The Vulture

That summer the heat was dry, that sticky, creeping kind, that turns the flies to ghoulish fiends and hastens all the fruit toward a shrivelled end before its flesh has even had chance to swell. Heat took hold of my Daddy too, he got sick and it kept ‘im there. Locked ‘im in a fever o’ some kind.  I used t’think, Summer ain’t the time for dying. When I was younger, when I was laid out under the stars, a-talking ‘n’ drinkin’ with the boys. I used to say Summer’s the time for taking a bride and loving long into the night out in the fields when night was always light as dusk. They laughed at me, but I knew they liked the idea of it, ‘s much as me. That Summer though, I knew that the darkness and the heat was not a thing you could see with your eyes. Its breathless heat could get into men’s bones and in their minds. Notes carried further in the air, Summer brought with her the kinda nights that made voices crack and tremble with the telling of stories. Every opening in a doorway seemed to tell of some happier time long since gone. Our house changed. We nursed the sickness within, like an open wound. It seemed as though nothing got older like the wood was too tense to creak. The stove took longer to burn up hot and every object we dropped on the floor, from needle to pin, to bolt or hammer, caused the strangest noise that would startle the stomach and quicken the breath. I learned to make myself as small as possible, make only the tiniest of movements, the slightest noise. From a distance the house looked like an animal, a scrawly-haired Coyote or some such, reeking o’ pee and dry blood, alert, twitchy, expectant of some change that was coming. Ready to follow the next trail of stench, stretching far out across the plains till the eye could no longer see. 

My wife didn’t take much amiss. She cooked like before, plenty of dough and salt, plenty of pastry and sugar, said it reminded her of her Ma. Her Muma told her you could always take a plain bit o’ something and make it into something better. “Even if you don’t have much, it don’t take much”, her Ma would say, and I wondered why she needed reminding of her Muma so often. It was the same with Linney’s sewing, she was always fixing something up. ‘Making it better’, so she said, forcing the edges of the holes in ma Johns back together. The underside of the stitching was always nipping at my skin, never fit so nicely like it did before. Then there was her singing, her voice was not as strong as some would own, she had a tiny frame. It was pretty enough if you sat close to hear. Though that never seemed the point of it to me. It didn’t seem to matter to her if folk were there or no. Singing made everything better she said, same song, same tune over and over, set my knuckles to clenching every time she started.

‘Over mountain cross the sea she looked not back for she was free she was free . . .’

‘Linney?

‘Over mountain cross the sea . . .’

‘God damn it, Linney! Can’t you hear my Daddy?

‘I hear him . . .’

She flicked her fingers clean in a tiny saucer of water and sauntered casually into Daddy’s room as though she weren’t the lady o’ the house, more like she were taking her time, allowing boredom to set in.

‘Daddy?’ says Linney.

‘I don’t hear him say nothing’. I said. Linney wonders back in.

‘He sleeping.’

‘Sleeping? You sure?’

‘Yes, Sir …’

‘Ain’t nothing he wanted?’

Her face turned blank on me as though I shouldn’t have asked such a question, and by rights maybe I shouldn’t have.

‘Now Lemmy, don’t you go waking him now!’

‘Pa? Pa!’, I go racing in.

What if she had moved him wrong and he couldn’t breathe right? She just didn’t think things through. What if he suffocated or sumthin’ and we never heard him? Truth was, all the really practical thoughts flew from my mind when I saw him there tucked up tight in that big heavy horse rug. I went straight to free it from his shoulders. To see him looking so small, and old, it couldn’t be my Pa. Not the Pa who had taught me how to fix fences, to beat and hammer right, or groom a horse till the hair shined and the beast’s withers rippled under your hands. It wasn’t really about fixing fences and grooming horses it was about doing something right and doing it well, because, well, how else was a man to be judged? Was Pa, pointed Linney out to me too, just an ordinary market day. Little colder than the rest, so a man could pay a bit more attention. She were talking with the other girls, scuffing her shoes on the wooden deck, tapping at the ground at little. You could see they all wanted to practice their steps but were too shy. Not Linney though, she hitched up her skirts and got right to dancing right there in front of ‘em all, and laughed at herself whilst doing it. That girl Linney laughed so much, the other girls laughed too, then she took one of ‘em by the hands and swirled ‘em round, and Linney laughed even harder. That was what I liked about ‘er, her laughing at herself like that.

I stroked Pa’s hair, it felt coarse. Normally, it was soft and fine. He was a man of nature, he understood her patterns, her strengthening and slackening with the seasons like the flex of his own muscles, but he enjoyed the finer things in life too, more, man-made inventions. Whiskey, a cigar when the mood took him. He could enjoy a good meal at any time. A county fair, a dance, or hearty conversation with folk of any sort.  I soaked a cloth and put it to his forehead just as I remember he had done to me on times, to let Muma rest a little I shouldn’t wonder, and because he knew the chatter about the day’s ranching would be a tonic after Muma’s reading of the Parables.  I willed my touch to put some life back into ‘im, and for all, I could not help it I thought about him actually dyin’ ‘n’ all. Watching his final breath seep out between two lipless lines, his eyes would still be open and in shock. How quickly he would turn grey-cold and stiff, all his skin would sink into the cavities between his bones.  Would Daddy not be pleased to think of all the creatures coming in from outside and making his carcass their shelter for the night? The Wolves and the Worms and the Birds and the Mice all shoulder to shoulder, having a feast at his expense? Then I considered the insects nibbling their way around the insides of his eye sockets and tearing the tops of his fingers off. I knew too, any eggs and faeces would stick to his now straw-like hair, and any thought about what my Pa might appreciate, vanished. I told myself he would not like for me to let the animals at his carcass, he would not care for it. Whatever else, he always believed in cleanliness. Unease swept across me, a giant primaeval bird, an angry, featherless, vulture had circled above the house. The rooms got darker and brighter again with each circle. In time, my father’s room stayed dark, and I knew the bird had come to rest upon the roof.   

Forcing myself to leave Pa’s side, I gathered up the cloth and bowl went back through the kitchen to replenish it. There was no water in the place, not in the jug, barrel or kettle. My stomach turned over.

‘Linney?’

I tried not to sound angry or accusatory. I needed water, I needed water for my Daddy. I wanted the water replenished in the next minute. I looked around and saw she was not inside. I looked out the window, up towards the roof, half expecting to see Linney caught in the claws of the creature, her rough, black hair, all undone. Her petty coats raised above the knee with her stockings rolled down. Her breasts toppling out of her bodice. The thing would tighten and tighten its grip around her waist till her bones crumbled to powder.  I felt a strange sense of calm wash over me again. Sure I could get my rifle out ‘n’ all, but how would the bullets penetrate a beast such as that? I knew there would be nothing I could do in such an eventuality. I took the barrel out to go and fetch the water myself.

When I got outside Linney was putting out sheets on the line.

‘You gunna be long at that? Pa needs his supper.’ I could see this angered her a little, she beat her palms against the sheets and tugged hard upon the legs o’ ma breeches that were already hangin’ up.

‘The meat takes time, you want it to be soft for ‘im don’t yer?’

‘I told you broth would be about as much as he could stomach, right now.’

‘And what are we supposed to eat?’

I looked at her for some time. Marvelling at her attitude. She looked back at me standing by her reproach.

‘It don’t signify nothing what we eat when he’s like this? Don’t you get it, girl?’

‘Fine then! I just thought a taste of some meat in his mouth might get his appetite back o’ somethin’, but seeing as that ain’t good enough for you . . .’

‘Appetite? Appetite! Hell, he don’t even know what day o’ the week it is, he dudn’t know where he is. He dudn’t know who we are.’

Linney rolled a rock around underneath her shoe, looking down at she did so. Her hands were rolled into fists and were now resting on her hips. I pictured the shape of her hips free of the line of her skirts, I saw my own baked hand tracing the kidney-shaped line of her rump and grabbing at her buttock out of a sense of my own frustration. Why was it that I could see the beauty in a canyon, or a snorting wild stallion, or the pattern on the back of a snake but when it came to talking, to people, seemed like I had little need of their good regard or conversation. I had the means to catch food, make money I had the whole world to walk in if I so chose it. It’s all about how you view a thing. Yes, I enjoyed physical pleasures as well as any man, it is nature to do so. Thought and false sentiment though, conversation and books, men, women, complicating things. I never really could pay all that any much mind. Linney was mad for sure, but she sure as hell wasn’t goin’ ta rise to it. I couldn’t help but smile at her show. I couldn’t help liking her sometimes. I fixed on my feet same as she, so we didn’t have to look at each other, didn’t have to learn the truth.

‘I know one thing’. She says looking at me more defiant than ever I had known her.  Didn’t need to raise her voice. ‘I ain’t your girl’.

And that moment it didn’t seem fit to argue with her.

Back in the house, Linney dumped the laundry basket where the meat should go once it’s finished cooking.

‘You gunna leave it there?’

‘It’s where I put it? Ain’t it’

I felt the shadows darken and the wooden panels of the house rumble from the top down. I saw the old vulture shifting on ‘is claws, bending its neck looking sideways at us through the window. It was Linney and Me, our carry on was making Daddy sicker. That old bird would never fly away now, why couldn’t I stop it? There was nothing big enough to scare it. All it had to do was dig its terrifying beak into the roof and that would be our house ripped from the plains. I sat down at the table, Linney set the cutlery and plates. I could see the pot was heavy, the weight of it pulled her arms down low and she had to shuffle her feet along without picking them up. She was anxious, not wanting to drop the pot altogether. I figured the effort would do her good, remind ‘er hard work and mindfulness paid off. She wouldn’t drop the pot and burn her feet or waste our food, not if she were careful. Linney made a deal of squeezing into her seat, she hadn’t pulled it far enough away from the table, made her look like an old woman thirty years older with heavy pendulous breasts and a dent in her spine. Soon as my plate had been covered, I took up the spoon and dug straight in.  I’ll admit it tasted so good, my stomach started to eat itself on the inside. Then Linney took to starting up on her nonsense. I became aware she was stoney-faced staring at me.

‘What?’

‘You ain’t said Grace.’

‘Aw, Linney . . . I’m hungry. I killed the food, didn’t I?  You cooked it. That’s thanks enough for each other’

‘You know how I like it.’

I made a pretence of dropping my spoon and locking fingers. When I saw she had her eyes closed I took another silent mouthful of food.

‘I know what you did Lemmy, you going straight to Hell. – God bless this food on our table and . . .’

‘And make our Daddy well again. I chime in. Amen.’

‘  . . . Amen . . .’ I ain’t never heard Linney say ‘Amen’ like that before. She was normally so certain.  Linney had no fear o’ dying that’s for sure, said it would be like sleeping on cotton tufts in snow or some such nonsense. I wondered at myself fucking her on times, she could still seem like such a child.

I heard the crows outside fighting over scraps of bread Linney threw out on the porch. It was the quiet I remember.  Our spoons and plates, our chewing and swallowing, could not be heard above the silence. The table seemed the width of a wild river that neither of us wanted to cross to save each other. The wind was getting up outside, not by much, though from inside it sounded to be whipping up a storm. I would have to go and close the barn doors after supper. I wondered whether, when my Daddy finally stopped, whether we would stop too. Linney would sleep on cotton tufts for sure, but I wouldn’t get chance to see to the cattle and bolt down the windows or turn down the lamps. I would just cease to be in that moment, same as him, as if we never existed.

‘Won’t you take ‘im his supper, or will I?’ Linney asked. Pushing the bowl of broth under my nose.

‘Let me’. That feeling of panic swelled inside me again. Without thinking, I placed my hand on my chest to stop my heart from beating so fast. I was dripping with sweat; my shirt was sticking ta me. There was no let-up from the heat.

‘Well, go on now. Linney says, looking at me kinda funny. ‘What’s the matter wit you?

I didn’t know how to answer. The bird had left the top of the roof and was wildly circling the house again, his spiky wing storks were catching on the timber frame.

‘Let me do it . . .’ Linney says.

‘No! Pa needs me right now, not you.’

I took the broth through to my father. The vulture’s crusted point of a beak plunged at his window the fragile shield of glass offered me a close view of the dark stretchy lining of his throat. I closed my eyes. Didn’t do no good, he was still there when I opened them.

‘Pa? Listen, Pa you gotta wake up now, don’t you see? I bought you some broth, Linney spent hours on it. Pa? Please Pa? Won’t you try it?’

I placed the spoon in his mouth. but he wouldn’t swallow. The juice just runned from his lips. I didn’t like to see it, his face all messed up like that, like a baby. I didn’t think to bring no cloth with me so I used my hand ‘n’ this smeared it across his face, left my hand all greasy and sticky. I wiped my hand on my trousers. The bird was growing ever larger and soon he’d be victorious over the young fool Lemmy.  I stayed for some time feeling the bird’s eye upon my back, put me in mind of when Daddy had me shoot my first Buffalo, he was still a young’un like me. Just me and the little fella, looking into each other’s eyes, ‘n’ Pa said,

‘Son, the one who’ll win this fight, ‘ll be the one who keeps ahold his right to survive, you hear? This ain’t no Buba sucklin’ on ‘is mother’s teet, all sweet big eyes ‘n’ curly hair. To you this is meat, this is dollars, this is hide. And to him, he don’t care for none o’ those things, he don’t need ‘em.  He got the whole o’these damn plains to run in if he want it. Them Natives would call him sacred. Well, he ain’t that, but sure he don’t know nothing about no dollars ‘n’ no hunting. If it ain’t his turn to die today, it ain’t his turn. I ain’t no Native, but there sure is hell one thing I agree on. You can’t beat Nature, but you can sure as hell make it work for yer. If you keep your nerve, if see things for what they truly are down the barrel of your gun, you’ll never make a wrong hit.’

I kept my back to the vulture fixing on me through Daddy’s window and left the room. Linney wasn’t mending at the fire like usual. I figured she was out in the yard taking in the sheets. Outside the sun had sunk but it didn’t seem to want to leave the plains. I wiped my forehead, made little difference. The sheets were still hanging up, rock hard now they were dry, not much cleaner than before. I tugged at one to get it free of the line and there was Linney out back by the creak dancing a waltz in her bare feet, her dress all loose about her shoulders, bottle in her hand.

‘Linney?’

She turned towards me, shocked she’d been caught out.

‘Don’t come near me, Lemmy. Not You!’

 ‘What have I done?’ Linney was still trying to point at me as she stumbled in an aborted pirouette and landed with a bump on her ass.

‘Nothing. ‘s’ all you ever do … nothin’.’ She was hugging the bottle now, sipping from its neck as though she were kissing the downy head of a newborn baby while it rested in between her crossed legs. I ain’t never seen ‘er so broken.

‘He’s dying Linney ‘n’ there ain’t nothin’ I can do ta get ‘im back . . .’

‘You only just noticed? - You don’t notice a lot round here. She took a big drink of the whiskey this time. I well knew the warmth o’ liquor and I envied her it’s soothing balm as it glowed a fire in her gut. ‘My Muma died. Everybody dies.’ Linney rested her lips a good while on the opening of the bottle before sipping this time. ‘Everybody dies . . .’.

‘You never said.’

‘No, I did not.’ She says. As though she had made the most logical choice in her life. ‘Care to dance wi’ me, Lemmy?

I helped her to her feet, she pulled a stone chip away that had stuck itself to the bottom of her foot. I felt her go heavy against my chest, I wished I could be the one to relax.

‘Hold me Lemmy, you dope. Put your arms around me.’ I put my arms around ‘er but I never let myself hold her none. Felt wrong.

‘You always loved dancing . . . ’

‘That was a long time ago, Lemmy’

‘There’s always time for dancin’, ain’t it?’

‘Why’d you gotta do that, Lemmy?’

‘Do what?’

‘Pretend . . .’

‘I ain’t pretending nothing.’

‘I didn’t says you could help it none. You think nothing can touch you. So proud and stupid!’ Linney broke away went and sat down by the river. She looked longingly at it, needing to be carried away with its twists and its turns.

‘You’re just like ‘im, you know - your Daddy . . . weak. Godless.’ Linney took another swig a’ the bottle, choked a little as it went down the wrong way, this made her laugh hysterically.

‘Linney, why don’t you go on in the house now . . .’ I take her by the arm try to shove her onto her feet ‘You’re drunk!’ I tell ‘er like that’ll make sense. 

‘Don’t you touch me!’ I backed away, put up my hands, surrendered to her, to the emotion, the anger and confusion.

‘He made me marry you, Lemmy, you know that? His precious boy. Don’t you get it? I was his girl. I’m still his girl. Right under your nose and you do nothin’. Said he’d do whatever it took to see you married to me ...’

‘You’ve said enough now, Linney …’

‘ - Said he’d hurt my Muma, burn out her herd. I didn’t have no daddy to take care o’ me none.’

‘I said I’ve heard enough!

The old bird came to rest upon the house once more. It spread its wings out like knives and wrapped them around each side of the house. The lifeless head of the creature flopped down. The weight of his head was swinging on the end of its tubular neck.

‘Pa! No!’

I ran towards the house, leaving Linney standing in a wake of dust. She hollered after me,

‘I ain’t nobody’s girl – nobody! Don’t you wake ‘im now Lemmy. Don’t you wake ‘im!’ I heard her laughter. My chest tightened. The house with my Father’s room, my Father’s bed, my father’s body, seemed to move further out of reach the faster I ran.  

‘Over mountain cross the sea she looked not back for she was free she was free . . .’

I heard the beauty of Linney’s voice carry far out across the plains behind me.

By Robyn Hunt (c) July 2016

Blog Image: Gavin Roberts

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In loving memory of my beautiful friend Hannah Buchanan who delighted in the contradictions and ambiguities of life. 17th January 1981 - 7th June 2016.