Great-Granddaddy’s Gun - 1. Great-Granddaddy's Gun

Sitting above the mantel piece, wedged on a couple of rusty nails in the cream stud wall, is a slightly rusty, double barrelled twelve gauge shotgun. The walnut stock has been well loved, oiled and rubbed down, but it’s cracked anyway from some collision or other way back when. The gun looks like history, like something that polished up and clean of rust, would be worth a lot of money. But to me, it’s worth way more than anyone could ever pay, because that’s my great-granddaddy’s gun.

*

The Sears and Roebuck catalogue was a hefty thing, even in black and white. The etched copper plate print of the new twelve bore shotgun was a lovely thing to behold, beautifully detailed, the cursive annotations explaining the movement and recommending ammunition to accompany the gun. It came with a lovely little wooden boxed kit for maintenance and basic cleaning, and though it was expensive, it was a good gun, the kind of thing William Sanderson thought he would be able to pass onto his children, when he got around to having some.

The gun was more lovely in real life when it arrived. The walnut stock glowed, and the glass lamp over the kitchen table glinted and shone from the barrels. William took everything from the wood shaving filled crate, the scent of pine battling with the heady mix of oil and steel, walnut and linseed, and laid the contents out on the oval table. The gun, the many pieces of the cleaning kit, the case, lined with a cloth like velvet, and a pasteboard box of shells. William ran his large hands over the stock, cocking mechanism before realising it again. A cold wet nose poked at his elbow and William’s hand landed on the ruffled reddish-tan head of his bird dog Beans.

“What d’ya think boy?” The dog whined and yipped, sniffing the air and the new scents of the gun and it’s shiny bought-from-a-catalogue case. “Yeah, I think it’s a beut too. You wanna go see if we can get a long beard with it?”

“You’d better not have that gun out on the kitchen table William!” The sound of his mother’s voice drifted to him from where she was working in the back garden, sitting in the sun and peeling peaches into a huge pail to make jam and pudding.

“No Ma!” William shouted, stuffing the shells in his pocket, sliding the cleaning kit and the case onto the floor, the gun onto his knees. “Oops…” He muttered, and Beans barked joyously, time to go a hunting.

*

“Daddy, daddy!”

William scooped up his little boy in big arms and hugged him tight.

“What’s up little man?”

“Mama said you’d tell us a story!” The girl, seven, and therefore much too sensible for hugs, unlike here five year old brother, clung to his leg like a limpet. He hugged her too as best he could.

“Did she now?”

“Yeah!” The children chorused.

“Well which one do you want to hear?” William walked with his children to the kitchen, where his wife had already laid out two glasses of milk and some mid-afternoon snacks in the form of chewy cookies.

“Tell us about the burglar!” The little boy chimed. It was their favourite story, even though it was true, because apparently all the knights and pirates and dragons in the world couldn’t trump the image of your mother with a shotgun.

“Again? Alright then.” He sat in his usual seat and instantly Lil’Bean came yapping to his feet. “Well, this was just before you came along little girl,” William ruffled his daughters hair, “And I was out late and your mama was home alone.”

“And there was a burglar!” His son shouted.

“Yes boy, there was a burglar. Your mama heard him coming in the back door, she was up waiting for me to come home. She came down the stairs and I always used to keep my gun leaning in that corner there by the front door. Mama grabbed the gun and she backed him down and outta that door alright.”

“And she took the safety off!”

“Yes son, she did. But you must never do that unless you’re willing to actually fire the gun, you know that.”

“Yes dad.”

The little girl put her chin in her hands.

“Mama is so cool…”

*

Declan Sanderson turned thirteen on a bright but cold early fall day before the leaves had started falling and the trees in the wood were flame coloured but the grass was still green as spring. His father had told him to run over to see his grandparents, and his grandfather had been standing in the front yard with an old long-rectangular gun box.

“Come on son,” William said, putting his arm around his grandson’s shoulders, “I got a present for you.”

In the big back yard William had arranged a bunch of old paint cans, the contents empty or dried out, on a long wooden work bench. He opened the box and handed the gun to his grandson.

“Granddaddy?” The boy took the half shot box of shells, “But it’s your gun.”

“And now she’s yours,” William showed Declan where to brake the gun and how to load the shells, “Target practice.”

After the first three shots, William knelt on the grass next to his only grandson and put his arms around him, taking the weight of the gun from him. He adjusted the teenager’s hands, showed him where to grip the stock, and settled the butt back into his shoulder.

“A gun’s like a woman son,” He shook the tension from Declan’s shoulder’s. “You’ll learn soon enough that it’s all about how you hold her.”

Declan grinned, sighted up the paint can, and hauled down on the trigger nice and slow, exhaling as he did so.

“It kicks like hell Granddaddy.”

“And looking after her will teach you a whole lot more than just how to hunt. Now put some holes in those damn cans birthday boy. Then you can have a go at the lemon meringue pie your Grandmamma has made you.”

Declan whooped, but just once, before breaking the gun, reloading smoothly and placing the cracked stock to his shoulder. Now he held the gun softly, smoothly then cocked the shotgun and fired. The ding of the shell hitting the can made both the Sanderson men grin.

*

“Who is that?” Jesse-Ray asked me, holding the worn photo rom the gun case in one hand. We had been planning to build a big campfire like the older guys did in the fields and have some fun, but it had started raining around lunch and we’d run home and gotten soaked.

I handed Jesse-Ray a mug of hot chocolate, I’d even found marshmallows.

“That’s dad when he was our age. The man with him is my great-granddaddy. That’s his gun on the wall.”

“Cool. Does it still work?” Jesse-Ray put the photo back where Dad usually wedged it in the case, “It looks broke as an old dog.”

I punched my best friend hard on the shoulder.

“It works just fine. Dad got that long beard on the wall with it last fall. You know I made him a box-call in shop class? He used that to get it.”

“Cool,” Jesse-Ray fished a marshmallow from his mug with a grin, “Reckon your mum’ll let us build a fire in the grate toast the rest of these?”

“I don’t see why not,” I smiled at Jesse-Ray, my best friend. I don’t remember when I met him, and he’s been my best friend forever, but I remember when I noticed him. We were thirteen, and I’d just started to notice Jesse-Ray in the way the older boys talked about girls they thought were cute. And sitting there by the little log fire in the living room grate, toasting marshmallows on sticks from the wood shed, I really wanted to tell Jesse-Ray that I thought he was cute too.

*

“Can’t we go back now Ty?”

“No, I know there’s another one around here somewhere.”

“It’s cold enough to freeze the tits off a statue. C’mon, let’s go back to town and I’ll take you to the IHOP and you can ogle that waiter you like so much.” Jesse-Ray started to press on the gas a little more, the trees whipping by.

“Jes! Slow down, we’ll miss it!” I knuckled his shoulder, keeping my eyes peeled out of the window, watching the headlights and trying to see any sign of the sign that my father swore was out here. “I have to find that damn sign.”

“Why?” Jesse-Ray let up on the gas again and we slowed to a pace where I could be sure I saw it, “Why are we out on the forty-nine when we should be persuading my cousin to buy us beer?”

“Like Danny would buy us beer,” I shook my head, refusing to look back at my best friend, “Dad said he and Billy Joe once shot up a stop sign out here with great-granddaddy’s gun. He won’t pass the gun onto me until I find it.”

“Well hell Ty,” Jes sounds exasperated, “Every stop sign we’ve passed has holes in it. We coulda been eating waffles and bacon hours ago.”

“I have to find the one he shot. You can tell the holes from that gun. Trust me.”

“Another five miles, and then you’re having to buy the pancakes bud.”

“Deal. Just drive will ya?”

It only took another mile and a half.

“There! STOP!” I practically fell out of the truck as Jesse-Ray pulled over onto the verge, running to the beat up stop sign half hidden in the trees. “This is it!”

“Looks like any other damn stop sign from around here Ty. You’d better be sure.”

“Yeah, look.” I jumped up on the concrete siding and used the light on my phone, “See the one right through the centre of the O? That’s the one.”

Jesse-Ray stared at the sign with his head on one side.

“How can you tell?”

I reached up and ran my finger around the smooth side edge of the hole.

“See how it’s not round, kind of pointed in the left side? Great-granddaddy’s gun does that. Not sure why.”

“So,” Jesse-Ray rubs his arms, cold in just a t-shirt, “Does that means we can go to the IHOP now?”

I took a photo of the bullet hole on my phone.

“Anyone might think that you’re the one keen to check out that waiter, bud.” I grinned.

Jes punched me on the arm, hard enough to sting.

“Dude!” He shook his head in despair, “Remind me again why I like you?”

“Because no one else will put up with you. Come on, you’re buying.”

“But I drove!” Jesse-Ray griped, walking back to the truck with his hands stuffed in his pockets, “No fair.”

I didn’t care much, and I knew I’d probably end up paying anyway, in more ways than one if I spent too much time following the hot waiter around with my eyes, because when I showed dad that photo, I was finally going to be the next Sanderson man to shoot that gun.

*

At sixteen, dad can’t put his arms around my shoulders to show me how to shoot, but I laugh when he tries to use the line great-grandfather told him when I grip the gun too hard. He shakes the tension from my hands, rubs my shoulder where the stock hits just right, feeling heavy and weighted with experience far beyond my own. This gun knows how to fire itself.

“A gun is like a woman son, it’s all about how you hold her.”

“Dad…”

“Sorry, well, I dunno, do you hold a guy the same?”

“How should I know?” I gave my father a look with one raised eyebrow, “It’s not like a have a great deal of experience here.”

“OK,” He’s gone beet red, so I figured I should just drop it and let him teach me how to shoot, “You hold it here, nice a gentle, like that yeah. Don’t close your eyes when you shoot, and you wanna either hold your breath or just exhale real slowly when you pull the trigger.”

The gun makes a blast like a cannon in my ear and it kicks my shoulder like a hammer, my fingers grip hard where the stock is cracked, the wood sharp and rough compared to the smoothness of the rest of the body.

“Damn!” I am shaking, but I feel amazing, and I turn from my father to see the image of a man who held me as a baby, but who I don’t actually remember. Great-granddaddy. He smiles at me and touches his hat. I smile back.

“It’s your gun now son,” My father rubs the back of my neck, “Treat her good.”

I thank him, and he walks back towards the house as I stand holding the hunk of wood and metal that is the old twelve gauge with the cracked stock that kicks like hell. I might be looking after it, and it might be worth money, but this isn’t my gun. This gun will always be my great-granddaddy’s gun.