Return to Oakpine (21 page)

“Those kids from Jackson Hole are just pulling into that town now, grabbing their gear, walking across to the doors of the gym.”

“What?”

“Other people,” Larry said. “Way out in the world.” Then he added. “That was a short fight for such a long wait. Was it even a fight?”

The wind was pulsing through the cemetery shrubs, and when they came to the corner of the iron fence, Larry said, “This is where Jerry Wainwright is—this corner.”

“He was a good kid,” Wendy said. “He was in algebra two.” Wendy moved alongside Larry, and he put his arm around her, and she pushed the side of her face into the hollow of his shoulder. Larry stopped again and looked over the fence at all the dark graves, and he pointed there. “I know what you're going to say,” Wendy said.

Larry dropped his chin onto his chest in the gusting wind and said, “I think you do.”

“It's from Miss Argyle's class last fall.”

“It is,” he said. “You must have been paying attention.”

“I remember the story is all,” she said.

The three young people stood close to each other in the dark place. “What story?” Stephanie said. “With Miss Argyle?”

“I don't remember the title. It's what the grandfather said in the story,” Larry said. “He's old. He points at the graveyard and says, ‘There's no sense lying there.'”

“Dylan Thomas wrote the story,” Wendy said. “He wrote like an angel.”

Stephanie was still warm from the car, and she stood with both arms around Larry and her face against his shoulder, but by the reference to the story she relinquished her claim and smiled at Wendy, who stood so close also against the boy.

“Look,” Larry said to Wendy, “when you write this, give me a couple graceful moves, like I ducked the punch and caught him with a left jab. Just one. Maybe I said something clever. Oh god, make me clever. No coarse or shitty swearing, like ‘fuck this' and ‘fucking that.' My mother might read your story, and I'd get in trouble.”

“You are simply full of it, Larry.”

“I may write it up,” Stephanie said. “This is my first prom, after all.”

•   •   •

The night wind ran for a hundred miles and then met the town and tore into ragged gusts between the sleeping houses, shuffling and repacking the leaf banks along the hedges and withered flower beds, and Jimmy Brand sat burning on the walker at the edge of Berry Street. He'd made it to the street and was all out. He had closed the throat of his robe, but the wind bit his bare ankles, and he was waiting to pass out. There was no wind in his head, just the hot fog pressing his eyes, and he clenched for balance. The periphery of his vision was shredded and unclear, but he saw something more than the waves of leaves cracking by. A figure crossed between the houses. A figure in the backyards, loping, floating, a figure that became a man, all dark and out of focus, huge with a cape, and then gone. A figure stumbling silently to the old garage and wheeling its arms, a man throwing ashes, something—a lick of light against the structure. Jimmy drew a breath, and it wouldn't come. He opened his mouth, a child under the great bare trees, and it wouldn't work. When he opened his eyes again, he saw the flames, a yellow sheet flapping against the side of the little wooden building where he dwelt, fire, where he did dwell, fire, his dwelling. Fire. And then like an answer to his silent calls, the light in the kitchen came on, and he heard the back door and his name in his mother's voice.

The Dinner

Larry Ralston drove through the dark town. The big red SUV felt huge on the little streets now, a lumbering gargantuan machine from the future come to visit and terrify the past. He was going twenty and speaking to each of the houses, saying goodbye and goodbye, “and though you will see me around for a while, by next year you will look for me in vain for I will be away.” The fingers of his left hand made guitar chords on the steering wheel, and he was singing the sentences. He pointed at a little wooden bungalow with pale pink siding and said, “Oh, I ate pudding in your tiny kitchen when I was seven or eight with Bruce McDougal, who was in Mrs. Dennis's class with me. Whoever heard of pudding for a birthday, not that it wasn't good. Goodbye!” He named the houses as he drove and kept talking to them. “We knew each other well, or fairly well, or not at all, I'm not sure, but I recognize you tonight and so: goodbye.” He turned slowly onto Berry Street and stopped and then carefully backed his father's red Cherokee along the Brands' two-track driveway, a lane made for narrower vehicles. Now the ancient sycamores and poplars along Berry Street stood barren in the gloom. It was an early twilight, and the cold, ever-present wind had risen with the dark, sucking leaves along the ground. It was twenty-five degrees. As he stepped out of the vehicle, the back porch light came on, and Mrs. Brand came out that door in a sweater. Arms folded, she hurried to the garage and met Larry there. “It smells like snow,” he said.

“We've had a gracious fall,” she said, “but it is definitely over.” They went into the warm little room where Jimmy Brand was sitting in the green easy chair in the lamplight. Beside him on the bed was his red Fender guitar. He leaned back watching the plastic ceiling as it billowed and then suddenly drew up against the rafters, the corrugated valleys looking like ribs. He wasn't dreaming, but it was easy to drift now, a short step from any light in the window to his rich compendium of memory. There'd been a lot of sweet quiet in his apartment with Daniel, their ritual reading with popcorn after ten o'clock at night. Popcorn. He smiled with his head against the chair, watching the clear plastic struggle against the staples. It made a muted flapping sound that was soothing and somehow domestic, and he thought: This would make anyone hallucinate
.
He breathed as the image drew air, and he was aware of his lungs in their workings.

“You'll need this,” his mother said to him, holding open a brown car coat. It had faux wooden toggles for buttons. Still sitting, he leaned forward while she helped him into it. “Thank you, Mother,” he said. Larry gave his arm, and Jimmy pulled himself up and straightened the coat. “Well,” he said to Larry. “Standing up in real clothes. Who would have thought?”

“How do you feel, dear?” his mother asked.

He reached his hand and took hers. “I love you, Mother,” he said. “Larry. Always, always, every chance you get, tell your mother you love her. It's always true, and it's the kind of fact that just improves everything, the room, the furniture, the task at hand.”

“Yes, sir,” Larry said. “I'll try it.”

“And there ends the advice,” Jimmy said. Outside, after they'd helped Jimmy into the big automobile, Mrs. Brand came around to Larry with a bag of vegetables and then another. “I know your mother doesn't have time for a garden now with her work at the museum. Your dad likes his squash.”

“He does, Mrs. Brand. Thank you.”

Jimmy Brand felt electric. The medicines Kathleen Gunderson had arranged for him were powerful; there was no way to take them and keep a balance. Some days he'd sleep for hours, a thin, almost waking sleep in which he could not move. Some days he'd speed, too wired to even write, and that's when the guitar was a blessing, and he'd pick it until his legs—under two pillows—could no longer stand the pain. He was giving Larry lessons. Now, he felt awake but off center. He was used to this feeling of being tilted, not quite sure he was standing straight and facing forward; and he was glad, as Larry drove them slowly in the large vehicle through the village and up Oakpine Mountain, past the strange yellow windows in the thick undergrowth, to be out in the night. To Jimmy, all the lights appeared to be sparkling ferries in the glowing harbor, ships coming, sailing for the sea.

There were four other cars in the Ralstons' big circular driveway, and when Larry Ralston helped him down from the car, they stood a moment, and Jimmy again pulled at the big coat to straighten it. The toggle buttons in his fingers sent him back forty years. “This is my father's dress coat,” he told the young man. “If he knew I was wearing it, he'd burn it tomorrow.” Seeing Larry's confusion at such a confession, he added, “Forget I said that. What I meant was, add your dad to the list—tell him you love him too, early and often. He's a big man and needs a double dose.”

“That's going to come a little harder.”

“Absolutely,” Jimmy said. “But you're a strong guy and young—you can learn it.”

Larry looked at Jimmy, and Jimmy added. “I know I can't walk, but I know who I'm talking to. We're friends now, like it or not, and you listen to me.”

“You have my best interests in mind.”

“You know I do.”

They could now hear a thumping from the house that resolved itself into a muffled drumbeat, the slow rhythm of a song. “‘Help me, Rhonda,'” Jimmy Brand said. “He's got the drum kit out.”

“Let's face it,” Larry said, “my father is a drummer. He is drumming night and day. He hasn't drummed since I was a kid, and now this fall he shows his true colors. The hardware store has been some kind of twenty-year cover-up.” He took Jimmy Brand's arm, but Jimmy stood and walked easily toward the house. “That is a great song,” Jimmy said. “But as long as I've lived and as far as I've traveled, I've never met a woman named Rhonda.”

“We've got one in my class,” Larry said.

“Well, talk to her for me,” Jimmy said. He was happy. “Look at me walk. This party has started.”

The house was rich with the smell of a savory roast and the promised early turkey and something nutty and laden with butter; the air was loaded. Larry did have to help Jimmy up the stairs, and Jimmy measured each one. Halfway up, Jimmy could feel each step double and then double again. It was as if he were giving blood. At the top he stood in the bright kitchen, every counter full of dishes and carafes, and his eyes clouded in a way that made it seem simple just to fall back down. He was gone for a moment, unable to speak, the breath he needed badly only seeping in. Marci came suddenly to him as he started to fall, wiping her hands on her apron, but Larry caught him, and then with a sweeping lift he was in the overstuffed chair in the den, the fire in the grate another hallucination. He heard his name and felt Kathleen's hand on his forehead; he knew her hand. He knew to gather a big breath and hold it for three seconds. Then quietly, he came back.

“Hello,” he said. “I wanted an entrance.”

“And some ice water,” Marci said, handing him a blue wineglass full of cold water. She kissed his cheek. “I'm so glad you could come up. Is this going to be too much?”

“No, not now. We're here. I can tell there's a turkey in the late stages of being roasted somewhere in this house, and your mushrooms sautéing in butter and garlic have revived me. And the music!” The drumming had continued, not always steadily, and now Jimmy could hear two men singing with it. From time to time a guitar rushed in, quit, rushed in.

“Craig!” Marci called. “Let it rest, dear. Jimmy's here.”

“Send him in,” Mason called. “We need that electric guitar.” There was a flurry of drumming and a cymbal clash closer, and the two men, Craig and Mason, ambled in from the back, each with a drink, and greeted Jimmy, taking his hand. “Larry, my boy,” Craig said, “there's a hole the size of your ten-year-old foot in my snare drum. What do you say to that?”

“That's no problem for duct tape,” the young man said. He was spreading a cracker with cheese. “Plus: seven years ago? I think I'm innocent by now.”

“You can get your innocence back?” Kathleen said to him.

“Oh yes, ma'am. I've read about it.”

“Show me those books,” she laughed. She had a glass of wine and settled onto the huge shaggy couch. The coffee table was the scarred walnut top of the stationmaster's desk from the old depot, and it was spread with glass dishes of olives and pickles and cheese on toothpicks and two open bottles of wine.

Mason sat down next to Kathleen. “What you've got with a drum set lying around the house is a classic case of the attractive nuisance. A ten-year-old is required to kick a hole in at least one of the drums. It's like gravity. It is unstoppable. I'm surprised he didn't jump in with both feet.”

“Mason,” Jimmy said, and reached to take Mason's hand.

“I think I did,” Larry said. “Both feet.”

“Don't you have someplace to be?” Craig asked his son.

“Ma said I could hang out.”

“The football star doesn't have a girlfriend?” Mason asked him.

“Yes, he does,” Jimmy Brand said over his glass. “But it's in the incipient stage.”

“What?” Marci said. “Stephanie is really after you?”

“They're all after me, Mom.”

“They should be. He rescues them two at a time.”

Craig had passed a plate of cheese and smoked oysters and crackers, and Jimmy Brand was nibbling a wafer. He held it up. “Eating a cracker with you guys,” he said.

They all heard a noise below in the entry, and then Frank Gunderson's voice called, “Larry, you got a hand?” Larry stood and went down. A moment later Frank stepped into the kitchen with a baking pan covered in foil: an antelope roast. After him came Sonny, tall and dark and twenty-nine, her long black hair in a single braid. She had two bottles of red wine in her right hand and a long loaf of French bread in the other. Behind her, Larry came in with a pony keg on his shoulder.

“Set that right here, and let's have the finest beer in Wyoming. Who's interested?”

Craig had gone into the kitchen and greeted them. Mason stayed on the couch, watching Kathleen as they heard the other woman arrive in the next room. He took her wrist and lifted her hand onto his krnee and then took it away. They both looked at it, some joke in the air. “That's nice, Mr. Kirby, if it's an advance. But if you're being solicitous, keep your hands to yourself.” She looked past him to Jimmy Brand. “We're fine here. This is a dinner party.”

A round of beer was poured into little glass tasters, and the large coffee table filled with little dishes of horseradish and mustard and soy sauce and a platter of antelope strips. Introductions were made. It all stopped for a minute when Larry stood to shake Sonny's hand, and when it became clear who she was, he said, “Oh, sure. You're Sonny,” and everyone heard it as
They've all talked about you.
Craig stood in the silence and made a little team project out of selecting the music, putting the Beach Boys CD on and then holding up another. “The greatest band with only one album,” he said.

“The Zombies,” Mason said. “Let's turn it way up a little later.”

Jimmy held the little glass of beer up to the fire, turning it and sipping. “A couple pints of this, and I'd be back to fighting weight,” he said. “Congratulations, Frank.”

Everyone fell back into chairs, Larry giving his spot on the couch to the woman he'd embarrassed, and crackers were spread with Brie and chutney. Frank pulled up an ottoman and asked Kathleen how things were going at the clinic. “She has delivered unto me the Harley Davidson of walkers,” Jimmy interrupted. “A sleek blue machine that I've already had to the street.”

“In the middle of the night,” Kathleen added, shaking her head.

“What was that fire?” Frank said.

“Some prank,” Jimmy said. “Some kid found the lawn mower gas and went for a walk. We were lucky he didn't smash Ma's pumpkins and wax the windows.”

“I'm not sure it's a prank,” Mason said. “But it was stupid enough that it might as well have been.”

“We'll repaint on the first clear weekend,” Craig said. “It's not much, a lick of soot.” He had a mouth full of cheese.

“Then I'll see you in May,” Jimmy said. Everyone heard it, and in the bare silence Kathleen poured herself some wine and said to Frank, “We're fine at the clinic. Summer is injuries at home and work and up at the lake—this frost is as good as a vaccine.” Mason could tell she'd gone into some kind of mode, because she could not look at Sonny, and she felt mechanical, forced. “We're still losing nurses,” she went on. There was a steady turnover at the medical center because the women's husbands' jobs kept disappearing. “We're going to end up with a bumper crop of trainees and assistants.”

“How's Mr. Brand here doing?” Frank asked her.

“He's been worse,” Jimmy said. “This woman's an angel.” He had spoken quietly, and the quiet now grew again.

“I've made an executive decision.” Marci came in from the kitchen and leaned on the doorjamb “We are not going to sit in the dining room. We are going to eat right here. We'll make a little buffet table and be ready in a minute.” Kathleen stood and sidestepped into the kitchen, and Sonny asked Marci if she could help with anything. Craig asked who needed any wine, and he put two more logs on the fire. Frank asked Larry if he'd tried the antelope. Mason looked across at Jimmy and said, “You here, or are you dreaming already?”

Jimmy's face broke, and he smiled. He was nodding faintly along with the song “In My Room.” “This is too slow, what a gambit, and it requires a great vocal,” he said.

“And a touch depressing,” Frank said.

“Brian Wilson,” Jimmy said. “He is a giant—the sad giant.” Suddenly the room filled with the smell of steaming turkey, and the business of the dinner began. A hundred dishes from the depot desk were shipped into the kitchen, and forty others came the other way. Marci brought Jimmy his plate of turkey and mushroom dressing and five tender spears of asparagus under melting butter and flecked with pepper. As platters rattled and knives were dropped and wine poured, one by one the diners crept back into the den settling onto the corners of things. Larry came last with a drumstick as big as his fist, and when he sat on the floor, Jimmy tapped his glass and held it out to the room. “Friends,” he said, “Thank you for moving this holiday up for me. Happy Thanksgiving. It is sweet for me to be here. Thank you, Marci.” In the silence as the CDs changed, each person in the room leaned forward and touched his glass with theirs.