A harmonica cannot go out of tune, since it is a pre-tuned instrument, already set to certain scales. That said, some people can really make it sound amazing but most others haven’t reached that level of ability. Tommy Toomey was one of those lesser talented fellows. You could have sworn the thing sounded out of tune or that maybe a cat was blowing into it rather than a human. It was not anything anyone would want to hear, but people tolerated it. He played most Saturdays out in front of Crookshanks’s barber shop in downtown Meadow Bridge, sitting on the stoop with a can of Coke next to him and a bag of Maverick tobacco that he would reach into from time to time and roll himself a cigarette, giving the folks getting their hairs cut from Don Crookshanks a respite from the noise.
While he was smoking and sipping on his Coke and chatting up the passers-by, people seemed to appreciate the absence of the atonal sloppy playing, even if it meant just listening to the wind blow through town. That seemed to most a more pleasant sound. After a while, he would start up again and people had to readjust themselves to the aural shift and let their brains do the work of pushing that sound to the background, behind the sound of Crookshanks’s clippers cutting little boys’ hair into typical hillbilly bowl cuts. He was trying to learn new styles though, and sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t come out too good, and some boys left the shop wearing the visual equivalent of Tommy Toomey’s harmonica playing.
Directly next to the barber shop which wasn’t but six feet wide, was the post office, which itself was about the same size, just a one room shack that stood at the center of town, which meant the only crossroads. Toomey’s great great grandpa Elijah Toomey had been the first postmaster at Meadow Bridge and this had accorded their family some kind of prestige in the history of the town, even though the total population was never more than 500 people or so. Some families counted, in their ancestry, the first mayor, the first sheriff, the first justice of the peace, the first mill owner, and other folks had nothing like that in their pedigree, so if your great great grandpa was the first postmaster, then that was something to be proud of.
Right in front of the barber shop was the stain on the sidewalk where the only African American resident that Meadow Bridge ever had, Black Bill they called him, was gunned down twenty or so years ago. One of Crookshanks customers was the one that done it, but of course no one was ever prosecuted. That was the same year that Jud Hickman got stabbed at the 4th of July Fireworks. He had told Cornelius Bragg to go on home and sober up since he was too drunk to be out at the festivities, with people and their families there enjoying the holiday. Well, Bragg came back while Jud was sitting under a tree resting, and drew a knife blade across his throat. Jud’s wife and three children just down at the end of the block came running and tried to stop the bleeding but it was too late. Cornelius Bragg tried to flee to Ohio but was brought back and was tried and convicted for murder.
That was a rough year for Meadow Bridge but there was no other gruesome events happening for some time after that. The populace was mostly hard-working people trying to pay the bills and raise their families. Some got a little richer and some got a little poorer, but mostly everyone was pretty much all in the same boat. Tommy Toomey himself worked for a while as the postmaster but then got bored and took a series of odd jobs around town to pay the bills, leaving him time to come down and sit in front of the barber shop on Saturdays and play his harmonica.
He didn’t have no family really, just a precious dog named Mongrel who had recently come up missing. She was out one night as usual and never came back to wait outside the door to come inside Tommy’s house down at the end of the lane. That was about a month ago and some people thought they detected a little more sadness in Tommy’s harmonica playing these days, but that was up for personal interpretation. Like others, pretty much everyone in the area really, Tommy Toomey was Scots-Irish and those folks didn’t really let their emotions show. Heck, they would have trouble finding their own emotions even if they wanted to show em. But some folks heard sadness in Tommy’s harp playing, if you can call it playing, and that was ever since Mongrel had not come home that one night about a month ago.
Etta Gadd came out of the post office after sending off some letters to family and friends. She stopped in front of the barber shop as Tommy was sipping his coke and rolling a smoke. “Hey Tommy. Get your dog back yet?”
“No. No. Mrs. Gadd. I don’t expect she’ll ever come back now. Been near a month.”
Even though Meadow Bridge was a stable little town, as compared to most, there was still a bit of movement going on amongst the residents, human and otherwise, pretty much all the time.
A wife would leave her abusive husband, take the kids and go to a relative’s house to stay for a while or forever. Teenagers would run off from time to time, sometimes for good reasons and other times for reasons that usually didn’t turn out so well. Birds would migrate. Traveling workers would pass through during harvest time. Once, a few years before, a whole bunch of strange folks came and bought a house up on the mountain. Supposedly, they were a cult moved here from California. That’s what people said. And sometimes dogs would run away.
“Well, if it’s in her heart to, then she’ll come back. Don’t you worry.” Mrs. Gadd said, smiling at Tommy Toomey, happy to give him some encouragement. She took a dime out of her purse, looking for a hat to throw it into.
“No. No. Mrs. Gadd.” Tommy waved her off. “I don’t play for no donations. I just like to come out here and sit for a while.”
“Well, if you’re going to entertain us, you might want to learn you some hymns to play.” She replied. “If it’s in your heart to do so, that is. It might sound real nice.”
Tommy Toomey lit his cigarette as Mrs. Gadd looked on, squishing up her face in disdain as the smoke was exhaled. “I don’t think I am able to do that.” he said. ” I just enjoy blowing a little, that’s all. Listening to the sounds it makes, seeing how different notes make me feel.”
He put his cigarette down and started blowing again, making an awful sound. Crookshank winced a bit as the sound seeped into the tiny barber shop. He did not close the door, though. He would never do that. And after a little while, what he heard Tommy playing was actually starting to sound quite a bit nicer than ever before. Well well, he’s coming along then, Crookshanks thought, as he smiled and snipped away with his shears.
THE MOSSY BOG 