Anne Tyler - The Tin Can Tree

Out in the back yard Joan could see her uncle – just his head and his crumpled blue shirt. He was tilting back on an old kitchen chair in the sunshine, with one hand resting absently on Nellie's neck. That was the way he had been sitting all day. When Joan called him for his meals he came in docilely and ate everything set before him, and then he went out back again. Twice he had gone upstairs to see his wife, but that had taken only a minute; he must have given up trying to talk to her. Even Joan had given up. When she went to her aunt's bedroom, to where she was lying on her back with the covers pulled up around her, and asked her to come down for a bite to eat, her aunt only said, 'No,' and closed her eyes. Saying that one word seemed to take all the strength she could muster; Joan didn't dare argue with her. In the back of her mind she kept trying to think up little plots, planning ways to get her aunt interested in something, but she wasn't the kind of person who could do that.

The most she could do was try and take care of the house for a while, and feed Mr Pike and Simon. Even that was hard; she had never learned how to keep house.

The top part of Simon's hair was cut now. She squinted at it, not sure if this was how it was supposed to be or not. It seemed a little homemade-looking. But then she shrugged and began on the shaggy part along the back of his neck. She could always even it up later on.

Outside, Ansel called, 'Is anybody home?' His voice was thin and wavered in the wind. Simon gave a sudden start and turned his head, so that Joan nearly gouged him in the neck. 'Hold still, Simon,' she said, and Ansel called again, 'Is anybody home?'

'It's him, 'Simon said.

'Who do you mean? It's Ansel.'

'I know. It's him.'

'Just stop wiggling,' said Joan. She raised her voice and called out, 'We're out here, Ansel.'

'Out where?'

'Out here.'

'Well, is someone going to come and let me in?'

'It's not locked,' Joan said, and returned to her cutting. She didn't like Ansel and had never pretended to; he could open his own doors. When he came ambling out to the kitchen, walking in that shuffling way of his and stooping to get through the doorway, she didn't even turn around to look at him. 'How are you,' she said, making it a statement.

'Oh, not so bad, I guess.'

Turn a little to the left, Simon.'

'Hey, Simon,' Ansel said.

Simon frowned at his boots.

'Hey, boy.'

'He's having his hair cut,' said Joan.

'Ah, I see. That makes it impossible for him to speak.'

'Will you have a seat?'

'I might,' he said. He pulled out one of the chairs from the table and sat down, facing Joan and Simon. He was looking better than usual today. The yellowish pallor of his face had faded and he sat nearly erect, with his arms folded across his chest. When he saw Simon frowning at him he smiled his dippy smile and said, 'What's the matter with the barber, boy?'

'What?'

'Barber sick?'

But Simon only shrugged and didn't answer. Joan said, 'I'm cutting his hair myself this time.'

'I see that.'

'I'm using the sewing scissors.'

'I see.'

That seemed to leave nothing more to be said. Joan hesitated a minute, with the scissors in mid air, and then she said, Turn around, Simon.'

'Are we done?' Simon asked.

'Almost. I want to think what to do about the front part of it.'

'Where's Mr and Mrs Pike?' said Ansel.

'Uncle Roy's out back.'

'Where's Mrs Pike?'

Joan was frowning at Simon's hair, trying to figure out how to begin on that front shock. Any way she managed it, it was almost sure to end up looking like bangs. She snipped gingerly at one piece and held what she had cut off up to the light to examine it. Then she said, 'Ansel, what're you here for?'

'Who, me?'

'Didn't James tell you not to bother her? Where is James?'

'He's taking pictures of the Hammonds.'

'Didn't he tell you not to come around here?'

'Well, yes, he did,' Ansel said. 'He suggested that I not. But I was sitting reading on the couch and it occurred to me: I thought I might just wander over and see how you all are doing.'

'We're doing fine,' said Joan. She snipped off another piece of hair.

'Joan, you're ruining that boy.'

'It'll turn out all right.'

'Well. I was sitting reading a Guideposts,' Ansel said, 'and after that two outdoor-type magazines, and then I read them again. I would've read them a third time, if I hadn't come on over here. I read even the smallest inch-long ads for worm farms; I read the list of editors at the front and the entire information about the subscriptions. Then I thought I might come and see you.'

'Simon, maybe you better get a mirror,' Joan said. 'I'm not sure what you're going to think of this.'

'Aw, I don't care,' said Simon. 'Is it done?'

'You go look in a mirror and see if it is.'

Simon stood up and little rags of hair fell around him, spilling off the apron around his neck. When he walked out of the room he trailed fuzz in a long path behind him.

'He won't thank you for this,' Ansel said.

'I don't think it's so bad.'

Twice before, I started to come,' Ansel said. 'I got up and headed for the door and then I thought, "No." I cut my fingernails. I cleaned out my wallet. Then I thought I might as well come over. I thought -'

When he talked he had a way of leaning slightly forward and placing his fingertips together, as if words came hard to him and he had to consider. Yet in reality the words came flooding from him; it always made her feel swept away and drowned, with so many useless words spilling around her. Sometimes she could even get interested in what he said, but she never lost that drowned feeling. While he talked she stood silently by the stool, keeping her face blank and idly snipping at thin air with her scissors, but inside she was thinking. I wish you would go. The pale thinness of his face irritated her. She thought about all the long evenings of three long years, with James sitting next to her on the porch and never taking one step forward, never asking for more than tonight's kiss and tomorrow's date and never mentioning marriage or a family or any of those other things she was sitting there waiting to hear. And the reason for it all was Ansel, who hung limp and heavy in his brother's living room and expected to die any day, although actually he was stronger than any of them. He had that flood of words, after all, and that sad dippy smile, and that way of placing his fingers together as if asking people to be patient while he fumbled for what to say. 'I thought I would come offer sympathy and then leave again,' he was saying, and Joan snapped, 'Well, you've offered it. Are you leaving?'

'Huh?' Ansel said. He looked up, bewildered. 'Joan, I ain't even seen your Aunt Lou yet -'

Simon came in, with his hair plastered down by water. 'It looks kind of like I expected it to,' he said.

'You don't like it?'

'Well, yes. It'll grow out.'

'I could trim it around the edges a little more,' Joan said.

'No, that's all right. Thank you anyway.'

'Or maybe tomorrow you could -'

'Hush!' Ansel said. He sat up straight, listening, and when the other two turned toward him he pointed at the ceiling. 'Footsteps,' he said.

It was the slow, clapping sound of Mrs Pike's mules, crossing the upstairs hallway. 'She's only going over to the bedroom,' Joan said, but then the sound continued to the stairs, and Ansel said, 'She's coming down.' He stood up, preparing to meet her. Joan reached out and touched his arm. 'Let her be,' she said. 'Why don't you go home?'

'I wanted to say hello.'

'Do it some other time.'

'No, I want-'

The footsteps descended slowly, like a child's – both feet meeting on the same step, then another hesitant step downwards. Joan left the kitchen, with a wave of her hand toward Ansel to show that he should stay there. He did, which surprised her a little. She crossed through the parlour alone and came to stand at the bottom of the stairs, looking up. Her aunt had just barely reached the halfway point. She was holding on to the railing and gazing steadily at Joan, her face blank without its makeup, her dark yellow hair straggly and uncurled, and her plump body wrapped in a chenille bathrobe. The greyness of her made her blend into the dark stairwell. She said, 'Joan,' and her voice came out blurred and grey also, without expression.