Uncle Martin (F)

Running nearly due east off of Highway 701, the driveway to my uncle’s home stretches for more than a quarter of a mile on crushed oyster shells, and along the ride in, the vineyard spans out left and right as part of the nearly two hundred acres that my uncle planted more than 20 years ago. The Black Spanish vines, or what is left of them, are aggressively contested by a variety of weeds and brush, but most of the posts and the wire are still generally intact.

The house itself, which is in need of a coat of white paint, is a large single-story affair with four chimneys, very much set apart by its deep porch that runs along both sides and across the front. The brick steps—six steps up to the porch—could use some repair, and the handrail on the right side is no longer there. 

I got out of my truck and stretched, having driven up from Jacksonville that late September morning without stopping, and took in a deep breath. The wind was from the east, and I thought I could smell the ocean and figured that somewhere toward the sun, the Inlet ought to be butted up against the Atlantic. 

When I started toward the house, the screen door swung wide and out stepped my Aunt Karen.

“Well, Thomas! Thomas, Thomas, Thomas.”  She waited for me to come up onto the porch, and she leaned up to kiss me on my cheek and then hugged me around my waist.  “You were just a boy, just a boy the last time—when?”

“Maybe 6, maybe 7, at the beach, the last summer we all got together.”

She shook her head. “No, that can’t be. That’s—what—20 years?  More.”

“Yes, I know, but it’s true.” We both smiled. “Not since y’all moved…”

“I’m sorry about your father, Thomas.”

I heard footsteps on the drive, and as I began to turn my head, I saw Aunt Karen’s face lose its softness.  “Look, Martin. Look, he’s here, John’s boy, Thomas.”

My uncle held his hand up to shield his eyes from the sun. “Yes, I can see that.” 

I started down the steps. “Uncle Martin.” 

“Tom.”

As I got nearly to him, he turned and started walking back around the house. 

“Martin—“ Aunt Karen called, but he was already out of sight. He led me back to the area in front of the barn and to his tractor that was backed up toward his brush hog.

“Give a hand with this thing.”

“Okay.”

“You know how this mower works?”

“No.”

He turned his head up at me. “Well then just hold this up right here steady and let me get it hooked up.”

He went about his work, and when the mower was ready to go, he took a dusty Gamecock cap off the tractor seat and pulled it low to his ears and down a bit in front.

“I have work to do.” He stood still for a moment and just looked at me without a flicker of what might pass for any thought or emotion.

“I have pictures.”

“What?”

“Pictures. I have pictures.” I pulled the packet out of my back jeans pocket and took out the dozen photos. “Pictures of my family. Pictures of your family.”

He took them from my outstretched hand and flipped through them. “Yep.” He handed them back.

“Uncle Martin.”  I paused. “You know your brother is dead?  My father.”

“Yep, of course I do. I heard about that. Two days after. Annabeth called me.”

“You talked to Aunt Anna?” Aunt Anna was the baby of my father’s seven siblings, and he and Martin, who was the oldest of the brothers and sisters,  were the only boys.

“No, she talked to your Aunt Karen.” He shifted his weight as if to remind me that he something else to get to.

“Oh.” I paused. “He reminded me right before he died that y’all hadn’t talked for 20 years.”

“Guess that’s done with now. What are you doing here, Tom?”

“I—I just wanted to know. To know what happened.”

“I got to work the pines.”

“Do you still harvest the grapes?”

He looked at me and seemed to shake his head ever so slightly. “Nope.” 

I waited.

“Not anymore. I just cut between the rows sometimes. Some of the locals come and pick what they want. But they’re no good.”

“I’d like to see back in the pines.”

“Nobody goes back there with me.”

I looked around the yard. “I could take the golf cart.”

“Go home, Tom.”

“I’ve got some questions, questions about when you bought this farm.”

“That’s all done now.”

“Did you steal my father’s money?”

He lifted his cap and then resettled it low on his head. He held my stare. “I look like I got money?”

“Uncle—“

“Tell your Aunt Karen I will be in in an hour or two.” He mounted the tractor and looked down at me. “Just go home.”

He fired up the engine and was off toward the rows of tall trees that stretched out far beyond the barn. In less than a minute, driver and his machine were disappearing into the deep shadows of his piney woods. Ladson 2014