Part 8 (1/2)
”Comes back next morning, nice fat duck under his arm.”
It looks as if there has been a very significant shrinkage. What we hoped for of course but frankly we did not expect it. And I do not mean that the battle is over, just that this is a favorable sign.
”Dad don't know what to say. Just don't know what to say about it.
”Next night, very next night, sees his son goin' out the door with big bunch of branches in his hand.”
Quite a favorable sign. We do not know that there may not be more trouble in the future but we can say we are cautiously optimistic.
”What's them branches you got in your hand?
”Them's p.u.s.s.y willows.
”Okay, Dad says. You just hang on a minute.
”You just hang on a minute, I'm gettin' my hat. I'm gettin'
my hat and I'm comin' with you!”
”It's too much,” Jinny said out loud.
Talking in her head to the doctor.
”What?” said Matt. An aggrieved and babyish look had come over his face while he was still chuckling. ”What's the matter now?”
Jinny was shaking her head, squeezing her hand over her mouth.
”It was just a joke,” he said. ”I never meant to offend you.”
Jinny said, ”No, no. I-No.”
”Never mind, I'm goin' in. I'm not goin' to take up no more of your time.” And he turned his back on her, not even bothering to call to the dogs.
She had not said anything like that to the doctor. Why should she? Nothing was his fault. But it was true. It was too much.
What he had said made everything harder. It made her have to go back and start this year all over again. It removed a certain - 75*
low-grade freedom. A dull, protecting membrane that she had not even known was there had been pulled away and left her raw.
Matt's thinking she had gone into the cornfield to pee had made her realize that she actually wanted to. She got out of the van, stood cautiously, and spread her legs and lifted her wide cotton skirt. She had taken to wearing big skirts and no panties this summer because her bladder was no longer under perfect control.
A dark stream trickled away from her through the gravel.
The sun was down now, evening was coming on. A clear sky overhead, the clouds had vanished.
One of the dogs barked halfheartedly, to say that somebody was coming, but it was somebody they knew. They had not come over to bother her when she got out-they were used to her now. They went running out to meet whoever it was without any alarm or excitement.
It was a boy, or young man, riding a bicycle. He swerved towards the van and Jinny went round to meet him, a hand on the cooled-down but still-warm metal to support herself. When he spoke to her she did not want it to be across her puddle. And maybe to distract him from even looking on the ground for such a thing, she spoke first.
She said, ”h.e.l.lo-are you delivering something?”
He laughed, springing off the bike and dropping it to the ground, all in one motion.
”I live here,” he said. ”I'm just getting home from work.”
She thought that she should explain who she was, tell him how she came to be here and for how long. But all this was too difficult. Hanging on to the van like this, she must look like somebody who had just come out of a wreck.
”Yeah, I live here,” he said. ”But I work in a restaurant in town. I work at Sammy's.”
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A waiter. The bright white s.h.i.+rt and black pants were waiter's clothes. And he had a waiter's air of patience and alertness.
”I'm Jinny Lockyer,” she said. ”Helen. Helen is-”
”Okay, I know,” he said. ”You're who Helen's going to work for. Where 's Helen?”
”In the house.”
”Didn't n.o.body ask you in, then?”
He was about Helen's age, she thought. Seventeen or eighteen. Slim and graceful and c.o.c.ky, with an ingenuous enthusiasm that would probably not get him as far as he hoped.
She had seen a few like that who ended up as Young Offenders.
He seemed to understand things, though. He seemed to understand that she was exhausted and in some kind of muddle.
”June in there too?” he said. ”June 's my mom.”
His hair was colored like June 's, gold streaks over dark. He wore it rather long, and parted in the middle, flopping off to either side.
”Matt too?” he said.
”And my husband. Yes.”
”That's a shame.”
”Oh, no,” she said. ”They asked me. I said I'd rather wait out here.”
Neal used sometimes to bring home a couple of his Yo-yos, to be supervised doing lawn work or painting or basic carpentry.
He thought it was good for them, to be accepted into somebody's home. Jinny had flirted with them occasionally, in a way that she could never be blamed for. Just a gentle tone, a way of making them aware of her soft skirts and her scent of apple soap. That wasn't why Neal had stopped bringing them. He had been told it was out of order.
”So how long have you been waiting?”
”I don't know,” Jinny said. ”I don't wear a watch.”
”Is that right?” he said. ”I don't either. I don't hardly ever meet another person that doesn't wear a watch. Did you never wear one?
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