They had come five hundred miles to meet strangers simply because Harry said it paid to patch things up. Typically, Ethan didn’t have an opinion. Patch what up? With Dixie who would rather hang out in the country making crafts out of cornhusks that she sold to tourists heading out to the beaches on the coast? Taking his child back to live with the grandparents didn’t seem like a bright idea. Reconcile? Did Dixie even want to? In spite of his misgivings, Ethan packed a bag and went along, following his father out to the old sedan and throwing his duffle into the trunk. Following someone else’s lead was a bad habit. He didn’t often take risks but he would this time because Harry suggested he do so. Harry said family came first but he used it as an advertising slogan. Ethan thought they were never a family, not a real one. They just looked like a family from the outside when they lived together as father and son. The same might be said about his time with Dixie. But that had been a while ago, eighteen months in the past. Since then he had changed some things about himself. He hoped for the best. He tried harder now. He thought about consequences before he acted. Now he saw Dixie’s life had changed too. He made concessions to her transformation. He noticed things. Of the six cars parked in the farmhouse yard – three pickups, a Jeep, an oxide red Ford – he recognized only Dixie’s purple Volkswagen Beetle because hanging from the bumper were high school pom-poms.
“Let’s meet the in-laws,” Harry Williams said with his typical enthusiasm.
So Ethan went along.
He was overcome when he saw Dixie. She looked the same as always — blonde, lean, and beautiful. He tried to think of something to say as she led the way back through the dark halls up the steps into the living room where her brother Will ate a bowl of cereal. “Howdy,” Will said in a put-on western drawl. He lifted himself out of his relic Morris chair and shook Ethan’s hand. Will had a long stringy beard; the beard hid a habitually dour expression.
“No trouble now,” he said.
“That’s all in the past,” Ethan answered. “I’ve come in peace.”
He was making a joke but Will didn’t notice.
“You intentions better be good.”
“They are. I’m a new man. I came here to apologize.”
“You should meet everyone,” Dixie said. Her short dark-blonde hair had once been long and golden. In a soft voice she called up the stairs. “Visitors are here. You’ll come down and say hello.” There were tramping feet above, and then loud footsteps on the stairs. Aimee came down first. The child had blue eyes bright as lamps, a high forehead like her mother, and a chunk of ash blonde hair. She raced across the room, and then upon seeing her father, she stopped.
“Hey,” she said and looked down at the floor.
“Aren’t you glad to see me?” Ethan said.
“Hello,” Aimee said. She went up to Dixie and held her hand.
There were two big men and a woman with a baby in her arms. The two men wore brand new Sears and Roebuck farmer’s overalls stiff as cardboard. The taller one smoked a corncob pipe. The other chewed tobacco. The woman wore a brightly flowered smock and was broad-hipped and plain. Her attention was on the baby fussing in her arms. She rocked her baby back and forth and spoke in a low, soothing whisper.
“This is Claire, Daffodil, Fossy, and Moon… The baby’s name is Cleopatra,” Dixie said, leaving it to Ethan to figure who the adult names belonged to. “Aimee,” she said turning to her daughter, “at least give your granddad a kiss on the cheek.”
Harry leaned over and patted her head, flattening the yellow ribbons tied into a blonde chunk of hair. Aimee was skinny and tan with a saddle of freckles across her nose. “You bring me anything, Grandpa?” she said.
“Not this time,” Harry said. “I’ll get you something when we get back home.”
“How about you?” Aimee said.
“What about me?”
Ethan reached out to touch her blonde ribbons but she stayed just beyond his fingertips.
“Did you bring me a present?”
Ethan lunged to snatch her up but she was dancing and bobbing around, stamping her feet just out of his reach.
“It must be no,” she said.
Ethan shook his head and tried to make a funny face. “I can buy you something tomorrow,” he said.
Aimee frowned and skipped backward across the room to Dixie.
“I can buy you a present now.”
“No you can’t. It’s too late,” Dixie said.
“Please Momma!”
“How about it, Dix?” Ethan said. “We could take a run to town in Harry’s car. We could buy ice cream sodas too.”
Dixie said no in that faraway voice that had always ended their talks.
•
The two big men began watching a baseball game on TV. They went to opposite sides of the large room and sat in identical wing chairs in front of tall bare walls. One chair had a coil spring hanging under the seat like a spit curl.
“Would you like a chair, sir?” Will asked Harry. He hefted a baseball bat that had been leaning in a corner. He took a few half swings and then held it like a shotgun in the crook of his arm.
“We’ve been on the road a long time, I’ll stand,” Harry said.
The short woman sat herself on the arm of Will’s recliner. She nursed baby Cleopatra. No one seemed to know what to say. Shafts of sunlight pierced the holes in the old window curtains. Momentarily, Dixie brought out a pitcher of ice tea and a stack of plastic cups. The two men drank and so did Will and so did the short girl who did up her blouse and introduced herself.
“I’m Claire,” she said.
“Tea?” Dixie offered.
“No thanks,” Harry said.
“Just water,” Ethan said though he thirsted for the tea.
“Our water stinks,” Aimee said gleefully.
“That’s no way to talk!” Dixie said.
“It comes up rusty from the old pipes.”
“Shallow well, probably an old cistern,” Harry said.
“You got that right,” answered the fellow smoking the pipe.
“If you don’t like it here, you can leave, anytime,” Will said.
“I didn’t mean no disrespect,” the man said.
“You better not have.”
For some reason Ethan could think only of Aimee’s hair; giving her the first cut, the blonde clippings had scattered like pin feathers over the sheets. He scarcely remembered Aimee as an infant, and he watched with detached fascination as the short woman, Claire, carried her infant into another room where she sang a lullaby and played a guitar. She had a piercing soprano voice that sounded almost ghostly. It was difficult for Ethan to imagine caring for a child. Instead Ethan thought of how much he missed Dixie. He could not look at her. He looked down at the scuffed shoes, assessing the deep scratches and the grain in the floorboards. He saw dust motes rolling across the big room like miniature tumbleweeds.
•
He went outside then and sat on the stoop to bolster himself against his disappointment. He admitted out loud that he knew nothing about raising children and that he had no idea why he had come. One of Harry’s slogans was “families are everything that matter in the world.” Harry believed in families and at every opportunity he reminded Ethan of their importance, often giving his advice on those long haul truck runs when they worked together. Then Ethan was a captive audience and he likened these rambling talks to brainwashing. He would listen to Harry’s gravelly voice rising to a scratchy crescendo when demanding Ethan make everything right for Dixie and Aimee. Ethan saw his point but when he tried to explain it wasn’t entirely his decision, Harry became insistent. “What kind of man are you!” He bellowed so loudly that Ethan, at the wheel, almost swerved the truck off the highway. Afterwards, Harry wouldn’t let him finish driving the route. Thereafter, Ethan sat fuming, demoted to the passenger seat while Harry drove peering owl-eyed over the steering wheel challenging the world and Ethan’s assumptions through the windshield’s smudged glass. The engine sounded loud and raw; it was angry noise that thundered through the floorboards, Ethan remembered.
Sitting hunched on the stoop and looking out into the quiet disarray of the undergrowth Ethan imagined the roar of that engine. In the glare orange dots floated over the briars and across the sky. When he blinked them away there was a silver gleam lying flat on the horizon. He saw his wife and daughter standing together. He let his vision adjust to the brightness of the sunset while looking through the bare trees out into the fields. The sun’s warmth hung on the rain gutters and on the shingles. He wondered if Dixie felt it or if she even paid attention to such things. Aimee tugged at Dixie’s fingers. She wanted release but Dixie didn’t seem to notice. She stared, her eyes fixed on something faraway. She seemed to be searching for something out there on the horizon, and Ethan realized after all the time they had spent together, he did not really know her and doubted she knew much about him. This feeling of strangeness made it difficult to speak. He thought Dixie recognized it too, because after releasing Aimee, she stepped away. Aimee dashed down the steps and with great bravado proceeded to perform sweeping ballet movements back and forth across the yard. They both applauded but when Ethan spoke to Dixie, he felt he was calling out across a great distance. She had a far-off look and had her arms crossed hugging her shoulders.
“I was hoping you’d be here,” he managed to say after an uncomfortable silence.
“I’m always here,” she said. “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
“I’m very glad to see you,” he said.
Dixie smiled absently — a practiced smile that showed her perfect teeth white as pearl.
“Watch me tumble,” Aimee said. She bounced and rolled and then flopped down on her bottom in a clump of weeds.
“Be careful you don’t cut yourself on a piece of glass, honey,” Dixie said.
She took a step toward Ethan, and he caught a whiff of perfume. He wrinkled his nose, as if a stiff breeze had lifted it from a garden. But there was no garden, only the brown mass of weeds. He found himself reaching for Dixie. He thought he had misjudged her intention but then their hands slid comfortably in place. It made him lightheaded to touch her. He thought about sweet Aimee. He thought about taking them home to Greenwich Village. He saw the bewildered expression Dixie wore as if she had just awakened from a deep sleep. She had always dreamed of strange places — huge dark cities with narrow streets and ornate buildings; lush parks with graceful stone fountains and tall statues that lined the massive boulevards. In a thick sleepy voice he had adored, she had described the white linen daffodils in fluted vases in the windows of brasseries, the formal gray of liveried doormen who manned their posts outside the gilded entrances of glorious hotels. She spoke of her dreams in a whisper; her descriptions were precise even down to the spoke wheels of the long automobiles that roved the streets.
Aimee came back to her mother’s side and leaned her forehead into Dixie’s hip.
“Nice performance,” Ethan said. “We could find you dance lessons in New York.”
“Dance lessons,” Aimee crooned as if savoring the words.
“Nothing is settled,” Dixie said. It sounded like a question; one Ethan could not answer.
“I thought we could just spend some time,” he said.
Some time. He had scarcely made it out of college. He admitted that Dixie, four years behind him, had been smarter than he, more studious, more organized. He admitted that in every way she was the stronger personality. One semester of chemistry; one of courses in sociology, she never finished though she had planned to — a plan spoiled by Aimee’s birth. He found it difficult to admit that he was jealous of Aimee — that as she became a person, he just got older. For a time he had supported them driving his father’s refrigerator truck delivering prime beef to supermarkets. He had been paid well though it was hard to work four AM to midnight three days a week, often stopping overnight to sleep at a motel. Sometimes he worked with Harry and sometimes with a helper who was paid more than he and in cash. He quit after six months just in time for his name to come up on the register for a government job at a Social Security office. There he filled out benefit applications for people embarking on retirement. Though regimented, the work was easy enough except that it forced him to think about his future as he was thinking about it now. Seeing all those people marching toward retirement, their wrinkled faces frowning with uncertainty, depressed and frightened him, and he bravely tried to imagine that his life would turn out another way. He would be someone with hope. This imagined person was a stranger though he supposed he had encountered a number of retirees who remained hopeful even as they aged. In his roundabout way, he asked them questions about themselves but never discovered their secret. Nevertheless, because he had a family, he continued working until the day Dixie took Aimee and fled back home to North Carolina.
•
Ethan and Dixie stood on opposite ends of the living room. The baseball game was on. The men shared some weed rolled in a long fat cigarette. There was Fossy, the man who had complained about the taste of the well water, and his twin brother, Moon. Harry took a turn as well. Ethan had never before seen his father get high. It was all bravado to him. Ethan watched every detail. When Harry inhaled the smoke, the glowing ash crackled and hissed; the expanse of his face narrowed and his complexion resembled the color of an oxidized penny. Ethan noticed that his father’s eyes, normally a gray blue like his own, brimmed with a deep purple color ready to overflow. “Good stuff,” he warbled. He made a two finger victory sign and passed the smoldering cigarette along to Will who clamped it between his teeth and sucked hard.
“This is premium grass grown in the rich earth of a Carolina farm,” Will said.
“That’s North Carolina, Uncle Will,” Aimee screeched.
“Aimee!” Dixie scolded.
“But it is North Carolina not just any old Carolina.”
“Little pitchers have big ears,” Dixie said.
“How about the two of you?” Fossy said. He offered the fat cigarette, and sucked on his pipe.
Ethan looked hesitant because of Aimee’s presence. Dixie made a sour face.
“You dumb cluck! My sister’s got a thing about smoking,” Will said.
“Sorry to hear that,” Moon said. He was Fossy’s younger brother by fifteen minutes.
Aimee looked to her mother. “Should I go upstairs?” she asked.
“No, you stay by me. We’re going to go back outside soon as we get you a sweater.”
Dixie rummaged through the closet under the stairs and pulled out a sweater from a cardboard box.
“Everything’s such a mess,” she said as if thinking out loud while Aimee twisted the sweater over her head and wriggled it onto her torso.
Ethan pointed back down the hall to the front porch. Smoke clung to the ceiling like cobweb, and the pungent odor offended his nostrils. He wanted to breathe the fresh air and feel the breeze rolling across the field. Dixie’s face registered bland acceptance and she followed, with Aimee in tow, making their escape through the front door.
Now the sky was a darker gray and the air more brisk. The tree branches swayed in the wind. Ethan suggested a walk, and they tramped through the yard passing a rusted cultivator crouched low in the tall weeds like the carcass of a prehistoric animal, and into the field of bramble and razor grass. They walked on a rutted dirt path that had once conveyed farm machinery.
“Along time ago this all used to be all tobacco and soybeans,” Dixie said.
“Tobacco and soybeans,” Aimee said skipping ahead.
“Don’t put your fingers in your mouth.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing happened,” Dixie said. “My granddad was the farmer and he died. You know Daddy moved us around because of the army. He was never here.”
“Looks like Will thinks he’s got some farmer in him.”
“Will thinks a lot of things, mostly of himself.”
They had walked a quarter mile from the house when they saw Harry on the dirt path following after them. He called to them, waving his hand and jogging to catch up. He was out of breath when he caught them. “Christ!” he said. Gulping air, he bent over from the waist. “I thought you were leaving me behind.”
“You and Will looked like you were enjoying yourselves just fine,” Dixie said.
“I don’t smoke that stuff. I cupped it in my palm to look like I did but it never touched my lips — something I learned from a friend of mine, an undercover cop.” He cupped his hand to his mouth in what seemed to Ethan an unconvincing demonstration.
“You know an undercover cop?” Ethan said.
“Yah, I know one, Morris Kornhauser. Did you think I was making it up?”
“I didn’t think anything. I just asked.”
“Maybe we should quietly pack up Dixie’s belongings.”
Dixie looked upset. She stood tall and straight and stared into Harry’s face. “I’m not ready to,” she said.
“I’m staying with her,” Ethan said.
Aimee tied a long skinny batch of weeds into a necklace. “Momma, if we go can I pack my own suitcase?”
“We’re not going anywhere,” Dixie said.
“You can’t just walk off,” Ethan said.
“I’m going home,” Harry answered. “I’ll give you fifteen minutes to decide.”
“I’m staying.”
“Is Grandpa coming back with a present?” Aimee asked.
“It’s his business what he does. Don’t be so nosy.”
They watched Harry pick his way down the path toward the parked cars. There was nothing much to talk about. For a short while they shared a tree stump and sat watching a flight of crows swoop low over the bramble. The crawl of traffic on the interstate miles off disrupted the quiet. They could see smoke trails floating up on the horizon from diesel trucks hauling lumber from Kentucky. Thin purplish exhaust trails snaked low on the sky and drifted slowly off toward the foothills. The sky had coarsened to the color of slate and the farmhouse sat like a big dark box on the crest of a hill. Now there were lit candles in the ground floor windows — a faint yellow light shining through the panes. An oval moon climbed the tree branches. The path took them further from the house where no trespassing signs had been posted along a barbed wire fence. It was there inside a chain link fence that they saw row after row of tall vines tied to stakes and tented under sheets of dark plastic. In the distance they heard the hoarse insistent barking of dogs.
“Where is Granddad going?”
“Nowhere. Back to the house.”
“Is he coming back?”
“Maybe. It’s his business. Don’t be so nosy.”
“Goodbye Granddad!”
“He’s too far away to hear you,” Ethan said.
“I think you should go with him,” Dixie said.
“I want to stay.”
Dixie put her head down and continued to walk along the path. Ethan walked beside her, and although they were shoulder to shoulder he felt she ignored him.
“There’s Uncle Will,” Aimee shouted. She pointed across the field to Jeep headlamps. Their silver light showered the tall brush scattering rabbits and partridge. The bramble shook as they made their escape. Then the Jeep came down the rutted path and jerked to a stop. Will sat behind the wheel puffing his pipe and Harry was beside him in the passenger seat giving instructions. The big motor throbbed.
“Don’t go past the fence,” Will shouted over the engine noise.
“We know that,” Dixie shouted back.
Will shut off the engine. In a few moments they could hear the crickets ringing.
“I’m not ready to go,” Ethan said.
“Uncle Will,” Aimee said.
“Not now,” Dixie said.
“They’re just strolling under the stars,” Harry said.
“I don’t see any stars,” Aimee said.
“Little pitchers have big ears,” Harry said.
“Anyway, you can’t walk out here, even at night,” Will said. “It’s better for all concerned if you don’t know the specifics.”
“Brother Will! At least show some decent manners,” Dixie said.
“Don’t lose your cool,” Will said. “This is serious.”
“Calm down,” Harry said.
“How serious is it?” Ethan said.
Will leaned over the wheel. When he set his chin and puffed out his jowls, he looked like a scruffy bulldog ready to fight. “Keep your eyes peeled for freaking crop duster copters with searchlights,” he said.
“Uncle Will is swearing,” Aimee said.
“Aimee, turn your butt around and start back down the path to the house, please.”
“It’s too dark, Momma. I can’t go by myself.”
“Then button your lip and let the grownups settle this.”
“Why don’t you two go for a walk,” Harry said. “Let Will and me take her back to the house?”
“I’m not going anywhere with Granddad. He smells like pinecones.”
“That’s just his aftershave,” Dixie said.
“We’ll go in my truck, sweetheart,” Will said.
“Why don’t we let them do that?” Dixie said.
“They smoked an awful lot of grass,” Ethan said.
“They look all right to me,” Dixie said.
“Yah, I’m all right. Not even fuzzy,” Will said.
“I don’t think so. Look at their eyes. They could run off the road,” Ethan said.
“It would be worse having to carry her all the way back to the house,” Dixie said.
“Really I’m all right,” Will said.
“I’ll look after the little one,” Harry said. “No need to worry.”
They watched Harry take Aimee by the waist and hoist her onto the running board.
“Don’t worry, Sis. I’ll drive slow,” Will said.
“Can I ride in back, Uncle Will?”
“Sure, just keep your head down.”
“No you can’t,” Dixie said. “You’re no hound dog.”
“Oh Momma,” Aimee cried and stamped her foot on the running board. She climbed into the front seat next to Will and sat there pouting with her arms folded across her chest.
“My good friend Uncle Will and I can handle this,” Harry said. “Ain’t that right, Will…? Aimee, you can sit in my lap.”
“No!” Aimee said, pouting.
“Watch your hands,” Harry said. He moved into the seat beside Aimee and slammed the door shut. Then he rested his arm on the window frame and gently stroked Aimee’s hair until she pulled away. Will pressed the ignition and the engine roared.
“You go on now,” Dixie hollered. ”But drive slow.”
Will touched his fingertips to his forehead and gave a mock salute. “You watch for them copters,” he said.
They drove off in a trail of dust; the big truck wheels kicking dirt and stones. Ethan and Dixie walked a little ways on the path counting the rows of tall vines. They counted fifty-six rows before they stopped.
Ethan didn’t feel all that good about letting Will and Harry look after Aimee. He wished he had spoken up more and now that he was alone with Dixie he wanted to say something to her about it, but he refrained from doing so because he didn’t want to spoil the moment. So he remained glumly silent while walking next to Dixie and chewing a blade of grass. She still was beautiful, he’d give her that, but he felt a change in her he couldn’t understand. The silence between them made him uncomfortable and without realizing it, he suddenly blurted out:
“Your brother is an idiot!”
“Your father was stoned and lied about it,” Dixie snapped back.
“Yes, I saw his eyes. His pupils looked like jellybeans.”
“Ethan, please don’t exaggerate.”
“I want you back, baby.”
“It’s just going to be Aimee and me for a while.”
“How long?”
“I don’t know, Ethan — awhile.”
“How you going to take care of yourselves?”
“I have some money.”
“From where?”
“Certainly not from you.”
“From Will, I bet.”
“I’m not answering.”
“I’m your husband, dammit. We don’t have to go back up north. We could stay here.”
“I don’t think I’m ready to just yet. I’m not sure I even want that.”
“What about Aimee?” Ethan said.
“She doesn’t even know you.”
“I’m her father.”
“Her father! When’s the last time you sent her anything.”
“I haven’t found another job.”
“Well isn’t that just like you. Quitting a job thinking you were too good for and winding up with nothing.”
She started to walk away. Fat tears rolled down her face and dripped off her chin like rainwater overflowing a drainpipe.
“Christ, I didn’t want things to turn out this way,” Ethan said.
Dixie dried her face with the palm of her hand. “Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain,” she said.
They started back down the path toward the farmhouse. Ethan couldn’t look Dixie in the face. They might well have been strangers: people who had never crossed paths much less a bed. He kept his head down following the dirt path for a while before he looked up. The sky was overcast and starless. The moon, a blur, shimmered over the trees. Back across the field he heard shouting. He thought he recognized Harry’s gruff voice. He might have been telling off someone. The other voice might have been Will’s. The shouting went back and forth though the words were unclear. Then Will’s Jeep, with its headlight beams fanning out across the field, backed out of the driveway. Watching it roar down the twisty country road, Dixie let out a long weary breath. Her shoulders sagged in a way that made Ethan sad. He understood there was nothing more to say. Coming here had been useless. Suddenly, Dixie stopped in the middle of the path and looked up at the sky. “Take care of yourself, Ethan… I need to get back to Aimee,” she said.
George L. Chieffet grew up on a small farm in Dix Hills, New York. He received an MFA from UNC Greensboro, drove a minibus, and played softball in a beer league. He also briefly edited a CCTV security magazine and taught at UC State San Fernando as well as a college in Luxembourg G.D. Later he worked as a LCSW in the Bronx Hospital Psych Ward. Recently, he has had work accepted in Per Contra and The Suffolk County Poetry Review. He lives in New Jersey and works in NYC.