Tiny Gina is dragging a white pool ladder she found behind the shed up through the backyard toward the house, leaving twin lines through the grass. Grandpa’s at the library, so she’ll have to ask Gramma if she knows where it came from.

Gramma is sitting on the back porch swing, barefoot and shelling beans into the bowl on her lap. Her daughter, Big Gina, sits on the middle porch stair, her hair parted down the middle like it has been since junior high. She’s shelling beans, too. Both women look out over the backyard, now and then glancing at the weathervane on the shed or the birdhouse hanging on the lowest branch of the tree where Big Gina used to spin in her tire swing. 

What’s Tiny Gina got there? says Gramma.

Big Gina looks up from her bowl to the girl walking backward toward them, leaning and pulling something through the grass. Big Gina says, Maybe a ladder. 

We keep the ladders in the garage, same as always. Gramma raises her voice to reach Tiny Gina. Whatch yoo been getting into, girl? 

Tiny Gina pauses and looks over her shoulder toward the house. 

Ladder! 

Ladders are in the garage, Big Gina says.

Tiny Gina starts shaking her head and starts walking again. 

What’d she say? Gramma says.

What’s that? Big Gina calls, cupping one hand to her mouth for help.

Tiny Gina raises her voice and pulls at the same time. It’s hard talking loud while your neck’s turned. This here’s a pool ladder, she says. Found it behind the shed. 

Tiny Gina stops and lifts a bare foot out of the grass. She points her toes, patting the grass until she feels her shoe and slips it back on. They’re see-through jelly shoes with bits of silver glitter. When she takes them off at night, there’s a dark dirt line around each foot. Like a waterline dried to a drinking glass, but gross. 

Gramma yells that she doesn’t want Tiny Gina fooling out back of the shed. It’s not safe. 

Okay! Tiny Gina says, shifting her hands on the ladder and then taking another step back. The ladder is made of white metal with a blue stripe around each main pole. The steps look made of plastic, and there’s only one side to it instead of the usual two sides required for standing-up ladders.

Who knows what all’s back there, Gramma’s saying to Big Gina. Broken glass, wood gone to rot, rusty nails, tetanus.

Big Gina shifts so she’s got one knee bent so she can see her mother better. You wearing your hearing aids?

Gramma shakes her head. 

I’ll get them for you, says Big Gina and she starts to stand.

Gramma shakes her head and shoos her hand at her. I can hear fine. 

When you’re wearing them anyway.

I wear them when I need to. 

Big Gina frowns. And where’s that? 

Church. Grocery. When I take Snodgrass to the veterinarian. 

But not when we visit. 

If you visited me at church, yes. 

Big Gina turns more in order to face her mother full on, so her mother can read her mouth and facial expressions. She talks louder. You get a pool after we moved out? 

I wish.

What’d you mean, you wish? All we wanted growing up was a pool. Nothing fancy, either. Just one out of the Service Merchandise catalog.

Service Merchandise, Gramma says and smiles. Now there’s a place I haven’t thought about in years.

She pushes her bare feet against the porch floor.

Tiny Gina is halfway to the porch. She sets down the ladder and rests her hands on her hips. She turns to look at her mother and grandmother. Her little face is flush with the work and heat. 

What’s Service Merchandise?

What a question, says Big Gina.

What’s she wanna know? says Gramma.

She doesn’t know what Service Merchandise is. Big Gina looks back to Little Gina. It was like a Wal-Mart but better. They had one in Terre Haute. 

Gramma points at the dark red lawn furniture sitting out under the big oak tree. That’s where we got them—oh, thirty, forty years ago now. 

More like fifty years ago, says Big Gina.

Only threw out the original cushions last summer.

Couple summers ago.

Well, they sure lasted.

They did.

Don’t make them like they used to.

Big Gina nods and sets the bowl on the stair above her, up against the railing so her mother doesn’t trip on it.

We got the ping-pong table there, too, says Gramma. 

Big Gina nods. She remembers her dad having her older brother help him move it to the shed one winter. It was snowing, and her dad kept saying to go a little faster because the snowflakes would ruin the top. Her dad’s plan was to set it up in the shed, fold one side up so he could play against it. 

The shed roof leaked, but no one realized how badly it leaked until the ping pong table was under it. Usually, the dirt floor soaked up the rain or snow, and mostly he used it for repairing lawnmowers in the summer and he did most of that outside when he could. The people who lived in the house before them had built the house and the shed, and the man had been a blacksmith so he didn’t mind the shed being so dark, and being made of corrugated metal, it heated up real quick. 

In only about a month, the green surface of the table started rippling. 

That’s too bad, says Big Gina.

It was, agrees Gramma. Seems like the library was maybe gonna get a ping-pong table. Now they’ve got a pinball machine instead. 

What for?

The kids. Kids these days getting up to trouble when school lets out each day. Librarian’s been trying to help out. Keep the kids busy and not tearing us people’s property or leaving trash all over. As far as I can tell, though, only people playing the pinball machine is your dad and his other farmer friends and retirees.

It’s better than sitting around watching TV.

Gramma nods. 

Big Gina says, I guess I didn’t realize it was at the library. I imagined it at the Downtown Garage.

Downtown Garage’s been closed ten, twelve years now.

Now that I’m thinking of it, of course I knew it. But that’s where I imagined it. 

I agree it makes more sense there. The librarian got somebody to fix it so don’t need a quarter to run. Play all day if you want, and many people do from what I understand. Your dad’s taken to returning our books so he can have an excuse to play on it. From what I hear, he’s not the only one. Last handful times I’ve been to the library, I can hardly see it because of the crowd around it.
            Tiny Gina stops at the shadow crossing the grass from the porch’s metal awning. She’s walking around the ladder, looking for a good place to flip it over. The top of the ladder’s curved like two hooks to hang over the edge of a pool, and the bottom poles end like the footrests on stilts. The ladder is for the sort for pools you can set up in the summer and put away later. But that lots of people don’t put away and then the pool fills up with snow and is usually ruined before the next spring.

Where’d that come from? says Big Gina. 

Heck if I know, says Gramma. Your dad gets an idea in his head or sees something he thinks will get an idea into his head, and that accounts for 90% of the whatnot in and around the shed. 

What’s your plan with that, Tiny Gina?

Gonna climb it to the moon, says Tiny Gina. She’s bending over and reaching to grab the ladder’s supporting poles. When she has a good grip, she starts shuffling backward so that the ladder starts raising up toward her and the women on the porch.

Don’t you need an astronaut suit? 

I got it on.

Oh, says Gramma. I see now. Careful.

I am.

It reminds Tiny Gina of the Olympic ice-skating couples and the men skaters who will spin their lady skater by her blades. Big Gina always winces during that move, and Tiny Gina always expects the man to cut his hand and blood to spurt out like in the scary movies her neighbor’s brother is always watching. Her bedroom window faces his, and she can’t help standing there and watching.

What would the Olympics do if a skater did have his hand slashed in half? Probably go to commercial while people in the audience threw stuffed bears and flowers onto the ice, trying to avoid the puddle of blood.  

Tiny Gina’s standing firm and has the ladder leaned against both her shoulders. She reaches for a lower stair with both hands.

Gramma calls out to Tiny Gina that those aren’t meant for standing up straight. See how it’s built on an angle?

Not tall enough to reach the moon, either, says Big Gina.

I remember watching the moon landing. You were two, maybe three years old.

That was Mags. 

Was it? 

I wasn’t born yet.

What year did they land?

1969 seems like. 

That’s Woodstock.

And the moon. And Vietnam.

Big year.

Big Gina shrugs. 

We were all in the living room. 

Not me.

Right. Mags, your dad, and me. 

What about Eddie? He was older than Mags.

Eddie was somewhere. A friend’s, maybe. I don’t remember. Quite a few people had parties. I wonder why we didn’t go to one. 

Maybe you weren’t invited.

We were always invited to parties. Your father has always been a very gregarious man.

Eddie will remember where he was, says Big Gina. 

If he comes to dinner, you can ask him then. I really can’t picture him in the living room that night.

But you can other nights?

Sure, but that night was different. I’m sure I’d made a special dessert. There’d been special recipes running in all the women’s magazines around then. That’s right. I made this lime Jell-O. It had crushed pineapple in it, which your father didn’t like, so I ended up eating most of it myself. I probably have the recipe somewhere if you want to try it.

No, thanks.

Or if Tiny Gina wants to try it, seeing as how she’s the one interested in the moon. I’m glad she’s got an imagination. A lot of kids these days don’t. They sit around watching screens. Mrs. Harris told me that many of her preschoolers have their own iPads. Can you believe it? They don’t bring them to school, of course, but they watch them or play games on them or whatever on the drive to and from school and God knows when else. Several children watch theirs during the sermon. The parents encourage it, in fact. And they do sit quietly, but it seems a matter of principle—a matter of manners . . . Anyway, you’re doing something right is my point.

I’d get her a swimming pool before I got her a screen. 

Don’t say that too loudly, says Gramma. 

She knows I’d never get her a screen, much less a pool—although they’re a lot more affordable these days than when I was growing up.  

Gramma, shading her eyes even though the porch is in full shade. There’s always once in the early morning and once in the early dark that the sun glares in so nobody can hardly see to sit there.

You sure that’s a pool ladder? 

What else would it be for? 

Firetruck, water tower, those giant oil drums or whatever they are at Marathon.

I’ll tell you what you never bought us from Service Merchandise. 

Gramma looks up at the metal awning. There’s cobwebs up there, and she’s pretty sure a wasp’s nest. She keeps meaning to ask Eddie to take a broom to them, but she forgets once he’s over here. Probably because he’s not out here with her when he visits. 

Every kid wants a swimming pool, and I’ll bet even parents who do have one don’t know how they afford it. 

You sure were little beggars.

You’d say, What’s wrong with the one in the park? But we wanted an indoor one like Joanie Stewart’s.

And look how Joanie Stewart turned out.

Isn’t she married with a few kids.

Third marriage, dumb kids.

Mom!

Gramma shrugs. It’s true. But that’s always been the Stewarts for you.

Well, her mom threw wonderful birthday parties. She’d invite the whole class. Every single one of us. That was nice. 

I don’t know if that’s the word for it, says Gramma.

The pool house was added onto the house and much taller than the rest of it. Seems like it was made of glass, or maybe just one wall was all glass so you could see to the outside or see back to yourself, depending on the light. 

The Stewarts have never had a problem with other people seeing what they had. 

I remember one time I was over at her house, she wanted to swim, but I hadn’t brought my swimsuit, so she opened her bottom dresser drawer, and it was stuffed full with swimsuits. I only had one swimsuit for each summer. 

That’s all you needed.

I was at the park pool almost every day. 

Your suit always dried out before the next day. Besides, you were always scooting around on the floor of the pool. By the end of summer, there’d be hardly any fabric left covering your backside. We’re lucky you showed up last because if you’d been first, there’d have nothing left of the clothes to hand down. A button, maybe. A strap.

You’re exaggerating. 

You think I am. 

It’s not like we asked for an indoor pool.

How did we get on this anyway? 

Big Gina points at Tiny Gina, who has one foot on the ladder’s bottom rung and is peering up the rungs.

Why don’t you lean it against the tree? Big Gina calls.

It might hurt the bark, says Tiny Gina. 

Everybody thinks they need a swimming pool until they have one. Nobody uses it nearly as much as they imagined. Same as anything. Indoor pool or tennis racquets. That reminds me. If you don’t take your rackets home, I’m giving them to the thrift store. 

They’re Mags’s rackets. 

You played tennis. 

Now and then, but not for the school like Mags. 

I wonder why I thought that. Maybe Tiny Gina could use them.  She has a good imagination. Pretend guitars or butterfly nets.

Not good for the butterflies. 

Mosquito killers, then. It’s good for kids to pretend, to be able to turn things around in their minds. Lookie there, for example, says Gramma—pointing at Tiny Gina who has the ladder standing steady, her feet spread wide to keep it and herself from tipping.

If you don’t look at the top, it’s easy to imagine she’s balancing someone on it. A circus girl in a sequined leotard and feather boa. Or an elephant. 

You’re always imagining the circus, says Big Gina. 

Then imagine she’s got the neighbor’s bulldog up there. It’s standing on one paw. Mr. Pitters is his name.

Big Gina laughs.

Gramma grins and says, And his big ol’ tongue is lolling out like always. He’s like your brother Eddie when he was born. I thought Eddie’s tongue was too long for his mouth, and the doctor said he was just sticking his tongue out. That’s how new a mother I was when I had Eddie. 

Tiny Gina lifts one foot to stand on the bottom rung, but when she steps forward to lift her back foot, the ladder starts to tilt forward, and she drops her foot to the ground again. The ladder wobbles and she returns to her steady stance. She glances over at the women. 

Tiny Gina says she bets from the top she’ll be able to see all the way to Martinsville. Maybe even all the way to the Marshall water tower or Walmart. Just like the Ferris wheel at fair time.

I can’t hear what she’s saying, says Gramma.

She’s guessing what she’ll see from the top of the ladder.

I need to go to Walmart, says Gramma. I meant to go before you got here.

I can take you later.

I don’t like driving at night. 

I’d be driving.

There’s too many deer out. The afternoon’s a better time to go, even if there’s more people at that time of day. I’d rather that than hit a deer.  

It’s been a year since the only grocery in town closed down. The nearest one is fifteen miles away, but many people drive to Walmart instead—prices are cheaper and more to choose from. But it’s such a big place that the older people go only a few times a month because of how much walking it involves.

Tiny Gina has the ladder up again, though the weight of the stairs is clearly working against her. 

She’s gonna knock herself right out—that’s what she’s gonna do. Stars will be the only thing she’s seeing. And the ceiling of an ambulance. 

Tiny Gina’s pushing with her arms but leaning back on her heels. Hurry, Gramma, climb up.

Absolutely not, says Big Gina.

What’s that? says Gramma.

She’s gonna hold it so you can climb it to the moon.

Oh, that’s sweet of you honey, but I need to go to the grocery more than I do the moon. Unless they’re having a sale on milk and bananas up there.

Big Gina remembers standing on Milton Davies’s shoulders in the deep end of the park pool. Her feet curving like talons to keep from falling. He’d try to throw her into the air, but most of the time she’d fall off or push off at the wrong time or, if she did go into the air, she’d be a jumble of legs and arms splashing down. 

One day, she and Milton must have worked a whole afternoon trying to do their trick because his shoulders were purple with bruises by the time they biked home, wet towels around their necks. Not long after they parted at the street Milton lived on, his mother was on the phone with Big Gina’s mother demanding what happened to her son. 

Milton was the first of her graduating class to die. By then, he was in the military and living in another state. One of Big Gina’s friends emailed her a photo of him with a wife and little kids—all of them on a carpeted staircase and wearing matching Christmas pajamas. A heart attack. Everyone agreed it didn’t make sense. She could recount every detail of his childhood house. From the little cross-stitched boy and girl on either side of the mantel to the clutter of nail polish bottles his older sister kept on the bottom shelf of the bathroom medicine cabinet. If she went back to his childhood home, she’d know exactly which cabinet to take a glass from.

His online obituary offered donating money for a tree to be planted in his honor. She’d ordered one but never received word if the tree was planted or where. There was a debit on her bank statement, so the transaction went through. The tree itself didn’t seem like a thing she could inquire about. 

Gramma stands up from the swing and presses her hands against her back.  

Probably about time to start dinner, she says. 

Big Gina nods. 

Tiny Gina is standing on the third rung up, somehow. With both feet and with the ladder still standing. 

If she falls, says Gramma, she’s gonna crack her head right open.

She’ll be fine, says Big Gina, although she won’t stop watching.

You better go hold that ladder, says Gramma. 

You almost to the moon? calls Big Gina, watching her daughter’s determined face, her flexed arms and the jelly shoes flipping down to show the backs of her feet and where a tiny band-aid is dangling from one side. 

Nearly! says Tiny Gina.

As the little girl starts to stand, holding her arms out, the balance shifts. That’s when Gramma starts down the porch stairs. 

Big Gina is standing up. 

Gramma’s moving fast and misses the last stair on her way down. 

Tiny Gina drops to the ground and pushes the ladder away from her so it falls forward into the grass. 

Gramma’s fallen on the sidewalk, her knees skinned and her housedress above the bare backs of her legs. There’s dark blue veins running through her legs that Big Gina has never seen before. 

Then Tiny Gina is turning around toward Big Gina’s yelling. And seeing Gramma on the ground and all that blood coming out on the sidewalk and welling into the cracks where the dandelions peek out. 

The sun is warm on the old woman’s body and the grass beneath her. She closes her eyes and waits. Her daughter’s yelling 9-1-1 and give me your shirt before you run inside and don’t ask why just do it. She’ll have to remember to ask what the girl planned to do on the moon or how long she imagined the trip would be. Probably the girl doesn’t know about the layer between here and there that burns anything not flying fast enough. 

Mom, don’t try to get up. Mom.

She imagines one of those old Service Merchandise catalogs, open to a two-page spread of lawn furniture. Each piece of furniture labelled with a letter that corresponds to a marginal description and price. The yellow and white striped lounger (A), the metal end table (B) and blanket beneath a blue plastic picnic set (C). A woman in a dress and heels is serving the Apollo Appetizer to the neighbors playing croquet (D). Central to it all is the above-ground swimming pool (E) where a brother and sister toss a red and white ball while their father flips burgers on a BBQ (F) and their grandma lays in the grass near his feet, arms out. On her wrist a gold watch (SEE PAGE 278), an anniversary present from her husband who is at the library playing pinball (NOT PICTURED).

She starts to laugh. 

Here’s her daughter, bending over her like a metal awning and saying, Hush, Ma, stop moving, the astronauts are on their way.

Erin Pringle has written three story collections and one novel: Unexpected Weather Events (AWST 2023), The Whole World at Once (WVUP 2017), The Floating Order (Two Ravens Press 2009), and Hezada! I Miss You (AWST 2020). Learn more at www.erinpringle.com.