Alice Bliss - Laura Harrington [72]
She takes the handles, adjusting the speed. Uncle Eddie walks beside her in case she needs a hand. She’s taking it slow, really slow, slow enough to lift her face from looking down at the dirt and take in the whole gentle swath of the garden; the earth turned up, the wet mushroom-y smell of dirt in the spring, full of loam, and promise and possibility. She can do this; she is doing this.
Fifteen minutes later she’s helping Uncle Eddie drive the rototiller up two planks and into the bed of his truck.
“You want to come in for a beer or something?”
“Like this? Your mom would kill me. She’s already gonna kill you.”
“I could bring one out to you.”
“That’s okay, kiddo, I promised to get this baby back to the rental place before five.”
“Thanks, Uncle Eddie.”
“Anytime.”
“I wish I could get a picture of you.”
“Wait until you see your own dirty self. We should’ve made a video. I think it could be a big hit on YouTube. In the farm states.”
Uncle Eddie peels out and leans on the horn as Alice turns toward the house. She kicks her boots off outside and goes in the back door and directly down the basement stairs where she strips off all her clothes and throws everything into the washing machine. Every stitch is soaked, even her underwear. She grabs a towel out of the dryer and heads upstairs. Now she can see her dirty footprints on each step. And her path from the back door to the basement is muddy as well. Her big muddy handprints are all over the back door and the basement door. She can’t believe it. If it weren’t so cold outside she’d go wash down with the garden hose. Now she has to track and drip all the way up to the shower, too. Her mom is gonna kill her. She grabs paper towels and scrubs the bottom of her feet.
She sidesteps her way up the stairs so she won’t touch the walls. She turns on the shower and steps in. The water coming off her is black with dirt, her hair is gritty; there’s even mud down her back. She leans against the wall of the shower, letting the hot water wash over her. She’s feeling better than she’s felt in days. They got the job done. She’s going to have her garden no matter what her mother says, just the way she planned it with her dad. Exactly like last year. Sunday she’ll plant peas and radishes and the earliest lettuce and spinach. Sunday she’ll be in the garden, down on her knees with stakes and string and seeds.
“Alice!? Alice! Get down here right this minute!”
Oh, shit, here we go, she thinks, as she steps out of the shower, slips on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, and heads downstairs.
Her mother has a bottle of Fantastik in one hand and a big pink sponge in the other. She shoves them both at Alice.
“Here. It’s your mess. You clean it up.”
Without a word, Alice sets to work.
“I thought we discussed this. I thought I made myself perfectly clear.”
No answer from Alice.
“Why are you insisting on—?”
“I promised Dad,” Alice mumbles into the floor.
“What? I can’t hear you.”
“I promised Dad,” Alice enunciates slowly and clearly.
“Well he’s not here now, is he?”
“That’s the point, Mom.”
“What did we agree on last night?”
“We didn’t agree on anything last night. You made some pronouncements, I kept my mouth shut.”
“We agreed that if you get your grades up where they belong then you can do the garden.”
“I didn’t agree to that.”
“That’s the deal.”
“I can’t accept that.”
“You’re going to have to learn how to accept it. If your father were here—”
“—We wouldn’t be having this discussion.”
“If your father were here—”
“—Don’t go there, Mom.”
Alice stands up, puts the Fantastik under the counter, rinses the sponge in the sink, and walks out of the kitchen.
“Just where do you think you’re going?”
“To do my homework.”
Alice hears a cabinet door slam as she crosses the yard to her dad’s workshop, where she will most likely not do her homework, where she will most likely sit there wishing she could write a letter to her dad about fat, fast Uncle Eddie and the garden and the muck and the mud, and the way the machine was roaring under her hands as she guided it through its last pass around