Tribute

down the road, and thought I’d stop on the way home to let you know we’ll be starting tomorrow if the weather’s clear.”
    “That’s great.”
    “These are my grandsons, Jake and Lester.” He winked at Cilla. “They don’t bite.”
    “Good to know.”
    “Grandpa.” The boy rolled his eyes. “Lester’s my dog.”
    As Cilla crouched to greet the dog, Spock bumped through them to claim Cilla’s hand. It was a clear: Uh-uh, you owe me first.
    Cleaver hailed the trio of men walking toward them. “Tommy, you son of a . . .” Cleaver slid his gaze toward his grandson, smirked. “Gun. Don’t think you can fast-talk this lady into selling. I’ve got the roof.”
    “How you doing, Hank? I’m not buying. Just checking up on my boy here.”
    “Cilla, this is my dad.” Brian, the landscaper, gripped his father’s shoulder. “Tom Morrow.”
    “He’s a slick one, Miz McGowan,” Hank warned her with another wink. “You watch out for him. Before you know it, he’ll talk you into selling this place, then put up a dozen houses.”
    “This acreage? No more than six.” Tom offered a smile and his hand. “Welcome to Virginia.”
    “Thanks. You’re a builder?”
    “I develop land, residential and commercial. You’ve taken on quite a project here. I’ve heard you hired some good people to work on it. Present company excepted,” he said with a grin to Hank.
    “Before these two get going,” Brian interrupted, “I’ve got some sketches on the landscaping I wanted to drop off for you to look at. Do you want a hand with that haul?”
    Cilla shook her head. “I’ve got it. I’m just going through the stuff I brought down from the attic, stowed in the barn. Rainy-day work, I guess.”
    Brian lifted a dented toaster out of the wheelbarrow. “People keep the damnedest things.”
    “I can attest.”
    “We cleaned out the attic when my mother passed,” Hank put in. “Found a whole box of nothing but broken dishes, and another dozen or more full of papers. Receipts from groceries back thirty years, and God knows. But you want to be careful sorting through, Miz McGowan. Mixed all in there we found letters my daddy wrote her when he was in Korea. She had every one of our report cards—there’s six of us kids— right through high school. She never threw a blessed thing out, but there’re important things up there.”
    “I’m going to take my time with it. I’m finding it an interesting mix of both sides of my family so far.”
    “That’s right, this used to be the McGowan farm.” Tom scanned the area. “I remember when your grandmother bought it from old man McGowan, back around 1960. My father had his eye on this land, hoping to develop it. He brooded for a month after Janet Hardy bought it—then he decided she wouldn’t keep it above six months, and he’d snap it up cheap from her. She proved him wrong.
    “It’s a pretty spot,” Tom added, then gave his son a poke. “See that you make it prettier. I’d better get going. Good luck, Miss McGowan. If you need any recommendations on subs, just give me a call.”
    “I appreciate that.”
    “I’d better get on, too.” Hank pulled at the brim of his cap. “Get my grandsons home for supper.”
    “Grandpa.”
    “They’ll talk another twenty minutes,” Brian commented when his father and Hank strolled toward the red pickup. “But I really do have to get going.” He handed Cilla a large manila envelope. “Let me know what you think, what kind of changes you might want.”
    “I will, thanks.”
    After Brian tossed the toaster into the Dumpster, he shot a finger at Ford. “Later, Rembrandt.”
    On a short laugh, Ford waved. “Around and about, Picasso.”
    “Rembrandt?”
    “Short story. Wait. Jesus.” After she’d handed him the envelope and started to push the wheelbarrow up the Dumpster’s ramp, Ford nudged her aside. “Flex your muscles all you want, but not while I’m standing here holding paper and guys are around.”
    He shoved the envelope back at her, then rolled the wheelbarrow up to dump. “Brian and I could both draw, and somehow or other got into a sex-parts-and-positions drawing contest. We got busted passing sketches back and forth in study hall. Earned us both a three-day pass.”
    “Pass to what?”
    He looked down as he dumped. “Suspension. I guess you didn’t go to regular school.”
    “Tutors. How old were you?”
    “About fourteen. I got my ears burned all the way home when my mother picked me