Sunny was in the kitchen making fried bread. Evidently her ancestral genes had been warmed up while she was on the Lummi Reservation and she felt the need to be near a stove.
“Go get cleaned up. We’re going over to Emily’s for dinner. Tell George,” she said.
“Yes’m,” I said and grabbed one to take with me.
Two hours later, we were at Emily’s house and I could sense the tension in air, so I grabbed another of Ted’s Shiner Bocks and went outside to the patio. Being the family patriarch gave me certain privileges, like being rude if I wanted to. It was still hot even in the shade of their pecan tree, but a lot cooler than inside. After a few minutes, George and Ted came outside to join me.
“Max, you’re in the doghouse, big time,” George said.
“Tell me something I don’t already know. I have my own recliner and a flat screen TV in there, I’ll manage.”
“Max, you know Emily invited Kevin and Ariana, right?” Ted said.
“I kind of figured that, but I was never one to turn down Emily’s cooking.”
“I’m sure Emily will be glad to hear that. So, what do you think Kevin’s going to do now?” Ted asked.
“What most men eventually do, I suppose. They suck it up and get on with life. I think we raised him right, despite his initial stupidity.”
I noticed Ted shake his head. I wasn’t sure exactly what he meant by the gesture. Ted had been a good role model for Nick and Kevin while they were growing up. He’d helped to develop their athleticism and baseball skills in their early teens when I got too old to be of much use on a practice field. Ted had been a former college player and was with a minor league in Texas before he married Emily.
“You’re right about that. He’s a good kid and has a good head on his shoulders. Give him time,” Ted offered.
“That’s something I don’t have a lot of.”
“Well, then, you need to make the most of it, Max. Don’t turn your back on him.”
“I didn’t. I was facing him, when I showed him toward the door,” I said a little too testily. I could see it bothered George. He stood up. Ted wasn’t bothered, though; he and I knew each other pretty well.
“I’m gonna get another beer. You want one, Max?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
After George went back inside, Ted cleared his throat. “Okay, what’s going on?”
I studied Ted a moment. Besides my son, James Lee, Ted had more common sense than most men I knew. He not only spoke the truth, he was man who kept his own counsel. I admired that quality in him. People felt the need to talk too much nowadays; so, I was surprised at his question.
“I’m sure Emily has filled you in.”
“Oh, she has. More that I wanted to hear.”
“It’s the price we pay for being married to a good woman.”
“True. But I also know you,” Ted said.
“Sometimes a boy has to grow into man whether he wants to or not.”
“And your kicking Kevin out of the house is going to make a man out of him?”
“That I don’t know. He has it in him or he doesn’t. I’m just speeding up the process,” I said.
“Why?”
“I can feel the wind blowing my way,” I said and was surprised at my own words. It was something that was there but I had chosen to ignore or at least acknowledge before now. It wasn’t so much the fear of death as it was the acceptance that I was closer to it than I wanted to be. Magali’s appearance on the Pape Ranch had planted that seed in me.
“Oh, come on, Max. What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ted had asked that with a little too much of an attitude from a younger man to suit me. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t there to convince him to see my side of things or explain my actions to him. “I’m gonna go check on where my beer’s at,” I said and got up, leaving Ted alone on his own patio.
When I got inside the kitchen, I heard the conversation in the living room. Kevin and Ariana had arrived. It was time to swallow my pride, go in there and eat some crow, and show my family that I loved them. I’d have liked to say that was the way I was raised, but the truth was it was a lesson learned over many years, when a man finally comes to understand that family is all that really matters and the rest is pretty much horse manure.
Chapter 18
After we left Emily’s, I figured Katie had picked up on her mother’s dismay over Kevin’s situation and was busy engaging George in conversation in the back seat to distract herself, or him.
“There’s going to be millions of them. Millions and millions of butterflies,” she said.
Evidently, she believed in Clete with the same enthusiasm that she believed in unicorns. I hoped she was right.
“I’m going back to Washington tomorrow. Can you take us to the airport?” Sunny said without turning away from the window. She had been staring out it since she got in the truck; preferring the scenery outside to talking about what had happened with Kevin.
“I have a meeting in the morning with Hannah and Shane. I can take you any time after noon.”
“I’ll get a ride,” she replied back.
“It’s going to work out, Sunny.”
“Don’t,” she said.
She wasn’t one to discuss personal family business in front of George, it was a Lummi trait, but I’d already begun to think of him as family and I didn’t care. Kevin had informed everyone at Emily’s that, like his brother Nick, he had enlisted as a Marine and was leaving for the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego in four days. Everyone was stunned and even though Ariana obviously knew about it she was still in a daze from the news. I was so outdone with him; I wanted to put my boot at least two inched up his backside. I had never raised a hand to any of my children and he sure gave me second thoughts about the wisdom of it. Maybe in his mind, he thought he was being a man, but the truth was he was running away from his responsibilities. I think everyone in the room realized that, especially his wife. He hadn’t gotten the reception to the news that he had expected.
“She can work at the Center for as long as she needs to. And, if she wants to start college after the baby comes, we can help her.”
“This is your fault,” Sunny said.
“I wasn’t there when he signed the papers. Nor did I put a gun to his head. This is all on Kevin.”
When she turned to look at me, I saw it. She had a glazed look in her eye and I surmised that she had already tuned me out. I knew she was going to leave me for good over this. Sunny had left me before in anger over something I’d done or hadn’t done and I had begged her to come back each time. I’d always put my love for her over my pride, as wise old men often do, and I would’ve begged her not to leave again, but I didn’t. I kept my mouth shut knowing it was better for her and Katie to return to the res.
She didn’t say anything in response to my statement about Kevin and no one spoke again, even after we arrived at the ranch house. Katie went inside with Sunny and George had enough sense to make himself scarce once we headed inside. I piddled around outside, swept off the sidewalk in the porch light, wiped down the patio furniture, and generally killed time until Sunny went to bed.
Around eleven, I went inside and grabbed a handful of Shiner longnecks in the refrigerator and then went back outside to Sunny’s chaise lounge chair. It was my favorite drinking spot on the ranch. I had decided not to try and talk Sunny out of leaving; she had to be on the res with her family when Ruby passed away. I would instead go out there for the funeral and then try to convince her of the wisdom of returning to Texas with me as soon as I felt it was safe.
Both her boys had shattered the dreams she had for them and I was the easiest to blame. Sometimes a man had to swallow his pride and accept unjustified criticism from those he loved. Shit happens, as they say. I wasn’t going to tell her that her boy’s choices had more to do with her first husband than me. He had been a well decorated hero and taken away far too early in the lives of her boys. He had been killed in Iraq. It
was perfectly natural for a son, when faced with a situation where he didn’t know what to do, to try and follow in his father’s footsteps. Nick had done it. And, in a panic, Kevin had done it. In Kevin’s case, though, it didn’t make it right. It just gave him some cover and the ability to leave his problems for others to deal with, which I would. Despite his stupidity, I loved the boy and cared about the young girl he impregnated.
Thinking about Kevin and Nick made me think about my own father. He was the last man on this earth I would ever want to be like. In fact, I had spent my whole life trying not to be like him and what did it get me. A few years ago, I found the remains of my mother buried on the ranch and I realized after so many years of beating myself up that he had killed her. He had always told us that she had run off and left my brother and me. I was around five or six at the time and had grown up with a big hole in my core being; feeling abandoned and unwanted by my mother. When I learned what happened‒that she didn’t really abandon us‒the wound still didn’t heal. Whoever said that the truth shall set you free was full of shit. The truth merely brings more questions and more pain. The worst part of it all was that I realized how stupid I was for believing him.
I finished the last bottle of beer and gave into the anger within me at myself and Kevin and without thinking threw the bottle against a stone planter box. In the dead of night, the bottle shattered with the noise of a car crash and I figured Clete could probably hear it across the ranch. A couple of lights came on in the house. I heard the window in the guest bedroom slide open.
“You okay, Max?” George asked.
“Yeah, I just dropped a bottle.”
“You want some company?”
“Thanks, but I’m coming in. I’ll see you in the morning.”
. . .
I rousted George out of bed early and fed him some bacon and eggs. I wanted him to ride out to the Butterfly Pasture with me before our meeting at nine. I had five acres in Common and Swamp Milkweed, along with Butterfly Weed, and another five acres in Indian Blanket and Huisache Daisy. It was a cornucopia of color as the early morning sunrise hit the pasture and it brought joy back into my heart, considering all that had gone on the day before.
George got out of the truck, climbed up in back, and took a picture with his phone.
“What do you think?” I asked him.
“My mother would have like it.”
“You know, from what I can remember of Laura, you’re right,” I said.
“Do you really think the butterflies will come back?”
“When I was a boy living on this ranch, Monarch Butterflies used to be here in the tens of thousands on their way to Mexico. The Texas Hill Country was part of the flyway for them in September and October. I could go out and stand in a pasture and be covered with them within a few minutes. Not anymore. But, maybe, just maybe, this will be the year a few more will land here to lay their eggs on the way to Mexico. And when those Monarch caterpillars are ready they’ll have all of the Milkweed plants they’ll need to thrive and turn into butterflies.”
“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a Monarch Butterfly in San Antonio. What happened to them?”
“They need the milkweed plant to lay their eggs on. My father, and his father before him, overgrazed the land with too many Angora goats. They eventually killed off the butterfly’s natural habitat. The loss of the milkweed plants and heavy pesticide use in the migration corridor has pretty much sealed their fate in this part of Texas. I’m trying to remedy that before I die. If it’s not too late and we can attract a few more this year, I’ll expand the acreage we’ve planted next year.”
“That’s pretty cool, Max. Will you let me know when the migration starts? I’d like to see it.”
“You can count on it. We’d better head back to the ranch house. It’s almost nine.”
“If I don’t get a chance to say it before I leave this afternoon, I’m sorry about Kevin. Given his circumstances, I don’t think he made the right choice. But that’s not for me to say to anyone but you.”
I nodded that I appreciated it.
. . .
Hannah, Shane, and Clete were sitting in Emily’s office drinking coffee when George and I walked in. Hannah had her laptop open and was taking advantage of the WiFi at the Center.
“I saw you head out early this morning. Did you take him out to the Butterfly Pasture?” Clete asked.
I nodded that I had. “This is the year, Clete. I can feel it.”
“I still keep in touch with some of the guys I used to work with at Texas Parks and Wildlife. One of them is a Biologist. I could ask him to come out and take a look,” Shane said.
“What’s he going to tell us? The Monarchs will come or they won’t. No, I have faith in what you and Clete have done on the ranch. The butterflies will find the milkweed patch in greater numbers this year and then we’ll double the acreage next year,” I said.
It seemed just like yesterday that I had hired Shane away from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department to oversee the land restoration on my ranch. He was a good man and I felt comfortable in his being in charge of the work on the Pape Ranch. With my plans for the Pape Ranch, I was concerned the restoration of the ranch wouldn’t be continued after the sale, and Shane would be out of a job. I needed to talk to James Lee about that.
I was watching Hannah at her laptop and thinking about these cayuses, when I realized that my priorities weren’t with them. They had everything under control whether they knew it or not and I shouldn’t worry so much about the Pape Ranch. What was really important to me was at home. Sunny was returning to Washington today and once again I had lost sight of my real priorities.
“Shane, would you make sure George gets to San Antonio this afternoon in time for his flight. I’ve got some personal business to attend to.”
“Sure, Max, no problem. What about our meeting?”
“Put a plan together for the next six weeks, will you. George, would you make sure James Lee hasn’t forgotten about our security needs for the Pape Ranch. And, Clete, maybe I spoke too soon about the jaguar. We’ve made peace for now, so don’t shoot it on sight. Just be careful if it shows up. I’ll talk to you later in a couple of days,” I said and left.
. . .
Katie was at the breakfast table when I walked in. She had a glass of orange juice, which was the extent of her ability to fix herself some breakfast.
“Are you hungry?” I asked her as I leaned over and kissed the top of her head good morning.
“Yes.”
“How about some maple syrup with pancakes and bacon?”
She looked up at me and smiled briefly and then she frowned with a sad face, like an actress in a silent movie.
“What’s the matter?”
“I don’t want to go back,” she said and sighed. “It’s too sad there and there’s nothing to do. All we do is play computer games.”
“Well, I was sort of thinking about going out there with you guys. Maybe you and me could find something to do while the others are busy. What do you think?”
“Momma,” Kate shouted.
She jumped down from her chair and knocked it over. She ran off to find Sunny. I picked up the chair and started fixing her breakfast.
I was whisking the batter, when she dragged Sunny in by the hand, still in her bathrobe. We had barely spoken since Kevin’s announcement and I’d ended up sleeping in the recliner the night before.
“Good morning, Sunshine,” I said to play with her. She looked disheveled, grumpy, and in no mood for humor. She had probably still been asleep when Katie found her. “You want some breakfast?”
“Just coffee.”
“Well, come sit down, before you fall back asleep standing up.”
“Ruby passed last night.”
“I’m sorry, Sunny. What time is your flight back?”
“I cancelled my flight last night.”
That was interesting, I thought. “We should all go out there together for the funeral. Why
don’t you rest up today and we can fly out tomorrow or the next day. I’ll call Ariana and ask them to go out there with us. Do you know where Nick is? I’ll call him.”
“No. I don’t want Kevin to go with us. I texted Nick last night to let him know.”
“What did he say?”
“I don’t know, he hasn’t replied. He was never close to Ruby’s family. He won’t go.”
I led Sunny over to the table and sat her down. She was in the dumps; there was no doubt about that. I started a fresh pot of coffee and wondered what was going through her mind. Did she regret raising her sons on the ranch? I hoped not. In my mind, I knew that eventually both boys would be the better for it, but I also knew she had her regrets about moving to Texas. The pull of her family to raise them on the Lummi Reservation had been strong and substantial during their childhood.
“Have you been out to the Butterfly Pasture yet?”
She was staring at nothing on the table. “No.”
“As soon as you’re dressed, we’ll ride out there. I took George out earlier. It’s absolutely beautiful, Sunny. I think this is going to be the year more Monarchs find us on their migration to Mexico.”
She shrugged her shoulders. She was already there, in that place again, I could tell. I set a coffee mug down on the table in front of her.
“Sweetheart, did you take your pill last night?”
She looked up at me. “I ran out.”
I left her at the table and walked into our bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet above the sink. Her bottle of Seroquel wasn’t there. We had been down this road before, too many times, I thought, and now when it happened again, I was ready. I kept an extra supply of the medicine in the closet in my travel kit. The pills were probably expired, but I figured they were better than nothing until I could get her regular prescription refilled or find what she did with her current supply.
The Turbulence of Butterflies (Max Howard Series Book 6) Page 24