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SNOW and EMBERS
From 3 Teeners – Men between Wives

Roy Haymond

    Monday 5:45
    K.M.
    Your mother said it was urgent that you call her immediately. You had already gone when the call came in and we didn’t have your motel number.

    This was the note Keith found on the message board at the construction site when he showed up for work Tuesday morning.
    After hanging up from the call to his mother, he immediately put in a call to Myra in the main office in Cleveland.
    “Look, I need some help. I just talked to Mother...she says there is an emergency...”
    “Somebody ill?”
    “I asked her, but she didn’t say...she was hysterical...or at least she sounded that way...with her you never know. This is a bad time...we’re having some problems with the frame...But I suppose I’d better get down there and see what this is all about...”
    “Of course you must. Do what you can on the job, and I’ll be working out something for you...Get back to you in an hour or so...one way or the other...”
    And, surely enough, Myra worked things out for him. She talked to the bosses and cleared a short leave for him. And she lined up a series of short flights that would relieve him of spending long hours in commercial airports.
    He spent the morning mapping out things with the crew foreman, and by noon he was on a flight to Cincinnati. From there he was on a freight plane for Washington.
    On this flight, he drifted into a pleasant nap that led to a delightful dream: Myra in overalls; Myra in a business suit; Myra in the kitchen with her apron on. She wouldn’t allow herself to be seen in a swimsuit, but there she was in a skimpy two-piece job. And then Myra in negligee! And she was singing in that husky, tuneless voice! Things were about to get sticky!
    But just as matters were shifting into an exotic plateau, the plane landed in Washington at midnight. He then had to rush to catch another freight shuttle to Charlotte.
    And on the flight to Charlotte he hurriedly tried to get back to sleep, hoping to recapture that dream. He was unable to doze off, but his thoughts were full of Myra, with remembrances of how he had come to know her.
    Myra was a whiz. When the company had been smaller, she was called a dispatcher, somebody who knew where everybody and everything was, knew how to find who or what anybody needed. Then when all the mergers came about, she continued to do what she had always done, but she was ever more valuable as a troubleshooter now that the corporation had crews in construction sites all over the place. She could get on her keyboard and cite the quickest flights to whatever sites, where to find this equipment or that information. She never used an office, rather keeping a desk in the hall where she was more accessible when someone needed her.
    She was already a solid blue-collar fixture in the main office in Cleveland when Keith came to work there as a hands-on construction engineer. The bosses had told him that he should call on Myra whenever he needed logistics help, and he quickly came to realize why the management held her in such high regard.
    He also found her refreshingly attractive in a plump, bubbly way, this in sharp contrast with Thelma, his thin, sophisticated, poster-girl wife.
    And even after Thelma walked out on him, unable to handle the routine that had him on construction sites here and there and home only on weekends - sometimes not even on these - he never considered Myra as anything more than a comrade-at-arms, for Myra did, after all, wear a wedding band of her own.
    Then came a fateful afternoon, a Friday when he had been in afternoon meetings in the company’s main offices. Upon leaving the building he found Myra in the parking lot. She was in her car, churning it, pumping it, trying desperately to get it started, even as the battery was obviously getting weaker.
    In her thirties now, her hair was still raven without the help of tint, her teeth were still white, and the dark eyes still sparkled. She may have put on a little weight - that’s why she would refuse to be seen in a swimsuit - but she was still ever so plumply attractive and bubbly.
    Keith walked over to her car, signaled to her, and she released the hood latch. He lifted the hood and signaled for her to try the starter again. He held up his hand, giving her the halt sign. Then he motioned for her to step out of the car. She looked under the hood with him.
    “Myra, it could be a number of things, but one thing is sure: your battery terminals are badly corroded...and your battery is suspect...Why don’t I take you home, and your husband can come back with a scraper and some jumper cables...”
    “I don’t have a husband...”
    “But I thought...”
    “I was...but we have separated...”
    Keith took her home on that Friday afternoon, and then he went to her place early Saturday morning. From there he took Myra and Margie, her eleven-year-old daughter, back to the parking lot. Keith cleaned off the terminals and posts, got the car started, and then followed them to a garage where the battery was replaced.
    Thereafter, Keith spent many hours with Myra and Margie, their time together limited to weekends because he would fly to a construction site on Monday and not return until Friday.
    It was really a halcyon period for Keith. His brief marriage had really turned cool before it heated up, and in the few months before Thelma threw in the towel his weekends had been torture. So the calm times with Myra were something like a respite.
    And he learned about Myra, about the husband who would not keep a job, who drank a bit too much, and who was a compulsive gambler. From him Myra was separated but not yet divorced.
    So Keith’s apartment stayed mostly unoccupied as he spent so much time at Myra’s suburban bungalow. They’d play badminton or rent a movie, or go skating, or play scrabble or simply laze around. And after church on Sundays they’d go for drives that usually ended up in picnics.
    More often than not, Margie would be along. Keith and Margie got along famously.
    And with Myra and Keith, a warm but circumspect intimacy was growing, and growing.
    On a Friday, he got back to town and went to his apartment for a shower and change. He found Myra waiting for him at his door. The look on her face told him something was very wrong.
    “Keith, do you have a beer for me?”
    “Of course. Come on in.”
    He dropped his luggage inside the door and they shared a long, rather tentative embrace. He went to the refrigerator and got a couple of beers and they sat on the couch in his den.
    “Keith, I’ll get right to the point: I won’t be seeing you anymore. Edward has moved back to town...he has a job and he has begged me to take him back...”
    Keith had never met Edward, and since Edward was a subject that never came up between him and Myra, he only knew about Edward what was generally known around the workplace.
    “Is that what you want to do?”
    “No, it isn’t. I don’t feel right about it at all...but he is still my husband...legally, anyway. And then there is Margie...Keith, I don’t know what to say...You and I...and Margie is so fond of you...”
    “You don’t have to say anything...We have to do what we have to do...”
    That appeared to be the end of things for Keith and Myra. When he was in the main office, he avoided passing Myra’s desk - too painful even to see this probably sad girl he’d become so fond of.
    Some three months passed. Keith was on a construction site in Tennessee when he got a mid-week fax from company headquarters. His advice was needed in a critical meeting, so he was to fly back to Cleveland in a company plane immediately.
    And there was a memo at the bottom of the fax sheet: “Please stop by and see me before you leave for the day. - Myra”.
    Keith did not wait for the end of the day - he stopped by Myra’s desk even before dropping in on the meeting already in progress.
    She said, “You’ve heard?”
    “Heard what? I haven’t seen you in weeks...I would have stopped by, but I thought...well, I thought it might be awkward...”
    “Well, Keith, I finally threw him out. Period. He wasn’t drinking as much as before...and the rumors of a woman might be just rumors. But I couldn’t ignore some evidence...He lost his job and didn’t tell me...and as far as I could see, he was staying at home all day...not even looking for a job...so I threw the son of a bitch out...”
    “I can’t say I’m surprised...”
    “Look, I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want to see me any more...but I’ve missed you...so has Margie...But things are awfully messy right now...I won’t go into all of it at the moment...When, and if, things ever stabilize, maybe...”
    “Maybe we could get together again? I surely hope so. I’ve missed you, too...So do we have to wait for things to stabilize?”
    When Keith’s meeting was over a little after five, she was waiting for him in the parking lot. After a long embrace, they walked two blocks to a neighborhood tavern where they sat and had a couple of beers.
    “Tell me now: just how messy is it?”
    “Terribly messy...Since he was staying at home, I suppose he had to gamble...to him, the main purpose of a phone is calling in bets...”
    “Calling in bets? How? I mean, if he had no job, how could he continue to make bets?”
    “Well, now, here’s the sweet part: when we took out the mortgage on the house, it was in both our names. So scarcely a week after I threw him out, I learned he had forged my signature to get a loan on our equity...”
    “So he’s gone, but you’re stuck with another home mortgage?”
    “That’s what it has come to. In short, I’ll have to sell the house. I could have Edward charged with forgery, but what good would that do?”
    “How soon?”
    “As soon as I can sell the place...”

    In Charlotte he changed planes once again, this time into a commercial carrier. It was 7 AM when he landed in Hartsville.
    His first thought was of a shave. The dark stubble on his chin and neck was beginning to irritate. He fished a ditty bag from his suitcase and went into the men’s room of the small private airport. He removed his shirt and washed his face.
    Then he gasped – how could a grown man come off without his razor?
    He put his suitcase onto the back seat of the Ford Escort that had been rented for him (something else Myra had taken care of). It was a little after 8:00 when he entered the city limits of Meade. When he passed Becker’s Drug store, he almost stopped to buy a razor, but thought better of it.
    (“Hell, I’ve got to get this thing, whatever it is, over with...if I stop here, somebody will tie me up with small talk...”)
    But he did stop at a phone booth for some talk that he didn’t consider small. It was just 7:00 in her time zone, so he got her at home.
    “I just got into Meade...”
    “Into the crisis center?”
    “That’s about the size of it.”
    “Maybe it won’t be as bad as you think...Do you think you’ll see Pop?”
    “I’ll make a point of it...”
    “Good...both of you need that...Anyway, I can hardly wait till Friday...”

    He pulled into the circular drive in front of the big, impressive house he had once called home. While the place may have changed superficially, there were no surprises. The white house had its Doric columns, high banisters, and rocking chairs that were never sat in, all smacking of paint and polish. The small lawn before it was manicured and very formal.
    His mother’s black Continental was in the garage. As he parked behind it, he noticed the BMW.
    (“Somehow I knew that’s what this would be all about.”)
    He carried his suitcase with him. The front door was unlocked and he went through the immaculate entrance hall. Then there was the over-decorated, over-formal parlor, and then a narrow hallway. He found his mother in her breakfast nook off the kitchen with her very civilized breakfast of tea and toast.
    In her mid-fifties, she was stylishly slender, carefully coiffured, and, except for the obvious efforts to be prim and formal, she was an extremely attractive woman, with her tall grace complemented by smooth skin, an even oval face, and striking sky-blue eyes. She was sitting there in her dressing gown. Her make-up was fully in place, and Keith had no doubt that all the proper foundation garments were under the gown.
    She spied Keith and sprang up from her chair. After hugging him and pecking his cheek, she broke into a fit of sobs.
    “I’m so glad you could come...I just don’t know what we’re going to do...”
    Keith, quite familiar with this kind of behavior from his mother, stood and waited for the hysteria to subside a bit.
    “Look, Mother, I had to juggle things to get this little bit of time off...I’ve got to fly back this afternoon one way or another...So we’d better get on with it! But first: I saw Bobby’s car outside. What’s he doing in town?”
    “That’s part of the problem,” answered the still sobbing but dry-eyed Mother, “so I’ll get Robert and we can have breakfast...”
    Keith almost blurted out that his mother was stalling, but he took the stall obediently. “I’ll grab a shower and be with you in a minute...”
    And no need to ask if Bobby had a razor (“He’s sure to be one who uses the latest electric job, and this beard cries for foam and sharp steel.”).

    When he returned to the breakfast nook, Bobby was standing there with his mother.
    Even if he’d not been wearing a silk smoking jacket and white ascot, one could not have missed the trappings of a professional actor: the carefully styled dark-brown hair, the complexion that gives off the aura of makeup and sun lamp, the obvious emotional control.
    (“You can tell he’s an electric razor man!”)
    Bobby and Keith shook hands and took seats at the table. As they were getting the routine how-you-doings out of the way, Mother served them eggs that had been scrambled by Carol, an old family retainer.
    When they finished the eggs with toast and marmalade, Carol took away the dishes and the three of them adjourned to the parlor for coffee, where Keith figured they’d finally get to the reason he was summoned for this crisis. Keith and his mother sat on a sofa and Bobby slumped in an armchair.
    But Mother and Bobby were chatting about something or other, apparently in no hurry to get to whatever the vital subject might be.
    Keith cleared his throat and blurted out, “When you called yesterday, Mother, it sounded like the world was coming to an end. I really had to juggle to get these few hours here - we’re right in the middle of a project. And now that I’m here, you don’t seem any the worse for wear...”
    “Oh, Keith, it’s awful...what I’ve been through...”
    Keith then looked at Bobby, the Bobby who probably shouldn’t be here, the Bobby who was sure to be the root of whatever disaster Mother was so slow in getting to.
    Hollywood Bobby, the lead in all the school plays, ballet lessons, piano and voice lessons, fencing lessons, drama camps every summer; then a “scholarship” which paid a small part of the tuition for an exclusive private school, still leaving much more to pay than the total at almost any other school. Then the change of schools, and more changes of schools until, the last Keith had heard, he was “working out of Atlanta” - some little theater, some TV commercials, but at the moment sitting here with every hair in place and with a condescending smirk.
    “Well, Keith,” pined Mother, “you know your father just walked out on me...”
    “Of course I know that, Mother - you called when it happened, and Pop sent me a card...but that was six months ago! You’ve got the house and an allowance, haven’t you?”
    “Oh, I suppose most people would say he has been reasonable, not that it makes up for the humiliation he has caused...”
    Another sobbing fit followed, and Keith waited impatiently for it to pass.
    “You wouldn’t believe the embarrassment, Keith. When the Garden Club meets...and I have to go...I am president, after all...I see all the sympathy in their eyes, and I can imagine what they are saying behind my back...”
    “Mother, of course I am sorry about you and Pop...”
    “Don’t refer to your father in that colloquial manner...”
    “O.K. But Mother, this thing has happened. And you seem to agree he has taken care of you financially...So what’s the problem?”
    “Yes, I said your father has been reasonable in a way...I have the house and he sends me enough to get by on and to take care of most of the bills...But it is so humiliating...”
    “Mother, you must have realized how miserable Pop has been since he retired from the plant. You couldn’t have been surprised when he left here...we all knew he was feeling lonesome and useless, didn’t we?”
    “I did all I could, Keith. I tried to get him interested in things. I took him to meetings...”
    “Come on, Mother! You know very well he couldn’t stand meetings - he’d had enough meetings to last a lifetime...”
    “...And I tried to get him to take a European tour with me...”
    “No good! Something like that would drive him up the wall He’s happier when he’s doing things with his hands...”
    “That’s right; all he ever wanted to do was go fishing...and when you were in school, he went to all those ball games you played...and those auto races... even those awful wrestling things...”
    “And you never went with him...”
    “Goodness no! I can’t picture respectable people...”
    “But if he enjoys those things, he must think they’re respectable enough.”
    “Oh, Keith, he’s a retired executive; he has so much to offer a community. But he’d rather slouch around in those old clothes...and burn those awful cigars...”
    “Which you wouldn’t allow him to smoke in his own house!”
    “That’s not true! He had the back porch...and he could use his study - after I put in a purifier!”
    “Well, anyway, I wasn’t surprised when he decided to leave. I got a card from him. He praised you as a great lady, but said he couldn’t stand it any longer. Said you decorated the house and ran it in ways that made him feel like a stranger...That card is all I heard from him. Do you know where he is staying?”
    “Do you remember that little farm he bought...north of town?”
    “With the pond on it? Yes, we went fishing out there.”
    “Well, the houses on the place were decrepit. He’s living out there...in a trailer!”
    “Where he can fish every day, and smoke cigars when he pleases?”
    “Yes, and we’ve been hearing of some other disturbing things...And did you know that he has a job? As a night watchman! Imagine!”
    “No I hadn’t heard that...But, again, Mother: I must insist...What is it that made you call me? Why was it so necessary for me to come down here, and right now?”
    “I haven’t told you everything yet...”
    Bobby’s smirk was now a bored stare as his mother went on. “You see, I had to go to family court...he’s reduced the stipend I was getting...”
    “Oh? Can you be a bit more specific?”
    “I keep the house, as agreed; and he gives me living expenses; there is a fund for my car, and there’s hospitalization...all that stays the same...”
    “Then what changes were actually made in the arrangements?”
    “He’s stopped Robert’s allowance!”
    “Robert’s allowance?”
    “Yes! Would you believe it?”
    Keith paused for a long look at his indignant mother and then at her now fidgeting younger son.
    “Mother, the only thing I find hard to believe is that he was giving Bobby an allowance in the first place! Bobby is twenty-four years old! You are not in school again, are you, Bobby? I thought you were working in Atlanta.”
    Bobby, in his rich stage tone, answered, “I am, but I’m not making any money.”
    Mother broke in, “He was doing television commercials. I hate to see him wasting his talent that way, but they do pay well...”
    Bobby spoke up again, “You see, Keith, I was spending so much time on call for the commercials, I was letting too many good opportunities slip by, good roles that could help my career...”
    “Hold the phone! You were working steady and you decided not to?”
    “I’m still working steady, but this is a stock company. We’re doing an exciting new play. There’s a good chance it will be presented on PBS...”
    “But with this stock thing you don’t get paid?”
    “Very little, Keith; hardly enough to live on. But this is just too good a vehicle to pass up...”
    “So you asked Pop for an allowance and he turned you down?”
    Mother took over again. “That’s not exactly the way it was. Your father was giving him a small allowance all along, but he stopped it.”
    “Pop was sending Bobby an allowance? Since when? I don’t understand.”
    “Well, your father wasn’t actually sending Robert a stipend; I was.”
    “You were? A while ago you sounded as if you were just eking by; how can you manage to send Bobby money?”
    “When Robert was in school, I had an account set up by bank draft.”
    “But Mother, that was six years ago, and Bobby finally dropped out of school...or at least he quit switching schools...I wasn’t able to keep up with it all...You mean Pop agreed to let the allowance continue?”
    “Well, he didn’t disagree. I just saw to it that Robert’s allowance continued when he left school to go on the road that time...”
    “But Pop didn’t know about the allowance?”
    “I never lied to him! But, no, maybe he didn’t know about the arrangement. You know how dead set he was against Robert’s developing his talent as an actor!”
    “Let me see if I understand this: you just let the allowance account stay active, and Pop didn’t know about it?”
    “Now don’t sound so stern with me, young man! When Robert makes a name for himself as an actor, your father will be proud that he helped in this small way! I’m Robert’s mother; I had to look after his interests...”
    “Oh, I get the picture all right! How did Pop finally figure all this out?”
    “Oh, some accountant working with your father’s attorney. He kept asking me about the nature of that account. I finally had to tell him. I don’t know what the accountant may have told your father.”
    “So it boils down to this: you call me with a crisis, and it has to do with an allowance for Bobby? That’s why I had to juggle to get a day off at an especially bad time?”
    “But Keith, you’re the only one who can really talk to your father!”
    “Me? Talk to Pop?”
    “Yes. He would listen to you! Your father spent so much time with you. When you were playing all those ball games, he was always there. But with Robert it was different - he never really understood Robert! It was like pulling teeth to get him to go to see Robert in a play...you remember how Robert always got the lead in the school plays...and the storm your father had when Robert started dancing lessons...and went to drama camp! Why, he wasn’t even pleased when Robert got that drama scholarship!”
    “Well, I do remember that the school was expensive...”
    “But it was in Robert’s chosen profession, after all!”
    “Anyway, I guess that’s water over the dam...But I can’t see myself talking to Pop on this allowance thing!’
    Bobby said, “It wouldn’t do much good for me to talk to him, Keith. When I was at home a year or so ago, we got into an awful argument...I don’t suppose I behaved too well...I walked out on him.”
    Mother took over again. “Keith, they just lost control - both of them had doses of pride...But this is really critical. This play may be just the opportunity Robert has been waiting for...”
    “Tell me, Bobby, is everyone else in the play blessed with independent means?”
    “Well, some of them hold down jobs, like waiting on tables, working in gas stations, that sort of thing. But I’m second lead. I need free time to work on the part, to keep sharp...”
    Keith looked at his younger brother and grinned. “Bobby, that’s where you and I part company...you always seem to have something against holding down a job!”
    “And you’re just as stingy-minded as your father!”
    Bobby got up and stormed out of the room, with Keith wondering if there were a drama lesson there somewhere.
    Mother moved over to Keith and affectionately squeezed his arm. “Keith, darling, forgive Robert - he’s hurt by all this. He sees this play as his big chance, and now he feels pinched for money...”
    “Mother, I don’t have any ill feelings toward Bobby, but I do think he should be on his own. Maybe he should be taking one of those jobs like some of the others have to do.”
    “That would kill him, Keith...and that’s why I am begging you to talk to your father...”
    “I just don’t think I can do it!”
    “...And, really, you might break some ice. You see, the divorce is not final. If you could get it across to your father that he could come back home, it could be like it was before. I’m not a vindictive person. Of course I am hurt by all this. That’s to be expected after all he’s put me through. But I have a forgiving nature. And think of it: what he’d save on living expenses by moving back here...why, that alone could almost be enough for Robert...And, well, I don’t like to heed rumors, but there is talk that everything out there in that trailer is not circumspect...”
    The tears came again. Keith knew this routine very well, but by then he was out of patience.
    “Stop it, Mother!”
    The sobs stopped abruptly. “What are we going to do?”
    “I don’t know that we can do anything. But I’ll run out there and see Pop...No promises, you understand...I’m not going to try to get Pop to do what he’s against, but I will talk to him! O.K.?”
    “I’m so glad you came. I knew I could....”
    Her poignant words fell on Keith’s back as he was leaving the room.

    (“How about that? Pop lives in a trailer and she thinks it’s gross! Well, Myra lives in a trailer, and it’s damned nice.”)
    Myra was able to sell her house almost immediately, but there was so little left over from the indebtedness that a down payment on even a modest house was out of reach.
    So she bought an acre lot in the country. Keith, using some company equipment and the help of a couple of friends, leveled the lot and landscaped it. Then they shopped around and found a more than functional repossessed trailer.
    This had been home to Myra and Margie for over a year now. A divorce is expensive, and Edward was unwilling and unable to contribute anything to the process, so this was put on a back burner. Myra was given custody of Margie. Edward had visitation rights, but he had moved out of the area and had not kept in touch.
    Keith was more or less a member of the family on weekends. However, if he did spend a night in the trailer, he slept on a daybed.
    (“Could I tell all this to Mother? Me cavorting with a girl who lives in a trailer? One who actually has to work for a living? And Mother thought so much of Thelma because she was so ‘elegantly thin’! Mother would say poor Myra needed to go to a spa!”)
    
    He found a phone booth at the edge of town and called Myra at work.
    “Just checking in, and I only have a minute...I’ve had a session with Mother...”
    “How was it?”
    “Not so good...I’ve never told you much about my family, have I?”
    “Not much...but I’ve always sensed that you were not too comfortable talking about it...and that’s all right...But I’ve noticed a little sparkle when you mention Pop...”
    “I’m on my way to see him now...”
    “Then you know where he is?”
    “Yes. He’s had this little farm for years...he doesn’t have a phone...but he’s got a job as a night watchman...so he’ll probably be at home.”
    “You’ll call me after you see Pop?”
    “Sure will.”
    
    It had been several years since he’d been to the farm, but little had changed on the ten miles of paved road and four miles of dusty dirt roads leading through the brush that surrounded the place where he and his father had often gone fishing. Off the county-maintained dirt road was a bulldozed single lane trail intermittently covered with pinestraw. This went on for a half-mile and ended at a large pond, almost a lake, surrounded by pines, oaks and willows. To the right of the pond was Pop’s place, a small, single-wide trailer with a deck and a pier that extended over the pond. This was set off by a recently mowed green yard inside a chain-link fence. Pop’s six-year-old LTD was parked outside the fence.
    The sign on the gate said BEWARE OF DOG, but Keith saw none and he gingerly opened the gate, crossed the yard and stepped up on a small covered porch. The trailer gleamed like one either steam-cleaned or freshly painted.
    Sounds of radio or television came from within. Keith knocked on the door and got no answer. He pushed open the unlocked door and stepped inside. To the right of the door a narrow hallway led to what appeared to be the master bedroom. He stepped to the left into a living room where a plain sofa and a couple of armchairs gave off a masculine, almost military simplicity. A step up led to a kitchen-dining area. Two pots on the kitchen stove were on low-boil. And, again, the utensils were in a simple, neat military order, so much in contrast to the frilly mansion he had so recently left.
    Beyond a glass sliding door was the deck with the pier extending over the pond. His father was seated at a picnic table on the deck in loose cotton clothes and bedroom slippers. Keith watched him for a moment. His father was reading a newspaper, sipping coffee, and occasionally puffing a big cigar. A very large German shepherd was asleep at his feet.
    Keith, not ready to confront the dog, opened the door an inch or two.
    “Hey!”
    “Why, Keith! I had no idea...it’s all right, George, he’s one of us!”
    The older man patted the dog and stood up as Keith stepped out of the door and closed it behind him. The two men embraced, with Pop patting Keith on the back.
    “Good to see you, son...mighty good!”
    By now the dog had sensed a friend and tried to join the reunion.
    “Meet George...he’s more than a companion...he earns his keep around here...He’s friendly now, but it pays to stay on the good side of him...”
    “I suspected as much, Pop. You’re looking good, Old Man!”
    Pop was sixty, with all his teeth and with the same iron-gray hair he’d had for thirty years. At 5'10, he was a solid one-ninety with a thick chest and heavy arms. There was a slight bulge around his middle, but he gave off a sense of energy and good condition.
    Pop poured Keith a mug of coffee from a ceramic jug on the table and had him take a seat in a lawn chair by the table.
    “How’d you manage to get off work? Through with a project?”
    “No, we’re doing this plant in Indiana...be there six months at least...I’m just down for the day...”
    “Oh, I see. Your mother call you?”
    “That’s right, Pop,” he said firmly, but he couldn’t suppress a little grin.
    “She cried the blues to get you here, right? And she wants you to talk the two of us back together?”
    “Right again, Old Man!”
    “How much do you know about all this, Son?”
    “Well, that card I got from you when you split up...and several long, wandering letters from Mother...Can’t say I know a hell of a lot.”
    “Right. And I don’t know if that’s fair to you...You want to hear my side of it?”
    “Whatever you’d care to tell me.”
    Pop looked at his watch and mused, “It’s ten-fifteen. It’ll be a little over an hour before lunch is ready, but I think I can say about all I’m capable of saying in less time than that. Tell you what: why don’t we ditch this coffee and have a couple of beers. It’s nice and cool out here and the bugs don’t get bad until late afternoon. That suit?”
    While Pop tended to the pots on the stove, Keith stepped down into the living room and then went down hallway to use the half-bathroom. This was adjacent to what would probably be called a guest bedroom, currently used for storage. In this room, things were stacked on standing shelves and, again, in neat military order.
    When Keith joined him on the deck, Pop was in a canvas chaise-lounge with a can of beer in one hand and a cigar in the other. A beer for Keith was on the table beside the several others in a cooler.
    Pop toyed with the cigar for a moment before putting a lighter to it. He lit it, took a long pull on it, and blew out a cloud of blue smoke.
    “I’d start from the beginning, but I’m not sure where the beginning is. So let’s fix it about fifteen years ago. At the plant, they moved me off the line where I belonged and put me into the office...a damned executive, for crying out loud! At about the same time, whether by luck or otherwise, some of the investments I made - you know, rental properties, little pieces of businesses, whatnot - they all started paying off...the property I sold to the highway people, in particular...”
    “...Think on this: there were these old guys I used to run with - you remember some of them...veterans, old timers...we used to go to the VFW for a few beers after work, go to the races and wrestling matches...”
    “Yeah, Pop, I went with you sometimes. Remember Haystack Calhoun used to wrestle in his overalls?”
    “Yeah, Keith, I enjoyed it so much more when you went along...but, you see, the other guys from the plant...well, they just didn’t feel right going places with me after I was promoted. Hell, I was a damned big shot!”
    “...So your mother got a bee in her bonnet - we just had to buy the old Bradley place...so we could have a decent home...Oh, I know I should have put my foot down, but, as you know, your mother is a forceful woman. So we bought the place and she became a decorating maniac...Hell, you lived there, you know all this. The place had to be ready all the time in case Better Homes and Gardens wanted to take pictures...I was too busy to interfere or to get riled, and we just rocked along...”
    “...Think about it: all the old guys I used to have a few beers with - they didn’t really want to go gallivanting with a company executive. And then you went off to school, and I started getting lonesome...I mean, the only unwinding I did for years was when you were playing a ball game, or when we were fishing...”
    “And then there’s Bobby. I’m not saying your mother purposely set out to alienate the boy from me, but look at it! He was going to this lesson or that one - acting, fencing, even singing and dancing. And he was gone every summer to this camp or that. It’s an awful admission here, but I don’t really know that boy...And then all that business about going to that plush college, and then changing schools and changing schools...and never any hint of getting a job...His mother kept saying he was just a step away from something...”
    The cigar was slow burning and Pop started on his second beer.
    “This’ll have to be my last beer. I have to hit the sack by one o’clock, and if I have any more beer I won’t sleep for having to go to the bathroom...”
    “...But things got really bad when I retired from the plant. Seems your mother had my retirement all mapped out. I was to join the Lions and the Rotarians - she even sent in my name. And she wanted me in the history society, and a bunch of other things. She had a spiel about what I could offer the community...And I don’t know if this is so or if it just seemed so, but she seemed to be stepping up the social calendar - all kinds of groups were meeting at the house. And get this: I was to use the back door, unless I was properly dressed. And she fixed up the back porch and a den for me, so I could stay there when she had company, or if I wanted a cigar...”
    “...The long and the short of it, Son: I was plain bored and lonesome. No old buddies to spend time with, and with you gone, and maybe I ought not to mention this -your mother and I haven’t shared a bedroom for years - that’s something respectable people don’t indulge in after a certain age...”
    “...This place here? As you know, I’ve owned this property for years. Used to make a little money on it when I could lease out the farm acreage, but that kind of thing dried up. So, to pass the time I started coming out here to work on the place. Rented a backhoe and leveled off this plot; got a road scraped; built a sluice for the pond. Got to where I’d come out here every day and work...Of course your mother raised hell when I came home smelling of work and woods and maybe some manure...but I kept at it...got me a nice little garden on the other side of the pond...”
    “...Well, I won’t even try to recall the exact sequence of events, but it was about two years ago I decided we had to make a change. Would you believe I had to get an appointment to talk to your mother? Yes, I’m sure you can believe it! Well, I put the cards on the table. Told her things had to change, that I couldn’t go on with my home being such a sterile, unhappy place. Got nowhere, of course...The place is still a museum, isn’t it?”
    “I can’t argue with that...like it’s ready for a group of tourists...”
    “And I do believe I will have one more beer...So I told her I couldn’t take it anymore and she ignored me! And since I was having my best hours out here, I just bought myself this trailer and moved. Your mother keeps the house...I have a good retirement plan and social security will kick in, so I can live here reasonably well, and still give your mother what I think is a pretty good living allowance, with hospitalization and that sort of stuff...So here I am!”
    “...Of course, your mother didn’t seem satisfied with her living allowance. I can show you the books if you like, but I think what I was giving her is a reasonable part of the total income...Lawyer Boggs is representing me, and he brought in an accountant. I didn’t want to be mean about it, but we simply had to cut back from the amount she was asking for...we think the judge will go along with us on this...”
    “...Right now I have a little shortfall of ready cash, so when the plant over in Eastover advertised for a security guard, I applied and got the job...I’ll stay with it for a couple of years at least...until I get the trailer paid off...or maybe longer...”
    Keith, also on his third beer, mulled all this over. He had, of course, decided there was no point in bringing up the business about Bobby and the allowance.
    “Are you happy, Pop?”
    “Son, happiness is a relative thing. I regret losing Bobby - I’ll always regret that, and when I think about it, it hurts. And your mother...we just don’t feel for each other like two married people should. I didn’t get from her what I expected a marriage to provide, and I’m sure it works the other way around...and certainly I regret any pain this separation has caused her...No, I don’t enjoy that aspect of it...but I can’t help thinking that the two of us are better off apart...”
    “...I get in at seven-thirty in the morning, and I have all these things to do - the garden, work around the trailer...I built the porch and this deck and pier and I did the underpinning. And I had a good time doing these things...and there are still fish in the pond...I go out in a boat sometime, or just fish off the pier...”
    “The night watchman’s job? Dull sometimes...go an hour or two without seeing a soul...but that’s not too bad, really...get to do a lot of walking...I get together with the other guards and some night employees in the lounge and shoot pool about an hour before work. There’s ten of us altogether, kind of a regular gang...I had all ten of them out one Saturday for a fish-fry...And get this: I’ve been wanting to build a shed...they’re all coming out and bringing tools and we’re going to have a building party...”
    “...On my nights off, I sometimes go to the VFW...couple of buddies from the old days have forgiven me for becoming an executive, especially if I wear my security-guard uniform...and I’m making some new friends. Happy? It’s not Disney World, but I’m getting more out of life than I have for some time...”
    “...But get back together with your mother? No, Son, it’s not in the cards...I’d be nothing but miserable, and I don’t really think it would make her happy either...”
    They said little else before going in for a lunch of boiled chicken with rice and garden-grown lima beans, and Pop had made some cornbread. They ate in relaxed silence for a few moments before Pop said, “We went through my situation all right, but what about yours?”
    Keith knew what his father was leading up to, but he said, almost in a shrug, “What do you mean, Pop?”
    “You think you might get married again?”
    Keith grinned. “Thelma walked out because I was always on the construction site. And I’m still on the construction site...fly to the site most Mondays, then fly home on Friday...and in some weeks, not even then...What woman is going to put up with that kind of schedule?”
    “Well, you make good money, don’t you? Looks like women would be chasing after you...Besides, sooner or later, they might kick you upstairs - like they did me...”
    “Put me into an office? No, Pop, that’s not likely...I’m a construction engineer - to me that means working on the site...”
    “So you’re going to be flying to sites for years to come? Living in motels all week and just be home on weekends for the rest of your life? Not making yourself a home?”
    “Oh, things could change a little before long. The company is expanding, and there will be branch offices. Could be that I would be the official engineer in one of them, you know, the engineer on call for all the sites in that area...and I would be part of a team that inspects completed projects and supervises reconstruction and expansion.”
    “But you won’t start looking for a wife until that happens?”
    “I didn’t say that, Pop.”
    “Oh? Then tell me about her.”
    “Not much to tell. Myra is a troubleshooter in the company’s Cleveland office...she’s a couple of years older than me...we’ve been getting together almost every weekend.”
    “She been married before?”
    “Yes. Has a thirteen-year-old daughter...She’s had a hard time with her husband, a loser if there ever was one. She hasn’t gotten a divorce...her husband lost their home to gambling debts, so she’s been on the ropes financially, and I know divorces are expensive...”
    “Well, now, even when you’re telling me the downside, your face lights up when you talk about her...She’s nice?”
    “Oh, yes, Pop. She’s a smart girl...practical and sharp. And I’m crazy about her daughter...”
    “She pretty?”
    “Oh, yes. Now, she says she is overweight, but I don’t agree ...Thelma was a good-looking girl, but I always thought she was just a little too skinny...”
    “Got a picture?”
    “No. But I’ll send you one...”
    “Sounds like a good thing, Son. I’ve been a little worried about you since you and Thelma broke up, with you not really settled in one place...afraid you’d get lonesome and hook up with the first good-looking thing that came along. But the kind of fellowship I’m sensing here has a ring of truth about it...something sensible...You made any kind of commitment?”
    “Well, not officially...but I think we both know what’s coming.”
    “You behaving yourselves in the meantime?”
    Keith grinned.
    “Unfair question, Keith; I withdraw it. Did you tell your mother about this situation?”
    “Not a word; she didn’t ask and I didn’t tell.”
    “Good move. But let’s keep in touch... I’d like to meet the lady, before or after any event...”
    “We’ll see what we can do. But about keeping in touch, neither of us is too great on writing letters, and you don’t have a telephone...”
    “Oh, I’m getting one...in just a few days...need one for the job, mainly. But the number will be unlisted. Imagine what I’d be in for if your mother knew I had a phone!”
    “But you’ll let me have your number?”
    “Of course. I’ll call you as soon as it’s installed. What do I do if it’s during the week? Call the Cleveland office and have them put me through to you?”
    “You could do that, but it would be best just to call Myra at the main office and have her get me the message...that falls under the head of troubleshooting.”
    They sat in silence for a few more moments.
    “I don’t care for dessert, son, but if you are so minded, there’s Jell-O and ice cream handy...”
    “No thanks, Pop, but could I use your razor? I went off without mine and my stubble is beginning to itch....”
    “Of course. Go through the bedroom...the razor and things are on the sink.”
    Keith left his father to clean up the lunch dishes and went to Pop’s bathroom, a small, closet-like room with a tub-shower and built-in cabinets under and over the sink. And like the rest of the place, there was a ship-shape military air about it.
    There was a sentimental pleasure in all this - he enjoyed using Pop’s ancient Gillette double-edged razor, and his obsolete mug and brush. He leisurely lathered his face and then gingerly pulled the heavy old razor across his stubble.
    As he was shaving, something was almost catching his eye, something he could not quite focus on. This gave a slight feeling of something amiss, something out of order. But he dismissed this idea and continued the work on his stubble.
    When he had rinsed off the excess lather, dried his face and patted on after-shave, the something that had been hovering finally came clear to him. In the bathroom mirror, he could see things hanging on the door behind him, things that did, indeed, violate the military order of the place.
    (“A woman’s slip, a garter belt, and a bra, a substantial bra, at that!”)
    His imagination ran wild in wonder over whether the owner of these things had left the trailer wearing a spare set of these items, or if the lady in question had simply departed without bothering to replace the garments!
    When he joined Pop in the kitchen area, he said, “Pop, I guess I’d better be moving on...”
    “Yeah, and I’ve got to be getting to bed...need five or six hours and I’ll be all right. I don’t envy you having to report to your mother...But, Son, I’ve told you how things are...There’s no way I’ll be going back. I’d do anything reasonable for your mother...In her own way, she’s a good person...but I can’t see trying again something that hasn’t worked for thirty-five years...”
    “I understand, Pop. I guess I had figured it this way all along, but I wanted to hear it from you...and I am so glad you’re not so lonesome anymore...”
    “Well, yes, there is that! There are some regrets, but I guess things are about as good for me as they could be...and I hope things work out for your mother...”
    They shared a hug and Keith was gone.
    He drove slowly back toward town, deeply pondering a possible scenario for his mother.
    (“Yeah, she’d take him back, all right...shower him with forgiveness that she’d shout from the rooftops, but keep the cigars out of the house and get rid of the dog. And she’d restore Bobby’s allowance without informing Pop that any such thing existed...”)
    There was a phone booth outside a little convenience store on the road just before he got back into town.
    “Myra, I’m back...”
    “Did you...”
    “Yes, I spent a couple of hours with Pop...and he looks great...”
    “Can you tell me about your mother?”
    “I’d rather go into that Friday...for now, let’s just say the crisis is not life-threatening...and it’s something I couldn’t do anything about anyway.”
    “Your flight is at four-thirty...”
    “Yes...but I’ll be there in plenty of time...By the way, you look great in a two-piece swimsuit!”
    “Keith, you’ve never seen me in a...”
    “But, beautiful lady, you can’t control what you wear in my dreams...”
    “What color was the suit?”
    “I don’t remember...anyway, you changed to negligee...”
    “What did that lead to?”
    “I don’t know...the plane landed and I woke up!”
    “Do you want to see me in a swim suit?”
    “Later. Negligee first.”
    “Well, we’ll see about Friday...Margie is going to a movie with some friends...maybe the plane won’t land at a critical time...”
    “And, by the way...I promised to send Pop a picture of you.”
    “My, my. How did that come about?
    “He asked me and I told him.”
    “What did you tell him?”
    “Just that I spent most of the weekend hours with a charming example of the opposite sex...”
    “Did you tell him how I look in a swim suit?”
    “No. My dreams are not for general discussion...”
    “Even this Friday?”
    “On this Friday, any discussion will hardly be general...”
    “I should say not! Did you mention me to your mother?”
    “No. Again, I’ll have a lot to tell you Friday...”
    “Yes, you will...but maybe we can get to your dreams first...”

    He bypassed another painful stop at his mother’s to report what couldn’t be reported. He was fighting sleep on his way to the airport in Hartsville.
    (“I noticed a bunk at that little airport...a nap before the four-thirty flight would be nice...I’ll call Mother when I change planes in Charlotte - the crying won’t be so loud from there!”)
    He found himself breaking the speed limit in putting distance between himself and his mother’s home.
    (“Suppose Pop did go home to mother? Would her undergarments ever hang on a door in Pop’s bathroom?”)



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