Big Man

It takes until the dust clears and my adrenaline levels return to normal for me to notice the other occupant of the driveway. The beat-up blue pick-up truck parked on the far side of the house, back to the porch like it’s awaiting a delivery of lumber or something practical.

Probably one of the county assessment guys, come to survey the property and figure out how much it’s worth. Crap. I didn’t expect them to beat me here.

It doesn’t matter, I remind myself as I put the car in park and grab my Hermès purse—a purse that earns me a million compliments a day back in NYC, but which feels somehow out of place here, too much. I ignore the instincts tickling at the back of my mind. That’s just my country self talking. The girl I used to be before I escaped this hellhole.

I face the pickup again and throw my door open. Who cares what these surveyors think? And me dusting the place a few times isn’t going to make them assess the property value any higher. They’ll pay me what they want to pay me for it, no matter what.

I can find a nice charity to donate it to. Something Mama would’ve loved. I think about those sad-eyed dog commercials on TV, the way she used to tear up every time the music started playing. I’ll look into donating to the ASPCA for her. That would make a nice memorial.

I’m still thinking about sad puppies when I take my first step out of the car… and promptly shriek, toppling forward, barely catching myself on the car door before I face-plant in the mud.

Mud.

Because of course, it rained here last night. And we don’t have a cement driveway. Not even a proper gravel one. “I don’t see the sense in splurging on something like that when our trucks can handle this road just fine,” Mama always said. When I pointed out that sometimes visitors’ cars might not be able to navigate the dirt road, she just grinned. “Exactly. The road weeds ‘em out for me.”

Mama was never big on strangers visiting. Hell, even when friends popped by to visit, she always needed alone time to recharge after they left. The ultimate introvert.

I pull my high heels out of the mud with a horrible sucking sound and teeter on them while I slam the door closed. Dammit. A perfectly good pair of Luis Vuittons caked in country muck. At least I was smart enough not to wear the suede boots I almost put on this morning, dressing for my flight at the crack of dawn. These are leather—I have hope the mud will wash off.

I shoulder my purse once more, square my shoulders, and face the short walk to the porch.

Shit.

Now that I’m looking at the house head-on, it looks a lot more run-down than I remember. I didn’t stop by last time I was here—I just went straight to Mama’s hospital bed, and stayed in the hotel next door the whole visit. It’s been fifteen years since I last stood in this driveway. Since I hopped into my crappy pickup truck, just barely holding itself together long enough for one last road trip. Since I filled the truck bed with my every worldly possession, kissed Mama goodbye and drove three days straight to NYC. Since I stomped on that gas pedal and never looked back.

I take a halting step toward the house, my mind more full of images of the way it used to look than the dilapidated structure before my eyes. I spot the tire swing out front, the one Mama had our neighbor Beck hang for me. Shockingly, it’s still there, the worn rope he used to hang it apparently a hell of a lot thicker and sturdier than it looked.

Past the tire swing, a few of the apple trees out front have sickened and died. They’re still upright, hanging on just barely. I’ll need to cut those down, I know, before a storm passes through and sends them crashing down on their own, wreaking more havoc. At least I can chop up the wood, fill the wood shed out back and have more than enough to spare for winter, when the wood-burning stove in the kitchen eats pine by the belly-full.

Then I stop and shake myself. What am I talking about? I’m going to be back home by winter. Safe and snug in my apartment, rent paid, utilities included, any breaks or wear and tear the landlord’s problem, not mine.

I push open the rickety front gate, which shrieks on rusty metal hinges, and then shriek myself as I promptly fall in an ankle-deep hole. Luckily I catch myself on the gate before I hit the ground, but it’s enough to make me grit my teeth in frustration, reach down and, despite the early fall chill in the dirt, yank off my heels, one after the other.