stretched on her back with her long legs propped atop the armrest and put a dish towel over her eyes so the pictures playing inside her head would flicker brightly against a darkened space. A tiny purple circle puffed into a large blue circle, an expanding bucket mouth, maybe, and inside the bucket it was like ten gazillion fireflies popped into sparks but their sparking light was of all the colors known to the mind and constantly popping from one color into another. A red cloud of mist grew from the bucket and shrunk into a regular little crooked tree on a hilltop with an old wrinkled sky above. When the wrinkles parted the sky was a blue eye that winked until she was in the tree with her feet hanging from a branch, dangling above a sudden roiling ocean that opened below. The ocean had waves that leapt like dancers. A smattering of cows grazed between dancers in the ocean but many others puffed with bloat and floated foundering horribly on their sides just beyond reach of the waves until pitchfork tines swooping down from somewhere pierced their bloated bellies all at once and the released fart-wind from so many bloated cows knocked her flying from the tree into a fragile green jungle. The jungle shattered into smoke behind her as she ran and held people she knew, sort of, at least she sensed that she did, but they wouldn’t face her or say hello or stop to help with directions. All her feelings were of being lost and her frantic words were shouted in a language nobody else seemed to hear. She ducked under a yellow leaf big as tomorrow and fell against giant time- spanning lips that could smooch her spirit entire from days of girlhood to now with but one knowing pucker. The lips kept smooching on her sweetly like she was yet and forever a child, though, which felt wrong, stunting and stale, then in the measure of a single heartbeat her dress fell open like shutters and she stood revealed, a woman, and…
The dish towel fell from her eyes and the flickering pictures sank beneath light with the lips sinking away last, even as she felt her fingers reach out to grab them for holding near. She opened her eyes to see Uncle Teardrop’s face poised inches above her own, and seen at this distance his melted side looked as big as a continent on a globe. He said, “You think I forgot about you?”
It was a continent with a volcanic history, vast sections of wasteland and rugged brown mountainous zones rained upon eternally by three blue drops. Her eyes took it all in as she rolled off the couch sideways beneath him onto her knees and hurried across the floor. As she crawled she said, “What do you mean, forgot about me? Huh?”
Uncle Teardrop wore a brown leather jacket that had been slashed open in a couple of places and home- stitched back together with fat leather strands, and a camouflage cap meant for green seasons. His dark graying hair was dull, lank. His black jeans had washed pale in patches and his boots were dun lace-ups. There’d be a weapon on him somewhere.
“Forgot about you and everything happenin’ over here.”
She stood near the far window and avoided his eyes.
“That’s your business—forget us if you want.”
He turned to look calmly her way while giving a slight shake of his head.
“Jessup never would smack you. I don’t know why, why he never would, but I always have said someday somebody’s goin’ to pay a price for him not whompin’ you good when you needed it.”
Gail was napping in Ree’s bed, the boys ran loudly about in the side yard, and Mom sat silently in her rocker. Ree edged along the wall so there’d be furniture blocking his way if he made a mean move toward her.
“I wasn’t tryin’ to be a smart mouth, there, Teardrop. Uncle Teardrop.”
“It don’t seem like you’ve got to try none, girl, smarty-mouth shit just flies out your yap anytime your yap falls open.” He walked to the window that overlooked the side yard. Sonny and Harold chased each other around in circles, flinging snowballs while yelling fantastic threats back and forth. Teardrop stood with his arms crossed and studied their play like he was scouting the boys for the future. He was silent long enough for the quiet to become worrisome to Ree, then said, “He’s faster’n Blond Milton ever was. He hits stuff he throws at, too. Blond Milton, he always was strong as stink but he threw rocks’n balls’n shit about like an ol’ granny would without her glasses on, and he never could swim real swift or play horseshoes worth a damn or whatever. He wasn’t coordinated as Sonny is already at any of that. Course, the man has proved he’ll
“Was…?”
“He wasn’t in it.”
Late-morning shadows worked patterns across the scarred wooden floor, patterns underfoot shifting angle and design at the pace of the sun crossing the sky. Mom’s eyes fell closed as though she’d heard and she began to hum a short snatch of flat music that nearly brought a song to mind. Teardrop’s green truck was down in the yard and the boys ran around it hurling dripping snowballs at each other. Ree felt a low vibration become electric in the jelly between her bones and heart, and said, “He’s gone, ain’t he?”
“This is for you-all.” Teardrop took a flat square of folded dollars from inside his jacket and tossed it to the couch. “His court day was this mornin’ and he didn’t show.” He flung his arm out, gesturing vaguely toward the land up the hill behind the house. “I’d sell off that Bromont timber now while you can.”
“No, huh-uh. I won’t be doin’ nothin’ like that.”
“That’s the very first thing they’ll do once they’ve took this place from under you-all, girl. Go up’n cut them woods down to nubs.” He stepped to stand before her and put a hand beneath her chin, raised her eyes to meet his. “Might as well have the dough to spend on your own.” He stood back, plucked a bag of crank from the smoke pocket on his shirt, scooped a load with a long fingernail and snorted, snorted again. He twisted his neck while rubbing his nose and the black dots in his eyes burst wider and darker. He held the bag to Ree. “You got the taste for it yet?”
“Hell, no.”
“Suit yourself, little girl.” He rolled the bag, put the crank away, turned in a circle to inhale the room, stopped suddenly to stare directly at Mom, humming with her eyes closed. He squinted and listened to her disjointed song awhile before turning from her. “She ain’t moved since I was here in April.” He walked to the front door and opened it, then turned to look at Mom again. “This floor, here? I remember when this floor here used to get to jumpin’ like a fuckin’ bunny from all the dancin’. Everybody dancin’ around all night, stoned out of their minds—and it always was the happy kind of stoned back then.”
Ree held the door open and leaned against the jamb to see him leave. She felt blue and ruined, as adrift and puny as an ash flake caught in a tossing wind. Teardrop started his green truck and gunned the engine until it roared, then turned around to head out. The boys stood together beside the rut road to watch him go by, stood a little bit scared and very still, their arms hanging at their sides, faces empty of any telling expression. Uncle Teardrop eased the truck slowly, slowly alongside them, stared at them intently without a word of greeting or gesture of recognition, and with no change in speed drove out of sight.
21
MOM STOOD when asked and Ree dressed her in a white winter coat that was puffy and slick and a yellow stocking hat that had a floppy yellow ball knit at the peak. Ree opened the side door and ushered her outside into the yard. Mom seldom left the house and her face looked anxious. She stepped uncertainly onto the thin snow, first tapping about with a toe before letting her heel come down. Ree held her by the elbow and led her to the steep trail on the north slope. The sun was dropping behind the far ridges, and in such light ice on the trail looked like spilled milk frozen hard.
After each step up the trail Mom would pause and lean back on Ree until Ree boosted her forward again. The routine acquired a working rhythm when Ree began boosting Mom along in that brief second before her pause could become a lean. Brittle ice snapped as boots fell and toes pressed forward. Mom’s breath washed back in gusts to break across Ree’s face. The warmth and flavor of Mom’s breath held sweetness and opened memories. Mom before she was all the way crazy, lolling with Ree on a blanket between the pines, telling windy tales of whiffle- birds, the galoopus, the bingbuffer, and other Ozark creatures seldom seen in these woods but known for generations to live there. The whiffle-bird, a jolly feathered mystery just waiting to be born from shadows hatching
