Momma says “there ain’t going to be no axe murderer stormin’ in here any time soon, and all the protectin’ I seen you do is protectin’ a bottle of beer from sloshing out when you drive your truck around a corner too sharp.” Daddy is mighty appalled at that and says, “since you all high and mighty and ain’t think I do nothin’ besides sitting around and drinking beer and whatnot, you just give it a try. You just give my job a try and see how hard it is and I’ll be waiting when you come crawling back, asking for my help when everything gets all rough and falls apart.”
Momma scoffs “ok, how’s about this. I do your job, and my job, and you take care of Jacob there, for it was your idea that we ain’t get someone to look at him. What if all he needs is something stuck in his arm to bring him back? What you know about doctorin’ except for doctoring your pride when you fail at everything?” Daddy is sputtering and his face is red and he yells “fine! I’ll fukkin’ take care of him! I’ll fukkin’ take care of him all right!” He picks up the mattress, Jacob on it and all, and heaves it through the door, stomping off with it to the yard.
Momma is shaking her head slowly and I follow Daddy out. He’s roughly taking Jacob’s clothes off and Jacob is on the mattress naked now. Daddy is grabbing the hose and yanking it hard and it’s caught on something and he’s swearing and pulling on it something fierce and I say “I see it, Daddy!”
I run to where the hose is caught and I unstick it for him, but he gives it a big angry yank anyway and stumbles a bit and he’s at Jacob now, spraying him and the mattress fiercely like he’s putting out a fire. The stream of water is in Jacob’s face and in his mouth and I walk up to Daddy slow for I ain’t want to rile him no more as he’s liable to do anything. I stand next to him while he’s hosing off Jacob and he‘s breathing hard, then he throws the hose down and says “there. I done washed him.”
He turns his head toward the house and says loudly “that was pretty easy! Fukkin’ washed him already and it was easy!” Daddy stomps over to where he had flung Jacob's soiled clothes and he’s going to put them back on Jacob and I say “that’s ok Daddy, I can do this part, you done real good with cleaning him and the mattress and I can do this part.” Daddy stops and says nothing, just stares off into the distance, then pretty soon he wipes the sweat from his forehead and takes a big sniff like taking a deep breath and rubs his hands on his face and says “I done told her. I done told her. We’s up here and we’re going to make it on our own without nothing helping us.”
He looks at me. “We’re all alone up here, Gabe. All alone. I’d rather we all die together making a try at it then to go back to the way it was. I can't go back there. We can’t go back there. I can’t live in no town. It’s not for us. You believe that?” I say I do and that we can make it. We’ve already come this far. They’s a good garden and we’ll make it out here. I don’t believe him but that’s not what Daddy is asking for. When he has something to say, he says it to me, for I always I agree. He takes strength from my words. I ain’t old enough for it, but he don’t see that no more.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
He hears the words and they’s good enough for him since I’m the only one that gives his words back to him.
I say “and I can help out with Jacob, only I ain’t so strong like you and I ain’t know what to feed him, but I can help.” Daddy nods and he’s calmed down some and he says “that’s just right, Scamp. Just right. You'n me. We can take care of him and it ain’t hard like Momma says. We can do it together.” I say that’s good and I ain’t know how to wash clothes too good and maybe we can get started with that so we don’t put the pee back on Jacob after he already got washed off just now.
Daddy is calmed all the way down and he says “that’s a right good idea. Let’s me and you get these clothes washed. We can wash em’ right up and hang ‘em up. Good as new.” He claps his hand on my back and says “let’s get on in the house and see if we can rustle us up some soap from Momma. That is if she ain’t yell us out of the house.” He guffaws and we both head in and Momma is standing in the kitchen, not looking at us, but I can tell she’s not doing anything in there. I guess she was waiting for Daddy to come back in. Daddy says “since everything else is your job now, where that soap at, woman?” He gives me a big wink, like we’s in on a secret together. Like nothing out of the ordinary just happened.
We get Jacob's clothes cleaned enough to Daddy’s standards. That’s sloshing dish soap into a tub and getting them wet, me stomping them down to make thin gray suds in the cold water. Daddy takes them out and wrings them hard and hangs them to dry on a tree branch. He dusts his hands off and says “that’s done just right. I expect that’s about all for the day.”
I say that I think Jacob needs something in him as all he ate yesterday was some lettuce and a few beans I found in the garden. Daddy says “I don’t think people that don’t move around need too much to eat, ’sides, the more we put in him the more we’re going to have to clean what comes out again.” I say that his ribs is showing, and he’s got dark circles under his eyes. Daddy says proudly that that’s probably because he don’t poop enough. Then he gets a look on his face and snaps his fingers “hey! Not poopin’ enough means he’s not eating enough to poop out! These here is some easy puzzles. I bet your Momma couldn’t even do so well.”
I nod along. Daddy gets to jogging over to the garden and picking out some things like I done yesterday. He brings them back and there’s a little cherry tomato and some more beans what I missed yesterday and a ear of corn. “But not too much” he says “too much and we’ll be cleaning up his poop all day and every day of the week probably.” I know this ain’t true and I can tell Daddy just ain’t want to work since that’s how Daddy is. I say “sure enough, Daddy” knowing that I’ll have to go out and find him something more than a few scraps from the garden. Daddy gets to feeding Jacob but too rough, and I help him with making the pieces of food small so Jacob can swallow them without choking. They all go down ok, and Daddy is proud and says he done took care of Jacob real good today.