But, really.
“Yes, I think I do,”he says.“I’m sorry.I’m going to figure out a better way to feel.And in the meanwhile, I promise to behave.”
She makes a silencing gesture.She thinks she hears something, a noise from down the hall.
“Nobody’s awake yet,”Daniel says.
She listens again.He’s right;the house is silent.She hears the distant whine ofa snowmobile, powering through the white enameled stillness ofthe world like a dentist’s drill.She kisses him.
“You’d better go back to the guest room,”Iris says.“Nelson could walk in here any second.”
“All right.”He leans out ofthe bed, as ifout ofa life raft, reaching down for what is left ofthe night’s wreckage—his shirt, his underwear, his pants.
She feels a sudden gust ofdesperation at the sight ofhim beginning to leave.What ifthis never can happen again? He looks at her over his shoulder as he gets out ofbed.His reddish, slightly wrinkled little be-hind.She dives across the bed, grabs his hips, he makes it easy for her to pull him back into bed.When they have stopped rolling around, he has ended up below her, his head between her legs, his mouth kissing her opening as ifthey were the lips on her face.At this point, it is barely ex-citing, it’s comforting, it feels warm and kind and devoted.
Footsteps.Have they been getting closer all the while? In a panic, Iris lifts herselfup and twists away from Daniel.Her pubic bone bangs against his teeth.He looks bewildered, but she doesn’t have to tell him to get up, he knows what’s happening.There is apat pat patoffootsteps getting closer.He rolls out ofbed, grabs the clothes he gathered minutes before, makes a vain attempt to cover himself.Iris pulls the covers up to her chin.
It’s Scarecrow.The old dog waddles in, head cocked, her long lilac tongue out, a good-natured glint in her blue eyes.
“Thank you, Jesus!”Daniel says.
They are so relieved, they share the hysterical laughter ofthe near miss.Iris does something she hasn’t done since she was a little girclass="underline" she covers her mouth while she laughs her gummy laugh.And Daniel pre-tends to have a heart attack, grabbing his chest, staggering, falling back into the bed.Iris strokes his long, soft hair.She leans over, kisses the taste ofherselfoffhis mouth.
Nelson’s footsteps are softer than the dog’s.He is right next to the bed before they notice him.
“I’m cold,”he says, staring intently at Daniel.
[8]
Hampton was still pinching black powder out of his back pocket, rubbing it be-tween his thumb and forefinger.His fingers were long, poetic;you could imagine him playing piano, stroking a sleeping cat, caressing a woman.He tossed the powder into the darkness, as if scattering ashes after a cremation.Then he raked a handful of dead leaves off of a wild cherry tree, one that was still standing, and used them to wipe his hands.“I used to make Iris laugh all the time.”
“I used to make Kate laugh, too,”said Daniel.He said it because he had to say
something.He couldn’t simply let Hampton go on about Iris and not say any-thing in reply.It would be too strange, and it would be suspicious, too.However, what he said was true, meant.“First couple of years, I had her in hysterics.”
He noticed that Hampton’s shaved head had suffered a scrape.There was a
little red worm of blood on the smooth scalp.
“Kate doesn’t think you’re funny anymore?”
“No, she doesn’t,”Daniel said.
”Iris thinks you’re funny.Maybe you’re funnier around her.”
“Maybe she’s just very kind.”
“Or very lonely.”
Daniel must move quickly now that Nelson has crawled under the covers to be next to Iris;he slips out ofher bedroom and into the hall, where he dresses frantically and with more clumsiness than he thought himself capable of, before going into Nelson’s room and waking Ruby.He shakes her awake.Time to go, sweetie.She nods, accepting the wisdom ofhis edict.She never argues with anything he says.She assumes he knows what is best for her and what is correct.Ifhe serves her peas and corn, she eats peas and corn.Ifhe tucks her in bed, she closes her eyes.Ifhe tells her there are no such things as ghosts, she believes him, she doesn’t even ask him to look in the closet.Daniel dresses her hur-riedly, and then carries her down the stairs and through the door to the stunned, frosted, broken world outside.
His car has been spared.No trees have fallen on it during the night, though there are twigs and branches stuck in the snow on the roofand windshield.Next door, not thirty feet away, a dogwood has snapped in two;its crown rests on the roofofthe house, right next to the chimney.
Ruby stares at it with no small measure ofawe, her eyes open so wide that the whites show above and below her pupils.Daniel gathers her closer, though he, too, stares at the tree, feeling creepy but spared.
No one has yet come out to shovel a sidewalk or clear a driveway, though the snow has finally stopped and the sky is a ridiculously cheer-ful blue.The blanket ofuntouched snow stretches as far as he can see—untouched, that is, except where trees or branches have plunged through the surface.At the far end ofthe block, a long coil ofpower line lies curled into itselflike a snake in a basket, every now and then spitting out a warning venom ofbright-orange sparks.
“We’re going home, honey,”Daniel says.His hands caress her cheeks, smooth as glass.
Though there is no road to drive on, Daniel goes through the motions ofleaving anyhow.Feeling at once drunk and ill with the flu, he brushes the snow offthe front-door handle, yanks the door open, breaking the brittle spun-sugar sheet ofice, slides into the car, and gets the engine started.Ruby climbs into the back and puts herselfinto the child seat, slip-ping the straps over her shoulders.While the engine warms, Daniel clears the windshield and the back window, and then brushes snow and debris off the roof.He gets back into the car and looks at Ruby.Her eyes are swollen with exhaustion, and she is shivering.“You all set?”he asks, and she nods.
He puts the transmission into reverse and guns the motor, hoping to shoot over the hump ofsnow at the end ofIris’s driveway.It doesn’t quite occur to him that ifthe road crew hasn’t cleared Iris’s street right in the center oftown, then there is no possibility ofany ofthe roads being cleared, least ofall the dirt road where he and Kate live, well out oftown.
His car’s back wheels spin uselessly.He puts the transmission into reverse, goes back a foot or two, and then puts it in drive, hoping to free himself by creating a rocking motion, back and forth.Soon, however, the spinning tires are melting the snow beneath their treads, and soon after that there rises the sharp odor ofburning rubber.
“You know what?”Daniel says to Ruby, turning to look at her, smiling, trying to be as casual as possible.“Even ifwe get this stupid car out ofthe driveway, we still might not be able to drive all the way home.
There’s so much snow, honey.”
“What about Mom?”Ruby asks.
”Well, she’s the lucky one, isn’t she? She’s already home.”
“Can’t we go home, too?”
“Don’t worry.We will.”He looks back at Iris’s house and tries to gather the courage to go back in.She is likely tending Nelson’s abused sensibilities, but he has a little girl out in the snow.
Just then, he hears the urgent whine ofa small engine revved to its upper limits, and a moment later an oversized, gaily painted snowmobile careens into view.It’s Ferguson Richmond—airborne for a moment, as he comes over a rise, and then bouncing offthe snowy street, raising up fans ofpure powder.He takes a long, looping turn, and a moment later he pulls into Iris’s driveway.