BACKYARD
JOE BAUMANN
I You walk into the backyard and they’re everywhere. God damn round little spheres, green like tennis balls but without the fuzz or pleasant bouncing sound when they connect with a hard surface. In your right hand you hold the plastic handle of a purple basket, slender, whose hard mesh side scrapes against your bare leg, stinging your hairless calf with each step. Staring down the hill, your mouth falls open. The entire sloping yard is pockmarked with baby-fist sized walnuts. When full, you’ll have to set the basket down and wait for your father to get home from work and have him bring it inside, because you’re not strong enough yet to drag forty pounds. He will deposit it in the garage, waiting for—you’re not sure what; your father doesn’t tell you these things. Eventually the walnuts will overtake the corners, crates and boxes leaning atop one another, sagging as their contents decays, the rotting smell of dying matter permeating the garage. * * * You do not hear the growl of your father’s lawnmower. Moments earlier, its howl shot through the line of windows along the living room wall, interrupting the sound of cartoons on the television, then dissipated as he drove along the side of the house. The noise roared up again just outside the open
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