by Donna Ball
Cici gave a wry shake of her head. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
And Bridget added uneasily, “I don’t know. He seems a little scary.”
“Not as scary as that crazy dog,” Lindsay pointed out, and Bridget had to agree.
Cici shaded her eyes, watching the lawn mower make a careful circuit around the overgrown flower bed. “Assuming he doesn’t just drive the mower on down the highway to that Burger Shack job,” she said, “it would be great if he could weed the flower beds and burn some of this brush.”
“Not to mention the boxwoods,” Bridget added, indicating the nine foot high shrubs that flanked the front porch.
“And when he’s finished with that . . .”
“I think this is going to work out just fine,” Lindsay decided smugly. And then she exclaimed, “Oh!” as she suddenly remembered. She whirled and cupped her hands around her mouth. “Watch out for the yellow jackets!” she shouted.
By the end of the day, the boy called Noah had mowed the entire front lawn and emptied eight bags of soggy clippings into the compost pile. At dusk, he solved the problem of the yellow jackets by the time-proven method of pouring gasoline into their ground nest and tossing a match in after it—a process to which the horrified women would have immediately and strenuously objected had they known about it before the fact. Lindsay paid him in cash for hours worked, and no one would have taken wagers as to whether they would ever see him again.
However, at seven o’clock the next morning the dog started barking and the engine started grinding, and he was back to finish the backyard. Cici made a few phone calls and discovered the boy’s last name was Clete, and that he came from what a social worker might have referred to as a “disadvantaged background.” His mother had died when he was a baby, and he lived in a single-wide on a half acre outside of town with his father who, Cici was given to understand from Maggie’s subdued tone, drank. This wasn’t much in terms of glowing recommendations, but there was some reassurance in knowing someone who knew him, and, Maggie insisted, he wasn’t a “bad kid.”
Bridget, who worried about how skinny he was, left orange juice and muffins on the back porch for him. Within the hour, they had disappeared. At noon she left two sandwiches, a bowl of potato salad, and a pitcher of iced tea in the same place, and was enormously pleased to find only empty dishes when she returned that afternoon to collect them.
Lindsay was feeling quite pleased with herself as she made her way down the freshly mown path to the dairy barn. The sky was a brilliant blue and the rain had brought with it a cool front that tasted faintly of autumn. It was the perfect day to work outside and, dressed in jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and work gloves, Lindsay was ready to start reclaiming the building that would one day house her art studio.
The wisteria that had seemed so picturesque when they had first moved into the house in the spring had overgrown the door, the windows, and roof, and was encroaching upon the stone slab of the entry. Tucking her hair up under her cap, Lindsay made a note to herself about what Noah’s next job would be as she ducked underneath the living canopy and pried the viny tendrils away from the door. The door squeaked on stiff hinges and scraped against the stone floor as she pushed it open.
For a moment she felt like one of those characters in a Grimm Brothers fairy tale, in which you simply know nothing good can happen to the protagonist once she or he has crossed the threshold of what will always turn out to be an enchanted castle. She did not remember the piles of rubble being quite so daunting, nor the debris on the floors quite so thick. Spiderwebs festooned the corners and she clawed at one that clung to her face. The two walls of windows, which had spread such a brilliant light over the building when they first had viewed it a year ago, were now clouded with a year’s worth of grime and, worse, obscured by the creeping fingers of green vines that cast slippery shadows across the floors and the walls. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, one of the shadows seemed to move, to actually slither across the floor. She stepped forward, kicking at a pile of leaves that had accumulated on the floor. The shadow scurried to a corner, formed itself into a coil, and hissed at her.
She didn’t scream at first, because she was too busy choking on her own breath, paralyzed by the hot-flash strobe of adrenaline that surged through her veins. But by the time she stumbled back out into the sunlight the scream had bubbled up through her throat and out of her mouth, and she didn’t stop there; she kept on screaming.
As it happened, Noah had stopped the lawn mower to empty the collection bag. Bridget had stepped out onto the porch to try to tempt the dog with another plate of chicken livers. Cici was rinsing off a paintbrush with a backyard hose. So when Lindsay screamed, everyone heard it.
Bridget dropped the plate of chicken livers and ran toward the sound. Cici left the hose running and, slipping and skidding in the mud, raced around the side of the house. Even Noah, his curiosity aroused by all the commotion, sauntered toward the dairy barn.
They found Lindsay leaning against a cherry tree, gasping for breath and hugging her arms. “S-s-snake!” she managed.
Cici demanded, “What kind?”
And Bridget gasped, “Oh my God! Are you sure?’
To which Lindsay replied, “Of course I’m sure! Do you think I’d make something like this up?” She shuddered and answered Cici, “I don’t know what kind. It didn’t have an ID card. All I know is that it was huge!”
“What I mean is,” insisted Cici, “was it poisonous? Some snakes are good, you know.”
Lindsay groaned, closed her eyes, and sank back against the tree trunk. “And I was having such a good day.”
Noah, glancing at the huddled group of women, pushed open the door and eased inside. Three pairs of eyes followed him as though he were an infantryman preparing to launch a grenade. In a moment he returned, thumbs hooked into the pockets of his jeans, and spoke around the cigarette that dangled from his lips. “Rattlesnake,” he pronounced. “Big ’un. Wish I had my gun.”
Lindsay’s knees buckled. Bridget caught her arm to brace her. “Good heavens,” she said, eyes big.
To which Cici replied, “Farley! I’ll bet he’s got a gun!”
She raced to the house to call him.
Five minutes later, Farley roared up in his truck, slammed the door behind him, and strode toward the dairy barn with a shotgun under his arm and a determined expression on his face. Feeling like maidens in a comic horror film, the three women pointed toward the door of the dairy. “In there,” they cried, almost as one.
Farley stared down the door grimly, cocked the shotgun, and nudged the door open with his shoulder. Noah followed closely behind, his excitement almost—though not quite—disguised by his aura of slouching nonchalance. The women edged close behind—but not too close. They stood just outside the door while Noah pointed toward the corner. “There she is.”
Farley shuffled his weight, planted his feet, and raised the gun to his shoulder. Cici gripped Lindsay’s arm. Bridget clutched Cici’s hand. They all squeezed their eyes closed and tried not to squeal like girls at the huge ka-boom that seemed to shake the ground beneath their feet. When they opened them cautiously again, Farley was muttering beneath his breath, his face bright red. Over his shoulder, they could see ragged daylight pouring in through a hole the size of a doggie door in the far wall. The snake, still curled in the corner, rattled its tail ominously.
“Missed ’er a little,” commented Noah, deadpan.
Farley raised the gun again, and this time all three women turned away and covered their ears with their hands. Two concussive blasts later, Noah let out a triumphant, “Eeee-haw ! You got ’er dead between the eyes!”
Farley shouldered his weapon and turned to the women. “Ten dollar,” he said,
Bridget said shakily, “I’ll get my purse.”
Lindsay said, “I’m going to be sick.”
Noah said, “What do you want to do with it?”
The three women stared at him wordlessly
.
“Makes good eatin’,” said Farley.
“Indians used to wear the rattles around their neck,” added Noah.
Lindsay said, “I am seriously going to be sick.”
“You want ’em?” asked Noah.
“What?” Cici managed.
“The rattles.”
Cici glanced at the other two, took a breath, and said, “I think I can safely say—no.”
“Can I have them?”
Lindsay started toward the house on unsteady legs. “Is there any aspirin?”
Cici said to Noah in a tight, strained voice, “Help yourself.”
Noah pulled out a pocketknife and went to collect his prize. Farley repeated, “Ten dollar.”
“Um . . . right.” Bridget turned to follow Lindsay to the house. “My purse.” She stopped suddenly and turned back, looking dazed. “There was something I wanted to ask.”
“About the snake?” prompted Cici, when she said nothing further.
“No . . . I don’t think so.”
“The sheep?”
“Oh,” said Bridget, still looking a little unfocused. “The dog. That was it. The dog. How does he like his chicken livers?”
Farley looked at her with absolutely no expression. “Raw,” he answered.
Bridget blinked. “Oh,” she said. “Of course. I should have thought of that. I’ll get your money.”
As it turned out, the excitement was not over for the day. No sooner had Farley bounced down the drive in his truck than Deke’s cousin arrived with two other men, a pulley ladder, and a chain saw in a pickup with a magnetic sign on its door that read, Tree Cutting. Within the hour the air was filled with the sound of thundering chain saws, cracking limbs, and shouting men, all orchestrated to the background of manic barking and the drone of the lawn mower. They had to close all the windows even to be heard over the din, but fortunately the day remained so cool it was no hardship.
“It’s times like this,” Bridget said, chopping herbs for a pasta sauce, “that I really miss my library job.”
Cici was washing off the last of the overripe tomatoes they had been able to salvage from the ruins of the garden. “Somehow this is not what I pictured when I decided to move to the country either,” she agreed. “The guy said they have to trim back the poplar tree by the porch,” she added. “Otherwise the whole thing would come down when they felled the hickory tree.”
“I hate to see the hickory tree go. I was going to make a hickory nut cake.”
“It was already dead.”
She sighed. “I know. It’s just a shame.”
Lindsay opened the refrigerator and took out a bag of store-bought lettuce, which she began to shred for a salad. “At least Noah will have plenty of work cutting and stacking all that firewood.”
“Not to mention cutting back the wisteria and cleaning out the dairy barn.”
“You’re damn right,” said Lindsay darkly. “I’m not setting one foot back in there until all the creatures have been cleared out—and that includes dust mites.”
Cici chuckled and scooped a handful of chopped tomatoes into the pan Bridget had prepared. They sizzled softly and released a tangy fragrance as they struck the garlic-infused olive oil. “That should be fun,” she said. “Sanitizing a barn.”
Bridget used her knife to scrape the chopped herbs off the cutting board and into the pot. “What are you going to do about the holes in the wall?”
“Not a problem,” Cici said, “a couple of one-by-sixes and you’ll never know what happened.”
“Oh yes I will,” replied Lindsay morosely. “I’ll never forget it. What I’d like to know,” she added with a touch of weary indignation, “is why all the wildlife is picking on me. First the yellow jackets, then the snake . . . I hate wildlife. I don’t even like the dog.”
“Nobody likes the dog,” Cici pointed out.
To which Bridget replied defensively, “I do.” She poured a measure of red wine atop the tomato and herb mixture and set a pot of water on the back burner to boil. Then she said, “Maybe they’re trying to tell you something. I read a book one time about totems and animal medicine. Every animal has a different message.”
“Great,” said Lindsay. “Now I not only have to worry about being stalked by them, I have to figure out what they’re trying to say.”
“I don’t think bees officially qualify as animals,” Cici said, “so you’re off the hook there. Wait a minute.” She turned toward the window. “The noise has stopped. Do you think they’re finished?”
Bridget turned the heat down under the tomato mixture and all three of them went out onto the porch to survey the results of the afternoon’s work. For the longest time all they could do was stare.
Where once the sprawling hickory tree had framed the meadow, there was now only blue sky and rolling fenced pasture beyond. The newly clipped lawn was littered with leaves and branches and massive chunks of chain-sawed trunk, as far as the eye could see. The air was filled with the bitter smell of stripped hickory leaves and green bark.
Slowly, almost as one, they walked around the porch to the front of the house. The majestic poplar tree, whose shade had once stretched over the entire west side of the house and halfway across the lawn, had been shorn off at roof level. Bare stubs of branches were all that were left of what once had been as much a part of the house as the columned porch or the mansard roof. The porch was carpeted with its green leaves, and its broken branches lay like fallen bodies from the steps to the flower beds.
“Good God,” said Cici, when she could speak.
“It looks like a bomb went off,” Lindsay said, her voice subdued with horror.
“It will take weeks to get all this cleaned up.”
“I guess . . . nobody said anything about debris removal.”
Bridget’s hand was at her throat, her eyes stricken. “The birds. What will happen to the birds?”
At the bottom of the steps was Deke’s cousin, proudly coming toward them with the bill.
That evening they wandered with peculiar reluctance out onto the porch for their ritual glass of wine, uneasy in a place that no longer felt familiar to them. Cici had spent a long time sweeping the leaves off the porch, but the smell of them still hung heavy in the air. And they all knew what lay beyond the railing. It was like a graveyard.
For a time even their conversation was stilted. Nothing felt the same. They sat in their chairs, but did not rock, and even the wine tasted too much of green and broken things.
And suddenly Lindsay summed it up for them. “I feel exposed,” she said. “The tree was like—a shelter. Now”—she gestured—“the whole world is out there.”
Unwillingly, they turned their eyes toward the place the tree once had been. In the distance was a magnificent vista of the mountains they had never noticed before. They could see the rise and fall of their own drive almost to the highway, and the whole of the pasture. Had the poplar tree not been there, they surely would have noticed sooner that the sheep they did not realize they owned were grazing in a pasture that they did. Yet Lindsay was right. The tree, with its towering limbs and green canopy, had been a kind of barrier between themselves and all that lay beyond. Without it they felt uncomfortable, defenseless.
“The guy said it would come back bigger than ever next spring,” Cici offered. “You’re supposed to trim back poplars. They’re lightning rods, and during an ice storm the branches can go right through the roof.”
“I wonder how old it was,” Lindsay mused.
“Not as old as the hickory tree,” Cici pointed out.
“I know, but . . . I hardly even noticed the hickory tree. The poplar was like a friend.”
“Well, you know the old saying.” Cici sipped her wine, but the cheerful note she was trying for fell flat. “God never closes a door but that he opens a window. We got someone to do our yard work only hours before we need more yard work done than we ever thought we would.”
“What if he quits?”
&
nbsp; “Then we’re screwed.”
“He doesn’t seem all that reliable.”
“Maybe we should pay him more.”
Lindsay glared at her. “Don’t even think it.”
Bridget said, “All that stuff you were telling him about how much people made in this county—how did you know that?”
Lindsay shrugged. “I made it up.” And at Bridget’s reproving glance she insisted indignantly, “When I started teaching I made twenty-four thousand dollars a year. The education of an entire generation—the future of this country—was entrusted to me, and I earned less than a sanitation worker. Now I’ve got some punk high school kid on a lawn mower holding me up for the same kind of money it took me four years of college and a teaching certification to earn? I don’t think so.”
Cici lifted her glass to her. “You go, girl.”
“Well, I feel sorry for him,” Bridget said. “No mother, an alcoholic father, and he’s so skinny.”
“Bridget, you can’t be responsible for every stray in the country. First the sheep, then the dog . . .”
“Besides,” Cici added, “do you really feel sorry enough for him to pay him ten dollars an hour?”
Bridget thought about that for only a moment. “No.”
They were silent for a while, sipping their wine. Then Bridget smiled a little, reminiscently. “Remember the first meal we had on this porch?”
“The day we moved in.” She chuckled. “Cici opened a bottle of wine with a power drill. I’d never been so tired in my life. Gosh, I can’t believe it’s been six months.”
“A lot of things have changed.”
“A lot of things haven’t,” Cici pointed out. “I thought we would have gotten a lot more done on the place by now.”
“We keep getting distracted,” Lindsay said. “What we need is a better list.”
“Six months to paint the porch.” Cici said with a short, incredulous shake of her head.
“And one bedroom,” added Lindsay, “and the whole living room. That was huge.”
