Reaching Out
William Cass
I’d just gotten home after a forgetful day teaching third graders and felt a little jolt when I saw the light blinking on the answering machine. I stabbed the button to retrieve the message, hoping against hope it was a return one from my wife. She’d left without warning the week before and hadn’t replied to any of my phone messages, texts, or emails. My shoulders slumped when I heard instead an older man’s voice I didn’t recognize. I knew he’d misdialed because he told someone called Sarge to send him the broken watch and he’d see if he could fix it. I glanced at the caller ID, saw that the area code was from another part of the state, and swore knowing that this was a mistake that would go uncorrected unless I did something about it. Reluctantly, I returned the call and left a message of my own letting the man know he’d reached the wrong number.
It was early spring and as I put down the receiver, I heard the trill of a bird outside the window. A long silence replaced it that fairly screamed: empty rooms in every direction, all my wife’s things exactly where she’d left them. I lifted a framed photograph that stood next to the answering machine. It was from a dozen years earlier when my wife and I were in college together. In it, we stood holding hands on a bridge leading to the student union, our hair blowing in the breeze. I set it back down with pursed lips. I had no idea where she’d gone; the note she’d left had simply said she didn’t love me anymore and had met someone new. None of her family or friends knew anything about her whereabouts, and she worked remotely, so there was no information to be gleaned from her employer either. I changed into my workout gear, turned the music up loud in my earbuds, and went outside for a run that had grown longer each day since she’d been gone.
I didn’t get back until the afternoon had begun its descent towards gloaming. The answering machine light was blinking again and I pushed it eagerly.
The same elderly voice said: “So, I just wanted to let you know I appreciate you leaving that message. Sorry about calling your number by mistake.” He chuckled. “Don’t get old, is all I can say about that.” A pause followed. “My name is Hector, by the way.” Another pause. “Well, once again, I’m grateful. You have a good evening.”
I felt a small smile crease my lips before erasing the message, then thought of the long hours ahead before I could try again to make sleep come, if it would come at all. “Yeah,” I told the machine. “Good evening to you, too, Hector.”
~ ~ ~
I heard nothing from or about my wife for the next several days. As time wore on, I felt more and more desperate, like I was falling in a well with no bottom. I could barely function at school and fought back tears often and at odd moments. I had no family left and no close friends to confide in, so was alone in my misery. One of the things that hurt worst was that I’d had no idea she was unhappy. Why hadn’t she told me? We might have been able to do something about it if she had. The irretrievability of it may have been the hardest pill of all to swallow.
When I came inside after mowing the lawn on Saturday, there was another mistaken message waiting from Hector. It said: “Hey, Sarge, it’s me. Got your watch fixed and just mailed it back to you. You get that damn thing when we were in Nam? Sure old enough.” The same low chuckle followed, then: “Stay well, big guy. Hope we can get together soon.”
I shook my head and returned the call immediately. I was expecting to leave another message, but instead the now familiar voice answered, “Hello?”
“Hector, this is Ben Atkins, the wrong number you left the message for last week. I just got another one from you.”
“Well, good goddamn, I’m sorry, Ben.”
“Wanted to be sure you try the correct number again. What is that, by the way? Maybe we can figure out why you’re dialing wrong.”
He gave it to me slowly.
“Last digit is off by one, that’s all it is. You’re hitting seven instead of six.”
“Go figure. Sounds like me.” He paused. “So, you have the same area code as Sarge. Must live pretty close by.”
“That his name…Sarge?”
“Nah, just what I always called him. We served in the Marines together.” He gave another chuckle. “Been pals ever since, going on fifty years now. Heck of a guy. Like a brother.”
“Must be nice.” I paused. “Having someone you’re close to like that.”
There was just the sound of static on the line for a long moment before he spoke next, his voice quiet. “You okay, Ben? You don’t sound too good.”
“Oh, you know.” I heaved a sigh. “Been better.”
“Relationship trouble?”
“Something like that, yeah.”
Another extended silence followed while I squeezed my eyes shut and pinched the bridge of my nose. Finally, he said, “Truth is, I’ve been on my own pretty near all my adult life, so don’t have any special wisdom to share with you there. Hope things work out for you. I bet they will.”
Even though I knew he couldn’t see it, I found myself nodding. I blew out another breath and said, “Thanks.”
“Yeah, well, you hang in there. I’ll be thinking of you, sending good thoughts your way.”
I nodded some more.
“Okay, then,” he said. “Guess I’ll make that call to Sarge now. Six instead of seven for that last digit.”
“That’s right.”
“Okay, Ben. You take care.”
I heard a click, and the line went dead. I replaced the receiver slowly in its cradle, took a few steps, and sat down on the couch. I was vaguely aware of a dog barking somewhere nearby. A few minutes later, sprinklers hissed on in a neighbor’s yard. I reached over and touched the spot next to me on the couch because I realized it was the last place my wife had sat with me before she left. We’d watched television together that night just like so many others; I’d found the note from her when I got home from work that next afternoon.
~ ~ ~
Our school district’s Spring Break started a few days later. I couldn’t stand the thought of wandering around the house’s silent rooms during it, so booked a campsite in a state park nearby instead and drove there right after student dismissal that last day. It was a pretty spot, wildflowers just beginning to peak out in the meadows, and I went on some nice long hikes. But, try as I might, my wife was never far from my thoughts. I kept worrying that I might have missed a call at home from her, so finally headed back a couple days earlier than I’d planned. There was a message waiting when I arrived late that afternoon, but it wasn’t from her.
It said: “Hey, Ben, this is Hector again. You’ve been on my mind, so I just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing. I hope things are okay, or at least better than last time. I’m here if you need to talk.”
The date and time on the message were from earlier that week. I replayed it three times, shaking my head back and forth, then took a long shower and changed clothes. I stored away my camping gear in various closets, passing the answering machine and glancing at it several times as I did. The last piece of gear was my sleeping bag that I tucked in its spot next to my wife’s in a corner of her bedroom closet. She’d left most of her clothes there on hangers and shelves, and they still held her scent. I closed the closet door and buried my face in one of her dresses in the darkness.
Afterwards, I took a nearly full bottle of wine out onto the back deck. I didn’t bother with a glass. I sat in my tulip-backed chair there, looked at hers beside it, and drank. Full evening had come on by the time I went back inside, brought the phone over to the couch, and called Hector’s number. He picked up right away.
“Hey,” he said, his voice chipper. “Thought I recognized this number. That you, Ben?”
“It is.”
“How you doing?”
I closed my eyes, rubbed my forehead, and said, “Not so hot.”
Static over the line followed until he said, “So, your relationship trouble…this a girlfriend, boyfriend, wife?”
“Wife.” I paused. “She moved out a few weeks ago. In love with someone else.”
He made a soft whistling sound, then said, “Shucks.”
“Yeah.”
“And you didn’t see it coming?”
“Not a bit.”
“Can’t you get ahold of her? Talk things over?”
“Nope. No idea where she went, and she won’t answer any of my messages.”
He made the same whistling sound before he said, “Well, that’s about as shitty as it gets, isn’t it?”
In spite of myself, I grinned and said, “Yep.”
“Doesn’t sound like there’s much you can do except hope and wait.” I heard his slow breathing over the line. “Been doing that a long time myself. You’ll get used to it eventually, if she doesn’t come back.”
I felt myself nodding again. I shook the wine bottle, found it almost empty, and said, “So, listen, Hector, enough whining about me. Tell me a little about yourself?”
“Like what?”
“Well, to start with, how’d you learn to fix watches?”
He told me his grandfather had been a watchmaker in Mexico City, and his father had continued in the trade until the company folded and he emigrated with his young family to the United States where he’d eventually transitioned to doing repairs. Hector had helped him in the shop before enlisting after graduating from high school. He’d been a mechanic in the service, but learned to fix almost anything, and opened his own appliance repair business when he got out. He’d run that by himself until his retirement a handful of years earlier.
“Now, I mostly piddle around with woodworking projects in my garage. Birdhouses, coatracks, toys, Merganser ducks with spinning wings.” He gave one of his low chuckles. “I’m one of those old farts you see at crafts fairs sitting around in a VFW cap surrounded by all the junk he’s made.”
“Sounds pretty good to me.” I was smiling. “I can barely change a light bulb.”
“I’ll show you sometime,” he said, “if you’re ever up this way.”
A blush of warmth opened in me, something I hadn’t felt for a while.
“Hey, listen,” Hector said. “I got a casserole burning in the oven, so I better go.”
“You do that,” I said. “And thanks again for reaching out.”
“Reaching out?”
I laughed, “That’s what they call it now when someone makes an effort to get in touch with someone else.”
“Well, whatever the hell it is, you’re welcome. Talk to you later.”
The line went silent. I shook the bottle again, then tilted it back to drink the last little bit it held.
~ ~ ~
At school that next week, we had mandatory state testing with lots of paperwork and accountability procedures, which kept my mind a little more occupied. And the week after that, there were professional development sessions each day after school, so that filled some extra time, too. But the other hours were just as endless and hard. Even though I had no idea if my wife was still in the area, I went by a few of the places she used to frequent: a café that served her favorite chai tea, her community choir practice, a walking path through our central park, the library. I didn’t see her at any of them. I still called, texted, or emailed her daily with no communication from her in return.
Every few days though, I’d come home to another message from Hector, each saying he was just checking in to see how I was doing, no need to return his call. Sometimes I did and other times I didn’t, but I looked forward to the messages either way; they lifted my spirits, and I felt anticipation for a new one as soon as I came through the door.
Although I still harped plenty about my woes when we did talk, I tried to minimize that as much as I could by asking Hector more questions about himself. He told me his family had first travelled the farmworker circuit for three years from the lettuce fields in California’s southern Imperial Valley up to the apple orchards in central Washington before finally earning green card and citizenship. Hector struggled with English, not really becoming fluent until junior high, and school was always a challenge. That’s why he enlisted after graduation, although almost every guy he knew was getting drafted and sent to fight in the war then anyway. He’d met Sarge in boot camp at Parris Island, and they’d shipped off together to Vietnam several months later; they served there in the same platoon for two years.
Hector said, “We saw shit in that place you wouldn’t believe.”
“I bet,” I replied.
I didn’t tell him that neither my father or I had served in the military. I didn’t tell him that my parents had been killed in a car accident when I was eleven or that I’d been raised by my grandmother afterwards who was the only family I had and that she’d been dead, too, for many years. But I did tell him about how my wife and I met, the little things I missed about her: her touch, her smile, her voice when she sang, her gentleness, her tenderness with others, the garden she kept so pristine that was now wilting and fading despite whatever I tried to do to save it.
“I’ve kept quite a few gardens in my time,” Hector told me. “They’re funny things. Sometimes they thrive when you do almost nothing to care for them, and other times, you tend the hell of out of them, and they just don’t make it.”
“Yeah.” It came out as almost a whisper. “I guess you’re right.”
~ ~ ~
A couple of Saturday mornings later, as I was pushing through the back door with a grocery bag on each hip, I heard Hector’s voice start another message. I dumped the bags and hurried to answer it.
“Hey, there,” I said, interrupting him. “Sorry…I just walked in.”
“No problem.” He paused. “Listen, Ben, I need to ask you a favor. I haven’t been able to get ahold of Sarge for over a week. Keep getting a message that his line is no longer in service. Isn’t like him not to be in touch, so I’m kind of worried. Wondering if you’d mind going by to check on him. Would do it myself, but I can’t drive anymore since I lost sight in one eye, and the bus would take forever.”
“Sure,” I said. “What’s his address?”
He gave it to me. I recognized the area; it was only about twenty minutes away.
“Okay. I’ll head over now. One of us should be getting back to you soon.”
~ ~ ~
I found Sarge’s house easily. It was a little rundown bungalow perched on a rise a few lots up from a busy street. When I rang the doorbell, a rough voice inside growled, “Coming. Wait a minute.”
I heard shuffling and rolling over floorboards, then the front door was pulled ajar, and a huge older man appeared in the opening in a wheelchair. He looked to be in his early seventies with white stubble on his face matching that on his head. Large, black plastic glasses framed keen eyes. I put his weight at somewhere near three hundred pounds, and the bottoms of both legs had been amputated at the knee; stubs stuck straight out of gym shorts in my direction.
I found myself blinking and said, “You Sarge?
The big man gave a grunt and nodded.
“I’m Ben, a friend of Hector’s. I live near here. He called and asked me to check on you. Hasn’t been able to reach you recently and was getting worried.”
Sarge snorted a laugh. “You the wrong number guy?”
“That’s me, yeah.”
He chuckled some more, his eyes brightening. “Hector’s told me about you. Your wife skipped out.”
I felt something like a shadow pass over me, but repeated, “Yeah.”
“Sorry.”
I shrugged, then said, “So, you all right?”
He made a gesture with his hand like he was shooing away a fly. “Heck, sure.” He glanced down at his missing legs, then back at me. “Except for my diabetes, but that’s no worse or better. Thing is my daughter talked me into dropping my landline and going on her cell plan. Guess lots of folks have done that, and she wanted me to have a cell phone at all times in case of emergency with me all by my lonesome here. Just got it a few days ago and can hardly work the damn thing. Haven’t gotten around to calling Hector to tell him yet.”
I nodded. “But you will…call him, I mean.”
“You bet. Soon as you leave.”
“Okay.” I looked past him into a living room that was sparse, but neatly kept. “So, you need anything? Something I can help you with before I go.”
“Don’t think so.” He shook his head, then his eyes suddenly widened. “Well, there is one thing. You ever head up Hector’s way?”
“Not recently.” I felt myself hesitate, then said, “But I could.”
“Wait here.”
I watched him whirl around and wheel himself over to a dining room table nestled in a little alcove off the living room. The interior was dim, but a gooseneck lamp in the center of the table sent a cone of light over parts of a model ship, an open stamp collection, and a dusty shoebox with its lid off. He sorted through items in the shoebox, took a photograph out of it, and wrote something on its back side. Then he wheeled himself over with it on his lap. When he gazed up at me through those glasses, his eyes had softened.
“Here,” he said and handed me the photograph. “Give that to Hector, will you?”
It was a black-and-white photo about three-by-four inches with serrated edges creased in places with age. A short, young soldier with dark skin and a darker crew cut stood in it with a Vietnamese woman about the same age. They had their arms around each other’s waists and were grinning at the camera, jungle and huts behind them.
I looked from the photo to Sarge and asked, “This Hector?”
He nodded slowly. “Found it yesterday in some old things I was looking through. Don’t know how I came to have it. I took the shot, but it’s his, from one of the places we were stationed together in Nam.” His brow furrowed as he shook his head. “They were about as in love as you can get. He spent every spare minute he could with her until our unit got sent to the Central Highlands. He took a bunch of shrapnel in his leg there and got shipped back to the states for treatment. The war ended soon after that, and he never saw her again. He tried like crazy to make contact with her, but…no luck.”
I watched him shake his head some more and looked down at the picture again. Hector had his chest thrust out with the fingertips of the young woman against it. Their smiles seemed unbridled. I figured neither of them could have been much more than twenty, about the same as my wife and I when we met.
Sarge said, “I don’t want to gamble on having it get lost in the mail, and I’m not sure when we’ll see each other again. Afraid we’re both slowing down, tougher to travel very far. Really want him to have it, though. Appreciate you giving it to him when you get the chance.”
I nodded. “Sure, no problem. Happy to do it.”
“Good. I wrote his address there on the back.” He extended his hand, and I shook it. “All right, then. I’ll give Hector that call right away. Hope things work out with your wife.”
I nodded once more and watched him close the door. I waited until I heard the wheelchair roll across the floor, then returned to my car at the curb and set the photograph on the passenger seat. I looked up at the house and watched Sarge settle in his wheelchair at the dining room table. When I saw him lift his cell phone to his ear, I started the engine and drove away.
I headed back towards the freeway onramp that led to home and let my thoughts tumble over themselves. I thought about my wife and Hector and the woman in the photo. I thought about the paths of the heart and how little control we had over where they might lead. I thought about how none of us could have any idea how many good days we had left; I wasn’t sure about mine, but I was pretty certain that Sarge’s and Hector’s were numbered. And Hector’s eyesight problems probably diminished his further.
I considered that last thought for a while longer, then pulled to the side of the road and used my cell phone to Google directions to Hector’s place, which indicated about a three-hour drive without traffic delays. I glanced at the time on the top of the screen; if I left then and only stopped for a quick lunch and gas, I could be there by the middle of the afternoon. I’d done all my lesson planning for the next week before leaving my classroom the evening before and had no special plans for the weekend; just an empty house, the same memories and hopes to struggle with, and hours to fill. I checked the directions on my phone again, then started following the first part of them that led me towards a different onramp.
When I came to a stop light, I lifted the photo off the passenger seat and studied Hector’s face in it. His eyes were downturned at the outside edges, gentle, kind. I wondered about meeting him in a few hours and what that would be like. After I gave him the photo, I supposed we’d talk for a while. Maybe afterwards, we’d go out to his workshop and build something together, like he’d suggested. Maybe one of those ducks with the spinning wings that I could put in my wife’s garden. I’d seen them in places like that before. When the wings spun forward, they’d always appeared to me to be saying, “Go ahead, be on your way.” And when they spun the other direction, they seemed to say, “Come on back, come on home. It’ll be all right.”
William Cass
I’d just gotten home after a forgetful day teaching third graders and felt a little jolt when I saw the light blinking on the answering machine. I stabbed the button to retrieve the message, hoping against hope it was a return one from my wife. She’d left without warning the week before and hadn’t replied to any of my phone messages, texts, or emails. My shoulders slumped when I heard instead an older man’s voice I didn’t recognize. I knew he’d misdialed because he told someone called Sarge to send him the broken watch and he’d see if he could fix it. I glanced at the caller ID, saw that the area code was from another part of the state, and swore knowing that this was a mistake that would go uncorrected unless I did something about it. Reluctantly, I returned the call and left a message of my own letting the man know he’d reached the wrong number.
It was early spring and as I put down the receiver, I heard the trill of a bird outside the window. A long silence replaced it that fairly screamed: empty rooms in every direction, all my wife’s things exactly where she’d left them. I lifted a framed photograph that stood next to the answering machine. It was from a dozen years earlier when my wife and I were in college together. In it, we stood holding hands on a bridge leading to the student union, our hair blowing in the breeze. I set it back down with pursed lips. I had no idea where she’d gone; the note she’d left had simply said she didn’t love me anymore and had met someone new. None of her family or friends knew anything about her whereabouts, and she worked remotely, so there was no information to be gleaned from her employer either. I changed into my workout gear, turned the music up loud in my earbuds, and went outside for a run that had grown longer each day since she’d been gone.
I didn’t get back until the afternoon had begun its descent towards gloaming. The answering machine light was blinking again and I pushed it eagerly.
The same elderly voice said: “So, I just wanted to let you know I appreciate you leaving that message. Sorry about calling your number by mistake.” He chuckled. “Don’t get old, is all I can say about that.” A pause followed. “My name is Hector, by the way.” Another pause. “Well, once again, I’m grateful. You have a good evening.”
I felt a small smile crease my lips before erasing the message, then thought of the long hours ahead before I could try again to make sleep come, if it would come at all. “Yeah,” I told the machine. “Good evening to you, too, Hector.”
~ ~ ~
I heard nothing from or about my wife for the next several days. As time wore on, I felt more and more desperate, like I was falling in a well with no bottom. I could barely function at school and fought back tears often and at odd moments. I had no family left and no close friends to confide in, so was alone in my misery. One of the things that hurt worst was that I’d had no idea she was unhappy. Why hadn’t she told me? We might have been able to do something about it if she had. The irretrievability of it may have been the hardest pill of all to swallow.
When I came inside after mowing the lawn on Saturday, there was another mistaken message waiting from Hector. It said: “Hey, Sarge, it’s me. Got your watch fixed and just mailed it back to you. You get that damn thing when we were in Nam? Sure old enough.” The same low chuckle followed, then: “Stay well, big guy. Hope we can get together soon.”
I shook my head and returned the call immediately. I was expecting to leave another message, but instead the now familiar voice answered, “Hello?”
“Hector, this is Ben Atkins, the wrong number you left the message for last week. I just got another one from you.”
“Well, good goddamn, I’m sorry, Ben.”
“Wanted to be sure you try the correct number again. What is that, by the way? Maybe we can figure out why you’re dialing wrong.”
He gave it to me slowly.
“Last digit is off by one, that’s all it is. You’re hitting seven instead of six.”
“Go figure. Sounds like me.” He paused. “So, you have the same area code as Sarge. Must live pretty close by.”
“That his name…Sarge?”
“Nah, just what I always called him. We served in the Marines together.” He gave another chuckle. “Been pals ever since, going on fifty years now. Heck of a guy. Like a brother.”
“Must be nice.” I paused. “Having someone you’re close to like that.”
There was just the sound of static on the line for a long moment before he spoke next, his voice quiet. “You okay, Ben? You don’t sound too good.”
“Oh, you know.” I heaved a sigh. “Been better.”
“Relationship trouble?”
“Something like that, yeah.”
Another extended silence followed while I squeezed my eyes shut and pinched the bridge of my nose. Finally, he said, “Truth is, I’ve been on my own pretty near all my adult life, so don’t have any special wisdom to share with you there. Hope things work out for you. I bet they will.”
Even though I knew he couldn’t see it, I found myself nodding. I blew out another breath and said, “Thanks.”
“Yeah, well, you hang in there. I’ll be thinking of you, sending good thoughts your way.”
I nodded some more.
“Okay, then,” he said. “Guess I’ll make that call to Sarge now. Six instead of seven for that last digit.”
“That’s right.”
“Okay, Ben. You take care.”
I heard a click, and the line went dead. I replaced the receiver slowly in its cradle, took a few steps, and sat down on the couch. I was vaguely aware of a dog barking somewhere nearby. A few minutes later, sprinklers hissed on in a neighbor’s yard. I reached over and touched the spot next to me on the couch because I realized it was the last place my wife had sat with me before she left. We’d watched television together that night just like so many others; I’d found the note from her when I got home from work that next afternoon.
~ ~ ~
Our school district’s Spring Break started a few days later. I couldn’t stand the thought of wandering around the house’s silent rooms during it, so booked a campsite in a state park nearby instead and drove there right after student dismissal that last day. It was a pretty spot, wildflowers just beginning to peak out in the meadows, and I went on some nice long hikes. But, try as I might, my wife was never far from my thoughts. I kept worrying that I might have missed a call at home from her, so finally headed back a couple days earlier than I’d planned. There was a message waiting when I arrived late that afternoon, but it wasn’t from her.
It said: “Hey, Ben, this is Hector again. You’ve been on my mind, so I just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing. I hope things are okay, or at least better than last time. I’m here if you need to talk.”
The date and time on the message were from earlier that week. I replayed it three times, shaking my head back and forth, then took a long shower and changed clothes. I stored away my camping gear in various closets, passing the answering machine and glancing at it several times as I did. The last piece of gear was my sleeping bag that I tucked in its spot next to my wife’s in a corner of her bedroom closet. She’d left most of her clothes there on hangers and shelves, and they still held her scent. I closed the closet door and buried my face in one of her dresses in the darkness.
Afterwards, I took a nearly full bottle of wine out onto the back deck. I didn’t bother with a glass. I sat in my tulip-backed chair there, looked at hers beside it, and drank. Full evening had come on by the time I went back inside, brought the phone over to the couch, and called Hector’s number. He picked up right away.
“Hey,” he said, his voice chipper. “Thought I recognized this number. That you, Ben?”
“It is.”
“How you doing?”
I closed my eyes, rubbed my forehead, and said, “Not so hot.”
Static over the line followed until he said, “So, your relationship trouble…this a girlfriend, boyfriend, wife?”
“Wife.” I paused. “She moved out a few weeks ago. In love with someone else.”
He made a soft whistling sound, then said, “Shucks.”
“Yeah.”
“And you didn’t see it coming?”
“Not a bit.”
“Can’t you get ahold of her? Talk things over?”
“Nope. No idea where she went, and she won’t answer any of my messages.”
He made the same whistling sound before he said, “Well, that’s about as shitty as it gets, isn’t it?”
In spite of myself, I grinned and said, “Yep.”
“Doesn’t sound like there’s much you can do except hope and wait.” I heard his slow breathing over the line. “Been doing that a long time myself. You’ll get used to it eventually, if she doesn’t come back.”
I felt myself nodding again. I shook the wine bottle, found it almost empty, and said, “So, listen, Hector, enough whining about me. Tell me a little about yourself?”
“Like what?”
“Well, to start with, how’d you learn to fix watches?”
He told me his grandfather had been a watchmaker in Mexico City, and his father had continued in the trade until the company folded and he emigrated with his young family to the United States where he’d eventually transitioned to doing repairs. Hector had helped him in the shop before enlisting after graduating from high school. He’d been a mechanic in the service, but learned to fix almost anything, and opened his own appliance repair business when he got out. He’d run that by himself until his retirement a handful of years earlier.
“Now, I mostly piddle around with woodworking projects in my garage. Birdhouses, coatracks, toys, Merganser ducks with spinning wings.” He gave one of his low chuckles. “I’m one of those old farts you see at crafts fairs sitting around in a VFW cap surrounded by all the junk he’s made.”
“Sounds pretty good to me.” I was smiling. “I can barely change a light bulb.”
“I’ll show you sometime,” he said, “if you’re ever up this way.”
A blush of warmth opened in me, something I hadn’t felt for a while.
“Hey, listen,” Hector said. “I got a casserole burning in the oven, so I better go.”
“You do that,” I said. “And thanks again for reaching out.”
“Reaching out?”
I laughed, “That’s what they call it now when someone makes an effort to get in touch with someone else.”
“Well, whatever the hell it is, you’re welcome. Talk to you later.”
The line went silent. I shook the bottle again, then tilted it back to drink the last little bit it held.
~ ~ ~
At school that next week, we had mandatory state testing with lots of paperwork and accountability procedures, which kept my mind a little more occupied. And the week after that, there were professional development sessions each day after school, so that filled some extra time, too. But the other hours were just as endless and hard. Even though I had no idea if my wife was still in the area, I went by a few of the places she used to frequent: a café that served her favorite chai tea, her community choir practice, a walking path through our central park, the library. I didn’t see her at any of them. I still called, texted, or emailed her daily with no communication from her in return.
Every few days though, I’d come home to another message from Hector, each saying he was just checking in to see how I was doing, no need to return his call. Sometimes I did and other times I didn’t, but I looked forward to the messages either way; they lifted my spirits, and I felt anticipation for a new one as soon as I came through the door.
Although I still harped plenty about my woes when we did talk, I tried to minimize that as much as I could by asking Hector more questions about himself. He told me his family had first travelled the farmworker circuit for three years from the lettuce fields in California’s southern Imperial Valley up to the apple orchards in central Washington before finally earning green card and citizenship. Hector struggled with English, not really becoming fluent until junior high, and school was always a challenge. That’s why he enlisted after graduation, although almost every guy he knew was getting drafted and sent to fight in the war then anyway. He’d met Sarge in boot camp at Parris Island, and they’d shipped off together to Vietnam several months later; they served there in the same platoon for two years.
Hector said, “We saw shit in that place you wouldn’t believe.”
“I bet,” I replied.
I didn’t tell him that neither my father or I had served in the military. I didn’t tell him that my parents had been killed in a car accident when I was eleven or that I’d been raised by my grandmother afterwards who was the only family I had and that she’d been dead, too, for many years. But I did tell him about how my wife and I met, the little things I missed about her: her touch, her smile, her voice when she sang, her gentleness, her tenderness with others, the garden she kept so pristine that was now wilting and fading despite whatever I tried to do to save it.
“I’ve kept quite a few gardens in my time,” Hector told me. “They’re funny things. Sometimes they thrive when you do almost nothing to care for them, and other times, you tend the hell of out of them, and they just don’t make it.”
“Yeah.” It came out as almost a whisper. “I guess you’re right.”
~ ~ ~
A couple of Saturday mornings later, as I was pushing through the back door with a grocery bag on each hip, I heard Hector’s voice start another message. I dumped the bags and hurried to answer it.
“Hey, there,” I said, interrupting him. “Sorry…I just walked in.”
“No problem.” He paused. “Listen, Ben, I need to ask you a favor. I haven’t been able to get ahold of Sarge for over a week. Keep getting a message that his line is no longer in service. Isn’t like him not to be in touch, so I’m kind of worried. Wondering if you’d mind going by to check on him. Would do it myself, but I can’t drive anymore since I lost sight in one eye, and the bus would take forever.”
“Sure,” I said. “What’s his address?”
He gave it to me. I recognized the area; it was only about twenty minutes away.
“Okay. I’ll head over now. One of us should be getting back to you soon.”
~ ~ ~
I found Sarge’s house easily. It was a little rundown bungalow perched on a rise a few lots up from a busy street. When I rang the doorbell, a rough voice inside growled, “Coming. Wait a minute.”
I heard shuffling and rolling over floorboards, then the front door was pulled ajar, and a huge older man appeared in the opening in a wheelchair. He looked to be in his early seventies with white stubble on his face matching that on his head. Large, black plastic glasses framed keen eyes. I put his weight at somewhere near three hundred pounds, and the bottoms of both legs had been amputated at the knee; stubs stuck straight out of gym shorts in my direction.
I found myself blinking and said, “You Sarge?
The big man gave a grunt and nodded.
“I’m Ben, a friend of Hector’s. I live near here. He called and asked me to check on you. Hasn’t been able to reach you recently and was getting worried.”
Sarge snorted a laugh. “You the wrong number guy?”
“That’s me, yeah.”
He chuckled some more, his eyes brightening. “Hector’s told me about you. Your wife skipped out.”
I felt something like a shadow pass over me, but repeated, “Yeah.”
“Sorry.”
I shrugged, then said, “So, you all right?”
He made a gesture with his hand like he was shooing away a fly. “Heck, sure.” He glanced down at his missing legs, then back at me. “Except for my diabetes, but that’s no worse or better. Thing is my daughter talked me into dropping my landline and going on her cell plan. Guess lots of folks have done that, and she wanted me to have a cell phone at all times in case of emergency with me all by my lonesome here. Just got it a few days ago and can hardly work the damn thing. Haven’t gotten around to calling Hector to tell him yet.”
I nodded. “But you will…call him, I mean.”
“You bet. Soon as you leave.”
“Okay.” I looked past him into a living room that was sparse, but neatly kept. “So, you need anything? Something I can help you with before I go.”
“Don’t think so.” He shook his head, then his eyes suddenly widened. “Well, there is one thing. You ever head up Hector’s way?”
“Not recently.” I felt myself hesitate, then said, “But I could.”
“Wait here.”
I watched him whirl around and wheel himself over to a dining room table nestled in a little alcove off the living room. The interior was dim, but a gooseneck lamp in the center of the table sent a cone of light over parts of a model ship, an open stamp collection, and a dusty shoebox with its lid off. He sorted through items in the shoebox, took a photograph out of it, and wrote something on its back side. Then he wheeled himself over with it on his lap. When he gazed up at me through those glasses, his eyes had softened.
“Here,” he said and handed me the photograph. “Give that to Hector, will you?”
It was a black-and-white photo about three-by-four inches with serrated edges creased in places with age. A short, young soldier with dark skin and a darker crew cut stood in it with a Vietnamese woman about the same age. They had their arms around each other’s waists and were grinning at the camera, jungle and huts behind them.
I looked from the photo to Sarge and asked, “This Hector?”
He nodded slowly. “Found it yesterday in some old things I was looking through. Don’t know how I came to have it. I took the shot, but it’s his, from one of the places we were stationed together in Nam.” His brow furrowed as he shook his head. “They were about as in love as you can get. He spent every spare minute he could with her until our unit got sent to the Central Highlands. He took a bunch of shrapnel in his leg there and got shipped back to the states for treatment. The war ended soon after that, and he never saw her again. He tried like crazy to make contact with her, but…no luck.”
I watched him shake his head some more and looked down at the picture again. Hector had his chest thrust out with the fingertips of the young woman against it. Their smiles seemed unbridled. I figured neither of them could have been much more than twenty, about the same as my wife and I when we met.
Sarge said, “I don’t want to gamble on having it get lost in the mail, and I’m not sure when we’ll see each other again. Afraid we’re both slowing down, tougher to travel very far. Really want him to have it, though. Appreciate you giving it to him when you get the chance.”
I nodded. “Sure, no problem. Happy to do it.”
“Good. I wrote his address there on the back.” He extended his hand, and I shook it. “All right, then. I’ll give Hector that call right away. Hope things work out with your wife.”
I nodded once more and watched him close the door. I waited until I heard the wheelchair roll across the floor, then returned to my car at the curb and set the photograph on the passenger seat. I looked up at the house and watched Sarge settle in his wheelchair at the dining room table. When I saw him lift his cell phone to his ear, I started the engine and drove away.
I headed back towards the freeway onramp that led to home and let my thoughts tumble over themselves. I thought about my wife and Hector and the woman in the photo. I thought about the paths of the heart and how little control we had over where they might lead. I thought about how none of us could have any idea how many good days we had left; I wasn’t sure about mine, but I was pretty certain that Sarge’s and Hector’s were numbered. And Hector’s eyesight problems probably diminished his further.
I considered that last thought for a while longer, then pulled to the side of the road and used my cell phone to Google directions to Hector’s place, which indicated about a three-hour drive without traffic delays. I glanced at the time on the top of the screen; if I left then and only stopped for a quick lunch and gas, I could be there by the middle of the afternoon. I’d done all my lesson planning for the next week before leaving my classroom the evening before and had no special plans for the weekend; just an empty house, the same memories and hopes to struggle with, and hours to fill. I checked the directions on my phone again, then started following the first part of them that led me towards a different onramp.
When I came to a stop light, I lifted the photo off the passenger seat and studied Hector’s face in it. His eyes were downturned at the outside edges, gentle, kind. I wondered about meeting him in a few hours and what that would be like. After I gave him the photo, I supposed we’d talk for a while. Maybe afterwards, we’d go out to his workshop and build something together, like he’d suggested. Maybe one of those ducks with the spinning wings that I could put in my wife’s garden. I’d seen them in places like that before. When the wings spun forward, they’d always appeared to me to be saying, “Go ahead, be on your way.” And when they spun the other direction, they seemed to say, “Come on back, come on home. It’ll be all right.”