side as the town’s gravedigger, sat in the bordering grass and sagebrush, covered in faded yellow paint bubbled and chipped and revealing spots of dark rusted metal. The landscape, the cemetery, and the girl lent a strange beauty to this death. He felt little emotion, no urge to weep. He had braced himself for a wind and received a breeze. Though he had certainly loved the woman in her time, that love had cleared like smoke, and there had been time since to prepare for this and it was no surprise. It occurred to him that things might come out, even that evening. He imagined that those things had been settled firmly and cleanly sometime in the past and that this day when the old woman was put in the ground would be the day his future at the farm would be revealed. It would be momentous if it came out in the immediate wake of the burial, it would seem his mantle, magnifying the drama of the passing, honoring it even, and he did not know how he would respond. He did not know if he would be able to think clearly should it come that way. The emotion of the moment might suade him in a direction he was not sure he wanted to go. Did he want the farm? To stay here alone in this town and work a lonesome and obscure life out in the same fields, gathering milk twice a day, beating his life out upon this ground—this was the natural course of things, the path that would unroll before him in some laissez-faire of fate were he only not to interfere. Was this the future he had envisioned for himself? This farm was both a boon and a curse, then. The boon was the curse. But the dignity of having that option should not be denied him. He should be given it if only to reject it, if that was what he chose, a small matter of human dignity and a symbol of gratitude. Human dignity among the eternal and ubiquitous odor of cow shit and fermenting corn silage. If he were given his right share this would be his living, his life, and how long could he last at that. With this girl could he do it? Even with her here now he viewed the world differently, even this death. The town was changed for the presence of her spirit and this change beat in his blood. He tried to envision her as a dairyfarmer’s wife and could not. He tried to picture her living out her life in this town and could not. These unwelcome revelations crossed him like shadows as she leaned beside him on the gravestone. He saw Blair sitting him down at the kitchen table after milking and feeding were done, telling him, Son, you’ve worked hard for this farm. Here you go. He placed Rebekah in this future and it was a dream. He blinked his stinging eyes, his mind full of the vision, and Rebekah turned him away from the departing group. With an arm around his waist she walked with him toward the back edge of the cemetery where the wild yellow grass grew.
Heber wore a red and black checked flannel jacket over his broad shoulders and huddled himself down to ward off the cold of the night. When any one of them shifted, the dead brown grass crackled and rasped beneath them. Heber let fall an unopened pack of cigarettes on his palm and the steady tap was a drumbeat as they sat under the trees at the park and looked out at the leveled field adjoining. Heber and Seth smoked and held bottles in their laps and were enjoying themselves and being redblooded and vulgar. They were comfortable.
—Good beer, Seth? said Heber.
—Good beer.
—You wouldn’t know good beer if it bit you on the ass.
—This is good beer.
—What makes it good?
—It’s just good beer, Rafuse. I know good beer.
—You’re a few years shy of twenty-one and you know good beer.
—Am I drinking a beer right now Heber? Do I got a beer in my goddamn hand?
—Better than what you usually have in your hand, said Heber. And don’t forget where you got it. And don’t drink it so damn fast. Enjoy it.
—I’ll drink it as damn fast as I feel like it, said Seth.
—In this town a boy picks up his habits of vice and mayhem early, said Heber, like embracing new friends decreed by fate. But you, Seth, you’ve collected them late and desperately. You defy the relaxing manner these habits naturally inspire. If you’re not meant to be together you’ll couple by force, won’t you. These vices are supposed to bring a measure of peace, but you haven’t found it. You’ve done it wrong. You’ve gone from one frenzied consciousness to another. Traded each for each. Poor fella.
—Piss up a rope, said Seth.
—And now I hear you’re riding bulls. And your mother will feel new ulcers bloom in her stomach as she drops more often to her knees in what must be as fervent prayer as there ever was.
—You want her prayers, you can have um, said Seth.
—There is no peace, saith the Lord, unto the wicked, said Heber. What of the wicked then? Are they not at peace? Do they not peacefully enjoy their lives? We do. Compare us.
—Just let me enjoy my smoke, said Seth.
Heber looked at him for a moment, then at Jack.
—Here’s to the late and dear Adelaide Selvedge, he said, holding up his bottle. Here’s to her, John.
Jack raised his Pepsi and they all touched bottles.
—She was a fine lady, said Heber. That we’d all be lucky enough to find someone like her.
—You didn’t hardly know her, said Seth.
—I knew her enough to say we’d all do well to find someone like her. A bit younger maybe.
—You’d take it from her corpse on the right weekend.
—Hey now, that’s off limits. Tell him that’s off limits, John.
—Where’s Geneva? said Seth. I ain’t seen her in a while.
—Welcome to the present hour, Seth. Where the hell have you been? I quit with her before summer.
—Hm. I liked her.
—So did I.
—Did she leave yuh?
—It was mutual.
—So she left yuh.
—I said it was mutual.
—She left him, he said to Jack. No shit. She still in Salt Lake?
—Finishing law school. She’ll be done in the spring.
—Maybe I’ll go look her up. Marry me a lawyer.
—You want my sloppy seconds?
—That’s what you get with most girls, said Seth. Or fifths and sevenths and so on. Can’t be too choosy. If she’s a lawyer, that’ll do.
—Will it?
—She was all right. I thought she could be pretty sexy once in a while.
—Once in a while, he says. Ignoramus.
—Why’d she end it?
—She wanted what I couldn’t provide, said Heber. She wanted to get married and get back to the church, after we were through sinning. Wanted me to move to the city too. Can’t practice law in Juniper Scrag, can you.
—What’s wrong with moving to the city?
—Nothing. I can’t go back to church.
—You
