"Look at this," he said, peering out over the weeds toward the skyline. Biting on his pipe stem. Shaking his head. "It's a shame. It's like we've gone back to the jungle out here. I had to buy a gun. I did. A forty-five. I keep it in the closet in my bedroom. Half the time I'm terrified my grandson'll find it and blow his head off. But what else can I do? We have packs of predators roaming the street at night. Attacking anyone that moves. Breaking in and attacking women right at home in their own beds. Setting cars on fire, houses on fire. The media don't even report half of what goes on. How can they? They're too busy glamorizing slut actresses and gangster music stars. It wouldn't be good for business if they told people what really happens in a neighborhood when morality breaks down. We've got girls here getting pregnant at thirteen without husbands. The fathers taking no care of them or the children. And the sons become predators and it starts again. So help me, all it takes for the world to crumble to nothing is for women to lose their virtue and men their honor."
Shannon gave a sort of smile to himself. It was the usual old man complaint: the world's not what it used to be. It's all going to hell. Back in the day, everything was better. Blah blah blah. As if there was ever much honor or virtue in the world. Holding the angel's new wing piece on his lap now and sanding the edges, Shannon tried to humor him out of it. "I thought you said you weren't a preacher."
But Applebee didn't get the joke. He just went on. "A high school math teacher. Retired now. You can't teach children if they have no discipline. They won't let you discipline them yourself and they get no discipline at home. So it just gets worse. My daughter found that out-yes, she did, for all her idealism."
It was his first mention of his daughter and it turned Shannon's attention. He wanted to find out more. "Your daughter-is she a teacher, too?"
"Teaches the little ones. At least there's still some hope with them. But she finally gave up even on that. In the neighborhood, the thugs come younger and younger. Even the little ones can't be controlled anymore. Now she teaches on the west side, in a private school. That way, Michael can go there free of charge."
Shannon nodded. He liked the image of her teaching little children. It struck him as very womanly. It touched him somehow.
"Oh," said Applebee then, "a preacher." He suddenly got Shannon's joke. He gave a good-natured chuckle. "No, no, no. I guess I was going at it though, wasn't I? But no."
"A teacher not a preacher," said Shannon with a laugh.
"Exactly. This house did used to be a rectory, though."
"Oh yeah?" Shannon wasn't exactly sure what a rectory was.
Applebee must've picked up on that. "It was a preacher's house. The church used to stand right there." He pointed with his pipe stem to a field full of garbage. "It burned down years ago. That altarpiece-it was the only thing that was saved."
"Well, I guess the house must've had an effect on you," Shannon kidded him. "Cause for a teacher, you preach it pretty good."
Frederick Applebee laughed. "I'm just a cranky old man, that's all. But cranky old men know a thing or two. That's what makes them so damn cranky. Fact is, I'm no churchgoer and never have been but…"
Shannon had risen from his stool and was attaching the wing again. He took a pencil from his pocket and began to sketch an outline of feathers on the wood so he could carve them to join properly with the broken stump. He didn't notice that Applebee had gone into a fugue state and fallen silent.
Then Applebee said quietly, "You ever study calculus?"
"Oh, sure," murmured Shannon, sketching away. "Calculus? That's all I ever do."
"Yes," said the old man, almost to himself. "I understand. No one does anymore. But there's a lot of mystery to it. Infinite limits… a lot of mystery." He shook his head slowly. "Sorry. These things-they run around in my brain and I've got no one to tell them to."
"That's all right. I don't mind. It's interesting."
There was no answer. Shannon came out of his focus on the wing long enough to glance at Applebee. Applebee was holding his pipe to his mouth and tapping the stem against his lower lip. He was looking thoughtfully over the arches and jumbles and lopsided spires of the debris lying in the high weeds. Shannon figured he was thinking about the old days. He smiled again. He liked Applebee. He was a good old guy.
Coming back to himself, Applebee noticed Shannon watching him. And he noticed the wing Shannon was working on and how well it fit to the stump on the broken angel and how perfectly and gracefully Shannon had drawn the feathers. "Look at that," he said, perking up, delighted. "Why, that's wonderful. Where'd you learn to do that?"
"I just can," Shannon said with a shrug. "I've always been able to."
At that moment, the little boy-Michael-came bursting out of the house into the backyard. All his earlier solemnity was gone. He was running full speed, squealing with laughter.
"Ho!" cried Frederick Applebee as the boy darted behind him and clutched at his legs, hiding. "What's this?"
Michael's mother cracked open the screen door behind him, peeking around the edge of it with bright, mischievous eyes.
"Where'd he get to?" she said. "I know he's here somewhere."
The little boy giggled behind his grandfather's legs as the woman came out of the house and crept steadily toward him like a stalking cat.
"I know he's here somewhere," she said again.
The boy, unable to tolerate the suspense, broke from behind Applebee's legs and ran for it. The mother went after him and caught him and swept him up in her arms, laughing and tickling him.
Shannon felt a hitch in his chest at this first close sight of her, the sight of her bright eyes and smile and the sound of her laughter. She was wearing loose jeans and a baggy sweatshirt, but Shannon could see her figure moving under them as she wrestled with her son. She was definitely the woman he'd seen weeping in the window, but so different from that woman, so lively and hilarious, that he half doubted the two were the same.
"Henry Conor, this is my daughter, Teresa Grey," Frederick Applebee said.
She came over to them, clutching the giggling, struggling boy in her arms so that his feet kicked and dangled off the ground. She was as pretty up close as she'd been through the window, prettier because she was smiling now. She had big, warm brown eyes, high cheekbones, and a chin like the point of a valentine. She had her father's squashed nose, but smaller, more graceful, like an Irish pug. Her hair sprang out all over the place in corkscrew curls, which Shannon found endearing.
"Hi, Henry," she said. She held the boy in one arm, letting him slide his way to the ground. She offered her free hand and Shannon shook it.
"Look at this," said Applebee, indicating the angel on the reredos. "He's doing a great job so far."
"Oh, I'm glad!" she said. She had a warm voice, on the deep side. "My father loves this old thing. He was crushed when it got broken. Oh, you are doing a good job, aren't you?"
"Just the wing," said Shannon modestly. "The head'll be the hard part."
The boy squirmed free of Teresa's hold and dashed for the house. Laughing uncontrollably, he shouted, "I'm getting away!"
"Excuse me," Teresa said to Shannon with a laugh.
Shannon felt another hitch inside him as he watched her go chasing after the child, shouting play threats at him.
He went back to work. He began to carve the delicate wing feathers with an X-Acto knife. The old man wandered into the house and back out again later, standing and watching, chatting about the thoughts he had had on his mind for too long. At lunchtime, the woman brought him a sandwich and a Coke. Now and then, the boy peeked solemnly at him through a rear window. Shannon made faces at the kid and pretended to shoot at him. The boy ducked and came back, fighting down a smile. He was too shy, though, to come out into the yard.