The Qualities of Wood (12 page)

‘You don't have to…'

‘What am I supposed to do, watch you work while I lay in the sun?'

‘I've been doing some laying around myself.'

‘Then we'll do that together too.'

‘I'll be glad for the company,' Vivian admitted. ‘Nowell writes every day so I'm pretty much left to myself.'

Dot's eyes narrowed. ‘Do you have any sisters?'

The question surprised her. ‘Sisters? No.'

‘You seem like you do.' She set a purple cosmetic bag on the dresser. ‘Lonnie says that the little town is just a few miles up the road.'

‘Yes. We'll have to drive in for lunch or a movie sometime while you're here.'

‘That would be great.'

Lonnie and Dot insisted on buying some groceries. They went into town and brought several bags back. After a while, the men decided to drive back for beer, after determining that the supply in the refrigerator was insufficient. Dot took a nap while
Vivian spent some time in the front yard, flipping through magazines. When she heard Dot rummaging around in the kitchen, she went inside.

‘Good nap?' Vivian asked.

Dot had a reddish crease on her cheek that almost matched the hue of her freckles. ‘Yes. Lonnie had me up at five o'clock this morning.' She pulled some ground beef from the refrigerator.

‘What can I do?' Vivian asked.

‘Just sit there and take it easy.' She stood for a minute, scanning the kitchen. ‘I need a skillet, which I'm sure is in this cupboard here. Yes, here it is. You've put everything just where I would have.'

‘At least let me make a salad,' Vivian said.

‘Alright,' Dot said, ‘but that's it.'

They both heard a car in the driveway. Vivian said, ‘That was fast.' A few moments later, the screen door rattled as someone knocked on it. ‘No one's home!' she called.

‘Excuse me,' a deep voice said.

She spun around and saw Sheriff Townsend peering in, the bill of his hat pressed against the screen door.

‘Oh, hello, Sheriff,' Vivian said. ‘We thought you were someone else.'

When she opened the door, he took off his hat and stepped inside. ‘Sorry to disturb you at the dinner hour.' He nodded at Dot. ‘I noticed the out-of-state license plates on that jeep outside. I wanted to make sure everything was in order.'

‘That's my jeep.' Dot came forward, wiping her hands on the front of her shorts. ‘Mine and my husband's.'

‘Sheriff Townsend, this is my sister-in-law, Dot Gardiner,' Vivian explained. ‘She and my brother-in-law just arrived this afternoon for a short visit.'

‘I see.' He looked again at Vivian, his face slightly flushed. ‘I really don't mean to bother you. It's just that you and your husband are here to take care of things for the late Mrs Gardiner, who was a member of our community for some time. I guess what I'm saying is, I figured you'd had enough trouble since you've been here, and I've made it my job to keep an extra eye out for you.'

‘I understand,' she said. ‘And we appreciate it, really.'

The sheriff looked at the hamburgers sizzling on the stove. ‘I should let you get back to your cooking. Something sure smells good in here.' He looked at the opening to Nowell's study and the curtain that hung bunched at the side.

‘Dot's made herself quite at home in the kitchen,' Vivian said. ‘I'm afraid I'll get spoiled if she keeps cooking like this.' She winked at the sheriff. She had never been a winker, hadn't even thought of it until she saw Katherine do it.

‘You don't have to worry about that,' Dot said. ‘Cooking isn't exactly a talent of mine.'

Sheriff Townsend lingered in the doorway. ‘Will you come down for the festivities in town at the end of summer? It's not too far off now.'

‘You're not talking about the reunion for the Clements, are you?'

‘I was talking more about the town anniversary festival the following weekend. They'll have music, carnival rides and such. All to celebrate the founding of the town.'

‘You're a relation of William Clement, aren't you?' Vivian asked.

‘Yes, ma'am. He was my great-great-great-grandfather.'

‘How many Clements will be there?'

He laughed. ‘Hundreds, I would guess. I expect that many will stay through the week. Should be a real boost for local business. Along with the road finally going in.'

‘It sounds fun,' Vivian said.

He twirled his hat around in his hands. ‘I'll leave you to your cooking.' He turned to Dot. ‘Nice meeting you.'

‘Likewise,' Dot said.

Sheriff Townsend stepped outside and put on his hat. Vivian watched as he slowly descended the steps of the porch then walked to his car, the shiny white cruiser with tan and black stripes. He looked around as he went, taking in every detail of their yard.

‘Talk about a hard-working police force,' Dot said.

Vivian walked over to the counter and continued slicing a tomato. ‘They certainly are.'

‘What was that about? I mean, the part about the trouble you've had?'

Vivian looked at her. ‘Didn't Nowell mention anything to Lonnie about what happened?'

Dot's forehead wrinkled. ‘I don't think so.'

‘It was the day Lonnie left, the same day I arrived.'

‘What was?'

‘They found a dead body,' Vivian said, pointing with the knife towards the woods. ‘Practically in our yard.'

Dot inhaled quickly.

‘It was a young girl who lived nearby. Seventeen years old.'

‘What happened to her?'

‘It was an accident. They did an autopsy and didn't find anything suspicious. She died from head trauma. She tripped on something and hit her head on a rock.'

‘How terrible.'

Vivian dropped the core of the tomato into the sink. ‘A woman I met here says that she was a wild girl, always in trouble.' She shook her head. ‘I don't know why I said that. It's only gossip.'

‘Her family?' Dot asked.

‘Just her mother. She was here the other day, the mother.'

‘Why?'

‘The sheriff brought her. She wanted to see where they found her.'

Dot groaned.

Vivian nodded. ‘It was awful.'

‘That must've been pretty big news for a small town like this,' Dot said.

‘Not really. They ran a couple of stories in the paper, and an obituary, of course. But once they reported that it was an accident, there wasn't much else to say. Bad things happen everywhere. There was an automobile crash just last weekend, some kids from a neighboring town. They were out partying and one of them, the driver, didn't make it.'

Dot took the plate of steaming hamburgers to the table. ‘I guess we think of the country as an escape from all that. Crime, violence, you know.'

‘But there are reckless kids everywhere. I'm sure they have their share of domestic problems here, drugs, everything.'

‘It was nice of him to stop by,' Dot said, something implied by her raised eyebrows.

‘What?' Vivian asked.

They heard the truck rumble up the driveway.

‘They're back,' Dot said. ‘Perfect timing. I'm famished.'

Lonnie leaned back in the chair, his hand circling a near-empty bottle of beer. ‘There are people who have physical proof of their abduction,' he said. ‘Coded messages scratched into their arms, burn marks on their temples, blackouts. Some of them wake up in places and don't know how they got there.'

‘Maybe they're sleepwalkers,' Nowell said.

Dot's eyes sparkled in the light. ‘You should see this documentary, that's all we're saying. There are too many coincidences between these stories. People who don't even know each other, living in separate parts of the country.' Her cheeks were blazing and her blondish-red hair was molded against the sides of her face. They were all a little drunk, sitting on the porch after a long dinner.

‘Yeah,' Lonnie said. ‘How could they have the same experiences? Being put on a lab table and having samples taken, or being watched through a monitor in a small room with no windows.'

‘Maybe it's because they've all seen the same movies as you,' Nowell said.

‘What movies?' His eyes widened. ‘There's proof. Haven't you ever seen pictures of those big craters where the crafts have landed, or heard from the people who say it happened to them? What proof do
you
have that there's no other life out there?'

‘You're asking me to prove a negative thing, which is impossible.'

‘Then what's there to argue about?'

Nowell laughed. ‘I'm arguing that it's extremely unlikely that any of these desperate people on your video were abducted from their trailers by aliens and tested. Don't you think that intelligent life would choose a more diverse and accomplished cross-section of humanity? Scientists, artists, political leaders?'

‘Maybe they take what they can get. It would be hard to snatch someone in a big city.'

‘Now we're really getting into mere conjecture.'

As the yellow porch light softened around her like melting wax, Vivian worked on her fourth beer.

Dot spoke softly, and everyone turned toward her. ‘I just think it would be nice, wouldn't it? To know that we're not alone in the universe, that other types of life are out there.'

Nowell took a long drink. ‘How would it change anything?'

Lonnie said, ‘For one thing, we could travel there, set up space stations.'

‘You've never left the United States,' Vivian said. ‘What makes you think you'd go to Mars?'

He smiled at her, nodding his head. ‘You're right. Maybe you should go first.'

Dot got up and stood behind Lonnie's chair. ‘Maybe it wouldn't make any real difference in our lives,' she said, ‘but it would show us another way of living, a new perspective.'

Nowell crossed his arms over his chest. ‘There are millions of people on Earth, all with varying perspectives.'

‘But people are the same more than they're different,' she said.

‘I don't think that's true,' Vivian objected.

‘You know how they talk about separating people by race,' Dot said, ‘that it really doesn't mean anything, at least not nearly as much as we make of it? Because when you get down to people's genes, you know, there's such a small amount of difference…'

‘…that it's inconsequential,' Nowell finished.

She nodded. ‘So when you think about human nature, about our feelings and what makes us tick, maybe there's not much difference there either, you know, when you look at the whole range.'

Nowell slapped his leg. ‘So a greedy child who, say, won't share his candy is basically the same as some tyrannical ruler who wipes out an entire population to feed his ego?'

Dot's eyes blazed. ‘Okay, yes. Greed, fear, happiness. What if there's a system that's different, you know? A completely different type of life.'

‘That's too philosophical for me after so much beer,' Vivian said. She looked up at Dot, who remained standing behind Lonnie, her small hands on his shoulders. ‘Let's hear about your whirlwind romance instead.'

‘There's not much to tell,' Dot said. ‘Lonnie came into the store where I was working.'

‘I was visiting Sal Brewer. Remember him, Nowell?'

‘The guy you worked with at Build Rite?'

‘Yea. Sal moved out west a few years ago and invited me to come hang out for a while, check out the coast.'

‘They came in to buy beer,' Dot said, ‘and I was having a really bad day.'

Lonnie peered up at her. ‘She had just moved up there, and she hated her job.'

‘A convenience store. It was all I'd been able to get.'

‘So I started teasing her a little. She told me off. Later, I came back and we got to talking. She finally agreed to go out with me.'

‘And I quit my job, and we went up to the mountains, lived like real naturalists, you know?'

‘You should have seen it up there,' Lonnie said. ‘The trees, the sky at night. We camped near a little creek, filled with fish. It's like you have the whole world to yourself.'

‘It was beautiful,' Dot agreed.

‘I asked her to marry me,' Lonnie said. ‘I told her I wanted to live around here, though.'

‘And I didn't mind. There wasn't anything keeping me there.'

‘We're glad to have you in the family,' Nowell said. ‘I was afraid that nobody would
ever
marry Lonnie.'

‘Very funny, Number One.'

‘I've been bailing him out of trouble my whole life.'

‘Now…' Lonnie started.

‘Remember that time you and your friends had to go back down Birch Street, apologizing to everyone on the block?'

‘Why?' Dot asked.

‘They drove down the street and knocked over all the mailboxes with a baseball bat,' Vivian explained. ‘Didn't you have to try to put them back up?'

‘We tried,' Lonnie said. A wide grin pushed his cheeks into two round masses. ‘But some of the poles were busted, just splintered like firewood.'

‘I can't imagine you and your rough friends knocking on all those doors and telling people that you broke their mailboxes.' Nowell shook his head.

‘Why would you do something like that?' Dot asked.

Lonnie looked up at her. ‘We were just blowing off steam.'

‘But why knock down mailboxes? Did you have something against the Post Office?'

‘It was just for fun,' Vivian said. ‘Weren't you ever reckless, out of control?'

Dot looked from Lonnie to Vivian. ‘How is being out of control fun?'

‘Oh, forget it, honey,' Lonnie said. ‘We were just kids.'

Vivian carried some dishes inside and Dot followed. Dot sat down at the table. ‘I'm completely exhausted, even with the nap.'

‘Long day,' Vivian said. ‘You were at Beverly's pretty early this morning. Is this the first time you met her?'

‘Yes. She was very nice. Surprised to see us so early, you know, but Lonnie told me she wouldn't mind.'

Vivian stretched her neck, yawning. ‘I think we're all used to Lonnie's habits by now.'

‘I guess you must be.' Dot stood up. ‘I think I'll take a hot shower and go to bed. Any big plans for tomorrow?'

‘Not really. I need to drive into town for a few things, if you'd like to come along.'

‘What time?'

‘Not early. Whenever we get up and around.'

‘Yes, I want to go.' She went to the screen door. ‘Lonnie, I'm turning in.'

‘Be there soon,' he told her.

Dot paused in the hall. She looked small in the dark space. ‘Thanks, Vivian,' she said. ‘For everything.'

Vivian opened the screen door and went outside. Lonnie reclined in the swing, one leg propped up on the bench and the other extended out. Nowell sat on the banister opposite him, leaning against the narrow column.

The breeze, cool now, spread over Vivian's skin like balm.

Nowell was saying, ‘So this Mr McDermott, the lawyer, told me the claim is unsubstantiated. Mom's protected by the first document.'

‘That's good,' Lonnie said. ‘These big businesses, these firms, they've always got people looking for loopholes to make them money. So what if it's a widow, right? Anything for a buck.'

‘At first, I was angry with Dad's former partner,' Nowell said, ‘but talking to the lawyer, I realized it's more complicated. There's a board of directors now, and Mr Ward is actually trying to get everything settled.'

‘Sure he is. He waits until Dad dies then he settles things. Just takes everything he can.'

‘It's not so simple. There isn't always a bad guy or an easy solution.'

‘I don't see why not. Give Mom the money; that's an easy solution. Dad's the one who built that company from the ground, not Mr Ward. He's been benefiting from Dad's hard work for years.'

Nowell sighed. ‘Sometimes talking to you about things is as bad as talking to Mom. You can't be rational.'

‘And maybe you're too rational.' Lonnie sat up. ‘Doesn't this whole thing piss you off?'

‘Being pissed off doesn't solve anything. It never has.'

‘I thought everything was settled,' Vivian said.

Nowell nodded. ‘Mom's lawyer is meeting with the company's lawyer early next week, and he's going to take care of it.'

The headlights of a lone car appeared over the hill towards town. As it passed on the empty road, they listened to the rising then falling hum of the engine and the faint melody of music from the car's radio.

‘Oh, Viv,' Nowell said. ‘Lonnie and I are going fishing tomorrow, with a few of those guys from the road crew.'

‘The road crew?' she said.

‘I met them when I was here before,' Lonnie said, ‘and we ran into them at the store. Four-thirty, Number One.'

‘Don't remind me,' Nowell groaned.

‘You're going to take a day off?' Vivian asked Nowell.

‘Just the morning. We should be back by two o'clock.'

‘You must be at a good stopping point,' she said.

He ignored the tinge of sarcasm in her voice. ‘Almost.'

‘I think I'll go to bed, too,' Vivian said. ‘Suddenly, I'm very tired.'

‘Okay, Viv. I'll be in soon.'

‘Dot's going with me into town,' Vivian told Lonnie.

‘I'll give her some cash,' Lonnie said. Remember, we're paying for half of everything while we're here.'

‘You don't have to…' Nowell started.

‘Oh, come on,' Lonnie interrupted. ‘You're not exactly rolling in it. We're not normal guests, we're family.'

Vivian went into the living room and grabbed the pages that Nowell had given her to read while he was gone. Her face was burning. Weeks of shutting himself in that room, practically ignoring her, she thought. His baby brother arrives and now it's a big party. She washed her face and brushed her teeth and by the time she had crawled into bed with the pages from his book, she had talked herself out of being angry. Nowell had been busy working very hard. He deserved a break, she knew. She shut their bedroom door and skimmed through the first chapter, which she had already read. The second began:

He was a young man, older than her but inexperienced still in many ways. And she was much older than her years in ways that mattered. For her, life was an easy thing, no grand design, no complications, no detours. She worked during the day at a regular job, cooked sometimes in the evenings and sometimes went out with friends.

There were things that she had forgotten, either by effort or by chance, and these dark moments of longing from the past cropped up then sunk again into the oblivion of memory and time. Seeing the man caused one of these moments, a memory or re-memory taking shape but distorted and uncertain, leaving her only with a feeling of controlled anger.

Vivian yawned, then pushed herself to a more upright position. She scanned the remaining paragraphs. The story was beginning to form, despite these distracting sections, and it centered around the girl, the man who had sparked her memory, and the girl's roommate, a friendly middle-aged woman who mothered her. Vivian's eyelids were heavy, and the room began to contract around her. At her side, the glare from the lighthouse lamp softened and dimmed.

Suddenly, the door opened with a popping sound, and Vivian opened her eyes.

‘What do you have there?' Nowell asked.

She began to gather the pages into a pile. ‘I was looking over the writing that you gave me. I wanted to read it again before I said anything.'

‘So?'

‘It's great,' she said. ‘I can't wait to read the rest.'

‘You didn't think it was difficult to follow, the way I told the story from her point of view?'

Vivian spoke cautiously. ‘I had questions as I went along, but it seemed like they would be answered as she discovered things.'

Nowell unfastened his shorts. ‘But didn't you think that her world was a confusing vantage point? Her thinking is so subjective, so pointed.'

‘I would think that the readers can be objective.'

‘That's what I thought.' He nodded slowly a few times, contemplating.

She asked, ‘Did you and Lonnie finish your argument?'

‘It wasn't really an argument. He starts with his conspiracy theories and his aliens and makes all these generalized, ridiculous statements that add up to nothing. Sometimes it's all I can do not to reach over and shake him.'

‘A lot of people believe in alien abductions.'

Nowell climbed into bed. ‘I don't want to know about it.'

Vivian gave him the extra pillow. ‘You were right. Dot is very sweet.'

‘Yeah, I like her. I hope Lonnie doesn't screw it up.'

‘That's not nice.'

‘You don't know him like I do, Viv. He sabotages his life on purpose, especially good things that come along. Like when we were in school. His grades were average mostly, but then he'd get a good grade on a project or a report, something that interested him. Almost like it was an accident. Then before you knew it, he'd be in trouble or getting kicked out of class again for goofing off. By the time he reached high school, I think he'd finally fallen behind.'