Chapter 6
CHAPTER 6
ARLOW
Calliope—she was aptly named, although muse doesn’t feel like a strong enough word. If witnessing her from afar is inspiring, spending time with her impels me straight to the barn as soon as I see her front door shut behind her.
Inspiration or obsession? Is there even a difference? If there is, I can’t measure the distance between them.
It’s dawn when I come out of the barn, covered in sweat, spent, but satisfied for now. I couldn’t get her out of my head, and I knew there would be no sleeping until the early hours regardless. I’m not complaining. This is the most alive I’ve felt in a long time. Exhaustion takes over once I lie down and the next thing I know, the afternoon sun is beaming across my room.
My hand aches from last night but I know I’ll be back at it later tonight. I’ve just showered and turned my coffee pot on when my phone rings with a video call from Mom. We usually talk a few times a month, but typically on the weekend.
“Hey,” I answer.
“Hi! Are you busy?” Her smiling face fills the phone screen.
“No, not at all. Is everything okay? Dad alright?”
“We’re fine.” She hesitates before getting to the point of her call. “Listen, I saw Chris Handleman’s mother post on social media that he’ll be getting released from prison soon.”
A weight instantly settles on my chest at the sound of his last name. Guilt is a heavy vest to wear.
Mom continues, “It didn’t say when, but if I see?—”
“Mom, it’s fine. There’s nothing to worry about. You don’t need to stalk them online.” I’m one to talk, watching as Calli comes out of her cabin to get into her car.
“I’m not stalking! I’m sure he won’t give you any more trouble after all this time, but she mentioned he’d be staying with her.”
“Did you get the honey?” I ask, changing the subject and pouring myself a cup of coffee.
“I did, and it’s absolutely delicious. I put it on our pancakes this morning. Oh, you’ll never guess what your father brought home!”
“Is it another roadkill horror?” Shit-faced drunk at a local flea market, Dad once bought a taxidermy possum that bears very little resemblance to an actual possum. It’s a cross-eyed monstrosity that he still won’t admit he hates. Mom set it on the fireplace mantel in his office and it’s lived there for years now, haunting the room.
“No, these are alive! Let me show you.” It’s good to hear her enthusiastic voice. Mom has always been the cheerful family optimist, desperately dragging me up to see the bright side with her. It’s impossible to hear her excitement and not smile. Two little calico fuzzballs appear on the screen, mewing as she holds them up. “A little girl was trying to rehome them outside the hardware store, and he surprised me with them.”
“Have you named them yet?” I ask, once she sets them loose and comes back to the camera.
“No, your dad has been calling them Thing One and Thing Two but I’m not going to let that stick.”
“Uh-huh,” I chuckle. “I’m happy for you. You’re going to have your hands full.”
“I am, and I’ll have to ask Teresa to pet sit over the winter holidays. That’s what else I was calling you about.”
“It’s July.”
“I know that! But your aunt Gina is planning ahead and inviting the whole family out to stay from Thanksgiving to New Years. You know she just moved into a huge new house? Your dad and I plan to go. She wanted me to extend an invitation to you too.” She grins at me and raises her eyebrows. “She’s right on the beach.”
“I’ll think about it.”
We talk for a few more minutes before a loud crash sounds in the background. “Oh hell, the kittens got in the cabinet. I have to go. Love you.”
“Love you, Mom. Good luck.” Her concern over Handleman’s release is understandable but I’m not worried.
My phone shows me an alert reminding me of my Thursday night standing appointment. I’ve slept half the day away and I need to get moving if I’m going to get anything done beforehand. After having a quick meal, I head out to my ATV, gas it up, and switch the trailer to the log hauler. There are five fallen trees that need to be moved.
Once I get them laid behind my barn, it’s too late to chop them up. That can wait until a cooler evening anyway. My ATV is almost out of gas, and my cans are empty, so I toss them into the back of my truck then go inside to wash the sap and dirt off my hands. After putting in an online food order, I return to my truck and head to the gas station to fill up the cans.
My next stop is Hatty’s Seafood Shack. It’s crowded, likely with people traveling to and from the lakes. By the end of October, more than half of the traffic and people will be gone until spring. Since I’m here for a carryout and most of the crowd are waiting for a table or to place an order, it doesn’t take long for me to get our food.
It’s getting dark when I drive the winding road back to Earl’s place. Someone has cut his grass. No need for me to come back for that this week. His mutt, Harvey, trots alongside my truck as I pull into the driveway and get out, escorting me to the door.
“I don’t want no girl scout cookies!” Earl calls when I knock. Every week, it’s something similar. Last week he said he wasn’t interested in buying encyclopedias. I don’t think encyclopedias have been sold door to door in about fifty years.
“Let me in before I eat your hush puppies, you old bastard.”
With a grin that’s missing multiple teeth, Earl opens the door. “Did they have tea this time?”
I hold up the gallon jug. Harvey darts around my legs to enter before me, then follows us both to the kitchen.
Earl digs the cartons of food out of the bag while I pull two glasses out of his cabinet, fill them with sweet tea, and store the rest in the fridge. After three years of weekly dinners, I know my way around his kitchen.
He peeks inside the containers to see which is his, trades me mine for the glass of tea, and we take our food to his living room as usual.
“Who cut your grass?” I ask, sitting on the couch while he settles into his chair.
“A boy down the road was going door to door trying to make some money from yardwork to buy a four wheeler. One of the Billing’s kids. Rider or Striker or something like that, I can’t remember. They name them anything these days. Sweet kid, though. I’m going to pay him to keep it cut the rest of the summer.”
“Good for him.” I know Earl hates the fact he can’t keep up with his property anymore, but at seventy-five, it’s too much.
“Works for both of us. He needs money, and the last time I got on that riding mower, it nearly shook my bones to powder. Did you get those trees cut up this week?”
“Got them moved but not chopped yet. I took your advice and got the Forsythia bushes planted.”
Crunching into a piece of deep fried catfish, he nods and swallows. “They should help with the erosion, but they won’t spread like the honeysuckle.”
We spend a few minutes discussing landscaping and my plans to have a well dug near my bee hives. Once we’re finished eating, he grabs a deck of cards for a few hands of Rummy. It’s the most boring card game ever invented in my opinion, but Earl loves it. He hosts a weekly game at the Golden Hours Senior Day Center.
After he catches me accidentally discarding a playable card twice, he looks up at me with one scruffy eyebrow cocked. “Did you rent out your brain today? If so, they paid too much.”
My brain is stuck on a certain neighbor while my fingers itch to get back to work. “Maybe I felt sorry for beating you last time.”
He scoffs and takes his turn. It’s quiet for a few minutes as we finish the hand. “You’re in your own world. Something on your mind?”
Earl is a gruff guy with some sharp opinions, but he also possesses plenty of wisdom and isn’t shy about sharing it. He’s become something of a second father figure.
“I’ve been working a lot. Not sleeping enough, probably.” With a shrug, I finish the last of my drink. “A new neighbor moved into the cabin.”
The offhand way I offer that information doesn’t fool him.
“Oh, now we’re getting to it. What’s she like?”
“I didn’t say it was a woman.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“She’s…distracting.” That’s an understatement and untrue at the same time. She distracts me from everything else but sharpens my focus on my work.
“Seems to me you could use some distraction. Especially the pretty kind.”
“You know I don’t date.”
With a sigh, he sits back in his recliner. “I said the same thing when I was young. I didn’t want a girlfriend holding me back. Lord knows I had my fun. Fucked my way through my town and the surrounding ones but look at me now.” He tilts his glass at me and looks me in the eye. “Bachelor life ain’t fun forever.”
It’s not fun now, but it is necessary. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
His warning is warranted even if it’s unhelpful. I might not be out here banging every woman in sight like he claims he did, but his future is waiting for me and likely at a much younger age. I’ve always been fine alone but the thought of so many years ahead of the same long nights and empty days is hard to face.
My mood is low when I leave. I’ve been riding that high of inspiration and as it fades under my dark thoughts, all I want to do is spend time with Calli again to reignite it.