CENSUS_What Lurks Beneath

by Marshall Cobb

Dave was walking away when Adam cried out, “Daddy!” Dave shook his head and walked back to the room.

  Dave stuck his head into Adam’s doorway but dared not venture any further. He whispered, “You’re going to get Daddy in trouble. What is it buddy?”

  “Daddy, are we going to go fishing and catch a big catfish this weekend?”

  Fishing. In the pond. At the farm. Where things seemed more than a little off at the moment. The spinning wheels inside Dave’s brain were spared further anguish by the appearance of Sampson, who pushed the door fully open with his nose, and then ran over to the bed to lick Adam’s face.

  Adam retreated under his covers and pushed Sampson away. This just heightened Sampson’s interest, and he put both front paws on the bed as he searched with his nose for Adam’s face. Dave lumbered in and grabbed Sampson by the collar. “Come on boy. Down!” He nudged Sampson’s rear with his foot, and the dog grudgingly complied and shuf- fled out of the room.

  All the commotion was readily overheard by Marilyn, who again cried out from her roost in the kitchen, “David Reynolds, get him to bed and get down here now!”

  Dave hustled to the door. The last thing he needed was a fight over Adam’s bed time. At the rate Marilyn was going, his middle name would soon be part of the escalation—Dave, David Reynolds… As he pulled the door shut Adam’s face reappeared from the covers and he repeated his question. “Daddy? Fishing?”

  “Maybe buddy, maybe.” Dave pulled the door behind him as he exited so it was almost shut. The light from the hallway illuminated a sliver of Adam’s bed. “Go to sleep and we’ll figure it out tomorrow.”

  “OK Daddy.” Adam turned over and closed his eyes.

  Sampson sat at the top of the stairs, ready for anything. “Shoo. Go on!” Dave flicked his hands at Sampson to compel him elsewhere, and Sampson, after confirming that Dave was right behind him, ran noisily down the stairs, momentum building, and narrowly avoided crashing into the wall opposite the bottom of the stairs.

  Dave followed at a much more sedate pace. Upon entering the kitchen, he went to assist Marilyn’s efforts at filling the dishwasher, but was him- self shooed away. It was understood that Dave had an almost limit- less desire to help, and was simply inept when it came to what Marilyn viewed as the optimal way to fill a dishwasher.

  Working at the sink, her back to Dave, Marilyn asked, “Why don’t you do whatever it is you need to do for work, and then get to bed?”

  Dave mumbled his agreement, set up his laptop at the edge of the counter and slid noisily onto one of the available bar stools. Marilyn’s efforts produced a series of clinks and clanks as she filled the dishwasher. Dave’s laptop chimed in with its customary noises associated with booting up.

  Soon Marilyn was off to the living room to watch a show about English gentry that would only put Dave to sleep. Dave stared at the cache of new emails that filled his inbox, and ran off the screen. Though his eyes stared at the screen, his mind was elsewhere—running an internal slide show of decapitated deer, monstrous creatures peering into his bedroom window and a shallow grave for the doves.

  As fixated as he was on the downside of what he had recently experi- enced, or at least thought he had experienced at the farm, he was oddly numb to all of it. The farm occupied his thoughts, yes, but it did not scare him. In fact, he actually liked thinking about it. Adam’s idea to go back and go fishing sounded like fun. What exactly was it that he was so worried about?

  The pain flared in his temple and he pushed down hard on the counter with his palms on either side of the laptop. He held that position for a few seconds, willing the pain to subside. The pain eventually took a half-step back and he let his arms go loose, sweat beading on his brow. He took a deep breath and wiped the sweat away with his right hand.

  What the hell was that? That was the worst one yet.

  He took a quick look around, but he was alone. He stared again at his email inbox filling the screen, tried to figure out what he was looking at, and whether or not he cared. More than a minute passed as his eyes stared vacantly at the screen. His hands remained on either side of the laptop. His mouth was slightly open and his breathing was loud, raspy. Eventually, he shook his head to clear it, rubbed his aching temple and decided that his only option was to plow forward.

  At 11:00 p.m. Marilyn came into the kitchen, took a quick look at Dave, then stopped and stared at him. Dave had taken the deep dive into his inbox, and was only distantly aware of the physical world. She watched as he clicked between emails and programs, typing at a furious pace.

  His already-tired eyes looking much the worse for wear in the dim light provided by the screen.

  She walked up behind him, lightly touched him on the shoulder and whispered his name. Dave jumped at the contact and nearly knocked Marilyn over. “Jesus Christ, you scared me!”

  Marilyn’s concern slid toward anger, “Dave, you’re exhausted. Come to bed.”

  Dave sneered unhappily and turned back to his laptop. He clicked back over to his inbox and then moved to the side, gesturing sarcastically at the screen. “And what about all of this? This only gets worse every time I see it.”

  Marilyn relented a little and came closer to stare at the screen. She took in the multiple messages with repeated replies and forwards. Her eyes followed the list off the screen. She moved back to her former spot and chewed a little on her lower lip. “Can’t you find a way to push some of this to someone else?”

  Dave shoulders slumped and he pecked absently at some of the keys. “We’ve been down this road. The clients expect me—not somebody in training.”

  Marilyn placed her hands-on Dave’s shoulders and rubbed gently. They were both shocked by the fact that he initially pulled away at the contact. “And what if you just slowed down a little? Would the world come to an end if you didn’t immediately answer every request?”

  Dave turned to look at up at her from his perch. “It probably wouldn’t.” He gestures expansively around the room, “but our world would probably look a little bit different than what we have here.”

  Marilyn pulled her hands back and pondered the correct response.

  “Maybe we don’t need all of this.”

  Dave snorted. “Because struggling for years was so much fun?”

  “In a way, yes. At least we had each other then. I never see you. Even when you’re physically here you’re not really here, and all you ever want to do with any free time you have is go to the farm—where you spend all day mowing and digging and whatever else it is you come up with.”

  “And all you do out there is putter inside the house on your iPad.”

  Marilyn stiffened, her hands clenching and unclenching. “The farm is your place—not mine. I go there because it makes you happy.”

  “And Adam. It’s his favorite place too. And this house, and all this stuff, it’s for him.” He stood up, and in an effort to make up for his earlier flinch at contact, attempted to hold one of her hands. Marilyn’s fist remains clenched, uninterested. “It’s for you too.”

  “I don’t need stuff Dave. I need you.”

  Dave dropped his attempt to hold her hand. “I think if we’re all being honest, you like the stuff as well.”

  Marilyn dropped his gaze and looked at the floor for a minute, searching for an answer or formulating a response. Or both. Dave expected anger from the low blow he had just delivered, but did not feel any regret. What he said was true. He’d been keeping that thought, as well as some other more significant ones, to himself for too long.

  “If we’re all being honest Dave, I’m seeing someone else.”

  Marilyn scanned his face for a reaction, and, seeing none, volunteered, “It hasn’t gone very far. I don’t want to hurt you.” She stared at him intently, getting nothing in return. “I’m just so lonely.” Tears fell from her eyes and streamed to the floor between them. She sobbed uncontrollably, her back arching from the effort. Dave offered no reply and made no

  move in reaction to her confessi
on, or her tears. This appeared to be the night that all secrets were going to be revealed.

  She continued to cry, hugging herself with her arms to try and stem the flow, as her eyes stared at him with disbelief and, increasingly, disdain. “Why won’t you say something?”

  Dave turned from her and sat back down to face his laptop. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say, and, for the sake of our child I won’t say some of the things I want to say.” His fingers hit the keyboard roughly as he opened yet another message and began to reply to it.

  Marilyn’s tears slowed as she realized that he really didn’t intend to talk to her. She stood behind him for what seemed like an eternity, watching as he continued to type. “You really have nothing to say?”

  Dave stopped typing for just a moment, then continued. “I’ve known about your affair, but I’m glad you told me.”

  Marilyn walked to his side and used her right hand to shut his screen. She then drew closer and stuck her face within inches of his. “You knew?”

  Dave ignored her and reopened his laptop. “Everyone makes mistakes.” He paused and for the first time that night truly looked at her. “It defi- nitely looks like I made at least one.”

  Marilyn tensed as if she was about to strike him, then turned and walked out of the kitchen, and upstairs to their bedroom.

  Dave watched her go, then squeezed his head between his hands. He stayed that way for some time before slowly dropping his hands back to the keyboard.

  As the first rays of sunlight strolled across the kitchen window the next morning Dave continued to crunch away at his laptop. He was definitely worse for wear, and his already-tired eyes now had a vacant quality to

  them. Other than taking off his dress shirt and, at some point, plugging in his laptop, he sat exactly where he had been when Marilyn stormed off.

  Marilyn had not yet appeared, which was likely good, as Dave had noth- ing new to say to her. The rate of his typing had not appreciably slowed, though the lack of sleep combined with the emotionally draining con- versation would likely leave him unable to remember much of what he had been typing.

  “Daddy, why are you still working?” Adam stood shirtless in his pajama pants at the doorway of the kitchen. Unlike Marilyn, a query from Adam shocked Dave into action. He closed the laptop and pushed back from the counter. Adam met him in the middle of the kitchen and Dave scooped him up and squeezed him tightly, trying not to think about the fact that mornings like this would soon be a thing of the past if they moved forward with a divorce.

  “Daddy, your face is scratchy.”

  He pulled back and smiled at Adam. “Yeah, well, I’m going to take a shower and shave in a little bit.”

  Adam made a face, “And brush your teeth.”

  Dave feigned a hurtful look and poked Adam gently in his exposed belly. “Your breath isn’t exactly wonderful either fella.”

  Adam giggled and then fell back against him. Dave hugged him and gently rocked him as Marilyn appeared in the doorway and stared at them.

  From his perch against Dave’s chest Adam asked, “So, Daddy, fishing this weekend?”

  Dave captured Marilyn’s gaze as he continued to hug Adam. Marilyn’s face offered no answers as to her thoughts. Dave absently stroked the

  back of Adam’s head for a moment, trying to think through what he thought about the farm, and what he would be doing if he did not leave town and was forced to deal with Marilyn. The decision was tipped by the odd, warm feeling that came over him when he thought about going to the farm. He replied, “Sure. I’ve got some more driving around to do between now and then but we’ll go to the farm this weekend. Maybe just the boys again?”

  Adam giggles. “All Mommy ever does there is play on her iPad anyway.”

  Marilyn’s mouth fell slightly open and Dave averted his eyes. It could not feel good to hear the same sarcastic comment he had just used now coming out of Adam’s mouth. He had a lot of things to work through in the short term, but he knew that Marilyn loved Adam. Regardless of what he feels, or doesn’t feel for her, causing her pain related to Adam would not do anyone any good. Marilyn turned without a word, and silently went back upstairs as Dave continued to slowly rock Adam.

  CHAPTER TWENTY: Real Property

  The following week Dave diverted from his normal route to the farm and instead headed into town. Nedville was a town of roughly 13,000 farmers and ranchers. Minus the area just off the main highway, where the usual assortment of box stores and chain restaurants dominated the landscape, there was a smattering of restaurants and small stores in the town proper. One of those stores was the old, locally-owned hardware store, and Dave visited it on a routine basis in an effort to steer his money somewhere other than the two giant hardware box stores back by the freeway.

  After stopping in at the store to buy some filters for the air conditioner, he began his drive back to the freeway, and saw his realtor’s SUV parked out in front of the small house that served as his office. Wayne was an old-timer with an old-timer’s dim view of trends, new products and other realtors in the area—he did not like them. He saw the world through his narrow prism, and did so with an emphasis on telling it like it was, and with no allegiances to anyone other than his clients. Dave loved to spend thirty minutes with Wayne every now and then to get an updated account of all the things that were screwed up in the world in general— and Nedville in particular.

  As he pulled up to park behind Wayne’s SUV, Dave fumbled around in his center console trying to find the letter he’d received from someone soliciting his mineral rights. He had been driving around with it for a month, waiting for just this kind of chance to run it by Wayne. As far as

  Dave knew he did not have any mineral rights. The lady he’d bought the property from had none to convey, and the family she’d bought the place from owned all the rights in the area and had no intention of changing that position. Further, the letter referenced his property as being over 200 acres when he actually had a fraction of that amount.

  Dave shut his door and walked up the skinny sidewalk to the small, wood-frame house. With the door still closed he could hear some of a conversation taking place inside, primarily because Wayne only has only one setting for his volume—full blast.

  Dave tapped on the frame of the door and then opened it. An unoccu- pied desk that Wayne’s assistant sometimes used sat to his right with a long hallway connecting back to the source of the noise, Wayne’s office.

  “Well, they can think it’s worth $2 million all they want. That doesn’t make it so.”

  Dave grinned at the frustration that whoever was on the other end of the line must be feeling about now. No one got to tell Wayne what their property was worth—certainly not the seller of a property sought after by a buyer Wayne represented—without hearing some detailed, salty feed- back.

  Wayne swiveled around in his chair, so that he looked at the tree out back through a large window, with his well-worn boots perched on the credenza below. His longish, almost fluffy gray hair made his head seem disproportionately bigger than it actually was. The longer-than-normal cord for the phone trailed down from the receiver he clutched against his ear, to the phone on the opposite end of the desk. Wayne’s assistant previously told Dave that he had her order an extra-long cord to accom- modate his penchant for pacing, but routinely complained about how it became twisted and tangled.

  Dave sat in one of the two wooden guest chairs, and walked the folded up mineral rights letter between the fingers on his right hand, to pass the time.

  “Uh huh. Great. You do that.”

  Wayne lowered his boots and spun back around to face his desk. If he was surprised to see Dave sitting there it did not show on his wrinkled, weathered face.

  “Well, my buyers will just have to take their chances with that then. Uh huh. Goodbye.”

  Wayne slammed the phone down and then tossed the irritating cord after it.

  “Dave Reynolds. To what do I owe the pleasure?” Wayne leaned forward
with a smile and extended his hand, which Dave rose to shake.

  “I’ve been working in Austin this week and I’m using the farm to stage the trips.”

  Wayne squinted and then let out a low whistle. “That’s a lot of god-damn driving around.”

  Dave nodded. They had a variation of this same conversation just about every time they met.

  “What’cha got there in your hand?”

  Dave handed Wayne the letter without further comment and sat back to wait. Wayne had a good memory and Dave was curious to see how much he recalled about the mineral rights to his property. Wayne squinted as he quickly scanned the letter and then let it drop to his desk.

  “All these assholes trying to fool people into selling their mineral rights for pennies on the dollar…” Wayne leaned a little closer. “But you don’t have any mineral rights, and you sure as hell don’t have 200 acres.”

  Dave grinned in recognition of the fact that Wayne’s memory was likely better than his own, which was generally considered to be exceptional. “You’re right on both fronts. It seemed odd to me as I’ve seen a bunch of these kinds of letters for my in-laws’ place and they always draw from the information on file at the county clerk. I don’t know how they’d miss the fact that I don’t have any mineral rights and be so far off on the acreage.”

  Wayne sat back again and stared at Dave. “You look tired. And skinny. You got something else on your mind besides a poorly executed solicita- tion?”

  Dave marveled at how quickly Wayne could cut through to the heart of the matter. His skills were wasted on real estate.

  The man could’ve been one hell of a psychologist.

  “The 200 acres. How long ago did all of this get divided up?”

  Wayne scratched his head through his mess of hair and gazed up to where the wall met the ceiling as if the answer were written there. “I’d have to look it up, but it’s been at least twenty years. Where you headed with this?”