11. Maria
Maria
It’s funny. We’ve only been here about a week, Papa and me, yet it already feels like home.
Best of all, Papa’s a changed man. No more sitting around in his favorite armchair all day, drinking Negronis and talking about the past. Oh no, not Papa.
Not anymore. He’s up at seven sharp every morning, dressed in his brand-new blue serge overalls, and taking his place at the breakfast table with the other men.
Bacon and eggs and fresh-made biscuits most days, maybe grits if they fancy a change.
Always coffee. Then off they all go to work.
Abe and Regan to the workshop, Grant to the office to reply to customers, or deal with paperwork.
As for Papa, he’d chosen the cabin as his first task, and he’s giving it a top to bottom clean-out and make-over.
When they’d first bought the property, the little two-bed, log-built cabin was all there had been in terms of buildings.
Apparently, the previous owners only came up here for hunting and fishing vacations.
The old building was perhaps thirty years old, or more, but it provided the essentials for them whilst they built their new, much larger home.
As much perhaps for sentimental reasons as any other, they’d never gotten around to knocking it down, but it needs a fair amount of work to get it up to scratch.
The old boy decided to work from the top downwards, so for the first couple of days he’d spent his time up a ladder he’d borrowed from Grant, resetting old tiles that have slipped in one storm or another over the years, replacing the broken ones, and generally making everything watertight up there.
He says he’s going to replace the gutter, when he gets the chance to order up the parts, and he’s planning to catch the rainwater runoff from the roof using an enormous, two-hundred-gallon, black plastic tank he’s spotted lying on its side not doing anything.
Says it’ll be perfect for watering the plants.
“What plants?” I ask him, and he looks at me with a wide smile.
“Why, all the vegetables we’re going to be growing, of course, my dear. Look at all this free space.” He opens his arms wide to indicate the wide expanse of land that the boys own. “Have you ever seen anything like it?”
I smile and shake my head “No.”
“I’ve always wanted my own vegetable garden,” he says, taking off his cap to scratch his head as he talks to me.
“Onions and garlic of course, zucchini, pumpkin, white beans, green beans, pinto beans, eggplant, tomatoes… all freshly home-grown. It’s going to be amazing my little amore mio bellissimo.
And then the food you will be able to cook…
oh the food!” He puts his fingers to his lips in that classical Italian chef’s kiss and gives me a broad grin.
“Then you can show these American boys what proper Italian food tastes like, eh, my sweet?”
Just perhaps, out of everything, seeing Papa so happy for once—indeed for the first time ever—well, it could be the best thing of all about coming here. The expression “changed man” really doesn’t begin to do it justice.
Sure, he’s still tired by mid afternoon and needs a nap before dinner.
But the fresh air, exercise, home-cooked, healthy meals and perhaps above all, the complete absence of vermouth, gin, and Campari bottles within a hundred miles in any direction has already worked wonders in such a short space of time.
Did I say it was funny? Actually, thinking about it, it’s not just funny… it’s nothing short of a small miracle. I’m just not at all sure who it is I should be praying to with my thanks.
Yesterday, Grant’s friend Ritchie had swung by, driving a huge car transporter with three vehicles already on it, all older, higher mileage models, which apparently was the niche market he specialized in.
Grant introduces us, and we shake hands.
He’s a small guy, swarthy, walks with a slightly bow legged gait, and wears a brown leather jacket.
A large gold watch adorns his wrist, but it looks fake to me.
We see plenty of those in downtown Brooklyn.
All shiny on the outside, but not really worth a lot when it comes down to it.
He’s pleasant enough, though, and after making a note of the mileage, doing a quick walk round and driving it up and down the yard, Ritchie gets onto the Internet and checks a car valuation website.
“Okay,” he says. “Let’s see… Toyota Corolla sedan, 1995, base model, no upgrades, a hundred and thirty-seven thousand miles, needs new driver’s seat. Overall condition…” He hums as he works, not actually saying anything about the condition, but I can guess what he’s inputting.
“Alright,” he finally says, after a minute or two pressing buttons. “I can give you two thousand five hundred for it. And that’s only because you’re Italian, and we Italians… well, we should always look after each other, am I right?”
“Thanks, I’ll take it.”
The transaction settled, he goes on to negotiate for Grant’s 2017 Dodge Journey, which he says is a little too modern for him, but which he takes anyway… no doubt at a knock down price.
Transactions done, and paperwork completed, he loads up the two vehicles and heads back to North Carolina.
After watching him go, I hand the wad of cash to Papa.
It’s his vehicle really, I just ended up driving it after Papa stopped.
He hit another car at a light one day, and got nervous. Never drove again after that.
But Papa pushes my hand away. “Now, don’t be so stupid my girl,” he says. “You know that I gave you it years ago. I don’t even drive anymore. Besides, you haven’t got much of a legacy coming, as you know. Take it. I only wish it was more.”
I’m in the kitchen, clearing up after breakfast, when Regan puts his head around the door.
“Hey.”
“Hey, yourself.”
“I fancied another cup of coffee. Is there any left?”
“Yeah, I think there’s at least one more left in the pot.” I push the big, enamel coffee pot across to him, and he picks it up and gives it a swirl, his ear cocked.
“Oh yes, there’s plenty.” He reaches for a clean mug and starts pouring. “Will you join me?”
“Alright.”
He unhooks a second mug from the rack, and pours one for me, passing me the mug, the little milk jug, and the sugar bowl. He always drinks his coffee black, but like most Italians, I have been taught to prefer my coffee white and sweet in the mornings and strong and black in the evenings.
“It’s a Tuesday,” he announces.
“Well done.” I smile sunnily back at him, but he just grins at me.
“No bookkeeping’s what I mean.”
“That’s right.”
“So… well… I’ve not got much on, and your father—Sandro—he’s busy giving the old cabin a new lick of wood preservative, so…”
“Yes?” It’s not like Regan to need to have a conversation dragged out of him like this. Then it suddenly strikes me.
Is he trying to ask me out?
Funny, I could never have imagined this super-confident guy ever getting tongue-tied in front of anyone, let alone a working-class city girl like me.
“I wondered… well… I thought as it’s such a warm, sunny day, we could go for a bit of a drive after lunch.
” He seems relieved to have finally got it out.
“You know… I could show you around a little. There’s this wonderful waterfall just up the road, and a really nice trail round a lake we could easily do, and we’ll still be back in time to make dinner. What do you say?”
“Yes. Alright.”
“Sorry?”
“I said ‘yes’.”
“Oh. Yes, right. So, err… If I help you make the sandwiches for Grant, Abe and Sandro, then we can get going sooner, right?
“Alright, you’re on.”
It’s eleven-o-clock as we head out, turning right this time and driving steadily upwards into the mountains, instead of taking our usual left to go downhill into the town below.
It’s the warmest day of the year so far, and we’re both dressed in khaki hiking shorts.
Regan has a blue short-sleeved cotton T-shirt on.
I’m the same, except mine is red. Regan’s wearing a khaki baseball cap and mirror sunglasses.
I’ve tied my hair back into a bun for maximum coolness on my neck, and slipped a red, paisley-patterned, elasticated bandana on, that matches my T-shirt.
We both wear hiking boots. Mine are still shiny and new from the store, Regan’s are more worn from months of heavy use.
Sitting so close together in the cab of his truck, I can’t help noticing that he must have put some cologne on, because he smells great. I’ve no idea what it is, but its kinda half woody, half citrusy, with an overtone of spiciness in there too… ginger, perhaps?
Seems he really is pulling out all the stops. I should feel honored. I guess I do feel honored. But I also feel… what?
Excited, perhaps?
Maybe a little, yes. But mostly I feel… comfortable, protected.
…Safe.
Looking across at him, as he steers us ever upwards with the confidence that no doubt comes from years of traversing these types of narrow, steep, winding roads, I can’t help noticing how the muscles slide, bulge and contract on his firm, tanned thighs as he changes gears—it’s an older, stick shift vehicle—and how even seated, his T-shirt hangs straight down, seemingly not an ounce of unnecessary fat covering his waist.
I realize with surprise how much more aware I am, not just of him as a person, but as a man. Far more than I’d noticed on our previous journey together into Coyote Creek Falls.
Sitting there, as the engine throbs beneath us, and the sunlight warms the backs of our necks, there’s another word that springs to mind. Not a word I’ve had cause to use too very much, over the years. A simple word…
Happy.
We’re already heading quite steeply upwards. The road is narrow and winding, snaking between tall trees either side of us. Regan leans towards me as he drives, waving at the foliage with one hand whilst steering with the other.
“Beautiful, aren’t they?”
“Yes, they are.” I admire the massive trunks, towering upwards to the sky, the foliage forming a luxuriant green living canopy far above our heads.
“How old are they? They must be ancient.”
“Younger than you think,” he responds with a grin. “Most of West Virginia was deforested in the early 20th century. There’s very little really ancient forest left now. This part was all replanted back in about 1930 or thereabouts.
“How can you know?”
“You count the rings.” He smiles at the naivete of my question, though with more affection than criticism. I nod and roll my eyes.
“Yes, of course, stupid of me.”
“Not really.” There’s a brief pause, then he says “The oldest tree cut down in West Virginia was cut down in 1938. They counted the rings to calculate its age. Care to take a guess which year it dated from?”
“Oh…” I think for a moment. How long might a huge oak or a sycamore or something live for, if humans weren’t around to cut it down? A hundred years? Two hundred years? These were not questions that had ever come up during my life in Brooklyn.
“How about 1735?” I guess a year that would make the tree a little more than two hundred years old before it was cut down. It has to be a biggish number, because he’d hardly be asking me to guess, otherwise.
“Thirteen-hundred-and-sixty-one,” he replies, grinning broadly at me. Pleased by my shocked reaction.
“1361? That’s… well, that’s before everything.”
“Yeah. Amazing, isn’t it? Five hundred and seventy-seven years old when it was cut down. It had a name: “Mingo Oak” they used to call it. They had to cut it down because of a fire in the area that had gotten to it.”
“I see, so it wasn’t for the timber?”
“No. By the late thirties they were actually already replanting, believe it or not. And to bring our story through a full circle, that’s what we’re looking at through the window right now.”
“What… these huge trees were planted in the thirties?” He nods.
“Strange to believe, but that’s exactly right.
Tall though they are, they’re nowhere near the size of the first-generation hardwoods the old timers cut down.
Oak, poplar, sycamore, walnut… they all went under the axe back in those days.
West Virginia was almost entirely deforested by 1920.
Then they realized what they’d done. Started a huge soil improvement and replanting project.
And now look at the place… almost unbelievable what they did. ”
I can hear the pride in his voice for what the locals had managed to achieve. Turning a man-made disaster around and making a success story out of it.
“Well, it sure is pretty now,” I say, as we drive ever upwards, sunlight dappling between branches, and glimpses of blue sky appearing and disappearing as we continue on.
“I thought we could stop at the lake first,” he says. “Then we can take in the waterfall on the way back. If that suits you?”
“Sure. You’re in charge. Any particular reason?”
He scratches his nose. “Well, it’s a warm day.
I thought it would be as well to get the hiking done early, then we could have lunch and rest up.
The waterfall’s easy to reach – maybe a five-minute stroll…
something like that. Also, the waterfall’s the most spectacular part of today’s adventure, so I thought we’d save the best until last.”
“Great. Sounds like a plan.”