The number of raisins in his bowl. “Squalls possible tomorrow but it’s looking clear today, folks,” Ted Waite said, friendly as ever. “Keep on your toes, keep on truckin’…”
“Storm’s coming,” the Old Man said, shuffling into the kitchen.
“The radio says tomorrow,” Perry countered.
His father muttered something, picked up his “#1 Grandpa” coffee cup, filled it with black, and stood at the counter to prepare his usual bowl of instant oatmeal. The cane was slung over his forearm—the Old Man used it more and more these days. He was supposed to let Perry take on more decision-making power, a natural generational progression, but his father was ornery, still trying to run what he could no longer work. He’d recorded every crop they had planted and harvested since 1957. Read like the Bible, consulted like an oracle: ledgers stacked on his bedside table and pulled out whenever Perry talked about trying something new. Not everything new is radical, not everything radical is new, Nina had whispered across the pillow last night.
The Old Man sat, spooned oatmeal into his mouth, and coughed. Tiny bits of oats dotted the table between them. Without Nina’s presence, the less they said to each other the better. Perry pushed his chair away from the table and put the cereal bowl in the sink. He went to the parlor and pulled the old Webster’s dictionary from the shelf. After Rose’s last rebuff, he had pressed his copy of the unsigned lease between the pages—in the “P” section, “Predispose” to “Pregnant.” He put the folded contract into his pocket and walked back to the kitchen to pour a glass of juice for his father. Then he went to the mudroom for his boots and headed down to the barn, tongue working a shred of raisin still stuck between his molars.
A crow swooped overhead with a baby gopher dangling from its beak. The bird perched on the eave of the barn, holding the motionless body as if waiting for applause. Then it set the rodent down and the thing scurried into action, running west along the roof in a mad dash. The bird shook its feathers leisurely, spread its wings and cawed, and then launched into the air, plucking the gopher up again. There it is, Perry thought, in a nutshell.
The raisin was stubborn between Perry’s teeth, and he pressed it with his tongue as he rode out to the east fields to clear rocks. He had been paying particular attention to Rose’s adjacent acreage ever since the day three months before when Nina told him, her voice crackly: “Jim Culp drove out to see Rose and Sill followed him out there and made him tell her too. Lance is dead. My God, Perry, the boy is killed. What’s Rose going to do?”
It was natural for the Browns to acquire Rose’s land now. It would be practically negligent not to. Grow or die, was one of the Old Man’s pearls of wisdom, imparted, in the old days, with a rare grin. Perry wanted Rose’s land but the want came from his head, not his gut. That’s where he and the Old Man differed. That, Nina said, was Perry’s strength.
The corn was growing well. He passed it by, moving on to the untilled acres, and then cut the tractor engine and stepped down. There was no sign of life from Rose’s place. Perry stuck his index finger in his mouth, pulled out the raisin shred with a fingernail, and flicked it away. His mouth tasted metallic. They’d gone to Lance’s funeral: a folded flag, buttons on a uniform, a crisp salute. What was there in those things for a mind to latch onto? The whole town had turned out to pay respects, except for Rose herself. They’d tried to visit her afterward but she wouldn’t speak to them. Was busy, she said. Pruning.
The Brown land that abutted Rose’s was untilled, an old pasture that hadn’t yet been made into something new. Perry had been slowly clearing rocks and brambles from a portion of it, without machines. He’d come to look forward to the time, just an hour or two most mornings, spent rolling and lifting rocks, digging up stubborn roots, watching the rich soil revealed bit by bit. He was creating a dividing line of sorts between the acre he wanted to reclaim for pasture and the rocky piece that he’d leave be. Nina had scolded him for not wearing gloves—he’d dinged his hands more than once. He always felt best when he climbed off the tractor and worked the land directly. Now he surveyed his progress and bent to hoist a mid-size stone, clenching the muscles in his legs and back. He crab-walked with it to the edge of the pasture and settled it into line.
Perry didn’t fool himself that gaining a hold over Rose’s land would bring him peace. What it would bring was authority, a wedge in his father’s grip on things. He had a plan. Rose would lease him her place at a fair price. At the dinner table, he would hold up the contract and say, “It’s ours now. I have ideas—” and the Old Man would set down his fork, acknowledging the inevitable handover of power. Sweat soaked the back of Perry’s shirt. His segmented dividing line grew rock by rock, and as he worked, he kept Rose’s property in his peripheral vision. The air was soft. A tickle of extra humidity caressed his skin—so much for the promised cold front. If the Old Man was right about the weather, he’d be sure to remind Perry of it over dinner. And Perry would sit there and feel the tilt of their elevated house and the weight of the unclaimed land.
The folded contract felt stiff in his pocket, and his knuckle was bleeding a bit. Perry paused to rest, dragging the back of his hand down the leg of his jeans, and then without thinking too hard about it he hoisted himself to his feet. His pasture gave way to hers, and soon enough he walked through the thicket that led to her front yard.
She stood on the porch as if expecting him, holding a casserole dish in one hand. Tinfoil dangled from one corner, juices dribbled out the side and spattered to the ground. There was a smell of rot. Lance’s dog, Fergus, growled a few times then wagged his tail. Perry cleared his throat but she didn’t look up, just tossed the dish onto some sort of compost heap.
“Rose, how are you?” She didn’t acknowledge him. “Rose?” Her hair hadn’t just gone white, it had changed texture; tendrils strayed up to the sky.
“I just thought I’d…Are you okay?” Her shoulders curved inward. She grabbed a pair of pruning shears from the porch step and walked to her overgrown plants. He swung his arms out in a fake relaxed semicircle, sore knuckle landing in his opposite palm, some part of him still thinking this might go well. “Rose—” he started. “Rose, will you please just think about my offer? Me leasing from you is the best thing for both of us.”
She ran her thumb along the handle of the pruning shears and fixed her eyes behind him, on the hayloft. Your place was a refuge for me once, he thought. But maybe you never knew it. “Have you thought about what I said last month? I want to make it easier on you, Rose. It’ll help you, it’ll help me. Please.” He reached toward his pocket.
“How is your father?” she asked, eyes sliding past his. She couldn’t stand the Old Man. Rose without family, standing among the brambles with long shears, looking for all the world like someone who shouldn’t hold sharp objects. She’ll turn them on me, ran through his mind before the other: She’ll turn them on herself.
“He’s fine, Rose. He’s just slowing down…” Perry pulled out the lease. “I brought this for you just to read over…just to think about.” He paused. “With Lance—” Her eyes went sharp, her mouth twisted. She came at him, hair flying, a great rushing of air and the paper was gone. It took everything he had not to fall back. The dog was at her side, his eyes yellow, tail pointing upward. Hairs rose on the back of Perry’s neck. He looked over his shoulder and took a deep breath. “Keep it up, Rose, and the bank will take this place.”
Her face crumpled, and her fingers twisted the fabric of her skirt. He felt like a kid seeing an adult, the person supposedly in charge, collapsed. Something splashed in the well. How had it come to this? Rose batty, older than her years, and him clutching papers in a grabby fist. Both of them not their true selves. Or perhaps these were the selves they’d been working toward. Fergus scratched his ear roughly and whimpered in a kind of sensual relief.
“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to…” Perry stuttered. “I only want…” Even as he spoke he backed toward the property line. She seemed to have already forgotten him. The screen door screeched shut. “Rose,” Perry begged, too quiet for her to hear. His breath came fast as he retraced his steps. He passed the clearing project and his work seemed negligible, a new line of rocks dividing nothing