Just Shy of Harmony (4 page)

I
t was early July, one month since Sam Gardner had told his father he was depressed. The day Sam dropped by, Charlie Gardner had been in his garage, fixing his wooden screen door. He’d laid the door flat across two sawhorses and was replacing the screen, remembering back to when Sam was a little boy and had pushed the screen out.

He recalled getting mad and yelling at Sam to be careful, and Sam crying. Then he’d felt like a jerk, so he walked little Sam the four blocks to Grant’s Hardware, where they bought more screen and wood trim. Then he took Sam to the Dairy Queen and bought him an ice cream cone with sprinkles. Then he let Sam help him paint the door and taught him how to open it so the screen didn’t get pushed out.

Thirty years and two screen doors ago.

He’d been halfway through the latest job when Sam came by and confided about being depressed. Charlie had spent the next two days laboring over the door and
worrying about Sam, mad at himself for not being more sympathetic.

When Sam had told him about being depressed, he’d laughed. Laughed at his own son. He hated himself as soon as he did it. He hadn’t meant to laugh, but Sam’s candor had startled him and he’d laughed. Sam had been hurt, he could tell. He’d hurt his son.

He’d felt terrible ever since.

Charlie was proud of his boy. He sat in church on Sunday mornings and listened to Sam preach and marveled, That’s my boy. Where did he learn this? How did he get so smart?

But he’d never told Sam he was proud of him. He wanted to, but he couldn’t find the words. On Christmas Eve the year before, he had hugged Sam. He’d almost told him then how proud he was of him, what with his mouth being close to Sam’s ear, but he didn’t. He just squeezed Sam a little harder.

He knows I’m proud of him, Charlie assured himself.

But for the past month, he had been watching Sam closely, looking for signs of depression. He’d gone to the library to read about depression. Miss Rudy, the librarian, had hovered about him, asking if he needed help looking something up.

He didn’t want to tell Miss Rudy he wanted to read about depression. She’d think he was depressed and would march him down to the mental-health office over the Herald. She was pushy that way.

Charlie had found an article about the warning signs of depression—loss of appetite, loss of interest in
work, unusual irritability, diminished ability to concentrate, and difficulty sleeping.

The next Sunday Sam had stood in meeting and told the congregation he wasn’t going to preach. The warning sign Loss of interest in work leapt to his father’s mind.

He’d peered at Sam more closely. There were dark circles under Sam’s eyes.

Difficulty sleeping!

Charlie phoned Sam the next morning to meet him for lunch at the Legal Grounds Coffee Shop, even though Charlie didn’t like the Legal Grounds. They didn’t serve hamburgers or onion rings like the Coffee Cup. Instead, Deena served croissant sandwiches and spinach salads and vegetarian pizzas. But Sam liked it, and that’s what mattered.

They’d met for lunch. Sam had been distracted. He’d pushed his salad around his plate. Even Deena Morrison had noticed.

“Not hungry today, Sam?” she asked.

“I’ve been a little off my feed,” he said.

Loss of appetite!

C
harlie had encouraged Sam to take up a hobby—stamp collecting or gardening or maybe flying model airplanes.

Charlie’s hobby was his red Farmall tractor. Years before, he’d driven past Ellis Hodge’s farm and seen the tractor sitting by the road with a For Sale sign leaning against the front tire. He’d stopped his car to look at it. It was a 1939 Farmall Model M, just like the tractor Char
lie’s father had used on their farm. He climbed up in the seat, closed his eyes, and was transported to his youth.

Ellis was asking two hundred dollars. Charlie went to the bank, got the money and paid Ellis, and drove the tractor home, with Ellis following behind in his car. Charlie didn’t tell his wife—he just did it. The tractor was in pretty rough shape, but he’d fixed it up. Took him two years. Then he fired up his rototiller and made a flower bed in his front yard; he parked the tractor in the middle of it and planted marigolds all around it. A monument to the Farmall.

He likes to sit on his porch after supper and gaze at his monument. Three or four times a year, someone will knock on his door and offer to buy it.

“It’s not for sale,” he tells them.

His wife wants him to sell it, but he won’t hear of it. It would be like selling a child. Charlie loves his tractor. He drives it in the Fourth of July parade and in the Corn and Sausage Days parade the second week of September.

The Fourth of July parade is the highlight of his year. The day before, he waxes the tractor and tunes the engine. He mounts flags on the fenders. He has his wife, Gloria, take a picture of him standing in front of his tractor. He pastes the picture in a scrapbook. Twenty-eight pictures in all, one for each year he’s owned the Farmall.

In 1976, Charlie painted the tractor red, white, and blue for the Bicentennial. The newspaper from the city took his picture as he swung in place behind Harvey Muldock’s 1951 Plymouth Cranbrook convertible. Even though the picture was in black and white, it still
radiated glory. He’d clipped the picture from the paper and mounted it in his scrapbook. During the winter, he takes the scrapbook down from the closet shelf and thumbs through it, reminiscing.

He stores the tractor in Ellis’s barn through the winter. He visits it on Saturday mornings, then drives it home the first week of April. That’s the sign that spring has come, when Charlie Gardner drives his 1939 Farmall Model M tractor in from the Hodges’ farm west of town.

C
harlie had been hard at work getting ready for this year’s Fourth of July parade. He sanded the tractor down, borrowed Harvey Muldock’s air compressor, and sprayed a new coat of Farmall Red on it. It’s never looked better. Early of a morning, Charlie sits on his porch drinking coffee and watching his tractor.

This is what Sam needs, he says to himself. He needs some beauty in his life he can lose himself in.

On the morning of the Fourth, Charlie mounted the flags on the fenders and wiped the engine clean. At nine-thirty, he drove the tractor to the elementary school, where the parade was to begin. He took his place behind Harvey’s Cranbrook, just in front of the school band. It’s hard to hear the band over the tractor, which no one seems to mind.

The parade went north on Washington Street, past Owen Stout’s law office and the Legal Grounds, then turned west at the Harmony Herald office, and ran down Main Street past the Rexall and Kivett’s Five and Dime. He waved and threw Tootsie Rolls to the children.

It’s the same parade every year. Harvey Muldock in his convertible, Charlie Gardner on his tractor, the high-school band, the Odd Fellows Lodge, and the Shriners on their motorbikes. The veterans bring up the rear, their backs straight, their heads high.

There is much cheering. People appreciate the effort. The Shriners have brushed the lint from their fezzes and combed the tassels. Charlie has waxed his tractor. The veterans have pressed their pants and shaved their necks. The streets have been swept. Flags flutter from the lightposts. A deep pride hangs in the air. And Charlie and his tractor are in the thick of it. What a glory!

The parade is his legacy. Three years before, a certain town board member had visited New York City to view the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. At the next town board meeting he’d suggested leaving the tractor out of the parade.

“You don’t see a tractor in the Macy’s parade,” he said. “It makes us look like hicks. They don’t do that in New York City.”

“This isn’t New York City,” someone pointed out.

The next election, Charlie ran against him on the anti–New York City platform and won handsomely. He’s now the town board president.

But Charlie’s growing older and keeping up the tractor is hard work. It’s not easy being a legacy. People don’t say it, but they expect the tractor to be more resplendent each year—the paint to gleam a little brighter, the engine to purr a little smoother. The pressure’s getting to Charlie. He wonders what will happen to his tractor when he’s gone. He’s thought of having it
buried with him, maybe have Johnny Mackey at the funeral home prop him up in the seat for an eternal tractor ride.

T
he morning after the Fourth of July parade, Charlie’s tractor was back in place, gleaming amongst the marigolds. Sam stopped to visit. He brought his two boys, Levi and Addison. They climbed on the tractor while Sam and his father sat on the porch. Watching them, Charlie laughed. “You were about Levi’s age when I bought that tractor.”

Sam smiled. “I remember when you brought it home. Mom didn’t talk for two whole days.”

“Yeah, well, she’s over it now.”

They fell quiet, watching the boys. Then Charlie said, “Son, last month you told me you were…uh…not feeling well. Are things any better?”

“Not much. Barbara says I’m having a midlife crisis. She thinks you were right about me needing a hobby. Maybe I ought to buy an old sports car and fix it up.”

His father thought for a moment, then said, “I was about your age when I bought my tractor.” He studied his tractor. “Isn’t she a beaut?”

Sam didn’t think so. When he was a teenager, it had embarrassed him to have a tractor in his front yard. He’d bring home girls to meet his parents, and there would be the red Farmall. But he’d never said anything to his father. He hadn’t wanted to hurt his feelings.

“Yeah, she’s a beaut all right,” Sam said.

Sam and his boys visited for a while longer, then walked home.

That afternoon, Charlie drove the tractor to Sam’s house and arranged it in Sam’s front yard beneath the oak trees next to the flagstone walk. Sam and Barbara and the boys came out of the house. The boys yelled and ran to climb on the tractor.

“What’s with the tractor, Dad?” Sam asked.

His father paused, then cleared his throat. “Well, son, I’ve decided I want you to have it.”

The idea had come to him during the Fourth of July parade, while the people waved at him and called his name. The delight of it, to be acknowledged and loved by your fellow citizens.

This is what Sam needs, he’d said to himself. Affirmation. Acceptance.

That’s when the thought had hit. Give Sam the tractor! Give your son a hobby. But more than a hobby, a legacy!

Charlie stood beside the tractor, his hand resting on the fender. “It’s yours, son. I hope it brings you the happiness it’s brought me.”

He got choked up as he said it. Parting with his tractor was harder than he’d imagined. He laid his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Take good care of her, son.” Then he walked home.

Sam and Barbara stood in their front yard, watching their boys climb on the tractor.

“We can’t have a tractor in our front yard,” Barbara said.

“You said I needed a hobby.”

“I was thinking of stamp collecting.”

“You should have been more specific.”

The tractor is still there, out front of their house un
derneath the oak trees. Sam and Barbara sit on their porch at night, looking at it. It’s starting to grow on them.

“I don’t care for marigolds,” Barbara said one evening. “But I do think white geraniums would look nice up against the red.”

The Corn and Sausage Days parade is three months away, and Sam has been asked to take part. He’s thinking it over. The boys want him to. They want to ride on his lap and wave and throw candy.

Charlie’s excited at the prospect. He said to Sam, “Come on, son. Ride in the parade. Take the boys along. You’ll enjoy it.”

He hopes Sam will do it. Legacies are hard to come by, after all. And if you have one going, you ought to do what you can to keep it alive.

W
ayne Fleming and Deena Morrison have been attending church for two months. They sit in the former Wilbur Matthews pew, behind Fern Hampton. The meetinghouse isn’t air-conditioned. If you look closely at the pew, you can see Wilbur’s sweat outline. He’s been dead thirty years, but remnants of his perspiration linger on.

Their first Sunday at worship, Wayne’s three children sat between them. But over the past two months, Wayne and Deena have shuffled the children to the pew ends and are now sitting side by side. Sometimes their hips touch, which causes Wayne to think of things other than the Lord.

In the silence, when the Quakers sit with their heads bowed and their eyes closed, Wayne glances at Deena out of the corner of his right eye. It gives him a headache to stare sideways for such a long time, but to gaze at such loveliness makes the pain worthwhile.

The pew had sat empty since Wilbur died. People aren’t accustomed to seeing anyone there. It doesn’t
feel right. Though they are happy for Wayne and Deena, they wish the couple had sat somewhere else out of respect for Wilbur’s memory.

Their first Sunday there, Fern Hampton turned and said, “You know, the view from that pew isn’t all that great. Why don’t you sit somewhere else?”

Harmony Friends Meeting is not a user-friendly church. When Sam held an all-church workshop on how to make visitors feel welcome, not many people showed up. The ones who did argued with him.

The workshop was held in the basement. He had purchased the workshop materials from the Church Growth Institute of Valley Vista, California, after reading their ad in a ministers’ magazine:

Sam’s first proposal had been to reserve rows four through seven for visitors. “The rest of us can share pews. We don’t all need our own pew. Let’s not make our visitors sit in the front row.”

“I’ve sat in the sixth row since I was a child,” Fern Hampton said, verging on tears. “And now you’re going to throw me out after all I’ve done for this church. That’s the thanks I get? I’m glad my mother isn’t alive to see this.”

There were other concerns. Dale Hinshaw believed that telling the visitors where they should sit was a violation of their constitutional rights. “We can’t be telling people where to sit. This is a free country. We oughta let them sit where they want to sit. The last thing we need is a lawsuit on our hands. No, sir, I don’t think we oughta be telling people where to sit.”

Sam tried to get his money back from the Church Growth Institute of Valley Vista, California, but they’d moved and had not left a forwarding address.

Deena talked over matters with Sam at the Legal Grounds Coffee Shop.

“Have Wayne and I made Fern Hampton mad?” she asked. “For some reason she doesn’t want us sitting behind her. Are we not welcome?”

Sam sighed. “Just ignore her. Folks at church are just a little set in their ways, that’s all.”

“Set in their ways” is putting it mildly. The church has used the same hymnals since 1943. They’re held together with duct tape. Once Sam had suggested buying new hymnals, and they’d brought it up in his annual review in the “Areas Needing Improvement” section.

Shows a callous disregard for our religious tradition, the review read.

On another occasion, when Sam tried to move the offering from the front of the worship to the back, it became the subject of an all-church meeting. The meeting ended with Dale Hinshaw asking Sam whether he believed in the virgin birth.

“What’s the virgin birth got to do with moving the offering?” Sam asked.

“Well, if you can’t see it, then it’s not for me to explain,” Dale replied, clearly troubled.

But Deena and Wayne are sticking with it. They’re there every Sunday, in the Wilbur Matthews pew with Wayne’s three children.

S
unday is Wayne’s favorite day of the week. It’s his day to hope, his day to believe anything can happen. He sits in the pew and listens to the stories of old and prays for God to do something miraculous in his life.

He feels guilty asking God for anything while sitting in church with a woman he isn’t married to. Sometimes when their hips are touching, the stirrings unsettle him and he’ll slide away. Deena notices but isn’t sure what to make of it.

Wayne puzzles her. All the other men she ever dated had one thing on their minds. But not Wayne. Though she appreciates his manners, she does wonder just how much he likes her. It’s hard for her to tell. They’ve held hands, but that’s it. He’s never even tried to kiss her. One evening, he walked her home after she closed the shop. She waited for him to kiss her good-bye, but he shook her hand instead.

She talked about it with her grandmother over supper.

“Maybe he’s gay,” she told her grandmother. “Maybe that’s why his wife left.”

“Don’t be silly,” Mabel Morrison said. “He’s just bashful. You know, Deena, you don’t have to sit around waiting for him to ask you out. Nowadays women ask
men out. If you want to go on a date with Wayne Fleming, ask him.”

The next evening, Wayne stopped past the Legal Grounds on his way to work. It was closing time. Deena flipped the sign on the door from Open to Closed. She poured Wayne a cup of coffee, and they sat at the table in the corner. She was wearing a new dress. She arranged herself in the chair across from Wayne, the picture of feminine charm.

“Would you like to go on a picnic this Saturday?” she asked. “I’ll close the shop and we can go on a picnic.”

“That would be fun. The kids would like that.”

“Actually, I was hoping we could go by ourselves. My grandma can watch the kids.”

Wayne hesitated. “I don’t know. I am still married, after all. I mean, church is one thing, but a picnic with just the two of us, well, I’ll need to think about that.”

“Look, Wayne, your wife’s been gone over a year now. She’s not coming back. Wake up and smell the coffee. You need to get on with your life. Are you taking me on a picnic this Saturday or not? If you’re not, I’m asking Ernie Matthews.”

Ernie Matthews!

Ernie Matthews had spent eight years in high school. Ernie Matthews wore his pants low. When he bent over, you could see the pale suggestion of a crevice.

“You’d really ask Ernie Matthews out?” Wayne asked.

“Watch me. And what’s more, I’ll tell everyone I turned you down for Ernie Matthews.”

“Can we take roast beef sandwiches on the picnic?”

“Sure. Pack whatever you want,” Deena said.

They laughed. Deena reached across the table and
took Wayne’s hand. “I’m looking forward to being alone with you,” she said. Then she smiled.

Wayne blushed. His heart swam. Deena leaned forward.

Oh my, she wants a kiss, he thought.

He leaned forward. It was a wide table, and he couldn’t quite reach her. He leaned further forward and knocked his mostly full coffee cup over onto Deena.

Wayne had given considerable thought to what their first kiss might be like, but had never contemplated this scenario.

“Daggonit, Deena, I’m sorry. Here, let me help you.” He jumped to his feet and ran to get paper towels. He mopped the floor while she dabbed the coffee off her dress. They wiped off the table together. He looked at her. She looked at him.

“Let’s try that again,” Wayne said, and then he kissed Deena Morrison flush on her plump lips, just like Rhett Butler kissed Scarlet O’Hara in Gone with the Wind.

“My,” Deena Morrison exclaimed. “My, oh my.”

Wayne grinned a rakish grin, then said, “I’ll pick you up at ten o’clock Saturday morning. Be ready.”

D
eena walked him to the door. She thought of kissing him again, but didn’t want to seem overeager, so she squeezed his hand instead. After he left, she washed the coffee pots, turned off the lights, locked the doors, and walked home to her grandmother’s house. Her grandmother was sitting in her chair in the living room, reading a book. She looked up as Deena came through the door.

“How’d it go?” she asked.

“He kissed me.”

“Where?”

“In the coffee shop.”

“No, I mean was it a peck on the cheek or a kiss on your lips?”

“My lips.”

“Well, I guess that means he isn’t gay.”

That Saturday morning—a beautiful July morning, not too hot, not too sticky, just right—Wayne and his three kids pulled up to the curb in front of Mabel Morrison’s home. Mabel and Deena were watching from the front window as they climbed from the truck.

“Say, he’s a looker,” Mabel said. “I’ve half a mind to go on that picnic and leave you here with the kids.”

“Stay away from him, Grandma. He’s mine.”

“Since your father’s not here, I think it’s my job to lay down the law to this Wayne Fleming character.”

The doorbell rang. Mabel opened the door and peered at Wayne. “Just what are your intentions with my favorite granddaughter?”

Deena stood behind her, chuckling.

“I’m flying her to Las Vegas for a quickie wedding. Then we’ll move in with you and have six children in five years. But don’t worry about money. I’ll apply for welfare, and with nine kids we’ll make a bundle. Is that all right with you?”

“So long as you pick up your children by seven o’clock tonight so I can make my bridge club.” Mabel bent down to the children and took their hands. “Come on, kids, your daddy and Deena have a plane to catch.”

She hugged Deena good-bye. “Enjoy your picnic,”
she said. Then she whispered in Deena’s ear, “I like him. I like him a lot.”

Wayne and Deena walked to the truck.

“I like your grandmother,” he said.

“Are we really going to Las Vegas to get married?”

“Let’s see how the picnic goes.”

They drove through the country, past farms and fields and woods to a state park. His hand rested on the seat beside him. After a time, Deena reached over and took it. His insides shuddered. They parked the truck and hiked through the woods to a meadow. Wayne carried the picnic hamper with one hand and held Deena’s hand with the other. They walked through the grass to a rise above a stream. Wayne spread the blanket on the ground. They ate lunch, then lay on their backs, side by side, looking up at the blue sky and talking.

They talked about everything. About their families and where they’d grown up. She told him about law school, and he told her about the classes he was taking to be a teacher.

Then they turned on their sides and looked at one another. He placed his hand gently upon her face, ready to pull it back in case she frowned. But she didn’t frown; she smiled.

It had been a long time since he had whispered intimacies to a woman. He was a little out of practice.

“I hope you liked the sandwiches,” he said.

“Oh, they were fine. It was nice of you to bring them.”

“I had the lady at the deli make them.” He stared at her a bit longer, then swallowed and took a deep breath. “You’re a beautiful woman, Deena Morrison.”

“You’re a kind man, Wayne Fleming.”

They lay side by side on the blanket, talking and watching the sky for the longest time.

W
hen Deena was fourteen she’d written in her diary about the perfect date. It had taken eleven years, but now she’d finally had it.

They pulled up to Mabel Morrison’s house a little before seven. Mabel left for bridge and Wayne and Deena sat on the porch talking while the children played tag in the front yard. Then five-year-old Kate settled into Deena’s lap and fell asleep.

A little after nine, Wayne stood to leave. “Time I got the kids home,” he said.

He carried Kate to the truck and propped her in the seat. Adam and Rachel squeezed in around her. Wayne buckled them in.

He climbed in the truck. Deena was standing at his door.

“Thank you,” she said. “Can we go out again? Soon.”

He smiled. He felt bold. “Only if we end up in Las Vegas.”

Deena blushed.

He drove home in a fog of love. He ran the kids through the bathtub, brushed their teeth, tucked them in bed, and read them a story. He watched them as they fell asleep, three little breathing lumps lying in a row.

He went outside and sat on the front steps. He thought about Deena and their day together. He wished she were here now. Right beside him. For the rest of his life.

The phone rang through the screen door, an intru
sion of noise. He hurried inside and picked it up. He could hear slight weeping on the other end.

“Hello,” Wayne said. “Hello, who is this?”

“It’s me, Wayne. Sally. Your wife. I want to come home. I want to be with you and the kids. I want us to be a family again. I’m so sorry. Will you take me back?”