by KT Morrison
When 7:30 rolled around, she knew she had to wake him. It would give him an hour to do the birds, eat breakfast, and have a shower because she planned to leave early in case there were any unexpected obstacles along their way.
Up the stairs, she moved quietly, paused at his open door. Thoughts of what she’d seen last night came back to her, but she flitted them away, blinking her eyes and physically shooing them with the backs of her hands. She tapped on the door with the point of her finger then pushed it open, saying his name softly. There was no answer, so she poked her head into Evan’s room and saw the young man fully asleep in her son’s bed.
There was something sweet about it, seeing him vulnerable like that. A very handsome young man, at peace with the world, his whole future ahead of him, flat on his back, one arm above his head, the other big hand opened on his bare chest. He’d closed the window again during the night and slept with only a sheet and a thin fleecy blanket. The quilt she’d made for Evan pieced together with swatches of his old dungarees was pushed down to the foot of the bed in a billowing cotton mountain range. The boy’s big bare feet stuck out the bottom.
Before she even knew what she was doing, she’d walked the three steps to stand by his bed then sat down. She didn’t want to creep the kid out, but she was going to indulge her inner mom whether he liked it or not, and she didn’t care if he was twenty.
Now sitting close to him like this, those images from last night returned, and she made a funny grimace. It had just been his naked body she’d seen, but somehow the accidental exposure and her surreptitious spying made the whole affair seem lurid. It was only a naked body. But, she supposed, it was because he was a good-looking young man, tall and striking, and he did have an exceptionally beautiful body. And a real live extra-large penis, something she had never seen before.
Her eyes wandered over the exposed skin above Evan’s faded chambray sheets. Maceo was olive-skinned, and it looked like he tanned back in Italy. She wondered if he ever went to the beach. It was supposed to be beautiful there, some truly breathtaking spots along the coast. Did he go there with his friends, did they play on the beach, how many girls were in love with this kid? His nipples were taut, dark brown quarters, and somewhere in Italy was a lucky twenty-year-old girl who’d laid in bed with him, put her mouth on them and felt their supple shape. Yes, Marissa’s dimepiece. And her daughter away at school would probably be equally intimate with young men with flawless youth and vigor—she didn’t want to know, and prayed every night her daughter used protection. But the thought of her daughter that way lowered her brow; was she sleeping around? Was it terrible if she did? Her marks were excellent, and she had a level head.
Maceo’s arm, extended up above his head, showed off his young, sinewy muscle. His armpit was alive with a bushel of wiry hair. His skin was flawless, not a mark. No moles, no flecks, just youthful beauty. His sleeping face was placid but his pouting lips hung open. They were soft and curled, almost feminine, but set on such a striking masculine face. Overnight she could see stubble had peppered along the angle of his jaw and up his cheeks.
She resisted the strong urge to give his thick head of hair a motherly tousle, but did whisper, “Rise and shine, sleepyhead.”
His lashes fluttered before his eyes came alive. He blinked, turned his head on the pillow and regarded her with a slow smile creasing his cheeks. He began to stretch, flexing his muscles, the large hand on his chest closed in a fist, and he breathed deeply, his eyes on hers. She felt suddenly frozen in place, her eyes locked on his and she was unable to turn away. They were too close, and this was too intimate. It was unnerving but strangely compelling. She said, “I suppose they don’t say that in Italy, do they? What would a mother call her sleeping son?”
He regarded her sleepily and yawned with his mouth closed. At last, he breathed in with a low, masculine sound, said, “A mother would say Vita Mia, it means My Life, like you are everything to me, you know...?”
“That’s nice. Better than sleepyhead.”
“But my mother she call me Patatino.”
“And what’s that?”
“Like, ah,” he looked away, then darted his eyes back to her in a charming but embarrassed sort of way. “It means she call me her little potato. I was a Cicciobomba...” He winced then puffed out his cheeks, raked that big hand through his thick hair to clear it from his eyes, saying, “A fat kid.”
“You were not,” she laughed.
“Uh-ho,” he laughed, “You ask my mother, she be happy to show you picture for proof.”
“I might do that,” she said, smiling and rocking back.
Maceo smiled at her, looking in her eyes, his hair sliding down and hanging to one side. She licked her lips, swallowed, and the sound was huge in her ears. She cleared her throat, said, “I’ve been waiting to do the chickens, would you like to come out with me?”
He sighed, flexed again, regarded her now through narrower eyes. “Yes, I would like that,” he said and rolled to his side and propped his head in his hand. The sheet had worked down below his chest, and her eyes moved to look at the newly exposed ridges of ribs and his sternum.
She said, “I’ll let you… I’ll let you get dressed then. Meet me downstairs? We should leave in an hour...”
“Yes,” he said, still watching her. He would be naked under those sheets, and she was still sitting here. He was supposed to get up, why was she still sitting here? When Evan was a little lad, he’d sometimes wake up with the blanket tented and she’d sit here and pretend she didn’t notice. What might be going on under the sheets right now?—she shouldn’t be so close to him when he was undressed and barely covered.
Now she was awkward, standing up, keeping her robe closed even though she wore a flannel shirt, pajama bottoms, and slippers. But she couldn’t help a quirky weird smile from tugging up one side of her face. “Okay, right, you get to... Hey, if you don’t have jeans, for, uh, chores, you know you can wear maybe some of Evan’s old things, you can wear whatever you see in the closet there. Gosh, wait, you’re a lot taller than him... Did you bring jeans?”
He was still smiling at her, confident and charming, laying in her son’s bed. He said, “I’ll find something to wear.”
“Okay,” she said, walking backward to the door, her heart starting to pick up its beat, imagining him now tossing aside the sheets and showing her what a twenty-year-old man looked like laying in bed. A wild thought hit her: would he be aroused or not? She closed her robe tighter, said, “I’ll let you get to it, maybe you could wear John’s boots—shoot, your feet are really big, aren’t they?... Anyway, just, well, come down when you’re, uh, dressed, and, uh, I’ll find you some coveralls...”
He still watched her, seemingly amused at her awkwardness.
“Okay, we’ll maybe get you boots at the co-op but, uh, just come on down when you’re dressed.” She backed herself out of the room, closing the door as she went, but leaving it a fist’s breadth open. That was the way she found it—but what if she opened it up again, right now? What would she see? Holy cow, Janie.
She closed the door until the latch clicked. “Good gravy,” she said to herself and rubbed her brow. She headed downstairs.
* * *
Maceo brought his own jeans though they weren’t exactly what she would describe as farm-ready. They had fancy stitching and looked more like something he would wear to a nightclub in Rome. But it didn’t matter, she thought, because she was sure she had a pair of coveralls that would fit him.
They went in the closed space of the mudroom that opened out to the wraparound porch on the side of the house where steps down led to the path to the chicken house. Back when they had kids coming in and out of the homestead from distant parts, she would buy old work clothes wherever she saw them; at the Salvation Army, the Goodwill, the Bargain Barn. There hadn’t been any young men who were as tall as Maceo but she was sure she had a well-worn set of faded green cotton coveralls in an XXL. While he’d dressed, she’d gone to the dee
p end of the pantry and sorted through old clothing she kept stored in Rubbermaid bins on angle-iron shelving and found the ones she was looking for. The size label was so faded, she wasn’t sure if it read XXL or plain XL.
She watched him stretch his long legs into them and when he hiked them up to get his shoulders and arms shoved in, the crotch tugged up tight between his legs. While he struggled his arms into the sleeves, she could see the shape of his genitals like a big soft hump down one of the coveralls’ pant legs. In just his jeans there’d been no bulge she saw (uh, why are you even looking, Janie?), but the tightness of the coveralls made his male parts prominent.
Now he stood and presented his hapless visage to her, arms out, showing the sleeves ending far above his wrists, the pants as well, like he was preparing for a flood. But if they could find a pair of boots for his big feet, it would do for this morning and keep his clothing clean. And he said the same: when she asked him if they were too tight, they both laughed at the obviousness, but he assured her they would be perfect for the job. She pushed a pair of Evan’s rubber boots toward him and caught him tugging at his manhood and wincing.
“We’ll get you some work clothes that fit when we’re in Rochester today,” she laughed.
He smoothed his hands on the coveralls, sheepish being caught adjusting himself and her eyes were drawn down again, and from her angle she could see the bowed out shape of his penis, even the lip of its head.
“Try your feet in those boots,” she said, averting her eyes again and feeling a wave of displeasure for herself.
They were snug and gave him a hobble but he assured her he would be fine in them, and she assured him she would get boots that fit, too, and asked his size. He told her American fourteen.
* * *
He came out with her to wake the chickens, shrugged into a too-tight work coat with sleeves that left a gap between the cuffs and his gloves. It was gray but light out, cold but not frigid, and they walked the plowed path between snow-covered gardens, and the empty pens where the kids used to have their goats and pigs.
The chicken house wasn’t too elaborate, and not high-tech; just a wooden bungalow John built, sided with greying pine. It had two chambers and a penned-in run protected with a roof that extended over top. Heat in the coop was electric, but even still, the girls slowed down their egg production when the snow and cold hit. Maceo had to stoop when he entered.
She showed him where they kept the feed, how much the birds got, showed him the ones that had names, the egg layers. He said, “Why do some not have names?” and she drew a line across her throat. We will eat those ones.
They collected the eggs, washed the ones they would eat for breakfast in the kitchen sink, put the rest in the pantry for later or to be sold to neighbors, and he sat at the kitchen counter and watched her cook. Scrambled eggs, pea-meal bacon, toast with butter and jam. He drank coffee, and she drank tea.
While she washed the dishes, he went upstairs and showered. When he came down he was dressed for his appointment at the school, and together they went into the kids’ Yukon. She showed him all the vehicles quirks (it was almost ten years old); how the stereo worked, how the CD didn’t run anymore but how he could plug in his phone if he liked; how to put on the cruise control if he wanted it; told him it had high mileage but was safe and had good snow tires; she warned him about the steep driveway, how it could get slippery. John kept it maintained personally, and while they drove out of Iroquois Falls, she told Maceo all about the plow business. How after high school John went to work there, and they rented this farmhouse while she raised Evan. Then two years later there was Marissa, and they saved and saved and saved. John was a hard worker. Twelve-hour days were the norm, especially in winter. A lot of the times it was seven days a week, too, but it all depended on the weather. They had two fleets of plow trucks now, one for Rochester, one that went out west toward Buffalo. Plows were a hard business. A lot of work. They had fourteen employees, six Mack trucks, she wasn’t sure how many pickups, and when it snowed John was like a ghost around the house. Maceo asked about the summer, and she said he did grounds maintenance but it was just to keep his hands busy; she told him he used the trucks for haulage, too.
She said, “John keeps these roadways clear so the people can go to their job or to church, or the hospital,” and Maceo said, “All of them?” She said, “Well, not all of them. He doesn’t have the contracts for the highways, he’s not quite big enough. The bigger companies will sometimes subcontract him to do the highways on the snowiest days, but he has contracts with some of the counties. He has to make money everywhere he can, it’s not so easy, and there’s competition...”
“Competition?”
“As John would say, there’s always some Joe Jerk-off with a pickup truck who gets a vinyl sign for the side door, puts a plow on it and starts undercutting guys who have serious businesses. There’s not a lot of margin for profit but it gets better year after year because he keeps growing...”
Maceo said, “What’s a Joe Jerk-off?”
“Oh, a bad name. Something I shouldn’t have said. It’s rude.”
* * *
Before she knew it they were seeing the first signs for Rochester. It was her old hometown. The place where she’d grown up. He asked her where. The suburbs, she told him. North Chili, exactly. Her and John. It was where the college was, though it was in a part of Chili that she didn’t know very well, and the campus was secluded from the road, hidden in a patch of woods.
They drove past her old high school, Wheatville-Chili, and she’d taken that route by choice, a detour because they had some time to spare. It was the first time she’d passed in a long time; usually when she’d come to Rochester, she went right in on the 490 and skipped Chili altogether.
Between the road and the school was a vast snowy field, the geometric shapes of the senior high poking up like pale brick icebergs in the distance. She said “This field here that’s all snow, that’s where John used to play football.”
Maceo looked past her, taking it all in with wide eyes. “Just like on TV. Friday Night Light.”
“You watch that?”
“My sister watch.”
“Yeah, I guess like that,” she said, as they passed. There were a ton of memories coming at her now, and she was smiling.
“He play football, you were cheerleader...?”
“Good question, Maceo,” she said, impressed by his grip on the culture and language. “No, I was not a cheerleader. I did not like the girls that were cheerleaders.”
“But you like football player.”
“Yes. One. But it was more like he liked me, I didn’t go after him.”
He laughed, swept his hair back up on to the top of his head, slouched in the passenger seat with his long legs folded up even in the spacious cabin of the truck. He said, “That’s the way it should be, yes?”
“I think so,” she laughed. “No, I mean, I was in love with John at high school, but I didn’t go chasing after football players.”
“Si.”
“John and I were just...” she laughed again, looking up at the sky, feeling good and smiling, “we were just right for each other.”
Now they were slowing, coming into the developed area of Chili, where the 33 started to be referred to as Buffalo Road, and there were plazas on both sides, a sign up on a marquee indicating one unit amongst a dozen: Marco’s Pizzeria. The place where she and John would come to eat during lunch break maybe twice a week, driving from Wheatville-Chili in his old Nissan pickup. She was rubbernecking, looking left and right, bunched up in traffic slowing for the traffic light ahead. It hadn’t been twenty years since she’d last been here, but it felt like it today; felt like she was passing through a portal into a different time. Most of the storefronts were the same, and as they passed through the lights, she saw a coral pink-painted house, a cottage really, a sixty-year-old throwback probably to a time when Chili was just a rural intersection. This tiny pink house set back from the road lo
oking out of place amongst the big parking lot plazas and fast-food joints was still Rosa’s Salon after all these years. Her head was on a swivel as they passed, looking out Maceo’s window, then behind as she continued on.
Maceo asked her, “Did you study art in high school?”
“I had art in high school. I didn’t take it as seriously as I should, but it was my best grade... But I never did anything with it after that.”
“You do, you paint now.”
“I never did anything after high school... I never studied at college.”
“Your paintings are beautiful.”
She rolled her eyes like Marissa would. “Thank you,” she said and wobbled her head on her neck, unsure how to take a compliment. “Do you really mean that?”
“It’s true. When we go home, do you think we can paint?”
The college entrance was ahead now, the long brick sign with the brown metal letters spelling out Chesborough College mounted on it. She flicked her indicator, slowing. “We can if you’d like to,” she said. “Is that what you want to do?”
He was nodding as she pulled in and ascended the long sloping drive lined by trees. He said, “I don’t know how long the meeting is going to be, but maybe before John gets home...?”
She said, “I’d love to. John probably won’t be home early, anyway. We’ll have a few hours.” Her hands twisted on the wheel with a tight grip. The college was ahead, students hustling now with their parka hoods up, trying to get from building to building without freezing. This had been in her hometown her whole life and she never thought about it. A top quality art school with an instructor inspiring enough she lured a young, talented man all the way from Italy. She pulled in, looking up in awe at the old architecture mixed with the new; modern cantilevered vestibules merging into old brick buildings that looked like churches. A real genuine spark of excitement sizzled in her bed of ashes. And she was smiling again, wide, very wide, and she couldn’t stop it.
