The Newcomer

“You keep this place real nice, Rawley,” Cooper said. “It must have made your dad real proud to leave it to you.”

“Like I said, it’s just us. Buried my mother some thirty-eight years ago. The Red Cross brought me home from Vietnam. Since I was an only son.”

“And then you went back?”

“Yeah. But that was okay at the time. I knew how to act over there. I wasn’t real sure over here. Times were different. Soldiers weren’t heroes back in those days. It was hard times here.”

“I’m glad you told me this, Rawley,” Cooper said.

“Why?”

“It’s not easy to work side by side with a man you don’t know anything about,” Cooper said. “I realize sometimes a man’s private.”

“I ain’t all that private,” he said. “Sometimes you get to know a person and you’re sorry.”

Cooper laughed. “I guess that’s true, too.” He drained his cup and stood up. “You order a box for your old man yet?”

“Yup,” Rawley said, standing.

“No funeral, huh?”

“A graveside prayer. A prayer for soldiers, that’s all he wanted. He was real specific. He was in the Army, too. But I think he ordered it up more for me. He was that kind of man.”

“Where is the service?” Cooper asked.

“Why?”

“I thought I’d come.”

“Why?”

“You’re my friend.” Cooper remembered the day Rawley handed him the envelope with Ben’s will and a key without a word and then just high-tailed it out of there. “In fact, one of my first friends since I’ve been here, even if you did leave me to deal with that shithole of a befouled bait shop alone.”

And at that, Rawley grinned. He had a good pair of dentures. “Stank up real bad, didn’t she?”

“Real bad,” Cooper agreed. “But that’s rotten septic over the dam. Now, I’d like to take care of that casket for you, Rawley. I think if Ben were alive, he’d want to do that.”

“Charity don’t sit well with me,” he said.

“Sure it does. You took all Ben’s old clothes and stuff to the VA. The washers and dryers, dishes, glassware and flatware went to some church group you knew about. You could’ve kept it and had a garage sale, but you didn’t. I have no doubt you’d give the shirt off your back if someone needed it. Now take the sign out of your truck, tell me what funeral parlor is taking care of the box, what time to be at the cemetery and where. Let’s not argue. I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t want to.”

So Rawley told him where to be at 10:00 a.m. on Thursday.

“You have a suit?” Cooper asked.

“I don’t need a suit. My dad might not even recognize me in a suit.”

Cooper laughed. “My brother-in-law is some big-shot executive, but he got fat. My sister sent me a few of his suits. I’ll be here at eight on Thursday morning with one of my hand-me-down suits that I never wear, anyway. If you don’t drown in it, it’s yours. With any luck, you’ll wear it exactly once. Unless you get married or something.”

“Coop,” he said, using a name on him for maybe the first time. “Ben was right about you. You’re a kick in the ass.”

“Yeah, that’s me. Flattery will get you nowhere.”

* * *

Rawley filled out the suit pretty well. There was more to him than met the eye. In his old worn-out jeans and shirts, with his thin hair and drawn face, he looked scrawny, like a skinny old guy, but in fact he was sixty-three, long-legged and had some strong arms on him. Cooper should’ve guessed; Rawley worked pretty hard at the bar, especially buying and delivering large boxes of supplies. And now that he thought about it, there had been no wheelchair lift in their house. Rawley had probably been carrying his father to bed. If he had a run-down look about him it probably had more to do with living an unstable life for forty years or so.

He had shaved, something Rawley didn’t do every day. His hair was slicked back, his nails clipped, his best shoes cleaned and polished. And he was very somber.

“I’ll drive,” Cooper said. “This is a tough day for you.”

“He’s resting now. The last few years were hard on the old man.”

“I’m sure. At least he had his son with him.”

“You ever had a son, Cooper?” Rawley asked.

Cooper shook his head. “No son, no wife. We’re a lot alike, Rawley. Couple of guys just moving where the wind blows us. Drifters.”

“Maybe that’s set to change,” Rawley said.

“Let’s get to the cemetery and say a last goodbye.”

There was no more talking until Cooper had driven them almost to the cemetery gates. Then Rawley said, “He was a real good father when I was a kid. When I was growing up. He was a better father than I was a son.”

After a moment of respectful silence Cooper said, “I think maybe a lot of us feel that way about our dads, Rawley.”

The cemetery appeared to be crowded for a Thursday morning—plenty of cars parked along the winding roadway. And then Cooper saw the Sheriff’s Department SUV and Gina’s old Jeep. And there sat the van from Carrie’s Deli. But Rawley was the one to speak first.

“What the hell,” he said. “What did you do, Coop?”

Cooper shook his head and looked for a place to park. “I didn’t say anything. I only told Sarah and Mac, that’s all. And I only told them so they’d know why I wasn’t going to be around this morning.”

“Well, Jesus,” Rawley said. “Lookit those people. Must be twenty or thirty of ’em. They didn’t know my dad.”

Cooper pulled along the side of the road and killed the engine. “They’re here for you, Rawley.”

“They don’t know me, neither.”

“Sure they do, Rawley. Maybe you don’t chew the fat a lot, but most of those folks see you all the time. You’re one of them. By the way, was there anyone you talked to regularly?”

Rawley shrugged and made to get out of the big truck. “Ben. Just Ben. Till you came around. Am I gonna have to make conversation with all of them now?”

“I don’t think they expect that,” Cooper said with a laugh. “If the spirit moves you, you might thank them for the effort.” They walked toward the casket. “It must be a comfort to know Ben will be holding the door open for your dad.”

The casket was covered with an elaborate spray of white flowers.

“I didn’t buy no flowers,” Rawley said.