He went outside and made a pretense of checking his mail. Greg leaned on his rake and waved. Daniel raised a hand in return.
“Sunday, you know,” Greg said, leaning the rake against the fence and taking off his gloves. “No mail. I guess you know that already. So, people across the way, eh? Think they’ll take the place?”
Daniel tried to look only mildly interested. “Oh. Maybe. Be good if they do. She could get on with her life.”
Greg made a birdlike motion with his head. “They’re coming out.”
They stopped on the porch and looked the windows over, then stood on the lawn looking at the mailbox. The woman shook her head and pointed and their voices went up and down. Daniel wondered what they were saying. He could only catch one word in twenty. He shifted his gaze to Ellie, seated on the porch. She looked as calm as anything, but he knew any calmness she had was hard-won. He smiled at her and held a hand up in a low wave. She nodded back carefully, like her head might fall off if she wasn’t extremely cautious about it.
“Looks like they got kids,” Greg said. “See the stickers in the window? Two kids.”
Daniel looked. Family stick-figure stickers lined the side window. Two adults, two kids. “And a dog, looks like.”
“Is that a dog? Guess you’re right. Well. Hope it doesn’t bark all the time.”
Daniel muttered his agreement. He hoped so too: God alone knew how much. “We don’t know if they’re buying, anyway. Maybe just looking.” People had been in and out of the house all week, mostly brief visits, mostly just looking. Lookie-lous, just like at the yard sale. Ellie had hated them. She hated them all.
This couple seemed serious, though. The way the man knelt by the mailbox to look at the sidewalk; the way he placed his hand on the trunk of the ratty old tree and looked up into the branches; the way the woman held her arms up toward the house as though she was painting it in her mind. This was very real to them. And apparently the realtor saw it too, because he was smiling smiling smiling as though the commission was already in the bank. Maybe he always smiled that way, but Daniel didn’t think so.
The couple got in their car and drove off. The realtor got in his car and made a phone call. He looked around the neighborhood as he talked, spotted Daniel and Greg watching him, and bobbed his head at them. Then he pulled away from the curb and was gone.
“Wonder if they made an offer,” Greg said. “We should have asked him.”
Daniel shrugged. They’d find out soon enough in any case. “I’ll ask Ellie how it went.”
Greg tugged his gloves back on and took hold of his rake. “You do that, let me know. I’m curious.” He went back to his raking. Daniel walked across to Ellie’s. He knelt by the mailbox to see what they had seen; he looked up into the branches of the ratty old tree. Then he went to sit by Ellie on the porch.
“How are you holding up?”
“Less bored than I was an hour ago, I guess.” She laughed a hollow-sounding laugh. “I hate Sundays. Glad I vacuumed this morning. Good timing, there. She complained anyway, though. That woman. She said the house smells funny. They noticed the fresh paint, though. That was a plus.”
“Well…” He patted his thighs lightly. “I guess you’ll hear soon, then.”
She shook her head. “I won’t. My brother will. He’s handling it, I told you.”
“He in town?”
“Yuma.” She made a strange face. “That’s Arizona, you see. God, it’s hot there. Dry. He wanted me to go there to live, so I’d be close to him, but I said no.”
“You’ll be staying in town then?”
She nodded but didn’t offer details. He didn’t ask for any, either. What would be the point? Eventually, if she didn’t tell him, he’d ask. Until then, he’d let her take the lead. They sat on the porch watching Greg rake his leaves.
“Sundays are always so boring,” Ellie said, lighting a cigarette and holding it out for Daniel.
“How come?”
“I don’t know. It’s like the week is really only supposed to be six days long and they threw in an extra. By the time Sunday gets here, I’m looking for Monday already. Are you cold?”
He shook his head.
“I’m freezing.” She got up and went inside. Daniel followed her in. Ellie grabbed a sweater from the coat rack and went to sit on the couch. “I guess it’s just my old bones.”
“Well, it’s not very warm out today. Probably fifty-five, sixty.”
“Feels like thirty to my old, cold bones.” She laughed and lit a cigarette for herself. “My mother used to say that. Old cold bones. She said they were made out of ice.”
Daniel smoked his cigarette and looked out at the leaves on the lawn. No point in raking them until it was all done falling down. Greg had been raking leaves three times this week. “It’ll warm up this afternoon.”
“Fall used to be my favorite season. The leaves, and the fall flowers. Mums. I used to have mums, you see. I had all kinds.”
“I know. You told me. I brought you some mums, last Spring. I promised to plant them for you when it got warmer.” He frowned. “I think I forgot to do that.”
“Oh. I had forgotten those. I forget everything I want to remember, you see. It’s the stuff I want to forget that sticks like glue. One day, maybe I can just forget it all.”
Daniel sat across from her. The vacuum cleaner rested between them. He couldn’t blame her for wanting to forget, nobody could. He said as much to Ellie and she gave him one of her strange looks.
“Memory is a funny thing. I’d like to remember things like the flowers. But sometimes one memory leads to another. Sometimes…it’s safer to just forget. I think of memory like it’s a place, you see. A place like… oh, I don’t know. Pakistan, or something. A place I don’t really want to visit, but I hear about sometimes. Bad things are always going on there.”
“Yeah…some of it you do want to remember, though. Not just the flowers, but… other things. Don’t you?”
She shook her head. “If I could forget everything... I don’t know. I might. It’d be easier.” Ellie stubbed her cigarette out and adjusted her sweater around her shoulders. “They had a river in Greek mythology that made you forget your entire life. They said the spirits of the dead had to drink from it before they could move on.”
“What if they don’t?”
“If they don’t… I guess that’s where ghosts come from. The River Lethe, it was called. I keep looking for the river, looking and looking. I try to forget my grief but it never goes away.”
“Grief is good for you, though, Ellie. It hurts, but it heals you. You need to accept it.”
“That’s for the young. Grieving.” Ellie leaned back and looked at her hands. “I’m not young. It’s too late.”
Daniel thought about that. “No. Grief isn’t for the young. It’s for anybody, everyone. You grieve… and then you move on with your life.”
She blew out air dismissively. “Move on.”
“That’s right. Time moves on, you move with it. You have to.”
“You don’t have to. Not always.” She stood up and began wrapping the vacuum cleaner cord into a loop. “Time doesn’t always move on, trust me. It’ll stand still if you make it.”
He shook his head. “You can’t keep reliving the past.”
“Everyone lives in the past, Daniel. Everyone does, at least some of the time. You can’t tell me you don’t.” She chuckled. “How many girls you been with in the last few years? Any? You’re every bit as stuck in your past as I am in mine.”
Daniel didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing. Across the street, Gringo lay dozing in the sun.
Chapter 70
A lemon rolled out of the kitchen. Toni came after it, sucking her thumb. “Stupid lemon. Get back here,” she said. Margie wasn’t in this morning. The girl was on her own two mornings a week now. Margie had been complaining to Hector about a ham sandwich Billy had ordered and then not eaten, and Hecto
r had taken an empty Bud Light bottle from the trash and was making fun of Billy with it, using a dopey voice. (Duh… I’m Bud Light, and I don’t like to eat my ham. Duh.) Billy had caught them. He wrote them both up. Then, despite the fact that it wasn’t really her fault, he’d cut Margie’s hours almost in half. Hector – in the same dopey voice – had then made jokes about the Fuckup Express. (Woot-toot! All aboard!) That was two days ago. Daniel hoped Margie was using the spare time to look for another job. She had to see what was coming next. She’d have to be blind not to see it.
Daniel stuck his head around the corner. Toni had the lemon back on the cutting board and was trying to slice it into wedges. The problem was, Daniel thought, she wasn’t holding the knife right. Then he decided the problem was that she wasn’t holding the lemon right. Actually, she wasn’t holding the lemon at all, which was really the main problem. It rolled off onto the floor again.
She looked at him petulantly and mumbled around the thumb. “Icutmyseff. See?” She held the wet thumb out to show him the wound. “Damn knife. Stupid lemon. Will you cut these for me?” She batted her lashes. “I’m no good at it.”
“It’s just that you’re not used to it. You’ll get better. Cut it in half first.” He bent down and took up the lemon. “Here, go wash it off.”
The look on her face told him she hadn’t washed it off the last time it fell, but she nodded and took the lemon to the sink. When she came back, she tried to hand the lemon to Daniel. He drew away.
“No, no. You have to do it. I’m showing you how, not doing it for you. Put the lemon on the cutting board.” He watched her set the fruit on the board as though it was a grenade. “Didn’t Margie show you this before?” He knew she had.
She made circles with her head, yes and no at the same time. “Yea-a-ah… kinda-sorta. But I don’t… I’m no good at this stuff. It keeps rolling away.” She stuck her thumb in her mouth again.
“Quit—” Daniel broke off and sighed. “You can’t keep sucking on your finger like that. Go wash your hands.”
“But it’s bleeding,” she whined.
“So put a bandage on it. You’re going to get us fined if they catch you getting your spit all over the lemons.”
“Nobody eats the lemons. They’re just for looks.” She blew on her thumb and inspected the cut, then looked up at Daniel. “Aren’t they?”
When she returned with the bandage, he helped her put it on. “Now. Slice the lemon in half. Lengthwise.” He drew a line across the lemon with his finger, from the knobby end to the pointy end. “Here.”
She put the knife to the lemon and it started to roll. Instead of using her free hand to hold the lemon, she added it to the hand on the knife. Now she looked like a samurai warrior, and Daniel laughed.
“You can’t cut that way. No wonder you… look. Here. Like this.” He took the knife from her and sliced the lemon in half. “See? It’s easy.” He positioned the lemon halves on the board for her and handed her the knife again.
Now that it couldn’t roll, she had an easier time of it, but she still looked very ill-at-ease. She managed to get it halved again and then again, into wedges. Daniel directed her to half them once more, and to take the seeds out.
“There. Now, just make a little cut here, so we can hang it on the glass.” He pointed. “Right… there. Good. Just like that.”
Toni held the lemon wedge up and looked at it briefly before tossing it into the prep bowl. “Ok. So, is that enough?”
Daniel snorted laughter. “One lemon? No. How many did Margie usually do?”
“Dunno.” She shrugged and chewed on her knuckle.
“Do four or five. They don’t last, so we don’t do very many. Here.” He handed her three more lemons from the box. She took them and put them on the cutting board and picked up the knife.
“You’re supposed to wash them first.”
She shrugged her shoulders and kept slicing. “I hate these new hours. I want my old schedule back. Margie does the lemons better anyway.”
Billy came up behind them. “Danny, there you are.”
“Sorry. I was helping Toni with the lemons.”
She looked at Billy sadly and pouted. “I hate the lemons.”
“You’re doing fine,” Billy said. “Another week of this, you’ll be pro at it. I just posted the new schedule for next week – a few more hours for you, Toni. Yours changed too Danny, better take note.” He took a few steps and turned back. “I’m headed out to take care of some things. I’ll be back around lunch.”
Hector stuck his head around the corner. “Guy at the bar, Danny-boy.”
Daniel went to the bar, grumbling. Another new schedule. He’d have to check it and see what sort of misery was in store this time. The idea that he’d ever return fully to his old night shift had gone right out the window, and his schedule had been increasingly unpredictable. Billy was never available to talk about it. He’d be there at lunchtime, of course – Billy had a habit of sitting down at the bar right at the busiest time and placing his lunch order – but Daniel would be busy then, obviously. And Billy, well. Billy would vanish right after that. He’d wolf down his burger and fries, he’d ask for a refill on his beer, he’d leave a huge wad of used napkins and no tip… and he’d be gone again before anyone got a word in. Especially if he’d made a questionable change to the schedule. Especially then.
He waited on the lone customer and then went back to the kitchen to check the schedule. Hector was slicing lemons into perfect little wedges and Toni was nowhere in sight.
Daniel looked at the schedule for a long time, almost not believing his eyes. His hours had been cut in half, too.
Chapter 71
The next morning he slammed the door of his car, honked the horn at the ever-present dog, and pulled out of the driveway. He didn’t wait to make sure the dog moved. He didn’t look to see if Ellie was outside watching for him, which she probably was – he hadn’t been over there for a couple of days. To hell with it. To hell with everything. He had tomorrow off, if Ellie needed something. In fact, he had lots of time off now. Woot-toot, all aboard the Fuckup Express.
Just because he’d wanted not to work fifty hours didn’t mean thirty was fine. How the hell could Billy expect him to live on thirty hours? He’d demanded a word with Billy, caught him and forced him into a discussion, but got nowhere. You said you didn’t want to work so much… Kiki needs the hours…he has a baby on the way… you said you were tired of the overtime…
Four days off, three days on. And the three days! One fifteen-hour shift, open to close, followed by an opening shift and then another closing. Almost the worst schedule imaginable. He’d never make it. And he couldn’t afford it. He’d told Billy so, he’d said he needed full time work. And Billy had said: according to the law, thirty hours is full time. And then he had tossed his greasy, ketchup-y napkin down on the bar and walked away. No… strolled away.
“And the look on his face, the fucking look on his face… damn him, this isn’t accidental.” Daniel rolled through the stop sign and accelerated into the turn. “He damn well knows I can’t make it on this, he’s trying to make me quit.”
He sped down the street. He’d probably have to find a new job, but he was on his way to talk to Bud and let him know what was going on first; he owed the man at least that much, he thought. But he doubted Bud would do anything about it. What could Bud really do, anyway? Go back to work, kick his son out, promote Daniel to manager again? Not likely. Bud would sigh and talk about how it was a shame and too bad but he had to let the boy learn on his own. Learning by doing, that’s the way, gotta make his own mistakes, by Christ. And then Daniel would be out.
“Just as well,” he muttered, tapping his hands on the steering wheel as he waited for the light to turn. “Not like the place means anything to me anymore.” He tried to tell himself he didn’t know why he hadn’t looked for a job months ago. Then he tried to tell himself he’d been putting up with it out of loyal
ty to Bud. But he knew better. It was the idea of change that stalled him. Sure, he had some loyalty to Bud, a layer of gratefulness to the man for hiring him when he was down, for not asking a lot of questions about his past. Bud had made it easy to pretend he was moving forward when he was standing still.
And that was what he had wanted, all he had wanted. To stand still. He didn’t live in his past, like Ellie said he did. He didn’t want to go back… but he didn’t want to go forward, either. He just wanted to stand very still, and wait. For what, he didn’t know. Eventually, he thought, he would have known what he needed; it would all have made sense again, maybe, given time. But then his hand had been forced. He’d had to accept the small changes, one right after another, to avoid bigger ones – and even so, here he was. It was going to be a big change now, because there was no other option. And he’d thought Margie had to be blind if she couldn’t see what was coming. Woot-toot. Next stop: Firedsville.
“I should have gotten a new job months ago.” He turned the idea over in his mind. He could get a night shift now, probably. Somewhere. He’d be low man on the totem pole, wherever he went. He might have to take crap for a while before he earned anything better. No different than what he had now, except that it would be a starting point instead of an ending. He could take what they had and work toward the shift he wanted. Which was…what? What? He didn’t know.
He turned onto the freeway ramp and merged into traffic. He wasn’t sure the night shift was what he wanted anymore. The day shift hadn’t been all that bad. He’d had more time to think, which had been something of a mixed bag. Good in some ways, though. And it had been nice to be able to do things in the daytime on his day off without feeling like a groggy intruder. The night shift had been something he had wanted. Or thought he wanted, or needed. But as long as he was making changes, he ought to think about it. Maybe Ellie had been right in a way; maybe working nights had been a way of avoiding people.
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