by Unknown
As I got into the car, I stopped, struck by a flash of insight. Was the old man Billy Joe? In the rear view mirror, I saw he had emerged from the store. I got out of the car to ask him, but his truck was pulling away. Jumping back into my car, I turned to follow him; but the truck had vanished.
Sighing, I turned toward Corkscrew Swamp. I wondered why he’d told me the story. Then, I saw things as he saw them. Clearly, we weren’t ‘natives.’ So, was this a ‘legend’ perpetrated on unsuspecting tourists? If so, it never really happened and the old man couldn’t be Billy Joe. I smiled, chuckling to myself.
The story stuck in my mind, though. It wasn’t long before my wife and I were standing right where the children in the old man’s story had stood that fateful night, at the edge of the boardwalk. The daylight faded away. I saw the full moon reflecting on the water. In the distance, at the edge of the strand, I saw Billy Joe, Carlito and Rain.
My wife nudged me. “Honey, come on! The kids are way ahead of us.” The sun beat down, bright and warm. Blinking, I saw my kids, right at the edge of the strand, where Billy Joe, Carlito and Rain had stood. A shiver went down my spine. We hurried to catch up. Together, we entered the cool, dim strand.
We saw the wonders of this unique, subtropical swamp, and had a special treat. In one of the lettuce lakes, there were alligators. Several were sunning themselves on small hammocks, while others prowled the waters. With only their snouts and eyes breaking the surface of the water, they barely caused a wake as they moved with great stealth. I stood on the boardwalk leaning on the rail, watching the ancient reptiles.
One of the 'gators glided close to where I stood. In its eyes, I could almost see back to when the Earth was young, and 'gators, not so much different from the creature before me, searched for meals, perhaps here, in this place. We stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Then, without a sound, the 'gator submerged into the dark water. It disappeared, like Billy Joe, Carlito and Rain.
The afternoon we spent at the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary was the highlight of our vacation. Much to my surprise, the kids want to go back again. Someday, we will. I’ll never forget the old man and his tale of youth and adventure, even if it wasn’t true. Or was it?
Years later, I still think of the ‘legend.’ Was it really just for tourists or was it a true story? When I think about it, I get the same feeling I’d had at the gas pump - there was something otherworldly about the old man.
Author Dayna Leigh Cheser is a life-long reader/writer. After retiring, she ‘got serious’ and published her debut novel, ‘Janelle’s Time,’ an adult historical romance, in 2012. Four more books in the ‘TIME’series will soon follow. She currently lives in southwest Florida with her husband, Peter, and her cat, Spunkie.
Visit her at her Website
or at her FaceBook Page
THE MIGHTY PEN
Troy L. Lambert
My grandfather never wrote anything down. He always committed everything to memory. I asked him why once and he simply said this:
“Boy, the pen is mightier than the sword. You don’t want to trust a dullard like me with a weapon that powerful.”
My grandfather had a sixth grade education. He had quit school to help his father on the farm, and all along I figured that writing was just a hardship for him. Grandpa even did math in his head. He never even wrote a grocery list. I never found out why until a sunny day in 1995.
I walked into the nursing home where grandpa was sitting in a rocker looking out the window. In his hand was a pen. In front of him was a notebook.
“What are you doing Grandpa?” I asked. Grandpa did not answer. He seldom did these days. I figured his talking days were almost done. I never dreamed he would start writing instead. The memory of yesteryear was gone: I figured that is where the stories had gone too.
He held the pen tightly. When I asked him the question again, he began to scribble on the pad. “Just sitting,” he scrawled. The penmanship was surprisingly neat, the letters clearly formed.
“Thought you didn’t write, Grandpa,” I said. I admit I had a little smirk. My grandfather and I had made a game of making fun of each other over the years. I was trying to spark that again. I never would have if I had known then what I know now.
Outside the window a dog was barking incessantly. There were a couple of kids out there playing with it, laughing and giggling.
Grandpa started to scrawl on the paper again. “I wish that dog would shut up,” he wrote.
I laughed. It was suddenly so like him—he hated dogs that barked constantly and had chased people from his neighborhood when they would walk such dogs near his house. He would grin, playing the role of a crazy old man. It was a role anyone who knew him knew he did not fit. He was not crazy. I swear to you he wasn’t.
Outside the dog yelped. Grandpa’s hand started to tremble. The dog jumped still trying to enjoy the game, and yelped again as he landed. A little girl screamed. The dog fell on its side, writhing in the grass. White froth came from its mouth, and I saw a parent rush from the corner of my vision and try to comfort the children and grab the dog at the same time.
I was distracted by all the commotion, but when I turned to look back at grandpa he was crying. I had never seen him cry before, and in his still powerful right hand the pen was crushed. In crushing the pen he had cut his hand, and ink and blood mingled on the wheel of his chair and puddled on the floor.
It wasn’t the pain. Grandpa’s eyes showed grief. He wasn’t crying. He was weeping in sorrow. Suddenly a memory came flooding in and I realized I had seen him cry once before exactly like this. It was the day my grandmother died.
***
April 1, 1990. April Fool’s Day had brought with it spring, even if we knew it would be short lived this far north, and winter likely had another month up her sleeve. My grandmother was still healthy as could be at 78 and showed no signs of slowing down. Grandpa was not yet in a wheelchair, but his legs were going. A weakness had settled there, and he did not do nearly as much walking as he had before.
We loaded him in his van and took him out to our favorite fishing hole. We had been going there since we were small children. A new pier had been constructed and it had handicap access. All the places we had hiked along the river to fish were to be no more for Grandpa. This was now his spot: it was almost as if it had been created just for him.
April was before the standard fishing season, but the pier stretched over the Snake River: rivers were technically open to fishing all year. We didn’t expect much. The trout would be sluggish and likely not into the spring feeding frenzy yet. It was a chance for grandpa—for all of us—to get out and spend time in the sun.
Grandpa was still telling stories at that point. As the sun rose and the air got warm jackets were shed and hung over rails. Worms were drowned. The coffee thermos was empty and the water bottles were fetched from the cooler by either my brother or I.
There was a silence. There had been no bites—the poles were as unmoving as the spring air. That is why we thought the story was a joke.
“It was a day like this,” he started. “The water still too cold, but the air so warm we couldn’t sit in the house and stare at the walls any more. Dad took us out fishin’. This was on the Platte in Nebraska, long before we lived here. I was about ten or so. Old enough to know better.”
He paused and sipped some water. None of us had heard this tale before, but I looked at Grandma and could tell that she had. Usually when she had heard a tale of his before she showed an indifferent lack of interest. This time she had a look of utter fear on her face as if he was about to reveal an ancient secret.
“I already knew I was different from the other boys. I was about a year from quittin’ school and helpin’ dad on the farm. But I had no idea about that then.” He span into the dirt. “I knew that I had a knack for getting’ what I wanted. I just didn’t quite know how things worked yet.
“My dad told me we weren’t going to catch a thing. It was too early. H
e had about enough of us boys wrestling in the living room, and I think he was afraid my ma would beat us to death with the broom if we broke one more of her good dishes or her figurines throwin’ a ball in the house. Kinda like what used to happen to you and your brother Bill.” He pointed to me. “You remember your momma on those days dontcha?”
I said I did.
“Well, my momma was no different than yours. Little meaner maybe. Anyhow so he hustled us out of the house and took us down to the river. The water was still brown and slow and he thought the fish were still sleepin’.
“‘You’ll catch one if you hit it on the head, and tick it off enough to bite whatever hit it,’ he told us.
“I figured he was right. He knew most of the time what he was talking about when it came to fishin’ and huntin’. He had kinda an instinct for it. Kinda like the one I got right here.”
He paused. He wiped his eyes, and I thought it was because he was tired. But I think looking back he was remembering the good old days. Those with his dad and his brother out on that river.
“I wanted to catch fish though. I wanted a big ole catfish for ma to fry up for supper. I wanted the days of summer that were not yet here. I wished real hard, because back then I still thought that might be enough sometimes. It wasn’t. I started singin’.
“Fishy, fishy in the brook,” his voice rose. “Come and bite on Grandpa’s hook. I will catch you if I can. Cook you in a fryin’ pan.”
It was something we had all heard him sing before. We all smiled. All of us except for Grandma. She frowned as if she knew what was next.
“Of course that did nothing. Dad even made fun of me. ‘Son, wish in one hand and crap in the other. See which one fills up first.’ Dad had his pole stuck in one of those rod holder stakes you stick deep into the mud. We didn’t buy ‘em back then. We made ‘em with PVC pipe and parts of old fence posts.
“I finally took a little notepad from my pocket and the stub of a pencil. I wrote in big letters on the pad ‘three big catfish.’
“You have to understand I did not know at the time that wishin’ for stuff like that had consequences. As I put a period at the end of that simple sentence, dad’s pole bent near in half with a bite. He grabbed it and I could see his strong arms straining to hold it as line sped out of his reel with a high pitched whine.
“My pole followed his. So did my brother’s. We had three big cats on at once. My brother was younger and he was struggling not to get dragged into the river. I stood my ground, but it was tough. My arms were straining. I saw my little brother to my right lay on his back and put his feet agin a stump to hold himself from slidin’ through the mud.
“Dad got his fish pulled up on the shore and put a gaffing hook into its brain right away. He knew if he didn’t kill that fish it might flop all over and hurt somebody. He had two more fish to deal with. He jumped over to help my bother Mikey, yellin’ at me to just hang on.
“Moments later, but what seemed like an eternity to a little boy with sore arms and a sore back, he had landed Mikey’s fish and killed it as well. ‘Here you are Eddie,’ he told me grabbin’ my rod. I collapsed to the muddy bank and rubbed my sore arms as he pulled.
“I shoulda’ seen it comin’. I didn’t and dad was tired by this point. Mikey was young and curious. He was way too excited and payin’ too little attention. I moved out the way as dad pulled in that last fish but Mikey didn’t.”
There was quiet on the pier and we knew this story wasn’t gonna end with a punch line. This was one of Grandpa’s true stories.
“Dad swung the gaffing hook one more time, intendin’ to kill the last fish. Then I figured to haul all of this up to the house he would have to go get the tractor. The bank was a bit muddy for the truck yet. Mikey was behind him but too close. The hook stuck in Mikey’s hand and drug him forward. Dad felt the resistance and thought he hooked a limb or bush behind him. He pulled harder, tossin’ Mikey on top of that big cat.”
“Is that how Great Uncle Mike. . .”
“Yeah, Eddie that is how he lost his hand. My fault. I wished for fish, and I got ‘em. But there was a cost. There is always a cost when you wish for something’.”
“Careful what you wish for and all that. Know what happened to those fish?”
We all shook our heads. All but Grandma.
“They rotted on that bank. It was fifty miles to the nearest hospital that could fix Mikey’s hand. We dang near didn’t make it in time to save Mikey. Lucky I thought somethin’ worked once that day and it might work again.
“On the way I wrote in my notebook: ‘I wish my brother will be okay’ and he was. If only I had known I would have wished his hand would be okay too. I have no idea what the consequences of that might have been.”
“So are you telling us Grandpa that if you wish for something, you get it?” my brother asked.
“If I write it down,” Grandpa said. “Only if I write it down.”
Bill laughed. The rest of us joined him nervously. I wasn’t sure if Grandpa was being funny at this point or not. He reddened but remained quiet.
Grandma watched in disturbing silence.
***
The following week she was killed in a car accident. She had gone out to the store in the van and decided to go to the market at the end of town. They had better meat, but you had to cross the highway to get there. As she pulled out to cross she was struck broadside by a semi that had lost his brakes coming down the huge pass just before their small town.
The state police said he was going almost a hundred miles an hour, and was totally out of control. She died instantly.
At the funeral Grandpa wept. That was when I had seen him cry like he was now in the nursing home.
“My fault, my fault,” he kept saying that day.
I hugged him. I was always close to him. “Careful what you wish for,” he whispered in my ear. Even then, I think he knew.
***
I remembered the story as they bandaged up his hand. I was trying to sort in my head what it might mean. A pickup truck had pulled up and the body of the dog was gone. The family had long since fled.
“When did he start writing?” I asked the nurse.
“Last week. He was having such trouble communicating the speech therapist thought this might do him some good. He seemed happy with it the first couple of days. What happened?”
“I am not sure,” I lied. I thought I just might know.
Grandpa looked at me. I could tell he had something to say. With his uninjured left had he gestured like he wanted to write. I looked around and found a pad and the stub of a pencil. He took the pencil awkwardly in his left fist and scrawled on the paper I held for him. There was only one word.
“D-I-A-R-Y,” the ugly capital letters read.
I patted his hand and he smiled, sitting back into his chair. He knew I understood what he wanted me to look for.
Grandpa had kept a diary, and I needed to find it. It was 1995. Grandma had been dead for five years, and Grandpa looked like he might follow her at any time. I had just discovered that my Grandpa did write.
***
There was not one diary. There were four notebooks all filled with close, neat handwriting that I never would have suspected from him. I took them to the kitchen table of the house he no longer lived in, and sat down to read.
The entries were short. The first page of the oldest simply said “I must be careful what I wish for.”
“May 17, 1935: I wish Elna liked me more.”
The page across from the entry held a newspaper clipping. “Football Star Drowns.” I shivered and turned the page.
“August 7, 1935: I wish Elna would agree to marry me.”
The facing page held a birth announcement. February 28, 1936. A little girl born to Elna and Ed Ingram. I did some math quickly in my head, and figured why my Grandmother had agreed to marry Grandpa.
“January 23, 1938: A son would be nice.” A birth announcement on the facing page. Underneath, seemingly u
nrelated was an article about a hospital in a town nearly seventy miles from their home burning to the ground.
I flipped ahead a few pages. Each page seemed to have a wish, and a facing article or story. “September 11, 1949: I really would love a new house.” The facing page held an article that I recognized from a story my mother had told me. A plane had crashed into their house when she was thirteen or so.
“It was just a crop duster. The pilot lost control and he was killed, along with half our cows. But we got a new house and more cows. Something about insurance.”
The news article called the crash suspicious. There were no follow ups.
I skipped to the next book.
“August 29, 1960: I wish Kennedy was President. Even for a couple of years. I think he would do the country some good.”
The facing page held an article about Kennedy’s assassination. Under the original entry were scrawled the words “I AM A FOOL” in all capitals. 1963 was scrawled underneath. A few pages later:
“April 10, 1970: I wish we would stop wasting money going to the moon!”
The facing page held an article about Apollo 13. An oxygen tank exploding on takeoff. Underneath was scrawled: “Bring those men home safe!” The following page held an article on the miraculous safe return of Apollo to the Earth.
The rest of the notebook was blank. I sat back and sighed. I looked at the next two books. I wondered if Grandma had ever found these. Grandpa thought he controlled events by wishing. I began to wonder if he was right. I was exhausted but curiosity drew me to the other two books.
I opened the next. Inside the cover was written in his close hand the words “I must be more careful what I wish for.” More was underlined twice.
By this time Grandpa had moved to Idaho. The kids were grown and scattered.
