By the time Christmas came, we were knee deep in mutiny and I moved the bat from under my bed to right next to me where I slept. I started to think Dr. Livesey wasn’t so bad after all, and I grieved anew for Pearl.

Just as the crocuses started poking their heads through the melting snow, Ashley moved in with Julie and, shortly after that, Bud left town for someplace in Arkansas.  That was fine with me. One less person meant more food for the rest of us.

“But why do you think it was so important for Jim to strike the Jolly Roger?” Sally repeated with some exasperation. She was talking to Sweet Beat.

“It’s their colors,” he said at last.

“Right, Kevin. Their colors, as you say, tell who’s in charge. They tell where their loyalty lies. But beyond that . . .”

“Beyond that it tells their future!” interrupted Sniff exultantly.

If astonishment could be described, that moment was an apt description. Sniff had had an original thought. We all looked at her in wonder. Sniff, herself, was so overcome with surprise she started crying. Then Sally started chuckling until the whole room was laughing right along with her, even Sweet Beat.

After we’d wiped our eyes, though, he said, “I just think Hawkins was crazy to give the wheel to Hands.”

“What else could he have done?” Sally asked.

It wasn’t a question, though; like maybe she’d given Hawkins’ decision a lot more thought than she let on. She got up from her chair and started clearing the snack table.

*     *     *     *     *     *     *      *      *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

By the time the church choir down the street was practicing the Hallelujah Chorus, Ben Gunn had led them to the treasure, that traitor, Long John Silver, had cut out with some of the stash, and Jim Hawkins had said all he had to say.

We all stayed later than usual that last night. It didn’t seem quite right to stop meeting every Thursday, and someone said as much. Sally just nodded. We all waited for her to say something; to say we would start another book, for instance. She didn’t. She just started clearing the snack table alongside her boy, calling ‘good night’ to us over her shoulder.

We all just stood there looking at her as if that would change things. No one moved. No one said anything.

“The book club, as you will recall, was for the cold, winter months.”

No one answered.

“It’s officially spring now,” she persisted.

The house creaked.

“Bulbs are sprouting, soon the grass will be green instead of brown.”

She looked at all of us for a minute. Then, with a slight smile, she shook her head.

That shake of her head, that short laugh tinged with a sigh said either that she didn’t understand us or that we didn’t understand her. I guess I’ll never know for certain.

There was nothing else to do then. We started leaving by ones and twos and threes.  Before I left I kissed her on the cheek.

“Thank you kindly,” I said. I meant every word.

Then, as had become my habit, I was the last man out.

to be continued . . .

THE BOOK CLUB

“Halloween is over, thank goodness. Having to sit in a dark house half the night just to keep greedy little kids away is not my idea of a holiday.”

“I appreciate your frustration, Mr. Bingham, but I believe I asked what you thought about Captain Bill’s wild stories and songs.”

I settled back then to consider it. You see, this was the second meeting of the book club and, while I was glad for a night out, I couldn’t make heads nor tails of Bill nor Dr. Livesey nor why in the world anyone would give a motel the name of a person. I mean, for Pete’s sake, call it by a number. There’s nothing wrong with numbers. Or directions, like Eastside something or other. Or even the name of a street or a town. But a person?

Sally cleared her throat.

“What, for instance, do you think of the song that goes ‘Fifteen men on a dead man’s chest’?”

Well now, we were finally getting somewhere.

“That’s my favorite so far. I ‘specially like the part about the rum,” I answered knowledgeably.

“You fool, that’s the only song so far,” spouted Sweet Beat.

“Ah!  Kevin. How astute of you to note that it is the only song to which the author gives words. Yet, Mr. Bingham, you’re right as well. There are more songs noted in the first chapter. We just aren’t made privy to their lyrics.”

I caught Sally somewhere between a smile and a frown. I think now, years later, what I would say was that a look of apprehension crossed her face, but only for a millisecond; like the ember of a lakeside bonfire landing on the water and quenched the minute it hits. Then, however, I was too busy with what I regarded as my triumph.

I looked condescendingly toward Sweet Beat, he smirked my way, Sniff licked her finger to turn the pages of her book as though she was searching for something, and Julie and Ashley alternately crossed and uncrossed their legs and looked around the room.  There wasn’t much to look at: just the sixteen of us scrunched up next to each other in this one little living room and the leftovers on the snack table along the wall. That was really why most of us came, I figured. There’s nothing like free food.

That first meeting, in fact, had been all about food: who was willing to bring something and when. We considered this carefully as we munched on blonde brownies and drank RC cola. After that Sally told us we’d be discussing Treasure Island, passed out books she must’ve gotten from Salvation Armies all over the city, and told us more than any of us wanted to know about the guy who wrote it. After a few snide comments and one or two polite questions from the group, Sally said she’d read aloud the evening’s chapters to anyone who came for snacks in order to refresh our memories. Yeah, right. I, for one, know that Sweet Beat couldn’t read a stop sign much less a book. I guess he lucked out.

“I don’t like he stayed without payin’.”

I started, since the comment came like a shot out of nowhere. It was only Ashley.

“Tell us why, Ashley,” Sally encouraged her.

“I, I just don’t. He like as promised he’d pay, but he didn’t.”

“He didn’t no such thing,” Bud said quietly but with an intensity that made me scared.

Ashley eyed him for a minute, then slumped back in her chair.

“Maybe he didn’t say no such thing, but he made ‘em think he would,” she muttered under her breath.

Sally ran her thumb back and forth across her fingernail for a few minutes.

“I suppose,” she said, “what we’re examining here is whether Captain Bill is a man of truth. The question then becomes not whether he paid, but whether implying something is the same as saying something outright. Can one be accused of lying, of not meeting his obligations when he hasn’t said something, but has rather behaved in a way that said it?”

That was really too much for me. I got up for some more weenies in barbecue sauce. I could feel Sniff raise her eyebrows at me clear across the room.

to be continued . . .

“What’d you say, ol’ man?” he yelled, jostling me with his shoulder.

I looked at him and spit. I was tired of that fool of a kid. Well, he pushed me against a tree and caught my throat in his hand and pulled back the other for a good punch when we both heard a whistle pierce the air.

Sally was running full tilt our way, and when she got within a couple of yards she slowed, bending over double to catch her breath.

She walked up to us, spit on the ground, and said, casual like, “I was wondering (pant) if (pant) you two would be (pant) interested in a book club this fall?”

“Why’d you spit, lady?” Sweet Beat frowned.

“Kevin. Have you forgotten my name? I’m Sally. Sally Cortland. And, although I’m grateful you think me a lady, I prefer you address me less formally. At any rate,” she continued as Sweet Beat squinted, trying to figure out if he’d been cut down or not, “I’m going to host a book club in my home during the cold winter months. A lady (as you so ably noticed, Kevin) must plan ahead, and I need to know if you’d be interested.”

“Of course,” she continued as we both began to decline, “I’m only asking those who I think could keep up. You see, not everyone is man enough to take on something like this.”

Well, I wasn’t going to let anyone beat me out. I spoke right up.

“You can count on me, Sally.”

She nodded and raised her eyebrows at Sweet Beat. He shrugged.

She continued to stare at him until he grunted, “I’m more a man than he is,” and walked off.

“We’ll start the first Thursday in November, then!” she called after him. “7:00 sharp, 6:30 if you want snacks.”

She turned to me, then, and said, “I suppose if spit remained in one’s mouth, one might retain more of one’s teeth. I see today you are that lucky one.”

I had to give her that joke and laughed out loud. I supposed I could forgive her some things after all.

The sticky hum of summer began to be visited by cool nights that extended their arms into evening and morning respectively, until the air was again palatable. Neighborhood tempers followed suit. The neighbors somehow seemed to stroll more; the kind of taking a walk that led to nowhere and was just for pleasure.

I noticed kids walking down Plato Street on their route from school to wherever the heck they lived. I piled up more rocks in my rock pile near the corner of the house. I’ve always believed in planning for the future. A man who doesn’t take care to plan for the future, well, he might as well wear a skirt to a penitentiary, that’s what. I’m no fool. Who knew when I might need to hurl one of those things? And where were those kids coming from, anyway? I got so mad thinkin’ about it, I selected a small projectile from the pile and threw it at Sniff’s geranium pot. I was standing where the porch column didn’t obstruct my aim.That thing went as straight and true as ever any guided missile did. It whistled through the clear, fall air and knocked that planter smack against the siding faster than you can bite your lip. Which is what I did when Sniff came barreling out of her house like a moose on a rampage. Not one to be discourteous, I got out of her way.  She chased me around to the back of my house and down the street until she tripped on a jut in the sidewalk. I didn’t turn to look at her. I just heard the sound of her large thighs slapping the cement. Well, I thought. Well maybe she’d learn her lesson about letting her temper fly like that.

Later, though, I got to thinkin’. It weren’t her fault the sidewalk was stickin’ up like that. I slipped into my house for a Coke and came out with two.

“Want one?” I asked just as she was limping by.

She stood in front of my house for a full minute, then kept walking. She could suit herself, I thought, leaving the Coke on my porch railing. I went in to get my paper. When I came out, there she sat in one of my metal rockers on the porch drinking the Coke, so I graciously handed her the business section. I figured she could use it for her parakeet, Fred, if she wasn’t inclined to read it. I know I wasn’t. I read the obits until the sun set. She got up in the fading light and slowly walked to her porch where she sat until the stars came out. I went inside.  After all, something was bound to be on the TV and I don’t much like sitting in the dark.

to be continued . . .

Photo: www.goodfreephotos.com, plants-25622_640-pixabay-CC0 Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

CHANGES

By Labor Day weekend Sally had planted a vegetable garden of a respectable size in front of the apartment building. Gladys and Manny tended it like it was their sacred charge. Manny would pick up his hoe the minute they got back from Marv’s, and Gladys would sit in a lawn chair and tell him what to do. Then he would do it while she talked to the bean plants.

The Wangs had pulled out the overgrown jungle in their backyard and a few other neighbors up and down the block started mowing more often. It was the “keeping up with the Jones’s” thing and it disgusted me. If a man can’t be who he is, it ain’t worth livin’. I said as much to Sally one day when she brought over some sugar cookies without frosting.

“I agree, Mr. Bingham, a man should be who he is, but. . .”

I coughed and spit then. I hate ‘buts’, large and small. The only ones I ever liked were in an ashtray, and even they get stale after a time.

Sally stopped.

“I’ll be heading home now. Nice to visit with you.”

She started toward the porch steps.

“You didn’t finish your sentence, missy,” I remarked.

That threw her, I could tell, for she just stood and looked at me for a minute.

“It bothers you, Mr. Bingham? An unfinished sentence?” she asked.

I squinted at her.

“Maybe an unfinished sentence bothers you like an unfinished man bothers me.”

She smiled, waved, and left.

Now I ain’t dumb. I resented that woman, Sally. She tweaked me on purpose, and it wasn’t the first time.

The rest of the neighbors took to her pretty well, though. Sniff copied her like a scribe – not one jot or tittle was omitted. She had a red potted geranium balanced on her porch railing. She got it at K-mart. I know cuz I saw them on sale there for 99 cents. Sniff pretended it was from Bachmans, though; like she was some sort of landscape expert herself.

I started a game of throwing pebbles at it. She caught me at my game, though, and you would have thought Armageddon itself was located on Plato Street and the good Lord sent His angels for the last war. That explosion lasted at least a week. The problem, of course, was that the corner column of the porch was in the way. Otherwise I would’ve taken that stupid geranium out for sure.

I started making a habit of walking down Plato Street every day. Someone needed to keep track of things and, as usual, I could see it would fall to me. No one else was up to it.

Sniff sat out on her porch drinking Coke all day long. There were too many Wangs for them to keep track of themselves, much less of anyone else. Gladys and Manny had their garden to tend. Julie was too scared to leave her apartment for anything but work.  Luckily for her she worked at a grocery, so she didn’t have to make special trips for anything. I rarely saw Bud, although Ashley came out to visit with Gladys when Bud was on his shift. She wore dark glasses sometimes or long sleeves in the sunshine. No one said anything, but everyone knew what was going on. But I’m getting sidetracked.

Anyway, as I said, it fell to me to be the neighborhood monitor. When I was in grade school, the teacher would appoint a hall monitor while we put on our coats. One time she appointed me, and I had them kids in line, no question. A classmate, Martha was her name, started to cry when I yelled at her. To this day, it bothers me. At any rate, I’ve always liked that word. Monitor. It sounds business-like.

It fell to me to monitor Plato Street, and I noticed before long that it began to look, well, for lack of a better word – clean.

The sidewalks, though still jutting up in places for all the world like a California fault line, were clear of weeds and gum. Even the gutters were swept at some houses. That was going too far to my mind. Didn’t people have anything better to do than sweep a gutter?  I said so under my breath. It happened, though, that I mumbled this just as Sweet Beat walked past me.

to be continued . . .

“I’d agree with anything you say, Ms. Cortland,” I answered truthfully. For at the moment that, at least, was the truth. I added the ‘Ms. Cortland’ part to amuse myself, but after I said it, I really began to think she ought to be shown some respect and that Sweet Beat ought to show it. Here she, the newest kid on the block, had invited all of us to her house. We barely fit in there and, even with two fans going, it was one warm party. Then, in addition to the three lemonades being spilled, the uninvited pervert she’d had to ask to leave, her little vase she had rescued just before it walked out the door, and an odd variety of other little incidents, she had Sweet Beat pulling a knife.

I decided I’d had enough then, so I got up to leave.

“Thank you kindly, Ms. Cortland, for the lovely party,” I said, looking at Sweet Beat out of the corner of my eye, so he could hear how it should be done.

I heard someone say that on television once, and it stuck with me, I guess.

“Thank you kindly,” I repeated.

“I’m glad you came, Mr. Bingham,” Sally said brightly. Her smile was tired.

I didn’t leave, though. I thought I’d check out the kitchen. Sure enough, Sniff was in there.

“Eating the leftovers?” I asked.

There was a brownie crumb on the corner of her mouth, which was full. She glared at me.

I stuck some Chex mix into my pockets and peeked into the living room.

Sally was still talking to Sweet Beat – something about the lunar cycle and meteor showers.

I leaned against the archway until he left. I was the last one out.

There are times in the years that count a man’s life that he regards as markers on his journey: incidents of great proportion that all around him notice and which, by virtue of their enormity, stand like a totem pole of meaning. There are other times, however, that are quite inconspicuous to all, and nearly unnoticeable to the man, himself: yet by the insight they spark, inscribe upon his life that indefinable mark of understanding that his Creator gives as pavers along the path of wisdom.

Standing there in the archway, waiting for everyone to leave Sally’s party was such a time for me. Sally could take care of herself. That was obvious to anyone who met her.  It seemed to me, though, as I watched her visit with the leader of a neighborhood gang that life hands us duties to each other: obligations like protection and, if we are unequal to that, duty to “keep company”. At the time, I couldn’t have put into words the feelings that began to force such thoughts into my hard head and harder heart. All I knew was that I needed to be the last man out. I remain amazed to this day that I was.

to be continued . . .

I looked around the room. Five of the folks there were from the brick apartment at the end of the street. There was the old couple, Gladys and Manny, that breakfasted at Marv’s Café every morning. She started using a walker about a year ago and he was bent, but they still got out every morning for their Number 2 special and coffee. Julie, that flighty woman who worked at Stellard’s Grocery, was standing frozen in the corner, her eyes darting around the room, until Sally went up to her, linked arms and brought her over to visit with Gladys and Manny. Bud and Ashley were making out in the corner. I saw an empty envelope (I know it was empty because I checked) with his address on it in the gutter one day. It was addressed to ‘Thom Winston’. Ashley’s name was underneath his, so I knew it was Bud’s name. I’ve never trusted the name ‘Thom’. It seems somehow deceptive to me. If a person wanted to stick in the ‘h’, he might as well add the last two letters and get a whole name out of it. But this. This I judge to be either pseudo sophistication or stupidity. You can be sure that the last follows the first no matter where and when it shows its silly head. I guess Bud never trusted it either.

All the while I was thinking this, Sally had spotted them. I watched her as she quickly fixed up two plates of snacks and two lemonades and brought it over to them. They had to unlatch then and act interested while she visited with them. Ashley actually looked engrossed in the conversation, but Bud looked peeved.

I went over and helped myself to the food. There was a huge bowl of popcorn, some Chex mix, little circles of bread with what looked like Ranch dressing and cucumbers on top, brownies, and oatmeal raisin cookies without the raisins. As I sized up that last plate, I shook my head in despair and loaded up. I’d have to come back for my lemonade once I got settled.

The Wang family from the house on the other side of Sniff’s jostled in just as I reached my chair. I had my place staked out just in time! There are a lot of them, and once they started finding places to sit, there was certain to be no place for anyone else.

Neighbors filed in and out for over two hours. They came mostly to check out Sally and her boy and, of course, because, other than the gatherings of loud music and beer cans, we never had parties on our street. It was a novelty, and no one wanted to be the only one to miss it.

Sweet Beat walked in around 8:45 or so. His name is Kevin, but no one in his right mind would ever dream of calling him that. Some days he seemed almost normal, but other days he seemed wound tight as a champagne cork. It was at his house that the loud music and beer cans had their parties. Maybe he thought he’d see what a party with people was like. I said as much in a jokey sort of way, and he popped a switchblade out at me before you could say ‘thou shalt not kill’. Sally hurried over and asked if she could admire it while he helped himself to the snacks. She held that thing in her hands and examined it like it was a lovely antique, but I saw her glance at her watch when she thought no one was looking. Sweet Beat came back over to collect his knife, but Sally kept it in her hand and patted the seat beside her on the couch (the Wangs had left by this time, so there was room for others again).

“Would you like me to hold this for you while you eat?” she asked, as though they were old friends and she was doing him a favor.

He grunted, and started in on his plate.

“I noticed you have a new bike,” she continued.

Sweet Beat looked at her sideways.

With his mouth full, he said, “Harley ”.

“Right. Harleys are the best, don’t you think so, Mr. Bingham?”

I looked at Sally like she was out of her mind because I was beginning to think she was.

“Mr. Bingham,” she persisted, “Harleys are by far the best, wouldn’t you agree?”

“I’d agree with anything you say, Ms. Cortland,” I answered truthfully.

to be continued . . .

I called over to Sniff’s house, “Seen anything of Sally Cortland, Sniff?”

“If there was anything to see of her, you woulda’ by now, ya been keepin’ watch nearly a week!” she hollered back.

You would’ve thought she meant to notify the neighborhood of my own private business and I set her straight right then and there.

“You just can’t stand to look in the mirror,” she answered; an answer which made no sense.

“I can look in the mirror same as you, you nosy old woman, an’ get a better picture back in the process.”

Well, she started to yell then, and that teenage boy from the other corner – the one that wears his pants halfway down as though he has his heart set on being a plumber – happened to walk by. His face sprouted a sarcastic smile, and I ran down my steps to the rocks that I keep handy in one corner against the house. He spied me out of the corner of his eye, though, and jogged away. He’d had a couple thrown at him before for one offense or another, so he’d learned his lesson. ‘Kids these days,’ I thought.

People started filtering over to Sally’s place around 6:30, so I started over, too.

I heard a voice from behind yell to me in a whisper, if you could call it that, “Bill Bingham, the party ain’t ‘til 7:00. What you doin’ goin’ over an’ disturbin’ that woman a whole half hour early?”

“Can’t you see all the folks already goin’ there?” I answered the Sniff.

I kept walking, and in another minute I could feel her monster steps behind me.

“What’re you doin’, Sniff? ‘The party ain’t ‘til 7:00,’” I mimicked her in a whiny voice and she thumped me over the head with something.

I looked behind me, and she was placing the hat she had whomped me with back on her head.

“What you wearin’ a hat fer?” I said in a disgusted tone.

Fanny threw back her shoulders and walked past me as though she was some kind of queen.

I caught up just as she reached the door and rang the bell. It didn’t work, so she poked her head through the door and yelled, “Sally, dear?”

Sally weaved her way to meet us through the nearly ten people already there.

Sniff leaned over and whispered to Sally, “Can you believe these people! What can I do to help?”

Sally squeezed her hand and said, “Dear Mrs. Smith. Whatever would we do without you? Would you be so kind as to keep an eye on that tray over there and refill it from the kitchen when it gets low?”

Sniff beamed, looked over at me condescendingly, and started over to ‘her’ tray which she watched like a hawk the rest of the evening.

to be continued . . .

THE PARTY

Sally was beginning to cause a bit of a problem for me. One morning I headed down to my basement. I mostly stayed out of it since I couldn’t abide the cobwebs. I had a few things stashed down there – mostly bits and pieces the previous owner had left behind.  There was a package of mousetraps, of course. Some Shell No Pest strips were down there along with a big hammer, a baseball cap, (I had brought up the bat that had stood next to it to keep under my bed for protection right after Pearl, my bloodhound, died), a few old paint cans, and a growing pile of shredded paper. I considered the latter and decided the mice might as well stay comfortable for awhile, so I left it alone. Besides, I could ask my daughter to clean it out when she came at Thanksgiving. She was always on the lookout for something to ease her guilt for not coming to visit me more often.  The paint cans were so old, they’d gotten lightweight. The other thing that was down there was a putty knife. I’d seen Sally had one around, so I picked it up. (Heart glad I was to find I had one!) I climbed back upstairs and settled on my porch.

See, I’d moved from the yard to my porch by now. I thought it best to leave some of the crab grass just in case I ran out of things to do. Like I said, Sally was causing a bit of a problem for me. If I stayed indoors, I wouldn’t know what was going on across the street. If I sat out on my porch it might start tongues flapping about comparisons I wasn’t willing to have made. I wasn’t on any account going to let a woman best me. If Sally was working up a sweat, I’d at least pretend to. I had started by sweeping twenty-five years worth of dirt through the porch cracks. It took a surprisingly little bit of time to do. If I had known that, I might’ve done it sooner. Then again, why do what would just need to be done again the next year? The wind mostly took care of the upkeep of that porch anyway. I swept over the same two feet for about half an hour, but my arms began to feel stiff, and Sally was so much in and out of her house, it was hard to keep track anyway. Still, I would have hated to miss anything, so I had to get creative. That’s why I had hunted for something to bring out with me to the porch. I sat with it in my hands for awhile, but then it occurred to me that I might raise suspicions, just sitting like that. So I figured I’d scrape with it like I’d seen Sally do. No one could fault that. After all, that little woman was beginning to make a name for herself. Every day folks would stop and check on the old Johnston house. She must have met everyone in a two-block radius in record time.

Friday was a very long day. The Johnston place was as quiet as the suburbs. At the moment I was scraping peeling paint with the putty knife. Fanny Sniff had been sitting on her porch most of the week, watching Sally and the boy. If that woman ever lifted a finger in her life it wasn’t enough for anyone to detect any movement. It was almost an embarrassment to live next to such an idle woman. However, there was one thing at which she excelled. It would be no exaggeration to put her in an Olympic contest of the greatest busybodies that ever lived. She would win the gold.

to be continued . . .

I woke up to see Sally bent over, cleaning the last of the brushes. She must have sensed my gaze, because she looked up and smiled.

“Have a good nap?”

“I always need a nap after I hear Fanny Sniff’s voice,” I replied.

“Thanks for keeping us company, Mr. Bingham.”

She straightened and looked at the house.

“It’s a good week’s work,” she said.

“You been doin’ this for a week?”

“I guess there are so many things going on in this neighborhood, it’s easy to miss some of it,” Sally commented in an amused voice.

Indeed, the house did look as though it began to be cared for. The creamy yellow was pared with a gray-green trim. Looking back, I admit I didn’t appreciate her taste at the time, but even then I could see it was an improvement.

“Stoppin’ already?” I asked. I thought she should at least work the day out.

“It’s 7:00, Mr. Bingham,” Sally answered, “It seems the day got away from you.”

I watched as she pulled out her ponytail and let her hair fall as the door closed behind her.

I’d have to make myself a quick supper, if I wanted to get to the comics before daylight faded. Some days are just like that. They are so full, that there isn’t time to fit in everything. I blamed it on Fanny Sniff. If she hadn’t interrupted my morning, I might have not had to hurry like I was now. That darned woman!

 *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *     *

The rest of the week I spent on my porch, watching Sally and the boy. No matter what time I got out there, they had beat me out. The woman had kept her weeds mowed since the day they’d moved in. I had noticed that right away.

I do like putterin’ in the yard. It lets me keep an eye on things. And one more thing. I hate crab grass. Now Creeping Charlie I like. It’s pretty. It perks up a yard a bit. Clover has a sweet smell. Plus you never know when you’ll get lucky with clover. Old sayings always have some truth to them, and you just never know where a four-leaf clover will take you. Dandelions are a fine little flower. I always said ‘If dandelions are good enough for a President of the United States, they’re good enough for me’. Crab grass is an entirely different matter, though. Some loud-mouthed kid not worth the gum on his shoe once made a comment about my yard fitting its owner and ever since, I’ve been death on the stuff.

It nearly met its final doom. I was outdoors so much – keeping an eye on things at the old Johnston place – that I swear I nearly dug it all up. I never worked so hard in my life.

The worst, of course, was when they went around to the back of their house. I ended up having to walk around the block and take a shortcut through their back alley to see anything at all. I heard Sally talking quietly to her son before I could see them. They were kneeling there not three feet from the alley. A box lid was crowded with little cups: some of them broken at the lip, some of them old plastic ones someone had thrown out, some of them Styrofoam ones in good shape bearing the logo of the donut shop three blocks down. I wondered if the owner was sweet on her. The cups held seedlings she must have planted a few months back.

She and the boy had measured out a little garden in the back and were planting the seedlings. I was sure she wouldn’t get anything from it, starting so late in the year. Still, she nursed those things in her hands as though they were her own babies.

I kicked a rock and scuffed my shoe so Sally would hear me. Someone had to tell her the garden wouldn’t do any good.

“Those ain’t gonna grow big enough by the time it frosts, ya know.”

She didn’t stop working at all. She just answered, “I know.”

“What?!” I couldn’t believe my ears.

That was it for me. I marched from there in such a huff that I had to rest by the time I got home.

She cut up some wilted hostas on the side of the house one day. I never sat so still in my life. The woman reminded me of a Samurai warrior, slashing those things the way she did. For one dreadful moment I thought she looked my way, but to my relief, she picked up her shovel and started planting what she’d just so viciously attacked. Funny thing is, they lived.

to be continued . . .

I went across the street to the old Johnston place.

After nosing around a bit, I found Sally in the back yard, up on a ladder. The boy was at the bottom, holding it steady.

“Whatcha doin’?” I asked.

“Oh, hi, Mr. Bingham,” she called down.

The boy eyed me with a fearful look, but held his ground.

“Don’t worry, boy,” I said, friendly like, “Your ma’s a friend o’ mine.”

I spit in the grass, and wiped the rest off my chin.

I sat down in the grass a while and watched her work. The day was nearing noon and the sun was piercingly bright.  Her shirt was starting to show sweat. Even from where I was, I could see a trickle make its way from her temple to her jaw.

An hour went by. I wondered why she chose this hot day to paint, and I asked her.

Sally gave a short laugh, though she sounded a little out of breath.

“It’s hard to predict a cool summer day,” she smiled, and winked at her son.

“Especially in the city,” she murmured under her breath.

By now she had the top half painted, and no longer needed the ladder. The boy took up another brush, and they worked together to finish the back of the house.

I began to feel restless. She looked so tired and hot.

“Never liked the color yellow,” I commented.

“Mr. Bingham,” she replied, “would you go inside and grab two pops for us, please?”

I hesitated.

“Grab one for yourself, too,” she added.

Never one to waste time, I walked through her back door. It was warmer inside the house than it was outside. I nearly suffocated looking around. I’d been in there just once before, two owners back. Something was different now, though. The whole of the rooms I investigated had been newly painted, the floors had been polished, and the woodwork stained. The rooms were furnished simply, certainly, but still felt very complete. I almost wished I could sit down, but there was still the upstairs to see.

I hurried up and looked in three bedrooms. They showed the same attention to cleanliness and neatness that the downstairs did. One room held a small desk, a wooden chair, a stuffed chair with a braided rug in front of it, and two large bookcases full of books. The other two obviously belonged to the boy and his mother. On a small table by the bed in each room were two pictures of two different men. One was quite handsome and looked as though the outdoors was his friend. I couldn’t tell much about the other one.

I went down to the kitchen again and poked my head into the refrigerator. It felt so good that I stood there for awhile to cool down. I pulled out three of those generic brand sodas and took them outside.

The boy came over to me and took two of them. He handed the first to his mother, and then opened one for himself.

I love the sound a soda can makes when it’s opened. The snap is so definite, so deliberate, so . . . so . . . confident. That’s it. It makes me feel confident when I open a soda can. I took a long swig. The biting coolness made its way straight to my gut.

I lay down in the grass, looked at the sky with barely a cloud crossing its expanse, closed my eyes and fell asleep. I snoozed off and on through the day, monitoring their progress as well as I could.

to be continued . . .