I woke up to a cloudy, chilly Mother’s Day. Ben planned to ride his motorcycle to Tennessee to play a show in Knoxville, and asked if I wanted to tag along, but I felt blue. I lied and told him I had other things I needed to do. Instead, I moped around all morning remembering my mom who’d died six years earlier. I regretted that she died suddenly before I had a chance to mend the rift that came between us. Sometimes things can’t be fixed, nor can anyone turn back time. Not only that, but I hated being unemployed and the uncertainty that comes with it. The interview seemed to go fine, but I suspect they chose someone else for the warehouse position.  

I spent most of the day watching movies, but later on as I was folding clothes and putting them away, I noticed a small piece of paper fall to the floor beside my bare feet. I picked up the handwritten note and all it said was, “call Darrell Sunday night 589-484-2120.”  I couldn’t remember meeting a Darrell. Where’d the note come from?  As I was cooking dinner, it dawned on me. The note was from the two girls I’d met in the laundromat. I walked back to the TV room  and dialed the number.

A woman answered, I told her my name and asked for Darrell. She had a concerned tone to her voice and asked why I was calling. The minute I mentioned work, her voice became more pleasant, then she called him to the phone. Darrell’s voice sounded rough with a heavy accent. He wasted no time and got right to the point. “You want work? I got work.” He gave me directions and said to be there bright and early at 5:30 AM. The darkness I felt earlier had lifted.  Having work gave me a sense of purpose and hope.

My alarm went off at 4:30 am. Monday morning and it was still quite dark. Groggy and half awake, I shuffled to the kitchen and brewed a pot of coffee, cooked a fried egg sandwich and gave Buddy food and water. I threw on a warm jacket and sat on the porch swing to eat breakfast as Buddy did his business. My breath hung in the crisp air. I rarely got up this early since leaving the Army. The birds hadn’t even started singing yet.

Within twenty minutes, I was on the road, singing along with nervous excitement to classic rock songs playing on the radio. Upon reaching the outskirts of town, I noticed a glow on the horizon through my rear view mirror. I passed what used to be my pappaw’s farm. It’s a sad thing to live in a dying town like Millersburg. It had seen its heyday back in the mid 1800s up through the mid 1900s when it was a thriving community producing hemp, tobacco, flour and lumber. Something happened along the way. Once the interstate highway was built, the two lane road and the small rail line couldn’t support growth, and thus began its gradual decline into ruin. Now it’s just a relic of better days and a shell of its former glory. Ain’t no jobs here, and drug use is rampant, yet somehow my former neighbors seem to persist despite all the odds against them. I grew up believing that a better future lay elsewhere, and yet here of all places, I find myself coming home.

Upon reaching the other end of town, I crossed the bridge near the road that led to Ben’s house. According to my directions, Darrell’s driveway was just past an old brick farmhouse to the left. The car ahead of me turned onto the same driveway. I followed behind it through fields of grazing cattle. A little house sat at the end of the gravel road. Three cars and two trucks were parked out front as people stood outside milling about. I pulled up beside the car in front of me and parked. I got out and walked towards them. An obese, middle-aged woman with huge breasts dressed in sweats and a straw hat cackled loudly. Two young men who appeared to be friends leaned against a car laughing with the woman. One was a hefty, blonde dude wearing jeans, a Metallica t-shirt and a nylon blue jacket. The other guy was thinner, wore jeans, a thick black jacket, and a red ball cap. The passenger doors of the car beside me opened, it was the two girls from the laundromat. Susan stood and stretched.  Cindy emerged from the back seat yawning. A big hulking redneck wearing dirty jeans, a blue flannel shirt, and a red bandana tied around his head, got out from the driver’s seat scratching his ass.

“Damn it Suzanne. Did you forget to bring the god damned cooler?” he snarled all rough and grumpy, but despite a face full of stubble, a fu manchu mustache and long black hair pulled into a ponytail, he wasn’t a bad looking man.

“Glad to see you made it,” Cindy said, snapping her gum as she sashayed towards me.

Everyone seemed friendly except for the big guy hovering over Susanne.  The bigger woman sat against her car with the window open playing the radio. It was close to sunrise when Darrell came out of the house. Nearly my height, he wore a dirty jean jacket and a black ball cap. His jet black, shoulder length mullet jutted out in back. He didn’t have a beard, but his face was covered in thick stubble.

“Hey guys, you ‘bout ready to start?” He mumbled in a thick southern accent. His teeth looked too straight as if he wore dentures. “You kin foller me back to the beds. It’s ‘bout time we got started.”

We got in our vehicles and followed single file, back towards the front gate.  To our left, there was a field behind a fence. Darrell stopped his truck in front of the gate, undid the wire latching, and pulled the gate wide open to allow the cars to enter. As soon as we were all inside, he closed the gate behind him. In this field, there were three long beds covered with a thin, white gauze. Darrell pulled up the wire stakes that held the cloth down and revealed a thick mat of tobacco seedlings nearly half a foot tall. He marched to his truck and grabbed piles of burlap bags and handed us each a bundle. He also had some long wooden benches in his truck that stretched the width of a tobacco bed, so that we could sit on, without trampling the plants as we pulled.

The sun  peeked over the horizon, and the tall grass was wet with dew and cold. My pant legs were soaked by the time I got to the beds. We each took a bag. I sat next to the larger women who introduced herself as Charleen. Right away, she demonstrated how to pull only the medium sized plants with straight stems without bruising or breaking them. We knocked off the dirt from around the roots and placed them all facing  the same direction on the burlap bag.

Charleen noticed that the two boys sitting beside her had a pile of mangled plants, so she slid closer to show them the right way to pull plants. On the other bed, Cindy and Suzanne sat on one end chatting away, while Darrell and Suzanne’s boyfriend Rodger, sat on the other end. Darrell pulled out a pouch of chewing tobacco from his pocket and offered a big chaw to Rodger. They both spit a nasty black liquid as they talked. My hands stung from the cold, wet mud and my back itched from mosquito bites.

About an hour later, the sun dried up all the dew. My hands were muddy and tired, but I didn’t feel cold anymore, so I took off my jacket. I pulled a few bundles, and latched the ends of the burlap with a wire hook. Once a few bundles were finished, we placed them on the back of Darrell’s pickup.

Later that morning, once the entire back bumper of Darrell’s truck was stacked high with burlap bundles, Darrell drove Cindy, Suzanne, Charleen, and Roger with him to the fields to ride the setter.

Soon after that, an old man drove up in a beat-up truck asking where Darrell was.

“Last I saw of them, they got in his truck and headed out to the fields to plant,” I said.

“Ahh okay, well I guess I’ll just help you guys then,” said the short white haired man, as he sat down between me and the two boys.“Howdy boys! My name’s Oscar. I’m Darrell’s dad.”

The husky dark haired boy wearing a black Copenhagen cap and the beginnings of a goatee stood and said, “I’m Bobby Pagett and this is my cousin Jerry.”

“Pleased to meet you boys. Good thing you’re here getting some work done, er else you’d be laying up in bed jerking off all day.”

The boys gasped and snickered.

“Nuh uh!” said Jerry.

“Why the hell not? If I was young and full of cum like you boys, I’d be doing it any chance I could,” said Oscar.

Bobby and Jerry giggled and turned their heads.

“Oh you think it’s funny huh? Just wait till you get to my age. Some days you’re just lucky if you can get it up.”

He kept me and the  younger boys laughing as he told dirty jokes about pussy. 

“You boys get much pussy?” He said, in a loud rough voice.

“Yeah, all the time,” bragged Bobby.

I laughed, but kept quiet. The dirty jokes kept coming and then finally Oscar asked me if I had a girlfriend or if was married. I told him no, because I’d just moved back home after serving in the Army.

The old man looked impressed, “So were you in the Gulf War?”

“Yeah, I was there.”

“You see any action?” he said.

“Yeah a little.”

Bobby perked up and said, “Wow! did you kill any Arabs?”

I thought about it for a moment and said, “I don’t know. I shot at them from a distance but really didn’t see the outcome. I did see a few dead bodies of the ones that others had killed.” But I lied, I really didn’t want to get into the details with these kids.

I got asked a few questions about the army and what it was like. I was glad because it got them off the subject of pussy and especially my sex life. Bobby talked about his uncle who served in Vietnam. It got me to thinking about my own reasons for joining so long ago. I saw the gleam in their eyes as I told them of my experience in the Army. I knew that look all too well. It’s probably the same yearning look that sailors have in their eyes when they hear the voices of the Sirens. The military has this mystique of seducing the spirit of young men with hopes of becoming a man. The type of man that other men admire and respect is something men value highly. This ideal image that so many men cling to yet so few attain. I heard the same tune when I had doubts about my own masculine identity and my discovery of my homosexual desires. The Army sang the promise of being able to take a boy and turn him into a man of honor and in my mind that meant turning me from a homosexual into a heterosexual. I spent my life chasing that vague illusion of what a man is supposed to be. Wanting desperately for my father’s blessing and stamp of approval that never came. As we told war stories to these two wide eyed young men, I remembered not how the army had changed me, but how I came to see that no one really has any of the answers to life and that all of us fumble. I suppose I should’ve told them the truth, that the army can’t really make a man out of them, and they are really just working for the oil companies, but why deprive them of that myth. I think all men crave the right of passage into manhood like a torch being passed down through the generations from father to son. It’s a holy and sacred rite, but many of us never get to experience that in modern culture. Part of me felt glad to add my part to that myth.

The morning flew by fast and by lunchtime, it got hot. The sun was blazing. I knew that I was going to be sore and stiff by  the next day. Oscar kept us amused all morning with his tall tales. Bobby tried his best to tell equally funny stories, but they just came off as awkward.

We all looked up to the sound of tires rolling over gravel.   Darrell’s red truck was kicking up a cloud of dust. The truck stopped on the trail between two of the tobacco beds. Darrell stepped out and walked around to the back of his pickup and opened the tailgate. He placed a big cardboard box there along with a cooler. Suzanne, Cindy and Rodger jumped off the back of the truck. Charleen opened the passenger side door, walked around and sat on the tailgate.

Jerry, the tall skinny kid with monkey ears, grabbed my shoulder. “Travis they brought lunch.”

Bobby who was covered in sweat looked up  and smiled.  “Oh, fuck yeah!” he said. “I’m hungry as hell.”  

Oscar stood up, stretched his back, shook off the dirt and said, “Bout time you got here. I was thinkin’ maybe you forgot all ‘bout us. I hope dat’s lunch you’re bringing over in the box.”

“We didn’t forget about you, Dad. I made ham and cheese sandwiches, some chips and I hope you like Sprite and Pepsi,” said Darrell.

Oscar, Cindy and Charleen  dug through the lunch box.

Darrell put two fingers in his mouth, whistled, and said, “Go ahead and grab yourselves some sandwiches and pop. No need to be shy here.”

It felt nice to be taking a break. My back ached from bending over all morning. The sun felt warm on my bare arms after I stripped down to a t shirt. Rodger and Suzanne took their food and sat in their car together, while Darrell stood outside talking to Charleen  as she sat in the passenger seat of her car, eating and listening to the radio. The rest of us sat on the long boards above the beds. Cindy sat between me and Bobby, apparently enjoying the attention that Bobby paid to her. She laughed and played with her pony tail that poured out from under a blue bandana. They both attended Paris high school, but at different times, she being nearly seven years older than Bobby. Jerry smiled and  listened to everyone else talk. He tended to be the quiet one. Every so often, Jerry would catch my gaze and blush, then look away.

Halfway through lunch I heard Rodger yelling about something.  He scolded Suzanne using the most vile words.

“I’m sorry, I forgot,” she said cowering.

“What the fuck! You springing this crap on me now!” he growled, as Suzanne held her head down. “Fuckin Bitch! How can you be so damned  stupid!” He said, flailing his beefy arms.

Cindy jumped up and yelled back, “Don’t you be talking to my sister like that you bastard!”

Rodger turned and smirked. “Keep out of this Cindy. This ain’t none of your business.”

Suzanne held up her hands and smiled, “It’s okay. I’m fine. I’m fine!”

Darrell walked over to talk with Rodger. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but whatever it was, it seemed to be over. Cindy leaned over and whispered, “Rodger’s a fucking asshole. He treats her like shit and she just takes it. I just wish she’d leave that jerk.”

“So why does Darrell put up with Roger treating her that way?” I asked.

“Because Darrell and Roger are cousins. Darrell’s a nice guy, but Roger’s a prick. I wish she’d just leave his sorry ass.”

I looked over at Rodger and could see the attraction. He wasn’t a bad looking guy, dark hair and bearish, but he was a bully who had a bad temper and no respect for women.  

The drama died down and all seemed fine for the moment. After lunch, Darrell got back in the truck and drove off back to the fields. Charlene and Oscar traded places on the setter. Near the end of the day, everyone looked tired. Charleen  stripped down to a white tank top. Being a big woman, her large breasts nearly plopped out of her shirt each time she bent over the wooden boards.  Everytime she wiped her sweaty brow, Bobby and Jerry would stare at her sunburnt breasts and snicker to themselves. It  broke  the silence of being too tired to talk.

The shadows cast by the late afternoon sun were a sign that this long day would soon end. My back and hands ached, and all I could think of doing was getting home, taking a hot bath and drinking a big glass of sweet iced tea with Buddy on my porch swing. Our skin was cast in golden light as the last rays of the sun fell upon us, that was when Darrell’s truck came kicking up dust down the dirt road towards us.

Darrell got out and said, “Time to go home boys.  Be back bright and early cause there’ll be plenty more of this same shit tomorrow.”

Bobby jumped up and announced that he was going to Paris to get drunk. Charleen stood slowly, stretching her back, then brushed the sweaty hair away from her forehead. Bobby ran to his beat up blue Honda, as Jerry hung back a ways behind him. I caught him staring back at me a few times, but then he would look away as if shocked. I didn’t know what to think of it.  A little thrill perhaps. It was probably nothing, but just enough to make me wonder…

I got in my truck and noticed  thousands of crows circling the sky, moving as one undulating mass, as they were preparing to roost in the trees near the creek. The sky was filled with cawing and bickering. All the commotion seemed to be coming from Ben’s direction. His house was just over the hill towards town. I decided to surprise him.

I turned up the hill on that narrow strip of road. It was already quite dark, because the trees formed a canopy, blotting out what light was left in the sky. I came upon the last house to the left. All the windows were dark. His motorcycle was parked out front so I assumed he was home. I got out and walked up to his front door. It was deathly quiet. No light, no sound except for the crows cawing and circling the trees. Should I really expect him to be here? I’d come unannounced and we never made plans, so I chickened out and headed home without even knocking.

The next morning I arrived at Darrel’s farm before the sun came up. I was early and noticed Charleen’s car parked next to the tobacco beds. Her lights were off, but she was sitting in the driver’s seat. I parked nearby, and sat listening to the morning news on the radio for about five minutes as it grew lighter. I lit a cigarette and rolled my eyes to the lyrics to some twangy, good ole boy, country song blasting away on her stereo. I glanced over, her big bologna roll arm was waving, beckoning me to join her. I got out and approached her black Trans Am.

She poked her head out the window, smiled and said, “Morning Travis. How are you t’day?”

“I’m fine and you?”

“Good as to be expected…She  raised her head up, slightly cocked to the side, then sorta winked, “You know, I was sittin’ next to Cindy on da setter yesterdee when she starts telling me how she met you at da laundree mat. I think Cindy kinda likes you, ’cause she been saying how cute she thought you was,” she said, in a loud whisper. “Well, she asked me if I knew if you were taken or not, and I said I didn’t know. I said I didn’t notice any weddin’ band on his finger. Well I ain’t normally one to be spreadin’ gossip, but I know Cindy got herself a boyfriend already and she just likes to flirt. Now if you’re married and have a girlfriend, then you just tell me to mind my own business, but I just thought you might want to know.”

She looked at me eagerly, hoping for an answer. That hit me out of the blue. I was stunned, and not quite mentally prepared to leave my comfort zone and come out to people I just met. Suddenly in the spotlight, I was being interrogated by a woman who could be part of an audience from a Jerry Springer show.  Women like that can be dangerous, especially in Bible country.

“Uhhh well… No, I’m not married or anything… Just getting over a bad break-up and not thinking about dating right now.” Good answer, I thought to myself, but it was the start of a lie, even though I left it vague as to how long ago this break-up occurred.

“Oh, I’m sorry Travis. I know that can be a hard thing to go through,” she said.

“Its okay. Just something I don’t normally want to talk about.”

She reached out and patted me on the arm. “I’m truly sorry, Honey, I know exactly what it’s like. Been there, done that.”

Bobby drove up and parked his truck next to mine. Jerry sat in the passenger seat staring at me, not smiling, not frowning, but looking as though he were lost in thought. I pretended to be looking elsewhere as Jerry’s eyes scanned me.  Bobby seemed more interested in his cigarette than me or Jerry’s awkward gaze. Suzanne and Roger arrived next. Roger got out and strutted over to Charleen, boasting about something.  Suzanne waved when she saw me, then looked away as if she feared Roger might catch her.

The sun broke out over the horizon, making the dew on the white cloth covering the beds shine.  I was careful not to brush up against the dew soaked grass as I helped remove the covering. It was then that Darrell and Oscar showed up.

Darrell walked up to me and said, “Hey Travis, have you ever rode on a setter before? Cindy called this morning and said she has to take her little boy in to see the doctor ’cause he got a peanut stuck up his nose.”

“Yeah, I rode one back when I was in high school right up before I joined the army.”

“Were you any good at it?  You know you got to be fast,” he said, squinting one eye.

“I think so. No one ever seemed to complain.”

“Well good, cause I can use you on the setter today.”

Darrell had us pile in his truck. Charleen sat up front and Roger,  Suzanne and I hopped in the back of Darrell’s 4X4. Darrell sped off with us clinging to anything welded to the truck. The wind made me shiver and my eyes were blinded by tears. He honked his horn when he stopped in front of the cattle gate. I suppose that was our cue to get out and open the gate so they could drive through. My pant legs were soaked again. Once back on board, he drove across the bumpy field, those of us in the back desperately trying to hang on.  

The tractor sat before a large freshly plowed field, and hitched behind it was the setter. The bundles of plants were stacked in a neat pile on the ground. There are four seats to a setter that face the opposite direction that the tractor travels. I took the seat second from the left. Charleen to my left, Roger beside me on my right and Suzanne to the far right. Darrell picked up some burlap bundles and placed one on a small platform in front of each of us. We each removed the metal hook that held the burlap ball together and the bag fell open. Darrell started the tractor and lifted the setter up in the air, then he carried us slowly to the harrowed field.

He hollered out, “Ready?” We each responded yeah.  He set us down and as he drove forward, the revolving wheel with the curved blades opened up like two hands cupped to receive the young succulent tobacco seedling. I grabbed the plants with my right hand and fed the plants to my left hand, roots facing forward and leaves towards me. As the wheel turned, the hands grabbed the plant tighter, carrying it downwards, behind a plow that cut the dirt allowing the roots to be placed below the surface. Once the plant was released, it was watered, and dirt pushed around the roots, by the setter. Charleen would place a plant, then it was my turn to place a plant, back and forth, back and forth. Sometimes if I got hung up, Charleen could quickly place hers then one of mine and then hers again. I could catch hers if she got hung up. It became mechanical. We could talk and keep in rhythm at the same time. Click clock, click clock was the sound it made as the wheel turned. The sound alone could tell you when it was time to place a plant.

By mid-morning the sun had warmed things up. Being on the setter felt much better than being bent over the tobacco bed. You can sit straight all day. Charleen and Rodger joked and flirted with each other all morning. Rodger talked like a big shot, bragging about some drag race he had been involved in. His huge biker arms caught my attention. A flaming skull with a sword through it covered most of his upper arm. His nose appeared to have been broken at one time and he had one chipped front tooth which led me to guess he had been in a few fights.

Despite her baggy dirty clothes and being a mother of three children, Suzanne was a beauty.  But unlike Rodger, she was friendly, sweet and a bit shy, but I think that shyness may have been her fear of Rodger. She recoiled every time Rodger raised his voice and he seemed to get a kick out of it.

Charleen was a big woman in her forties, and nearly my height. Most notable thing about her was her huge breasts. She wore a blouse that could hardly contain them, and every time I looked her way, I noticed that she wasn’t wearing a bra. Her exposed skin was beet red where the sun shone. Her dark auburn hair, combed into a ponytail, was covered by a straw cowboy hat. Her upper arms were like big rolls of bologna and much bigger than mine. The way she talked back to Rodger assured me that she had the confidence to take him in a fight. She seemed to like me well enough, but I certainly didn’t want to get on the wrong side of her. We worked well together. I found the momentary tangles in the young plants to be a little exciting and we would laugh as each of us quickly produced a plant for the revolving arms of the setter.

By the end of the day I was tired and dirty. I wanted to get back home to see if Buddy was okay. I kept him in a fenced in area in the back yard so he could run and play, but I imagine he was lonely there all by himself. It was dark by the time I turned onto the gravel road that led to my house. As I parked the truck and got out, I could hear Buddy barking. I walked around to the back yard and opened the gate and said, “Sit”, and he sat down and wagged his tail. “Good boy!” He gave me lots of licks and then he shot out of his pen and ran in circles. “You miss me Buddy?”  I opened the back door and Buddy ran inside.

I took a hot shower, turned on the TV and heated some leftover spaghetti. I called up Ben to see what he had been up to. I told him I dropped by, but he said he’d been out walking on the tracks and had met a new friend named Bill, a big mentally handicapped guy with long hair and a full beard, who seemed like a big kid. Ben found him sitting alone near the tracks beside the road with a sore ankle, and walked with him to see that he made it home to his mom and brothers on the other end of town. I told Ben that I worked close to where he lived, and he told me to drop by.

                         Wednesday May 15

It was another foggy morning with a chill in the air, so I ran back in to get a jacket. I heard Buddy barking in the pen. I knew he hated being alone all day, but I couldn’t take him with me. I considered asking Cody or Ben if they would mind watching him during the day. On foggy mornings, it was nearly impossible to see cars coming down these narrow one lane roads. As I pulled out from the driveway onto the road and traveled maybe 50 feet, I thought I saw the figure of a man standing beside the road. As I got close enough to pass him, the figure vanished. I shuddered and looked back, but it was gone. The antipsychotics seemed to keep the black-outs at bay, but I still saw strange things from time to time.

I pulled into the driveway at Darrell’s farm, rode down the bumpy path through the fields and arrived at the meeting place beside three long rows of  tobacco beds. Bobby’s beat up rusty old red truck was parked beside Charleen’s black Trans Am and Oscar’s Blue Dodge Ram pick-up.

Oscar leaned against Charleen’s car as I walked towards them and said, “Hell no! I ain’t about to bail ’em out.”

“That asshole can go rot there as far as I’m concerned,” said Charleen. “He ain’t nothing but a troublemaker.”

“Who’re you talking about?” I asked.

“Talking about my no account nephew, Rodger. Him and his buddies got all drunk last night, then came back to his apartment and started pickin’ on little Hank and got him to crying. Then Sam stepped in and told Rodger to leave him alone. From what I hear Rodger pounced on Sam and the two of ’em got into it swinging. Suzanne tried to break it up and Rodger wound up hitting her upside the head and cracked one of her ribs. She had to go to the hospital and Rodger wound up in jail. Now that’s what I was told last night when my sister called me up asking me for money to bail his ass out. I told her no. He needs to stay in there a few days to think about what he just did. Taint gonna hurt em,” said Oscar, all mad and red in the face.

I could see the lights of Darrell’s truck coming towards us. “I guess that means we’re at least two people short today,” I said.

Darrell’s truck pulled up beside mine, he rolled his window down and said, “I guess Daddy done told y’all what happened.  Rodger and Suzanne ain’t gonna be here today and Cindy says she is running late, but she’s gonna be here.” Darrell stepped out of the truck and spat some chaw. “What we’re gonna do is, all of us are gonna pull for a few hours till we get enough plants to start with. Daddy, if you don’t mind driving the tractor, I can be on the setter.”  

“Maybe you might wanna try out one of them boys on the setter. They gotta learn sometime,” said Oscar.

“Okay, so which one of you boys wanna be on the setter today?”

“I’d like to try it, if you don’t mind,” said Jerry, hoping that Bobby would agree.

“Sure, don’t much matter to me none,” said Bobby.

The fog was slow to burn off. Everything was wet and soggy and I felt so cold. About a half hour later, Cindy pulled up in her Blue Honda Civic. She got out and walked over to Darrell.

“Don’t think Suzanne’s gonna be back. She got hit pretty good, but she kept her kids home from school today, cause she said she was gonna spend the whole day packin’ up her stuff and moving in with Mom till she can find her own place. Said she was gonna do it while Rodger’s in jail so he won’t try to stop her,” said Cindy.

“I used to think Rodger did good by meeting Suzanne and taking in those kids, but he had no right to treat her the way he did. I don’t blame her for moving out. She always seemed like a very sweet girl and Rodger always had a nasty temper when he drinks,” said Darrell, shaking his head.

“I hope they keep the son of a bitch in there for a while! If he had tried that shit with me, I’d have knocked his ass out!” said Charlene, raising her fists.

When she said that, I looked over and raised my eyebrows at Jerry and Bobby for a second and then I heard them snicker. I didn’t want to tangle with Charleen either.

We all pulled plants for a few good hours until we had a couple dozen burlap bundles sitting on the bumper of Darrell’s truck. The sun finally cut through the fog in places and it was definitely brighter.

Darrell got up and said, “Charleen, I want you, Travis, Cindy, and Jerry there to hop up in the truck. I think we got enough plants to keep us going for a while.”

As we walked to his truck, I noticed Jerry smiling at me shyly. He was a nice looking young man, but I wasn’t sure what his interest in me was. Perhaps it had something to do with me being in the army or maybe it was flirtation. We piled into the back of the truck and Jerry sat across from me. Occasionally our eyes met. He didn’t smile when I caught him looking, but there was contentment in his eyes. Once we arrived at the fields, we jumped off and walked towards the setter.

“Jerry, I want you to sit next to Charleen. She’s a good teacher,” said Darrell.

“Oh, I’ll break the boy in,” said Charlene, tossing her hair back,”

Jerry looked disappointed as he took the middle left seat beside her. I climbed up and took the middle right hand seat beside Jerry.

“Is it okay if I take this one?” I said, looking for Cindy’s approval.

“Sure, it’s okay with me,” said Cindy.

I noticed a slight grin from Jerry as I sat down. There was definitely something going on with him.

Darrell plopped two big burlap bags on the wooden platform in front of us, one for Charleen and Jerry and the other for myself and Cindy. We broke apart the big mud clumps from around the roots and separated the individual plants in our hands. Darrell raised the setter up and drove us out into the field. He lined his tractor up even with the rows and then lowered us down right where he wanted the first plants to go.

Cindy smiled, turned to me and said, “So Travis… Did you miss me yesterday?”

What a loaded question. I had nearly forgotten about Charleen telling me that Cindy was asking all sorts of questions about me and that she suspected Cindy had a crush on me.

“Yeah, I noticed that you were gone.”

“I had to take my little boy in to see the doctor because he had gotten a peanut stuck up his nose. It was more scary than it actually was. The doctor says he sees stuff like this all the time with little kids.”

“Well he’s a cute, bright, little kid,” I said.

“Oh isn’t he though..?” Cindy said, smiling and patted me on the knee.

I felt awkward. On my left a handsome young man who seemed to have some interest in me and on my right was this pretty woman who seems to be flirting. I glanced over at Jerry, but caught Charleen looking at me, nodding as if I remembered the conversation we had the previous morning. I nodded back, and felt a feeling of dread pour over me. This was going to be an awkward day for me. I dreaded answering questions about my sex life. I certainly wasn’t in a mood to come out to a group of country folk who listen to country music and watch NASCAR.

“So Travis, I hear you were in the Gulf War?” said Cindy. “What was that like? I saw pictures of oil wells burning over there. Did you see that?”

“Yeah, the smoke was everywhere and it stunk. The stench lingered on everything. It made us sick.”

Jerry perked up and said,” Did you have to wear your combat fatigues and boots everywhere?”

“Yeah, we had to wear ‘em everyday except when were allowed to wear civies to town or on leave.”

“Did you have to do push ups and sit ups and lift weights too?” he said.  

“Yeah, I guess they didn’t want us to get fat sitting around guarding stuff all the time.”

Jerry tried to keep the conversation going on about the war for a while, but Cindy got antsy and finally it came out.

“So Travis, are you seeing anyone now?”

Oh crap, I felt my stomach drop.

Charleen spoke up and said, “Now don’t be bugging Travis. He just got out of a bad relationship.”

Not a lie, but not exactly the kind of relationship they imagined.

“What happened? Cindy said, acting all interested.  

“Don’t think I feel ready to talk about quite yet,” I said, letting out a sigh of relief.

I didn’t have to come out to them, yet left the door open as to my availability in the future. It kinda ended the conversation rather quickly. Then in those awkward moments of silence, Charleen broke in by asking Cindy more about what had happened between Rodger and Suzanne and the subject of my personal life was spared for the rest of the day. I did find moments during the day when Charleen was distracted, and I was able to observe Jerry. He caught me looking a few times and smiled back. I was engaged in a slight flirtation ever so subtly between us. Cindy looked over, smiling on occasion and I’d smile back, but only in a friendly manner so not to have it interpreted as flirting.

By the end of the day I was tired, but also a bit horny from the slight flirtation between us. I still had a big crush on Ben, but it seemed rather pointless to pursue anything beyond a friendship with him as much as I wished it could be different. Darrell drove us all back to our vehicles, where we all waved goodbye to one another. As I drove towards the gate, I looked in the direction of Ben’s house. I did say that I’d likely drop by on the way home from work. The sky was clear deep blue in the twilight. Crows were flocking again towards Ben’s house. I got on the road, but instead of crossing the tracks, I turned right onto Ben’s street.  I rode under the dark canopy of trees that lined his road and parked next to his motorcycle. Ben was sitting on his porch, carving a piece of wood with a pocket knife.  On the step beside him, sat a large hillbilly who looked like he came right out of the mountains with stringy long brown hair and a long scraggly beard. Ben looked up and waved.

“Hey Travis, how was work today, my friend?”

“It was very, very interesting, that’s for sure.”

“Hey Travis, this here’s my new friend, Bill, I told you about. He’s the guy I see walking all the time on the railroad tracks,” said Ben.

“Nice to meet you, Bill.” He looked at me and grinned, and said a quick hi.

“You don’t say much do you Bill?” I said.

“Oh yeah he does. You ask him a question about wrestling and he’ll talk for hours. Won’t you Bill?” said Ben, winking at me.

“Yeah.”

“So you a big wrestling fan?”

“Yeah, I like Randy Savage, Hulk Hogan and I like the Undertaker. Did you see where the Undertaker beat up Sting the other day? Mom said she was going to get me a belt just like Sting’s got…”

“Well nice to meet you Bill. I need to get going just stopped by to say hi real quick. Gotta get back and let Buddy out of the pen. He’s been a bit lonely there all day by himself.”

“Travis, why don’t you drop him off here during the day? I can watch Buddy while you’re working and he can keep me company while I’m making furniture.”

“You don’t mind?”  

“Oh not at all. Me and Buddy get along just fine.”  

“I’m glad. I’ve been feeling so guilty leaving him alone all day by himself.”

“Well it’s settled then. You can drop him off on the way to work.  You’re just over the next hill if I need to get in touch with you. Almost yelling distance. Oh by the way Travis, do you mind driving Bill back to the other end of town. It’s a bit dark out and he shouldn’t be out so late. His mom might get worried.”

“Sure no problem. You want a ride home Bill?”

“Yeah, okay,” he said    

We got in the truck and waved goodbye to Ben. I drove down the hill and crossed the railroad tracks on the way to the main highway. I looked over and Bill was looking straight ahead. I guess he must be shy.

“So Bill, what do you plan to do when you get home?”

“Eat supper.”

“Oh yeah? What about after that?”

“Uhhhhh, watch TV.”

“Oh Yeah?  What are you going to watch tonight?”

“Did you see the Undertaker versus Sting? It was on last night,” he said, as his eyes lit up. He began to tell me step by step blows that happened in the ring.

I just nodded and said, “Oh yeah?” He continued non stop until I asked, “So Bill, where’s the street you live on?”

“Not yet, not yet.” Finally he blurted out, “This one,” as I turned on to his street near the other end of town. “Ben said I can ride on his motorcycle.”

“Oh yeah? Have you been on one before?”

“Nope… But I will. He said I could. I’m gonna live in California one day. Pretty girls live in California.”

“That sounds great, so are we getting close yet?”

“Yep.”

“Where is it, Bill?”

“Uhh, you just passed it. Dares my mom’s car.”

I stopped the truck and Bill opened his door before I could turn around.

“Bye Travis,” he said, without turning around, walking straight towards his house.

“Bye Bill.”

The next day we pulled from the beds for a few hours then Darrell had me, Cindy, Charleen, and Bobby on the setter. Bobby said he wanted to have a try at the setter and Jerry said he was okay working alone, but gave me a disappointed look. We hopped on the setter and Charleen took her normal spot on the far left. Before Cindy could get up, Bobby climbed up and took the middle right seat leaving Cindy a choice between sitting in the middle between Bobby and Charleen or on the far right side next to Bobby. Either way she was not going to be sitting next to me. Cindy took the seat on the far right and chatted away with Bobby all morning. Charleen and I remained quiet.

After lunch Cindy came back and said she’d spoken to Suzanne. She told her that she needed to move out of Rodger’s house as soon as possible and that she couldn’t stay with her mom. She asked us if we knew of any cheap apartments that were for rent. She said that Suzanne couldn’t stay with her mother because they would be sleeping on the floor.

I thought about it for a minute or two then said, “You know, I suppose if she wants, she can use the upstairs of my house until she can find a place. I have three empty bedrooms upstairs and have been putting in an upstairs bathroom. It’s kinda far out in the country, but if she doesn’t mind the drive then she and her kids are welcome to stay.”

“Thanks Travis, I’ll talk to her tonight, but from the way she sounded, she really doesn’t have many options,” said Cindy.

I gave Cindy my number for Suzanne to call if she decided yes.

For the rest of the afternoon, I thought about the invitation I’d given this woman I hardly knew, along with her three kids. The reality started to sink in. I really wasn’t used to being around kids or a woman. It would only be for a very short time.