Most Wanted Dad

by Arlene James

  The feeling stayed with her until an afternoon several days later, when the dull rumble of a mower reached beyond the gentle hum of the central air-conditioning and into the shallows of an uneasy slumber, bringing a name to her mind. Evans. Evans Kincaid. Evans Kincaid was mowing his yard. Evans Kincaid was mowing his yard in the heat of the day. Facedown, she mentally shook her head at his gluttony for punishment and let herself drift in that comfortable place between wakefulness and real sleep—until the rumble grew louder and somehow measured, prompting new thought: Evans Kincaid was mowing her yard in the heat of the day. The dear.

  Amy rolled over, groaning as she realized just where her thoughts were taking her. But it was true. Her yard needed mowing. Evans was undoubtedly doing it, and it was very sweet of him to do so. He was a good neighbor, a better neighbor than she. He was, in fact, a better person than she. He had lost his wife, the mother of his child, but he hadn’t let himself and everything around him go to pot, and he didn’t resent God for taking the woman he loved. Amy stared up at the dingy ceiling of her bedroom and told herself that things were going to change, starting now.

  Sitting up, she threw her legs over the side of the bed, stretched her arms, shoulders and spine, then stood. What, she wondered, could she do for him? What neighborly thing would show her appreciation? In this hot weather, he was bound to appreciate something cold to drink. The fact that it was a rather obvious solution deterred her not at all. She moved briskly toward the kitchen to put on a fresh pot of tea to steep. On the way, she caught a glimpse of herself in the dresser mirror and shuddered. While the tea was steeping, she was going to pull herself together.

  She did just that. After catching a quick shower, she mixed the tea and placed it in the refrigerator to chill. Then she quickly blew her hair dry at the roots in order to fluff it up some. By the time she had applied a bit of light makeup to her face, darkened her brows and eyelashes, her hair was curling attractively about her face. She changed her sleep shirt for a cotton knit short set of coral pink and traded her sandals for a pair of simple white canvas shoes. Next she filled a quart jar with ice cubes and unsweetened tea.

  He had traded the mower for an edger and was grooming the borders of the sidewalk next to the street. He was wearing cutoffs and tennis shoes, his shirt hanging from his back pocket, an obvious concession to the heat. Nevertheless, his lean, sun-browned torso glistened with perspiration. It was a sight to make Amy catch her breath and swallow it, but she kept her expression determinedly relaxed as she carried the iced tea across the yard. He stopped what he was doing and mopped his brow with his shirt as she drew near. His smile was absolutely blinding even before he spotted the tea. She was surprised by how much that pleased her.

  “Thought you might like this,” she said, handing over the quart jar. “Tea, not syrup, this time.”

  He laughed at that before taking a long swallow of the cold beverage. “Ahhhhhh.” He rubbed the cold jar over his face and throat. “Wonderful.” His smile renewed itself. “Thanks.”

  “Thank you,” she countered. “You didn’t have to mow my yard, you know. I have a boy who comes around to do it from time to time, when he needs money, I expect.”

  He shrugged. “I was doing mine. I figured that while I had the mower out, I might as well cut everything that needed cutting. Besides, I like the looks of this neighborhood when all the yards are done. It makes me think of a green, manicured oasis in the middle of all this brown heat.”

  Amy glanced around her, noticing for the first time how green her yard looked. “That’s odd,” she said. “Things are usually all burned up around here by now.”

  He swallowed another long drink of tea and lowered the jar. “I, um, I’ve been watering it when I water my own. And I figure if I’m making it grow, I ought to keep it groomed.”

  She was surprised but not displeased, which she should have been, considering his high-handedness. But things were not as simple as that any longer. She even thought a little wistfully about the shield of anger that she might have wrapped herself in only days ago. But it was gone now. She wasn’t sure how or why, only that when she reached for it, it wasn’t there. She squinted up at Evans, wondering what he’d done to her. “Making that green, manicured oasis happen, you mean?”

  He grinned. “Something like that, but with some good old neighborly concern thrown in.”

  She nodded and looked away, uncertain what to say or do next. The obvious would have to do again. “It looks good, real good.”

  “So do you,” he said lightly, lifting his jar once more.

  She tried not to blush and fought a feeling of such pleasure that it was frightening. She couldn’t just ignore such a compliment, however. She licked suddenly dry lips. “Why, thank you.”

  He lowered the jar, his gaze suddenly keen. “You’re welcome. I thought you might like to know that somebody had noticed. When you live alone, there’s nobody to notice but you, so it’s real easy to let things slide. It helps when somebody else notices you’ve put out some effort.”

  Boy, did he ever hit that nail on the head! And the truth was that she was glad he had noticed. It occurred to her then that he had made her care again. Somehow, he had made it matter if she left her house looking like she’d just crawled up out of a hard night or looking her best. Maybe it was time to start caring about more than herself, too. She took a deep breath and, not quite meeting his gaze, confessed, “I’ve let a lot slide around here. I think it’s time I started putting out some effort again. Where better to start than with me?”

  He chuckled. “True.”

  She smiled, then sighed. “The problem is, I’ve let a lot more go than I can correct with just my own effort. I was wondering, would you mind if I asked Mattie to help me clean my house during this last week before school starts? I’d pay her, of course, and…well, she certainly seems to know her way around a mop and pail.”

  “She does that,” he agreed proudly, and drained the last of his tea. “I certainly don’t mind if you ask her,” he said thoughtfully, “but I can’t say for sure how she’ll answer you.”

  “We’ll leave it up to her then,” Amy said with satisfaction.

  “I hope she does it,” he said softly. “I think it’d be good for her. It’s been a long time since she enjoyed the company of a woman.”

  “She must miss her mother terribly,” Amy said.

  He nodded. “I’m sure she does, but it’s more than that with Mattie, too. I wish I understood it.”

  “Who really understands kids?” Amy asked lightly.

  He locked his gaze with hers. “You understood that she was lonely,” he said, “that she needed me to acknowledge and appreciate all the good she does. You understood that she still needs me, when all I could see was the crazy hair and the rebelliousness.”

  “They say rebelliousness is just part of growing up, a way to move from childhood to adulthood.”

  “And the weird hairdos and makeup?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “Maybe she’s just trying to find herself, you know? Figure out who the real Mattie is.”

  He shook his head, grinning. “Well, if that’s the case, I hope the real Mattie’s a little more conservative.”

  She laughed. “Maybe I can nudge her in that direction.”

  “I’d be eternally grateful,” he quipped. “You’d probably get your yard mowed for the rest of your life, not to mention some general repairs and maintenance around the place.”

  It was hot, and Amy could feel the perspiration beginning to trickle down the canal of her spine. Besides, she was keeping him from finishing up and getting inside where it was cool. She took the empty jar from him and tossed out the ice. “Let’s see what success I have first,” she said, backing away. “Thanks again.”

  “You’re welcome again,” he said, nodding and bending toward the edger once more.

  As he started it up, she turned and walked into the house, smiling.

  Mattie agreed to help Amy clean and reorganize her hou
se, but “only for the money,” or so she said. The girl possessed an amazing work ethic, however. The very day after Amy spoke to her, Mattie showed up at Amy’s house bright and early with every imaginable cleaning aid in tow. It took five minutes to move it all into the house. Amy had unwisely stayed up all night the night before and was not in the best of moods, but Mattie bullied her into acceptance with nothing more than a determinedly cheerful attitude and a deaf ear. And she was nothing if not organized in her approach. She literally canvased the house, poking her nose into every closet, cabinet and drawer. She even looked under the beds, and declared that everything there had to go—especially the dust bunnies! She went so far as to write down on paper everything that had to be done, providing them with a checklist three notebook pages long!

  Amy would have had an easier time accepting Mattie’s instruction if it hadn’t been for the girl’s bizarre appearance. For one thing, she was wearing solid black: shorts, T-shirt, socks and high-top shoes, but that was the least of it. Mattie had twisted up her long, straight hair so that it lay smoothly against her head everywhere except in front and right on top. These two sections she had ratted and pulled out at strange angles, some to droop about her face, some to stand on end, and she had sprayed the whole of it a veritable rainbow of glow-in-the-dark colors. In addition, she had painted her eyelids white and applied a layer of ultra shiny bloodred lip gloss. The effect was positively garish, especially as she kept cracking the gum that she was chewing.

  Amy longed to order the girl home for a good scrubbing, but she knew that making an issue of her appearance was the surest way to guarantee that she wouldn’t change it. Her own experience as a teenager had taught her that. In fact, she vividly recalled an episode over a white halter top that her parents had criticized as being too skimpy for modesty. For weeks she’d worn it at every available opportunity, going so far as to sneak out of the house with it on under other clothes. Only when her friends had begun to complain about seeing her in the same thing all the time had she stopped wearing it in public, but even then she’d worn it around the house just to steam her parents. When they finally stopped complaining, she’d gotten sick of the thing herself pretty quickly. Later, she couldn’t even remember why she’d liked it in the first place!

  So Amy said nothing about Mattie’s outrageous appearance. She pushed away her own reluctance and even ignored the physical exhaustion with which she’d awakened, finding strength in a pot of strong, black coffee while Mattie was organizing her checklist. It was the lull before the storm, so to speak, because she quickly found herself wielding broom and feather duster and vacuum wand with more desperation than enthusiasm as Mattie began to tear apart her house.

  Amy fell into bed that first night in a stupor of exhaustion, confusion and dismay. The house was a wreck, the contents of every closet, drawer and cupboard pulled out onto the floor and furniture, while said closets, drawers and cupboards were cleaned from the topmost corners to the very bottoms. The drapes had been pulled down from the windows and sent out for cleaning, along with a mountain of bed coverings. Linens and curtain sheers went into the washing machine, which itself was given a thorough cleaning, then were hung on the Kincaids’ clothesline to dry in the sun.

  Every throw rug in the place wound up on the porch, where they were hosed down, sprinkled with laundry detergent, scrubbed with a broom and hosed down again before being thrown over the fence in the backyard to dry. Light fixtures came down off ceilings and were soaked in a mixture of vinegar, water and detergent. Lamp shades were vacuumed, dusted with talc and vacuumed again, and then the procedure was repeated until each and every shade looked brand new. Baseboards, windowsills, window casings and door facings had been dusted, scrubbed with special wood soap and oiled to a bright sheen. The same process, Mattie had informed her, would be used later on every piece of furniture in the house. First, however, they would go through Amy’s possessions item by item in order to decide what had outlived its usefulness and must be discarded.

  Mattie was true to her word. The very next day she made sure that Amy, though stiff and sore, was at her side while she examined and questioned every effect that Amy had accumulated over the years. If it was not for emergency or special use, or if Amy had not used it within the last year or acquired it under unusually sentimental circumstances, it went into one of two piles, either designated for charity or the trash. Everything else was cleaned, organized and readied for storage, so that in the end, everything had its place and was in it. The organization of it was all Mattie’s, and Amy marveled at the ease with which she put it all together in the most logical, workable fashion. The sense of it was blatant, and yet Amy herself had not thought to arrange her belongings in such a manner. Mattie proposed to tape labels to all the shelves and drawers in order to help Amy become familiar with the new system, especially in the kitchen, but Amy did not find it necessary, the logic of Mattie’s plan was that firm.

  They called a halt early that evening, but Amy was so tired from the exertions of the past two days that she went to bed without dinner and slept soundly through the night. When Mattie arrived bright and early the next morning, garbed all in lime green and her hair sprayed to match, Amy was ready and waiting for her, a cup of coffee in hand and a smile on her face, despite the aching muscles that occasionally produced winces.

  It was the hardest day yet. By nightfall, the walls and ceilings in every room had been swept and washed; the floors were given the additional benefit of a good waxing. The carpets were vacuumed and shampooed. The windows were polished inside and out. The countertops and bathroom fixtures were scrubbed and bleached to a dazzling white. Not even the laundry hamper escaped sanitizing. And the furniture…

  Mattie insisted that every upholstered piece had to be carried outside and beaten to loosen the dirt, which was then vacuumed repeatedly and carried back inside to be shampooed by hand and vacuumed again once it was dry. The wood portions were scrubbed with special soap and an old toothbrush where there was carving, then polished dry with a soft cloth, oiled, and polished again until the wood gleamed. Knobs and handles were given the same treatment. Finally, casters and rollers were cleaned with bottle brushes dipped in alcohol, then lubricated for easy movement. By the time it was all cleaned and rearranged, Amy could have slept standing up against the wall—if she hadn’t been afraid of leaving a smudge that Mattie would have ordered immediately cleaned.

  Nevertheless, by day four, Amy found her enthusiasm burgeoning rather than diminishing. The house smelled like heaven and was organized to perfection. Wood gleamed. Glass glittered. The whole place felt lighter, brighter. The draperies, bedspreads, and blankets returned from the cleaners and again covered windows and beds. Whatnots, pictures and books were cleaned and placed in pleasing new arrangements, and finally, every remaining appliance, small or large, was dismantled so far as practical and cleaned to within an inch of its existence, including refrigerator, stove, microwave, toaster, dryer, coffee maker, oven and so on. Even the central air unit and the hot water heater received Mattie’s expert ministrations.

  Amy stood in awe of her young friend’s gift for homemaking. Mattie herself spoke often of her desire for a home and family of her own, so that Amy came to understand that it was family more than anything else that Mattie craved. She missed her mother, but Amy was impressed by how easily and fondly Mattie recalled her deceased parent. Mattie had grieved, yes, but the sheer joy of that relationship so completely overshone the pain of loss itself that Amy was forced to reevaluate her own experience. It occurred to her that there might have been less true joy in her marriage than she had believed, even before the onset of her husband’s illness. She had fashioned herself as much as possible to his desires without regard for her own wishes or inclinations—and he had let her; he had, in fact, required that she do so. Yet, somehow she had not quite managed to truly please him on many occasions. She did not come to these conclusions without suffering a heavy dose of guilt, but guilt was an all-too-familiar emotion f
or Amy, and she suffered it with practiced stoicism.

  Mattie was a constant diversion, however, and as the two worked side by side, Amy came to understand that Mattie’s need for family was predicated upon her sense that she was outgrowing her role as Daddy’s little girl. At one and the same time, she resented and treasured her place in his heart and home. More to the point, she understood at some deep emotional level that they both needed more than each other; yet, she hadn’t the least idea where that something more might be found. Put succinctly, Mattie was a girl poised on the threshold of womanhood, longing for the one man in the world who could join with her in creating the kind of family that her own mother and father had made together. But not even Mattie knew it, and Amy doubted very much that Evans Kincaid wanted to hear it.

  Yet, Amy knew that Mattie was at a very vulnerable place. It was a place that Amy recognized without ever consciously admitting that she, too, had dwelled there. It was a place from which Amy knew with awful certainty that Mattie could be lured with dangerous ease by the wrong man. Amy did not want to think that this disquieting knowledge came from personal experience, but just because Amy didn’t want to think it, didn’t mean it wasn’t so. And just because Amy could close her mind to this startling insight didn’t mean that she could avoid having her insides worked over as surely as her outside surroundings, so that by the time her house was all rearranged and polished, so were her moods and emotions.

  It would never again seem normal or preferable to close her door on the outside world and closet herself alone with her grief and her guilt and her anger. The long dark night was over, and never again could she lock out the day. It was as if she’d embarked upon a journey and wouldn’t even know where she was going until she got there. The prospect was both exciting and terrifying, and the only certainty was that she couldn’t go back even if she’d wanted to, which she didn’t. That in itself was the most shocking aspect of the whole situation. For the first time in a long time, she actually did not want to go back.