Hunter's Moon (8 page)

CJ parked the car, and Thor followed out the driver’s side with an immediate nose to the ground, investigating the difference in odors this far away from his home. It was something CJ could smell too, although in a much more muted fashion. But unlike Thoreau, who was experiencing these things for the first time, CJ was remembering the smell peculiar to the place, and to a season in that place. It smelled like fall on the Baxter property, with the scents of dying maple leaves, lilac, and damp earth carried on a biting breeze, and CJ could have been returning after fifty years, rather than seventeen, and been able to recognize it.

The house itself surprised him by the fact that it looked ageless, like a thing that existed in a book he’d read as a child and that had been plucked from the page and placed there. He allowed himself less than half a minute to enjoy it, though—knowing he could stoke wistfulness forever if he wasn’t careful. He could stare at the house, stroll the grounds, walk the woods, or chop the wood he saw gathered by the stump of a monstrous maple—he could do all of these things, never even going into the house, and be satisfied. He stood by the car long enough to watch the dog follow a scent past the porch, trailing it around the corner, before he ascended the front steps and knocked on the door.

There was something odd about the knocking. While it was true he’d been away for many years, he’d been in and out of this house countless times and he was reasonably confident that he hadn’t knocked once. He waited a little while before the door opened—long enough for Thoreau to return from wherever his nose had led him. The dog ran up the steps and sat at CJ’s right side, watching the door expectantly. When it finally opened, CJ wasn’t surprised to see his brother on the other side of the threshold. It was only fitting.

“Hello, little brother,” Graham said, wearing a grin.

CJ sat at a little table in the kitchen—the same table where, when CJ was in middle school, and poor health had kept Sal more sedentary than he was accustomed to, the old man would sit with a bottle of bourbon, a book, and a PBR can in which he would drop his spent cigarettes. They would play cards, or some other game that CJ would talk him into. Sometimes Sal would just read while CJ watched out the window, waiting for his grandfather to make some comment about the book in his hands.

CJ’s fingers glided along the beer can in front of him, tracing patterns in the condensation. With Sal now lying on his back at the morgue, it was Graham who occupied the other seat at the table. Like Sal, Graham drank bourbon and had a PBR ashtray at the ready. Now that CJ was an adult, the table seemed much smaller.

Graham hadn’t said a great deal to him after a half hug at the door. And the only other people in the house when CJ arrived were Uncle Edward, whose face almost cracked under his wide smile, and whose hug was of the back-breaking variety, and someone whose presence surprised CJ past the point he would have thought possible—Julie.

She was younger than he was—sixteen when he left Adelia. And CJ could scarcely reconcile the thirty-three-year-old woman with the image of the girl in his mind. He hadn’t exactly handled the end of their relationship in the best fashion. When he’d run out on Adelia, she’d been a casualty, and he’d long regretted that. He’d heard somewhere along the way that she’d married his cousin Ben, and so he supposed that things had worked out all right for her.

She’d also given him a hug, and had left a warm kiss on his cheek before gathering up her father-in-law and giving him and Graham the time she obviously knew they needed.

CJ wished she hadn’t left. There was an odd détente between the brothers, which CJ knew was to be expected, considering the thing that existed between them. He also knew that Graham was feeling him out, which was also to be expected.

Thor was asleep on the kitchen floor, having finished with his reconnaissance of the house, including a thorough sniffing of Graham. Apparently, he approved of CJ’s brother because, after his inspection, he licked Graham’s hand and solicited a scratch behind his ears.

“Congratulations on your award,” Graham said. “Even if I’m about a year late in saying that.”

“Thanks,” CJ answered. “And back at you for your state senate seat. And I’m much more than a year late in saying that.”

Graham looked much the same. A little gray in his hair, maybe a line or two on his face, but other than these he looked like a man in his midtwenties. Graham had always been the athletic one—larger and stronger than his younger brother. CJ was the cerebral one, although Graham was no slouch in that department either. CJ had no doubt that Graham had the mental acumen to succeed in the political arena. In fact, it was that part of his brother that CJ thought had changed the most. He was more confident, certainly; he’d always had that. But he was now a man who could handle himself among other men, even if they were his social, economic, or even intellectual superiors. He’d become what his potential had promised.

“So when’s Sal’s funeral?” CJ asked.

“Sunday at two o’clock. Visitation at eleven.”

CJ nodded. He didn’t ask about the particulars of the service and what his responsibilities would be. There was time enough for that. He pushed away from the table. When he stood, he raised an eyebrow at his brother. “You coming?”

It took a moment for Graham to catch on, but when he did he smiled, dropped his cigarette in the PBR can, and followed CJ through the mudroom and into the garage, Thor in tow. CJ took the three steps down by memory and felt for the light switch along the wall.

The two-car garage was a relatively new addition to the home, built in the 1920s. The automatic garage door was added in the ’70s. When he still drove, Sal would run one beat-up pickup or another around town, and he parked these anywhere on the property he had a mind to. The garage was reserved for a single vehicle—the one that now sat under a tarp illuminated by a half dozen fluorescent fixtures. It was a 1937 Horch 853, and the prize of his grandfather’s collection. Sal had kept the rest of his cars— the ones worth anything—in a garage he rented in Winifred, and before his health had confined him to his bed, one or the other of his sons would drive him over there once a month to check on them. But the 853 (legend had it that Sal had acquired the car in a poker game before Sal Jr. had even been conceived) stayed here, and Sal, even in his last declining months, would roll the tarp off and apply a thin and completely unnecessary coat of wax to it almost weekly.

“She’s still here,” CJ said. He wasn’t sure what it meant that the sight of the car stirred more emotion in him than had the news that his grandfather had died.

“And not a mile more on her than there was when you left,” Graham said.

“So he never drove it.”

“Not even once.”

CJ shook his head, suspecting his grandfather had missed out.

He forced his gaze away from the covered automobile and looked at the storage shelves affixed to the near wall. It wasn’t long before he spotted the ball clustered with the other sports equipment. It looked old, as if it hadn’t been used in the entirety of the time since CJ left.

He crossed the immaculate, gray-painted floor and picked the ball from the shelf. His fingers sank into it as he looked over at Graham.

His brother shrugged. “I haven’t played in years.”

A quick search located the pump and soon they were bouncing the ball on the driveway and taking practice shots at the basket hanging over the garage door. Time and weather had done their work on the backboard, and showed in the rust on the rim, but CJ found the sweet spot after a few shots and sent the ball through the net more often than not. Graham always beat him when they played, and it looked as if his brother still had his shot too. A few dribbles, a small hop, and a smooth release sent the ball through the net almost every time, without use of the backboard. About five minutes in, after one of CJ’s shots rolled off the rim, took a bounce off the driveway and headed his way, Graham cut through and swiped it away, dribbling between his legs once, pivoting, and sinking a shot.

The ball rolled CJ’s way, and he scooped it up, eyeing his brother.

“So that’s the way it’s going to be, huh?”

“To ten by two,” Graham answered.

CJ checked the ball to his brother, got it back, and started to the right. He turned his back to Graham, who positioned himself to keep CJ from cutting in for a lay-up. Graham had always defended with his long arms, reaching in to try to swipe the ball away, and CJ was ready for him, using his forearm to push his brother’s arm back. He worked his way toward the basket, feinted left, then pivoted the other direction and sent a shot arcing toward the basket. Graham, caught off guard by the feint, jumped too late to block it, and CJ watched in satisfaction as he struck true.

“Nice shot,” Graham said, although the look on his face belied the compliment.

He tossed the ball to CJ, who walked to the crack that served as the top of their invisible circle and checked the ball. Graham was playing back, waiting for him to come below the foul line before picking him up, so CJ took two steps forward, pulled the ball back, and shot. It had been a very long time since he’d played—a few pickup games in college—so there should have been no chance of his making that shot, yet it went through without so much as breathing on the rim.

When Graham pushed the ball his way, there was something in his eyes that CJ remembered from long ago—something that told him this game was about to become something more important than the game, by itself, could possibly be. It had everything to do with the competitiveness that had, along with the other thing, dogged their childhood. Out of the corner of his eye, CJ saw Thor pad up from who knew where. His paws were dirty, which meant he’d been having the kind of fun that only a dog could appreciate. He lay down in the grass, yawned once, and closed his eyes.

Graham tightened, not allowing CJ to get a shot off. So he put the ball on the ground and drove right, but Graham moved to block him, giving him a little shove. A small one—just to let CJ know it wasn’t going to be that easy.

“Call your own foul,” CJ said, backing off a touch to find an opening.

“Still playing sissy style,” Graham chided.

But CJ caught him in midsentence, cutting between Graham and the garage before his brother could react. He caught his own ball after the lay-up and carried it back out front.

“You’re a lot slower than you used to be,” CJ said. He didn’t check it this time but launched what would have been a three-pointer on a real court. It banged off the rim and into Graham’s hands.

“Don’t confuse biding my time with slowness,” Graham said as he moved the ball out, CJ sliding in to replace him.

“Problem is, you bide your time too much, and you find yourself in a hole you can’t dig out of.”

Graham didn’t answer except to work his way toward the basket, fending CJ off with his backside. At about five feet he turned and shot over CJ’s outstretched arms. The ball hit the inside of the rim and bounced out. He jumped in front of CJ, caught it, and put it back up for a point. He dropped the ball at his brother’s feet and walked to the top of the circle.

“I don’t care how many awards you win. You won’t beat me,” Graham said.

CJ tossed him the ball.

As the game wore on, Graham whittled CJ’s lead to a point. But both were tired, and the last few shots had reflected that, with neither man willing to drive, content to try their respective luck with outside shooting.

When CJ got the ball back, he quickly moved inside, heading to the right again. Hitting this one would win him the game.

“You still favor your right, don’t you, Charles?” Graham said. He was guarding tight, and CJ couldn’t fake him into taking a step back.

“Habit,” CJ responded, looking for his spot.

“Laziness,” Graham corrected. He was all over CJ, his forearm in his brother’s back. He was breathing heavy, and sweat dripped from his forehead. “Like writing about your family.”

It was a shot CJ had known was coming, and yet he wasn’t expecting it this soon. Somehow it seemed appropriate, though, that Graham would come out with it here and now. “My books aren’t autobiographical,” he said, not realizing how difficult it would be to say that word while winded. He set his shoulder against his brother’s chest, then pushed off, launching a wild shot that didn’t come close to the rim.