Solomon's Oak (30 page)

“What about that spaghetti dinner? You promised us you’d cook.”

“I’m still willing. It’s up to your mom. Hey, Juniper. What kind of student was your sister, Casey?”

“She got straight A’s.”

“When you lose somebody, take a lesson from their lives. That way their dying doesn’t erase them entirely.”

“I hate you.”

“I hate you, too. Shine the lightbulbs real good. Don’t forget to tell Glory I called.”

“I won’t. Bye, Copper Joe.” She hung up.

The rest of the day he found himself smiling now and then, thinking about Juniper on a stepladder unscrewing bulbs to get at the dust and that little greyhound racing around the house as if it were a track while the black-and-white collie zoomed behind, trying to herd him from one imaginary pasture to another, and Dodge barked his high-pitched, supersonic bark that made Joseph’s ears ring. Lots of crazy stuff went on in that house. He imagined Glory waiting on people at Target while her mind whirled around trying to figure out what to do about the third suspension. There would be more than raised voices when she got home. He cropped and touched up his pictures, trying to talk himself into believing the bad ones weren’t ready for the bone pile. Before heating up his dinner, he printed out the photo with Juniper against the tree. At lunch Lorna had remarked on her torn-up face, but in color on the paper, Joseph saw a resemblance between the girl and the oak he hadn’t noticed before. Against the gnarled bark, Juniper in her ripped jeans and grim smile looked as if she’d lived two hundred years’ worth of life already, too, witness to terrible things. She was so mad at the world you prayed she didn’t have matches in her pocket.

At ten that night his cell rang, jarring him out of the Ishi book he practically knew by heart.

“Hello?”

“Sorry to call back so late. I’ve been—” Glory sighed—“a little busy.”

“It’s not too late. I stay up until midnight, usually.”

“Juniper said you called. I guess she told you about her latest suspension.”

“She didn’t tell me why.”

Then it was as if Joseph had turned on the faucet. “What do I do, Joseph? She’s smart, capable of good grades, and she even studies without me harping at her. But try to get her to stay out of fights and she reacts like I’m asking her to go cliff diving. California passed anti-bullying laws for a reason, I told her. Those kids torment her about Casey, but she refuses to let me intervene. I tell her over and over, they’re immature and petty, wait until they lose someone and eventually they will. I tell her, don’t let them push your buttons and never let them see you cry, so what does she do? Throws a punch. Pulls a plastic cafeteria knife out of her pocket and
threatens
a cheerleader with it. A knife!”

“A plastic cafeteria knife is what, about five inches long? If she were eighteen, she could be charged with felony assault.”

“I know that. You know that. Juniper—well, something happens every week, and the principal is fed up and I don’t blame her. Why does my kid have to be such a hard-ass? Oh, gosh. Excuse my language, I meant to say—”

“Sometimes
ass
is the only word for it.”

“I don’t mean to dump all this on you. I just get so frustrated. I can’t talk to my sister. She’s on tenterhooks waiting to prove that I’ve made this monstrous mistake.”

“Tenterhooks?”

“
Escarpias
. Hooks, holding fabric together carefully so it doesn’t rip.”

“Like a clothesline?”

“Never mind. It’s just an expression. Even Lorna thinks it’s a mistake.”

“Do you think it’s a mistake?”

Glory went silent for a minute. “No. I can’t say exactly why, but I believe in this kid.”

“So do I.”

“You must think I’m some kind of nutcase, calling you up to unload like this. I know you have enough problems of your own, but you said you used to work with teenagers, so if you have any ideas, I’d sure appreciate hearing them. If you feel like sharing. Jeez! I’m sorry. Just ignore all that. Let’s start over. How are you?”

“At present, the good in my life outweighs the bad.”

“Juniper said you wanted to come by again and photograph the tree.”

“It can wait. How about chile spaghetti for dinner tomorrow?”

“We have to start cooking for the Valentine’s Day wedding tomorrow.”

“You asked for my advice. This is it. The day after Valentine’s, come to dinner here. Arrive early. Bring the dogs and the desperado. If it doesn’t rain, we can walk around the lake. If it does, we can play Parcheesi. My house is four miles from the Butterfly Creek. The dark green A-frame with the dilapidated roof surrounded by the mini-mansions.”

“I know where it is. I’ve driven past it.”

“So come to dinner. Give yourself a break.”

“Okay, Joseph. See you then. Good night.”

“Good night, Glory.”

He felt the old reflex rise to say “Sweet dreams,” the way he used to when Isabel turned away from him to sleep. But when he discovered she was dreaming something else entirely, he vowed never to say it again. After the call, insomnia set in. He named and filed his pictures, ran a diagnostic program on the computer, then walked around the cabin, looking at the cobwebs in the ceiling corners, dust bunnies under the furniture, and worst of all, the rag rug. It needed to be taken outdoors and shaken, but he couldn’t lift it by himself. Lorna said Juan was good with floors, but the man was seventy-nine years old. Joseph thought of the bikers; they would have no trouble hauling a rug down porch steps. It was amusing, this conundrum of his. It did not involve a woolly mammoth or the jaws of a mountain lion, or a train jumping its tracks; it was a six-foot-by-nine-foot rug as old as he was, and set against him, it would always win.

Saturday night he lay in the dark, mentally composing his grocery list:

Anaheim chiles (sub. for smoked Hatch chiles)

Ground pork (try to find fresh?)

Garlic (New Mexico garlic was fresh and plump, not dried out as in the California markets)

Cumin. This stopped him completely. Grandma Penny used to buy the seeds whole and grind them into powder. She insisted on giving Joseph a hankie filled with seeds to carry on the day he got married. “Carry cumin on your wedding day,” she said, “and your wife will stay true. It also keeps chickens from wandering off.” Joseph was pretty sure he’d had that hankie in his pocket the whole ceremony. He’d never had chickens, but maybe it was time to try that out.

Cilantro (available fresh anywhere)

Noodles (best to make your own)

All that sounded as if it would taste like a pathetic bachelor with a dirty rug threw chopped peppers into regular old spaghetti and then sat down to watch NASCAR. He got up, looked through the cupboards, and found the last two packets of dried corn of his grandmother’s stash. He opened one and poured it into a saucepan full of water and lime to soak overnight. Posole was a never-fail dish, as soothing as mashed potatoes and just as filling, plus with the kick of hot peppers, it was a lot more memorable than spaghetti.

Just as he expected, Glory brought Dodge with her, and Juniper had Cadillac by her side. The poor little greyhound missed out on everything. They parked their truck a ways from his cabin and let the dogs run off-leash. Juniper looked happy. Glory’s frown looked etched into her face. Joseph opened the screen door and brought out the teapot of cota tea and three mugs.

“This is hot,” Juniper said when she took a sip.

“It’s winter,” he said. “Hot drinks are called for.”

“Mom, you have to taste this. It’s like, I don’t know, really good.”

So it was “Mom” again. Juniper was pulling out all the stops.

Glory sat down at the picnic table on Joseph’s porch. She was dressed in jeans and a purple fleece jacket, the collar pulled up. “Thanks,” she said listlessly, and accepted her mug.

“You’re welcome.” Joseph watched the dogs nose into bushes and take off running toward a couple of jays on the branch of a pine tree. Cadillac abandoned the chase quickly, but Dodge’s bark button was activated, that painfully recognizable cattle-dog shriek that truly insulted human ears.

“Dodge! For crying out loud, will you be quiet for two minutes?” Glory said. “I have a headache.” The brown dog stopped at once, cringing at her side. “Down,” she told him, her voice uncharacteristically harsh. Joseph reached down to pet the dog. “Don’t,” she said. “He’s being a brat today. Like somebody else I know.”

“Can I walk around the lake?” Juniper asked. “Mom, will you come with me? Joseph?”

“The further you walk, the muddier the path,” Joseph said. “You could slip and fall, hurt yourself.”

“I won’t fall. I’ll be careful.”

“We’ll need a flashlight.”

“Walking won’t hurt your back?” Glory asked.

Of course it would. Joseph looked across the lake where the last light of the day illuminated the ripples. Soon the sun would sink into it and the water would go pitch-black, but for the next twenty minutes there would be a glorious explosion of orange and magenta. He looked at Glory. “You think I’m going to miss a perfect sunset with two special ladies because a couple of my vertebrae are quitters? Come on. If I can’t make it, you two can bring down a deer, skin it, and scrape the hide to build a travois and drag me back here.”

That made Glory smile. Juniper was already down at the pebbly shore, picking up rocks. “Where are the arrowheads? You said there were arrowheads!” Without waiting for an answer she ran off.

“She’s never heard of patience.” Glory sighed. “Maybe we should let her go ahead of us. She’s probably as tired of my company as I am of hers.”

“How was the Valentine’s wedding?”

“It went well, but you know.”

“Know what?”

She looked out toward the water. “It wasn’t a pirate wedding.”

He smiled. “Nothing could compare to that.”

“Can I help you with dinner?”

“Sort of. You can help me haul out my rug and shake it, if that isn’t too lame to ask.”

“Most men wouldn’t even notice the rug was dirty.”

“I’m not most men.”

Juniper and the dogs ducked out of sight, then reappeared behind a fir tree. “Are you guys coming or not?” she hollered.

“In a minute,” Glory yelled back.

“It embarrasses me to ask for help.”

Glory stood up and walked into the cabin behind him. “I’m the same way. Maybe we both need to get over that.”

“Do you think it’s possible?”

“I don’t know. But I can honestly say no man on earth has asked me to shake out his rug. Oh, my gosh. I didn’t mean that to come out so wrong.”

He smiled. “It’s okay. I won’t tease you about it.”

Her cheeks stayed red as she pulled the bulk of the rug out his front door. Together they draped it over the railing and slapped at it until the dust clouds made them cough.

“This probably hasn’t been cleaned since my grandmother died,” Joseph said. “You know what? Leave it here and the construction crew can haul it away.”

“It’s a nice rug. I’ll take it if you don’t want it. Meanwhile, I’m happy to shake it whenever you need me,” Glory said, grinning.

“First time a woman ever said that to me.” He smiled back.

“You’ve led a sheltered life.”

“Apparently.”

After that, it was as if they shared evenings together all the time. Juniper, bored of her solo walk, threw the ball for Dodge. Caddy pranced at the water’s edge, transfixed by fish he could see but could not figure out how to herd. Dodge jumped in the lake and splashed around. “Mom!” Juniper called. “Joseph! You guys promised we’d walk around the lake!”

“Come on,” Joseph said, setting his tea down on the table. “We can watch the sunset.”

“All right. But as soon as we get back, I’m opening the wine I brought.”

“Fair enough.”

Halfway down the path visitors ran into ruts all summer long, Glory knelt down and prized up an arrowhead. “It was just sitting there,” she said, holding it up for Juniper to see. She handed it to Joseph and he rubbed the dirt off it.

“Chert,” he said. “See how uneven the flakes are here at the point? That’s called ‘fast and dirty,’ a point made on the spot for a job, then discarded. I’m surprised to see it here. I used to find arrowheads in my grandmother’s garden when she dug up the potatoes, but not this close to the lake.”

“I want to find one,” Juniper said.

“Take mine,” Glory said, but Joseph reached out and took Glory’s hand, closing her fingers around the point. “You keep it. It’s special. Let Juniper find her own.”

“I bet I never find one,” Juniper said.

“You won’t with an attitude like that,” Joseph said.

“I’m going closer to the lake,” she said, and Joseph lifted his hand to warn her to be careful. “The shore drops off,” he said as a wet Dodge raced by him. “It’s really slippery. She could fall in.”

“Let her,” Glory said. “It appears to be the only way she learns.”

When Juniper fell, Glory reached over and squeezed Joseph’s hand. Juniper was screaming and Cadillac ran in circles around her, trying to make things better. “I’m all wet!” she cried as she staggered back to them.