by Watt Key
I hugged him and cried into his shirt.
37
It wasn’t until Mother stood over us that I realized the sound of the men talking had stopped. She touched my shoulder, but I didn’t move. Finally she nudged me and I rolled over and looked at her. She was holding a box of dental floss and a sewing needle.
“I need to see his arm, Foster.”
I scooted to the end of the bed. I thought she would tell me to leave, but she didn’t. She sat down beside him and crossed her legs and started to gently peel off the duct tape. He stared at the ceiling fan.
“I don’t know anything about this,” she said.
“There’s not much to it,” he replied. “I’ve already cleaned it.”
“Tell me if I hurt you.”
He glanced at the arm, then looked at me, then looked at the ceiling fan again. “Dax poisoned the dog,” he said. “I went to talk to him about it. Things got out of hand.”
She got the tape off and unfolded the towel. I saw her face go ashen. She swallowed and looked away and fumbled with the dental floss.
“You can’t worry about hurting me,” he said. “You’ve just got to sew it up before I lose any more blood.”
“Go get another towel, Foster,” she said.
I got up and went into her bathroom to get a towel.
“You shouldn’t have taken him,” I heard her say.
“I know. I shouldn’t have … I didn’t expect it to go like it did.”
“Should I be scared?”
“Of Dax?”
I didn’t hear her reply.
“We don’t need to worry about him for a while,” he said. “He’s in pretty bad shape.”
I came back with the towel and gave it to her. The cut was separating and blood rose into the valley of the cut like a spring boil. She put the towel under it and began threading the needle.
“I’m going to see it through,” he said. “It’ll be all right.”
She held the needle and thread over his arm and studied the wound. She took a deep breath.
“Start near my wrist,” he said. “I think it’s deepest there.”
“What if it cut something important?” she said. “What if there’s something in there that needs to be fixed?”
“I can make a fist. I think everything works.”
“Okay,” she said. “Here I go.”
She leaned over and closed the lip of the wound with her fingers. Blood ran over the sides of his arm. She glanced at him, but his face held no expression. She ran the needle through and pulled the floss to the knot at the end. He didn’t flinch.
“All right?” she asked.
“Keep going.”
She ran the needle through again and pulled the first suture snug. Then she had more confidence and made steady progress up the arm.
“How did it happen?” she asked.
“He stabbed at me with a hunting arrow. I tried to grab it and it slid through my hands.”
She winced and kept working. Eventually there was what looked like a tiny, waxy white railroad track in a mess of blood. Then she took the edge of the towel and blotted most of it clean.
“Go get some alcohol, Foster,” she said.
“I think we used it all.”
“I’ve got a brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide in my bathroom drawer. Go get that.”
I left again.
“What makes you so sure he won’t come tonight, Gary?” I heard her ask.
“I ripped some wires out of his truck and cut his phone line. It’s going to take him a while to crawl up that dirt road and get some help.”
“Crawl?”
“I beat him senseless,” he said with no remorse. “I had to stop myself. I wanted to kill him.”
Silence.
“He’s got friends,” she said.
“I’ve seen them.”
I returned with the bottle. She poured a thin line down the track of sutures and it rose and bubbled white. After a few seconds she dabbed it dry and got up and went into the bathroom. I heard the sink come on and in a minute she came back wiping her hands on a washcloth.
“Okay.” She sighed. “What next?”
“Go get my pistol, Foster.”
I looked at Mother and she moved her chin for me to go on. I left the room and went outside into a twilight that was quieter than any I remembered. Kabo rose from the back stoop and looked at me with a question. I reached down and scratched him behind the ears. “He’s all right, boy,” I said. Then it hit me that Joe was gone. And it seemed like something that had happened a long time ago—something that wasn’t even real. But the pain of it was so mixed in with everything else that it fell flat and was impossible to dwell on.
I got the pistol out of his pack and brought it back to him. Mother was still standing where I’d left her and I could tell they’d been talking about something. I put the pistol on the bed and he reached across his stomach and took it.
“Let’s go, Foster,” Mother said. “Gary needs to rest.”
38
I followed her into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator and started pulling out leftovers. “Go into your room and pack some clothes,” she said. “We’re going to Granddaddy’s tonight.”
“What?”
She straightened and looked at me. “You heard what I said, Foster. Please just do what I say. I’m really tired.”
I slowly shook my head.
“Foster,” she warned, “now’s not the time for this.”
“We’re not leaving him here like that.”
“Go pack your clothes,” she said again.
“He won’t be here when we get back.”
“Yes he will.”
“No he won’t! And you know it!”
She took a step toward me. I turned and bolted out the back door.
“Foster!” she yelled.
I kept running until I was in front of the barn and turned and walked backward, facing the house. She stood in the doorway watching me. She rubbed her hand over her face with frustration. I turned and went through the bay doors and lay down in the dirt next to his pack. Kabo trotted up and settled next to me and whined from deep in his throat. The refrigerator clacked and hummed from the far corner and the moths darted about the overhead bulb. It was so empty.
“Daddy,” I said. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t wanna leave you. I don’t know if you’re still here.”
But there was nothing except the whisper of a light breeze in the pecan orchard and the grit against my face.
“I just want you to come back,” I said. “That’s all I want.”
* * *
It rained that night and a breeze swept cool mist through the bay doors. I was so wound up that I couldn’t sleep. I kept opening my eyes and watching the house, Kabo breathing heavily beside me. The lights in the kitchen were still on, but I hadn’t seen her pass the window.
Finally, I must have slept. I woke later that night to Kabo whining and standing up. Mother was hurrying across the yard with a rain jacket over her head. I’d thought she wouldn’t come after me. She hadn’t been in the barn in a year.
I sat up and crossed my legs and waited for her. She stepped inside and lowered the rain jacket and studied me. I didn’t say anything.
She looked around and saw a nail on the wall and went and hung the jacket on it. Then she turned and looked around again.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve been in here,” she said.
“I know.”
She walked over and sat down beside me. Kabo resettled in his spot and she petted him with her other hand.
“It smells like his clothes in here,” she said.
“I know.”
“Gary said you took him to the ravine today.”
I nodded. “We buried Joe back there.”
She didn’t say anything for a moment. “I miss him too, Foster,” she said. “I don’t know when it stops.”
“I don’t think it does,” I said.
&nbs
p; “I just wish I had the answer to a lot of things.”
“Nobody has the answers,” I said.
“You can’t want to stay here,” she said. “He’s just not here now.”
“But Gary is.”
She looked at me and sighed. “I told you not to get attached to him. I told you he was leaving.”
“You got attached to him.”
She looked away.
“You know he’s in trouble,” I said. “And you let him stay.”
“I don’t know any more about him than you, Foster.”
“Why won’t he see doctors? Why is he scared of the police? He looks around all the time like people are after him.”
She looked at Kabo and didn’t answer me.
“Why?” I asked again.
“I don’t know,” she finally said. “I keep thinking tomorrow’s the day he’ll be gone. And I can stop thinking about him. I don’t trust my decisions these days, Foster.”
“I don’t want to go to Montgomery,” I said. “I won’t. Not yet.”
“Well, it’s too late to leave now. But Gary says you can’t stay out here tonight.”
“He’s awake?”
“He was. But he’s probably asleep again and you’re not going to bother him.”
“Does he think Dax’ll come tonight?”
She shook her head. “He doesn’t think so. But the barn’s no place to be if he does.”
“Mother?”
“Yes.”
“Why can’t we just fix it all?”
She pulled me close and rocked against me. “I’m trying, Foster. I’m trying.”
39
I woke in my bed the next morning to the smell of bacon cooking. The storm had moved on and sunlight came softly through the curtains and fell over my face. I heard Mother on the phone, telling the post office that she wasn’t going to come in that day. I got out of bed, walked down the hall, and peered into her room. Gary cocked his eyes at me and smiled his crooked smile.
“Morning,” he said.
I opened the door and walked to the bed and sat on it. His arm was wrapped in gauze strips and a line of blood showed through. “Does it still hurt?” I asked him.
“Yeah,” he said.
“How long are you going to have to lie here?”
“You ready to get back to work?” he joked.
I smiled weakly. “No. I just wondered.”
“What’d I tell you about doing what your mother says?”
I looked at my hands and didn’t answer him.
“Hey,” he said.
I looked at him.
“I told her you needed to get out of town last night.”
“I’m not going,” I said.
He studied me for moment. Then, for the first time, it was him that turned away. He looked at the ceiling. “Thanks for showing me your tree fort yesterday, Foster.”
“I was fine because you were with me.”
He looked at me again. “You were fine because there’s nothing to be scared of. You get scared of life and it’s got you beat.”
“Sometimes I wonder if our cows know how close they are to where they used to live.”
He watched me.
“They probably like having the mules,” I said. “We never had mules.”
He listened patiently.
“Mules chase coyotes away from the calves.”
“I didn’t know that.”
I nodded. “They hate coyotes. That’s why farmers have them.”
“Sounds like a good place to be for a cow.”
“Yeah,” I said.
“I smell bacon,” he said. “Been a while since I’ve had breakfast in bed.”
“When does your blood grow back?”
“Couple of weeks. Maybe a month.”
My eyes widened.
He smiled. “I won’t be in bed that long,” he said. “I’m going to get up and walk around some today. Just might be a little dizzy for a while.”
“I can paint until you’re better.”
“It’ll wait,” he said. “Why don’t you go out to the barn and get the rest of my things and bring them inside. Put them in your room.”
“Okay,” I said.
“That pack’s pretty heavy.”
I got up to leave. “I can get it,” I said.
* * *
I walked into the barn and saw Kabo lying next to Gary’s pack. I got some of Joe’s dog food and poured it into his bowl and made the clicking sound. I could tell he’d lost some of his spirit too. He got up and slunk to the bowl with his head down. He looked at it then looked up at me again.
“I know, boy,” I said. “Me too.”
I gathered Gary’s things and put them into the pack. I hefted it onto my shoulder and staggered toward the house with it. After I got it to my room, I went back to the kitchen, where Mother had bacon and eggs and biscuits ready. She fixed a plate for me and a TV tray for Gary. She knew what I was thinking.
“Let him eat in peace, Foster,” she said.
I took my plate to the dining room table and watched her disappear with Gary’s tray. In a few minutes she came back to the kitchen and started cleaning up. I finished eating and took my plate and eased it around her into the sink.
“I took off work,” she said. “I can’t leave you here with him like that.”
“Dax’ll try to kill him.”
She turned to me. “If Dax tries to come over, then I can call the police and have him arrested.”
“Then we can’t leave. We have to watch for him.”
She studied me for a moment then turned back to the sink.
“No reason we need to stay cooped up in this house all day,” I heard Gary say.
We both turned and saw him leaning against the wall. His face was pale and his bandaged arm hung limp and swollen at his side.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Little light-headed. Like I’ve got a blowtorch on my arm.”
“Maybe you should rest some more,” she said.
“If you can wrap it in a plastic bag for me I think a soak in the creek might get my fever down.”
“I can fix a bath for you.”
“A little sunshine and fresh air wouldn’t hurt either.”
“You don’t think we should be here?”
He hesitated and gave her a long look. “I think it’d do us all some good to get away for the day.”
40
I loaded Kabo in the truck, feeling the stab of Joe’s memory once again. But it was like a loss that was partly on hold while something bigger hung over me. I slammed the tailgate and blocked it away.
I drove around to the front of the house and saw Mother coming out, holding Gary by his good arm. He didn’t seem to need the help, but took it anyway. I scooted over and opened the door for him, and Mother waited until he’d eased himself onto the seat. Once he was settled she shut the door and went back inside. She came back a moment later with an ice cooler and a cloth bag and put them in back with Kabo. Then she got behind the wheel and studied the column shifter and smiled like there was something she’d been holding back. “Been a while since I’ve driven one of these,” she said.
“Want to help her out, Foster?”
I leaned over and started to grab the gear lever.
“Now, hold on,” she said. “I was driving these things ten years before you were born.”
“I’ve never seen you,” I said.
“Well, sit back in your seat. I used to do more than wash dishes and sort mail.”
I looked at Gary and he stared ahead and smiled.
She could drive it. We sputtered and jerked in the driveway, but once she got on the blacktop, she was working through the gears as good as anybody I’d seen. It was just cloudy enough so that large shadows eased across the pastureland and the morning alternated between sunlight and shadow. It felt good to leave Fourmile. It felt good to let go of it all and put it down for just a little while. I was getting tired now. Tired of thin
king about everything. Tired of clinging to everything.
* * *
She spread a blanket on the creek bank and Gary eased himself onto it. She sat next to him and got a garbage bag and taped it over his arm. I sucked in my stomach and crossed my arms and waded into the creek. When I turned, Gary was sliding on his rear into the shallows. He came to rest with his good elbow propped on tree roots and the water swirling around his torso.
“Far as I go today,” he said.
“Feels good,” I lied.
He laid his head back and looked into the cool canopy of the evergreens. Kabo walked up behind him and settled down just above his head.
“I’m going to catch a fish,” I said.
“Get dinner for us,” he replied.
I lowered my arms and started wading downstream. I hadn’t gone far when I felt loneliness creeping over me. I slowed and studied the shaded tunnel of juniper and cypress curving out of sight. Suddenly I didn’t want to go and I stopped and looked back. I couldn’t see them behind the trees. I was ashamed. I stepped over to the edge of the creek bank and sat down in the shallows and wedged myself between two cypress trees. A breeze rustled overhead and their voices came clear over the gurgling water.
“Would you tell me if I asked?” she said.
He didn’t reply right away. Then I heard him say, “No.”
“Do I want to know?”
“You don’t need to be scared of me,” he said. “It’s nothing for you to be scared of.”
“I’m not scared of you. Not in that way.”
He didn’t answer.
“What do you think will happen to you?” she finally said.
“I don’t know.”
“Was it just a mistake?”
“No, it wasn’t a mistake. I knew what I was doing.”
“But you’re a good person.”
“Am I? Why did I stay? If I was such a good person, I would have left.”
“You know why,” she said.
“You could go to prison, Linda.”
No one spoke for a moment. For the first time I wondered where Mother had slept the night before.
“I just needed somebody,” she said. “I didn’t know he was like that.”
“You’ve got some bad luck when it comes to men.”
“Foster’s dad was as good as they come. He always did the right thing. I don’t consider any part of him bad luck.”