Tim Sandlin - Skipped Parts

At the cemetery, somebody had built a big fire to unfreeze the ground enough to dig a hole. They’d had to use shovels because they couldn’t get a backhoe through the snow. The shovels were leaning against other markers.

Maurey and I stood back by a cottonwood tree. She said, “He had a tumor in his head.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Dr. Petrov did an autopsy. He told Daddy a tumor the size of a split pea was why Bill had been hitting Oly the last few months and growling at people. Bill didn’t have control over those things he did.”

“That ought to make Oly feel better.”

“Why?”

The day was all blue and sparkly white. Whoever planned the cemetery put it where family and friends could stand and contemplate an amazing view of the Tetons and the mountains off to the south. The trees behind us practically buzzed with joy at being trees, and a raven circled up by the sun. The only man-made thing in sight was the rodeo grounds, and the stands weren’t painted or anything so they looked natural as trees.

I guess it’s great being buried in a breathtaking spot, but the contrast between looking at the casket and looking around at the world must confuse mourners. It made me feel funny.

Three older guys in uniforms stood in a line and fired a shot into the air. When the gray-suit guy said a prayer I looked around and saw Buddy Pierce had his eyes open in an unfocused gaze toward Yellowstone. Then his eyes shifted and looked at me. I looked down at my feet.

Sam Callahan lay in the plain pine coffin with his hands folded over his sternum, his blood drained away, replaced by a liquid chemical.

One by one, his family and friends walked past his dead form—his mother and grandfather, his coaches and teachers. Each girl placed a single red rose upon his chest. Charlotte Morris, the Smith twins, Hayley Mills, his baby-sitter from Greensboro, the receptionist at Dr. Petrov’s in Jackson. Maurey Pierce came last and her rose was white as snow on the Tetons.

Maurey touched his still hand and said, “You were too young to die, Sam Callahan. We all feel a loss.”

Then two funeral directors lowered the coffin lid and Sam’s face was touched by light for the last time forever.

Oly stood with his hands at his sides, tiny and cracked and completely disoriented in his suit and hat. The entire marriage and funeral system is set up to make men who work hard feel foolish. I mean, not only was Oly’s lifelong sidekick going in the dirt, but now he had to dress like a monkey and deal with the hordes.

Poor guy looked like he’d been hit between the eyes with a mallet. He had the slowest blink I’ve ever seen. After the ceremony, he didn’t move, just kept looking into the hole. Buddy stayed right next to him, like a bear protecting a skinny bird.

“I’m not in the mood to go back to the VFW and eat,” Maurey said.

“Is that the plan?”

“Why do women always think food helps?”

She went to tell her mom we were walking back to town and she’d be home later. Annabel was over by the cars and trucks talking to Howard Stebbins. While Maurey explained the deal, Stebbins stared at me meanlike. I guess he didn’t approve of the friendship, though I couldn’t see how it made crap to him. He probably thought of me as the slimy outsider come to stain local girlhood.

I asked Maurey about this as we followed the county service road the half-mile or so into town.

“Is there a gossip line on us yet?”

Maurey was wearing a dark blue dress and black stockings and new snow boots. Though it was a nice day, I think she was cold. “We’re children to these people.”

“When they see you coming out of Lydia’s cabin they don’t suspect ugliness?”

“If we were a couple years older they’d be vicious, we’re beyond their fantasies so far. Stebbins thinks your mom might offer me a cigarette—be a bad influence.”

“Lydia would never do that.”

“Mom’s afraid I’ll go down to the White Deck and be exposed to french fries. She has this idea that grease is only one step from decadence.” Maurey raised her arms out wide and turned around to walk backward. “I don’t like winter.”

“What’s that got to do with gossip?”

“We are no longer discussing gossip. We’re thinking how nice it will be at the TM Ranch riding horses with Dad this summer.”

“I wasn’t thinking about that.”

“The TM is up that canyon.” She pointed to a crack in the hills. “When the snow melts I can ride my bike up in an hour. I have a horse named Frostbite. He’s trained for vaulting but he can run barrels like you wouldn’t believe.”

The terminology was past my grasp. “Vaulting?”

“Tricks, you know, back mounts, reverse croupers, split-kick dismounts; like a gymnast on a vaulting horse, only our horse gallops. It’s fun.”

“Sounds like a good way to break your neck.”

“Frostbite wouldn’t do that to me. He’s my baby.” Her blue eyes had an in-love misty look.

“What color is he?”

Maurey turned back around to go forward again. She did a little dance step that came out klutzy on account of her boots. “He’s a skewbald gelding, five years old but he thinks he’s a colt.”

“Skewbald?”

She turned on me. “You’re the most naïve kid I ever met.”

Which is one hell of an attitude if you asked me. I guess naïve is someone who doesn’t know what you know. Maurey had never seen a live Negro, so in North Carolina she would be naïve. Neither one of us carried a gun, so in New York we’d both have been naïve. I think. At least I knew that naïve is only a matter of place. Maurey still thought there was a standard.

She stopped walking for a second. “Whenever I try to think about how being dead feels I end up wanting to have more sex. Isn’t that odd.”

“So let’s go to my house.”

“I want a Fudgsicle first.”

On the edge of town Maurey showed me how to cut between the Highway Department plow sheds into an alley, that ran behind the triangle stores. When we came through the Talbot Taxidermy backyard this little snot of a kid was teasing a snot of a dog with a kitten.

The kid held the kitten up over his head while the dog jumped and howled to get at it.

Maurey screamed, “ Pud .”

The kid looked over at us with no expression. He had burned bacon-colored hair and a holey nylon coat that seemed stuffed with mattress filler. His jeans were all bloodstained, his shoes spotted by pink cat guts. A kitten head lay on the snow under the prancing dog. Other kitten parts were strewn about the yard. I almost threw up.

Maurey started toward Pud and he lowered the kitten to the very top of the dog’s jump. “I’ll feed Stonewall.”

Maurey froze, her fists closed tight, the veins on her neck gone rope. I drifted off toward the porch to get a better angle at the snot.

“Tell your boyfriend to quit sneaking.”

Maurey’s lips barely moved when she spoke. “You kill that kitten you’re gonna wish you hadn’t been born.”

Pud studied Maurey out of one eye. The dog was going nuts, barking, leaping, drooling blood from the other kittens. Ugly dog, no tail, box of a body, snubby head—everything repugnant in an animal.

The kitten put out a tiny mew . I eased in closer.

“Mom told me to kill the kittens.”

“Did she tell you to feed them to Stonewall?”

Pud shrugged. “She said drown ’em. What’s the difference?”

“Give the kitten to me. That way you won’t have to kill it.”

“I want to kill it.”

“You do and I’ll hurt you real bad.”