The Wonder of All Things (6 page)

The smiling woman in the photographs was one version of her mother. It was the easiest to see, the easiest to believe. But that was not who Ava remembered. The only memory of her mother that lingered, intact and undiminished, in Ava’s mind was the sight of her swinging from the rafters of the barn.

But now, on the porch with Wash, with the broken insect in her hand, she could remember something more: she and her parents together at the Fall Festival, happy.

And then her eyes were open and she was on the porch again and there was something rising up inside her throat. She turned her head away from the porch and heaved until she vomited and, even in the dim light of the night, they could both see the blood mingled with the bile.

“Oh, God,” Wash said. He stood and turned to go into the house, his eyes wide.

“No!” Ava managed. “I’m okay. Don’t tell. Please.”

“What?”

Ava spat the last of the bile from her mouth. Her head ached and her bones felt hollow once again.

“I don’t want to go back to the hospital, Wash,” Ava said. She sat up, huffing, and looked Wash in the eyes. “Just keep this between us. I’ll be fine.” She smiled a fast, apologetic smile. “You’ve never seen a person vomit before? It’s no reason to call the ambulance.”

Wash sat again. He pulled his knees to his chest and folded his arms across them. “Okay,” he said, and there was guilt in his words.

“I’ll be fine,” Ava said. “Really.”

It was only later that the children remembered the cricket. When the vomiting began, Ava had opened her hand and the cricket had escaped. Neither of them, amid the darkness and the worry, saw the small black marble leaping away quietly into the night. Neither of them heard its song, vibrant and full of life.

Where there should have been crickets and the singing of owls in the deep darkness of the woods, there was only the sound of door hinges rattling. The sound of a low, snuffling growl. The sharp intake of air as a large dark snout sniffed at the bottom of the door.

Her father—tall and wide, with skin as dark as blindness—was there with the shotgun, easing up to the front window above the couch, craning his neck to get a better angle on the animal.

“You can’t kill it,” Ava’s mother said. She appeared suddenly behind the child, like the ghost she would eventually become. She placed her arms around her daughter—the two of them standing in the center of the living room like small trees, both of them thin as rails, their nightgowns displaying all of their bony angles. Ava’s mother squatted beside her and placed one hand on her head and said, in a voice that seemed like a command rather than a reassurance, “He won’t kill it. I promise.”

“I suppose I’ve got to reason with it, Heather?” Macon said. “Dear Mr. Bear,” he said in a stern voice. “Please cease and desist your activities on these premises and return to your home. Have a beer.”

“You can’t kill it, Macon,” Heather replied, holding back a smile.

“I’m open to other ideas,” he said. “But I don’t think they make an Idiot’s Guide to Speaking Bear, so I believe my options are limited.”

“You can’t kill it,” Ava parroted. Very suddenly her concern over the life of the bear was greater than her fear of it. After all, she was only five years old. “You can’t kill it, Daddy,” she said.

Still Macon was at the window—shotgun in hand—twisting his neck and squinting his eyes, peering out and seeing little more than darkness. But the pounding on the door and the bellowing confirmed that nothing had changed. There was still a bear trying to get into their home.

“It just wants food,” Heather said.

“It’s just hungry,” Ava said, supporting the case for the bear.

Macon stepped away from the window and walked to the door. He lingered there, looking at the hinges and listening as the bear growled and moaned and banged against the door.

Macon moved away from the door and returned to the window above the couch. There was darkness and the broken silhouette of a mountain covered in trees beneath a thin salting of stars. But he could not see the bear. He would not be able to take aim at it from here. If he were to kill it, he would have to open the door. A thought came to him then. “Ava,” he called, “did you feed this bear?”

“No!” Ava said loudly, and the bear responded with a bellow—whether it was confirming or condemning the girl’s story was uncertain. The yelling of the bear was so loud and well-timed that, for an instant, the family couldn’t help but laugh. They knew then that all of the dark sharp-tooth things that existed in the world would not enter into their household. At least not tonight.

Macon sighed and, with resignation, said, “Okay.” Then he opened the breach on the gun and removed the shells and leaned it near the door and, in the loudest, deepest, most policelike voice he could muster, yelled, “Dear Mr. Bear! As sheriff of Stone Temple, I hereby demand that you vacate these premises. If you do not comply I will be forced to issue a warrant for your arrest. We do not entertain visitors at this late an hour.”

The bear fell silent.

Macon chuckled to himself. “I can’t believe I’m doing this,” he said, turning to his wife and daughter. But in their faces he saw something akin to gratitude. Come what may, he would spare the animal’s life, and they loved him for it.

“Go away, Mr. Bear!” Ava shouted, looking at her father as she spoke. He seemed pleased, happy even. “No visitors this time of night,” she said.

“The diner doesn’t open until seven,” Heather shouted. And then they all laughed. “I’ll cook you eggs in the morning,” she yelled. “Eggs and bacon and maybe pancakes, whatever you want. But you’d better be a good tipper!”

“No bad checks,” Ava inserted, her face bright.

The small family could hardly breathe for laughing. It was a loud, hearty laugh that reverberated around their small, drafty home in the heart of the mountains. “Come with me,” Heather said. She took Ava’s hand and led her into the kitchen. When they returned Ava and Heather both carried cooking pots and metal spoons and they began banging and stomping in circles, half dancing, half marching, with Ava chanting, “Diner opens at seven,” in rhythm with her stomping and banging.

Macon held his sides with laughter.

“You hear that, Mr. Bear?” Ava called. “You’ll get eggs and ham in the morning. The diner opens at seven. But go away now, people are trying to sleep!”

Then, after a few more moments of silliness, Heather and Ava stopped and all three of them listened. They heard only silence. The bear was gone.

The family sat up together for the rest of the night, giggling and talking of nothing in particular. And when the sun rose it found them crumpled in a heap on the couch—Ava’s mother holding her in her arms, Ava’s father holding them both. Then, without word or explanation, the three of them cooked breakfast and, true to their word, set aside some eggs and ham. They set off into the woods, far enough away from the house so that the bear would not begin to think of their home as a place to be frequented in the hopes of food.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” is all that Macon would say.

As a family, they cleared a place and left the eggs and ham and, just to properly complete the scene, Ava picked a flower and garnished the ham with it. “Do you think he’ll like it?” Ava asked.

“I’m sure,” her mother said, smiling. The sun crested the mountains and it filtered down through her dark hair and lit a halo around her head so that, when Ava looked up at her, she seemed to be floating above the earth, unattached to anything and yet connected to everything. She reached into her pocket and took out a small slip of paper. On it was written “Diner Hours: 7:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. Closed Sundays.”

“The world doesn’t have to be cruel,” Heather said as she took her daughter’s hand. “Sometimes it can be whatever we want it to be.”

THREE

WASH’S GRANDMOTHER, BRENDA,
had always had a way with animals—dogs in particular. She garnered the nickname “the Dog Lady” and, for the most part, didn’t think it was something worth getting worked up over, so long as people chose discretion over valor and never said it to her face. If there was a dog that didn’t have a home, or one that had a home and simply needed a place to mend, it was brought to her. And sometimes the animals were left for years and simply became a part of the household, with no questions asked and no complaints offered by the commanding old woman.

So when the years had stacked up around her and life unfolded in its unpredictable way—taking from her a husband and a daughter—cancer for one; a car crash for the other—and she found herself with a grandson named Wash, who needed everything a child needed, the notion of turning her home into a dog shelter and clinic was as good a way as any to help the ends stay met.

And because she was an old-fashioned woman appreciative of her solitude, she liked the way the dogs always let her know when someone came calling. This morning they were at full tilt.

Wash heard what sounded like a car door closing outside, followed by the slow
swish-swish
sound of his grandmother’s house shoes sliding across the floor as she approached his bedroom. “I’ll handle it,” she said, looking in at the boy. “Likely as not it’s some damned reporter. Most of them got the hint, but there’s a hardheaded one in every bunch. And sometimes you just got to give them both barrels.”

Wash hoped his grandmother was speaking metaphorically, but he couldn’t really be sure. She kept an unloaded shotgun by the front door—a habit that, as legend went, she learned from an ornery cousin who lived on the other side of the state. She kept the shells for the gun in the pockets of the flowered apron she wore around the house because, as she once told Wash, “The world likes to sneak up on you, so you may as well be as ready as you can.”

“Just go back to sleep and get your rest,” she said, leaving Wash’s doorway and heading down the hall. “I’ll get this situated.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Wash said. He pulled the covers over his head and listened to the sound of the barking dogs out back as his grandmother moved to the front of the house. He heard the curtain in the living room slide back gently as she peeked out to see who had come so early in the morning. Then the knock came at the front door.

“Hell,” Brenda said, but Wash couldn’t discern exactly which “Hell” it was. She had a “Hell” for every occasion.

He heard the door open.

“Hell,” she said again.

“Hello, Brenda,” the voice said. It was a man’s voice, deep and even.

“I guess the creek done rose that high, huh?” Brenda said. “High enough to bring you back this way. Can’t say I expected otherwise. Not really.”

“How have you been, Brenda?” the man asked.

“Rose petals and beef Wellington,” Brenda replied. “I suppose the polite thing for me to do is to ask how you’ve been.”

Wash got out of bed and walked softly to the doorway of his bedroom.

“You stay right there,” Brenda said loudly.

Wash froze. “Yes, ma’am,” he answered. He’d lived with his grandmother all of his life, and he knew which commands to obey and which were elective.

“Well...” the man at the door said.

“Well...” Brenda replied.

“You’re not going to make this easy, are you, Brenda?”

“Give me one good reason why I should?”

The man sighed. It was then that Wash recognized his voice. Perhaps it had been the sound of the dogs barking that had made it take so long, or perhaps it was the early hour—the sun had only just broken the sky and the world was still gold and amber and sluggish in the new day—or perhaps it was simply that he had not heard the man’s voice in nearly six years.

“Dad?” Wash called, stepping out of his bedroom.

“Hell,” Brenda said.

Wash’s father was a tall man, tall and thin and with more wrinkles than Wash remembered. The scar on the side of his face—a memento from the car accident that took Wash’s mother—was still there, a stark and off-putting wound that seemed to twist and contort into a new version of itself whenever the man smiled.

“Hey there, son,” Wash’s father said as the boy entered the living room.

“What are you doing back here, Tom?” Brenda said. There was a mixture of civility and hardness in her voice, like snow draped over a wall of ice. “I suppose I could take a guess and, likely as not, that guess would be right, but I’d much rather hear you say it. I’d rather hear how you frame it, as folks say.”

“Don’t do this, Brenda,” Tom said. He shifted his stance, and continued to look past the woman and at Wash.

“How have you been?” Wash asked.

“Good,” Tom said. “Boy...you’ve gotten so big. Handsome, too. You’re thirteen now.” He declared the fact, as if to prove that he had kept proper count in the years since he had last seen his son. “I imagine you’ve got a girlfriend. And if you don’t, then you’re not far off.”

“No,” Wash replied, blushing.

“Keeping your options open, then?” Tom asked. He laughed awkwardly in the silence that fell between them. “You got your whole life ahead of you, son. A long time to find out about women.”

“I guess,” Wash said.

“You watch the news much, Tom?” Brenda asked. “Is that why you’re asking about Wash’s love life?” The smile on the man’s face receded.

“I suppose there was never any hope of this going smooth, was there, Brenda?”

“Can’t rightly say,” Brenda said. “I suppose it’s got to go the way you’ve set it up to go. This is the way you’ve made things.”

“Grandma...” Wash said.

“I’m trying,” Tom said.

“Of course you’re trying now,” Brenda replied, her voice rising. “There’s something to be gained.”

“It’s not like that.”

“How the hell else is it, then? You ain’t had time for him in years, and now you do. Can’t you see how I might find that just a little suspicious?”

“I’m trying,” Tom said again, his voice harder.

“Grandma,” Wash said.

“You should have stayed away,” Brenda said. “When’s the last time you had a drink?”

“He’s my son,” Tom replied. “Dammit, Brenda, he almost died.”

“That’s right,” she replied. “Your son almost died, Tom. And you weren’t there.”

“Grandma!”

The room went silent, and Wash felt a palpable heat between the three of them, as if the door to a furnace, long kept shut, had finally been opened. His grandmother stood tall and still. She scowled at Wash’s father, as if she could make the earth open up and swallow him.

But Tom remained there at her door, waiting, with an echo of Wash’s face hidden in the architecture of his own.

It took a little more time and arguing but, in the end, Brenda conceded to letting Wash and Tom spend the afternoon alone together, just so long as they didn’t stray too far from the house and so long as they didn’t take Tom’s car. “No farther than you can limp off,” Brenda had said to the pair. “Doctors say he’s okay, but I’m not convinced. And the last thing I need is for him to have an episode and for me not to be there.” When Tom asked what she was afraid might happen to the boy, Brenda would only reply, “If a person could predict the unexpected, it wouldn’t be the unexpected, now would it?”

“I suppose not,” Tom said.

“And don’t be gone long,” Brenda added before they left. “He’s got somewhere to be.”

She stood out back near the dog kennels and watched with disapproval as Wash and Tom made their way up into the mountain. There was a faint path that had been worn into the mountain over the years and the man and boy marched single file through the tall grass. Tom walked in front as Wash trailed behind, and before they reached the ridgeline, where they would disappear from sight, Wash looked back over his shoulder to see if his grandmother was still watching. She was. She stood like a lighthouse, tall and stoic and full of warning as, behind her, the dogs barked and pawed at their kennels, waiting to be fed.

Then Wash and his father reached the top of the mountain and Brenda disappeared.

“Pretty day,” Tom said, turning his eyes upward and breaking the silence between them. The sky was blue. The sun was bright.

“Yes, sir,” Wash said.

“I hate to say this,” Tom said, “but I’m not totally sure what to do now. I’d hoped to take you to a movie or something. Or, at the very least, to grab a bite to eat somewhere.” He huffed. “But, well, your grandmother...she’s...”

“Protective,” Wash said.

“Yeah,” Tom replied. “That’s the word I was looking for.” He turned and looked back at Wash. “So now I guess we just go for a walk through the woods.”

“That’s fine,” Wash said.

They marched in silence for a few minutes.

“Do you still sing?” Wash asked. He could scarcely remember a thing about the man, but his memory was full of his father singing. There was a collection of moments that clouded his head, moments in which his father was holding a banjo or guitar in his hands, his face contorted awkwardly as the passion of the song overtook him. In those brief years when Tom was a part of Wash’s life, the man always filled the air with the tinny sound of bluegrass and folk songs. And when he went from Wash’s life, the music stayed.

“I’ve been learning a lot of murder ballads,” Wash continued. “Ava says they’re morbid, but she actually likes them.”

“You’re singing now?” Tom asked.

“I try,” Wash replied. “But my voice...well, I don’t think I’m any good.”

“Stop singing,” Tom said sharply. “Just let it go. It won’t get you anywhere. If you ask me, you should give up music altogether.” Tom’s steps seemed to fall more heavily, as though he were treading upon his own regrets. Then he asked, “You do any camping?”

“A little bit,” Wash replied. The sun was growing warmer and he was beginning to sweat. “Ava and I have camped up here a few times.”

“You spend a lot of time with her, don’t you?”

“I suppose,” Wash said.

“You like her?”

“I guess so.”

“No,” Tom said, smiling. “I mean, do you
like
her. You’re too old to pretend you don’t know what I mean when I ask that kind of a question.”

Wash didn’t answer.

“You a virgin?” Tom asked.

“I’m thirteen.”

“That’s not what I asked,” Tom said. “You wouldn’t be the first thirteen-year-old to have sex, and you wouldn’t be the last. I’m not accusing you of anything, I’m just asking.”

Wash looked down at the ground and marched forward behind his father. “I’m thirteen,” he repeated.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Tom said. “But if you ever want to talk about it, I’m here for you. Okay? This is the kind of stuff boys are supposed to be able to talk to their dads about. My dad and I, we didn’t really talk much. But that doesn’t mean that’s how it’s got to be between you and me.” Tom scratched the top of his head and sighed. “Did she really do what they said?” he asked, looking back over his shoulder. “Did she really heal you? I mean, really and truly. It’s not just some scam, some hoax or something?” When his son did not reply to his questions, Tom scratched the top of his head again. “Wish I had a beer,” he said nervously. “I’m a little out of practice with all this. I’m not sure if I’m doing anything right.”

They walked for a little while longer and eventually came to a clearing beneath the shade of a large patch of pine trees. Tom paced in a circle, as though looking for something. “How are you at making a fire?” he asked.

“What do you mean?” Wash said. He sat on the ground and folded his legs. He was more tired than he expected and the coolness of the shade from the pine trees felt good against his skin. “I should have worn sunblock,” he said.

Tom laughed. “You’ll be okay,” he said. “So, can you start a fire?”

“With matches.”

“No,” Tom said. “I mean, can you start a fire from scratch? Without matches or a lighter.”

Wash thought for a moment. “Probably,” he said. “I’ve read books that tell you how to do it. Do you like Jack London?”

“I’ve heard of him,” Tom replied. He was on his knees in the edges of the tall grass surrounding the clearing. He picked up dried pine needles and some dried pieces of wood. “That’s what we’ll do,” Tom said as if finishing a thought. He rose to his feet and came to the center of the clearing and placed the pine needles and wood into a pile. Tom walked around the clearing, kicking rocks, examining them as he did. “The good thing about being up here is that it’s never really too difficult to find what you need to start a fire,” he said. “That won’t be the case everywhere, of course. I’ve started fires in places where there probably should have never been a fire.” He kicked more stones, and there was a slight bit of frustration in his movements. “I really don’t want to have to do this with a pair of sticks,” he said, a hint of laughter at the end of his sentence. “Takes forever and, while I won’t say it’s not worth the effort—because if you ever get into a situation where you really need a fire, any amount of effort is worth it—today’s just one of those days where I don’t really think it’ll give us what we’re looking for. You know?”

“Yes, sir,” Wash replied.

“Aha!” Tom shouted, squatting into a pile of brush. “Here’s what the doctor ordered.” He stood holding a pair of small rocks. He brushed the dirt from them. “Yes,” he said, “these will work just fine.” He came back into the center of the clearing and kneeled and began stacking the bits of wood and grass together. He stretched out on his belly. “It’s difficult,” Tom said. “More difficult than people ever really understand. Everybody thinks that, if they had to, they could start a fire. But the truth of it is that there are few people who could really do it. Not many folks understand the amount of nurturing and care it takes. Every moment it’s on the verge of dying on you. Every single moment.”

“Yes, sir,” Wash said. He found a stick and traced absentminded patterns back and forth in the dirt.

When Tom had arranged the pine needles and grass in a satisfactory pile he held up the two rocks for Wash. “Come here,” he said. “Come and look at what I’ve done.”

Reluctantly, Wash went over and kneeled across from his father.