Cliff Bingham hated the sign at the end of the driveway. It was a jagged piece of cardboard that read “4 Sale” stuck under the wiper blade of his son Ray Ray’s Ford F250. His daughter-in-law, Brenda, had labored long and hard to write “Fore Sale” using three day-glow magic markers and plenty of glitter. She stared him down, hands on hips when he pointed out the error. It was balanced, she said, each word ended with an “e.” “Mistakes get people’s attention, like in newspapers when they put the ad upside down. Besides who in St Albans, Vermont will know the difference. Bennington and Middlebury is where all the smart people live.”
But she’d eventually given in, flipped the cardboard over and scribbled “4 Sale” on the back before stomping off. No information about the truck-- mileage, price or features. It had been three months now and occasionally someone stopped, got out and walked around the vehicle. If he was puttering outside, he would wander over and answer questions as best he could. Brenda had never told him what she wanted for it. “Get as much as you can,” was all she’d ever said.
Carl Ainer stopped by last week and seemed interested. They had cut timber together a few years ago when the state forest opened up tracks to the public.
“What you asking, Cliff? Some rust towards the end of the truck bed right rear.”
He swallowed his pride, went inside and knocked on door to Brenda’s room. When she opened it, he could smell the dope she smoked every night. The TV was blaring. “Tell him I won’t take a penny less than $5000, final offer.”
He was ashamed to go back out to Carl.
“Five Thousand for a 2004 pickup that’s been plowing!”
“That’s what she said, Carl. It does have new tires, and Ray Ray refurbished most everything before he left. You know how good he was with cars.”
“That’s too rich for my blood. The book value is only fifteen hundred. By the way, how’s your boy doing these days?”
Ray Ray was Cliff and Adele Bingham’s only child. He drifted from job to job after high school and got into some scrapes. Drinking and some minor drug stuff for the most part. But slowly he was changing, maturing to the degree that he bought this Ford F250 to plow for the town during the winter and to start up a landscaping business. Then the judge came down hard on him for intent to sell. It was ninety days in the county lockup or join the military.
Almost the minute he got home on leave from basic, Brenda Sobel got her hooks into him. When he was sent to Germany, she went with him. They were married over there by the base chaplain. Cliff thought she was more in love with the army’s allotment and medical plan than Ray Ray. When he was posted to Afghanistan, she came home. Home was now Ray Ray’s old room. Cliff figured she could be a help as Adele was sinking deeper into the Alzheimer’s. There were things she could do for Adele that a woman’s best suited for. That wasn’t working out as well as it might.
Then Ray Ray got hit. Initially Cliff never worried about his son because he was assigned to a motor pool well behind the lines. But a fanatical camp worker planted an IED in the mess tent which tore up the left side of his son’s body, ripped away the lower jaw and left a stump below the right knee. He was blind and with ten per cent hearing. His brain only worked when the morphine let it. The government had him in a VA hospital in Rochester, New York. He’d taken Adele and Brenda out there every week or so, driving north into Canada to get around Lake Champlain, then down Route 87 to the New York Thruway. Nine hours each way, three people crammed into his Toyota Tundra’s front seat. That was their weekend ritual until winter hit, and the visits came whenever the forecast promised extended clear weather.
Adele didn’t travel well these days and had to be watched all the time. Now it was only Cliff who went, Brenda staying home to see to Adele. It was like visiting a grave anyway. Ray Ray was a lump. Years back Cliff had raised Big Max pumpkins, force fed them buttermilk via tubes. He took Honorable Mention at the Plattsburgh Agricultural Exposition. That’s what Ray Ray was now, a Hubbard squash hooked to tubes running every which way into machines that blipped and displayed wavy lines that glowed green.
So he and Adele were stuck with Brenda. She had Ray Ray’s monthly check, a roof over her head and, to hear her tell it, she was a regular Florence Nightingale to Adele. Ray Ray’s room was done over the way she wanted--posters, cable TV and her own mini-bar fridge. She went out to the Wagon Wheel several nights a week, stumbling in at all hours. She hadn’t brought a man home yet which was a blessing, and Cliff certainly didn’t mind when she disappeared for a day or two. Sometimes he wished he could vanish as well, leaving Adele, Brenda and Ray Ray each to the separate worlds they were sinking into.
But it was Ray Ray’s truck at the end of the driveway that galled him the most. It wasn’t the selling of it; it was the detached way she was doing it. She had no idea what that truck had meant to Ray Ray. It had turned his life around, given it purpose. Okay, if she wanted to get rid of it then why not pretend to care, take a few minutes away from the TV to talk to folks when they stopped by, it would increase the potential for a sale. But, no, he was left to explain to folks what Ray Ray had done under the hood and the heavy duty suspension he’d added. Brenda kept the keys so, if someone wanted to sit in the cab and start it up, it meant a trip into the house, rousing Brenda from bed and being told what to ask.
***
Burlington TV broadcast possible snow event. He was stacking wood on the back porch when Pete Warner pulled in. His wife Claire was with him. In all the times he’d seen Pete he’d never known Claire to get out of the vehicle. On good days he used to joke with Adele as to whether Claire even had legs. They’d stopped by three weeks ago and kicked the tires. This time Pete made an offer. Cliff trudged into the house.
He yelled through the door, waited, and then knocked before he opened it enough to stick his head in. “I need the keys. Pete Warner is outside; says he’ll give you $1200 for it.” Brenda was lying across the unmade bed, her butt barely covered by an old flannel shirt. She was glued to an afternoon court show.
“Are you shitting me? Did you tell him about the re-built transmission?” she said barely acknowledging the intrusion.
“He thinks it’s only good for parts or maybe a run to the landfill every month or so.”
“See if you can get him up to $4000,” she said with a dismissive wave of her hand
“Brenda, there’s no way in hell anyone’s going to pay that. Why don’t you come out and dicker with him? I feel like a fool running back and forth like this.”
She turned over and deliberately flashed her breasts at him. “Maybe I should wave these puppies around to sweeten the deal for any of your old logging buddies. The keys are on the chest there. Besides, I know you like to come in here to sneak a peek and get your rocks off. Now, bugger on out of my room, you old pervert. When my program is over and I’m decent, I’ll be out to talk to him and not a second before.”
He closed the door, stunned by the idea that she thought he was interested in her.
He went out to Pete. “Give me ten bucks and it’s yours.”
“That’s not fair, Cliff. How about a thousand? I’ll bring a check around by Friday at the latest.”
“I’ll take one dollar for it if you drive it away within the next ten minutes.” He reached in, took the title from the glove box, scribbled his name using the hood as a desk and handed it to Pete.
“Sure you want to do this?”
“Never been more sure of anything.”
“What about your daughter-in-law?”
He stuck the dollar bill into his front shirt pocket, patted it securely and walked down towards the house. Claire pulled away first in the Chevy then he heard Pete start the truck. He loved the deep throaty sound of the muffler, a musical memory of better days. When he resumed stacking wood on the porch, he looked back at the vacant driveway. He felt better. Like erasing a blackboard. He’d finish a few more rows then a tie down a tarp over it. Dark snow clouds had already blanketed the Adirondacks and were beginning to scud east towards Lake Champlain where they’d pick up plenty of moisture. A two day blow if he was reading it right. In a few minutes the front door would bang open and he’d have an even bigger storm to contend with.
But she’d eventually given in, flipped the cardboard over and scribbled “4 Sale” on the back before stomping off. No information about the truck-- mileage, price or features. It had been three months now and occasionally someone stopped, got out and walked around the vehicle. If he was puttering outside, he would wander over and answer questions as best he could. Brenda had never told him what she wanted for it. “Get as much as you can,” was all she’d ever said.
Carl Ainer stopped by last week and seemed interested. They had cut timber together a few years ago when the state forest opened up tracks to the public.
“What you asking, Cliff? Some rust towards the end of the truck bed right rear.”
He swallowed his pride, went inside and knocked on door to Brenda’s room. When she opened it, he could smell the dope she smoked every night. The TV was blaring. “Tell him I won’t take a penny less than $5000, final offer.”
He was ashamed to go back out to Carl.
“Five Thousand for a 2004 pickup that’s been plowing!”
“That’s what she said, Carl. It does have new tires, and Ray Ray refurbished most everything before he left. You know how good he was with cars.”
“That’s too rich for my blood. The book value is only fifteen hundred. By the way, how’s your boy doing these days?”
Ray Ray was Cliff and Adele Bingham’s only child. He drifted from job to job after high school and got into some scrapes. Drinking and some minor drug stuff for the most part. But slowly he was changing, maturing to the degree that he bought this Ford F250 to plow for the town during the winter and to start up a landscaping business. Then the judge came down hard on him for intent to sell. It was ninety days in the county lockup or join the military.
Almost the minute he got home on leave from basic, Brenda Sobel got her hooks into him. When he was sent to Germany, she went with him. They were married over there by the base chaplain. Cliff thought she was more in love with the army’s allotment and medical plan than Ray Ray. When he was posted to Afghanistan, she came home. Home was now Ray Ray’s old room. Cliff figured she could be a help as Adele was sinking deeper into the Alzheimer’s. There were things she could do for Adele that a woman’s best suited for. That wasn’t working out as well as it might.
Then Ray Ray got hit. Initially Cliff never worried about his son because he was assigned to a motor pool well behind the lines. But a fanatical camp worker planted an IED in the mess tent which tore up the left side of his son’s body, ripped away the lower jaw and left a stump below the right knee. He was blind and with ten per cent hearing. His brain only worked when the morphine let it. The government had him in a VA hospital in Rochester, New York. He’d taken Adele and Brenda out there every week or so, driving north into Canada to get around Lake Champlain, then down Route 87 to the New York Thruway. Nine hours each way, three people crammed into his Toyota Tundra’s front seat. That was their weekend ritual until winter hit, and the visits came whenever the forecast promised extended clear weather.
Adele didn’t travel well these days and had to be watched all the time. Now it was only Cliff who went, Brenda staying home to see to Adele. It was like visiting a grave anyway. Ray Ray was a lump. Years back Cliff had raised Big Max pumpkins, force fed them buttermilk via tubes. He took Honorable Mention at the Plattsburgh Agricultural Exposition. That’s what Ray Ray was now, a Hubbard squash hooked to tubes running every which way into machines that blipped and displayed wavy lines that glowed green.
So he and Adele were stuck with Brenda. She had Ray Ray’s monthly check, a roof over her head and, to hear her tell it, she was a regular Florence Nightingale to Adele. Ray Ray’s room was done over the way she wanted--posters, cable TV and her own mini-bar fridge. She went out to the Wagon Wheel several nights a week, stumbling in at all hours. She hadn’t brought a man home yet which was a blessing, and Cliff certainly didn’t mind when she disappeared for a day or two. Sometimes he wished he could vanish as well, leaving Adele, Brenda and Ray Ray each to the separate worlds they were sinking into.
But it was Ray Ray’s truck at the end of the driveway that galled him the most. It wasn’t the selling of it; it was the detached way she was doing it. She had no idea what that truck had meant to Ray Ray. It had turned his life around, given it purpose. Okay, if she wanted to get rid of it then why not pretend to care, take a few minutes away from the TV to talk to folks when they stopped by, it would increase the potential for a sale. But, no, he was left to explain to folks what Ray Ray had done under the hood and the heavy duty suspension he’d added. Brenda kept the keys so, if someone wanted to sit in the cab and start it up, it meant a trip into the house, rousing Brenda from bed and being told what to ask.
***
Burlington TV broadcast possible snow event. He was stacking wood on the back porch when Pete Warner pulled in. His wife Claire was with him. In all the times he’d seen Pete he’d never known Claire to get out of the vehicle. On good days he used to joke with Adele as to whether Claire even had legs. They’d stopped by three weeks ago and kicked the tires. This time Pete made an offer. Cliff trudged into the house.
He yelled through the door, waited, and then knocked before he opened it enough to stick his head in. “I need the keys. Pete Warner is outside; says he’ll give you $1200 for it.” Brenda was lying across the unmade bed, her butt barely covered by an old flannel shirt. She was glued to an afternoon court show.
“Are you shitting me? Did you tell him about the re-built transmission?” she said barely acknowledging the intrusion.
“He thinks it’s only good for parts or maybe a run to the landfill every month or so.”
“See if you can get him up to $4000,” she said with a dismissive wave of her hand
“Brenda, there’s no way in hell anyone’s going to pay that. Why don’t you come out and dicker with him? I feel like a fool running back and forth like this.”
She turned over and deliberately flashed her breasts at him. “Maybe I should wave these puppies around to sweeten the deal for any of your old logging buddies. The keys are on the chest there. Besides, I know you like to come in here to sneak a peek and get your rocks off. Now, bugger on out of my room, you old pervert. When my program is over and I’m decent, I’ll be out to talk to him and not a second before.”
He closed the door, stunned by the idea that she thought he was interested in her.
He went out to Pete. “Give me ten bucks and it’s yours.”
“That’s not fair, Cliff. How about a thousand? I’ll bring a check around by Friday at the latest.”
“I’ll take one dollar for it if you drive it away within the next ten minutes.” He reached in, took the title from the glove box, scribbled his name using the hood as a desk and handed it to Pete.
“Sure you want to do this?”
“Never been more sure of anything.”
“What about your daughter-in-law?”
He stuck the dollar bill into his front shirt pocket, patted it securely and walked down towards the house. Claire pulled away first in the Chevy then he heard Pete start the truck. He loved the deep throaty sound of the muffler, a musical memory of better days. When he resumed stacking wood on the porch, he looked back at the vacant driveway. He felt better. Like erasing a blackboard. He’d finish a few more rows then a tie down a tarp over it. Dark snow clouds had already blanketed the Adirondacks and were beginning to scud east towards Lake Champlain where they’d pick up plenty of moisture. A two day blow if he was reading it right. In a few minutes the front door would bang open and he’d have an even bigger storm to contend with.
