Sounds of the mountain

Chapter one

Her song sounded of mountains, she sang them low and sweet as she prepared the pack horse for the long journey to the ocean. Bathed in the smell of her kitchen Tess told him the story of why she must go, and how she must go right know.

“I have never seen much of this world Jonathan, I have barley even left the county, except that one time I had to get my daddy, your grandpa, from the hospital up in Celina, after he let himself get hit by that logging truck. It wasn’t much of a trip, I had to drive that beat up old wagon and broke down ragged mare all night. Loaded his broken body into the wagon and drove him home. Never saw nothing I couldn’t see from the top of the wagon. Then I had to nurse him back to health I spent the next 10 years watching him drink himself to death, getting meaner and nastier every day. You know your daddy wasn’t much better. Thank god he ran off.” Tess told her son.

“So Jonathan, now that you're all grown up and out a high school. I am going to see what’s out there for me. You can have the house and anything I can’t fit on the horse. You can do with it what ever you please. I hope you sell this place off and move on. Don’t go to work logging, you will never get out. There ain’t nothing here for either one of us.” And with that Tess lead her stallion Shadow and pack horse Spudnut down the long dirt path. Leaving Jonathan to fend for him self.

She felt like a school girl heading out to her first day of college. Wearing the best pair of here fathers worn out work pants. And one of his old wool shirts that she must of darned about a thousand times.

She had no real plans except to head west and north until she hit the Pacific Ocean. She had always dreamed of standing in the cold water with the waves crashing around her. And she was determined to see it before she died. With a renewed vigor and hope in her heart she left.

Jonathan just stood there and watched her go. Wondering if she would comeback. Knowing she never would.

She walked her horses down that dirt path. With each step she was leaving behind all the pain, misery and anguish this place has caused, that her life has given her. Leaving all the blood and mud and unwanted men. She never felt like she had a chance to do anything for herself. Never felt like she made any of her own choices. Her life was one constant fire after another. She was always reacting to bad situations, often putting herself in harms way to keep them from burning Jonathan.

The ones who caused all that pain were mostly dead now, some by her hand some not. When she got to the end of that dirt path and the bottom of the mountain that had been in her family for as long as she could remember. She paused, looked out at the endless swamp and thought about her mother and knew she was in there, some where, dead, broken and decomposed. He never would have let her leave, she never would have dared, he killed her, she knew it. “ Good by Momma” Tess says as she mounted Shadow, turned to the north and road her horses down the valley, singing in that soulful voice, the songs her momma taught her.

Chapter two

Jonathan just sat there, drinking the last warm beer, watching her leave. She always threatened to just up and leave but he never thought she’d do it. He never thought she was strong enough. Hell, how many times had he himself thought about just getting in grandads truck and taking off. Trouble was he never had no place to go. He never new anything but this mountain and the yelling, and the beatings, and the sound of his mama’s crying.

He looked around the yard from the make shift couch, made from the seats of an old logging truck. The one his grandad swore he was going fix up and start hauling lumber for the Natchez logging CO. But he never did. He just kept scraping parts off it, for beer money, until it looked like bones strewn across the yard. Fit right in with all the other rusted and seized machinery of three generations of poverty, failed attempts and drunkerdness.

He contemplated what he could sale to get a little scratch together, until he could figure out what he would do next. There wasn’t much, most everything had already been sold. There was the goat but he couldn’t sell her, doubted he get much for her anyway. There was the pickup truck but he thought he should keep that since Momma took the horses. It was his only way around. Sure didn’t want to be stuck on this mountain forever. That damn truck wasn’t worth much any way, had to push start the darn thing whenever you wanted to go anywhere.

He was stuck. Stuck, right here on this mountain, this mountain that killed every other man in his family. Stuck, alone. He had his crop up in the clearing but that would not be ready to harvest for sometime now. That was about the only thing his daddy ever taught him, was how to grow and how to care for plants until harvest. At best that would only bring him a few thousand dollars he needed something more.

He got up, off the sofa and finished his beer in one last gulp. Chucked it into the yard among all the other trash and broken down machinery, scaring the goat and walked into the house.

The house was respectively clean and tidy and smelled of bread and soup. On the oven there were three loafs of bread and a big pot of stew and a letter from Tess.

Jonathan

This is the last supper I will ever make for you. Do not waste it, eat your fill, freeze the rest, it won’t last you long but if your careful it will get you by for a spell. I was serious about you getting out of here. There ain’t nothing here for you. You stay and you will die a miserable mean man just like your daddy and granddad.

I don’t know what your going do but figure it out before the soup is gone

Hope to see you someday

Tess

“Ah mama, what the hell am I supposed to do.” Jonathan said with anguish

He looked around the house, and even through the clean and tidy appearance the place was poor, rundown, broken. There wasn’t anything in here worth a damn either. Hell, his whole life could fit into a paper bag, which he didn’t have either.

He opened the cupboard under the sink and searched for the corn liquor his mama always hid under there, among the vinegar and bleach and rotten trash. Finding it still half full. He sifted through the ashtray on the kitchen table and found two half smoked camels grabbed those and headed back into the yard. He looked at the sky and figured he had about two more hours before the couch wasn’t in the shade anymore and it would be just to damn hot to sit out there. He sat down and started in on the bottle and thought about just how bad his life had turned out.

“What’s a feller to do “ He said to the goat.