The Sweet Hereafter (25 page)

All the way across the field to the stands, I kept an out, but I never caught sight of anything that Boomer more than superficially. Boomer was, of course, name my boys and I had given to that old Dodge which had served back in the 1970s as my very first bus which, after 168,000 miles, had finally thrown a rod generally collapsed. I’d pushed it out behind the barn and stashed it on blocks, in case Abbott or I or one of the boys ever needed parts from it, which need never arose, as my boys were by then obsessed with off road vehicles and four by fours and I was driving first the GMC and then the International. And then Abbott had his stroke. The old Dodge got more or less forgotten over the years that it sat back there, and in time meadow grass and tall weeds and berry bushes grew around it. Until one day in June of this year, when Jimbo Gagne came out to the house unannounced and asked to buy it.

He said he liked its power to weight ratio, it had plenty of both, and he would like to get it running again and enter it in the demolition derby at the fair.

I said, ‘What the heck, Jimbo, just take it. Haul it out of here and keep it, I said, and on the spot wrote him a bill of sale for one dollar. He was the first person from town who had come out to the house in a normal way and on his own since the accident, and I was so grateful to him for that, I’d probably have given him my almost new Voyager van for a dollar, if he’d asked me for it. Jimbo is one of Billy Ansel’s Vietnam vets, the one who’s been working at the garage the longest, nine or ten years now, and though he still lives over in Ausable Forks in a trailer with his wife and a dozen sled dogs that he houses in oil drums spread around the yard, he’s practically a local person now, because of his association with Billy Ansel’s garage.

People talk against the way he uses oil drums for doghouses, but I can’t see how they’re any worse for dogs than house trailers are for people. Jimbo is a lanky brown eyed man with stringy black hair who wears one of those long Fu Manchu mustaches and a gold earring and looks downright evil. But he’s actually a very shy and sensitive man, a respectful soft spoken gentleman, underneath that pirate’s costume, and when he came with Billy’s wrecker to haul old Boomer away, he treated me with courtesy and kindness. He knew that I would take one look at that tow truck and remember the last time I’d seen it, when it had slowly drawn the bus out of the water filled sandpit that snowy morning last January, and so he telephoned before coming out and in a joking way said he was calling ahead in case I didn’t want to be there when he took old Boomer away.

I know how sentimental you are about that junker, Dolores. It’s like I am about some of my dogs. But I ain’t going to put your car down. In fact, I’m going to give the old boy a second life. Maybe you should think of it that way, he suggested.

I did, but I also made sure not to be home when be arrived with the big blue wrecker. In fact, that night and I drove into Placid for supper at the Ponderosa restaurant, where they serve good beefsteaks cheap and have long salad bar that Abbott particularly likes to partake because he can reach everything from his wheelchair.

always returns for seconds and even goes after salad me. Sit…

now… and… I’ll… serve, he says.

Every.

one… … … . serve… sometimes, he says.

I’m not inclined to notice, but now and then Abbott must feel a wave of guilt because of the way taken care of him in these last years of our life together, the few occasions when he can perform some little task for me are no doubt of greater importance to him than they are to me.

I try to keep alert to such opportunities and to make myself available to them, but they rarely come along, due to his condition.

To me, it never matters, because it’s his mind that takes care of me, not his body. In the old days, before his stroke, he took wonderful care of me with his body, which I will say was always a creamy white and tender delight to me, providing me with all the necessary and loving services a woman could imagine, and consequently I did not pay sufficient attention to his mind, which from the beginning was superior to mine, more logical and just. Now Abbott and I live together like the perfect brother and sister, and I do not think I would have been intelligent enough to do that back before he had his stroke.

When we reached the edge of the field, we had to cross the track behind one of the fire engines to get to the right hand corner of the grandstand, and I saw a few folks there that I recognized volunteer firemen from Sam Dent, and I know they saw and recognized me-I’m pretty easy to recognize even in twilight dark: I’m big and have red hair, and here I am pushing this small man in a wheelchair.

Not wanting to put myself in a needy position, though, I merely nodded a short hello, which I was glad of right after, ascot a one of those boys acknowledged me and Abbott when we passed by the fire engine and crossed the track.

We came up on the gate, where I paid, and passed through to the bottom of the grandstand. The thing was nearly filled already, with lots of folks standing around at ground level by the rail. I knew many of them, naturally most of the town of Sam Dent comes out for the demolition derby and saw them glance at us and then look quickly back toward the track and stage in front or nudge the person next to them, who would then take his turn casting a quick expressionless glance at us. No one said a word to me and Abbott or even acknowledged our presence. I knew it was not Abbott they were snubbing; it was me. But he was with me, so they ignored him too. That made me mad.

Several times I started to say hello, to force the issue, but before I could open my mouth, the person had turned his back to me.

I studied the stairs for a second; they looked steep and long. Down here in front, I might be able to see some of the action over and around the crowd of people at the rail; but not Abbott. Hold on tight, honey, I said to him. I believe I can get you up there a ways.

He has the good use of his left hand and arm, although his right is gone, of course; consequently, when he grabbed the left armrest tightly, he had to flop his whole body against that side of the chair for leverage, which put the chair all out of balance. Still, it was the only way to do it.

backed him around and drew the chair up backward to the first step, thinking I’d try to lug him up one step at a time, thinking also that maybe someone kind would see me struggling and would come to my aid.

It’d probably have to be a stranger. A tourist, even. I grunted and yanked, and the chair came along with a thump, and we were up one step.

I Then another. Then a third, until soon we had made the first landing.

Out of breath, with my back and legs hot and wobbly from the effort, I had to stop for a breather, when, all of a sudden, of all the people I did not want to see, there was Billy Ansel standing right next to me, with a woman I didn’t know bouncing up the stairs behind him.

He grinned widely, which was not exactly a characteristic expression, and said, H’lo there, Dolores! Come out to see the demolition derby, eh? Attagirl, Dolores! he said in a loud voice, and for a second I thought he was making cruel fun of me. His grin made his teeth show through his beard, like he was clenching them. He was dressed up, in his usual way, khakis and white shirt and loafers, but I saw he was carrying a small paper bag with a bottle in it, and then I realized he was drunk.

I took a look at the woman with him. She was maybe thirty five trying to look twenty barefoot, in tight cutoff shorts and a tee shirt with the words Shit Happens printed across the front. Taller than Billy and skinny as a stick, she was dark haired and had a small head made to look even smaller by one of those pixie haircuts that used to be so popular with teenagers. Her thin lips she had painted over and around with bright red lipstick, trying to make her lips look full; it only worked from a distance, though. Not the sort of woman you’d expect to see in Billy Ansel’s company. She was drunk too.

Goddamn, Dolores, you look like you an’ ol’ Abbott here could use a hand, Billy said, and he passed his brown bag to his friend. Oh, sorry, this here’s Stacey, he said.

Stacey Gale Morrison, from Ausable Forks. Stacey Gale, like you t’meet Dolores an’ Abbott Driscoll, old friends 233 Russell Banks from Sam Dent. Salt of the earth, both of ‘em, he declared.

Pleased to meetcha, Stacey Gale said. She didn’t put her hand out to shake, and neither did I.

Where you headed, Dolores? All the way to the top?

Lemme give a hand here.

No, that’s okay, I said. I can manage.

The hell you can. Here, you get on one side, an’ I’ll grab hold the other, an’ we’ll scoot ol’ Abbott right to the top, just like that.

What’s a neighbor for, right? We got to lend each other a helping hand, right, Abbott? Neighbors got to help each other out. Am I right?

Abbott swung his head around and looked straight into Billy’s bearded face, probably seeing grim things there that no one else could. You

.

. . help … Dolores . .

help… me Abbott said to him. Give … thanks…

then… all… around, he added.

How’s that, Abbott? I didn’t quite getcha. What’d he say, Dolores?

Billy asked. No offense, Abbott.

I told him, although I doubt he really got it.

Damned straight. Let’s go, Dolores, he said, and he grabbed onto one side of the chair, and I grabbed the other, and we lifted Abbott and his wheelchair together and crab walked our way sideways up the stairs.

Stacey Gale came along a few stairs behind us, looking slightly put out by the whole thing.

At the top, we put the wheelchair down, and I set the brake and parked it there on the landing. The folks who were seated along the last row silently moved in a bit on the long bench and made room for Stacey Gale and then Billy Ansel and, finally, me. I noticed a few familiar faces down along the row a couple of the Hamiltons and Prescotts, some Atwaters from up to Wilmot Flats, a bunch more from town but everybody kept themselves face forward, like they hadn’t noticed our arrival.

I sat down on the end seat, with Abbott on my left and Billy Ansel on my right, and dropped my head and put my face in my hands. Oh, this was hard on me. Much harder than I’d imagined. My heart was pounding lickety split, and my ears were hot. I was truly sorry that we had come.

Hey, Dolores, Billy said, and he flopped a heavy arm over my shoulder.

You just got to have a good time, Dolores, that’s all. Whenever you can, you just go out there an’ you have yourself a good goddamn time.

The hell with the rest, that’s what I say. The hell with ‘em.

He extended his bottle toward me. For a second, I was tempted, but I shook my head no, and he took a slug himself. What about Abbott? he asked in a low voice and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He up for it?

No. Abbott doesn’t drink.

Billy apologized, although I don’t know why, and passed the bottle to Stacey Gale. She took a long pull that she tried to make look like a sip, and Billy smiled approvingly and put his hand on her bare knee.

I didn’t know what to think of how Billy had changed since the accident. He scared me; but mostly he made me sad. He had been a noble man; and now he was ruined. The accident had ruined a lot of lives. Or, to be exact, it had busted apart the structures on which those lives had depended-depended, I guess, to a greater degree than we had originally believed. A town needs its children for a lot more than it thinks.

I reflected on the Walkers, Wendell and Risa, and how they were separated now, getting divorced, with their motel up for sale. A week before, I’d run into poor fat Wendell sitting on a stool rewinding rental videos at the Video Den in Ausable Forks, which is where I’d been going for movies these days, and he told me Risa was selling chili dogs at the Stewart’s in Keene. It was a short conversation; I think we were both uncomfortable to see each other there.

And the Lamstons, gone up to Plattsburgh and living on welfare in an old rooming house by the lake. Kyle Lamston had been committed for a spell to the mental hospital to dry out, and afterwards, as I later learned, he’d gone straight back to drinking, but with a vengeance this time, and had done himself some permanent brain damage and would never work again.

There had been trouble up on the Flats all spring and summer, bad enough to get into the papers, with Bilodeaus and Atwaters dealing in small quantities of drugs, cocaine and marijuana that they were sneaking across from Canada.

I Three or four Bilodeaus and as many Atwaters, the young ones, who a year ago had been parents, heads of house holds, you might say, were now locked up in prison over to Ray Brook.

All over town there were empty houses and trailers for sale that last winter had been homes with families in them. A town needs its children, just as much and in the same ways as a family does. It comes undone without them, turns a community into a windblown scattering of isolated individuals. Take the Ottos. With Bear gone, it was hard to imagine the two of them together. Significant pain isolates you anyhow, but under certain circumstances, it may be all youve got, and after great loss, you must use whatever’s left, even if it isolates you from everyone else. The Ottos were lucky, though in addition to their pain, they had that new baby. Otherwise, I’m sure, their lives, too, would have come undone.

I wondered if my own children, Reginald and William, had accomplished that for me and Abbott, if their presence in our lives had held us peacefully together all those years.

When Abbott and I were young, we were so obsessed with each other, so enthralled by what we thought were our striking similarities, that if I hadn’t twice gotten accidentally pregnant, we might have lost touch with everything and everyone else and maybe never would have grown up ourselves. Our obsession with each other was like the isolation that comes with great pain; it was like extreme sadness.

Without our children, we might never have discovered our differences, which is what has made our abiding love for each other possible. We would have been like a pair of infatuated teenagers, drowning in each other’s view of our selves, so self absorbed that we’d never have been able to help each other over the years the way we have.