The Drip, a novel by Michael Gullo
“An’ there it was, right there. Like it papped right out from ’round old man Teague’s place, crawled outa that big rig trailer. Didn’t hear a thing till I heard those tires. I follered it though. He pulled in’na the fishin’ hole trail with that thing. Tore the fence down and drove right in like he owned the place.” “Cody, are you listening?”
“Yeah, Pop, big green aliens came out of old man Teague’s truck trailer.”
“You on that pipe again, boy?” Damn boy he don’t listen, no how. He don’t care ’bout tradition or history or culture. Boy’s roots run deep like the ground wire for cattle fence, and here’s him, back sass all over him.
“Deddy, it’s dark and it’s late, an’ you out here hollerin’. And they ain’t no ground waar in a cattle fence, Pop. I’m listenin’, just you ain’t make no sense.”
“I don’t make no sense?” This the way he is, sit here in my house, house I pay for…
“You don’t pay for it, Deddy. You ain’t pay the rent in two year since me ’n Meghan move in. We pay it now.”
“You don’t pay shit. Her mama pay it on account you got her pregnant.” Damn kid always back sassin’. Git a day’s work, get some weed, and now he smoke and back sass me. “Why don’t you mind your own business?”
“Deddy, you the one come hobblin’ through with a brarr in ya’ ass.”
Can’t mind his own business. That’s what’s wrong. Can’t listen when I’m’a tryin’ tell him somethin’ but I might’s well go out here and tell the trees…
Whoa, an’ there they is! Juss like I called it from up the holler this mornin’. “Cody, you ain’t seen these Persimmon out here on the deck? You stomp all over ’em with them slick sole boots.” Damn kid, got him boots, they got the flag on ’em, an’ he think he ’Merican. Ain’t no boot got a flag on it makes you ’Merican. It’s yer roots decides that, and I give the boy the roots, and he run around got his dirty-ass jeans stuffed in’na them boots so’s ever’body see he got a flag. Maybe he orta show that checkin’ ’count he got instead, leave the statement out there on the counter ever’body gotta see he overdrawed, and them good-for-nothin’ boots s’pose’a cost ninety dollars up’a Tecova’s, but they end up cost one fifty five on account’a he overdrawed when he charged ’em, and he late to pay up too, so they charge him thirty-five and thirty-five extra. “Cody, are you deaf?”
“No, I ain’t deaf, but I ain’t listenin’ to you neither. All’s you ever do run your mouth these days. You should mind your business instead of talk about me mindin’ mine.”
Always back sassin’. I try an’ tell him what I found up there in the holler, an’ he ain’t listen. “Bring me a knife I cut one of these babies out here. Don’t you wanna know?”
“Deddy I already cut one when we brung the baby back from the doctor. Cain’t tell whuther it’s a knife or a fork or a spoon or nothin’ ’bout them damn seeds. It’s fruit. There’s a seed. Don’t look like no silverwar in it.”
“Gimme that knife. You don’ know how to choos’em is all. You prolly grabbed one of them’s that’s been down all week long under the bench. I seen them too, but them ain’t the ones. It was last night was the first freeze, and it’s all these dark ones over here you smooshed to jelly before we could get them in’na the bowl that’s the ones tell the weather. First freeze come, and heat of the sun come next afternoon, and there they is, all fall’d off on’na the ground at once. Them tart ones ain’t seen the freeze yet, them’ins, they don’t show nothin’.” Damn good fer nothin’ can’t figger why them been under the bench. Been there all week. If they were good for somethin’ at all the mice would’a grabbed one and drug it in’na the house through that gap there I told him to get on top of.
“Cody! Will you come back out here? I can see the kitchen light thoo this gap in this door it’s so big now. Lookie here, it say Phillips right there on the bulb. Gap so big I can read the light bulb, Cody!” And last night the first hard freeze, and he got a little baby in the house, an’ instead’a buy some trim wood and molding, “you out gittin’ Tecova’s boots you can’t pay for.” ’An’ it ain’t no fork neither. The seed’s a spoon. “You know that mean snow, boy, an’ a hole in the house can read a lightbulb thoo. Smooth shoes says it all. Just like up’in that holler. Man got smooth soles just like I says, Cody. “You listenin’?” Just like that Hummer suit up there, got a big bad shiny off roader. You know I look that up on the interwebs. Supposed to grunt and growl and crawl up any fool thing. Got wheels in back that steer an’a skid plate made’a some fancy alloy underneath. Couldn’t get past that washout, though ’n drive up in’na our damn fishin’ hole.
“Cody, are you listenin’? I been tryin’ tell you all night what I saw up there ’smornin’.”
“Deddy, I don’ care what you saw up thar. You said that man come down outa’ Knoxville buy the land’s up fer sale up Ellijoy way. He head the other way, prolly hadda piss is all. Besides all that, he can’t get nowhar near that pond old man Wiggins been tendin’ that Blackberry crop so hot ’n heavy. Ever Fall he run up there knock all them briars down, next Spring, crop’s double. Gettin’ so I can’t even get up thar ta’ fish no more.”
“Good fer the huntin’ though. He come in, knock all’em briars down, and I gets right up the hill pretty as you please. No need twist and turn through all the Honeysuckle choke saplin’s. Juss walk right through the knock down briars.”
“Yeah, I do like that.”
“Why cain’t you fix this door?”
“You always gotta start. I ain’t no carpenter. Why you don’t git yer friend Kerry King fix that door?”
“I paid Mrs. King rent here since you was no older’n Layla in there, ’n it was her fed us at the back door the church all them times too. She kep up the ’lectricity more times than I can count.”
This kid don’t got no roots. Think juss cuz her mama pay the rent for them’a live here so they don’t gotta live with her in the sub division, she got some right ta’ live in squalor. She got rights to tell old sweet Kerry King get over here with a hammer and some boards and fix this door he let rot out’a the frame in the first place. Just like them brars, old man Harry Wiggins seventy-nine year old, and he got a good little commerce goin’ with them blackberries. Puts the sign out ever’ year, climbs the hill, picks the berries, pull out the fruit trays he been savin’ all year, an’ he sellin’ berries so fast he can’t pick enough. An here’s this back sassin smartmouth gets a day’s work an’ goes buy boots on overdraft, and he down talk the people works for a livin’.
“Cody, listen up. This the part matters. Prove he didn’t hafta piss. I head out this mornin’ fore the sun come up cuz I gotta walk, cain’t park there in the driveway. I gotta walk…”
“Yeah, you said that part, Deddy.”
“Damn kid, always sassin’. ’n I don’t wanna drive all over the sign nuther. You tell a lot ’bout a man you can get all the weight changes in the walk. An’ I’m right too. Got smooth-bottom shoes. You listenin’, Cody?”
“Listenin’? How I’m not listen? Jed hear you from his trailer in the back yard. Gotta turn his TV up hear over your hollerin’. They hear you all cross the valley. Hell you care so much about the bottom of his shoes?”
“Jed don’t bother. Problem Jed up on his hill, git high and mighty. Don’t care that TV wake up Layla. You tell a lot what a man wear on his feet. This man got no tread. He comin’ up inna the woods, and he got on smooth bottom shoes made fer office carpet not fer these hills. They made fer show, not work.”
“You got tread on yer shoes, Deddy, and you ain’t got no job.”
“You mouthy son’va… You doin’ too much! Light’s up, an’ there I am on the job first thing in the mornin’ keepin’ this valley safe, and there’s them foot prints; one heavy one a bit lighter. A steady sign there’s a limp in his step, and he stop a lot too.”
“Prolly juss look around. First time there, first time he felt it.”
“Yeah, I guess that rings. I remembers the first time I felt it.”
“It’s eerie ’s hell that first time.”
“History’s like that when it’s in them places like it’s up in there. But that don’t ’splain it. This was different than stoppin’ for the chill. This stop’s different. He stoppin’ cuz he gassed, ’specially onna way back. Best part though, old man Wiggins late clear the briars this year.”
“He’s got time, ain’t froze yet.”
“I juss told you last night was the first freeze!”
“He got time. Not even close t’ hard freeze yet.”
“Old man Wiggins late ’s the point, n’ them briars menace even better ’thout them leaves. Thorns brown, hardened. Don’t nobody wanna walk through that.”
“So he turn aroun’ and walk back down.”
“No, boy, lemme tell it.”
“Alright then, go on.”
“Mouthy kid. ’s why he don’ know nothin’ interrupt every turn of the way. So, he cain’t go left, and he fade right on account ’a them briars, and he head up hill at the split, and he tarred. I can tell cuz he sit down on that Cedar fell ’cross the way. He sit there and he kick and swing his feet more ’n a little bit, and he go back inna them woods on the other side of the bottom land all the way wrong way from our pond.”
“So all yer worry ’n the man never made it to the pond? You’re the one’s too much.”
“Boy, I orta. No, he never make it to the pond, but he ain’t just pissin nuther. He walk all the way back, and not one sign he stop an’ piss up a tree.”