The Weather and Women Treat Me Fair Read online

  He stopped chewing and looked at me. “You think I’m a mean bastard.”

  “Yes, sir.’

  “Mad at me?”

  I shrugged.

  He rubbed his eyes and yawned. “I’m sixty-two years old and I don’t know what to do with my life, don’t know if I’ve done anything in it so far.” He chuckled softly. “You’re a smart fellow. Have you figured any of this world out?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “I read the papers and watch the news and I’m sure they’re lying to me. I used to get upset about it, but now I find it entertaining.” He shook his head as if to shake something free. “You’d think that in over thirty years as a doctor I would have learned something about the meaning of life, but I haven’t.” He took up his wineglass, raised it. “To these sad times.”

  I drank with him.

  Gaining the Door

  The horses huddled together against the icy northern wind. Their exhalations condensed and rose in clouds, drifted away. Cody Wilson circled the corral and studied them. The horses were exhausted and winter was on.

  “That’s right, Jake,” the aging Wilson said to his hand. “Gotta unshoe ’em and turn ’em out. That way they won’t be petty and nasty come spring. Petty and nasty. That’s how exposure to man will make a beast.”

  Jake nodded, having heard it all before, and followed Wilson through the gate. He held the sorrel while Wilson pried his shoes off.

  “So, you didn’t tell me how your wife’s leg is,” Wilson said.

  “Fine.”

  “She at home?”

  “Came home the same day.”

  “Hunh.” He stood and tossed the sorrel’s fourth shoe to the corner of the pen. “Grab the grey.”

  Jake caught the young gelding.

  Wilson bent down to work. “I remember when they’d keep you in the hospital for days for that sort of thing.”

  “Same day,” Jake said.

  “Hunh.”

  They finished with the horses. Jake opened the gate. Wilson hung on the fence and watched them trot away.

  “Well, there they go,” Jake said, loading his cheek with tobacco.

  “There they go.”

  The night rolled in colder and noiseless, with off and on flurries of snow. Wilson built a fire and sat in front of it. It felt good to be in out of the wind. He thought about the world outside. He thought he might never go to town again, or anywhere. He’d turn himself out, cut himself loose, rustle for sustenance and not grow fat. He might just sit where he was by his fire until there was no heat left, just a matterless flame.

  He thought about songs that he had come to know in his life; he had never set out to learn them. He hummed and whistled a few while the fire made his feet hot. He recalled poems he’d read, but could not remember the words, only how they had made him feel. This seemed right, to remember just the feelings conjured.

  Christmas was drawing near, but he refused to think of it. It was just another day. A day that would come and go as always, see him alone and leave him so.

  He drank some whiskey and it warmed his gut. He cursed his house for being a magnet for cold winds. He cursed his wife for having found death before him. His children for having grown up and away. And he cursed himself for being an ornery son of a bitch, a man who had driven his family like stock and finally away. He’d have to turn himself out, he reasoned, and he laughed, thinking he was the man to whom he’d been too long exposed.

  He got up, tied his boots, and bundled up in his down-filled parka, a gift from his children. Damned if he knew how a man was supposed to get any work done wrapped up like a fat snowman. He opened the door to find a steady snow falling.

  The wind pressed against his back as he walked toward the road. He found himself desperately accepting the push of cold air. He tried to occupy himself by looking back on the year. Prices had been good, handsome even. But soon all thinking was gone. He walked, numb to all things, inside and out. He walked the six miles to town.

  He stepped into the tavern and stomped the snow off his boots and some feeling into his legs. “I’m here,” he said, “and I walked and I’m on the prod.” He fell into a chair at a table near the door.

  “What’ll it be, Cody?” the bartender asked.

  “Whiskey.”

  Wilson’s face burned as it thawed. His feet were heavy and numb. He sucked down one shot and nursed his way through another.

  Two men came in, one tall, the other medium with a game leg.

  “What’re you doing out, Wilson?” asked the tall man.

  “I’m turned out.”

  The lame man coughed into his fist as he slid onto a stool at the bar. “Didn’t see your truck outside,” he said.

  “Walked,” Wilson said, and he stood to find his legs, swayed a bit as if with a breeze. The men watched him negotiate his coat and mittens.

  “Gonna walk home?” the lame man asked.

  Wilson studied the man’s face and offered a reluctant smile. “No, just walkin.”‘

  “We’ll drive you,” said the tall man.

  But there was fight in Wilson’s eyes. He gained the door. He didn’t look back.

  Against a dense night, he inhaled all the frozen air he could. He kissed the wet, parted lips of his wife’s memory. He sang softly to himself a song which once he had sung to his children. It had helped them find sleep.

  Chacón, Chacón

  Miguel Chacón had a scar on his left shoulder. The bullet had gone through neatly, but a drunk bootleg doctor had butchered him taking it out. The wound was suffered during a gang fight in Española when Miguel’s friend, such as he was, introduced him as Killer Chacón from Taos. On his left hand he had a thumb and three fingers, his pinky having been wrenched out of his socket when it got tangled in his insanely small chain-link steering wheel as he slammed into a spin. The left side of his face was noticeably disfigured: he and a friend felled a tree which landed on a good-sized fir sapling. Miguel, for a reason no one knows, took the chain-saw and began cutting the bent tree. The tree whipped and the saw went flying high into the air. The tree hit Miguel in the face. The chainsaw came down, still running, and sliced the left side of his back. Miguel’s friends, such as they were, sometimes called him Lefty. Mostly, they did not call him. They didn’t like to look at his scars. In a group, Miguel was always the last one on the left or the first one on the right. Those who knew his car always passed quickly, eyes forward, on the right if possible. Miguel concluded, logically, that his right side was charmed, invincible even.

  His belief in the guarded nature of his right side was reinforced by an incident on Route 3. His car stalled as he was pulling out from San Cristobal and a semi narrowly missed, yes, the right side of his low-rider. The truck rolled over the shoulder and down a steep slope. When the driver of the truck was hauled up he claimed not to know what had happened. He said, “I just lost control. Hell, I’d rather have crushed the low-riding son of a bitch than drive off the road.” When Miguel was pointed out as the driver of the stalled vehicle, the trucker tried to leap from the stretcher and hit him. “I’ll get you, Poncho,” the man said as the ambulance doors were shut.

  This notion of one-sided immortality led Miguel to do everything with his right hand and those tasks which required two hands were performed with his right side facing the project, his left arm stretched to its limit across his front. He always appeared to be handling caustic or potentially explosive materials.

  Many of the religious people in Taos saw Miguel Chacón as a living, breathing, nearly talking example of the dichotomy of the world, an ugly but tangible manifestation of nature’s duality, good and bad. Of course, they seldom spoke of it as such—they just crossed themselves and tried to stay on Miguel’s right side as it were. His presence taught them that whereas evil was disfigured and ugly, good was not much to look at. At first, the talk was in jest of Miguel’s right side being a different agent than his left. Then the talk, out of habit, became literal. “I saw Lefty Ch
acón,” someone would say. “Is he still alive?” was the stock response. People waved to Righty Chacón and turned away from Lefty. With all this going on, Miguel, not the brightest man, began to believe that he was indeed two distinct Chacóns, his right side, pure and uninjured, constantly riding herd over his blemished and misshapen left side.

  Lefty Chacón once punched huge José Archuleta in the face, then turned away, showing the man the opposite Chacón. Archuleta looked and looked but could not find Lefty to hit, in spite of the patrons of the bar pointing and shouting, “There he is! There he is!” The Chacóns slipped out of the bar and argued in the parking lot.

  “I wished he had bashed in your head,” said Righty.

  “If I die, you die, compadre,” said Lefty.

  “You’re ugly and disfigured,” said Righty.

  “And you are only ugly.” Lefty laughed. “You should be so lucky to share my deformity.”

  Righty began to pound Lefty with his fist, but Lefty kept laughing. Soon Righty was tired and they went home and to bed.

  That night, while they wrestled for covers and position, Lefty said, “You can not be so good if you have me.” This caused Righty to cry. He prayed for an angel to come smother Lefty.

  Lefty awoke before his opposite one morning. He dressed and carried himself out to the car. When he tried to drive away from the house he could only guide the car through tight left-handed circles. Undaunted, he marched to the road and hitched a ride. Old Lester Muñoz saw Righty at the highway-side, but it was Lefty who climbed in beside him.

  “Take me to the liquor store,” said Lefty, and a terrified Muñoz complied.

  At the liquor store, Manny Medina was opening the cash register. Lefty walked in and produced a rather large and nasty pistol.

  “You stupid pendejo,” said Manny, “I just opened up. I don’t have any money.”

  “I don’t care,” said Lefty. “Hand it over.”

  Apparently, Old Lester Muñoz suspected funny business and told the police, because the police showed up.

  Lefty turned to show the deputies a still-sleeping Righty Chacón. Righty woke up to find Manny and the two officers demanding to know what had become of Lefty. Not knowing what was going on and following an instinct for self-preservation, Righty said, “He’s run outside and down the street.” The men ran after.

  When Righty discovered what Lefty had tried to do, he beat him. But Lefty only laughed.

  Righty, at the end of his rope, dragged the other Chacón to the church. Once there he could only manage his half of the whole through the doors.

  “No, I will not go in,” said Lefty.

  “I’ll drag you in here so that Christ will strike you down with a lightning bolt.” But hard as he tried he could not do it. He prayed with all his heart and strength, breaking a sweat over the side of the face, his side of the mouth working madly.

  Lefty smiled and watched the traffic pass, waved at the pointing people. Soon Righty was exhausted from pleading with God.

  “Won’t You do anything?” was the last thing Righty said before collapsing.

  Clouds rolled in from the mountains as Lefty muscled the body many miles to Taos Junction, where Taos Creek and the Rio Grande meet. Lefty stepped to the point and laid the whole down, steep, deadly cliffs on either side. They slept.

  When they awoke, the moon was full and bright and a stiff wind pushed at them, urging them nearer the edge.

  “Why have you brought me here?” asked Righty.

  “We’re jumping.”

  “Do you want so much for me to feel pain?”

  “Yes.”

  Righty, upon quick reflection, saw this as a route to freedom. Certainly, Lefty could not follow him to heaven and, most definitely, he would be going to heaven. “Very well, then.” He paused and looked over the edge into the darkness. “Let’s jump.”

  They jumped. On the way down, Righty heard Lefty speaking.

  “What are you saying?” asked Righty.

  “I wasn’t talking to you.”

  “Who were you talking to? What did you say?”

  “I said that I accept Jesus Christ as my savior and the Son of God and I asked that he forgive my sins.” With that, they fell on, the only sound being Lefty’s laughter.

  This story originally appeared in Montana Review, Number 8 and Time Enough for the World (Seattle: Owl Creek Press, 1986), and is reprinted here with the permission of the Owl Creek Press.

  Nice White People

  Dovetail was just a post office. And that was open only three days a week. It was thirty miles beyond Carlis into the mountains. Carlis was larger; it had a feedstore and a church.

  That far up you’d find some Indians. They had roots there. And you’d find some old trappers and prospectors. They were too stubborn or crazy to leave. That was about it. Until Michael and Gloria Johns came from back east to discover the land and return to nature.

  The Johnses bought a cabin which had been built and occupied for many years by an old prospector. They purchased the property from an outfit called High-up Realty. The Indians called it Throw-up Really. Michael and Gloria came from just outside Boston, from Newton and a condo to a one-room shack just larger than its outhouse. The Indians thought the Johnses were nice. Odd, maybe. A little stupid, certainly. But nice. In fact, they called them the ‘nice white people.’

  Michael and Gloria arrived in the spring. They settled in and, first things first, they set to patching up the outhouse. That’s when an old gray-haired Indian stopped by.

  “How are you nice white people?” asked the man.

  Michael stopped and called Gloria over. “We’re fine.” He pushed his hand forward to shake. “I’m Michael Johns.”

  The Indian took the hand firmly and pumped it up and down. “I’m Old Sherman.”

  “This is my wife, Gloria.”

  “Pleased to meet you,” said Gloria.

  Old Sherman nodded and looked around. “Here for a short stay?” he asked.

  “Spring and summer,” said Gloria.

  Old Sherman looked at the planks and at the saw in Michael’s hand. “Fixing up your craphouse?”

  “Yes,” said Michael.

  “Gonna leave it where it stands?”

  Michael looked at the structure. “I suppose.”

  The old man scratched his head. “Pete, the old miner who lived here, built the place, put that craphouse there fifty years ago. Never moved it. Might be full.”

  Michael turned to Gloria.

  “What happened to Pete?” asked Gloria.

  “Drowned.” Old Sherman stretched and looked at the sky. “Well, you nice white people have a good day. Don’t work too hard.”

  Michael and Gloria moved the outhouse.

  Many of the Indians in the area raised rabbits as a cash crop. So, when a man in a truck came by selling them Michael and Gloria thought it would be a good idea to buy some. They bought twenty and several ready-made hutches, knowing that they would certainly need to build more. Indians came by and oohed and ahhed over the animals, nodded at each other and smiled at the Johnses.

  “You know these are pretty fancy bunnies you got here,” said a tall man.

  “Oh, really?” said Michael.

  “Yep,” said the man. “You can’t feed these fellas the wet stuff you’ll be pulling up from your garden.”

  “No?”

  Several Indians came and listened to the conversation. “No,” said another, a woman with hair that fell past her hips. “They’ll get the plague.”

  “These pure-bred bunnies ain’t as sturdy as mutts,” said the tall man.

  “Then what should we feed them?” said Gloria.

  “Rabbit chow?’ said the woman.

  “Rabbit chow,” said the tall man.

  “The little pellets,” said another.

  And so Michael and Gloria would pick up a forty-pound sack of feed for the rabbits each week down in Carlis.

  A couple of weeks went by and Gloria noticed somethi
ng odd about several of the rabbits. Their coats seemed to be thinning. Little tufts of hair floated about the hutches. She called out for Michael.

  He leaned the ax against the woodpile and went to her. “What is it?”

  “Something’s wrong,” she said. “Look.” She pointed. “Look at the hair.”

  Michael leaned forward and studied the animals.

  “I think maybe they’re losing their hair, Michael.”

  “Don’t get upset. I’m sure it’s common.”

  By the time the veterinarian arrived a week later, the rabbits had all lost their fur from their necks to their rumps. Patches of hair remained on the hindquarters.

  The vet frowned as he held a rabbit up to the sun.

  “Well?” asked Michael.

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen anything just like it. It ain’t mange, but it must be.”

  “It is serious?” asked Gloria.

  “Like I said, I don’t know.” He put the rabbit back into the hutch. “I wouldn’t eat any of them right now.”

  “So, what do we do?”

  “Well, I did bring some mange medicine. Maybe it’ll help.” He reached into his bag and pulled out a large can.

  “We have to put it on each one?” asked Gloria.

  “I believe so,” said the vet. “Unless you can talk them into doing it for each other.” He laughed.

  “OK, thanks, doc,” said Michael.

  The vet closed his bag, then looked at the Johnses. “By the way, is there any reason you don’t have any males?”

  “We have two,” said Gloria. She looked into the cages. “Well, one used to be black and white.”

  The vet shook his head.

  Gloria sighed.

  “All you got is a bunch of gals.”

  Gloria stepped away into the house.

  Michael walked the vet to his truck.

  “So, how are you liking it here?” asked the vet.

  “We’re getting used to it.”