Wood Work

Saturday morning.

From his prone position on the couch, Harry reached out for the remote and prepared to pause the race. It was some kind of NASCAR thing.

“Harry!”

He didn’t follow the sport. Wasn’t sure it even was a sport. Still, he liked to watch the cars go round and round, liked the way the engine noise drowned out everything else.

“Harry!”

Most everything else.

It was coming from the backyard. Linda was out there sunning herself. She’d been out there all morning.

“Harry!”

He burned easily and did his best to avoid it.

Getting up, he walked through the dining room, past a cabinet filled with clown figurines, then opened the sliding door that led outside. After struggling with a screen that long ago needed replacement, he popped his head out.

“Yes, dear?”

She was halfway between the house and a dense patch of woods that marked the boundary of their property. Her lawn chair sagged almost to the ground. The two-piece swimsuit she wore was three-years too small. Only a few drops of wine remained in her glass.

“What is it?” he asked.

She didn’t look up. “The trees need to be cut back,” she whined. “They’re blocking the sun.”

He stepped onto the porch. Looking up, he saw the late spring sun had almost reached its zenith. Lowering his head, he looked across their meager strip of yard and saw immediately what she was talking about. The trees were indeed encroaching upon their land.

They only had about thirty feet of backyard to begin with, but the shadows cast from long limbs now covered about a third of it, leaving only a slender strip of sunshine between the trees and the shade of the house. Bushy undergrowth beneath the trees had also migrated, leaving about ten feet less backyard than they had when they moved in.

Even as he watched, he saw the light breeze blow more shoots from the trees onto their lawn. He noticed too that the air was thick with universes of floating pollen and felt a sudden headache coming on.

“See what I mean?” she asked.

He did. But from where he stood, it looked like only four or five of the lowest-hanging limbs from the blend of pine and scrub maple were the culprits. The limbs themselves looked only an inch or two thick, and appeared to be no more than twelve or so feet off the ground. He made his decision.

“I’ll take care of it,” he said, watching the breeze blow more crap from the trees onto his grass. He turned in time to watch her raise her butt from the lounge and begin hop-hop-hopping it back into the sun. Turning around, he went back inside.

* * *

Thursday evening.

“I’m going to my mother’s this weekend,” she announced.

He nodded before taking another bite of microwave pizza, remembering then it was a three-day weekend. The visit would do them both some good.

“Make sure you get to the trees, all right?” she asked.

He nodded again.

* * *

Saturday morning.

The day had dawned gray and cloudy, with the wind blowing more crap from the trees onto their lawn. Down in the basement, he brushed cobwebs from the ladder while remembering it wasn’t even his. The ladder and an old rusty saw were the only two items left in the house from the previous owner.

Stepping onto the porch, he raised his head and marveled for a moment how tall the trees really were. Seventy-five feet. Maybe more. He realized then they would probably outlive him.

That didn’t seem fair, he thought, that trees could live hundreds, sometimes thousands of years, while humans got a measly seventy or eighty. He set that depressing thought aside and went to work.

Carrying the ladder to the lawn, he set it beneath what looked to be the lowest of the offending limbs, estimating he needed to cut about eight feet from each. Climbing, he was relieved to find himself able to plant his feet a few rungs from the top and still be able to grasp the limb in his left hand for balance.

Raising the saw, he dragged it back and forth a few times making an anchor groove before bearing down. His next few strokes brought a brownish liquid from inside the limb. After another few, he was half an inch through and feeling pretty good about himself.

Really should do more work around the house, he thought. Get more involved in things. Maybe even replace that screen door. There was just something noble about a man taking care of his own property, knowing the sweat of your brow was well earned.

Moments later, the yellowish inside of the limb began to appear. When he went to lift his hand from the limb for a better grip, he found it was stuck. Puzzled, he stopped sawing and pulled harder and the hand came away. Looking down, he saw reddish blotches now blooming on his fingers and palm. He felt a tingling sensation that he chalked up to vibrations from the saw.

Running his fingers together, he felt a sticky, glue-like sap and regretted not wearing gloves. Next time, he thought, placing his hand back on the limb and resuming his task.

After only a few more strokes, the tingling in his hand turned into something more like burning. Again summoning more strength than should be needed, he tore the hand away, this time leaving skin behind. He swore silently in pain as beads of salty perspiration fell into his eyes.

Looking down, he saw the flesh of his hand was now red and raw. The harmless welts of only moments before had started to blister and were even now bubbling their way to the surface. A soft whimper escaped his throat. Dropping the saw, he quickly scrambled down the ladder.

Clutching his injured hand to his chest, he ran across the yard and up the porch steps, struggling one-handed with the screen door before hurrying to the kitchen to place his hand beneath the faucet.

Relief from cool water was immediate and merciful. Closing his eyes, he drew in a deep breath. When he felt ready, he opened his eyes and turned the hand palm-up.

The blisters were fully formed now. Three large ones erupted from the surface of his palm. Smaller ones ran the length of each finger. A few had even popped, emitting yellowish goo. He closed his eyes and again let the cold water do its magic.

When the hand felt fully numbed, he turned off the water and headed to the bathroom. The closest thing to balm he could find was a crusty old bottle of Aloe Vera leftover from a long ago sunburn. He poured what was left of it on his hand before walking to the living room and collapsing on the sofa.

When the hand began throbbing again, he lay down and raised it above his head. Thankfully, the throbbing subsided. Only when his mind began to calm did he start to ponder what the hell just happened.

He had no allergies he knew about. Was it even possible to be allergic to trees? He smiled through his pain and dismissed that theory. Maybe he’d simply been gripping the limb tighter than he realized and friction had caused it to blister. He remembered the sap-like substance on his fingers and thought maybe it wasn’t sap at all, but some sort of mold or animal dropping he’d had a bad reaction to.

Anyway, there had to a reasonable explanation. If the hand felt better tomorrow, he’d give it another shot. This time, he’d wear gloves.

* * *

Sunday morning.

A storm had moved in overnight, pelting the house with pounding rain. In his second-floor bedroom, Harry awoke from a fitful sleep to a tap-tap-tapping on his window. In his sleep-dazed state, for one fearful moment, he thought it might be the trees taunting him, wanting to see if he’d come out and play. He put that thought out of his mind, and by the next morning, he didn’t even remember it.

Getting out of bed, he saw the blistering had gone down some. Much of the redness was gone too. After clenching the hand once or twice, he declared himself well on the road to recovery.

Down in the kitchen, he made himself coffee while lamenting the rain. But there was always the holiday tomorrow to finish what he’d started. After pouring himself his first cup, he glanced out the window and froze. The ladder was gone.

He smiled moments later, realizing the wind must have toppled it into the ankle high grass. Still, he should probably retrieve it. Put it beneath the overhang where it would stay dry. Wouldn’t want to slip when the rain lets up. After a second cup and a hot shower, he put on his slicker and ventured out into the drizzle.

Beneath the limb, he saw he’d been right the first time. The ladder was truly gone. It took another moment, but he soon realized the saw was gone too. He stood there a while staring at the lawn, wondering where they might have gone, while thoughts of ladder-stealing thieves crossed his mind.

Looking more closely at the wet grass, he noticed two distinct depressions leading toward the woods. Their distance apart was about the same as the legs of the ladder. Images of ladder-stealing thieves were replaced by those of harmless neighborhood teenage pranksters, and he followed the trail to where it ended, where the lawn met the dense woods.

Looking up, he stared into the woods a moment, contemplating the spiny barbs and pointy sticks of the undergrowth. It occurred to him then that he didn’t even know what lay beyond it. Thinking about it, he knew that a road ran perpendicular to his own, with houses dotting either side. He recalled hearing animal noises through the woods on warm summer nights and assumed somebody back there kept horses. If he kept walking, in all likelihood he’d simply stumble into somebody’s backyard. Anyway, he needed to retrieve his ladder. He’d never hear the end of it if he didn’t. He made his decision.

Holding his arms in out front of him to protect from whipsawing brambles, he took his first steps into the woods.

* * *

The edge was thick with spiky, low hanging limbs. He carefully pushed these aside, doing his best to avoid the pine branches, whose sharp needles reached out for him with every step. He ducked low now and then to avoid the gnarled boughs from larger trees that hung curiously low to the ground. Moving deeper, here and there he saw new growth, six and seven foot saplings struggling to make their way toward the sun.

The ground below was thick with brown leaves and downed limbs and broken sticks. He stepped carefully to avoid twisting an ankle on a leaf-covered animal burrow or a slick patch of moss. Even so, while attempting to avoid the boomerang return of a branch, he slipped and fell one-handed onto the ground, his hand sinking an inch into rotting ooze. Swearing, he got up, wiped the hand on his trousers, and began to rethink what he was doing.

Surely, whoever had pulled this prank would not have carried the ladder very far. They might have carried it far enough to make him work for it, but not so far that it made work for themselves. Where was the fun in that? Unless …

Shivering, he turned quickly to peer through the woods and back at his house. He could still catch a glimpse of white aluminum siding through the trees. Turning again, he glanced this way and that, listening for any sound that might reveal he was being watched, or snickered at, but heard only the sound of the wind and the steady drumbeat of rain landing on the treetop roof far above his head. Sighing, he realized that whatever the joke, it was meant only for him.

Moving again, he stepped carefully over downed branches and wandered deeper into the woods, turning his head this way and that in search of the lost ladder. He even looked up occasionally to see if it might be perched above his head, perhaps hanging from a short limb. But there was nothing.

A few feet more brought him upon what remained of an ancient stone wall marking a long-forgotten property line. Beyond that ran a narrow brook swollen with runoff. After stepping over the wall and leaping over the brook, he paused to gauge just how far he had gone.

Turning, he realized he could no longer see his house and considered a moment if this was as far as he dare go. Turning again, he saw off in the distance, just beyond a high thicket of bushes, was a large tree, and he decided that would be both his destination and his cutoff point. After that, he would declare the ladder lost. As he began the trek toward his goal, he smiled to remember it wasn’t even his ladder.

The woods thickened as he moved deeper. Long limbs devoid of foliage whipped this way and that. His journey slowed while he passed through tall, bush-like trees, with serrated thorns poking from branches that looked like braided wire. He stepped over and through and around these as carefully as one would traverse a minefield, keeping his increasingly bloodied and scraped hands held out in front of him.

Nearer his destination, a branch he had pushed aside came flying back, poking him sharply beneath the eye. He stopped to swear and to rub it, chilled to know that a mere half-inch was the difference between him being able to see out of the eye and a having gelatinous ooze dripping from the hole where it used to be.

Finally ready, he walked deeper into the bramble patch, the shrubby things now almost as tall as himself. While pushing a large one aside, he realized suddenly that something had changed. He stood quiet and listened, understanding after a moment it had stopped raining. As if to remind him of this sudden change, he heard a buzzing by his ear. He raised his hand to shoo it away.

Looking up, he caught glimpses of sky through the faraway treetops, saw low-hanging clouds moving quickly to the east. Between the clouds, patches of blue could be seen now and again. Feeling better about things, he returned to his task, moments later crouching low to make his way through perhaps his greatest obstacle yet, fifteen feet of dense brush with sharp nettles and pointy thorns.

Halfway through, a branch encircled his throat, its thorns pockmarking his skin as he struggled to release himself. But the more he struggled, the more entangled he became. Taking a calming breath, he stopped struggling and somehow managed to release himself from its clutches.

Proceeding more carefully, he went a few more feet and saw an opening near the ground. Bending low, he started making his way through, crawling on his belly with his head to the ground the last few feet.

The hellish shrubbery behind him, he lay there a moment to let his heart slow and catch his breath. When ready, he stood, doing his best to brush off those briars and thorns that had attached themselves to him like parasites. Feeling almost human again, he began walking upright, unmolested, and finally, toward the tree that had been his destination all along.

This part of the woods was considerably brighter than that which he had gone through. Rays of sunlight could be seen glimmering here and there on the bed of soft pine needles below. Reaching the tree, he touched it for a moment with the pride of something hard won. Looking just beyond it, he saw another reason for the increased brightness. He had reached the end of the woods. He stood there a moment staring out at the sun-drenched clearing beyond.

Perhaps six football fields in size, surrounded by woods, lush green grass grew knee tall, up and down gently sloping hillsides. To his right was the sound of running water. Turning toward it, he saw what might have been the continuation of the small brook he had stepped over earlier, but here, it ran stronger, its clear water rushing over smooth rocks and stones as it cut its way through the hillside. At the foot of a sloping hill beyond, it broke off into four separate streams that disappeared into the woods.

He turned his head to stare once more out at the clearing itself, to take in again the thing that dominated this fairy tale landscape.

It was a tree, but like no tree he had ever seen. Raising his head to find the top of it, he recalled Gulliver and his travels, understanding then what it must have been like to have hailed from Lilliput. A colossal thing, it was perhaps three hundred feet tall, with thousands of branches shooting crookedly into the air like bolts of lightning. Lesser limbs grew from those like the coiled snakes of Medusa’s head. Smaller branches of a uniform size numbering in the hundreds of thousands jutted from the trunk, like dowels, or pins used as part of a grueling acupuncture session.

There were no leaves, as such, but a bluish, mossy thatch encrusted the limbs and trunk, making it appear more cactus than tree. Red fruit that from this distance looked the size of soccer balls hung like Christmas ornaments from every limb.

When his mind began to work again, his legs began to shake. He intuited clearly in that moment that this tree was not of this world; indeed, was part of no world he’d ever known. He chanced one last glimpse of this forbidden landscape before turning around to go back to the world he knew by the way he came. But before taking a single step, he froze. Something had caught his eye.

He stood there a while, not wanting to turn around, willing himself not to turn around. But he soon realized he could go nowhere until he satisfied his curiosity. He had already come too far.

Turning once more, he blinked and saw it again, impossibly small against the backdrop of the tree. But there was no mistake. It was his ladder, standing beneath one of the gargantuan limbs, all set up and ready to be used. But by whom? And for what? Shuddering, he concluded he did not want to know and he turned again to make his way back to the woods.

He kept his head down while walking past the lonely pines on the edge, heading toward the now familiar tree he had made his goal. Upon reaching it, he raised his head and saw, curiously, that the impossible thicket he had crawled through to get here seemed denser now, taller than he remembered. He could no longer peer through it or see around it to the woods beyond.

Looking down, he tried to find the hole he’d come through, but that was gone too. Dazed now, he wandered a few steps to his right looking for some kind of egress, before backing up a few steps and turning his head to take in the entirety of the woods on this side of the clearing.

The hedge thicket ran unbroken as far as the eye could see. It made a lazy turn at the far edge before proceeding unremittingly along the other side. He couldn’t see beyond that, but knew instinctively that the thicket now surrounded this clearing as surely as a moat surrounded a medieval keep, and he realized then with a shiver he had been allowed to make his way through. But for what purpose?

Before surrendering his freedom, he walked the length of the thicket, looking for a thin place he could perhaps break through. Finding none, he picked a spot at random to try and bust his way out.

He bloodied his hands trying to pull thorny branches apart, stomped his feet and kicked his legs trying to force open a hole. On one vicious kick, his foot caught on a circular growth. Like the branch that had held his neck, the more he struggled, the tighter it became, eventually ripping his pants below the knee and tearing into his skin.

Tired and sweating, he ceased his struggles and collapsed to the earth. When ready, he began to calmly extricate himself. Five minutes and a little more blood later, he was able to loosen the noose-like thing from his leg. After dropping the now twisted and distended branch to the ground, he watched it slither into the hedge like an alive thing. He almost smiled, because of course it was an alive thing, just like that tree-thing behind him was an alive thing. That impossible tree.

He decided to take a few minutes for himself, to rub his ankle and lower leg trying to get some circulation back. When finished, he wiped his bloody hands on his shirt and stood, taking a few tentative steps on the foot before declaring himself somewhat sound.

The tear caused his pants to flap from the knee down, but there was nothing he could do about it now. When he was ready, when there were no more excuses, he turned back toward the clearing and began taking his first steps into the lush green grass beneath the now brilliant sunshine.

He raised his head while walking, trying to take in the whole of the tree. But even from this distance, the left and rightmost branches were lost to his vision. Halfway there, vertigo set in, and he lowered his head, and after a few more steps, he was able to see what was beyond the clearing to the east.

On the gently rolling hillside below, groves of fruit trees sprouted, too numerous to count, their succulent aromas filling his nostrils. To the right of them were open fields, filled with what appeared to be every flower known to man. And throughout both the trees and the garden, woodland creatures of every stripe frolicked here and there. He was awed to see such beauty. His jaw dropped further when he saw what came just beyond.

On the other side of the clearing, where the left and right side of the thicket came together, soaring taller than even the tree, were the gates to this place. In front of the gate, protecting all of this awesome beauty, shining brighter than the sun, swinging back and forth like Poe’s pendulum, was a flaming scythe.

Raising his arm, he shielded his eyes and squinted to see on the ground before the flame were the shadows of behemoth creatures standing guard; winged things with four heads, all too terrible and beautiful to contemplate. One stared languidly back. Harry closed his eyes, determined to gaze upon them no more, when from across the field, from one of the shadows, he heard a child’s impish laughter.

When he was ready, he opened his eyes and decided to focus on the only normal thing in his field of vision, his ladder. Moving closer, he saw the thing on top and wasn’t surprised. Nearer still, he began to understand his purpose in this place, because upon closer inspection — if indeed fifty yards could be deemed closer — a blight had overtaken this tree. The ends of its branches were blackened and cracked. Much of its fruit was rotting on the vine, spilling its precious marrow on the ground. He wandered the last hundred feet or so ankle deep in the once blessed, now rancid and fetid fruit of the tree. But no matter. Help had arrived.

The temperature in the clearing was far warmer than in the damp and dark wood, so he removed his jacket and walked with it slung over his shoulder as he approached the tree. He lay the jacket beneath the ladder before rolling up his sleeves. His now filthy and bloody shirt was soggy with sweat. He smiled to remember there was something noble about a man knowing the sweat of your brow was well earned.

He arrived at the ladder and took his first steps up. Reaching out, he touched the tree and was unsurprised to find it warm, even here, nearest the ground, in deepest shade. His best guess was ninety-eight point six degrees. The tentative touch also revealed the tree had a slow yet steady pulse. He wondered for a moment from where within it emanated. Maybe, he thought, lifting himself onto that first limb, it came from deep beneath the ground, or maybe, it emanated from without. It didn’t matter. Perhaps he’d find out one day. He began his climb.

He made good time scurrying to the end of one limb, where the cancer met otherwise healthy tree. The dowel-like branches made traversing the tree easy. Hanging one leg across the limb, he balanced his other on a jutting dowel before raising the saw. The wood of the tree, if that’s what it was, seemed to shrivel with fear or anticipation at the first steely touch. Removing the saw, he stroked the tree gently and whispered calming things, telling it everything would be okay.

When he raised the saw again, the wood seemed firmer, as if consigning itself to what was to come. He gently dragged the saw across the limb a few times and a bluish substance began oozing from the open wound. After a few more strokes, the pinkish yellow inside flesh of the tree began to appear. The bluish liquid flowed more freely.

Laying down his saw, he reached to his torn pants and ripped off the lower denim. After tearing that into narrower strips, he shoved all but one into his back pocket. I might be naked before all’s said and done, he thought, and smiled. That seemed more than appropriate.

He took the length of torn denim and tied it around the limb, stanching the flow of fluid, then patted gently a few times before raising the saw to complete the amputation. The diseased branch broke from the tree with a sigh, falling onto the ground below.

Peering inside the wound, he was pleased to see he’d guessed right. All looked healthy. The limb would recover. Leaving the tourniquet there, he scurried back up the limb to look for his next patient, knowing that daylight was wasting. There was lots of ground to cover before he was finished.

While climbing, he wondered if, once all his work was done, the tree would let him go. Then, he fretted it might get chilly at night. But he soon let that and all other worries go. He had a feeling the temperature in this garden would always be just about right. And the tree itself provided all the warmth he would ever need.

But enough dallying, he thought, beginning his climb to the next branch. There was work to be done.