The Last Days of Summer

by Vanessa Ronan

  That is not this sound.

  It hits her chest hard, like the breath is knocked out of her, and she stands, dazed. The brisket needs to come out of the oven. There’s still bread to butter. But Lizzie stands paralysed, listening to her brother’s laugh that is not her brother’s, spoon held before her like some useless shield against whatever unknowns may come to pass. The reverend’s words haunt her. Half a day with Jasper and her inner response is still the same: I reckon I don’t know at all. Except he’s here now. His strange laughter tearing through the thin walls. An inhuman sound that peels the yellowed wallpaper right off till there’s only bare wood left, every room a skeleton, the whole house a skeleton, and inside it Lizzie feels stripped raw too, like there is no hiding or place to hide even if she wanted to.

  ‘Joanne!’ she manages to gasp then shout. ‘Jasper! Supper!’ but now her voice, too, rasps: unnatural. Harsh yet quivering. And had she been in another room listening in, Lizzie would not have claimed that sound as hers. She sets the sweet tea on the table. Hurriedly slaps butter on the bread. Doesn’t breathe natural till two sets of footsteps are coming down the stairs.

  It’s been years since a man sat at the head of the table. Used to be Daddy’s spot when they were children. He would sit still and powerful and silent, glaring down if ever they were heard instead of merely seen. Not that Mama got freedom of speech exactly either, but she could talk about church and gardening and the weather, little bits of town gossip. She could talk about some things, woman things, but not about others. And before Bobby run off, he sat there awhile. Sunday dinners. Christmas. Easter. Thanksgiving. For the important meals, that was his spot. But after he left, Lizzie took over that chair. It felt strange at first. But Katie and Joanne had set the table up that day, and they’d put a plate at the head, small as the girls were back then, not knowing maybe it weren’t right with there being no man in the house. Not knowing yet that their daddy was gone for good. So when she saw that plate there, Lizzie had sat down. For the girls. That’s why she’d done it.

  She had imagined being her father. There, sitting for the first time in his chair, she had seen a fleeting glimpse of the world through his eyes. It was not a kind or pretty one. Mama was staring at her from across the table. Like she’d never set eyes on Lizzie before. The girls were too little to notice, squirming and restless and hungry in their chairs. Mama had looked long and hard at Lizzie and there had been something like pride in her eyes. And something else a bit like shame.

  So when Lizzie comes into the dining room it stops her short to see Jasper sitting there at the head of the table. That seat has never been his.

  ‘Something smells good.’ Jasper leans back in the chair so that the two front legs hang off the ground. Arms crossed behind his head. Mama would have slapped the back of his skull if he’d ever sat there like that. He’s still wearing the grey Coca-Cola T-shirt, and from him the slight smell of sweat sweetens the already sticky room. He’s smiling. That cold, mischievous smile that is her brother and isn’t her brother, and for a moment Lizzie wonders who this man is, sitting in her chair, smelling of sweat, about to eat her supper. But the twinkle in the corner of his brown eyes, that is Jasper. That’s the spark that pulled the faces that made her laugh at all those childhood suppers. It’s the spark that now relaxes her enough to step forward and set the brisket down.

  ‘Glad to see you’re comfortable.’

  ‘That there grub looks mighty fine.’

  She takes the seat at the foot of the table. Feels wrong somehow to be sitting in Mama’s old seat. She turns to Joanne. ‘Where’s your sister?’

  Joanne shrugs.

  Jasper goes on as if there’s been no pause: ‘Reckon they fed us all right in there but this here smells a whole lot finer.’

  Lizzie glances at the grandfather clock. Quarter past seven. Told Katie be home by half. So she isn’t late yet. It’s the brisket that’s early … Lizzie sighs. ‘We might as well start.’ She rises to carve the meat.

  Jasper rises too. ‘Let me. As I recall it’s the man that usually does the carving.’

  Above the table their eyes meet. Like how many countless times before. Stealing glances round the room while Mama said grace. Sneaking bits of food. Making those funny faces. The twinkle is still in Jasper’s eyes. He’s smiling at her.

  There’s nothing sinister in that smile. Nothing bad. He’s older, tireder, greyer, but it’s Jasper. For the first time all day it’s really Jasper. Her brother, home. Lizzie hands him the carving knife handle first. He takes it. ‘Yep,’ he murmurs, as the first cut slices, blood and juices dripping from the pink meat onto the serving plate, ‘this here sure is a lot nicer than what we was bein’ fed.’

  He dishes out four platefuls. Sits back down. The mash is passed round. And the corn. The bread. Half past now. Where is that girl? Lizzie takes a big bite of mash. Jasper’s eyes across the table stop her. ‘Don’t we say grace no more?’

  Joanne looks up from her plate. Head turns from her uncle to her mother and her gaze sticks. Lizzie can feel the girl’s eyes on her, but she holds Jasper’s cool gaze. Brakes squeak in the driveway and a car door slams. Crickets and July flies have started to come out to greet the evening, and their songs mix with the falling night, blown in through the open window and its screen. The front door opens and slams, and Katie’s clear young voice calls, ‘Sorry! I’m home!’ Footsteps fast approaching in the hall.

  Lizzie meets Jasper’s eyes, feeling her own go cold. ‘Whatever prayers you got to say, I reckon you can say in private.’

  Jasper comes out on the front porch and sits in the other rocker beside his sister. They are silent for a while as sunset fades to darkness. The evening primroses bloom, releasing their subtle scent, and the fragrance of the flowers mixes with that of the fresh-cut grass and the sunburned prairie, and Jasper breathes deep. At length he says, ‘I remember that smell.’ Lizzie turns to him, not asking, just nodding. Laughter drifts out from the kitchen window round the back where the girls are washing up. Jasper lights a cigarette. Drags on it long and deep. In the darkness the tiny butt moving from hand to lips looks like a caught firefly trapped and now forced in repeated migration. The porch light is off. And the stars can just about be seen.

  ‘Do you remember that time when you was a boy ’n’ that July fly shed its skin on you?’

  He searches for her face in the dark. It is not turned towards him. He cannot read whatever shadowed secrets might have offered themselves there. He looks back out across the garden and breathes in again the familiar smell. Garden. Closes his eyes and opens them and it’s still there. Garden. ‘Haven’t thought ’bout that in a long time.’

  Silence between them, but not the uncomfortable kind. ‘What did it feel like?’ Lizzie says at last.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That July fly.’

  ‘Stung like crazy.’

  She laughs a little, but not for long, and when she’s stopped and fallen silent he says softly, so that she can barely hear him, ‘Must be nice to hold on to someone and shed your skin like that.’

  Together, they watch darkness fall. She hums under her breath, but he does not recognize the tune, and when she falls silent, he does not ask. He wonders if she is even aware that she was humming. He tips his rocker back far as it goes, digging his heels into the porch, enjoying the slight strain on his legs as he watches the last streaks of golden light disappear. At length he releases his heels, letting the rocker rock itself still, soothed by the changing pace of the motion. He looks out across the lawn and tries to find the horizon, but can’t make out where prairie turns to sky. Too dark now. He breathes deep, holding Garden in his lungs. Thinks about the family photographs that line the stairs. All the pictures, once hung, now missing. He’d thought, maybe earlier, when he’d sat at the head of the table, Lizzie might have said something. Might have mentioned not to sit there, that was Bobby’s seat. He thinks again of Doe Eyes’ surprise when he asked where her father was. Out loud, Jasper says,
‘I could use a change of clothes. Reckon I could borrow some of Bobby’s things?’

  Her rocker stops rocking. Crickets call out and answer. Lizzie rises slowly, looking out over the garden to the prairie and up to the night sky. ‘He don’t got no things to borrow.’ Voice just above a whisper but hard. Too hard. She turns and walks to the door. Pauses as she opens it, inside light spilling out. She looks back at him but her face is shadowed. ‘There’s a box of Daddy’s old things up in the attic. Reckon that can tide you over. I’ll take you into town in a couple days. Get you them things you need. But I won’t have you growin’ lazy in this house neither. You’ll have to see to that, too.’ The door closes quietly behind her. A little girl’s laughter drifts out into the falling night, constellations brightening.

  ‘I’m obliged.’

  Only darkness there to hear his answer.

  ‘Katie?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘You sleepin’?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Joanne rolls to face her sister, mattress springs squeaking as she turns. In the darkness she can just make out Katie’s shadowed silhouette, back to her. She can feel the heat radiating off her sister’s body. The sticky cling of the sheets is uncomfortable against Joanne’s clammy skin. She is thinking of her own small bed down the hall. Of the man who’s sleeping in it. How cosy and comfy that bed always was, how she could kick the covers right off her if she wanted to, but Katie likes the sheet tucked up around them, and she smells of the perfume that Joshua Ryan gave her last Easter. Like one of those pink gumballs left out in the sun too long that’s melted into its own sticky sweet paste. Joanne did that once. By accident. Melted a gumball. It rolled out of her pocket and melted in Mom’s pickup, right there on the seat, baked into the torn leather by the heat of the sun. Mom made her clean it up, and the gum got under her nails, stuck her fingers together, even got in her hair somehow, and Mom had to snip the tangle right out. Whole truck smelt like bubble gum for about a week. That’s how Katie smells, like warm, sticky, melted bubble gum. Joanne wishes she smelt like that.

  ‘Katie …’

  ‘Ummmmm.’

  The curtain blows and a warm breeze finds its way into the room, bits of moonlight creeping with it through the open window, catching and reflecting on the tiny flowers embroidered in the curtain lace. Too late for crickets now. Night dark and silent outside that screen. Even darker inside in the muggy room.

  ‘How long you think he’ll stay?’

  Katie is still, breath steady. For a second Joanne wonders if maybe she is asleep after all, but at length her sister answers. ‘I dunno.’

  ‘You scared of him?’

  Katie tosses onto her back. Her shadowed face turns to search for her sister’s eyes. ‘Are you?’

  ‘A little.’ Joanne’s voice barely a whisper. ‘I feel sorry for him, too.’

  ‘Why?’

  A lone coyote somewhere far off on the prairie calls, then falls silent to call again. Joanne wishes she could see Katie’s face. It feels strange lying here with her sister talking to the darkness like this. Feels strange that Katie’s listening to her, actually listening, and asking questions when it seems like lately all Katie tells her is to ‘piss off ’n’ shut it’.

  Eventually Joanne whispers, ‘He reminds me of that dog we found. The one by the road that’d been hit. You remember, Katie, how he was howling when Mom picked him up?’ Silence for a moment. Then, to the darkness, Joanne adds, ‘Maybe if he hadn’t died we coulda kept him.’

  Katie does not reply.

  When Mom first told them Uncle Jasper was coming home, she’d sat the girls down in the living room all formal, same way she did when Grandma finally passed. The mood in the room felt the same too. Except someone was coming home, and that felt even stranger. There’d never been anyone to come home before – people were always leaving. All summer she had heard folks in town whispering about him and about him getting out, but when they noticed Joanne near they always fell silent. She had no real notion of what he’d done. Just bits and pieces to string together. When they’d been really small, Katie used to play detective with Joanne as they gathered Uncle Jasper clues. How the Saunders wouldn’t talk to Mama when they saw her in town. A photo of him when he was only young, his head thrown back, laughing, his arm around the shoulders of a smaller skinny boy. A letter they found up in the attic with only a court date on it, written from some attorney, folded and refolded as though read a thousand times. But Uncle Jasper had never been real before. Just a shadowy storybook figure from Mom’s childhood. A name forbidden to be spoken. A game they used to play. But when Mom sat them down and told them about how he was gonna come live with them, Uncle Jasper began to solidify. Joanne had felt cold all over, unsettled and itchy inside. ‘You girls is gonna have to be here for each other,’ Mom had said. ‘It won’t be easy havin’ him around, ’n’ I reckon it won’t be so easy for him comin’ back. I’m gonna need you girls, too. I’m gonna need you to be strong for me.’ And then Mom had held them both too long and too tight and real close.

  But still no one would tell Joanne what Uncle Jasper’d done, and Mom cancelled their newspaper subscription soon after she told the girls that he was coming home. It didn’t seem real. None of it seemed real. Even after cleaning out her room so he could have it. It wasn’t until earlier that night, when he’d been sitting on her old bed in her old room, looking at her with dark eyes, that Uncle Jasper had become real. He didn’t look like the gaunt man of her imaginings. He just looked sad. And tired, maybe. And like his eyes had seen great troubles.

  Joanne had never imagined that all this might change things with Katie, though. That Katie might actually listen to her now, might become her friend again instead of just her sister. She wonders if Katie might let her tag along more. Downstairs the grandfather clock strikes the hour and the two girls listen as the chimes drift through the sleeping house to fall silent, letting the house grow quiet again. A floorboard squeaks as though someone walks the hall, and Joanne catches her breath, wondering if it’s him, but only silence greets her straining ears.

  ‘I talked to him.’ Joanne can feel her older sister’s eyes on her even in the dark. ‘I think he punched the wall. I fetched him down to supper. He asked where Daddy was.’

  ‘Oh.’ Silence between them. ‘Why’d he punch it?’

  ‘Dunno.’

  Joanne kicks one foot out from the sheets. Knee down, her left leg is free and the skin feels like it can breathe again. She wishes she could kick the sheet all off. Wonders if maybe Katie will let her.

  ‘What’d you tell him?’

  ‘ ’Bout what?’

  ‘ ’Bout Daddy.’

  ‘That he’s gone.’ She hesitates. ‘Katie …’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘What’d he do?’

  ‘Go to sleep, Jo.’

  ‘You know, don’t you?’

  The thick silence her only answer. No breeze blows in now. Again Joanne misses her bed in her room where she could look through the curtains and count stars till she fell asleep. Counting stars works better than counting sheep. Mom taught her that. ‘Tell me ’bout Daddy again.’ Then softer, barely a whisper, ‘Please.’

  Repeated and repeated as lullabies on sleepless nights, Joanne knows Katie’s memories of their father as if they were her own. How he used to hold a cold beer can to Katie’s cheek and dare her not to smile. How he’d toss Katie in the air till she felt like she was flying. The roughness of the calluses on his palms. How he always called Katie ‘Lady’, and could wiggle his ears. Joanne was three when he left. Her only memory of him is being carried back to bed one night after she’d woken from a bad dream, his arms around her, breath stale, shirt smelling of tobacco.

  Into the darkness, ‘Katie?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Do you think maybe Daddy might come home like Uncle Jasper did?’

  Silence thick as humidity in the air between them. Wind blows through the open window, pulling the curtain out long.
Katie reaches across the bed and lightly touches Joanne’s cheek. ‘Daddy ain’t coming back, Lady.’ The curtain hangs limp again before the window. Breeze spent. Joanne smiles. She likes it when it’s just the two of them and Katie calls her that. Even if the nickname’s a hand-me-down.

  ‘Jo …’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Don’t feel too sorry for Uncle Jasper, OK? He ain’t here to be our friend.’

  Sleep does not come quickly. On the cell block there was the metallic creak and groan of locking bars to scream, ‘Lights out.’ There were the rough voices of prison guards and the convicts’ rougher sneered replies. And then the click of every lamp falling dark. And sometimes the moans of men overpowered. And sometimes low groans in the darkness. And sometimes crude jokes and laughter called from cell to cell before the guards would knock the bars again and demand, ‘All quiet.’ And then later sometimes the sounds of haunted men crying out in dreams.

  Here there is just silence.

  Silence of the prairie stretching out beyond, the huge openness of which, after so long enclosed in concrete, unsettles him. Silence of the house all dark and sleeping. Silence suffocating him in this room, wrapped around his ears, his head deafening in all its lack of sound. Then a lone coyote calls somewhere far off and he thinks perhaps there is hope, perhaps there is life beneath, beyond, this stillness.

  His door locks from the inside. He can’t resist the sweet temptation. Rises to cross the room to open the door, just to shut it, just to open it once more. And he can walk the hall. No bars. No guards. He pauses by each door listening. Not to be nosy. Just because he can. Just because each pause spells freedom.

  Back in bed. Feet hanging off the edge, he is surprised to discover it does not bother him. Something nice about his heels suspended like that, floating above the floor. He stares out of the window. Part of Capricorn is visible. A couple of its stars missing. Not perfect, but it’s there. He thinks about those other constellations above his prison bunk. The curves of them. And he misses them, the strange comfort of the fuck-me eyes looking down on him.