Wayne chuckled and patted Charlie on the back. "You'll do fine. Just watch your fingers."
Charlie held the nail on Wayne's mark and tapped timidly. The nail fell over with a "clink!" when he let go.
"Dang it!" Charlie glared at the nail.
Wayne smiled. "It's ok! Just hit it a few more times next time."
Charlie set the nail back in his little indent and held it, taking careful aim with his hammer and letting loose with a swing. The hammer glanced of the nail with a "tink!" and smashed his finger, sending a sharp jolt of pain up his arm. "Cwap!" Charlie held back the tears and stuck his finger in his mouth. He knew he couldn't cry on the job site.
Wayne waited quietly until Charlie pulled his finger out of his mouth. "You good?"
Charlie nodded even though his finger still stung and held the nail up again, carefully tapping it this time until it stood on its own, then carefully sinking it in with well-aimed blows, and grinning at the sunken nail head when he was done.
He finally finished with the remaining four nails, only hitting his thumb once, but holding back the tears.
Charlie stood up and stretched, and Wayne gave him a big high five. "You did it! Good job!"
A grin spread from ear to ear.
Wayne tipped his head toward the truck. "Now, let's go frame a wall."
Charlie's eyes bulged. "A wah!"
Wayne nodded. "Yep! Good thing you're here to help!"
When they got back to the truck, Wayne grabbed a little cooler from his cab and opened it up, pulling out bottles of cream soda, and handing one to Charlie.
Charlie grinned. "Cweam soda! My favowite!" He dug in his pocket, spilling most of his oreo crumbs, and grabbed his swiss army knife again, pulling out the bottle opener and popping the top off his bottle. Wayne held the top of his bottle over to him.
"Hey, pop mine while yer at it, wouldya?"
Charlie grinned and popped the cap off of Wayne's bottle too. Wayne opened the tailgate and they jumped up onto it, enjoying their pop.
Charlie took a sip, then pulled out his rock, wrinkling his brow and glancing over at Wayne.
Wayne slugged him on the shoulder. "What's up? I can see them gears movin' in there."
Charlie scrunched up his face a little as he looked at his rock. "Wew, I'm twin' to figger sumpin' out. I got this wock tumbweh a wiow ago, and I put aww the wocks in there that came with it wike it said to. I been fowwowin' the diwections, but my sodawite is wittuw now, but the tiguhs eye and the wose quawtz awe stiw big. What did I do wong?"
Wayne chuckled. "Aw, it ain't yer fault. Those people that put that fu- that thing together shoulda known better. They didn't tell ya to separate them rocks out for hardness, did they?"
Charlie frowned. "What's hawdness?"
Wayne pulled out a nail from his belt. "When you hammered them nails in that wood, did any of the nails go flat?"
Charlie shook his head. "Nope."
Wayne nodded, then pointed at Charlie's rock. "Would you wanna sleep on that tonight instead of a pillow?"
Charlie shook his head. "That wouwd be siwwy! The wock is too hawd! I wanna sweep on my piwwoh. It's softeh."
Wayne glanced over at Charlie with a little grin. Charlie stared down at his rock. "So naiws awe hawdeh than wood, and wocks are hawdeh than piwwows. But what 'bout my wocks? They're aww wocks! They'we aww hawd."
Wayne nodded. "But some are harder than others." He jumped off the tailgate and picked up a piece of gravel. "Scratch your bottle with your rock."
Charlie held the triangle-shaped rock against the bottle and drew the rock along the glass. He looked closely at the glass and lit up. "It scwatched the gwass!"
Wayne nodded. "Yep! That's 'cuz it's harder than the glass. Now try this piece of limestone."
Charlie pushed the little gray rock against the glass and tried to scratch it, but the rock just slid off. He tried again a few times, then looked at Wayne with a puzzled expression.
Wayne grinned. "Now, try scratching that granitoid with the limestone– but on the side without the chrysocolla."
Charlie did what Wayne had told him. The limestone left a powdery light gray streak on the granitoid. Puzzled, he tried again, and got the same result.
Wayne chuckled. "What do you think is going on?"
Charlie shrugged, a puzzled look on his face.
Wayne grabbed a scrap of wood and handed it over to Charlie with his nail. "Try scratching the wood with the nail."
Charlie drew the nail across the piece of wood, leaving a deep groove.
"Do you remember why you can drive the nail in the wood?"
Charlie thought a moment. "Because the naiw is hawdew?"
Wayne nodded. "Now try the granitoid against the limestone again."
Charlie tried it, leaving a scratch in the limestone.
Charlie's eyes lit up. "Oh! The granitoid is hawdeh than the wimestone!"
Wayne nodded. He rummaged in his toolbox until he found a ragged piece of sandpaper and handed it to Charlie. "The grit on this sandpaper is hard. Rub it against that piece of wood."
Sawdust flew from the wood as Charlie started sanding. He took a long sniff of the sweet-smelling dust and sighed. It smelled so good!
Wayne took a pinch of the sawdust and held it up to Charlie. "See what happens when something hard rubs against something softer?"
Charlie nodded. "The hawdeh thing woud wub the softew thing down?"
Wayne patted Charlie on the shoulder. "You've got it! That grit you got in that tumbler is like the sandpaper. It wears the rocks away. That grit will wear the softer stuff down faster than the harder stuff. The rocks rub against each other too. So what can you tell me about the sodalite, the tiger's eye, and the quartz?"
Charlie lit up. "Oh! The quawtz and tiguhs eye awe hawdeh than the sodawite?"
Wayne grinned. "Exactly. Like I said, the people who made that tumbler shoulda known." He glanced up at the sun.
"Well, we'd better get goin' on that da- on that wall!"
Wayne flipped over his RUSH tape and had Charlie help him get two 2x6s out of the back of his truck and lay them on his scarred old sawhorses. Wayne explained that these boards were called the plates, and that they would be the top and the bottom of the wall. Charlie held the end of the tape measure as Wayne marked out 16" gaps with his big square pencil, explaining that this is where they would attach the boards called the studs, which would give the wall its strength. He double checked everything, then marked both boards with his square and handed the tape measure to Charlie.
"So this is gonna be our front wall. It's gonna have a door and two windows."
Charlie nodded.
Wayne dug a big tube out from behind his seat and pulled a rolled-up piece of paper out of it. He spread it on the hood of his truck, telling Charlie that it was the blueprint of the house that told him how to build everything. He pointed out the front wall and the measurements of the windows and doors, then had Charlie help him as he marked everything out on the plates.
"Hey, uh, my arm's gettin' a little tired. I'm gonna get somethin' to help us out a bit with them nails."
Wayne jumped into the back of his truck, grabbed a strange-looking tool, and handed it to Charlie.
Charlie spread his legs a little and tried not to look like he was struggling to hold onto it as he examined it. "What's this?"
"A nail gun."
Charlie tipped his head and scrunched his face. "It don't wook wike no gun!"
Wayne nodded as he wheeled his air compressor with its hose to the edge of his tailgate, then jumped down and lowered the compressor to the ground. "Yeah, it's kind of a funny-looking bas– thing, but it's a gun that shoots nails."
Charlie grinned. "Coow! It shoots naiws?"
Wayne nodded as he pulled an extension cord out of the back of his truck. "Yep! It is pretty cool!"
Charlie raised his eyebrow. "How come we didn't use it on the fwoor?"
Wayne laughed. "Ok, you got me. You needed to break in your new hammer."
Charlie patted his hammer and grinned.
Wayne connected his extension cords, then handed the coil to Charlie. "Take this over to the house, will ya?"
Charlie nodded and carried the rolled-up cord to the house, unwinding it as he went. Wayne followed, pulling the compressor and holding the nail gun and the hose.
Wayne had Charlie help him sort out the pre-cut studs from the rest of the boards. He showed him how to look down the edge of the boards to see if they were straight. He showed Charlie how to identify the slight curve in each board and explained that the top of the curve was called the "crown." They brought the boards they needed over to the foundation.
He grabbed a set of earmuffs and a pair of gloves out of his truck. The earmuffs were a little big, but he managed to make them fit Charlie. He chuckled at how Charlie's hands disappeared in the gloves. They'd have to do, though. He gave him a pair of goggles and helped Charlie put them on. He led his little helper over to the rearview mirror. Charlie's grin split his face as he saw himself. He looked like a real construction worker with those earmuffs and goggles.
Then, he carried the chop saw over to the foundation, Charlie following him again, unwinding another extension cord.
He explained everything he was cutting. The headers, the trimmers, the sills, and the cripple studs, while Charlie stood a safe distance away. After a while, he motioned Charlie over to him. He had Charlie help him put a board in place and line its mark up with the saw blade. He brought Charlie to the side of the chop saw and had him pull the trigger. Charlie flinched a little as the saw roared to life, but he held his place. Wayne nodded and motioned to Charlie to let go, then he checked to make sure that the mark was still in line with the blade and the board was flush against the guide, and had Charlie pull the trigger while he carefully guided the blade into the wood.
Charlie was beaming when they lifted the blade up and he released the trigger. Wayne held the cripple stud up against one of the others that would also go below the window, showed Charlie how they lined up perfectly, then gave Charlie a high-five. He handed Charlie his pencil and lifted the ear muffs off his ears.
"This one's yours! Sign it!"
Charlie carefully wrote his name the best he could on the bumpy wood, then grinned as he held it up to Wayne.
Wayne grinned. "There ya go! That cripple stud will have your name on it as long as this house stands!"
Charlie could have floated off the ground, he was so happy.
Wayne and Charlie started putting the wall together. Charlie jumped a few times with the first few "PFF!s" of the nail gun, but he got used to it after a while.
Wayne explained everything to Charlie, showing him how every board had to be square and straight with the board he was fastening it to. He pointed out the plates and the studs as he went, then showed him where the king studs were, then pointed out the jack studs, cripple studs, and headers that they had cut as he began framing the door.
Charlie asked Wayne whether the king studs ever fought over who was in charge of the wall, and Wayne laughed. "Nah, fortunately, they just hold still. Otherwise, the fu– the door would fall off!"
Charlie watched in awe as he and Wayne put that wall together. His eyes widened as he realized that the wall was a series of post-and-lintels just like he had built with his Jenga blocks that morning. That day, Charlie decided he wanted to be a builder, just like Wayne, when he grew up.
Wayne started framing a window, attaching a trimmer next to a stud that he explained was now another "king stud." Then he held up Charlie's cripple stud. Wayne handed him the cripple stud and showed him where it fit in the wall. Charlie placed it in carefully, admiring the "Charlie" scrawled on the side. Wayne had him pull four nails out of his pouch. He started the nails for Charlie. He didn't mind. He knew they had to go in just right. Then Charlie drove the nails into the sill on the bottom of the window and the plate on the bottom of the wall. The wall was finished, with Charlie's name written on that cripple stud like a name engraved on a plaque on a monument. Charlie couldn't have been prouder if it had been.
Just then, Charlie heard the rumbling of a truck he didn't recognize as it pulled in from the highway.
Wayne looked around the site anxiously, then at Charlie. "Stay here, ok?"
Charlie nodded, and Wayne walked over to his truck, where a somewhat nicer truck was pulling up.
A husky man with a beard got out of the truck. He was wearing a slightly stained green polo shirt with the Silver Creek Fairways logo embroidered on the chest.
Wayne grinned anxiously. "Hey Doug! Thanks for comin' over to help with the walls. A little early, ain't ya?"
Doug shook his head. "Not really. Let's get them walls up. I got a lot to do today."
Doug scanned the scene, then stopped. "Wayne, what the hell is a kid doin' here? This is a construction site, not a damn nursery."
Wayne smiled anxiously. "That's Charlie. You know, Rich's boy? He's been helpin' me out."
Doug scowled and started toward the foundation. "I'm pretty sure Rich is paying you to build a house, not babysit his brat."
Wayne straightened and followed Doug. "He ain't no brat, and I ain't babysittin'! Charlie is my helper!"
Doug scolwed. "Not anymore, he ain't. Send him home, or I will."
Wayne sighed and jumped on the subfloor, then walked over to Charlie, kneeling down and looking at the little boy in the eyes.
"You did good, Charlie. Thank you. Come back again, ok?"
Charlie nodded, and Wayne stuck his hand out. "See you soon, partner."
Charlie glanced at Doug uneasily, then took Wayne's hand and shook it. "See ya soon, Wayne."
He started taking his gloves off. Wayne put his hand on Charlie's shoulder. "Keep them. Keep all of it. You'll need it again."
Charlie's eyes grew big. "Even the hammew?"
Wayne grinned. "Especially the hammer. Tell your ma and your old man hi for me."
Charlie nodded, then started walking off the platform, taking one last look at his name on his cripple stud as he left, and glancing quickly at Doug.
He patted Scamp on the head, got on his bike, and rode off a short way. He found a dirt pile and sat on it, watching the construction site.
********
Doug surveyed the site. "One wall, Wayne? What the fuck you been doing all day? I'm here to help you stand walls, not build them!"
Wayne looked Doug in the eyes. "I was buildin' a man, Doug. I'd think you'd understand. Ain't your Nate 'bout Charlie's age?"
Doug frowned. "He's five. How old's Charlie?"
"Same."
Doug sighed. "Fine. Let's just get these damn walls done."
**********
Charlie watched in awe as Wayne and Doug started lifting the wall, his and Wayne's wall, up. As he watched, he thought of the new words Wayne had taught him. Granitoid, stud, plate, hardness, and trimmer, among others. He learned a few more words from Wayne and Doug as they worked. Words that Wayne had tried hard to avoid when he was talking to Charlie.
When the wall was up and braced, Charlie got down off his dirt pile and stretched, rubbing his arm. It was tired and sore, but it was a good sore. He patted his pocket to make sure he still had his granitoid, then got on his bike and started riding home, his rock bulging in his pocket and his hammer bumping against his leg.
On the way, Charlie noticed a dark-skinned man wearing a long-sleeved shirt and a wide-brimmed hat in the alfalfa field next to the subdivision.
He'd seen the man before, but never so close. Charlie stopped his bike near the edge of the field and watched quietly as the man started unhooking handlines and carrying them through the growing alfalfa to a new spot a few paces away.
The man saw Charlie and grinned. He beckoned Charlie over.