Shaking the Sugar Tree Part 4

"Memaw!" he squawked happily.

Grandma!

"Oh, my baby's so big!" she said. "Did you go to Ma.s.s today, sweetie?"

Noah nodded.

"When is your father going to cut this hair?" she demanded. "You look like a girl."

"We don't like haircuts," I said.

"Howdy ho," my brother Bill said. He was three years older than I. He had a shaved head, wore camo shorts and a camo T-shirt, with a pair of sungla.s.ses perpetually perched on the top of his head. He would much rather be fishing, the look in his eyes said. The can of Skoal in his back pocket had left a permanent impression in the fabric.

"I brought some of Eli's clothes for him to try on," Sh.e.l.ly said. "They're in the guest bedroom."

"Thanks," I said.

Sh.e.l.ly was a businesswoman and looked like it. Prim and proper, she was a genuine Southern belle, a good Baptist, a firm believer in hard work and never setting a foot out of line. She ran a tight ship.

"The sleeves on Noah's coat are too short," Mama complained. "Why do you let him walk around wearing this thing?"

"I can't buy children's clothes with food stamps, can I?" I asked.

"Sh.e.l.ly, if you'll watch the food, I'm going to take my grandson to the bedroom and we're going to try on some clothes. What's the sign for 'try on clothes'?"

I showed her.

"Oh, I can never remember all these signs," she complained, leading him away.

"He's getting big," Sh.e.l.ly observed.

"What happened to Mary?" I asked.

"She went with her church group for some fund-raiser or other. She's too embarra.s.sed to be seen with us these days," Sh.e.l.ly answered, a trace of bitterness in her voice.

"She'll be embarra.s.sed when she goes to school with two black eyes," Bill added. "Can't hardly get her out the d.a.m.ned bathroom anymore. She sits there combing her hair like it was made out of solid gold."

"She's fifteen," Sh.e.l.ly pointed out.

"I'll fifteen fifteen her," Bill promised. her," Bill promised.

He talked a good game, but he would never lay a hand on any of his kids. Well, not under normal circ.u.mstances.

"I need a beer," Bill announced.

Mama didn't allow alcohol in the house, but I knew Bill kept beer in the cooler in the back of his truck. I followed him through the house and back outside, where we stood on the porch, drinking ice-cold Coors while listening to KUDZU on his radio. Papaw sat in the rocking chair, rocking back and forth like an old woman.

"Do You Want to Go to Heaven?" floated across the porch. floated across the porch.

"How's FoodWorld treating you?" he asked.

"Not as good as Lane is treating you," I replied.

He was a shift supervisor at a furniture company and spent all day watching over people who pounded together furniture for a living. It was a noisy, somewhat brutal existence, and he had the muscles on his arms and chest to show he'd spent many years of his life in the trenches putting together sofas and recliners and coffee tables.

"You still looking?" he asked, referring to my on-again, off-again job search.

"Sometimes," I said. "Noah keeps me busy."

"You ain't gonna get a decent job by wishing and fishing," he observed.

I said nothing to this bit of brotherly wisdom.

Bill is taller than I am, stronger, bigger; always was, always will be. As kids, we fought all the time. As adults, we rarely get into it. He's a good brother, a good man, solid as a rock. A little religious in his old age, though.

"Could have joined the Marines," Papaw said. Then he cackled at the thought of me being a Marine.

"Thank you, Papaw," I said.

"Probably get thrown out for wearing pink undies and lipstick," Papa added.

"It's all good," Bill observed. That was the Southern way of saying that life is c.r.a.p, so suck it up and deal with it and stop squealing like a stuck pig. He tipped his Coors back, drank it down, and immediately reached for another.

"Probably court-martial you for beating your meat in the mess hall," Papa said.

"Thank you, Papaw," I said firmly.

I heard shouts as Bill's boys played some game or other in the backyard. b.u.mblebee padded onto the porch, wanting attention.

"Mama's thinking about selling the house," Bill said.

"Why?"

"Too big for her. Dad's gone. We're gone. She's here by herself with Papaw. I don't understand why you don't come back and live with her so she can take care of Noah."

"She's probably just talking," I said.

"She's been talking to a Realtor. She loves Noah, you know."

"I hope so."

"She worries about him."

I rolled my eyes.

This again.

"I know you've been a good dad," he said, turning to look at me. "Everybody knows that. But... well, you know. You're by yourself. Noah needs a family."

"He has has a family," I pointed out. a family," I pointed out.

"You know what I mean."

"I thought you were on my side."

"You always were a stubborn s.h.i.t when you got something stuck up your a.s.s," he said.

"And you could never see the forest for the trees," I added.

"What Bill is trying to say is that the deaf boy should have a real man for a father," Papaw pointed out. "Someone who likes a good set of t.i.ts and knows how to scratch his b.a.l.l.s, not someone who's going to teach him how to have s.e.x with a chimpanzee."

"That's what your parents did, Papaw, and look how that turned out," I said.

He grinned.

I turned back to Bill.

"Would you give up your house and move back in with Mom?" I asked.

"No," he said.

"Then why should I?"

"It's not the same."

"You're married. You can make babies so you're better than me."

"Don't start with that s.h.i.t."

"That's what you're saying."

"I'm saying you need help. Why don't you let Mom help him?"

"I have to live my own life," I said. "You know how I am."

"That's the point, isn't it?"

"Whatever."

"Baby brother's mad now."

"Bite me," I said.

"Sh.e.l.ly and I would be happy to take care of him."

"Oh, thanks. Maybe I could live in your garage."

"Or maybe you could cut your hair and get a decent job."

"Not a whole lot of jobs for writers."

"I meant get a real job, not sit around with a thumb up your a.s.s writing about UFOs."

"I have never written about UFOs!"

"UFOs, vampires, crops circles, whatever the h.e.l.l it is, it doesn't pay the bills."

"Thank you for believing in me."

"Bite me."

"You might want to be careful before you say that to a gay man. Never know what they might do."

"Ain't that the truth."

Noah came out onto the porch, wearing shorts and a T-shirt that once belonged to Eli.

I want to see the rabbits!

"Come on," I said. "We're gonna go see the rabbits."

"Watch out for the anaconda out there," Papaw added. "b.a.s.t.a.r.d ate the mailman the other day and now the mail's always late."

We walked around the side of Mama's house out to the back where there was a large barn with a long row of rabbit cages inside. Her chicken coops were full, and dozens more wandered around pecking at the ground. Mama bred both rabbits and chickens and sold them and kept herself supplied with eggs and rabbit stews and a little bit of cash on the side. It was an odd hobby for a former schoolteacher.

We made our usual inspection tour, peering into rabbit cages, checking water bottles and feed bowls, and breathing in the scent of hay and rabbit pellets.

Watch out for snakes, I warned, because snakes were a problem at Mama's house what with all these rabbit and chicken McNuggets walking around. I warned, because snakes were a problem at Mama's house what with all these rabbit and chicken McNuggets walking around.

One of the four-wheelers was parked inside the barn, the key still in the ignition. Mama used it to haul away fallen tree branches and other debris that she burned out back.

"Come on," I said, hopping onto the four-wheeler.

Noah beamed, clambering up behind me. I moved him around so he could sit in front and do the driving while I did the supervising, knowing Mama would have a stroke, but he had to learn sometime.

7) H is for h.o.m.o

"LET'S SAY SAY grace," Mama said when dinner was ready. grace," Mama said when dinner was ready.

Noah was to my right, Sh.e.l.ly to my left. Bill and the boys were on the other side of the table. Mama was at the head. Papaw sat in Daddy's place.

We made the sign of the cross clasped hands.