Above the Waterfall by Ron Rash Page A

give you a pretty view in four directions,” Billysaid, his gaze sweeping the mountains now, “but like I said, counting labor, it’ll be around twenty-five thousand.”
    â€œThat’s fine,” I answered. “I need to go ahead and pay you, for everything. A hundred and twenty-five thousand total, right?”
    â€œThat’s right, but pay half now and half when it’s finished. I want you to be certain you’re satisfied.”
    â€œAll right. I’ll get half to you by Monday. It’ll be cash.”
    â€œI’m not averse to real money,” Billy said, smiling as he cranked the engine. “If something’s not the way you want it, let me know.”
    After Billy left, I checked out the foundation. Everything looked plumb, no cracks or bulges, the end and bed joints precisely measured. No drink bottles or food wrappers left behind either, another sign that Billy’s crew took pride in their work. I turned and looked at the view I’d have from the front porch. In winter, I’d see a couple of second homes on the ridge, but for now it was green trees and blue mountains and silence.
    It was a scene I’d once enjoyed viewing with a brush in my hand and a blank canvas. After a day dealing with the usual messes, it was nice to set an easel outdoors and look at the mountains, then try to re-create them, mixing colors to get the right shade of a leaf or boulder, or capture the way a tree limb reached crookedly toward the sky. The pleasure of that quietness, because even if people saw me ina yard or field they’d leave me be. Plus the pride anybody gets from doing something well, as the county art show ribbons attested, though sometimes, less proudly, an excuse to get away from Sarah. Which was ironic, because, like a lot of things, I’d not enjoyed painting much after she was gone, and so quit.
    I walked back to the car but didn’t get in. I leaned against the hood and looked at the mountains. A breeze stirred as the sun began to sink below them. Soon the leaves on the hardwoods would turn. Like the mountains are huddled under a big crazy quilt . That was what my grandmother used to say when it happened. Crazy quilt. It was an expression you rarely heard these days, same as “Proud to know you,” or “It’s a gracious plenty.” I thought about Gerald, who understood those words but, in a deeper way, couldn’t understand a NO TRESPASSING sign, because it belonged to a world he didn’t know.
    I had been bad to sleepwalk as a kid. There were times, for some reason always in the summer, I’d make my way out of the house and end up in the yard. Folks back then, or at least country folks, didn’t see the need for a porch bulb burning all night. I’d open my eyes and there’d be nothing but darkness, like the world had slipped its leash and run away, taking everything with it except me. Then I’d hear a whip-poor-will or a jar fly, or feel the dew dampening my feet, or I’d look up and find the starstacked to the sky where they always were, only the moon roaming.
    I turned onto the main road and drove back toward town, all the while remembering what it had felt like when the world you knew had up and vanished, and you needed to find something to bring that world back, and you weren’t sure that you could.

Seventeen
    We were at Laurel Fork, not just Sarah and me but with three children, who soon left the water to get warm. Sarah joined them. They lay sprawled on the big boulder while I stood above the waterfall. Can you touch the bottom? Sarah asked me. I dove and when I surfaced Sarah and the children were gone. Only damp shadows remained.
    Then the phone was ringing. I looked over at the clock and saw it was 8:20.
    â€œHarold Tucker just called,” Ruby said. “He said you need to get out to the resort right now. You, not a deputy. I sent Jarvis but Mr. Tucker was adamant that you come