2 of 100 - Sunday Afternoon

Julie looked across the long stretch of lawn as she shook the week’s dusty accumulation from the foyer rug. As the rug snapped and bits of dirt stung her bare legs and arms, she watched Ronnie mow. The riding lawnmower lumbered along as her husband peered over the side, making sure he missed the landscaping blocks that edged the yard.

He was shirtless, and small rivulets of sweat rolled down his chest and back, detouring around his nipples and rolling smoothly over the lines of muscle across his abdomen. Julie noticed, as usual, how he’d kept so muscular and thin over the years. She’d always had to work hard to keep the pounds off, but it seemed effortless for him. Sensing her eyes, he looked up to catch them. He smiled and held up a can of Bud Light, slightly shaking it to indicate its emptiness. She nodded, finished up with the rug, and went inside.

Retrieving a fresh can, she bent into the refrigerator, resting her forehead on her arm, letting the chill settle over her face. The hum of the water filling the automatic ice trays lulled her briefly and she wished just for a moment she could stay there all day. Then she heard the mower catch and stop, and she straightened and shut the door.

Out in the yard, Ronnie was crouched behind the mower, looking where he’d just mown. Walking out across the newly cut grass, she noticed his jaw working back and forth, a trait she’d come to associate with anxiety.

“Hey, what’s up?” she called as she approached his bent figure.

“Don’t come over here, Jules” he called out quietly, stopping her. “I’ve hit a nest of rabbits.”

Julie hadn’t known that wild rabbits had nests for their young until ten years before. She and Ronnie had pulled into a flea market to look for old furniture to refinish, and when they got out of the car, they realized they’d driven the front tire right through one of these nests. Five or six tiny rabbits lay maimed and broken, driven into the ground by the Jeep’s weight. She’d cried and Ronnie had walked her away from the carnage, stroking her head as she leaned into his shoulder and pressing his hand into the small of her back. That evening, she lost their first baby.

Four pregnancies and four miscarriages later, she approached another nest of mangled rabbits. She peered over Ronnie’s shoulder, and he looked up in her face, ready to put his arms around her. There was no need. She looked at the small carcasses and then into Ronnie’s face.

“Clean it up, will you?” she said as she handed him the beer and turned toward the house. “I don’t want the dog getting into that and dragging it around the yard.”