BrigitsFlame, June - Week 1
He stands in front of the dilapidated ranch house, staring. His tired blue eyes, surrounded by age spots and deep crows-feet, take in the ruined siding, the gaping hole in the middle of the front porch, the drooping window sills, and the threadbare, old roofing job. The house hadn’t been used in quite some time, according to the yellow tint of the chipped white paint, the shuttered windows and boarded-up front door, and the faded address, of which only a three could be made out, painted on the dented and grime-covered mailbox laid carefully next to the worn porch stairs. Everything about the small, one-story ranch-style screamed weathered and exhausted, haggard with time and wear.
He stands there, calloused fingers gripping his hat and leathery, freckled-tan arm shielding his face, and marvels at how the house looks so much like the old place he and Mary used to have.
Look, look there! He swears he can see her, sitting on the porch swing, a sweating pitcher of ice-cold, homemade lemonade ready for him. He would walk up the dirt driveway and hear the kids screaming off somewhere, two playing in the field to the left with Buddy, the others probably off in the mesquite woods. She’d finally acknowledge him with a glare, though she spotted him the minute his truck had been visible down the road about an acre away.
He would give her a laugh as he walked up, and off she’d go, damning to hell Texas and its insufferable heat as she swings back and forth. And he’d better not forget to knock that damn dead moth of the front door, she wouldn’t let him in the house until he did, because earlier the boys had tried to get Buddy to lick it off, but then she caught them and gave them the scolding of their little short lives! And no way in hell’s name was she gonna touch that thing, lookit, it’s nearly as big as her whole head! How could he 'spect such a pretty woman to do something like that? Mind him, if he walked through that door without doin' it, she swears on the Lord’s Holy Name, the Lord forgive her, that’s she’s gonna get the damn thing off the door with his boot and then you bet the devil’s toenails he’s gonna feel that same boot on his head! An' he’ll feel it hard! She’s been workin’ so hard all day, slavin’ o’er the stove, fixin’ his favorite greens’n’ham, nevermind you it’s too gaddamned hot, Jesus forgive her, to be slavin’ over a stove of all things! Damn Texas! An’ the girls have been over by that damn treehouse all day, actin’ like a bunch of lil'hooligan boys, she dun' know what kind stories he’s been feedin’ them, but they sure dun’ act like a bunch of lil’ladies! Sue’s the only one been in to help her all day, the Lord bless her purty lil’soul, she’s the only daughter worth somethin’ right now! An’ what’s he smilin’ at? Did he finally notice her brand-new dress she got on, 'cause she sure as hell dun’ know why she went an’ got all purty if he’s gonna go 'round smirkin’ like that! He better go’n an’ drink his lem-mo-nade and get that damn moth off the door and then call the bunch o'brats in for dinner, or else he ain’t gettin’ none! Oh, and call Buddy in too, he went chasin’ after a rabbit sometime ago…
He looks down at his loafers and the tips of his pressed pants. Dirt is already all over them both. Yes, this place reminds him. The beginnings of a tumbleweed, no bigger than a child’s fist, skitters across the ground in front of his feet.
The wind is already hot and dry, whipping away the last of the morning dew from the scattered splashes of blue-pink-purple-yellow-red wildflowers among the ragweed and fields of browned, tall grass surrounding the house, although it is only eight-thirty in the morning. Dust is already swirling and covering everything with a fine film of weathered filth, even when the sun is just barely peeking over the grove of twisted, gnarly mesquite trees that are just under a quarter of a mile away. The bugs have begun their low, constant droning for the day. It would get scorching-hot shortly-as per usual, during any July day in southwest Texas.
"Pawpa! Pawpa!"
His morning windbreaker, in its entire turquoise and musk-orange splendor, is suddenly thrust into his line of vision.
“You shouldn’t have left that on the barbed wire, Pawpa,” his eldest daughter, Sue, gently scolds. Her clear green eyes are half-sad, half-eager, and her head of red hair just starting to grey reminds him just like this old ranch reminds him. “You could’ve nicked some holes in it.”
He smiles and gives a laugh, which turns into a cough. A hacking cough. Sue’s eyebrows furrow.
“C’mon, Pawpa, let’s get back to the car. It’s getting too hot out here, probably-”
But as she gently takes hold of his elbow, the cough subsides and he remains rooted to the spot, staring at the house. “You know,” he begins in that overly-loud voice that elderly men always seem to use, “this here is just like the old ranch we used to have. You remember that, Sue? Your mama loved it here.”
Sue smiles. “Yes, Pawpa. I remember.”
But he doesn’t really hear her. He grips his morning windbreaker, and his blue eyes are clouded and lost in the past again. “I reckon Mary would love this. Where’s Mary, don’t you know she’d love this?”
The sadness in Sue’s eyes becomes a bit more pronounced, the eagerness fades away. Her smile falters.
“Pawpa. Mami’s dead.”
But he doesn’t hear her. His eyes are lost in the past, and the statement has become a fact that he doesn’t hear and never hears, whether he would choose to or not.
And then the little granddaughter that isn’t recognized runs up with fingers sticky from MinuteMaid Lemonade to tug on her mother’s sleeve, so they can return to the minivan full of a son-in-law who isn’t known, a younger daughter who’s barely recognized because of her age, and two grandsons who are only sometimes recognized. Then they’ll drive away from the old ranch with the “FOR SALE” sign still in front even though it’s already been sold to the local farmers’ guild, and he’ll comment every once and a while on how the little granddaughter that isn’t recognized looks so much like Mary did when she was little, she looks like such a little lady in her new sundress, and where’s Mary?
Every once and a while.
Where’s Mary?