There Is a River

by Charlotte Miller

  Stephen had grown up, had gotten his degree from the University of Alabama, had sat for and passed the CPA exam, and had begun work for one of the big accounting firms in Birmingham when Buddy at last sent for him to come home that past winter. Stephen had spent very little time in Eason County until then, but Buddy needed him now. Buddy had no one else, and perhaps Stephen had no one either, though he had brought a woman with him when he first came to live with his grandfather.

  Andrea Greene and Stephen had been living together in Birmingham, but Buddy knew her intentions were to get her hooks permanently into his grandson—it had not taken a month before she packed her things to move back to Birmingham, and she had tried to make Stephen leave with her. She had not liked living in the huge old house with Stephen, his grandfather, and his grandfather’s nurses, and had accused Buddy of watching her dress and undress in the bedroom she shared with Stephen—she was right, though Buddy never admitted as much to his grandson, and Stephen never asked.

  He could still remember very clearly the day she left. She had packed her bags and put them in the downstairs hallway, had even called Buddy a “sick old pervert” to his face, which had sent Buddy into a fit of laughter, followed by a fit of coughing from which he had feared he would die.

  When he had been able to breathe again, the girl was pleading with his grandson to leave with her.

  “I can’t do that,” Stephen told her, though he would not meet her eyes.

  “Yes, you can. You have to.” Her voice was almost begging now. “If you stay here in this county, you’ll end up just like him, a sick, twisted—”

  “I think you’d better go.”

  “Stephen, please—” She was holding to his arm until Stephen shook her off.

  When she took up her bags and started for the door a few moments later, Buddy could not stop himself from saying what he was thinking.

  “You think what you’ve been doing for him is worth what he’d give up if he left here?—believe me, he can buy better. He can—”

  “That’s enough, Grandfather,” Stephen said, but Buddy had already reduced the girl to tears. She ran from the house, carrying her bags, and Stephen watched her go without saying another word.

  Buddy rented a house for his grandson shortly thereafter, moving Stephen out on his own. Stephen needed a place where he could indulge his pleasures—and his vices—without having an old man in the way. Buddy wanted to give him that, and Stephen would need it.

  He was Buddy Eason’s grandson, after all.

  Now Buddy was alone, except for the nurses, and the daily visits he demanded from his grandson. He had been alone for many years, though he had married again after Cassandra left. It had amused him to bring Adele Rustin here into the house that had once belonged to his grandfather. He often thought about the time she and the old man had stood face to face, the day Cassandra had given birth to the twins, that same day Buddy had risen from a tub to touch himself before his grandfather, calling Adele to him to—

  Buddy had married her, though he had never divorced Cassandra, or been able to find her to kill her, which he had thought about and dreamed over often through the years. Few people in Eason County knew he and Adele had actually married, though it was common knowledge that she lived in the huge house with him, and even that he had had Wally and Rachel call her “mother”—what a fit old Helene Price had pitched over that, striding back and forth in the wide hallway, calling Adele a whore, when her own daughter had been little better, telling Buddy what she “would not have.” Buddy hit her at last to shut her mouth, slapping her hard enough to send her to the floor. He had not allowed her in the house again after that, or allowed her to see her grandchildren.

  Adele had been sick by then, thought Buddy had not known it. She began to stumble, falling once down the main stairs in the house, which had broken her collar bone. Her walk developed a jerky movement. She lived in dark rooms, or slept through the days, saying sunlight hurt her eyes in a way that reminded Buddy of how his eyes now hurt in the daylight hours. She had taken at last to walking down Main Street at night wearing nothing but her step-ins, and he woke one morning to find her standing naked by the bed, a butcher knife in her hands and the blankets pulled back where she had already taken hold of his privates—Buddy sent her away to the mental hospital at Tuscaloosa after that. She died there shortly thereafter, and the doctors came to him, telling him she had untreated syphilis, asking if they had ever been intimate—Buddy broke a young doctor’s nose because he had dared to say Buddy could have the same disease that had driven Adele insane—

  And then years had passed and his own steps had begun to stumble, with shooting pains in his legs and back that finally put him in the wheelchair. Light hurt his eyes, and he had begun to lose his mind—

  Had lost—

  Buddy heard a car door slam, and he knew it was Stephen. His grandson walked into the room a few moments later, having let himself in the front door without knocking, and for once Buddy allowed himself to enjoy the look of the boy, to be reminded for a brief moment of how he had looked long years before, for the boy looked so much the same. Stephen Dawes had the same height and husky build, but at age twenty-four, as the boy was now, Buddy Eason had already begun to go to fat, while Stephen’s bulk was from muscle alone.

  The comparison brought realization to Buddy of the years that had passed since he had looked as his grandson did, of the pain in the recent years that had stabbed through his legs only to have settled in his gut, and of the hurting in his back and the unsteadiness of his step that had condemned him to the chair.

  And of how he now found himself at the mercy of the men who tended him.

  Buddy did not like thinking about the past, and he knew he would not be thinking about it now if not for a trip he had made in his van out to his grandson’s house the previous day. He had been going past the cemetery when he caught sight of an old man and woman walking among the graves. He had his driver stop the van and circle back, at last making the man drive through the narrow lanes between sections of the cemetery, and Buddy had been overtaken by such a fit of hatred that he began to wheeze and gasp for air and had to be taken back to his house—it had been Janson and Elise Sanders.

  They were old, as was he. He had seen them rarely in recent years, but he hated them as much as ever. The Sanders were the one unfinished thing in his life that he had to take care of before he died.

  “Don’t worry, Grandfather,” Stephen said, bringing a touch of satisfaction to Buddy with his words: “I’m here to take care of things now.”

  An absolute silence filled the Sanders kitchen that morning, a silence so deep that Joanna could hear the trucks passing along the highway several miles away. She stared at her father across the kitchen table, the napkin that had been in her lap a few moments earlier now gripped tightly and knotted in her hands—no, she would not believe it could be true.

  They had sat down to breakfast and she had been enjoying the biscuits she made that morning, as well as fried eggs and bacon her mother had prepared, and grits yellow with real butter—she had never eaten like this in Auburn. She could cook rather well, thanks to her mother, who thought the ability to cook was as important as the desire to eat, but in Auburn she had often had little time to prepare more than cereal and milk, juice, and the sausage links Katie loved. With having to get Katie up and dressed in the mornings, and herself ready for class, there had never seemed enough time in the mornings for the full-out Southern breakfast Joanna had grown up with.

  Now there would be time for many things. Now there would be no more tests, no more nights spent studying while Katie slept, no more worrying over every single penny in order to get through school. College was over now, and there was nothing ahead but years of doing what she had planned all her life, and of doing it here in the place that she loved more than any other place on earth.

  She gave only a brief moment’s thought to
the people she graduated with, now likely all scattered to the four winds with dipomas in hand, and she told herself that there were at least a few with whom she might like to stay in touch—they were all going to their own worlds now, to dreams they had worked toward through the years at Auburn. Some, she knew, had never known what they wanted to do with their lives, and there were quite a few who were in college only because it was what to do after high school, as well as a decent contingent of girls who had attended Auburn with no further plans than landing a “Mrs.” degree—but Joanna had always known what she would do. She had known she would return here, to the Sanders land, and that she would make this place successful in a way it had never been.

  Katie had been holding a silent conversation with a Barbie doll as she ate. The doll was seated with her legs straight out in front of her, her back against an AlaGa Syrup jar on the kitchen table. Joanna watched her, seeing Katie offer a bite of a strawberry preserve-smeared buttered biscuit to Barbie, then tilt her head to one side as she listened to the doll’s imaginary response, her eyes fixed on the wide-eyed stare. Joanna had noticed her father was talking little as she sat down to eat her own breakfast. He stared into his coffee cup, hunched over it where he was sitting at the other side of the table, the cup held with both his hands wrapped around its surface on the tabletop, looking almost as if he were reading his future there in what was left of his morning caffeine. Her grandfather was at the far end of the table, his eyes moving occasionally to Joanna’s father, and then to Joanna as he ate, as if he were waiting for something to happen between them. Grandma sat to his right at that end of the table, and Katie to his left. Joanna’s mother, who had been dieting for as long as Joanna could remember, though Joanna had never been able to tell if she ever lost or gained a pound, had quickly finished her Special K and two-percent milk, then nibbled at some eggs before she returned to the stove.

  At last, when Katie finished what she would of her eggs, and had eaten a biscuit with a slice of Velveeta cheese melted in it, and a few bites from the one that had been smeared with strawberry preserves, she left the room to go watch cartoons on television, and Joanna’s mother went with her. Joanna looked at her father where he sat still staring into his coffee cup, her eyes moving from the cup in his hands to the almost-untouched plate that he had pushed aside. She brought her eyes back to her own plate, to the eggs that now looked slimy, and grits that had hardened into lumps that she could lift with her fork, and she knew that something was wrong.

  “I was thinking I would make a reservation for a couple of rooms in Tifton for tomorrow night,” her father was saying, and Joanna wondered when it was that he had begun to speak the words, for she could not remember now how they had started. “You remember Isaac Betts, Reverend Betts’s brother? He and one of his sons just bought a place over in Tift County, in Georgia, and he knows you just finished at Auburn. I believe he wants to talk to you about coming to work for him.”

  For a moment, Joanna could only stare at her father—yes, she knew Mr. Betts. He was one of her father’s oldest friends, and his brother, Andrew, was the pastor of one of the churches in Pine, as well as the founder of a food program for the poor in Eason County, to which the Sanders had often donated fresh vegetables and other foods, as well as their time. She had seen Isaac and Andrew Betts a few months before when the Sanders family attended Nathan Betts’s funeral, and had never been so touched by anything as she had been by Andrew Betts’s eulogy for his father, and the rendition of “Amazing Grace” sung by Isaac Betts, as well as the sight of Isaac and Andrew standing at either side of their mother, Esther, supporting her to keep her on her feet as their father was laid to rest—but she could not believe what her father was suggesting. He knew that she intended to stay here. He knew she had always intended to stay here—she looked around the room, at her grandmother now staring down at her own, almost-untouched plate, at her grandfather, whose fading green eyes were set on her in return—they knew what she had planned. They all knew. She had made no secret throughout her life of what she intended, and she could not believe that any of them would think she would consider leaving this land.

  She looked back to her father, to see him lift his eyes from his coffee cup at last to look at her. There was a determined expression on his face. And something also that seemed undeniably sad.

  “Joanna, things haven’t been good here for years now,” he was saying, staring at her. His voice was kind, but his words were not—she did not want to hear this. “There was equipment we had to replace last year, and some the year before. Expenses have all been going up, and the money’s just not coming in. We’ve been losing ground steady for several years—and it’s not just us. Most every farmer in the county is in the same shape, or even worse. Malcolm Gates, from over the other side of Wiley, lost his place last month; the Brimleys are being auctioned next week, and Joe Cagle just got his foreclosure papers—”

  “We haven’t—” She gripped the napkin tightly in her lap beneath the table—not us; not here. Not the land she where she had grown up, the home she had lived in all her life, the place where she had hoped Katie would grow to be a woman. “We haven’t—” She could not finish the sentence, could not even allow herself to consider the thought.

  “Not yet.”

  “But, if we have a good year, we could—”

  He shook his head. “We haven’t had a year that good in a long time.”

  “We could cut expenses, and get an extension on—”

  He was shaking his head again. “There won’t be any more extensions, and we already owe more on this place than it’s worth.”

  “But, there has to be something we can do. We can’t just—”

  “There’s nothing we can do,” her father said, his face resolved, and the silence had descended as Joanna’s hands knotted the napkin in her lap.

  Nothing—but she would not believe that. There had to be something. There had to be—she had thought about this place for too long, dreamed about it, planned—there had to be.

  “I won’t believe there is nothing we can do.”

  The sound of her own voice surprised her, for it was so calm, so assured, so far removed from the hands clenching the tortured napkin beneath the kitchen table.

  “We can’t just give up. We haven’t been foreclosed on yet. Maybe—”

  “Joanna, you can’t live your life on maybe. You’ve got your degree, and you ought to put it to use. The Betts have a fine setup over there—”

  “That’s not what I want.”

  “You can’t just stay here and hope things work out. He’s not going to hold that job open for you. We’ll still lose this place, and you won’t have anyplace to go.”

  “How can you just give up?” she shouted, rising from her chair. “You’ve worked this place for forty years. Grandpa worked it, and so did his father. How can you just give up and let someone—”

  Her father’s fist slammed down on the table top, making the plates and cups jump on its surface, and sending her into silence.

  “I haven’t given up anything!” he yelled back. He rose, shoving his chair back, to stand glaring at her. “They’ll carry me off this place when they come to—”

  His words stopped as he stared at her. He was breathing heavily, his shoulders tensed and raised, and Joanna could see what he must have been like as a young man—he was filled with rage, and it seemed an emotion familiar to him.

  He seemed slowly to regain control. His muscles visibly relaxed, his shoulders dropped. He stood with the fingertips of one hand resting on the table before him, his eyes still on her.

  “You can’t just hang on here, hoping it will work out. You’ve got your future ahead of you; you can’t just throw it away.”

  “My future is here,” she said. “I’m a Sanders, and this is my land.”

  Her father seemed unable to do anything but stare at her, then Joanna turned at last and crossed
the room to go toward the door. The knotted cloth napkin was still clenched in her hands.

  Janson stared at the door his granddaughter had gone through for a long time that morning. He could hear his son drag his chair forward before he sat down on it heavily. Then Henry shoved his coffee cup on its saucer away, making a rattling, scraping sound on the tabletop. Henry was grumbling just at the level of hearing, seeming to be afraid now that someone in another room of the house might hear what he had to say, when he had been shouting loud enough to be heard in the yard only a moment before.

  “Damn stubborn girl—throwing her future away. She’s got that child to think about. She can’t stay here trying to hold onto a dream when it’s already been lost. Damn stubborn—”

  “Did you really think she’d go?” Janson asked.

  Henry lifted his eyes to return Janson’s stare.

  “My folks risked everythin’ t’ have this place. Me an’ your ma worked years t’ get it back, an’ you fought t’ stay here—did you really think she’d just leave?” he asked again. “She’s a Sanders, just like th’ rest ’a us.”

  “Your pa died trying to hold onto this place,” Henry said slowly. “Buddy Eason almost killed you, and he had me beaten almost to death trying to take this place away from us—”

  “Joanna’s a Sanders,” Janson said, and he felt Elise’s hand come to rest on his, though he did not turn to look at her. He knew she understood, whether their son did or not.

  “Joanna’s th’ same as you or me,” he said, never taking his eyes from their son. “She’d die before she gives up this land.”