Joseph and Jose (Part 1 of 2 Parts)

 Markwildyr.com, Post #201

Image Courtesy of Twitter

 

Thanks, Donald, for the guest post last time. Got an unusually large number of hits, but no comments… unless they went directly to him.

 

 I have a short story for you this week.

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JOSEPH AND JOSE

                                                             

News traveled around our little town about as fast as the flu in wintertime. I first heard it when I went to the drug store for an ice cream sundae during Christmas break from my senior year in high school. Between slurps of his malted milk, my best friend Hank Nickerson told me we had some Mexicans in town now.

“We do?” I asked. “Since when?”

“Since yesterday. They moved in the old Hawsley place. I hear they’re fixing it up.”

“It’ll take some fixing,” I replied. “Are we supposed to call them Mexicans or Hispanics? Or maybe Latinos? Or even Spaniards?”

“I dunno. All I know is we’ve got some among us now. Anyway, it’s a family of four. Mom and dad, a son and little girl. The guy’s…you know, the son, he’s about our age. Girl’s maybe ten or so.”

That would make the kid about eighteen. That meant we’d be seeing him in school come January.

That piece of news wore itself out in a hurry, and I didn’t give it another thought. That’s not quite right. I saw the family, father and son, at least, down at the feed store while I was picking up oats for my mare. The kid gave me a start. At first, I thought he was a pretty girl… a girl with an Adam’s apple. Then I saw some dark spots along the sideburns and on his chin that’d turn into whiskers someday. From neck down, he didn’t look like a girl either. He was built slender but strong, if you know what I mean. They keep it warm in the feed store, and he had his sleeves pushed up so I could see his arms were muscled and corded.

After that, Christmas came racing up and pushed everything else out of my head. And the week between that holy day and New Year’s, my dad always freed us from chores so my sister and I can have a real vacation. I generally spend mine squirrel hunting, and the day after Christmas found me deep in the woods doing just that. I don’t bring my dog Chipper on a squirrel hunt because he tends to bark at everything that moves. So it was just me and my trusty twenty-two rifle traipsing around in the brush that day.

About an hour into my hunt, I caught a whiff of smoke. Not much chance of a forest fire in the winter with snow on the ground, so it must be more hunters. Curious, I set about locating the source. Tracking wisps of smoke isn’t an exact science, and it took a little effort to find something that hadn’t been there the last time I was in the area. A rude shack. And I do mean a rude shack. It was made out of cut poles lashed together with stout cord with brush stuck in most of the gaps. Smoke escaped from a smoke hole at the apex. Smoke meant somebody was in there, so I backed off and resumed hunting.

I wasn’t having much luck on the south side of Little Beaver Creek, so I decided to try my luck on the other side. As I stood on the bank, I could see it was covered with ice. I tested its strength with half my weight, and when it held, I stepped out onto the ice. Sometimes the creek floods when the ice becomes thick enough to impede the flow. Then when it starts to thaw, upstream water overtakes the plugged places and makes the creek look like a quarter of a mile wide river. But today, I could clearly see the water rushing past beneath the ice.

Right in the middle of this train of thought, something went “crack” beneath my boots, and I scrambled to get back on shore. As I turned for dry land, my feet went out from under me, and down I went. Hard. Hard enough to splinter the ice beneath me.

Little Beaver wasn’t a deep stream, but when you enter it flat of your back, it’s deep enough to soak everything you’ve got. The shock of the freezing water was enough to paralize me for a long moment, which meant the creek had a good run at me. My head never went under, but most everything else did.

I came up and crawled for shore with my clothes and my pack soaked. Even my twenty-two dripped water from the barrel. I made it to dry land shivering so hard I could hardly stand. Needed warmth. Never make it home in this condition. As I fumbled with my sodden pack for matches I keep in a waterproof pouch, I fixated on that smoke I’d smelled. Where was that shack? Seemed like my brain had frozen, same as everything else. I stumbled around aimlessly until I realized this was serious. I needed to shape up or check out.

Heading off in the direction I thought right, I eventually saw—my olfactory senses were no longer working—little wafts of smoke. I was walking on frozen stilts by the time I reached the shack.

“H…hello! Anyone in there? I…I need help.”

I heard scuffling a moment before the rude door opened. I had enough sense left to recognize the Mexican kid. A blanket of warm air hit me in the face as I realized he was shirtless and in a pair of shorts. What the hell?”

“Hey, man, what happened?”

“Ice broke on creek. Fell in.”

He reached out an arm and took my rifle. “Get in here before you freeze.”

He helped me over the threshold, and it was like walking from a freezer into an inferno. Probably wasn’t all that hot inside, but compared to the outside… it was an inferno.

He closed the door behind us and immediately began tugging at my dripping clothing. Actually dripping. Icicles had started melting.

As soon as he had my coat and shirt off, my torso was warmer. He pushed me onto a blanket he’d spread and started tackling my right boot. I tried to unlace the left one with semi frozen fingers, but he was yanking on it before I’d halfway finished. He rummaged in a pack he had and tossed me a towel before pushing me flat of my back and tackling my trousers. I was so numb I didn’t even object when he tugged off my undershorts.

I came to my senses enough while he was spreading my clothing to dry on the other side of the fire to realize I was stark naked… and didn’t give a damn. In moments he was back and snatched the towel from my hands, rubbing me vigorously.

“Man, you gotta get dry or you’re going to catch pneumonia. Might already have.”

“My mind was clear enough to understand what he was saying… and to realize he didn’t have an accent. I lay there and let him dry everything I had including my privates. When he was satisfied, he worried at me until I got up so he could put down a dry blanket. I fell on it and lay curled up, still shivering like crazy. After that, I sort of went out of it.

 

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I’d say Joseph was in trouble., wouldn’t you? How much help will this newcomer to town, this perfect stranger give him? It’s only human to give others help when they’re in distress, but there’s help and then there’s help.

Please friend this site. Apparently, that matters in the internet world.

As indicated on the last post, Charlie Blackbear has been published as an ebook by JMS Books.

My contact information is provided below in case anyone wants to drop me a line:

Website and blog: markwildyr.com

Email: markwildyr@aol.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/mark.wildyr

Twitter: @markwildyr

Now my mantra: Keep on reading. Keep on writing. You have something to say, so say it!

See you later.

 

 

Mark

 

New posts the first and third Thursday of the month at 6:00 a.m., US Mountain time.