Bubba sees that Grandpa needs a lot of help these days. He doesn't mind helping Grandpa, but it makes him feel sad. It reminds him of when Drayton said Grandma went to Heaven and they put her in the attic. "Those bastards at the funeral parlor already ripped us off when Momma died," Drayton told him. Nubbins likes playing with the bones at the local cemetery but Bubba tries to remember where his Momma is buried. He can't read the names on the tombstones, so he can't find it. The pretty lady face and makeup make him think of her, though. She insisted her boys be little gentlemen at the dinner table — something Bubba still does even though she's been dead since he was a boy.
Grandpa is almost a hundred years old, Bubba remembers. "He's a tough ol' thing," Drayton says. Drayton has always felt old to Bubba, too.
Looking at Grandpa in his dinner chair, Bubba thinks of the times Grandpa would hold him in his lap while Grandma snuck him a cookie behind Momma's back. Grandpa used to tell Bubba's favorite story all the time even when the twins said it was boring. Drayton always smacked them and told them to show respect to their elders.
"The Sawyers are hardworking people, not like those chickenshits in Austin," Drayton would say as Grandpa slowly nodded.
Bubba was happy, but very nervous the day he went to work at the slaughterhouse. "It's family tradition, Bubba!" His brothers told him even though they didn't work there. Drayton worked the gas station and Bobby went off somewhere Bubba couldn't remember the name of and Nubbins wandered. "It's a damn shame we have to send out your brother because you won't get a job! Or a haircut!" Drayton would tell him. Bubba doesn't like his brothers fighting, but it makes him feel good not to be the one in trouble all the time. He remembers something about his Daddy cutting trees, but he's not supposed to talk about Daddy.
Grandpa took his time telling stories, looking off into space. Bubba does that, too. He forgets what he's thinking about.
"Well…your Grandma and me were down on our luck…had all the kids to feed. Bank wasn't worth a damn. We didn't use 'em. One day I was workin' on a farm — didn't pay much. But the men noticed how good I was at butcherin' and killin' the hogs. Told me they knew the men runnin' the slaughterhouse in Newt. Started working there."
Grandpa needs a drink after saying all that. He shifts the young Bubba on his knee, the chubby boy pressing a lot of weight on his thin frame. The boy has been called "simple," but Grandpa can see a spark of something there in the boy's dark brown eyes. He's a Sawyer, alright, and Sawyers take care of one another.
"Went so good for a lil while we were able to move in this house here."
Bubba in the present smiles under his mask as he thinks about his home. He's supposed to have pride in it, whatever Drayton means by that.
"But then the whole country went to shit. Stock market. People livin' beyond their means hurting the lil fellas like us. We were going hungry again even though I was workin' sixty hours a week. Grandma tried her best. We needed some food, boy!"
The young Bubba babbles a noise out in excitement. The twins mimic the noise before Drayton smacks both of them. "Shut yer mouths!"
"Well…I put two an' two together. I was good at killing and butchering animals. And those people out there ain't nothin but animals."
The young Bubba cocks his head. He remembers Momma telling him about cows and chickens. But people?
Grandpa ruffles Bubba's curly black hair. "You'll see someday, boy."
"Yessiree," Drayton says, "Grandpa was the best damn killer there ever was!"
There was more to the story, but now Bubba can't remember it. He feels sad again that Grandpa can't talk good anymore. He just makes noises. Bubba felt bad when the slaughterhouse closed. He tried telling Grandpa, but Grandpa wouldn't say anything. Sometimes Bubba feels lonely in the big white house with just his brothers, but then he sees the people who trespass on their lands and he feels scared! And he wants to make Grandpa proud.