These Days

Tye grimaced slightly but swung the axe back, turning his hip with it, and drove the sharp blade forward and into the tree edge again. A few more sweat-inducing strokes and the wedge was wide and deep enough for him to set aside the axe and send out a holler that brought a fellow woodsman to take up one side of the two-man saw and drive back and forth across the massive trunk of the tree.

The going was slow and bits of flying wood chips stuck to his dirty, sweaty skin, making him itch all over. Tye ignored it as best he could and continued to work at the saw until a cracking sound had them quickly drawing the blade out and stepping back as the tree finally collapsed to the southeast where it wouldn’t damage any men or equipment. The man who helped him grasped his forearm quickly with a word of congratulations. Tye mimicked him before moving to prepare the tree for transportation.

Small limbs and branches were hacked away and piled separately. That work took him another hour or so. Then thick straps were banded around the tree at several points so that the crane could easily be attached to lift the massive wood to the truck.

Their team had cleared nearly a quarter of their allotted forest that day alone. The ground was studded with thick tree trunks and piles of waiting branched. The whir of chainsaws just barely eked through his yellow, foam ear plugs that closed him to the world around him. The hard, clear, plastic goggles gave the world an odd still-motion affect and made him feel distant from his work.

A shrill wistle arced over the forest, penetrating even his earplugs clearly, and all the men turned and moved slowly back to their trucks. Hard hats, goggles, earpugs, gloves, and jackets were tossed carelessly into backseats or truck beds as they began laughing and joking, glad to find the end of another work day.

Tye waited until he was safely ensconced in his dirty, used, Ford truck before dropping the sweaty and dirt-caked gloved next to him, followed by the irritating goggles and yellow foam earplugs. His hard had, slipped off his head easily but he left the thick leather and plaid jacket on since his drive was not very long.

Rough and unkempt roads led back to the their company's central building. He arrived before the rest of his team and parked quickly before going inside. The structure was a simple with locker rooms off to the right and offices to the left. The pretty secretary greeted him as he entered and Tye responded with a nod. Despite his less than friendly responses she was perpetually nice to him and he appreciated it.

For her birthday the week before he had left a gift box of expensive toiletries and makeup that he had a friend send him from Baltimore. The note only addressed it to her with a “Happy Birthday” but the following day she had been wearing some of the perfume and game him a soft smile after her usual greeting. Tye simply returned his per functionary nod.

Now he moved quickly, hoping to avoid as many of the workers as possible, as he trudged into the locker room. His jacket and dirty work clothes were quickly shoved off of him, the jacket went to his locker, replacing the t-shirt and jeans, while his work cloths went into a large mesh bag. Street clothes, towel, and toiletries bag in hand he moved into the showers. The clothes and towel he left on the bench before stepping under a hot spray in one of the stalls. Rich lemon and honey soap lathered up thick to lift and remove the grimy layers from his skin while sharp peppermint shampoo soaked through his hair.

The sounds of his works, mostly men but few women as well, coming in laughing and talking, began just as he was drawing the form-fitted tee over his head. One of the women commented on the heavy smells left by his soaps but Tye ignored it and grabbed up his things before slipping out the side entrance.

Dressed casually it was clear that despite the year of hard labor with the lumber company, Tye wasn’t putting on any weight, either in muscle or fat. If anything he was thinner than before but far more muscled. His stomach was a flat six-pack with his arms and back showed the definition of straight, working-man, muscle. He wasn’t corded and would never be mistaken for a body builder. But the past year had changed him, and probably for the better.

The winding dirt and gravel roads gave way to hard pavement leading into town. It was hill community, set up largely because of the mining and lumber businesses that came to occupy the area. Families moved with their husbands or wives were transferred and slowly other’s came until the community held a small WalMart, a grocerie, three gas stations, two dollar stores, and several smaller shops that were privately owned and carried anything from antiques to lingerie to car parts to gardening supplies. Some stores came and went, a bed and breakfast tried to set up but it failed because nobody wanted to stay in such a small town with very little scenery. All in all it was the prefect remote village.

Tye stopped briefly at one of the private grocers for a few straggling supplies before driving past where most of the houses and civilization lay to his large two bedroom house. It had previously belonged to a reclusive retiree who had been forced to move closer to a big city because of health problems. But it was just a few years old, custom built and hand-designed. And since it had come furnished, Tye didn’t have to worry about fixing it up.

Inside, he dropped his dirty clothes off in the laundry room before moving to the office he had made out of the spare bedroom. A bed was still in there and often as not he would make use of it when exhaustion struck him hard. But there was also a large desk, his designing computer, the internet hookup, and several books and papers relevant to his second job.

A handy coffee pot allowed him to boil some of the dark liquid right at his desk while he booted up the computer and began flipping through a folder left out the night before. The coffee finished at the same time the computer finished opening all of his files.

He poured a cup and capped it with cream and sugar while glancing back over the open files. A few sips and some perusing later he was clicking and dragging his cursor across the screen. Colors and figures danced behind his eyes as the design took form in front of him.

Another cup of coffee was made and drank as he layered colors and texts creating seven separate styles of the same design before finally setting all seven forms to print twice and stumbling out of the room. It was three or four in the morning, the LED lights in the clock were too fuzzy to read with his sleep deprived brain. The world tilted and swirled as he stumbled across the hall to his bedroom where he could hopefully fall asleep.

But even with exhaustion teasing behind his eyes and the soreness creeping through his bones slivers of memory and worries drifted through his head so that it was another full hour before he fell asleep.

There were few things he had kept from his city life. One of them had been his job. It would have been easier to leave it to, but graphic design was one of the few things he truly enjoyed, and had always enjoyed. So his boss agreed to send him commissions via e-mail and accepting the final product by both snail-mail and e-mail. In the year since he moved Tye had begun to build a highly respectable name for himself in the advertising world. Enough so that some commissions came for him specifically. Tye noticed only that the commissions came more frequently, sometimes two at a time, and he was making enough off of them that an abundant surplus was gathering in his bank account. Advertisement was one of the few strings he was unwilling to cut from the life he had disliked so much.

*****

Smiths grinned at the slobering beast in the seat next to him. After nearly four years away he was finally looking back on the town that had given him a home for so much of his childhood. The dog barked loud enough to deafen his right side as though sensing his master’s exciting. Smiths scrubbed a hand over the mutt’s head as he pulled his big, clunky SUV outside the only local hotel.

He stepped out of the vehicle, thick jeans clinging to his legs until they tucked into monstrous leather boots. His shirt was loosened and hung open over his wife-beater since his air-conditioner broke in the car. A pat to his big thigh brought the dog lopping out of seat and down to the gravel parking lot. Smiths drug a heavy sea-bag from the floor and slung it over his shoulder before locking up the ugly car and trudging inside. An old man sat behind the counter looking through a series of old registers. The bell jingled, announcing his entrance, but the man didn’t look up before yelling, “We’re closed. Check in begins at eleven!”

Smiths smiled and cleared his throat a bit so that the man looked up, “I was hoping you’d make an exception for an old boarder.”

Smiths laughed a bit at the open mouth and bulging eyes of the old man, “Smitherson, Smitherson! What are you doing here? Get over here boy, get back here. Gone for so long and can’t even greet you’re pops properly.”

“Hey, Pop. I missed you.” Smiths strode around the counter and gave the man a strong embrace. Trapped in his strong, massive arms the old man seemed even frailer but his returning hug was just as fierce.

“Bah, you never miss me! Hardly a letter in four years.”

“Please, I’m surprised you’re mailbox didn’t fall off with all the letter’s I must have written.”

“Ah, you know your mother. I hardly see what we get, she just tells me about in bed.”

“Hm, did you finally discover Viagra, old man?”

Smiths laughed a bit but his pops gave him a hard smack on the chest, “Now you, getting smart and you’ve hardly been home. Don’t talk about your mother like that. Ah, now its early but if I know you you’ve been driving all night, eh? I’ll set you up in a guest room tonight and have Maggie air out your old room.”

“Haha, I’ll take that guest room but don’t bother Maggie about my room. Hopefully I can get myself on my feet and in a place of my own. I won’t keep mooching off you. Isn’t that why I left?”

“I thought you left ‘cause the smell of wood and land made you sick.” The old man gave him a wink and grabbed a key before leading him up the winding stairs.

“Now, Pops, it didn’t make me sick. But once I hit the sea I realized how much the woods really smelled like home.”

“I should hope it does. You remember those rumors about you being the child of a wood sprite? Still go around, only now they’re closer to legend than rumor.”

“You really shouldn’t put such frivolous ideas into youngins heads.”

“Bah, does em good to have a bit of scare. Here ya go, I’ll leave you the key and just make sure the mutt doesn’t eat anything…or anyone.”

“Aw, he’s a good pup. I’ll watch him close. Promise.”

Smiths bent down and kissed the wrinkled cheek fondly, “Night, Pops. I’ll see you in a few.”

“Yeah yeah, Mag will be pleased you’re finally home again. For however long that is.”

Smiths nodded and watched as the old man tottered back down the hall. Dropping his duffle on the floor he happily collapsed on the mattress. The big black and brown mutt leaped up beside him and settled across his back, providing him with ample heat.

He really was happy to be home and more than pleased to be away from the short flings of a seaman’s life. He didn’t know how long he could or would settle in such a small remote town but he hoped he wouldn’t need to move any time soon. He hadn’t had a steady home since he left and the wandering lifestyle had worn out his restless spirit. Maybe he was getting a bit old before his time, but it didn’t really bother him all that much. In a town this size, there wasn’t likely anything to get him excited again anyway.