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By Root 1453 0

are battened down for the coming winter. As we go, I grab onto the lip of the top and start to laugh. Rolling bat-out-of-hell in a golf cart guarantees a trigger of your inner six-year-old, and I can’t help but get a case of the tickle-giggles as we bounce along. The fact that we are being accompanied by Kanye singing about the good life is just about perfect.

Butch:

(yelling over the righteous bass) You know what’s great about using this thing at night?!

J.R.:

(yelling back) What?!

Butch:

(points to teeth) No bugs!

Deer scamper out of the way at a dead run, their tails flipping up with white undersides flashing. Like Z, Butch doesn’t have the headlights on, but given how loud Kanye is, I don’t think there’s any chance of catching one of those lovely animals frozen in our path.

Eventually, Butch slows Edna down right in front of the forest edge. Kanye quiets and the night’s silence rushes forward as if it’s a good host and we’ve just arrived at its party. Butch grabs the duffel and together we walk about twenty feet, heading in the direction of the mansion, which is in the far distance.

Butch puts the duffel on the ground, unzips it, and wades around inside. What comes out is a series of thin metal sections, which he begins to fit together.

J.R.:

Can I help you? (Even though I don’t have any idea what he’s doing.)

Butch:

Two sees.

When he’s finished, he’s built an odd kind of platform. The base is a foot off the ground, and it supports a metal rod that’s about two feet high.

Butch:

(going back to duffel) The critical thing is trajectory. (Returns to platform and measures with leveler. Makes adjustment.) We’ll start small. (Again goes over to duffel and this time takes out . . . )

J.R.:

Oh, my God, that is fantastic!

Butch:

(beaming) I made it myself. (brings rocket over to me)

The model rocket is about two feet in length from pointed tip to flared bottom, and it has three sections. White, with a Red Sox logo painted on the side, its top is fluorescent, no doubt to track its path and increase the chances of recovering it in the dark.

J.R.:

I didn’t know you were into this.

Butch:

I used to make models when I was a kid. Airplanes and cars, too. The thing is, some people like to read, but I’m slightly dyslexic, so that was never relaxing—too much work to get the letters to come out right. But models? It’s a way to get my brain to shut off when I’m awake. (Shoots me a sly grin.) Plus I get to do something with my hands, and you know how much I feel that. (Takes rocket over to launching pad and slides it down vertical shaft. Makes more adjustments.) Can you bring me the ignition wires? They’re the two bundles tied with twists?

J.R.:

(goes to bag) Holy . . . crap. You have, like, three more in here.

Butch:

I’ve been keeping busy. And here, take the flashlight, you’ll probably need it. I told V to shut off the motion-sensitive security lights in this section of the acreage.

J.R.:

(catches penlight he throws over and finds wire bundles) You want this box with the switch, too?

Butch:

Yes, but leave it there. We’re going to want to be a distance away when we fire them off.

J.R.:

(brings over wires and, as he reaches up to take them, I notice his bent pinkie on his right hand) May I ask you something?

Butch:

Hell, yeah. That’s the point of interviews, ain’t it?

J.R.:

Do you miss any part of your old life?

Butch:

(hesitates briefly in unrolling the wires) My knee-jerk answer is no. I mean, that’s the first thing that comes to mind. (resumes unrolling, then takes rocket off of launcher and attaches wires at bottom) And the core truth is that I’m happier where I am now. But that doesn’t mean I don’t wish I could do some of the things I used to. Red Sox game on a Saturday afternoon? With the sun on your face and a cold beer against your palm? That was pretty cool.

J.R.:

What about your family?

Butch:

(voice gets tight) I don’t know. I suppose I miss the next generation . . . like, I wouldn’t mind finding out what Joyce