The Caretaker of Lorne Field

He was pushing the wheelbarrow away from the cabin and onto the path to Lorne Field when he saw flashing lights approach the house. He checked his watch and saw it was a couple of minutes to midnight. The idea of Dan Wolcott checking his garage and house to make sure he wasn’t there infuriated him, but he was too damn tired to do anything but trudge forward.

When he was two miles away from the cabin he remembered that he had forgotten the aspirin again. He thought about turning back, but decided if he did he’d never make it back to Lorne Field by morning.

Jack Durkin tried setting up some bedding on the floor of the shed, but couldn’t stand the cramped quarters. Boards from the wood floor dug into his back and it was unbearably hot and stuffy. After a while, he realized there was no reason he couldn’t camp outside instead. It wasn’t raining, and no bugs or critters came within a half mile of Lorne Field. He pulled the blankets and sheets and pillow outside and set up behind the shed so he wouldn’t have to see the field. It was completely still out there. No crickets chirping, no insects buzzing, absolutely nothing but a dead quiet, interrupted only occasionally by the groans that accompanied his restless movements. He wished to hell he had remembered the aspirin. He also prayed his ankle was only sprained and not broken. As it was he left his work boot on his injured foot. He knew if he took it off he’d never get it back over the ankle in the morning.

Earlier he had organized the food he brought, and if he was careful he would have enough for three weeks. First frost was four weeks away. Maybe it would come early. Whatever happened, he wanted to be prepared to last the season in case things dragged out with Hank’s litigating.

Once he was camped outside, he could only sleep fitfully for a few minutes at a time before either the hard ground or his ankle woke him. At one point he got up and loosened the ground with the spade. It didn’t help. Within minutes of tossing and turning, his weight packed the ground hard again. He’d have to stop by the Army Surplus store the next day and see if Jerry Hallwell could loan him an air mattress.

After a few hours he couldn’t take the hard ground and his throbbing ankle any longer and slowly rolled onto his knees. Using the shed for support, he pulled himself to his feet. He tottered for a moment, and grimaced as he tested his ankle.

The sun was hours from appearing in the sky. It wasn’t quite dark, wasn’t quite light either. More of a murky gray-ness. Looking through it was like looking through a fog. Jack Durkin squinted at his watch and saw it was only four twenty-nine. He hobbled past the shed and looked over the field. It was completely dead, and it would probably be another couple of hours before the first wave of Aukowies pushed their way through the dirt. He stood transfixed by the emptiness of the place and the eerie stillness of it. After a few minutes, he turned away from the field and made his way into the shed. He opened a can of baked beans and ate it cold for breakfast. Then he waited until the Aukowies appeared.

The day of weeding was the hardest he ever had to endure, even harder than the two weeks when he had pneumonia. Maybe it was because of his injured ankle, but he felt feverish and all day alternated between sweating profusely and shivering in the eighty-five-degree heat. He was only able to complete two passes of weeding with each one taking over seven hours. The Aukowies sensed that he was injured. He could see their indecision as they were torn between playing possum or acting more boldly, but they chose to keep playing possum.

He couldn’t carry the canvas sack on his back. Once the weight of the Aukowie remains reached twenty pounds, the canvas sack would collapse him to his knees. He ended up having to cart it around in the wheelbarrow.

He had started weeding early-as soon as the first wave of Aukowies broke through the field-but it was still after sundown before he finished the second pass. He looked over the field and saw small Aukowies covering the first half of it. He decided to let them wait, that he’d start early the next morning and get to them then. After he burned the pile of Aukowie remains and buried their ashes, he ate a can of sardines and wearily mounted Lester’s mountain bike and headed towards town in the hopes of obtaining an air mattress from Jerry Hallwell’s store.