Benediction Page 6

  No.

  Well.

  I don’t know, it was just different there. That’s all I’m saying. You’d have liked it.

  You’re going to mess this up, do you know that? You don’t even see what’s in front of you. You’re like everybody else.

  No, I’m not.

  You’re dreaming backward.

  One night his mother was waiting in the living room, reading, when he came in. It was late. He stood in the doorway. She was watching him over the top of her book.

  Come here, she said. I want to look at you.

  Why?

  I want to see what you look like when you come in so late after being out with her all night.

  It’s not all night.

  Don’t be literal. You know what I mean.

  He went over and stood before her. She studied him, a tall skinny thin-faced boy, his hair a mess.

  You smell like her, she said. Don’t you.

  No.

  Yes, you smell like her. You have her odor. I hope you’re not being foolish about this. I hope you’re not going to get this girl pregnant.

  She’s on the pill.

  Is she. Did she tell you that?

  Yes.

  Do you believe her?

  Yes.

  Well, we can hope she’s not a little liar. Do you love her?

  It’s none of your business.

  Do you or not?

  Yes, I do.

  That’s good. I wouldn’t want it all to be for nothing. Just sex.

  Mother. What are you doing?

  You’ll get tired of her. Or she you. It doesn’t last. Love doesn’t last. You look like you’re losing weight. Are you?

  No.

  Well go to bed. You must be exhausted.

  12

  AT THE WINDOW sitting in his chair Dad Lewis was awake in the late morning when the Johnson women drove up and stopped in front of Berta May’s house and got out of the car in their summer dresses. They went up the walk onto the porch and knocked and stood waiting.

  Dad turned his head and called toward the kitchen.

  Yes? Mary said. Do you want something?

  Would you come out here?

  She came out through the dining room. Is something the matter?

  They’re over at Berta May’s.

  Who is?

  Willa and Alene.

  Mary looked out the window. The Johnson women were still standing on the porch.

  What are they doing over there? Dad said. I thought they’d be coming here again.

  Maybe they’re just paying a call.

  Berta May came and drew back the lace curtain at the front window and peered out and opened the door.

  I didn’t hear you knock. Will you come in?

  Is this a bad time to come? Willa said.

  No. I don’t guess it is. Is there something I can help you with? Come in, please.

  They stepped inside. Alene looked at her mother and said, We just wondered if we might take Alice out for lunch today.

  Take her out for lunch.

  Yes. If you wouldn’t mind.

  Well, I don’t know. You only want her. Is that what you’re saying?

  Oh no, we’d like you to come too if you want to.

  She looked at them. No. I see now. I’m afraid I’m getting slow. You thought you might take her for a treat. Is that it?

  If you wouldn’t mind.

  I don’t mind. But we’ll have to ask her.

  Is she here?

  Out in the backyard. I’ll call her.

  She went out and stood at the kitchen door and called the girl in and they came back together to the living room. The girl was tanned and freckled, in shorts and T-shirt.

  Her grandmother stood with her arm around her. They want to ask you something. Go ahead and ask her, if you’d care to.

  Willa smiled at Alice. Do you remember meeting us next door when we were visiting Dad and Mary Lewis?

  Yes.

  We wanted to know if we could take you out for lunch today.

  The girl looked up at her grandmother’s big red face.

  If you want to, Berta May said. It’s up to you.

  For a little excursion, Alene said. Just the three of us.

  Isn’t Grandma coming?

  No, I’m staying here. I got too much to do right here.

  We’d bring you back home as soon as you would want.

  Where to?

  Where would we go to eat?

  Yes.

  We thought the Wagon Wheel Café out on the highway. Have you been there?

  I don’t think so.

  You haven’t, Berta May said. We go to Shattuck’s if we eat out.

  I guess I can go, Alice said.

  Then you better go change your clothes. You can’t go out in public to eat with these ladies looking like that.

  What should I put on?

  You decide.

  The girl looked at them again and went back into the hall to her bedroom. The women stood and talked, waiting for her.

  Then she came back in a yellow shirt and green shorts.

  Well, those are some bright clothes, her grandmother said. You won’t get run over at least.

  They’re my new clothes.

  I know. They’re clean anyway.

  Would you like to go now? Willa said.

  They went out to the car in the dazzling sun of midday and Alene drove and Willa sat beside her in the front seat and the girl rode in the back and watched out the window and looked at the back of the heads of the two women. They went up to the highway and turned east past the Gas and Go and on beyond the Highway 34 Grocery Store into the country past the implement dealership.

  They parked and went inside the café and waited at the counter until a woman in a white blouse and a black skirt came and led them past the bar and the salad buffet into the second room to a table where the woman put down menus at three places and took away the fourth place setting. Luann will be your waitress today, she said. She’ll be with you in a moment.

  Where would you like to sit? Willa said.

  Alice looked at the table and then around the room.

  Do you want to face the doorway so you can see who’s coming in or look out the window toward the fields?

  The doorway, the girl said.

  She pulled her chair out and took her seat and the two women sat on either side of her. They took up the menus.

  What do you feel like eating? Alene said.

  I don’t know what there is.

  Alene pointed in the menu. There are salads and sandwiches listed on this side and main dishes on this page.

  Do they have hamburgers?

  Yes. But you can have anything you want.

  The waitress came and they ordered drinks. She had blond hair, teased out around her face, and was nice-looking.

  Who’s this now? she said.

  This is Alice. Berta May’s granddaughter.

  Oh my, aren’t you a pretty girl. I like your outfit.

  Thank you.

  I could take you home with me, you’re so pretty. Do you want to come and be my little girl? I just got boys.

  I don’t know.

  Maybe some other day.

  The girl shrugged.

  The waitress left and came back with glasses of tea for the Johnson women and a Coke for Alice. Willa ordered soup and a salad and Alene a club sandwich and Alice said she still wanted a hamburger.

  How do you want it cooked, honey? the waitress said.

  The girl looked at Alene.

  Do you like it pink inside or all brown?

  All brown.

  With fries? the waitress said.

  The girl looked at Alene again.

  I think you’ll want some fries, don’t you?

  Yes.

  The waitress went off to the kitchen.

  Rose Tyler’s here, Alene said to her mother. By herself.

  They looked at the old woman sitting alone by the window.

  She’s ne
ver going to get over him, Willa said.

  Why would she? People don’t.

  The girl watched them talk and looked out through the doorway to the other room where people were coming and going.

  After the waitress brought their food Alice started to pour ketchup on her hamburger but it spurted out, covering it all and she set the bottle down and stared at her plate and put her hands in her lap. She looked as if she would cry.

  We’re not going to worry about that, Alene said. We can just scrape it off. Do you want me to?

  I can do it, the girl said. She scraped and spooned the ketchup off onto the side of her plate.

  There, Willa said. That’s better. Isn’t it.

  The girl nodded and began to eat her French fries, picking them up one at a time and dipping the end in the ketchup and biting off the end and dipping it in again and eating the rest by small bites. The Johnsons watched her.

  I’ve only used squirt bottles, Alice said. I used to help my mother fill the ketchup and mustard bottles and the salt and pepper shakers.

  Your mother worked in a restaurant?

  Yes. She always had me help her.

  Do you have any pictures of her?

  I do at Grandma’s. The girl looked around the room. She looked back at her plate. That old man’s dying like my mother did.

  You mean Mr. Lewis, the man next door to you.

  He’s got it all over him. My mother had it in her breast.

  We heard about that. We’re very sorry.

  Alice looked out the doorway and said, She didn’t have blond hair like that waitress.

  Didn’t she?

  She had brown hair like me.

  Then she must have been a very pretty woman. I wish we had known her.

  How does she get her hair that way? So puffy like that.

  Well. She must blow-dry it and tease it and then pick it.

  As they drove back to town in the car after lunch, Alice was looking out the side window at the trees and the houses going by. My mother said teasing your hair could damage it, she said.

  13

  ON THE PHONE Dad Lewis told Rudy and Bob to bring him the sales numbers in the morning this time since in the afternoons he wasn’t much good anymore, then he hung up and turned to Lorraine. Don’t you want to sit in with us so you can see for yourself what these store accounts look like?

  Daddy, they don’t want me there.

  How do you know that? It doesn’t matter what they want. If I tell them you’re sitting in, that’s what will happen.

  I’m still trying to decide if I want to at all.

  You have to make up your mind pretty soon. This isn’t going to go on forever, you know that. You can’t put it off much longer. If you don’t want to, I’ve got to do something else.

  I know, Daddy.

  So at midmorning the clerks came up on the porch and Rudy knocked quietly on the door. They removed their caps and Mary ushered them into the living room and served them coffee, and again they sat side by side on the couch as they had each time, as if they were attending a funeral service, and Dad was in his chair as always with a blanket over his knees and with his wood cane laid on the floor beside him.

  Rudy was a little quick voluble middle-aged man, with a balding head, and Bob was tall and skinny and slow, with thick graying hair combed straight back. Rudy held the store accounts in a file on his lap.

  You boys doing any good today? Dad said.

  We’re doing pretty good, Rudy said. How about you, Dad? It seems like you’re looking a lot better.

  Dad looked at him. Now that is bullshit and you know it.

  Well, you don’t look too much on the worse side, Bob said.

  Yeah. All right. He looked out the window and looked back. You want something to go with that coffee, you boys?

  No thanks, Rudy said.

  You, Bob?

  No thank you, I don’t think so. It’s still pretty early in the morning.

  All right then. Let’s see what you got there.

  Rudy stood up and set the file in Dad’s lap and sat back down. Dad took out the reading glasses from his shirt pocket and fit the thin bows over his ears and studied the pages. The two men bent forward and sipped their coffee, watching him.

  After a while Dad looked up. Any problem with any of this? he said.

  No. Not to speak of.

  Anything we do need to speak of, then?

  No. Don’t believe so, Dad.

  How many lawn mowers we sold this summer by now?

  Ten, Rudy said. He looked at Bob. Wasn’t it?

  That sounds about right.

  Last summer we sold fifteen, Dad said.

  Things have been slower this year, Rudy said.

  Why’s that now?

  They’re not building no new houses in town. That’s mainly it. That’s how I account for it.

  What do you say, Bob?

  It’s like what he said. And it’s this new mower we ordered in. It costs more.

  It’s a better machine, Dad said.

  Yeah. But it costs more.

  Well yeah, it costs more, Bob. Goddamn it, it’s got to cost more.

  Bob inspected his hands. People don’t like to spend too much money on a lawn mower.

  All right, Bob. I take your point. Dad opened the file again. He found the line he was looking for. What about this accounts receivable? How come that’s still so high?

  That’s old Miss Sprague, Rudy said.

  What about her?

  She bought that freezer.

  I remember she bought it. She bought it before I got sick.

  Well. She stopped paying anything on it.

  Did you call her?

  Yes sir. I called her. Called her two times.

  Then did you go to see her?

  I went.

  Well. Why don’t you just go ahead and tell me, Rudy. This ain’t some kind of mystery, is it?

  No, but it’s a bad mess, Dad. He stared across the room for a moment. I figure I can go over to her house and get it back if that’s what you want.

  You mean repossess it.

  Yes sir. Repossess it.

  How come?

  You ever been in her house?

  About thirty years ago.

  Well, I doubt she’s thrown anything away since then. Dad, it’s just an all-out bad situation. She sits in her rocking chair or walks up and down in that mess and confusion all day long. She’s left herself little narrow trails to walk in. And she’s put that freezer out on the back porch loaded up with things. It ain’t even food that she’s got inside. She’s put her old leftover bank papers and family letters and old yellowed newspapers in it. And she’s got it plugged in and turned on, keeping it running, keeping the papers cold. She showed me. She insisted on it. I didn’t want to look at it. I didn’t know what I’d see. Why hell. It just kind of made me feel sick to myself to see all those papers iced up like that. You want me to take her freezer back?

  You think she’s lost her mind now? Is that it? Gone over the hill?

  I guess that’s what it is. Or just pure old age.

  You don’t think she’s going to pay.

  I don’t think she can pay. It don’t look likely to me, Dad.

  Well. We don’t want it back. We don’t ever want to have to take anything back.

  She’s just all alone over there, is mostly what it is.

  Nobody to take care of her? Nobody to talk to?

  No sir. Not that I know of.

  Well. We can’t take back her freezer. It’s like she had some idea but whatever it was she forgot it. Let her go. It’ll be laid onto bad debts, that’s all.

  Yes. That’s the best way.

  What else? Anything happening around town or out in the country?

  You heard they started cutting wheat, Bob said.

  They should. It’s almost the start of July.

  You heard about that custom combiner from Texas.

  I don’t know. I guess. You mean that fellow that claim
s when you cross into Oklahoma it makes you want to steal?

  You heard his story about old Floyd.

  I don’t guess I heard that.

  Well, as he says, last year they come into this little town down in Oklahoma just before the Fourth of July and the hands, they all wanted a day off. He said he didn’t trust them but they’d been working pretty hard and deserved some vacation. All of them was pretty much a bunch of alkies, he said. Anyway so they was down there in this little place and he let them go for the one day like they asked. Then the next day when they come back one of the men isn’t with them. What happened to Floyd? he says.

  Well, one of them says, he’s sort of scratching his foot in the dirt, I guess we lost old Floyd.

  What do you mean you lost old Floyd?

  Well. We went out fishing in a boat on this lake and I guess we had a little bit to drink and then old Floyd, he falls in. He never rises back up.

  Goddamn. Didn’t you look for him?

  Yeah. We looked for him. But we couldn’t find him.

  So finally this Texas guy telling the story he says he had to call Floyd’s mama to tell her they’d lost old Floyd. His mama tells him, Well, just give his things to the hands.

  Dad shook his head, grinning. Hell of a deal. I guess it’s funny, in a sort of way. He stared for a moment at the two men sitting on the couch. They say drowning is the way to go, isn’t that right? But how anybody would know that I don’t know.

  That’s right, Bob said. How would they know?

  But you boys now, you could take me over to Bonny Dam and tip me in, couldn’t you.

  Hell now, Dad, Rudy said. That ain’t no way to talk.

  It ain’t no way to talk maybe, but it would settle things. It wouldn’t be a lot of trouble for you.

  They looked down at their coffee cups. It ain’t that it would be any trouble, Rudy said. That ain’t at all the point, Dad.

  All right then. I suppose not. He studied them for a while longer. I guess we’re done here. You boys want some more coffee before you go?

  We wouldn’t care to bother you.

  You don’t bother me. I just appreciate you coming. It’s good to see you.

  It’s good to see you too, Dad.

  You know I’m going to have Lorraine sit in with us next time.

  Oh? How’s that now?

  In case she takes over for me.

  They stared at him, not speaking.

  Afterward, he said. When I’m gone.

  I don’t know as we get what you’re talking about here, Dad.