Remain
by Joseph Wise
copyright © 2005
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Remain
by Joseph
Wise
copyright © 2005
Ludlow Press Short Fiction
Remain
Arvey could hear the gravel pelting his wheel wells, and behind him dust
rose into the overhanging branches. The road curved, dipped, and narrowed.
Arvey kept his speed, spraying rock into the brush as his suspension bounced
and jittered over the ruts.
Ahead, the road sloped up to a clearing, before diving back again into the
enveloping foliage. Arvey rounded the next corner and caught a flash of hot
pink as a lawn chair bounced off his bumper with a weak aluminum thump. He
clamped down on the breaks and let the car skid to a stop, where it blocked
the road in sharp angle.
He shifted the car into park. The air around him swirled with dust, which
climbed upward and vanished. He stood and watched the still trees.
The lawn chair was no longer on the road. Arvey backtracked, checking the
sides of the road as he walked. It had been thrown into a patch of tall
grass. The frame was bent only a little, and the pink canvas was a little
dirty. He recognized it immediately.
Arvey took the chair back to the car and tossed it into the trunk. He
checked the front bumper for dents, but only noticed a small scratch in the
paint. A mass of leaves billowed over the edge of the road. Arvey ruffled
his hair, and took off his necktie.
He backed his car down the narrow road until he found a small turnoff
through dense leaves. He pulled in only a short way before he saw the
trailer. It was curved against the far end of the campsite, and the truck
was nose to nose with a thick and jagged trunk.
Arvey's mother came right up to his door. Her hair, wiry blond strands
with invasive streaks of gray, was tied back and she wore a bandana around
her neck; the cloth was faded and the tips worn. He gave her a loose hug as
he stepped out.
"You're going to have a hell of time getting the trailer out again when you
leave," he said. She smiled and straightened his hair for him. Her hands
were dry and cracked, with pale dirt pushed under the nails, and Arvey could
smell peach lotion.
"You saw the chair? You found me okay?"
"It almost took out my headlight," he said, and took the chair out of the
trunk, along with a stack of newspapers.
She had put three logs into the fire pit. Arvey rearranged them into a
pyramid and stuffed newspaper underneath. She handed him a box of matches
and he lit one. A bag of marshmallows and two sticks were leaning against a
second pink chair.
"I've got graham crackers and chocolate in the trailer," she said. "For s'
mores!"
Arvey asked her for the truck keys. He kicked gravel with his heels as he
walked. Leaves had already begun to fall.
He slid in and started the engine, and rocked the truck back and forth
until it was clear of the tree stump. He left it running and went back to
the fifth-wheel.
"Did you bring the level?"
"I think he used to keep it in the drawer by the stove." She was sliding
marshmallows on to the ends of sticks. The fire had caught the inside edges
of the logs, and was crawling upward, sending thin smoke into the air. The
newspapers were ash.
On the fifth-wheel's table, Arvey's mother had already put a thick square
of chocolate on a graham cracker, leaving another cracker above for the lid.
She had made one for Arvey, too. He took the level outside and started
cranking down the corner-jacks. When he was done, he unhitched the
fifth-wheel and pulled the truck forward far enough that his mother could
get out of the campsite easily.
"Do you know where the store is from here?" he said. "I wanted to give you
my phone, just in case, but it doesn't get service out here."
"The coals will be ready in a minute," she said. "Do you want me to do
your marshmallow for you, or would you rather hold the stick?"
Arvey shook his head, "I have to head back."
She straightened the first pink chair. It seemed to be fine.
"Stay for a little bit," she said. "If you wait around long enough we
might have a fish to cook!"
Arvey glanced at the back of the campsite, where a small path of stones
dipped out of sight. He went that way, without a word. A breeze had begun.
Arvey could hear the hush of the creek, and felt the moisture it gave to the
air. Low sunshine crept through gaps in the shadowing leaves above and all
around.
The path curved through a wisp of tall grass, and came to a bank of
scattered stones, which were flat and smooth, and etched, it seemed, from
tumbling in the clear stream. Wedged into a pile of larger rocks was the
handle of a fishing pole. Its line trailed along the ground before touching
any water. Arvey followed the faint thread to a shallow pool, lined with
silt. Light shimmered on the surface, but Arvey caught the occasional
glitter of the lure, half buried. He tugged it free, ripped it from the
line, and reattached one of the smaller hooks.
Arvey walked downstream with the pole. The creek curved and quickened into
a swift chute before settling in a deep wash. Here, large stones rested at
the bottom, submerged and barely visible in this angle of light. A boulder,
its face gored by the river, formed the far bank. Arvey reminded himself
that he was wearing a suit.
When he came back to the campsite, his mother eyed the lure in his hand.
She frowned for a moment.
"You don't need this," he explained. "And the line needs to be deeper,
there won't be any fish in a little pool like that."
"Your father taught me how to fish."
"It's different in a river than on a lake," said Arvey. He told her where
to find the pole.
She asked him if he was ready to roast his marshmallow but he said he had
to leave. The air was getting cold as the sun dipped lower. The moisture
from the creek was spreading and he could taste it in his lungs when he
inhaled.
"I don't think you should stay here very long by yourself," he said. She
waved her hand at him and smiled.
"I've been camping my whole life."
"It's different by yourself."
Arvey said he would come back in a few days and help her hitch up the
fifth-wheel again. She brought out a blanket and sat by the fire.
"Bring the kids up tomorrow and let them play in the water?"
"It's a three hour drive, Mom."
She tightened the blanket around her shoulders. The sky was dimming, and
Arvey could smell the leaves and greenery all around as their scents began
to awaken for dusk, stretching into the crisper air of nightfall. Now, the
breeze rustled in the stalks.
Arvey bent and kissed his mother on the forehead. The fire had grown.
Arvey reminded her to use the newspaper tomorrow as kindling.
"Maybe when its summer again," he said. "We can all go over a weekend, or
something."
Arvey walked to his car, listening to the gravel under his feet as he
stepped. It sounded deep, and empty, as if he were walking over a hollow
slab. He thought about the drive home, and how long it would take, and he
thought about how easy it would be to rest by the fire and listen to the
water as it pulled away the last of the day's warmth.
He backed out onto the road quickly, and a wave of gravel shot into the
trees as he jerked the wheel around. His tires spun, digging into the road
before finding solid ground.
The road climbed out of the small dell, weaving a soft slope upward. The
land rolled out before him as Arvey crested the hill and began to speed
along the ridge. He drove quickly, and the sun dropped and touched the
horizon, sending bars of yellow and orange across the sky. It fell further
and became deep red, and as the road turned again, facing westward, Arvey
stopped and glanced as the light turned purple and the sun fell from view,
dragging the last of the summer with it.
He looked back toward the campsite, through the dust-covered glass, for
some sign of the fire. But he had gone too far, or the light could not
escape from the cold leaves. He stopped the car, and shielded his eyes
from the growing dusk. He turned away, not daring to look out again until
the world was dark, and the stars had kindled. Only then, when no piece of
sunlight could be seen anymore, did he continue toward home.