Chris Offutt - The Good Brother

“No. Sort of slow and steady for twenty years.”

“We all been going over it for twenty years.”

“Yes,” their mother said, “and it’ll be going over us for many a year more.”

Abigail removed a tray of cornbread from the oven. The smell washed through the room like mist.

“Glad I ain’t from off,” she said. “People from off don’t know how to do.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Sara said. “You’re the only one here who’s left out of here.”

“Worst thing I ever did was leave.”

“Well, you came back. I know one man’s glad of it.”

Sara looked at Virgil with an expectant expression.

“I’m real glad,” he said.

“Set and eat,” their mother said. “You’uns put a bottom to your stomach.”

They gathered at the table, which held pieces of fried chicken lying on the brown paper of a grocery bag. The heavy plates were veined by a network of fine cracks. They ate without talk, as if at work, and Virgil remembered that the back and neck had been his father’s favorite pieces. The family rule was that whoever ate them also received the delicacies — liver, heart, and gizzard. Everyone took a second piece and Virgil’s mother served the neck to Marlon. Virgil wished he were in his trailer eating a frozen pot pie.

“Any dessert?” Marlon said.

“Not tonight,” Sara said. She patted her hips. “I don’t need no extra.”

“Just more to love,” Marlon said.

“Kids sure packs the weight on,” Sara said. “You all fixing to have any, Ab?”

Virgil could feel heat rush to his face. Abigail pitched her voice slightly higher in order to appear casual.

“We haven’t done any talking along those lines.”

Marlon was clearly confused. He looked from Virgil to Abigail and back. “You all go and get married?”

“No,” Virgil said. “Folks do that for different reasons.”

“I was pregnant,” Sara said.

“Sara!” her mother said.

“Well, I was. The whole hill knowed of it. I told Virgil first, before Marlon even. If our family’s got secrets, you can’t prove it by me.”

“She always did talk worser than, a jaybird,” their mother said.

“Nobody’s pregnant,” Virgil said. “Unless it’s you.”

“We’re done, ain’t that right, Marlon, I’m thinking on getting my tubes tied.”

“Sara,” their mother said, “you’re at the table,”

“It’s on TV, Mama. And I ain’t no jaybird, either, I’m the only liberated woman on the creek. I cuss in my own home and Marlon don’t care if I do.”

“Around here,” their mother said, “they ain’t no liberated nothing. Why, even these old hills got laws put to them anymore,”

“My opinion,” Virgil said, “Abigail’s on the liberated side. She works and takes care of her own car.”

“And lives alone,” Sara said.

“That’s right,” Virgil said. “But she don’t go around talking about getting herself spayed, either,”

“Leastways, I’m thinking on doing something I should.”

“Meaning I ain’t. Is that what you’re trying to say?”

“Take it any way you want.”

Virgil stood and went outside, leaving a tense silence behind him. The sky was gray between the hills. He wondered what kind of person his family thought he was. Perhaps they’d never had him right. He realized with a terrible twist in his chest that they wanted him to be like Boyd.

He lay on his back and studied the sky. The Milky Way spread overhead like the partial covering of spring frost. Some stars were so far away that by the time the light got to him, they’d already burned out. Boyd was like that. Even dead, he still threw energy into the hills.

Darkness grew at the head of the hollow and filtered down the creek. The air between the trees closed. He stood and kicked one of Boyd’s old liquor bottle lids. It rolled in a circle like a crippled dog. A hundred years from now some kid would find the cap and make up its history. Virgil wished he could invent a new history for himself, or even better, a future.

The screen door rasped and he recognized Sara’s tread on the porch.

“Hey, Virgie,” she said.

He waited in the dark. He’d discovered long ago that the less talking he did around his sister, the more he learned.

“You out here pouting?” she said.

There was nothing for him in that except bait. He stayed quiet.

“Now, Virgie, honey. It ain’t but us now. We got to get along.”

A whippoorwill’s call floated along the ridge. Sara moved into the yard.

“I should have been born a man,” she said. “Then you could knock the shit out of me and everything’d be fine.”

“That’s easy talk,” Virgil said. He immediately regretted having spoken.

“I know what’s right.”

“You don’t know the first thing about it.”

“I’ve laid awake many a night thinking on it.”

“Me, too,” Virgil said. “I ain’t a murderer.”

“That ain’t what it is.”

“The hell it ain’t, Sara. That’s exactly what it is. You know it, Mommy knows it, even that damn Troy knows it.”

“If you don’t,” she said, “I know someone who will.”

“You’d do that, wouldn’t you. Just throw Marlon away. A man with four kids.”

“You heard what Troy said.”

“I ain’t talking about the law.”

“The rest of them Rodales, you mean. Well, you never can tell. Maybe they’re more like you.”

“You’re full of talk, Sara. You know that? You just sit in your house, watch TV, and not do a goddam thing else. Just talk. You’re the same as you always were only now you got Marlon and the kids to run. Well, you ain’t the boss of me, Sara. Get that in your head.”

“I thought maybe you’d want Marlon to help you out, is all. You always let Boyd do the doing for you before.”

“That’s not what I want. I don’t want nothing like that.”

“All right. Marlon don’t know about any of this anyhow.”

“No, I don’t reckon he would.”

“Ain’t no sense in you getting stubbed up over it, either. I was thinking of you. Trying to spare you.”

A dove called through the woods.

“I guess it’s good you ain’t a man,” Virgil said. “I don’t believe I’d like you much if you were.”

“Maybe not But liking never had much place in this family. All we ever did was love.”

“And the best of us is gone.”

“That’s the way it always is, ain’t it. The biggest tree gets hit by lightning, and bugs chew the prettiest flower. It’s the way of the world.”

“If it’s so natural, then how come you’re wanting me to do something about it.”

“Because that’s natural, too.”

She had answered gently, as if speaking to a lover or a child. She stepped into the house, boards creaking beneath her feet. The night enveloped him like a tent. A barred owl called, his favorite bird, and “Virgil mimicked the sound. Boyd had taught him to follow the rhythm of “Who cooks for you, who cooks for you all,” as he made the sound, ending with a throaty gurgle. The owl refused to return the cry.

The woods were silent until the first squeak of cricket, followed by young frogs in the creek below and the rising drone of cicadas. He inhaled the heavy scent of summer earth, a loamy musk that settled over him like a caul. He was home.

Abigail sat in the swing at the end of the porch. He hadn’t heard her leave the house. He joined her and the chain creaked as their knees touched. In the dim light from the house, he could see the silhouette of her powerful chin. It was like a handle for her head. He wondered if she appreciated any of his features as much as he enjoyed that chin.

“Virge.” Her voice was low and calm.