Percival Everett - The Weather and Women Treat Me Fair

“What kind of fish are those?”

The man let his eyes find me slowly and his smile was a few beats behind. “Why, they’re steelhead.”

“They don’t seem to be very interested,” I said.

The man turned back to his line and said nothing.

I watched a bit longer, then climbed back to the road. In South Carolina fishing was done quietly, in private, for creatures hidden from view. At least a man could say, “Aw, there ain’t no fish here.” But this seemed like premeditated self-humiliation.

A boy at the house told me I’d find his father in one of the stables. I wandered into the near one didn’t see him, but I caught a mare nosing around her hock. I found a halter on a nail outside her stall and put it on her, tied her head up.

“What’re you doing there?” a man yelled at me.

“She was nosin’ around her hock and I saw it was capped and had ointment on it. I raised her head up so she wouldn’t burn her nose.”

“What do you know about capped hocks? Who are you?”

“Are you Mr. Davis?”

“Yeah. I’m waitin’”

“Name’s Cooper. I heard you had a job open.”

“What do you know about horses?”

“I know enough to tie a horse’s head up when I’m trying to blister her.”

“Where’re you from?”

“Carolina.”

“North?”

“No, the good one.”

Davis rubbed his jaw and studied the mare. “We don’t get many blacks around here.”

“The horse said the same thing.”

“Five hundred a month. Includes a two-room trailer and utilities.”

Davis had twenty-three horses, most pretty good, and a lot of land. He rented rides to hunters and to anybody who just wanted to get wet in the woods.

The first thing was to clean out the medicine chest. The box was full of all sorts of old salves and liniments and I just had to say aloud to myself, “Pathetic.”

Davis had stepped into the tack room without me noticing. “What’s pathetic?” he asked.

I sat there on the floor, thinking oh no, but I couldn’t back off. “All this stuff,” I said. “Better to have nothing than all this useless trash.”

He didn’t like this. “What’s wrong with it?”

I looked in the box. “Well, sir, I appreciate the fact that this thermometer is fairly clean, but better to have a roll of string in the chest than keep this crap-crusted one on all the time. This is ugly.”

“So, you’ve got a weak stomach.”

I shook my head. “You’ve got ointments in here twenty years old. Why don’t you grab the good stuff for me. Where’s the colic relief? You’ve got three bottles of Bluestone and they’re all empty.”

He didn’t look directly at me, just sort of flipped me a glance. “Fix it,” he said and left.

There were no crossties, so I had to set up some for grooming. I was currycombing a tall stallion when Davis’s son came into the stable.

“Hey, Joe,” the kid said.

“Charlie.”

“Mind if I help?”

I looked at the teenager. It was really a question. As a boy, I would have been required to work the place. “I don’t know,” I said. “Your father might think I’m not earning my pay. Don’t you have other chores?”

“No.”

I didn’t understand this at all. I looked around. “I tell you what. You comb out the hindquarters on Nib here and then dandy-brush his head. I’m gonna shovel out his stall real quick.”

The boy took the comb, stood behind the horse, and began stroking.

“No,” I said and I pulled him away. “Stand up here next to the shoulder, put your arm over his back, and do it like that. So, he won’t kick the tar out of you.”

Charlie laughed nervously and began working again. I shoveled at the stall and watched him. He was a nice boy. I couldn’t tell if he was bright or not, he was so nervous. I stopped and listened to the rain on the roof.

“Does it ever stop raining?” I asked.

“One day last year.”

I laughed, but he just stared at me. Then I thought he wasn’t joking. “You’re not saying—” Before I finished he was smiling.

“How’d you learn about horses?” he asked.

“Grew up with ’em. You don’t spend much time with the animals?”

“Not really.”

“People say that horses are stupid.” I fanned some hay out of my face. “And they’re right, you know. But at least it’s something you can count on.”

Then Davis showed up. “Charles.”

The boy snapped to attention away from the horse and, glancing at the currycomb in his hand, threw it down. “I asked Joe if I could help, Daddy.”

“Get in the house.”

The boy ran from the stable.

“He’s a good boy,” I said.

Davis picked up the comb and studied it. “I’d appreciate it if from now on you just sent him back to the house.”

“All right.” I leaned the pitchfork against the wall and moved to take the horse from the crossties. “He’s got a bunch of chores in there to take care of, does he? Homework and stuff?”

“Yeah.”

Davis looked around at the stable and at the horses, at the stallion in front of him. “The other stables look this good?”

“Gettin’ there.”

It was a fun-time job, all right, and I went to bed sore every night. Finally, I took a weekend off and drove the hour to Portland. I got a hotel room downtown on Saturday and tried to figure out what I was going to do all day. I went to the zoo and a movie, ate at a restaurant, watched bizarrely made-up kids at Pioneer Square, saw another movie, shot pool at a tavern, and went to bed. I dreamed about women. You work ranches and you talk about women and you talk about going to town to get yourself a woman, but you end up watching movies in dark rooms and shooting pool with men.

After a big breakfast at the hotel restaurant, I headed back to the ranch. The weather in Portland had been nice and, to my surprise, the sun was out all during my drive home. I parked by my trailer. Charlie was splitting wood over beside the house. Seeing him doing this made me feel good. I went inside and stowed my gear. There was a knock.

“Come,” I said.

Davis came in. He had a bottle with him and a couple of glasses. “How was your trip?”

“Oh, it was a trip.”

“Mind if I sit?”

I nodded that he was welcome and watched him fill the glasses. “You like bourbon?”

“You bet.”

“Here you go.” He handed the drink over.

I took it and sat with him at the table. He knocked his back and I followed suit He poured another round.

He cleared his throat and focused on me. He had already had a few. “You’re all right, Cooper.” He leaned back. “Naw, I mean it.” He sipped from his glass. “You want to hear how I lost my wife?”

I didn’t say anything. I just looked at him.

“Killed herself.”

I had a headache.

“Know what she died of?”

“A sudden?”

He frowned off my joke. “She took pills. She was an alcoholic and a diabetic and a Catholic. All three, any one of which is fatal alone.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

He drank more. “They said she was manic, too.” He looked out the window at the sky which was growing overcast. “Charles is a good boy.”

“He’s quiet.”

“That’s my fault, I guess.”

“That’s not a problem.”

“He’s small, you know.”

I just looked at him.

“I don’t have a lot of patience. I don’t have a lot of friends either. I guess the two go together.”

“I reckon.”

“Tell me something, Cooper. What do you think of a man who can’t talk to his kid?”

I swirled my whiskey in the glass and held his eyes.

“I’ve got a temper. A bad one.”

I nodded.

“You want to hear what happened at Charlie’s school last year?”