to say. Mark seemed that way, too.

  A soft smile tugged at Basil’s mouth as he conjured an image of Kalp and Mark holding an entire conversation solely in eyebrow waggles.

  Kalp’s ears had always reminded Basil of a cat’s; that made Basil wonder if there were any fresh litters of kittens in the loft. Kalp would have liked the cats, would have twitched his ears in time and learned to purr in an effort to communicate with the queenly creatures.

  Maybe Gwen would like to take a cat back with them — something to put another heartbeat in the house. Wood had kept the chickens, in the end, and it felt too empty in the house.

  A cat might be good for them, something small and vulnerable, something that needed…taking care of. Something just theirs.

  Mark moved over to the next stall, rubbing an affectionate hand across the rump of the inhabitant as he passed, calm and gentle. Gwen rubbed Basil’s shoulders like that, used to rub Kalp’s head with the same affectionate motion. For a moment, Basil allowed himself to be miffed that she stroked him like she stroked a cow, but decided to be flattered by it instead.

  “Not done yet, Baz,” Mark said without looking up.

  Basil jumped, startled by the sound of a human voice cutting through the gentle calm of the quiet barn. “Oh, I…uh, just needed a break for a second, eh?”

  Now that Basil had spent so many hours lifting and pushing, the muscles in his back and arms, while still sore, seemed to be shifting easier, stretching and pulling with a burn that was starting to feel kind of nice.

  Endorphins, Basil decided. Endorphins rocked.

  By the time Basil made it to the end of the row, Mark had already finished his side and gone along a third aisle by the cows’ heads, breaking up bales of hay and balling up all the twine that had bound them. Mark had shoved all of the twine into a hole in the cement wall that was already filled with more of the same from previous feedings. He pulled a handkerchief out of his other pocket and wiped his face and arms with it. Basil glared at the handkerchief covetously.

  “So, I’ve been thinking,” Basil started quietly, and Mark blinked and nodded, encouraging him to go on. “Why all this talk about me and Gwen and marriage today?”

  Mark’s mouth slid upwards at one corner. “Evvie and me, we were talkin’ about it last night. About Aglunates and stuff, and wonderin’ if it was still official. That’s all.”

  Basil stripped off a glove and rubbed the back of his neck free of gritty sweat, and then put the glove back on, just in case Mark was going to send him off to do another torturous chore. Oh God, what if he wanted Basil to do the milking next?

  “It is official,” Basil said. “I mean, on paper and all, Gwen and I are husband and wife, even though we’re both…uh…widows. It’s no different from, um, a husband dying before his…his wife. They’re still married, you know…sort of.”

  Mark shrugged. “We wondered if Kalp dyin’ — an’ I’m sorry, I know you guys both…well, I know.” He didn’t seem to be able to say it — that you loved him — but Basil forgave him that small thing. What did vocalizing it matter, anyway?

  Then Mark shoved his handkerchief back into his pocket and ambled in the direction of the open door that led out into the paddock. Basil followed at a small distance, just in case another pitchfork was about to come flying at him. Instead, he found Mark waiting in the sunshine just on the other side of the rickety fence.

  Basil scrambled over a set of narrow wooden steps that had long ago dried into greyness, and stood beside Mark. He scratched his chin with the back of the glove.

  “We assumed it was still on,” Basil added, because he didn’t feel like he had really explained enough in the barn, a habit left over from grad school, where any silence was treated as one last chance to make the evaluator understand his brilliance. “But I guess we should go check to be sure. Go wait in line at the government office, yeah?”

  Mark shrugged again. “Yeah,” he said, which Basil thought meant “you’re welcome.” “C’ept, you know, Evvie was wonderin’…”

  Basil groaned.

  “She’d just like to see her daughter’s wedding, is all,” Mark said softly. “It was hard, you know — watchin’ her on TV, know’n what she was doin’ with her life and not…bein’ there to help. I’d, uh…wouldn’t mind givin’ away my girl, neither.”

  Basil narrowed his eyes. “You want us to have a wedding?”

  Mark nodded once, firmly, as if he’d said everything in the world worth saying, and moved towards the house with that swinging, slow and proprietary stride with which he seemed to stalk his land. Over his shoulder, when Basil failed to follow, he added:

  “M’ sure your family would ‘preciate it, too.”

  Well, yes, Basil conceded, speeding up to walk in step with Mark. His sisters and mother had been a bit put out to learn that Basil had gone and gotten married without a wedding for them to fuss over. Not even so much as a celebratory bridal shower. It was just that Aglunate ceremonies were only attended by the participants and an officiate, and they had wanted Kalp to feel comfortable. They had wanted to keep his customs alive.

  But Kalp was gone.

  And maybe, yes, maybe Basil wanted to marry Gwen, too. It was true, Basil was that guy, the one who wanted the picket fence and the cats and the babies. He wanted to play ball in the yard and curl up with his wife on the sofa and do the dishes after dinner. This was something he wanted, the affectionate curl of warmth in his chest when he realized just how damn much he loved Gwen, the stupid grins, the silly fights. He wanted it. He wanted it proper.

  They had a house. They could get kittens. They could adopt a child. Maybe Ogilvy’s.

  They could get married.

  It would be nice, a ceremony with a party, a chance to show his family and friends how freaking awesome his wife was (still mostly in the biblical sense, there, too). Something to take their minds off of the hurt, the big gap that had been left between then. Something special and joyous and for them. Something to celebrate Gwen and Basil.

  Just Gwen and Basil.

  They would never forget Kalp, of course, but…he wasn’t here.

  And they were.

  Mark and Basil came around a corner of the house, and were met with a window that looked into the kitchen. Basil suspected that Mark had done this on purpose, but was too stunned by the sight of Gwen — her arms wrapped hard around her mother’s shoulders, crying into her neck — to say as much. Evvie Pierson had one hand in Gwen’s hair, the other smoothing up and down the hitching length of her daughter’s spine. They were still seated at the table, pie and tea and a jumble of papers all around them. Evvie pulled back and the tips of her fingers brushed the edge of the lingering bruise on Gwen’s cheek, a keepsake from Aitken’s effective blackjack.

  “Yeah,” Basil said softly, eyes riveted. “Yeah, I guess it’s a good idea, innit? I should propose.”

  “Okay,” Mark said. Then he pulled one of his gloves off with his teeth — Basil gagged again — and jammed it into yet another pocket. Out of the same, he pulled a small object. “You could use this,” he said. Splaying work-calloused and dirt-lined fingers open, he revealed his treasure. It was a small maroon velveteen box, incongruously luxurious looking in Mark’s rough-worn palm. “That would pay me back.”

  “I…you!” Basil spluttered and tore his gaze from the reconciliation going on in the house. “You!”

  “I?”

  “You…the payment is the proposal, innit?”

  “Sure.”

  Basil stripped off his gloves and slapped them down on the lawn under his feet. “So I’ve been sloughing through cow shit for your sheer amusement?!”

  “Yup.”

  “Sonofa — !” Basil started, but then he remembered who he was talking to. The man who was asking Basil to marry his daughter. To heal the hurt of a whole family. And offer
ing a ring to do it with. “Fine then,” he huffed, reaching out and snatching at the box, even as he said “Ta.” Basil pushed open the stiff hinges, and Mark dropped his free hand back into his pocket.

  “Whoa,” Basil said, staring at the cluster of small blue and white. “That’s flash. Real sapphires?”

  “Yup. Was my mother’s,” Mark said, and now he finally sounded sheepish. “It was supposed to go to Gwennie, but then she ran off to…teach aliens n’ stuff, n’ I thought…she should have it, you know? And you’re already with her, so you know, it should be you, I reckon. Seems sorta fair. Gwen Grey — sounds nice, yeah?”

  It was the longest stretch of words Basil had heard Mark utter yet, and from his downcast, anxious eyes, the firm line of his mouth, it was a stretch he’d been practicing.

  “Yeah, okay,” Basil said. Something warm and wonderful was blossoming in his chest, an affectionate feeling of finally being welcomed to the family.

  Inside the house, Evvie leaned back and raised a thumb to clear her daughter’s tears off of her cheeks. They smiled at each other, broken and awkward, but genuine. Trusting.

  Trying.

  “One thing, though…” Basil said, snapping the ring case shut with a sharp click. He grinned, because he was about to be cheeky. “What if I don’t want to?”

  Mark looked back up, eyes devilish and mouth pulled wide with little-boy mischief once again. “I’ve still got that shotgun.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  J.M. Frey holds a BA in Dramatic Literature, where she studied playwriting and traditional Japanese theatre forms, and a Masters of Communications and Culture, where she focused on fanthropology. She is an active in the Toronto geek community, presenting at awards ceremonies, appearing on TV, radio, podcasts, live panels and documentaries to discuss all things fandom through the lens of Academia. She loves to travel (disguising it as research), and has visited nearly every continent. She also has addictions to scarves, Doctor Who, and tea, all of which may or may not be related.