The Tin Can Tree (2 page)

“I already said to you—” James began.

“Well, I
know,
” said Simon, and he started walking faster then and whistling. He whistled off-key, and the tune was carried away by the wind.

When they reached their house, which stood slightly swaybacked by the road with its one painted side facing forward, James stopped to look in his mailbox. There was only a fertilizer ad, which he stuck in his hip pocket to throw away later. “See what your mail is, why don’t you,” he told Simon.

Simon was walking in small neat circles around the three mailboxes. He stuck out a hand toward the box with “R. J. Pike” painted on it and flipped the door open, and then made another circle and came to a stop in front of the box to peer inside. “Fertilizer ad,” he said. He pulled it out and dropped it on the roadside.
“Letter for Mama.” He pulled that out too, and dropped it on top of the first. “She’ll never read it.”

James picked the letter up and followed Simon along the dirt path to the house. Halfway through the yard the path split into three smaller ones, each leading to a separate door on the long front porch. Simon took the one on the far left, heading toward James’s door, and James took the far right to deliver the Pikes’ letter. The Pikes’ part of the porch had a washing machine and an outgrown potty-chair and a collection of plants littering it; he had to watch his step. When he bent to slide the letter under the door he heard a scratching sound and a little yelp, and he stood up and called to Simon, “Your dog wants out, all right?”

“All right.”

He opened the door and a very old, fat Chihuahua slid through, dancing nervously on stiff legs as if her feet hurt her. “Okay, Nellie,” he said, and bent to pat her once and then stepped over her and continued down the porch. On his way he passed the Potter sisters’ window and waved to Miss Faye, smiling and shaking his head to show her he couldn’t come in. She was sitting behind closed glass, full face to the window and as close to it as she could get, and when James shook his head the corners of her mouth turned down and she slumped back in her chair. Neither she nor Miss Lucy could climb that hill to the funeral, and they were counting on James to tell them about it.

Simon was standing at James’s door, his hands in his pockets. “Why didn’t you go on in?” James asked him, and Simon just shook his head.

“I reckoned I’d wait,” he said.

“Ansel’d let you in.”

“Well, anyway,” said Simon, and stood back to let James open the door for him.

The inside of the house was cool and dim. It had unvarnished wooden floorboards, with no rugs, and when Simon walked in he clicked his heels sharply against the wood the way he did when he was wearing his boots. Walking that way, swinging his thin legs in heavy, too-big strides, made him look younger, like a small child entering a dark room. And he didn’t look to his left, although he knew James’s brother would be on the couch where he always was.

“Ansel?” James said.

“Here I am.”

James closed the screen door behind him and looked toward the couch. Ansel was sitting there, with his back very straight and his feet on the floor. Usually he spent the day on his back (he had anemia, the kind that never got much better or much worse so long as he was careful), but today he had made a special effort to be up. He was wearing his Sunday black suit, and he had slicked his pale hair so tightly down with water that it was the same shape as the narrow bones of his head. Probably he had thought that was the least he could do for Janie Rose. When James came in Ansel didn’t look in his direction; he was watching Simon. He waited until Simon finally turned around and faced him, and then he stood up and stooped toward him in what looked like a bow. “I hope this day wasn’t too hard on you,” he said formally, and then sat down and waited while Simon stood frowning at him.

“We got back before the others,” James said. “I promised Simon lunch.”

“Oh. Well, I doubt that he—Here, you want to sit down?”

He patted the couch where he sat, which meant that he was extending special privileges. Ordinarily he didn’t like people sitting there. After a minute Simon shrugged and clicked his heels over to the couch, and Ansel moved aside to give him room.

“I haven’t really talked to you since the, uh—It’s been quite a few days. But I wanted to say—”

“I been busy,” said Simon.

“Well, sure you have,” Ansel said. “I know that.” He was sitting forward now, placing the tips of his fingers together, gazing absently at the floor with those clear blue eyes of his. It made James nervous (Ansel had been known to get too serious at times like this) but before he could change the atmosphere any, Ansel had begun speaking again. “Uh, I wanted to tell you,” he said, “I been meaning to say to you—sheesh! James, will you close the door?”

James gave the inner door a push and it clicked shut.

“Too much wind,” Ansel said. “Well. I been meaning to, um, give you my condolences, Simon. And tell you how sorry I am not to go to the funeral. James said I shouldn’t, but you don’t know how I—”

“You didn’t miss much,” said Simon.

“What? Well, I just wish I could’ve come and paid my respects, so to speak. That’s what I told James. But James said—”

Simon sat tight, his hands pressed between his knees and his eyes straight ahead. When James started into the kitchen Simon half stood, with that squinchy little frown on his face again, so James stopped and leaned back against the wall. He wasn’t sure why; always before this it was Ansel that Simon followed, leaving James to Janie Rose. But now Simon sank back in his seat again, looking easier, and began kicking one foot
lazily in the direction of the coffee table. Ansel rambled on, his speech growing more certain.

“I had never been so shocked by
any
news,” he said. “I was saying that to James. I said, ‘Why, she and Simon were over here not but a while ago,’ I said. ‘Why, think how Simon must
feel.’ 
”

“I feel all right,” Simon said.

“I mean—”

“I feel all right.”

Ansel rubbed the bridge of his nose and looked over at James, and James straightened up from his position against the wall. “Mainly he feels hungry,” he told Ansel. “I promised him lunch.”

“Why, sure,” said Ansel. “If he wants it. But I doubt he does. You hungry, Simon?”

“I’m starved,” Simon said.

“You going to eat?”

“I
reckon
I am.”

“I see,” said Ansel.

Simon stood up and came over to James. When he got to James’s side he just stood there and waited, with his eyes straight ahead and his back to Ansel. “We going to get that pizza?” he asked.

“Anything you want.”

“Pizza?” Ansel said, and Simon turned then and looked up at James.

“That’s what I promised him,” James said.

“Why, Simon—”

“Hush,” said James. “Now, Simon, we got three kinds of pizza mix out there. Sausage, and cheese, and something else. I forget. You go choose and then we’ll cook it up. All right?”

“All right,” Simon said. He turned and looked back at Ansel, and then he went on into the kitchen. When
he was gone, James came over and sat down beside Ansel.

“Listen,” he said.

Away from outsiders now, Ansel slumped back in his seat and let his shoulders sag. There were tired dark marks underneath his eyes; he hadn’t slept well. “You’re on my couch,” he said automatically. “Do I have to tell you, James? Sitting like that makes the springs go wrong.”

“Simon’s folks are still on the hill,” said James. “We’ve got to keep him here; I promised Joan he wouldn’t sit in that house alone.”

“Ah, sitting alone,” Ansel said. He sighed. “That’s no good.”

“No. Will you help keep him busy?”

“The couch, James.”

James stood up, and Ansel swung his feet around and slid down until he was lying prone. “I don’t see how he can eat,” he said.

“He’s hungry.”

“I
wonder
about this world.”

“People handle things their own ways,” James said. “Don’t go talking to him about dying, Ansel.”

“Well.”

“Will you?”

“Well.”

There was a crash of cans out in the kitchen. A cupboard door slammed, and Simon called, “Hey, James. I’ve decided.”

“Which one?”

“The sausage. There was only just the two of them.” He came into the living room, carrying the box of pizza mix, and Ansel raised his head to look over at him and then grunted and lay back and stared at the ceiling. For
a minute Simon hesitated. Then he walked over to him and said, “
You’re
the pizza-maker.”

“Who said?” Ansel asked.

“Well, back there on the hill James said—”

“All right.” Ansel sat up slowly, running his fingers through his hair. “It’s always something,” he said.

“Well, maybe—”

“No, no. I don’t mind.”

And then Ansel smiled, using his widest smile that dipped in the middle and turned up at the corners like a child’s drawing of a happy man. When he did that his long thin face turned suddenly wide at the cheekbones, and his chin became shiny. “We’ll make my speciality,” he said. “It’s called an icebox pizza. On refrigerator-defrosting days that’s the way we clean the icebox; we load it all on a pizza crust and serve it up for lunch. You want to see how I make it?”

He was standing now, smoothing down his Sunday jacket and straightening his slumped shoulders. When he reached for the pizza mix Simon walked forward and gave it to him, not hanging back now but looking more at ease. Ansel said, “This is something every man should know. Even if he’s married. He can cook it when his wife is sick and serve her lunch in bed. Do you want an apron?”

“No,” said Simon.

“Don’t blame you. Don’t blame you at all. Well—” and he was heading for the kitchen now, reading the directions as he walked. His walk was slow, but not enough to cause James any worry. James could judge the way Ansel felt just by glancing at him, most of the time. He had to; Ansel would never tell himself. When he felt his best he was likely to call for meals on a tray, and when he was really sick he might decide to wallpaper
the bedroom. He was a backward kind of person. James had a habit of looking at him as someone a whole generation removed from him, although in reality he was twenty-six, only two years younger than James himself. He was thinking that way now, watching with narrow, almost paternal eyes as Ansel made his way into the kitchen.

“Naturally there are really no
rules,
” Ansel was saying, “since you never know what might be in the icebox.” And Simon’s voice came floating back: “Fruit, even? Lettuce?” “
Well
, now …” Ansel said.

James smiled and went over to the easy chair to sit down, stretching his legs out in front of him. It felt good to be home again. The house was a dingy place, with yellow peeling walls and sunken furniture. And it was so rickety that whenever James had some photography job that required a long time-exposure he had to run around warning everyone. “Just
sit
a minute,” he would say, and he would pull up chairs for everybody in this house and then go dashing off to take his picture before people started shaking the floors again. But at least it was a comfortable house, not far from town, and Ansel had that big front window in the living room where he could watch the road. He would sit on the couch with his elbows on the sill, and everything he saw passing—just an old truck, or a boy riding a mule—meant something to him. He had been watching that long, and he knew people that well.

Thinking of Ansel and his window made James look toward it, to see what was going on, but all he saw from where he sat was the greenish-yellow haze of summer air, framed by mesh curtains. He rose and went over to look out, with his hands upon the sill, and peered down the gravel road toward the hill he had just
come from. No one was in sight. Maybe it would be hours before they returned; Joan might still be standing there, trying to make her aunt and uncle stop staring at that grass. But even so, James went on watching for several minutes. He could still feel the wind, gentler down here but strong enough to push the curtains in.

For a long time now, wind would make him think of today. He had climbed that hill behind all the others, and seen how the wind whipped the women’s black skirts and ruffled little crooked parts down the backs of their hairdos. And when the first cluster of relatives had taken their leave at the end, stopping first to touch Mrs. Pike’s folded arms or murmur something to Mr. Pike, the words they said were blown away and neither of the parents answered. Though they might not have answered anyway, even without the wind. The day that Janie Rose died, when James had spent thirty-six hours in the hospital waiting room and finally heard the news with only that tenth of his mind that was still awake, he had gone to Mrs. Pike and said, “Mrs. Pike, if there’s anything I or Ansel can do for you, no matter what it is, we will want to do it.” And Mrs. Pike had looked past him at the information desk and said, “Just falling off a
tractor
don’t make a person die,” and then had turned and left. So James had let them be, and went home and told Ansel to keep to himself a while and not go bothering the Pikes. “Not even to give our sympathy?” asked Ansel, and James said no, not even that. He hadn’t liked the thought of Ansel’s going to the funeral, either. Ansel said he had half a mind to go anyway—he could always rest on the way, he said—but James could picture that: Ansel toiling up the hill, clasping his chest from the effort and gasping out lines of funeral poetry, calling out for the whole procession
to stop the minute he needed a rest. So James had gone alone, and quietly, and had promised to report to Ansel the minute it was over. The only one there that he had spoken to was Joan; the only two sounds he carried away with him were Joan’s low voice and the roaring of the wind. He thought he would never like the sound of wind again.

Out in the kitchen now, Janie Rose’s brother was talking on and on in his froggy little voice. “I never saw
peanut
butter on a pizza,” he was saying. “You sure you know what you’re doing, Ansel?”

“Just wait’ll you taste it,” Ansel said.

James left the window and went out to the kitchen. “How’s it going?” he asked.