fiction

HardTime Marrying 17 b

Anya was shaking as she sat gripping the water glass, looking as though she might faint.  Joe took Sally from the sling, putting her on the floor.

“I ain’t no whore!  My stepmother handed me off to that devil to get me out of her man’s way.  I had no say than a cow or hog off to slaughter.  He tied me up and hauled me off in that damned peddler’s wagon.  He beat me and passed me around when he needed a bottle. That last night, he got drunk enough I was able to get to his pistol and fire a shot off at him.  I think I missed and finished him off with a shovel.  He would have killed me if I hadn’t gotten away, but I’m not a whore.”  She was furious now, clinching and unclenching her fists.  “I’d kill him again, if I could after all he done to me!”

Joe didn’t speak for a long time.  “So that’s how you come to be here.”  Pausing, he went on.  “Thank God the creek was high and we couldn’t get to Meadow Creek for the revival.  If you had showed up there, wanting to make a new start, folks would’a had questions after that peddler turned up with a hole in his head.  We got to come up with a plan.”

“I didn’t run off from one man just to get stuck out here bein’ your whore.  Just because I got nowhere to go don’t mean I gotta take anything off you.”  She was furious to be so near tears.

“I don’t want nuthin’ from you except you earn your keep and help out with Sally while you’re here.  You’re gonna have to lay low awhile to keep the sheriff off your tail.  The preacher is the only one who saw my wife.  If we just keep to the place, you ain’t gonna bump into him.  I never was one for goin’ to church an’ it ain’t likely he’ll have business way out here.  He might not know the difference anyhow.  It was dark an’ the woman was wrapped up when we woke him to marry us.

She stared ahead morosely, feeling a prisoner again.

Hard Time Marrying Part 17 a

buzzardThe spring rains didn’t let up for days, washing out any chance of getting to the Meadow Creek Revival.  The small creek near the house swelled till there was no question of fording.  Anya was devastated to know she’d be stuck a while longer, but Joe was relieved at the reprieve, having no idea how he’d manage.  For the next few weeks, they settled into a routine.  Joe tore a strip of the flannel and fashioned a sling so Anya could manage the baby as she worked.  She her strength and hearing improved every day, and she was putting on a little weight, something she’d never done.  As well as cooking and cleaning, she worked alongside Joe putting in a garden.  She felt better knowing Joe and the little ones would have something to eat after she was far way.  As they planted beans, squash, corn, cabbages, and spring onions, the boy tagged along, packing dirt over the seed as they planted.  With the baby on her back, she had to stop and rest often, but it was pleasant, hopeful work, the type she enjoyed.  She thought a few times of the fine crop they’d harvest till she remembered with a jolt, she wouldn’t be there.  One day, Joe stood and watched her for a while on his way back from the barn with another load of manure, thinking she and the children on his place was the finest sight he’d ever seen.  He strode back to the patch, telling her, “These young’uns has got to have a name.  We cain’t just keeping callin’ em The Boy and The Baby.  Even my barn cats has got a name.”  Anya kept right on with her planting, not bothering to answer. “Let’s call the boy Joe and the baby, Sally.”

As she was coming back from turning the chickens out to scratch one morning, she came around the barn to find Joe in conversation with a man on a horse.  She tried to duck out of sight, but the man waved and called out, “Howdy, Ma’am.”

“Anya, this is Rufus Menlo, our nearest neighbor.” Joe introduced her.

“Proud to meet you, ma’am.  The preacher told me Joe done got hitched to a widow-woman, but I didn’t expect to see such a purty one.  My woman is gonna be wantin’ to git over and meet you soon as she can.  She ain’t had a woman to talk to in a while and now there’s one on the next section.”  Anya didn’t bother to correct him.  “We don’t usually git much news around here, and now there’s a marrying and a killing, all in a few days.”  He continued without hesitation.  “My boy Melvin was out lookin’ for strays and saw buzzards circling and come over a rise to find a sorry sight.  The buzzards had already worked the man over, but Melvin could see his head bashed in.  He was a peddler and somebody must’a robbed him and stole his horse.  They was a woman’s things in his peddler’s cart. Melvin went for the sheriff, and he’s on the lookout for whoever might’of done ‘em in. Some drifters told the sheriff they’d seen him with a fancy woman a few days before.    He’s thinking some lowlife might’of knocked that peddler in the head and took off with the woman, or else the woman did the feller in, but it don’t really seem like something a woman could do, does it?  The sheriff’s on the lookout for any folk that don’t fit around here.”

At hearing his news, Anya retched and wiped her mouth on her skirt.    “I’m sorry ma’am.  I never thought of you being delicate.  Let me git on my way.  I’ll send my woman over to see you.”  Rufus kneed his horse and went on his way.

“Here, sit down.  Let me get you some water.”  Joe steadied her to a chair at the table and poured her a glass of water.  “Drink this.  It ought to steady you a bit.”

 

Hard Time Marrying Part 17 a

buzzardThe spring rains didn’t let up for days, washing out any chance of getting to the Meadow Creek Revival.  The small creek near the house swelled till there was no question of fording.  Anya was devastated to know she’d be stuck a while longer, but Joe was relieved at the reprieve, having no idea how he’d manage.  For the next few weeks, they settled into a routine.  Joe tore a strip of the flannel and fashioned a sling so Anya could manage the baby as she worked.  Her strength and hearing improved every day, and she was putting on a little weight, something she’d never done.  As well as cooking and cleaning, she worked alongside Joe putting in a garden.  She felt better knowing Joe and the little ones would have something to eat after she was far way.  As they planted beans, squash, corn, cabbages, and spring onions, the boy tagged along, packing dirt over the seed as they planted.  With the baby on her back, she had to stop and rest often, but it was pleasant, hopeful work, the type she enjoyed.  She thought a few times of the fine crop they’d harvest till she remembered with a jolt, she wouldn’t be there.  One day, Joe stood and watched her for a while on his way back from the barn with another load of manure, thinking she and the children on his place was the finest sight he’d ever seen.  He strode back to the patch, telling her, “These young’uns has got to have a name.  We cain’t just keeping callin’ em The Boy and The Baby.  Even my barn cats has got a name.” 

Anya kept right on with her planting, not bothering to answer. “Let’s call the boy Joe and the baby, Sally.”

As she was coming back from turning the chickens out to scratch one morning, she came around the barn to find Joe in conversation with a man on a horse.  She tried to duck out of sight, but the man waved and called out, “Howdy, Ma’am.”

“Anya, this is Rufus Menlo, our nearest neighbor.” Joe introduced her.

“Proud to meet you, ma’am.  The preacher told me Joe done got hitched to a widow-woman, but I didn’t expect to see such a purty one.  My woman is gonna be wantin’ to git over and meet you soon as she can.  She ain’t had a woman to talk to in a while and now there’s one on the next section.”  Anya didn’t bother to correct him.  “We don’t usually git much news around here, and now there’s a marrying and a killing, all in a few days.”  He continued without hesitation.  “My boy Melvin was out lookin’ for strays and saw buzzards circling and come over a rise to find a sorry sight.  The buzzards had already worked the man over, but Melvin could see his head bashed in.  He was a peddler and somebody must’a robbed him and stole his horse.  They was a woman’s things in his peddler’s cart. Melvin went for the sheriff, and he’s on the lookout for whoever might’of done ‘em in. Some drifters told the sheriff they’d seen him with a fancy woman a few days before.    He’s thinking some lowlife might’of knocked that peddler in the head and took off with the woman, or else the woman did the feller in, but it don’t really seem like something a woman could do, does it?  The sheriff’s on the lookout for any folk that don’t fit around here.”

At hearing his news, Anya retched and wiped her mouth on her skirt.    “I’m sorry ma’am.  I never thought of you being delicate.  Let me git on my way.  I’ll send my woman over to see you.”  Rufus kneed his horse and went on his way.

“Here, sit down.  Let me get you some water.”  Joe steadied her to a chair at the table and poured her a glass of water.  “Drink this.  It ought to steady you a bit.”

 

Hard Time Marrying Part 16

Anya lay awake a long time thinking after Joe went to the barn and the kids slept, the baby snuggled up warm and sweet in the curve of her body.   In his rope bed near the fire, the boy cried out for his mama in his sleep and whimpered without waking.   Anya went to him, smoothed his hair and rubbed his back till he went back to sleep.  His warm little hand sought hers and she felt stirrings of pity for him, even though she tried not to.  She’d already lost the battle of staying detached from the little girl, and was beginning to wonder if she could take the poor motherless thing when she left though she saw the folly in that.  She had no friends, nowhere to go and no way to care for the child. Not only that, she might have killed the peddler.  The law was hard on a woman.  They might be looking to hang her right now. She needed to get far enough away to disappear in a sizable town. The baby would just hold her back. A woman alone would have a hard enough time providing for herself, even if she had nothing to hide. She had to get as far away as possible and seek work as a housekeeper or cook, since that was all she knew.  Having barely been to school, she couldn’t be a schoolmarm.  She’d had enough of men to know she’d never marry.  She needed to get to town where folks had enough money and house to need help. Her prospects were poor, but maybe when she got to Meadow Creek Church she’d meet up with somebody who could help get her on the road to something else.  It would break her heart, but there’s no way she could take the tiny girl.

Out in the barn, Joe was thinking his own gloomy thoughts.  He didn’t want Anya to go.  He started to hope she might stay and they could be a family.  Even though Anya hadn’t warmed to him, he’d gotten a little taste of family watching her doing for the baby and doing about the house.  It had been such a pleasure to come in last night and find supper laid out.  No one had done that for him since Ma died.  When Anya left, he and the boy manage, but who would do for the baby?  She was far too young to go around with him while he worked.

 

Hard Time Marrying Part 15

!fireplace-3She had supper ready when Joe and the boy came in.  She’d laboriously managed to cook beans in a cast-iron pot hanging over the fire and baked cornbread and some sweet potatoes in the coals, pleasant work she was accustomed to.  Joe’s brows lifted when he saw supper and bowls and cups out on the table.  She crumbled cornbread in a cup and Joe poured buttermilk over it for the baby before lifting her to Anya’s lap.  They all fell to with an appetite. 

“My name is Anya, not Anna.  I’ll stay and earn my keep till I can manage, but I ain’t no whore.  Don’t come sniffing around me.  I don’t want to owe you nothing.  I’m gittin’ better so I can do for the baby and tend the house, but you need to keep the boy with you.”  She looked him fiercely in the eye.

Joe looked her and raised his voice.  “I’ll thank you to call me Joe.  Don’t you think I could’a already done hurt you if I’d wanted? I don’t want nothin’ more from you than you take care of yourself and the baby.”  He dropped his voice, speaking more to himself.  “I been getting along without a woman for a long time, but I ain’t fell so low I got to take up with a stringy, beat-up neck bone like you.”

Poor Joe was unaware her hearing had improved and was surprised to have a hot sweet potato hit him in the jaw.  “I’ll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head,” she warned him through clinched jaws. 

“Yes, ma’am.”  He muttered.  “Beggin’ pardon, ma’am.  No call for me to be spiteful.  We are both in a pickle and battling ain’t gonna help.”

“You keep to your place and I’ll keep to mine till I can do better.”  The tension eased a bit now they understood each other.

They passed the evening watching the children at their play.  Joe had brought them a kitten from the barn.  The boy teased it with a bit of string, delighting the baby girl.  Joe and Anya caught themselves laughing at it a time or two.

“What’s the boy’s name?”  This was the first time it had occurred to her to ask.

“I don’t know.  I just been calling him boy.  His mama was sick when she got here and never told me nothing.  She died the next day.”  He stared into the fire.

“You mean these ain’t your young’uns?”  She was incredulous.

“No, I don’t know nuthin’ exceptin’ their mama up and died soon’s she got here.  I’d send ‘em back to her folk if I knew who they was.  She come with nuthin’ but my letter, a bundle of clothes, and these young’uns after I wrote off for a wife. I buried her out in the mesquite and tried to take the kids back to Talphus fer the town or the church to do for ‘em and them miserable bastards run me off like a scalded dog.  When I got back after doing chores that night, you was up in the house lookin’ at the baby.  I thought I’d done buried their mama alive.  It warn’t till just now the coyotes dug her body out of the grave till I knew you warn’t the woman I married.  Oh, Lordy.  I don’t know why I ain’t left well enough alone.”

 

Hard Time Marrying Part 11

 

Fatigued almost beyond bearing, Anya’s head felt as though it would burst.  Her jaw ached and blood drained from her left ear.  Her stepmother, Bessie had deafened her right years ago, but now she’d developed a deafening roar in her left.  Barely conscious, she struggled to maintain her death grip on the cow’s halter and half-walked and was half-dragged the final half-mile to the barn. Though she couldn’t hear it, the farm dog barked at her staggering approach, but for some reason didn’t offer to bite as she struggled to the barnyard. Instinct alone guided her into the barn where she collapsed on the haystack.  Old Bossie followed her in and was grateful of the opportunity to get her feed early.  Hay drifted over Anya as she slept, keeping the secret of her presence, though in her decreasing consciousness, she had no concern for anything.  Unaware of anything except pain and fatigue, she slept late into the next day.

Anya’s mind was foggy when she awoke, only aware of pain, hunger and thirst.  The beating she’d taken left her deaf and confused. She did vaguely remember trying to fire the pistol, but nothing after that.  Her raging thirst drove her from the barn.  With the pain in her jaw, eating would not have been an option.  She made her way toward the cabin, seeking water.

Had anyone been there to see her, she’d have been a horrifying specter as she fell against the door.  Wakening to find Jack licking the blood from her ear, she managed to hang onto the wall and table till she got to the water bucket.  Slaking her thirst, she dropped painfully to the cabin floor, unaware she was in the world.

 

 

Hard Time Marrying Part 8

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Once more, Joe settled into his snug cocoon in the barn. Jack and the cats made it their business to join him.  Though he was exhausted from all the work caring for his new family, he felt encouraged.  That boy was smart.  He mimicked Joe at his work and was picking up words way faster than Anna.  Now, he was putting a couple of words together. He used cat, dog, cow, milk, eat, pig and half a dozen other useful words. He even said damn.  He’d even walked up on Joe pissing behind the pigsty and worked at getting his own little doodle out to give it a try.  That would sure help with some of them diapers.

Even though Anna still looked down when he looked at her, he’d caught her looking his way a few times.  She drew back from his touch and certainly hadn’t given any indication she wanted him in her bed.  But she had two children!  Surely she’d warm up.  She knew a wife’s duty.

Deep in his thoughts, the howling of coyotes brought him out of his reverie.  Jack went wild lunging at the barn doors as the terrified cats scattered.  What in the Hell were coyotes doing this close?  They normally shied away from a place with a dog.  Maybe they’d gotten brave with Jack in the barn the last few nights.  The”d probably jumped a rabbit, but he’d better have a look.  Getting his lantern off the hook, he lit it outdoors.  Jack was way ahead of him chasing the coyotes from the grove of mesquites he’d been avoiding, the place he’d buried Anna.  He’d been avoiding thinking about that grave.

The coyotes were long gone but Jack ignored his call, digging and growling.  Though he’d have preferred waiting for daylight, he thought he’d best see what had Jack stirred up.  The smell of death overwhelmed him as he neared the trees and was sickened to see Jack pulling a long bone from the grave.  He wretched and dropped to his knees as he realized the coyotes had dug up his dead wife.

God in Heaven!  If she was in the grave, who was in the house?

Hard Time Marrying Part 7

spring-beauty-splashHe checked on the woman and children several times always finding them asleep.  The children’s breathing was regular and less shallow.  The pink of their cheeks faded as the fever dropped.  Twice more he fed and diapered them and assisted the woman to the pot.  The next two days were much the same, more feeding, more dosing with Dr. Marvel, more changing, and always, more washing.  The little boy rallied first, trailing Joe.  From time to time, he called for Mama, but overall seemed contented.  Joe looked forward to the woman regaining her strength and assuming her responsibilities.  She was attentive to the baby girl who still lay abed with her.  Thankfully, the baby finally got hungry enough to accept the bottle after a few tries.  It made it easier to get the Dr. Marvel’s in her, anyway.  The woman could barely stay awake long enough to feed the baby but kept it at her side.  On the fourth day, the woman began to eat regular food, though she mashed it first.  One day, she coughed and spit a cracked molar into her palm, increasing Joe’s guilt about burying her alive, though he still didn’t remember hitting her with the shovel.  Joe had hopes when she’d learn some English soon, since he didn’t understand a word she said when she did speak to the baby or cry out in pain upon moving.  She had picked up on coffee, milk, baby, hurt, boy, pot, and a few other words, but there was no conversation yet.  She never called him “Joe.”

Though there was no real talking between, Joe sensed a change.  The woman was able to leave the bed for longer and longer periods, and kept the baby on her hip as she padded around the cabin. Her bruises were fading and she was able to hold the baby with her left arm and feed it with her right. She was turning out to be a beauty, but looked so young to be a mother.  It warmed him to see the tiny girl laugh at her mother, though the boy clearly preferred Joe.  Joe had expected him to show more interest in his mother once she was out of bed, but he didn’t.  Maybe boys just liked men. Joe rigged a rough rope bed in the corner near the fireplace for the boy, thinking he could make a trundle when the girl was older. He was starting to think of her as “Anna” instead of “the woman.”  Anna only referred to the girl as “Baby” and the boy as “Boy.”  One day, he brought her the first Spring Beauty and she called him “Joe.”  Joe was glad of her and the children, glad of the life opening up to him.

That night the coyotes woke him.

Hard Time Marrying Part 5

baby-bottle

Though he considered himself unfit for human company, Jack and the barn cats didn’t concur and worked their way in next to Joe, slipping into the snug cocoon of the hay-covered saddle blanket and his heavy barn jacket.  The breathing and occasional stamping of the milk cow and the horses in their stalls eased him. This bit of his life was unmarred.  Comforted by the company of the beasts, he slipped into exhausted sleep.  Upon awakening to Ol’ Sal and her kittens purring, his spirits rose and he felt better about himself.  He lay in his nest enjoying their company till he turned to settle back in for a few more minutes.  Reaching up to feel slime in his hair, he found Ol’ Sal had rewarded him with the gift of a dead rat.  He sprang up, flinging the nasty rat, startling Jack and set the kittens to every way, his reverie ended. 

He dawdled as long as possible over the milking, spraying milk into the mouths of the dancing cats.  Rosie’s waiting calf lunged at her when he released them in to the feedlot. When the little heifer had gorged on her mother’s milk, Joe separated them, letting the cow out to graze.  Rosie ambled off without a care, leaving Baby Blossom bawling behind her. She’d be back lowing to be milked before sundown.  Joe chuckled thinking he must have looked a fool getting rid of that rat.  Tossing a clean towel over the milk, he passed out some hay and grain to the horses and opened the barn door to the corral, making sure the water troughs were full.  After tossing a few ears of corn and watering the hogs, he could no longer delay going back into the cabin.  If the kids had lived through the night, they’d need feeding, too.  If the sick woman couldn’t nurse the baby, he’d have to feed her using the bottle and some of that canned milk the town had provided before booting them all out of town.  The light was just breaking in the East on a cold, clear, windy West Texas day when he headed toward the house.

The fire was no more than embers. The small cabin reeked of urine, excrement, and fever.   He dreaded looking, but saw the boy lying to one side of the woman who’d turned to face the wall.  The child’s rapid breathing was shallow, snot crusted around his nostrils, his cheeks flaming pink.  There was no doubt about the scarlet fever.  He’d come uncovered and must have been near frozen in his sodden clothes.  Joe hastily covered him and turned to make up the fire before investigating further.  He’d have to get some food into the child and get him into a clean, warm bed to have any hope of saving the him.  He took care not to disturb the others as he heated water and looked for something to serve as clean bedding and clothes should the woman and girl be alive. Living alone, he’d never bothered with the niceties of bed-linens, settling for a simple straw-filled tick and a couple of quilts.  From the fetid smell, it was clear this one would have to be boiled and re-stuffed.  While the water heated, he brought a load of hay from the barn, along with his old barn coat and a couple of the cleaner burlap bags.  He pulled a couple of ancient quilts from a shelf, not even wondering what hand might have made them.  He’d often thought of tossing the ragged bedding, but was glad now his housekeeping had been lax.

In readiness for the tasks ahead of him, he opened the parcels, finding a baby bottle, four flannel gowns, a few cans of peaches,

some crackers, two bars of soap, in addition to several cans of milk, a bottle of Dr. Marvel’s Wonder Tonic, two rough towels, and the bolt of flannel.  In a moment of tenderness, someone had added a couple of peppermint sticks.  He warmed a pain of milk, poured some water into a wash pan, and laid out the towels and soap.  He tore off a few strips of flannel to use for diapers.  For now, that would have to do.

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