Paper Stones

by Laurie Ray Hill

  And grown people hobbling around in circles, drinking or sleeping around or taking drugs or whatever to numb the pain.

  Marg, you know, she never believed in the hotel before. But, now that it was coming true, she was so matter-of-fact about it. Like the lights were turned green. Time to drive on ahead. She was busy checking out wholesalers. Housekeeping carts, towels, fire alarm systems, hair dryers that hook to the wall.

  Tammy, she was trying. Putting in her kind of ideas. Let’s hand out mace spray with the shampoo and shower hats. She didn’t seem to know enough to be too flabbergasted with the fact we were really doing this.

  Sally, of course, was not surprised the least bit. Faith could move mountains.

  Al, he grumbled that, to hear Sally tell it, you’d think it was going to be the Lord writing the cheques.

  Josie, of course, she wasn’t surprised neither. Just nodded and smiled.

  Seemed like I was the only one amazed and worked up. Running around like a chicken with its head cut off.

  I says to Al, I says, “That’s your money. You don’t have to do this with it.”

  “Oh, I thought I had to.”

  “But now, serious, Dad, is this what you would want to do with it? Maybe there was something you’d always wanted to do, yourself?”

  “Well,” he says, “I will be wanting to hold back some of my capital for a project I got in mind.” He says, “Out there on the island in front of my place, I think it’s about time we invested in about fifty foot of new rope for to put up tire swings again. How would that be, princess? Grandpa will put up a bunch of swings this summer, eh, for yous to swing on and jump in the lake.”

  “Can Matthew and Meghan and Brett and Julie and Alexander play too?” (Tammy’s kids and some of the cousins there.)

  This is just normal life, far as Dave knows. A father backing a son and daughter-in-law’s venture. A grandpa putting up swings for to make kids happy. Dave gets a kick out of the way things like that still make me cry.

  The next thing that happened was the old Macaulay place burnt down. “The house that burned down before the castle came!” Jenny said.

  I turned around and looked at her.

  “Remember? The night Grandpa Al fell on the floor.”

  “Jenny can see,” Josie says.

  “In the fire,” Jenny tells me. “I saw it in the fire. A house burned down and then, out of the ashes, a beautiful castle arose.”

  Josie says it again, “Jenny can see.”

  So, of course, nothing would do Al and Dave but they had to switch plans and start talking to Macaulay again, see if he’d change his mind and sell them the land now his shack was gone.

  Al said it was a better place anyhow. That was where he was voting for all along. There was a real good aquifer up there.

  I said to Dave, “You don’t let a kid pick out a building lot based on what she thinks she seen in a fire.”

  Dave says, “Look,” he says, “yous all moved up here to this town because of a wrinkled-up, five-by-seven picture of it Josie cut out of some old magazine once. True or false?”

  “Oh, come on. It wasn’t that simple! A lot of things went on and we wound up…”

  “Nope,” Dave says. “That’s the long and the short of it. You might just as well admit it. And this piece of shit house here, why did we buy this?”

  “Well, but we like it. It has a good feeling to it. It’s on the lake….”

  “Yeah and we passed up a dozen better houses. Why? Because they weren’t down in a valley, the way the picture was in Josie’s little nuts head. Correct?”

  “Okay, Dave, but…”

  “And this here hotel idea. This is based on what?”

  “But…”

  “Are we a crazy bunch of dreamers or ain’t we?”

  “I’m not used to thinking of myself like that. I always thought I was more the practical type.”

  But then I got this echo of Meredith: “We have to live in the real world now that we’re grown up, Rose. We can’t live in a dream.”

  I never bought that, did I? Hung right on to the dream, in spite of her. Scratched fantasy off the bad list.

  I put my face against Dave, my arms around him. He’s strong. Feels like tire rubber.

  “Anyways,” he says, talking into my hair, “what’s wrong with Macaulay’s Point? Not like it’s impractical. You can see the lake on three sides. Old man seems to want to sell, now.”

  I told him Macaulay’s Point was my dream place for to put the hotel and also a sensible place for it. I told him I didn’t know why I was arguing.

  “And if Jenny can see like Josie can, that’ll be a good thing, won’t it?” he says. “It’ll come in handy.”

  I didn’t say nothing. What’s the use? The world’s a way weirder than what I ever used to think. Real and dream is more mixed together.

  I looked out the window after supper and there’s Sally’s T-Bird bumping up our dark driveway.

  “Can I talk to you, Rose?”

  I put my coat on, and we walked in the lane. The winter stars back north are bright as diamonds. She didn’t say nothing for the longest time.

  So I finally asked her, I says, “What’s on your mind?”

  “Tao asked me to marry him.”

  “Well! Did you want to marry him?”

  “Yes.” Her voice was like she was going to cry.

  “What’s the matter, Sal?”

  It was a real cold night. I stamped my feet to make sure they weren’t froze as we crunched along.

  “It’s too dumb to say.”

  I said, “Not because he’s Chinese?”

  “Oh, no.”

  “And his side don’t mind?”

  “No, no. His grandma told him I’d have lucky children from now on.”

  “Is it your old fears? Because of what happened when your daughter—”

  “No. I think I’ve worked through that. I really want to try again. I’d love to get married to Tao and have children. That’s what I’ve prayed for, but…”

  I thought, oh shit! I bet I know what’s the matter.

  I said, “Is it because of what Josie says?”

  I could hear her sniffing. Sally don’t cry very often. I scrounged in my pocket for a Kleenex.

  I had to smile. I says, “Ah, come on. If you want to marry Tao and he wants to marry you, you go ahead. Never mind Josie.”

  Sally says, “But she’s never wrong.”

  “The only unmarried guy at the hardware store,” I says, “he lives with Art Petty, who frames houses for Jan’s Tom.”

  “I know, I know.”

  We talked it over for a long time that night, walking up and down in the cold. I tried to convince Sally to go ahead. Told her sometimes Josie’s pictures didn’t mean what you’d think. Reminded her about Josie’s lucky ticket vision, how I thought Dave was the lucky ticket.

  “It’s a damn good thing I did marry Dave, see, Sal, but it turns out it was nothing to do with Josie and her pictures. I only thought it was. What if I’d gone and did something I didn’t want to do because of her? Or not did something I wanted to do? Maybe it’ll come clear some other time what Josie’s talking about. That’s how we got to use this second sight or whatever it is. Along with our own brain and our own feelings. Just for a hint. Not for the gospel truth.”

  I could see, by the time she left, she still wasn’t sure what to do. She was scared. Sally, you know, she needs a gospel truth.

  40.

  OKAY, SO, BY SPRING, we had our site and we had our blueprint. Dave and his cousin, Tom, had their construction crew over there soon as the ground dried out enough to get the machinery on the land. Dave’s dad, he was right in his glory, sitting on a stump, supervising.

  Jenny, of course, she always wanted to be tailing after him, to watch D
ave build her castle. She had her own little hard hat and work boots. Al would meet her school bus at the end of the lane when she come home and take her over to the site.

  I wasn’t one bit keen on her being over there. I says to her, “You stay out of the road of them trucks. Stay with Grandpa Al. Hang right on his hand. Don’t you go wandering off in the woods, or down by the shore there. You could fall in the lake and drown and nobody’d hear you for the uproar, what with the machines and all the sawing and drilling and hammering. And look out you don’t step on a nail.”

  And I says to Dave, when we were alone, I says, “You tell your dad to watch her. I don’t like all them workmen around her.”

  “You worry too much.”

  “I worry the correct amount I need to worry based on what the hell this world is like.”

  “Dad’ll look after her.”

  “How’s he supposed to watch her and watch yous pour the footings at the same time? I know what men is evolved for ever since cave days. Yous are evolved to hold your breath, watching for a turkey to shoot, thinking of nothing but what’s in front of your eyes. Your brains thinks of one thing at a time.”

  Dave said she’d be fine. She was sitting on a stump with Al, way out of the road. It was an education for her, he said, to see how a building went up.

  “Yous weren’t evolved to nurse a baby in one arm, stir the pot with the other hand, chew the fat, keep one eye on the toddler and the other on the fire, and teach the older girl to sew, all at the same time, the way us women was.”

  Dave always thinks things are going to be great. And me, I always think there’s disaster coming. The truth is normally someplace in the middle, so we balance out all right.

  Dave was after me to quit work at the plumbing and heating place. Said millionaires generally don’t have to listen to nobody yelling at them about sludge shooting out of the shitter.

  Tammy stopped by one day. I made the comment that I might quit work.

  She got this sad look on her. “I wish I could get your job after you. But I get all bent out of shape over every little thing. That’s what Matthew tells me every day. Says the lights are on but there’s nobody home. Says I’m no good for nothing. Guess he’s about right.”

  Chill went over me. What was young Matthew doing talking like that to his mother?

  I went and got Josie to let her sit on our porch the next Saturday. It was getting to be nice weather again, but the bugs wasn’t out yet. Gee, it was good to see the open water again! Josie watched the breeze sweep patches of sparkle over it.

  I picked up Dave’s binoculars, the ones that his uncle had in the navy. Scanned Macaulay’s Point. Good job Al’s got that orange plaid coat. I could always spot him. Jenny was right beside him. Little yellow hard hat. Pigtails sticking out from under the sides of it. Cute overalls tucked in the tops of her boots. Al was pointing at something, and she was gazing up. I made up my mind to quit worrying for a few minutes. Put down the field glasses. Took a swig of tea.

  I said, “Listen here, Josie. You got to tell Sally she can go ahead and get married.”

  Josie never said nothing.

  “It’s getting past a joke,” I said. I said, “Josie, are you listening?”

  I’d been after her for months now. She didn’t give me no answer. You can’t drag nothing out of that girl.

  We could hear the sounds of the hammering, sharp, across the water.

  “Can you believe it? They’re over there building your dream hotel, Josie! Never thought for a minute we’d really live to see it. Do you remember how you used to build that thing for us in the air, when we hadn’t nothing else?”

  Josie smiled. She knew what I was saying. She looked over at the point. She understands everything, same as you or me. And more. Only she sure don’t talk much.

  I let out a sigh.

  “Young Matthew’s been badmouthing his mother.”

  There’s not so much of a trick, sometimes, to seeing how the future could go. Josie looked out over the lake and said, “Matthew.”

  “What are we going to do about that kid? He’s starting to sound like his frigging father.”

  Nothing else was said for a while.

  Then I said, “I sure hope the hotel winds up being a good idea. Hope people want to come up here. And what about the people like us that we were always going to help? What happened to that part of it? What are we supposed to do about that?”

  Josie’s eyes seemed to focus different. I watched her careful.

  “What is it?” I says. “Did you see something?”

  “Cave,” she says.

  “Cave, eh?”

  Josie nodded.

  Could she see red fire jumping on rock walls? Caveman, wrong in the head, his twisted face? The long, long shadow of his raised-up arm?

  Al, he was getting a kick out of how rich he was. Kept trying to think of what a rich man would do. Not that he ever done nothing to his tarpaper house or bought a truck from any decade in living memory or nothing, like most people would’ve. He still was traipsing out to his backhouse in all weather and grousing about Sally using indoors when it was nice out. He had two pairs of pants, one for working and one for good. Sally was after him to buy new ones. He just asked why he would want more pants. Said he already had twice as many pants as arses. Wouldn’t buy tea now the mint was coming up. Grew and shot most of his own food, and Sally still canned it.

  Sally, she loved making all them shelves and shelves of jams and tomato sauce and fruit and jellies in jars. Born homebody. That’s Sal.

  But she was still wrestling with what to do. Just couldn’t bring herself to forget about this thing Josie said to her years ago. A box opening. Something about a hardware man. That’s who she was to marry. She wouldn’t give Tao an answer. She was praying for a sign.

  Marg was fed up.

  Them two get along, eh. But they’re different as chalk and cheese. Sally tall, pretty, gentle, and all wide-eyes belief in every kind of magic. Marg short and four square, both feet flat on the ground, sturdy and practical. She said, “Oh for frig’s sakes, Sally. Go ahead and marry Tao. It’s what the two of yous both want. There’s no sensible reason on the earth why not to.”

  Now, Al’s idea of spending large was he phoned me at work one day and says, “Don’t go home and cook, Rosie. I’m taking yous out for supper.”

  We went to the Chinese place. Sally was working.

  Elmer was there and four of his cronies, sitting in the corner with coffees, having a good laugh. One of them’s Charlie. I know him from the plumbing business. It’s spring, so they got a bunch of new Frank, the Toronto guy, jokes.

  This Frank, lawyer fellow, when he comes up north every spring to open his summer place, first thing he does, every year, is he finds out his pipes is busted.

  They tell him every fall. You got to drain out all the pipes real good, eh, Frank. If you leave any water in them, it’s going to freeze and burst the pipes. Frank, he figures he’s got them drained. How hard can that be, if these clowns can do it? Won’t hire nobody to do it for him. Gets mad if you say something. He can handle her. He’s smarter than this bunch. Nobody can tell him nothing. He’s the big shot. These here are the lowlifes.

  Then, of course, May two-four, regular as clockwork, there’s Frank on the phone. He can’t imagine how it happened.

  Charlie does an imitation of the Frank guy’s high-pitched voice: “It’s a complete fluke!”

  Elmer slaps the table, laughing. “Exact same complete frigging fluke every year!”

  Al says experience is overrated. You can do the same thing wrong for thirty years.

  Sally sat with us when she wasn’t waiting on nobody.

  Dave calls and nods to the Chinese grandma, sitting at the till there. He says, “Goodnight, ma’am.”

  Grandma likes Dave. She talks away to him, putting her
hand on her back and making faces.

  Jinping tells us that her grandma’s talking about her sore back that just started acting up this morning.

  Al goes through some pointing and nodding with her. Says, “Sounds like sciatica. Tell her to lay on her back and draw her knees up. One and then the other.” He draws his knees up, where he’s sitting, showing what he means.

  Jenny went out to play in the yard when she was done eating. We could see her squatting down feeding grass through the cage to Hong’s rabbits. Al always teases Hong about them. No matter what he’s eating, he says, “Good rabbit.” Orders sweet and sour rabbit balls.

  Hong, she gets him back today. “For you, Mr. Al. Flied labbit.”

  Sally’s boyfriend, Tao, come racing in, all excited. He’s got something in a fair-sized box that he’s wound up to show Sally and us. Looks real proud. Sets the box on the corner of the table. He has to tell us all about it before he will open it. His company used to be called China Importation Enterprise. What I gathered was, somebody in Hoi Nan figured out that there was room for improvement on that name, in terms of letting anybody know what the frig they were selling. So what they done was they put Tao here in charge of cooking up a new name in English.

  “Words to express high durability of clothing,” Tao says.

  He makes quite a production out of leading up to showing us the new letterhead that he’s got there with the new name on it that he’s made up himself. He’s been looking at some computer website where you can put in a word and get a list of all the other words that mean about the same. He’s got it printed off. Reads it out.

  “For adjective, I consider: Strong, Tough, Solid, Hard, Durable, Long-lasting, Everlasting, and Immortal. For noun, I consider: Clothing, Clothes, Garments, Wear, Outfit, Fashion, and Togs.”

  Elmer and his buddies are all sitting there, eh, listening to this.

  Tao opens up his box.

  And Sally, she shoots for the roof like fireworks. Grabs her orange apron over her mouth, bunching it in her fists. She hoots and howls. Her eyes are squeezed shut. Tears. You can’t tell whether she’s crying or laughing.