The way the officer had emphasized the word father... Something bad had happened to my mom, maybe she was in trouble. And I was out here playing cowboys on my way to Hollywood.
I’d never felt so utterly self-centered and frivolous in my entire life.
Beneath everything, the burning question I needed to answer was, who was with my father right now?
Clay came up with two mugs and my chest got tighter. I tried to take a deep breath, but I couldn’t inhale properly.
“What’s the matter? What’s happened?” His voice was full of concern and no one had ever sounded like that when they talked to me before. It made the bubble burst and I began to cry.
He put the mugs down immediately and got on the bed, knelt beside me and pulled me to him, holding me and supporting my limp upper body as I sobbed into his naked belly.
“Hey, it’s going to be okay, shh, just tell me what happened,” he soothed, rocking me back and forth.
“I don’t know. The cop wouldn’t explain anything!”
“What cop? Go back to the beginning.”
I explained about the phone call as succinctly as I could.
“You have to go to Alabama, and they can’t tell you why? This is some kind of bullshit. We’re gonna get this straightened out, and if you have to go back, I’m gonna fly back with you. You’re not alone, honey.”
His sweet words made me cry even harder. You’re not alone. All my life, I’d felt alone. And now there was this cowboy who wanted to stand by me through whatever was about to happen. We’d only known each other a few days and his solidarity didn’t make sense at all.
I didn’t know what to say.
* * *
Clay
“All right, sweet one, you need to sit up for me and drink some coffee. This sounds like it’s going to be the kind of day where you’ll be glad you started with a big drink. There’s bacon on downstairs so I’m gonna go turn it into sandwiches.”
I took the stairs two at a time and reached the bacon as it was starting to darken. It went between some slices of bread and I hurried back to Kinsley. My number one priority was making sure she was okay.
“I know the local sheriff, so we’re gonna go see him in a minute. If he can’t get more information from Alabama, no one can.”
She picked at the edges of her sandwich while I finished mine in four bites.
“I’m not hungry. I’m sorry.”
No. This wasn’t going to happen. Not when we probably had a long day and a trip to an airport ahead of us. “Missy, you’re finishing that sandwich if I have to tie you to a fence and spank you until you eat it.”
That got her chewing, and the whole thing was suddenly gone in three minutes.
We drove to Snake Eye sheriff’s office and wandered inside. Sheriff Bob Halsey was at his desk, like usual, while his deputies were probably on patrol.
“Clay, what can I do for you?” he asked, standing up to greet me.
“Hi, Bob. We got a bit of a situation.” I explained about what Birmingham Police Department had told Kinsley to do.
“I’ll call them right now and see if I can’t find out what this is about.”
We sat and waited in silence, and I held Kinsley’s hand. Bob was only on the phone a few minutes, which didn’t bode well.
“Okay, they’re being mighty mysterious about it, but it’s something to do with your mom. They’ve asked if you can fly to Alabama as soon as possible.”
Kinsley shook her head. “I can’t. I don’t have any money. I hitchhiked all the way here. I can’t even get a bus home. What do I do?”
I hated seeing the fear and panic in her eyes, detested hearing it in her voice when she spoke. And I could make it all better.
“Hey, don’t you worry about that, none. I said I’d fly with you, and a gentleman never lets a lady pay for airline tickets,” I told her.
“There’s no way I can pay you back,” she said morosely.
“You don’t need to. It’s just a good deed,” I reassured her. “C’mon, we’ll go straight to the airport and maybe we can be back tomorrow.”
I stood up, still holding her hand, and she had no opportunity to refuse.
“Thanks for your help, Bob,” I told him.
“Son,” Bob said, touching his hat.
I’d seen a lot of Bob over the years, and this was the first time I noticed just how well he watched over Lemon Tree Ranch. He was like our own guardian angel.
* * *
Kinsley
Phoenix Sky Harbor was beautiful. I’d never been in an airport before and I had no idea if it was the same as any other, but I really liked it. There were pretty patterns on the roads we drove under on our way to the building, and inside, there were a few places to get food.
Clay got the tickets for the very next flight. Since we had no luggage, we went straight to our gate and waited.
“It seems unfair that my very first time on an airplane is for some stupid family drama,” I mused.
“Don’t focus on the negative. Just think about how exciting it’s gonna be when that plane gets above the clouds.”
“Do they really go that high?”
“Yep.”
“All the same, after how much effort and time it took to get this close to L.A., I can’t believe I’m in touching distance of my dreams and my sticky life mess is dragging me back.”
“Hey, anything might have happened. Don’t be mad at your mom until you know the facts.”
He sounded stern again, but deep down I knew he was right. I resented having to clean up my mom’s messes, but if anything bad had happened to her or my dad, I’d feel awful.
It was late afternoon when we touched down.
“How do we get from here to the police station, do you think?” I asked him. I’d only really been to Birmingham a couple of times.
“I’ll get us a car.”
I was still processing how easily he said that when he walked over to the Hertz desk and organized a rental car. After some paperwork we were walking toward the parking lot with a key.
Was there anything he didn’t know how to do? And what on earth would I have done without him? I couldn’t believe he thought I was important enough for him to abandon his day—and his brother’s first baby—just to support me.
“Wait, how will Lawson and Alana get back from the hospital?” I asked.
“I called Barrett while you were in the can,” Clay replied. Ever the romantic. I couldn’t help laughing out loud at his blunt explanation.
* * *
Kinsley
“He stays with me,” I told the officer when he tried to make Clay wait outside.
“Fine. Please have seats.” Officer MacGuire spoke in a clipped tone which implied he had better things to do than deal with me. For the fact he’d summoned us here, I felt a pang of irritation at his attitude.
With trepidation, I stepped into the interview room feeling like a criminal. The only furniture was a table and some cheap chairs. There was a recorder on the table, and a loop embedded into the wall that looked like it was designed for bondage.
I guessed that was how they stopped criminals running away.
“When was the last time you saw your mother?” the officer asked.
“Sixteen days ago.”
“Has she called you at all since then?”
I held back my first response, which was that she probably didn’t even know I was gone. It wasn’t as though she noticed me when I was there, except to complain that I didn’t do enough housework.
“No. Although my phone battery died.”
“And you were in Arizona the whole time?”
“No. I was hitchhiking to Los Angeles.” I didn’t want to admit it because it sounded so stupid now I had to explain it to an officer of the law. His job and life must have been so stable. How could he understand what I was trying to do, or why I felt the need to go so far from home?
“But you had no contact from your mother?”
I s
ighed. How many times did I need to reiterate this? “Like I said, no.”
“Didn’t you think that was mighty odd?”
“No. She disappears for days on end sometimes. When I left, I wasn’t sure she’d even notice.” There, I said it.
He scribbled some notes. “Can you come down to the morgue, please? I need you to look at a body.”
My stomach seemed to be in my throat. I didn’t understand. What was he saying? One minute he was asking me all kinds of stupid questions about whether I’d heard from my mom, the next minute shit got real.
“B-body?”
* * *
Kinsley
I didn’t know how much time had passed, but I couldn’t get the vision out of my eyes. Every time I blinked, I saw her again. At first, I’d been in such disbelief that I’d fainted on the floor. There was no way my mom, who had existed all my life even if I hadn’t been so close to her, was the lifeless body I’d just seen. Except, the woman I’d had to identify looked just like my mom. Even had the same tattoo on her ankle. I was forced to concede it was her, but my brain didn’t fully believe it and shut down completely.
When I awoke, it felt like no time had passed, except I wasn’t where I’d been a moment ago. Clay sat me in a chair in a corridor where he gave me water and stayed with me, but nothing seemed real anymore. It was like a gray fog had descended on my thoughts, filtering sights, sounds, temperature... none of it was going in properly.
My mom was...
Oh, jeez. I mean, everyone knows their parents will die someday, but no one should ever have to see their mom the way she was.
Grisly wasn’t even the word for it.
“Literally covered in injuries,” I mumbled. I vomited water onto the floor, and Clay held my hand. I couldn’t begin to comprehend what she’d been through, or how it could have happened.
“I’m so sorry, sweetheart.”
“What the hell happens now? I mean, I have no idea what comes next? Is it the funeral? How do I get her from here to a c-c-cemetery? Are there special taxis for dead people? I don’t even know! And will they catch whoever did this?”
Someone had killed her. That was so hard to put into words. Almost impossible to accept. She’d been hit from behind and her car had gone into a tree. They didn’t know if it was malicious or not but at this point they weren’t ruling anything out.
“I’m gonna help you sort things out. If you need to stay here to take care of it, I’ll be with you. I’ve been through this, I know what you need to do. I’ve got this. Everything’s going to be taken care of.”
His tone was probably supposed to be soothing but I felt like I was floating by myself in a big, empty, gray sea under heavy clouds. There was a lighthouse out there somewhere, and boats, but none of them were visible. I was drifting further and further away from him, and I wasn’t sure I could ever get close to anyone.
I couldn’t even cry. My mom was dead and I couldn’t even cry. Seeing her so broken and battered was just too much to take in.
How was I going to tell my dad? Would he even understand?
* * *
Clay
I took care of everything, just like I promised, starting with her dad.
Going to Kinsley’s home, seeing where she’d grown up, my heart broke. The smell of filth was overwhelming. It was just a dump, with wrecked furniture and dirty dishes and laundry everywhere. Black mold on the walls told me we’d better not stay here for long.
I finally understood why she’d been so desperate and determined to get to Hollywood and become an actress. She had absolutely nothing and no other way of getting herself out of this existence. I guessed she’d fixated on acting a while back, but I already knew she’d never done any training. What chance would she have in a city full of people just like her, running away because Los Angeles called to them like a beacon of false hope?
In one upstairs room, there was a man in a bed. His eyes were open but he seemed not to focus on anything.
“Dad?” Kinsley said. He didn’t respond. “Dad, something’s happened to Mom. I’m real sorry. I wasn’t here and I should have been.” She began to cry. I put a hand on her shoulder.
“It’s okay,” I told her.
“Dad, Mom’s d-d-d-died.”
The man didn’t react at all. I wasn’t sure if he’d even heard his daughter’s words.
When her legs collapsed, I scooped her up and carried her out to the top of the stairs, where I placed her down and perched next to her.
“Does he have a nurse?” I asked quietly.
“Yeah. She checks on him a couple of times a day and cleans him up.”
“Can you call her, please? We need to figure out the best thing to do with your dad.”
She looked at me like I’d just suggested the moon was secretly a pigeon.
“What do you mean? There’s no options. People like us don’t get options. I’ll have to stay and look after him.”
“No.” She was eighteen and he might live another thirty years. She might feel loyal to him, and want the best for him, but leaving her here in this filthy house, broke and taking care of her dad? I wouldn’t allow it.
“I can’t just leave him. He’s my dad.” She shook her head adamantly.
“Hon, look around. He shouldn’t be here. Neither should you. He needs full-time care, in a place with medical facilities. And you need to go and live your life.”
“I can’t afford to send him somewhere better. Don’t you think we would have done that years ago, if we could?” she snapped.
“Missy, it’s not your decision to make. I’m going to cover his bills. Anyway, once he’s out of here, you can sell this house.”
I saw her desire to live her own life warring with her desperate need to take care of her dad. It was admirable loyalty, but she couldn’t give him what he needed, here. I was amazed he’d survived this long without proper facilities.
“What if I never make it as an actress?” she whispered, tears tumbling down her cheeks. “What if I get stuck working at Wendy’s my whole life, waiting for a big break that never comes because I’m just not pretty enough? Then what? How do I repay you?”
“You don’t.”
“Exactly. So I can’t let you cover this. It’s too much. No one should have to spend two people’s salaries a month on someone else’s dad.”
“Two people’s salaries? I’m not sure you’re aware, but ranching’s a little more profitable than that. I’ve got this.”
She shook her head. “He needs more money than I’ll ever earn.”
“You don’t know that. You might land a lead in a film.”
“I never even went to college. What do I know about acting?”
“Hey. No. You’re having the worst day of your life, but the future is going to get better. I promise. Stop thinking about things that aren’t important. And get me that phone number.”
She gave in, albeit reluctantly. I called the nurse and she arranged for Kinsley’s dad to get a room in a nice-sounding residential facility where there would be qualified staff on hand at all times.
We spent the rest of the day making phone calls, then we went out for sushi because we both needed a change of scene. This whole day reminded me of hours and hours sitting in what was now Lawson’s house, alternately calling people and staring at the wallpaper.
It wasn’t just the quantity of places we’d had to deal with, it was how long and in-depth some of those calls had to be. The bank, for example, hadn’t understood when Lawson told them his name, and kept referring to him as Mr. Lawson, then the call handler got even more confused when they couldn’t find an account for Dale Lawson.
I remembered feeling so lost, and having to deal with this huge thing all by myself. Lawson and I had come to blows a couple of times, until eventually neither of us could stand to hear the words “it’s what Dad would have wanted.”
I wished I could tell Kinsley this got easier, or better, but the truth was, the pain of losing a parent never went
away. It just got less all-consuming. Both my mom and my dad had left a gaping hole in my chest. Nothing would ever replace them, and nothing could heal the fact I’d been thrown into the world by myself at a young age and expected to know how to deal with everything.
I knew only too well what Kinsley was going through, and that made it hard to tell her anything. Having experienced it all myself, twice, I was well aware that nothing I said would sound meaningful or sincere right now, even if I meant it from the bottom of my heart.
Instead, I bought her sushi and prayed she’d have the strength and energy she needed to deal with this.
* * *
Kinsley
We spent hours sitting in the sushi restaurant. The staff were very patient and I was grateful. By the time we actually ordered food, Clay had arranged everything. Finding a funeral home, telling relatives, calling the bank, the IRS... I had no idea just how many things needed dealing with but he managed them all. Through the heavy emptiness that was grinding my soul away, I was grateful for his ability to help out. I had no energy reserves left to care about him as much as he deserved, or to show my gratitude, and there was no space in the deluge of emotions to feel any guilt.
“You had to do this before,” I told him, as we ate maki rolls and fumbled with chopsticks.
“Yeah. Twice. I was an orphan at twenty-five.”
“Shit.” I knew his parents weren’t around, but I’d had no idea they’d both died when he was so young. My chopsticks dropped the sushi again and I picked the food up with my fingers, instead, dipping the whole thing in my little bowl of soy sauce.
“My mom was cancer. Dad was a hit and run car accident. We never caught the bastard who did it. It was so senseless.”
“I’m so sorry.” I sipped at my drink as I thought on all this. “How do you deal with knowing the person who took your dad away is still out there?”
“I don’t. I don’t think about it. It’s probably unhealthy, but I never asked a shrink. Some things in life don’t wrap up, and you just have to accept it and move on.”
I didn’t think I could live like that. It would eat me alive.
“Clay?” I didn’t even want to bring this up, but I had to.
Take Me Hard: Arizona Heat 3 Page 9