The Drip, a novel by Michael Gullo
“Welcome home.”
“Right? How’s it feel that way already?”
“Because you have a basket of my laundry.”
“It’s absurd.”
“A little.”
“Is that Kitty way up there?”
“One and the same.”
“For a second I saw a cub, and I got excited. She’s off the porch at least.”
“Yep.”
“Out of bounds though.”
“I let her roam a bit while she’s at it. My biggest fear isn’t that she gets eaten, but that she runs away in a panic from something and can’t locate herself to the shed.”
“Kitty colored coyote poop in the driveway’s my fear.”
“Spring is sprung early. Did you see those Daffodils down there at Mrs. Wiggins’ roadside?”
“See them? They almost made me crash into the one gate post we have left.”
“I never once noticed those steps until I saw the flowers yesterday.”
“Eerie. Like they took an old house down to put up the trailer.”
“I thought more fit in than eerie. Look around. There’s a chimney stands alone in the field across the street - Stone foundation squares not far down. Up the street there’s this weathervane on top of an abandoned phone pole.”
“I saw the weathervane.”
“It’s rusted in place.”
“Does that mean something?”
“It didn’t just rust into place one night, and the next day start never moving again.”
“Who put it up there?”
“That’s what I mean. There’s more to it. Ever since I drove by that first day, it’s developed a whole personal folklore.”
“Welcome home.”
“I see that. At first, I noticed it’s pointed the exact direction from Hardin Valley to here at the Drip, but it’s at the end of the trip. Like I’ve been coming here so long the directional almost beat me to it.”
“You love it here already, don’t you?”
“I do. It’s all so vivid.”
“I knew you would.”
“This whole place is wonder and cypher. Today it’s feral daffodils alongside akimbo concrete slabs to nowhere and weathervanes pointing to the next encode.”
“What direction is it pointed?”
“Southeast.”
“What’s Southeast?”
“Sevierville’s out that way, Gatlinburg, Asheville, Charleston, Charlotte – is that right? I mix those up?”
“Charleston’s the ocean one.”
“I’ll learn it a hundred times, and I’ll always mess it up – just like spelling separate.”
“Um, S-E-P-A-R-A-T-E.”
“Yup, for a minute. Then it’s gone again. Thank god for autotypo. Put that basket in the shed.”
“A gentleman would have took it for me.”
“These are caveman times. Give it here and watch the cat.”
“I can’t see her.”
“She’s --- I can’t either. Put that down.”
“Call her. Where do you want it in here?”
“She doesn’t speak manners either. Get me a can of cat food.”
“She was right there in that shadow next to the outcrop.”
“Yeah, she moved on from there, and I saw her at the moss log – probably got a Chipmunk on the run.”
“Crack the can.”
“I have to wait until I see her. That trick’s more for turned-off ears, not out of service.”
“You can click those cheeks all you like, that cat’s ignoring you.”
“Well, I can’t open can after can, or every tree in the holler will unload a raccoon.”
“That’s a sep-A-Rat problem. And don’t be stingy. Feed the little trash pandas too.”
“Can’t do that. They’ll go to the weekly meeting, and they’ll tell all the bears. Next thing you know, we got a street gang and their ear-tagged henchmen. Nothing but trouble. Cat’s probably up there right now playin the stoo-pigeon.”
“You go that way, and I’ll go this way.”
“I’m heading up. Maybe get a couple cans yourself.”
“Coming.”
“She’s probably behind that log.”
“Could she have doubled back and gone this way?”
“No, I only – had my eyes off her a minute.”
“Nothing over here yet.”
“She’s up there - somewhere.”
“Would she go all the way - to the top?”
“Hope-not.”
“You’re out of breath.”
“It’s the clicking.”
“It’s the hill.”
“It’s this turn-coat cat.”
“Slow down. Rest.”
“I’m fine.”
“Michael.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re literally replying two words at a time.”
“And you’re using one.”
“Michael.”
“Get higher up than me and I’ll rest.”
“Now we’re racing up a near vertical hill?”
“Hey - if you can’t keep up - I understand.”
“Please don’t.”
“Not behind the log.”
“Rock neither.”
“You’re behind.”
“Michael – don’t.”
“I’m going across a little – this straight up here.”
“I’ve never been up - here before.”
“Easier from – the short slope – Much smoother grade.”
“Wow, it’s so pretty down there – is that her?”
“Where?”
“On the stoop.”
“I’m giving these to the raccoons.”
“Sit - I’m coming over.”
“Well, I ain’t walking down.”
“We’ll need a life flight.”
“Told you the ambulance didn’t need - to get up the driveway.”
“Maybe fix it anyway.”
“I’ve always worried that one day - the black helicopters would swoop in - with the rappelling ropes - and take my crazy ass away.”
“High odds.”
“Sit here – it’s soft.”
“Eww, it’s wet.”
“Moss. Not bad.”
“You have dry laundry.”
“Already wet. Hush.”
“Your hands are getting rough.”
“Just dry.”
“No, the weight limit is forty-pounds, Michael. No hammers. No saws. Moving that arm will kill you.”
“Hush, honey. Look.”
“Literally - took my breath away.”
“Amen. Do you see it?”
“Kitty?”
“Our home. This week’s work? The stretch next to the pond. See how I mulched that?”
“I saw it carrying up the laundry.”
“And there, on the left, see how we took those trees up – the switchback?”
“I see it now, that back driveway. I get it now.”
“The house goes there - All you’ll see from here in a year is a - brown metal roof.”
“The solar panels move from the pond, right?”
“Those go over there – We’ll run the septic field in that direction, six bedroom septic is a big field, and the solar panels go behind that open field.”
“So we can’t see them?”
“No, honey. Invisible. And thanks for that. Six gauge copper running five or six hundred feet is so much better than ten gauge copper running just a hundred feet or so.”
“Finally saved you a few bucks with my bright ideas.”
“Um. You know what. Let that one slide. It took all week to level out that switchback and get the culvert drain in there.”
“Drain tile.”
“What?”
“It’s called a tile.”
“Easy, Tommy.”
“Well, it is.”
“Receipt says culvert pipe.”
“Called a tile around here.”
“Look at you. Two for two on the wins. Wire and weather drains. You sure you don’t want to move up here and sleep in the job site shed?”
“No pancake batter left.”
“Black magic.”
“Leader of men.”
“We gotta finish the switchback, work in the gravel and connect the whole thing to the main driveway this week.”
“Like more driveway?”
“Well, how do you imagine we drive from…”
“I get it. Where’s that happening?”
“I see it happening like there, where it’s kind of got that little depression.”
“I don’t see it, but I’m sure you do, and that’s good enough for me. What else on the agenda this week?”
“You can see the dam a little better from here – that’s our next month. It held through the rain Friday – inch and a half.”
“That’s a good sign.”
“Do you see the scoop I’m talking about?”
“Scoop of what?”
“You accused me of making up the million year old dam.”
“I see the hillside missing – a scoop or whatever, but…”
“It’s okay. Doesn’t matter.”
“No, if you look, you’re right sort of, but there’s more. It’s like the sun is shining a spotlight through the clouds. There’s like something else. Look at the trees. They’re like younger, skinnier, different color trunks all the way down the hill to the dam.”
“That wouldn’t be millions of years.”
“No. I’m saying there was something more recent. If the millions thing is right, it happened again too – like recently.”
“I see it. That’s interesting. Those are oaks and hickories and Walnuts and old, old trees on either side and young grey Poplars in that whole swath down to the dam. You’re onto something.”
“It looks so different.”
“And I never noticed it from below.”
“Me neither.”
“Million year old dam a million miscellaneous tasks, but the biggies are: I have three appointments with GCs this week, we gotta finish the road, the switchback, the gravel and the dam.”
“Who are you meeting?”
“I just took a few names out of the Google list – they had custom homes in their presence, some pics.”
“I looked on Facebook, and I called the number on that sign you sent me – no luck.”
“I assumed the no luck.”
“Busy week.”
“We should be able to get all the way back to the stone bridge in a vehicle when you visit after church next week.”
“Sunday tradition.”
“Can you believe she’s just sitting down there?”
“It’s like she’s looking at us.”
“I can’t tell from here. I went blind from this range at fifty. Probably pissed we kept her waiting so long.”
“Let’s walk down.”
“Got it?”
“You’re the old one, Pappy.”
“Who got up here first?”
“You cheated.”
“Let’s hear it. How’d I cheat?”
“Pushed me down, made me spill the laundry and took off without me.”
“I see you.”
“I should hope so.”
“Did you spill the laundry in your haste?”
“Could be, but it’s your fault.”
“Love it. Such a clean plant, and I almost missed it.”
“Down is so much faster.”
“Especially with you behind me hallucinating pushes.”
“Dateline makes this subject quite clear; don’t kill him on a hike. Those girls always get caught.”
“God help me.”
“How’s that for a vivid encode?”
“What?”
“Kitty left you a warning of her own.”
“Ahh, the lowly chipmunk. Thank you, Kitty. I always wanted one of those.”