Circle of Three

by Patricia Gaffney

  “Landy, how’s your father?” Mom asked.

  “Not too well. Heart trouble. He’s weakening every day.”

  “I’m so sorry. Is your mother still living?”

  “Yes, she is. Yes, she is.”

  A man of few words. I looked around for something to do. This part of the barn was Jess’s workshop, cluttered with tools and pieces of machinery and workbenches and different kinds of saws. Power saws, lots of them—so why was Landy using a handsaw? For that matter, why was he using Jess’s barn, why not his own? He supposedly lived next door. “Are you also building the ark?” I asked.

  “Ha,” he said, and did the head ducking thing again. He was either really shy or not all there.

  Jess said, “That’s still on the drawing board,” and he said it so straight and firm, so matter-of-fact or something, it was like, well, at least there’s one completely sane person here. “In fact, it’s literally on the drawing board. Come and look.”

  We went over to one of the workbenches, where there was a big sheet of drafting paper with a drawing of an ark on it. It had the pointy ends and the flat-roofed box on top like you always see in pictures of arks. I had a lunch box in third grade with an ark and all the animals on it, I don’t know why, and it looked like that.

  “Cool,” I said. “How big is it?” I looked up to see Landy and Jess grinning. “What? What’s funny?”

  “That’s something else that’s still under debate,” Jess said, and he and Landy started to laugh.

  Landy had a big, dark gap between his two front teeth, which must be why he tried to smile with his lips closed. “My father would like it to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high.”

  Mom said before I could, “What’s a cubit?”

  “The distance between the tip of the middle finger and the elbow,” Jess said. “Biblically speaking.”

  “So what does that—”

  “It comes out to about four hundred and fifty feet long, seventy-five feet wide, forty-five feet tall.”

  “Wow!” I said. “That’s bigger than a football field!”

  “Good heavens,” Mom said.

  Everybody looked depressed.

  “So a cubit is your arm from here to here,” I said, measuring mine. “What’s that, twenty inches or so. Okay, but everybody’s different. What if you took, like, an infant’s arm and measured. It’d probably be about a fourth the size of a man’s, but it would still be a cubit.”

  Everybody stared at me.

  “Right? So you could still have the ark be three hundred cubits long, but instead of four hundred feet it would only be one hundred. Which is still huge. Does the Bible say whose arm you have to measure?”

  You’d’ve thought I just invented the electric light bulb. Jess and Landy looked stunned and then hopeful. “You think?” “I don’t know, what do you think?” Mom said, “Could you do that?” and Landy said, “I think so. I hope. He’s very reasonable—when I explain, I think he’ll say yes.”

  Yeah, that’s Eldon, all right, Mr. Reasonable.

  Landy said he’d like to ask Mom’s advice about something if she wouldn’t mind, she being an artist and all. That’s when I knew he was shy, not mental: he’d hit her right in her weak spot. Oh, no, she said, she wouldn’t mind at all, and pretty soon they were having a great time talking about plywood thicknesses and paint finishes.

  Boring. “Any new calves?” I asked Jess.

  “Twins. Want to see?”

  “You bet.” And we split.

  Walking through the dirt farmyard toward the real barn, the huge one where most of the cows live in winter, I thought about how much I could say to Jess about this ark project. It looked like he was in on it, though, so I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. I started with, “So is that guy going to do all the animals? All of them?”

  “Probably not.”

  “Yeah, because wouldn’t that be impossible? How many species are there, a thousand? No, more like a million. All the animals you never think of, the wombat, the weasel. The wolverine. Shrike.” Jess was grinning, which encouraged me. “Wildebeest. Jackal. Dogs! Hey, if you do dogs, don’t you have to do all the different breeds? Because, I mean, after the flood you wouldn’t want to be stuck with nothing but, like, Dalmatians.”

  “True.”

  “Fish, you have to put in all the fish. All the shrimp and minnows and rockfish, tuna—whales—there’s gotta be a million!”

  “Don’t forget reptiles.”

  “Yeah, two of all the snakes and lizards and everything. Don’t forget the snail darters!” We both started laughing, and it was great, I felt grown up making fun of this adult thing, something adults had dreamed up and it turned out to be crazy. “It’s nuts, isn’t it?” I asked, just to be sure.

  “It is completely nuts.”

  “I know! So why are you doing it?”

  “Hell if I know. Haven’t you ever done anything that didn’t make any sense? Just because you wanted to?”

  “Not that I can think of. Playing and make-believe, okay, but you’re supposed to outgrow that, right?”

  He just smiled, lifting up one crooked eyebrow at me. It had a scar in the middle, and he’d told me how he got it—when he was twelve a pony he owned named Dylan pulled a barbed-wire fence down on his head. Most of the time Jess looks like he’s kidding you, because he smiles a lot and that crooked eyebrow looks funny and playful and in the know. But other times his eyes, which are very light gray, get dreamy and faraway, and then he looks to me like a sad man.

  It was much warmer in the cow barn. Jess has about two hundred head of cattle, mostly females—that’s what a cow is—and in January and February they live inside. He swears they don’t mind it, not even staying in their stalls all day except for the two times, four in the afternoon and five in the morning, when they get milked. He calls them “girls.” “Here come the girls,” he says when they start plodding out of their barns and crowding around the milking parlor. They scared me the first time I got up close to a whole crowd of them in one place, but I didn’t know how gentle they were. They all look the same to me, fat black and white Holsteins with sweet, vacant faces. But Jess actually knows who’s who—or so he claims. And this I can hardly believe, but he says he knows their names. “Okay, who’s that?” I’ll say, pointing to some cow at random. “Cinnamon,” he’ll say if it’s nearby, or “Can’t tell,” if it’s in the distance. “Might be Tulip, can’t see her off side.” He could be pulling my leg, but I don’t think so. I think he really knows all his cows by name.

  “I can see how you could start to like them,” I said, leaning beside him against the door to one of the birthing stalls and looking in at two sleeping calf twins. “They’re nice. They don’t have any…” I couldn’t think of the word. “They could never plot to do something bad.”

  “Nope.”

  “They’re simple. They have good souls.”

  “Except when they break your foot.”

  “God, that had to hurt. Which one did it?” Last summer Jess got stepped on in the field by a cow that wouldn’t move, just stood on his foot until she broke it. He was on crutches for two months.

  “That would be Crocus.”

  “You still have her?”

  “’Course.”

  “Jess, can I pet the calves?”

  “Sure.”

  But I stayed where I was, next to him with my foot braced on the bottom rail, arms folded over the top. The barn smell of cow, urine, manure, and feed is amazing, the first whiff almost knocks you over. Then you get used to it and it’s not bad. That surprised me, the fact that all that cow shit and pee doesn’t stink to high heaven. It stays in your nostrils for a while after you leave, but you don’t really mind it. It’s a fresh smell, dark and sweet, like old grass and earth. I almost like it.

  “So,” Jess said into the peaceful quiet, “how’s it been going for you? How’s school?” he added—that was in case I didn’t want to talk about personal
stuff.

  “School’s okay. I have this pretty cool English teacher, Mrs. Fitzgerald. We’re reading some poetry. And she’s making us keep journals.”

  “Who’s your best friend?”

  “Oh…Jamie, I guess. And there’s this guy.” He made an interested sound. “He’s not my boyfriend or anything. His name’s Raven. Gram thinks he’s bizarre. Mom, too, but she doesn’t say it, she’s trying to be cool, but it’s so obvious.”

  “What’s bizarre about him?”

  “You name it. No,” I said, laughing, “he’s not really, he just wears makeup and dresses like a vampire, it’s no big deal.” I laughed again, this time at Jess’s face. I was this close to getting the giggles, which I thought I had finally outgrown. “He’s very smart, he’s probably the smartest kid in the class, he probably shouldn’t even be in school. We just hang together sometimes. He gave me a book of poems. When my dad died. I like him, but it’s not like this grand passion or anything.”

  I could see he was thinking it over, figuring out if he should say it or not. Finally he couldn’t resist, but he kept his voice really casual. “He dresses like a vampire?”

  I put my head down on my arms and snorted. Why was it so funny? Some sort of hysteria felt like it was right around the corner. “Sometimes, yeah. It’s nothing, it’s just a thing. An expression of his angst and disgust at the hollowness of the culture.”

  Something rubbed against my leg—I looked down and saw a skinny, dusty black cat. I petted it gingerly until it slunk off. “Which one was that?” I challenged Jess, and he said, “Blackie.” I couldn’t tell if he was kidding or not. “My dad was allergic to fur or dandruff or something, we could never have pets,” I said, “not even a cat. Not that I would want a cat.”

  “I like cats.”

  “Yours are okay.” He had about a dozen cats or kittens who lived outside, barn cats whose job was to catch mice. “But usually they’re sneaky. Once I had a guinea pig for about two days, but Dad said I had to get rid of it. So then I got fish, some goldfish, but all they did was die. It was totally disgusting. I’d wake up in the morning and there would be my new goldfish stuck to the top of my dresser.”

  He leaned over to rub the pink nose of one of the calves, and I could smell his lemon aftershave. My dad used Old Spice, which is sweeter, more prickly on your nose than Jess’s brand. “I was a little older than you,” he said seriously, like he was starting a story, “when I lost my father. His name was Wayne. My mother was Ora.”

  “Wayne and Ora Deeping.” They sounded so country.

  “He was a small, slight guy, only about five foot five. He started to go bald when he was in his twenties.”

  “You sure don’t take after him.”

  “Well, not that way. Other ways.”

  “How did he die?” How people die is the thing I want to know most these days.

  “An accident. Threshing machine.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “I still miss him. It’s been nineteen years. I think I stayed here because of him. Wanted to make a go of the place for him, and I guess I did.”

  “Yeah, sure. You’re probably rich.”

  He laughed, which was a relief, because I didn’t hear how rude that sounded until after I said it. “My dad worked harder than any man I ever knew. He taught me that—to love what you do, give everything to it. He was very quiet. He moved like this—” Jess straightened up very deliberately from petting the calf. “Slow as a turtle, so he wouldn’t spook his cattle. It worked, too, you never saw such happy cows. His doc told him he had no blood pressure at all.”

  Death is so weird. Here I am with a dead father, and here’s my friend Jess with a dead father and a dead mother. Everybody dies. Millions and millions of people are dead. All the people who ever lived since the beginning of time, since the beginning of the world, are now dead. I picture them as stacked on top of one another, like a gigantic pile of cord-wood about a trillion miles high. How could God, if there is one, think this is a good plan? How can it be anything but horrible, the absolute worst?

  “My dad’s heart gave out,” I said. Jess already knew that, but now I was telling him my story. “He was driving home with my mom on a Friday night. They’d just had dinner with my grandparents, but he wasn’t drunk or anything. He leaned over against the door, and his heart just stopped. Maybe even before the car crashed. Before that he never had anything wrong with him, he never even got colds. Sometimes.” I put my fingers on my lips and whispered. “Sometimes I think it would’ve been better if it had been her instead of him. And then—I’m glad it was him, because if it was her it would be even worse. And then I feel rotten because I know I’m making it all about me instead of my dad. Mom’s still a wreck and there’s nothing I can do, I can’t fix it. I can’t change anything, I can’t do anything. I don’t even get why he died. Why did he die? Does anybody know? Do priests know? Philosophers? You don’t know, do you?”

  Jess, of course, said no. The amazing thing was that I said all that, made that whole speech, without ever bursting into tears. That cheered me—a sign of growing up.

  I started thinking: if anything ever happened to Mom, say she got a job in another city or something, I bet Jess would let me move in, live on the farm with him. He might think at first that I’d be a pest, but he’d soon change his mind. I could do the cooking and cleaning, I’d help out with the chores. At night we’d keep each other company around the kitchen table or, in the summers, out on the front porch. He’s got a swing. Living all by himself, he has to be lonely. I’d be his right hand. Raven could come over sometimes, maybe he’d get a part-time job helping Jess out in the afternoons. I’m sure they’d like each other. They have more in common than meets the eye. Mom would come for visits on the weekends. She’d have her doubts at first, but then she’d see what a good job I was doing holding things together.

  I heard a door slam and a car start up. When we went outside, Landy was driving away in his Ford Taurus and Mom was standing in the yard waving good-bye. I guessed they were buddies now. “Now who’s starving?” Jess said, and we went in his house and had tea.

  The house is not very farm like, to say the least. It’s modern and mostly brick, two stories painted white, and inside there’s the living room, dining room, etc., etc., decorated just like some middle-class person’s house in the suburbs. It’s kind of a disappointment. The best rooms are the kitchen and the office, probably because they look like the only ones he uses. All the others are big, clean, empty, and sort of depressing.

  Jess had the kitchen table set for three people, including blue-and-white-checked place mats and matching napkins, plates, cups, saucers, and a teapot. “Have a seat.” He started heating a pot of milk on the stove.

  “Can I help?” Mom asked. She looked pleased but kind of nervous.

  “Nope. Like coffee cake?”

  “Is that what that smell is? Oh, man.” I really was starving all of a sudden. He took a loaf pan out of the oven and set it on the table. “Wow, did you make this yourself? Fantastic. Mom hardly ever bakes anymore.”

  “Go ahead, cut a piece. Eat. I’ve got sandwiches, too.”

  “No, we’ll wait for you,” Mom said.

  “Go ahead.”

  “Okay,” I said, “if you insist.”

  It was terrific, still warm from the oven, lots of brown sugar and cinnamon on the outside, silky cake on the inside. “Sour cream,” Jess said when I asked him the secret. “How come you don’t bake anymore?” he asked Mom.

  “I know I should, but it’s hard with just the two of us. And now that I’m working—”

  “It’s because she doesn’t want to get fat,” I explained. “She was moving in that direction, too, but lately the slide has been…” I couldn’t think of the word.

  “Decelerated,” Mom said coolly. “Thank you.”

  “Thank you,” I said when Jess filled my cup with hot cocoa and dropped a marshmallow on top. “Krystal doesn’t eat sugar, but I do. I�
�ll give it up someday, but I’m not ready yet.”

  “This is delicious, Jess, truly. I didn’t know you were such a good cook.”

  “Thank you. Tea or coffee?”

  “Tea, please. Thanks.”

  They were being sort of formal and stiff with each other. Friendly, but also really…alert. I said, “So did you all go to school together, you guys and Landy?”

  They started to answer at the same time. She stopped and Jess said, “Landy’s older, he was a few years ahead of us. He bought the farm next door about fifteen years ago, not long after his wife died. He’s been a good neighbor. We help each other out.”

  “So the two of you were in the same class? You’re the exact same age?” They nodded. “Landy looks a lot older than you guys. Maybe he had to stay back?”

  “No, I don’t think so. He has terrible arthritis in his hands, Jess.”

  “I know. That’s why he can’t use any of my power saws—I’m afraid he’ll cut his arm off.”

  “He can’t do all that work with a handsaw.”

  “No.”

  “What’s he going to do?”

  He shook his head. After a minute he said, “I’m going to help him build the ark.”

  I almost choked on my hot chocolate. “Get out. No. You are, really?”

  He smiled. Then he looked at Mom, who wasn’t saying anything. “He’s only got four months to do everything. He’s not completely alone, some of the members of the congregation have been helping him out when they can. But they’re old, and a lot of times—today, for example—they don’t show up.”

  “He’s not even a member of the congregation,” Mom said. “I couldn’t believe it when he told me that.”

  “No, he’s a Methodist.”

  “Whoa,” I said, “Landy’s not an Arkist? Then how come he’s doing this?”

  “For his father. Because he promised.”

  “Wow. Wow. So he doesn’t even believe in it.” This just got stranger and stranger. “How come he only has four months?”

  Jess looked funny, embarrassed or something. When he rubbed his cheeks with both hands, the raspy sound of his whiskers reminded me of my dad. “Well, according to Eldon, the Bible says the flood was in the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, the second month, the seventeenth day. Apparently that comes out to the seventeenth of May.”