Larry Goes To Space (8 page)

“Bastages,” Larry sympathized. “Don’t worry about tying up Ol’ Bucky. He hasn’t met a rope he couldn’t chew through or a chain he can’t break and drag behind him.” He pointed at his bedroom. “You can carry those suitcases right into the big bedroom up front.”

“We don’t want to put you out. That’s your bedroom. We can take the other,” Gary said. Even though he said it, he didn’t move toward the guest bedroom, waiting like all guests for his host to insist that he take the nicer of the two rooms.

“Nope,” Larry said. “I’m sure Dad told you I was leaving for a while tomorrow. So, no sense in letting the big queen-sized bed sit empty. The guest room has twin beds, so that isn’t good for a married couple. Did you two eat yet?”

“We’re stuffed to the gills,” Gary said. “We have a huge chunk of your mom’s peach cobbler in the car for you.”

“Good. I hope you don’t mind but I’m about ready to burn me a steak, so we can talk while I eat.”

Marcy shook her head, “No. You men folk talk about business and what not. I’ll go cook your steak. Gary, please go get the cobbler and put it in the refrigerator before it goes bad. How do you like your steak, Larry?”

Since Larry liked his steaks rare, it didn’t take them long to be arranged around the kitchen table. In between bites, Larry told his cousin and new wife about his farm, the cattle, the barn, where the keys were to everything that took keys, and what to do with Ol’ Bucky when he rolled in and ate skunk roadkill. He told them to help themselves to anything and everything in the chest freezer out on the back porch. He told them to ride Dollar anytime they could catch him. He told them to go through the clothes in the closet Nancy left behind to see if any fit Marcy. He doubted anything would fit as Nancy prided herself on being tall and model thin. Marcy obviously prided herself of being happy and healthy, eating another piece of cobbler while Larry attacked his slice of dead cow meat.

No matter what Larry’d told Nancy, she’d left a closet full of old clothes in the guest bedroom closet while cleaning out the master bedroom closet. He told them to use any of his clothes he left behind, not that he had that much worth borrowing and he doubted Gary wanted anything to do with his old used boxers. He even told them who to call if the septic tank backed up and where to go for a cold beer, if they’d a mind to go out for a bit.

Gary stopped him when he pulled up the bank records on his laptop and started writing down the passwords. “What are you doing? I’m grateful for the help and we’re flat broke, but you can’t just open up everything and give it to us like that. You sound like you aren’t planning on coming back.”

Larry chuckled. “I’m trusting you to keep all of this—” he waved his arms around indicating what he meant when he said all “—everything on my place, under your hat. I’m excited about going. I’ve never been where I’m going and I’m looking forward to getting there like you wouldn’t believe. But, I’m planning on coming back. For that matter, every time I go into town I plan on coming back, but you just never know. It doesn’t take but one small step in the wrong direction and you can’t go home. Just like you and Marcy, it isn’t even your fault, but you can’t go home.

“Both of you listen up. You’re doing me a bigger service than I’m doing for you. Besides, you’re family. If you’re going to be taking care of my place, you’ll take care of it all. Treat it like your own. Do your banking on-line and they won’t know you aren’t me. There isn’t that much in my banking account. There’s only about $40,000. Help yourself to what you need to keep things running and for—well, anything you need, baby stuff and all. Just remember, that’s all we have coming in until early spring next year and then we can sell off the two-year-old steers. So use what you need but try to make it last until then. Don’t hold any bills waiting for me to get back, just pay them through the on-line account.

“Lastly, if you need something legal, you go to my dad. He has a complete power of attorney on everything. One big request, keep what you see here and what we do a secret.”

Marcy said, “I don’t mind secrets. I can do that, but I don’t like this whole thing. You’re giving us too much and you’re making it sound too final.”

Larry shrugged, “Marcy, I’m sure your parents would do the same.” He stood up, stretched his back, and slid another piece of Grandma’s cobbler on his plate. He had to reach over a salad that Marcy had put on the table by mistake, but he managed to reach.

Gary shook his head, “No. They don’t really care much for me. They said Marcy married beneath her.”

Larry laughed, plopping back down in his chair. “Oh, hell. I can tell by looking at this pretty, young thing that they’re right. No girl ever marries a man that’s good enough for her. It’s up to you to prove you deserve the woman you won.”

He looked pointedly at the two. “So, at the risk of sounding a bit self-serving, you run this place like it was your own. You make it a success. Then, when you get your place back, you make that successful too. Marcy’s folks’ll come around.”

He pulled the clean sheets from the dryer, sent the two off to bed, cleaned up the supper dishes, tossed the bone from his steak to Ol’ Bucky, and stuffed some clothes straight from the dryer into a backpack.

—*—

He was still downloading books into his e-reader when the sun started peeking over the horizon. He was more than glad he’d found a whole section of classic novels for free on the internet. There were plenty of free books he wanted to read, and a few that he was supposed to have read in school already.

Gary and Marcy made their way into the kitchen at the same time, making Larry smile. Getting up early without being called or using an alarm clock was a good sign that the young couple was farm folk.

Sleeping past daylight was exactly like taking a vacation, only on a farm you weren’t on vacation. You woke up already at work. There wasn’t any getting ready to go to work, you were already there. It was simply “go to work” and work started at the back screen door, or half that distance if a fellow lived alone. An average farmer knew he had more on his schedule to do than he could get done before the day was out and a good farmer knew he would add to his to-do list more things than he got done.

Gary smiled. “I’m glad that you didn’t sneak out on us in the middle of the night. I hope you have time to show me around the place before you go.”

“Not much need to do a complete walk around. I’m leaving my laptop here for you. Go to the icon marked HOMESTEAD. Yep, the one in all caps. It has an online map of the whole place. Each pasture is clearly delineated. There are associated spreadsheets listing every piece of equipment and every animal on the place. It’s easy to manage. We can take a walk back through the cow pasture here in a few minutes.”

“Can I fix breakfast first?” Marcy asked.

Larry shook his head. “I’m sure you could whip up something better than I could, but I want to get an early start if I can. I promised my friends I’d be ready to go by sunrise and I don’t want to make them wait. Would you mind holding off on your breakfast until after I’ve gone?”

Marcy shook her finger at him. “You shouldn’t go traipsing off to God knows where on an empty stomach.”

Larry patted his stomach. It was flatter and better muscled than most men his age. “It wouldn’t hurt for me to miss a meal or two. Besides, I just wolfed down about half of that cobbler you brought over. Grandma would throw a fit if she knew that was what I had for breakfast, so let’s just keep that a secret, shall we?”

Gary laughed, “Far be it from me to tattle on the guy who is fast becoming my favorite cousin.”

Larry smiled, “Thanks for that, but I’m serious about secrets. I don’t do anything illegal or immoral on this place, but you will see things here that you’ll want to talk about. Don’t. You can talk to each other, but no one else. And I mean no one else. Not my folks, not yours, and certainly not Grandma. As to my trip, you cannot mention when, where, or how I am going,”

Marcy gave a small shiver, “Now you’re scaring me, Larry.” The shiver wasn’t at all like Ol’ Bucky’s wet dog shake, but more of a simple head and shoulders wiggle; the end result was a shimmy and a jiggle that would have been a winner at Racine’s: weekday, weeknight, or anytime on the weekend.

Larry smiled, “I’m getting scared myself now that it’s almost time to go.” He unplugged his e-reader, shoved it and its charger into his backpack. He hadn’t thought to ask Scooter, but he assumed that any civilization with the ability to cross light years could figure out how to convert electricity to 110 volts.

Larry said, “You both have to promise to keep my secrets, okay? And don’t worry, it’s not like I’m going into witness protection, or converting to Islam, or that I’m being arrested and sent to prison. But, keeping the secret is as much for your protection as mine. Promise?”

When both of then nodded, he jumped up. “Are you two up for a quick walk across the pasture?” He grabbed his backpack and attached sleeping bag without waiting for an answer and was halfway to the door before Gary and Marcy even finished listening to the question. It wasn’t a speed of sound issue as a certain cow in the back pasture could have explained. It was more of a human hearing versus listening issue. Most humans hear much more than they listen. Comprehension takes a tad bit longer than the sound itself. Reaction to the comprehension compounds the time lag. All of which was well understood by human psychologists and had no bearing whatsoever on why most human conversations seemed to drone on and on and on and on and on and on without any point whatsoever.

This listening versus hearing issue also had no impact on why people in conversations repeated themselves, or why they said the same thing more than once, or why they tried to say the same thing as many different ways as they could think of. With the exception of instructional situations where repetition is required, most people repeated themselves simply because they liked hearing themselves talk.

Larry was no exception when it came to talking just for the sake of talking. He could be quiet in a pool hall, well — at least when someone was trying to sink a difficult bank shot. He could be quiet waiting in line at the bank, well — when he couldn’t think of a reason to avoid going into town. He could be quiet on those rare days he went fishing, or at least any time he had his butt on the bank and his feet in the water.

However, his tractor, the four-wheeler and his old pickup truck could all testify that Larry could be a real chatterbox at times. The tractor and the truck found him occasionally informative and, on a rare occasion or two, even amusing. The four-wheeler, being a much less mature machine, thought Larry rambled on a bit too much, not to mention being a bit too gentle on the throttle.

Larry pointed out features of his farm as they walked. The morning dew was heavy on the grass and the air smelled of the sweet odor of clear, clean air. It was a beautiful morning to take a stroll before a long space voyage.

It didn’t take long to walk through the barbwire lane between the front steer pastures. The lane was wide enough to back up an eighteen-wheel cattle truck. At the point where the four pastures met, Larry pointed out his design for opening one pasture to the corral and cattle chute and then switching to another pasture. It eliminated the need to shuffle cattle between one pasture and the next during a roundup or at market time. Once through the gate between the steer and heifer pastures, Larry continued talking and pointing out watershed features and grass mixture.

He stopped talking when he realized he was talking to himself. He was alone. He was used to being alone and talking to himself. It just surprised him this time because he thought he had someone with him.

He looked behind him. Gary and Marcy were backed up against the cattle chute staring at the spaceships across the field. He had seen that look before. The wide-eyed stare of disbelief and horror was the exact expression Ol’ Bucky got come bath time. They even looked like they would try to bite if he dragged them any closer. Ol’ Bucky often tried to bite when he was being dragged to the big aluminum tub in the yard for his annual bathing.

Larry grinned to himself. Ol’ Bucky really liked baths once he got into the water. But he somehow never remembered it from one year to the next. He was sure Gary and Marcy would like Scooter and the other Teumess if they got the chance to meet them. Still, Marcy may not — stress may not — be much of a biter, but Larry had come to realize since Nancy left that he was a poor judge of the female half of the species. He could judge a cow. He could judge a book (whether by its cover or its content). He could judge good western music (not that new country stuff, but good old western stuff like Marty Robbins, the Riders of the Purple Sage, or Roy and Dale). He could even judge an apple pie, if he could remember to slow down and taste it. But, the older he got the more mysterious women became.

He walked back to where Gary and Marcy stood frozen against the cattle chute. Larry had to admit that he’d built a pretty sturdy cattle chute. It would easily hold a mean, three thousand pound bull that did not want to go into the back of a truck. It would hold half a dozen two-year-old steers. It would hold up against Gary and Marcy clinging to it for protection.

He just wasn’t sure how much protection it would provide against fourteen spaceships, should protection be needed. He was also sure it wouldn’t hold up if Scooter and the Teumess had landed on it instead of the open field. Scooter seemed to be a polite sort, so much so that they hadn’t smushed one of his cows on landing when she hadn’t moved out of the way fast enough.