Scarecrow

Roy Fogart lay in his bed, staring at the spinning ceiling fan above. He could hear the motor whining in the early morning silence.

“I need to fix that...” he said gruffly, and he looked to his right. There lay his wife of 40 years, Mildred; she was a small woman, frail looking at times, but damn could she scare him. That woman could stare Death in the face, and not blink. He looked over her shoulder at the french doors on the other side of their bedroom; when they had decided to build this house she required five things. French doors, a nice kitchen, a clawfoot bathtub, a fireplace, and a balcony, that was it. Roy had never really understood the balcony, or the french doors, but he would do anything for her. He pushed the covers gently off of him, and slid out of their bed; he scratched his stomach as he opened one of the french doors and walked out onto the balcony. The sun had just barely started to add a little pink to the base of the sky, but it was offset by the clouds and the smell of salt in the air.

“It’s gonna’ be a rainy day… That fence will have to wait.” Roy groaned woefully, he had put off repairs to the front fence posts for weeks, they crackled when you applied any pressure to them. He knew the boards were split and rotten, but he couldn’t change that now, not with rain on the way. “I could fix that ol’ scarecrow…” he mumbled, rubbing the stubble on his cheek, “It’s fallin’ apart for sure…” He walked to the right side of the balcony and looked in the direction of an older pole barn, recently painted red with a cedar colored wood sealer. He took a deep breath, stretched his arms over his head, and heard the first metallic pitter-patter on his tin roof as the rain descended.

Roy walked back into the bedroom in the direction of his dresser, leaving the door open; Milderd loved having the french doors open when it rained. As he opened the drawer and grabbed a pair of worn jeans, he thought of all the things he could accomplish on a rainy day. Fix the scarecrow, fix the ceiling fan, replace a few boards on the balcony, fix the leaky faucet in the downstairs bathroom, the list could go on. However, some of those things would have to wait until his beloved sleeping beauty was no longer sleeping. He grabbed a wood stain covered t-shirt and a pair of dirt stained socks from another drawer, placing them gently on the bed. He got dressed, dissecting his first task of the day into smaller steps; he would have to remove the old scarecrow hide from the hay bundles, grab the new hide from the bin, and stitch the hide together around the hay bundles.

Roy Fogart was always very proud of his hides, having spent the majority of his life perfecting his cape removal, pickling solution, and tanning process. The hides lasted about 5 years at a time before they began splitting around the stitches, or on the face. He would let them stay in the field longer, but Mildred preferred presentable scarecrows in the fields, especially since she peered out over them from the balcony. He walked out of the room, down the stairs, and through the kitchen to the backdoor; once he passed the threshold his pace quickened, he wanted to get out to the barn before the rain soaked him. The barn door opened with a harsh creak, and the smell of hay and straw filled Roy’s nose; he reached to his left, his fingers grazing a small wooden box with a lever on its side. He pulled up on it, making a loud clunking sound, bringing the barn to life just as lightning flashed outside.

“Oh, spooky.” he said, chuckling at nature’s ironic timing. The lights inside the barn illuminated the barn rafters, the hay glistened, and along the stable wall hung a prepared hide, ready to be put into his crow box, finally dry after being rinsed the day before. On the workbench sat the old scarecrow, darkened and dried with his exposure to the elements, “Well Jerry, the wife says you don’t look so pretty anymore.” Roy said, almost condescendingly to the decaying scarecrow. He grabbed a pair of scissors, and cut the stitching around the scarecrow’s neck, hay poking out along the stitch line. “Now, Jerry, I’m sorry about this, but Dave here is going to be taking your spot.” He pointed to the crow box beside the workbench, now open with a new hide ready to be stitched, “You gave us some mighty fine crops though, and I’ll be sure to bury you when I’m done.” He carefully removed the rest of the exterior of the old scarecrow, replacing moldy hay bundles with new ones when necessary. The old hide fell to the floor with an eerie, hollow thump, and Roy grabbed the new hide from the box; he laid it gently over the hay bundles, the first few stretches could cause tears in thin portions of the hide, so he had to be gentle. Especially as he stitched, one wrong tug could spell disaster and denial from his beloved Mildred.

He was securing the final stitch on Dave’s left wrist when Mildred walked through the barn door; she held a glass of lemonade in one hand, and clutched an umbrella in the other. She gently sat the glass on the workbench near him and admired his work.

“What do you think Milly? Isn’t it perfect?” Roy stuck his chest out with pride, he had been playing around with a new stitch pattern, one that was far less noticeable and almost invisible from a farther distance away.

“Yes, Roy, he is a very nice scarecrow. What was his name again?” Mildred said, her voice soft almost as if she were whispering. He turned to her and stood the scarecrow up next to him.

“His name is Dave. Dave, do you remember my wife?” Roy chuckled to himself, and looked at Mildred who was analyzing the scarecrow. He waited for her response to his newest masterpiece, the muscular ones are always harder to skin than the fatter ones. He had almost nicked the hide a few times with his fleshing knife, and getting it to hew to a smaller framed form had been rather tedious.

“Well, I think Dave looks very dashing, Darling.” She gently cupped Roy’s cheek and he smiled, “I have lunch ready, if you are interested.” At the mention of food, almost on command, Roy’s stomach grumbled; they both laughed and began walking to the barn door. Mildred had her slender arm around the tall man’s waist, and his arm was around her shoulders. He looked back at Dave again, his eyes and lips were stitched shut, and his nose sat ever so slightly off center. His chest bulged around the edges of the shirt. Roy had taken in the hide too much, and it meant the scarecrow would need to be replaced sooner than all the others. The fingers on either hand had begun shifting to a deep brown, he would have to choose different tanning solutions for darker skin tones, tones like Dave had. Roy smiled remembering how charismatic Dave had been at dinner that night, he told some outlandish stories. Places he had been and was planning to go. If Roy remembered correctly, Dave ran away from home at seventeen, and had been drifting from city to city ever since. He shrugged a little and looked back toward the barn doors now.

“I’ll put him in the field tomorrow Milly.” Roy said, and reached for the light switch, “I wonder if anyone is hitchhiking today, down Highway 64.”