“You really coming to work with me today?” Gus asks that afternoon, after we drop Weird Harold and Irma Jean off at their houses.
“Absolutely,” I say as we wave Irma Jean good-bye, and she scurries up her front steps. “Don’t want you taking something to McGunn’s that we could be using for our house.”
It’s far warmer today than it really should be for September. But that’s Missouri for you. People around here are always saying, “If you don’t like the weather in Missouri, just wait five minutes and it’ll change.” Once, when I was still going to school at Montgomery, the morning bell rang at the start of a sunny, early spring day. Soon after, the skies clouded up, and it rained so much that we couldn’t go out for morning recess. By lunch, afternoon snowflakes were bouncing off our windows. We gobbled down our sandwiches and ran to the playground for a snowball fight. By the time we went home, the snow had melted, and the sun was back out.
I swear it’s true. I’ve got yearbook pictures to prove it.
Old Glory rumbles and jiggles toward Gus’s scheduled pickup.
“Hey there, Gus,” a man calls out from his front yard. He’s wearing jeans and a white short-sleeved shirt that’s unbuttoned to show off his undershirt. Kind of old-fashioned for men to wear undershirts like that. The only other one I know who likes them is Gus.
“Hey, Burton,” Gus says, waving as he steps from the truck.
A big SOLD sign is stuck into the middle of his yard, next to a pot filled with flowers that have sharp petals, like daisies, but in the same colors as autumn leaves. Mums, I think they’re called.
“Really thought I’d have more for you,” Burton apologizes. He shuffles his feet, tucks his chin down toward his chest, almost as though to hide his embarrassment as he points at the cardboard boxes piled at the curb. “Don’t know that you can get much of anything at McGunn’s for this.”
I stand over Gus as he squats and riffles through the cardboard boxes. They’re full of toasters and lamp parts and hair curlers and coffeepots and irons.
“Just a bunch of stuff I swore I’d fix someday,” Burton admits. “Stuff we plugged into the socket one morning, only to wind up getting showered with sparks and snaps.”
Gus nods, understanding.
“Got one more box in the house,” Burton says. “If you even want it.”
“Sure, sure,” Gus says, because he’s a sweet guy. He’d never in a million years tell someone that their junk is too junky, even for a trash hauler.
As Burton disappears back into his house, I smile at Gus. “Look,” I say, riffling through the box. “This toaster still gleams, even if it can’t toast a piece of bread anymore.”
Gus whistles as he slides the toaster from the box and holds it to the sun. “Sure does, Little Sister,” he agrees. “Almost need a pair of sunglasses to look at it.”
He frowns as he thinks. “There’s only so much you can do with an old thing like this,” he admits. “It’s not like we can cut it up like the stained glass—”
Suddenly, Gus stops talking. He flashes a smile so wide and full, it swallows the rest of him right up. “Can’t cut it up,” Gus chuckles through that Cheshire cat grin, “unless you’ve got the tools to cut it with.”
“Like, say, an old welding torch lying around in a shed?” Now I’ve got my own Cheshire grin.
Burton and his white undershirt appear again, along with the last of his promised boxes.
“You sure you want this, Gus?” Burton asks, still embarrassed.
“You bet we do,” Gus says, taking the box out of Burton’s arms with such care, you’d think it was filled with about fifty eggs.
“And if you find anything else in there, anything at all, even so much as a pencil that’s been snapped in two, you give us a call,” I add.
Gus winks at me, his dark eyes shining brighter than the side of the toaster.