A Flicker of Light

by Katie Powner

  “You weren’t the only one hurting, you know,” Frank said. “We loved her, too.”

  Mitch recoiled. “Don’t compare your pain to mine.”

  “Like I said.” Frank looked him square in the eye. “This isn’t a competition.”

  Mitch held his gaze. “You have no idea what it’s been like.”

  “Because you’ve never told me.”

  Weariness gripped Mitch suddenly and fiercely. He’d had his reasons for avoiding his best friend. Avoiding the church. Avoiding . . . well, everything. Life. But now all he could think about was Bea having a baby and his mother losing her mind and Marge giving him that look and saying she’d love to come to his birthday party.

  “Would you talk to Marge for me?” Mitch asked. “Tell her to back off a little?”

  Frank’s laugh was long and hard, coming up from the soles of his feet and bursting into the unseasonably warm air. “Not a chance, buddy. Not a chance.”

  SEVENTEEN

  As Jeremy pulled up to the stoplight, Bea looked out the window and cringed. The jacked-up Ford F-350 in the neighboring lane towered over them like Saddle Peak. She was still getting used to being dwarfed on all sides when on the road. In California, the Toyota Matrix fit right in. In Montana, it stood out like a Shetland pony in a herd of wild mustangs. Plus, Dad wouldn’t stop nagging about how its tires weren’t fit to face a Montana winter. “Why’d you trade the Blazer for that thing?” he’d asked three times now.

  In Santa Clara, it was all about gas mileage. But she’d missed the sound of a Power Stroke diesel engine.

  “I still can’t believe it.” Jeremy reached over and squeezed her knee. “We heard our baby’s heartbeat.”

  “Yep.” Bea kept her eyes on the window. “Pretty amazing.”

  Jeremy didn’t comment on the lack of enthusiasm in her voice. Maybe he didn’t notice. It wasn’t that she had been unmoved by the sound of her baby’s heartbeat coming through the monitor when the doctor pressed the wand against her stomach. She had been. Very much. It was just that the resolute thumping sound had made it all so real. So tangible. So inevitable.

  What was her problem? Seriously, she acted as if she were dreading the arrival of her own child. Why wasn’t she crying happy tears every time she thought of holding the little bundle in her arms? Why couldn’t she beam and count down the days like a normal person?

  “Which do you want to get first,” Jeremy asked, “the vitamins or the Orange Julius?”

  The doctor had insisted she start taking prenatal vitamins with folic acid immediately.

  “Orange Julius.”

  He smiled over at her. “You got it.”

  As Jeremy drove toward the mall, Bea surreptitiously studied his face. They’d had a good first year of marriage in Santa Clara. Despite a few bumps, they’d made a lot of great memories, but he’d never looked like this. Happy and content.

  Okay, and sexy. Ha. Maybe that was her hormones talking. Or the ruddiness in his face and slightly more defined muscles in his shoulders that she could only attribute to the hours he’d put in on the Duncan farm.

  “I think Montana agrees with you,” she said.

  His dimples appeared. “I’ll admit, it’s way different here than I expected.”

  “How do you mean?”

  He shrugged. “I feel like I can breathe here. The world just stretches out in front of you for miles and miles.”

  She nodded. That was one of the things she’d missed the most. The wide-open spaces. The way you could look out over the valley and see pretty much the same thing people had been seeing for hundreds of years. There were farmhouses and little towns here and there, but for the most part the land was as untamed and rugged as the day the mountains were born.

  She hadn’t been many places, but Montana had to be one of the best.

  A Luke Bryan song came on, and Jeremy turned down the radio. “We’ve heard this one at least five times today.”

  “That’s the country station for you.”

  “And you know what else?” Jeremy waved a hand in the air. “These songs are always about Southern girls. Why aren’t there any songs about Northern girls?”

  Bea raised one eyebrow. “You been listening to the station a lot?”

  Jeremy made a face. “Like I’ve had a choice.”

  “The older songs are best.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  “You’ve got to give it a chance.” She turned the radio back up. “It’ll grow on you, just like the big sky.”

  He gave her a wink. “If you say so.”

  They picked up their drinks and the vitamins and started back for Moose Creek. There had been snow on the peaks of the Bridgers for a couple of weeks, yet the back way home through the canyon was clear and dry. They’d opted for the scenic route rather than the interstate since it was such a nice day. Though the weatherman on the radio was calling for snow by late this weekend, today she hadn’t even worn a coat.

  “What’s up with your dad’s belt?” Jeremy asked as they passed Moreland Road.

  She wrinkled her nose. Her dad’s belt? “What made you think about that?”

  “I saw that shop across from the mall, Jack’s Custom Leather.” He shrugged. “Your grandpa’s got one and your dad’s got one—I just wondered if it was a Montana thing.”

  “More like a Jensen thing, I guess. The Jensen men receive a belt embossed with their name on it from their fathers when they get married. It’s a tradition.”

  He nodded and drove on as the canyon widened and the valley came into view. When they left Bridger Canyon Drive for Highway 288, Bea checked the time. “Don’t forget to drop me off at The Baked Potato.”

  Jeremy glanced over. “I’m glad you decided to meet up with her.”

  Amber had stopped at the Food Farm the other day and greeted Bea like they’d grown up together. Which of course they had. As she hung a green basket on her arm, she’d repeated her sentiment from the football game: “We should meet up for lunch sometime.”

  As Amber wandered the store picking up a few items, Bea had tried to focus on unboxing the iceberg lettuce but found herself unable to shake off Amber’s words. Had she meant them? Did she really want to be Bea’s friend, or was she just being polite? Amber had probably been nervous to reveal her pregnancy, as well. How had her family reacted?

  In the end, Bea’s desperation to talk to someone—anyone—about the surrealness of being pregnant and the weird things happening to her body won out. She’d rung up Amber’s groceries, handed her the receipt, and forced out the words, “I’m off on Tuesday.”

  Amber had said, “I’m free, too,” with a smile, and they had made their plans.

  Bea was surprised at how easy the whole thing was.

  After stopping to allow a small flock of ducks to cross the street, Jeremy pulled up in front of The Baked Potato. “Have fun. Text me when you want me to pick you up.”

  “No.” Bea opened the door. “I’ll walk home.”

  “Are you sure? You don’t want to overdo it.”

  She rolled her eyes but not so he could see. “I think I can handle it.”

  As he drove away, she fiddled with her phone, then slid it in her pocket. Why was she so nervous? Inside the diner, Amber and Hunter were already seated at a table. Amber was smiling—she always looked happy—but there were dark circles under her eyes and leftover smears of some kind of food on the shoulder of her shirt.

  As Bea walked over to join them, Amber gave her a once-over and laughed. “I remember the days I could leave the house with nothing except what fit in my pockets. Now I have to pack half the house before going anywhere.”

  Bea sat down across from her. “Half the house?”

  Amber indicated her son sitting in a high chair and the paraphernalia strewn around him. “Diapers, wipes, diaper cream, change of clothes, snacks, water bottle. Binky. Blanket. Light jacket and warm jacket in case the weather changes. His favorite toy. I even pack an extra shirt for m
yself, just in case.”

  Bea’s eyes grew wide. “In case what?”

  Amber laughed again. “In case he throws up on me or has a blowout or something. You never know.”

  Bea wondered what her unencumbered life looked like to Amber. “I guess I never thought about that.”

  Amber nodded knowingly. “You’ll learn all about it soon enough.”

  Bea grimaced. “You heard?”

  “Oh, honey.” Amber folded her arms on the table and made a sympathetic sound. “Everybody heard.”

  Bea sighed. Nothing got past the moosevine.

  “When are you due?” Amber asked.

  The doctor had given them a date just that morning at the appointment. “May fourteenth.”

  “A spring baby.” Amber clasped her hands together. “That’s the perfect time to have a baby around here. You won’t have to sweat through the summer, you can eat whatever you want at Christmas, and by the time you’re recovered enough to want to go outside, it will be nice enough to do it.”

  “When was Hunter born?”

  “February. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the entire winter hadn’t waited until the week after he was born to show up. We had to take him to his first well-child exam in two feet of snow.”

  We, she said. Bea had noticed Amber’s left hand was conspicuously bare. She didn’t want to jump to any conclusions, but she wondered about Hunter’s father. It was hard enough for Bea to imagine becoming a mother and dealing with all that at her and Amber’s age. But if she had to do it without Jeremy by her side . . .

  The lone waitress on duty appeared at the table with two glasses of water, wearing jeans and a Moose Creek Spuds sweatshirt. Unlike the servers at the restaurants in Ponderosa, this woman wore no makeup and gave no hint that she was trying to impress anyone or angle for extra tips. She just kept her gray-streaked hair out of her face with a ponytail and tapped the table with her little notepad.

  “Are you ready to order?”

  Neither Bea nor Amber had looked at the menu, but they were ready. The offerings hadn’t changed for as long as Bea could remember. The prices had gone up, but the Tuesday special was still the same.

  “I’ll have the deluxe cheeseburger, please. With extra fries.” Amber tousled Hunter’s hair. “Hunter loves fries.”

  The waitress jotted it down and turned expectant eyes on Bea.

  “I’ll have the same. With a chocolate milk shake.”

  After barely choking down half a bowl of cereal for breakfast, she was starving.

  “Ooh, good idea.” Amber’s excitement made Bea happy. “We’ll have a chocolate shake, too.”

  The waitress nodded and walked away. Bea could appreciate the lack of airs at The Baked Potato. It was the kind of place that never tried to be something it wasn’t. Two-thirds of the floor was laid with gray-speckled linoleum, and the other third had gray-checkered linoleum because when the owners had gone to replace the part of the floor that had been damaged by a small fire, they discovered the speckles had been discontinued and decided the checkers were close enough.

  Amber patted her stomach. “I won’t be able to keep eating like this forever, but I’m still nursing so I think I can get away with it.”

  Bea worked to hide her surprise. She was still nursing? As in, breastfeeding Hunter? But he was sitting up. He ate fries. He had teeth!

  She had so much to learn.

  Amber was happy to fill in Bea’s stunned silence. “My goal is to make it to his first birthday. The lady at the WIC office says a full year of breast milk is super beneficial. Of course, she would say that since they don’t want to add formula to my WIC checks. That stuff costs a fortune.”

  Hunter somehow got hold of a napkin and tried to put it in his mouth. Amber pulled it away and wiped his tongue.

  “What’s WIC?” Bea asked.

  Amber shrugged like she thought everyone should know. “It stands for Women, Infants, and Children. It’s the program where the state gives vouchers for certain types of food to pregnant women, nursing women, and kids up to the age of five. If they qualify.”

  “Oh.” Bea’s mind swirled with a hundred questions she was too embarrassed to ask.

  Amber continued, her persistent smile faltering for a moment. “I qualified easy since I only work part-time and I’m a single mom.” Her face brightened. “I bet you’d qualify, too, since Jeremy’s unemployed.”

  So she was a single mom. What had happened?

  Bea mulled Amber’s words over in her head. Jeremy was self-employed, not unemployed. At least that’s what he was working toward. But aside from his limited stint at the Duncans’, the amount of income he was bringing in was zero, regardless of what you called it, and her twenty-five hours a week at the Food Farm left a lot to be desired.

  She wondered what Jeremy would say about WIC. How he would feel about it. Shouldn’t she know something like that about her husband? Her family leaned so far toward the too-proud-to-accept-handouts side of the fence they were liable to fall off and break their necks. But what about Jeremy?

  Bea poked at an ice cube in her glass with a straw. “What happened to Hunter’s dad?”

  Amber sighed and gave her son a smile. Ran a finger along his cheek and booped his nose. “Well . . .”

  The waitress appeared with two milk shakes, each topped with a generous dollop of whipped cream. “Here you go, girls.”

  Hunter slapped the table and made happy gibberish sounds. Bea understood how he felt. The sight of all that cold chocolate goodness made her whole body take notice. She’d heard about cravings before but had never dreamed they could be so powerful.

  Amber dipped the tip of her spoon into the whipped cream and let Hunter lick it. “The WIC lady would probably have a fit if she saw me doing this.”

  Bea had to suck hard to get the milk shake through her straw because it was so thick. “Well, there aren’t any hidden cameras in here. I think you’re safe.”

  Amber chuckled. “I suppose so.” She gave Hunter another tiny lick and turned on her mushy mommy voice. “We just won’t tell that mean old WIC lady, will we, buddy?” He babbled in response. Amber looked over at Bea. “She’s not really mean. Just intrusive and opinionated.”

  It was Bea’s turn to chuckle. The waitress appeared again with a plate in each hand.

  She plunked them down on the table. “Two deluxe cheeseburgers with extra fries. You girls need anything else?”

  “No, thank you,” Bea said. “We’re good.”

  There weren’t many other people in the diner, so the waitress shuffled behind the counter to restock napkin dispensers.

  Amber squeezed a giant pile of ketchup onto her plate. “Anyway, I was telling you about Hunter’s dad.”

  Bea cringed. Hot coffee, she shouldn’t have brought that up. “You don’t have to.”

  Amber exchanged the ketchup bottle for the mustard and squeezed another pile. “No, it’s fine. I’m surprised you haven’t heard about it around town.”

  Bea pulled the onions from her burger. “Everyone’s too busy talking about me, I guess.”

  “You’re right.” Amber’s eyes twinkled, and she leaned forward like they were sharing a secret. “Thanks for taking the heat off me.”

  “Glad I could help.”

  “Do you remember Axel Scott? He was a couple years ahead of us in school.”

  Bea nodded. “The guy with the mohawk?”

  Amber blushed. “Yes. We got together after I graduated. I moved in with him and everything. He was working at the auto shop, but he always talked about getting out of here. Leaving Moose Creek in the dust and all that. I guess when he found out about Hunter, he couldn’t stand the thought of being tied to this place. He was gone before I could say, ‘Get me some pickles and ice cream.’”

  “Just like that?”

  Amber raised one shoulder. “Just like that. I live with my mom now. She still works at the school, so I watch Hunter during the day and pick up a few hours at the gas station in t
he evenings.”

  “You didn’t want to go to college?”

  “I did.” Amber swirled a spoon through her milk shake and looked Bea over with an assessing gaze before answering. “But a baby changes everything.”

  EIGHTEEN

  I lean my head out of the bathroom into the hall and call to Rand, “You forgot to flush last night.”

  The distinct sound of his walk—thump, slide, thump, slide—draws closer until he appears around the corner. “What’re you talking about?”

  “Someone peed in this toilet.” I point over my shoulder. “And it certainly wasn’t me.”

  He watches me for three blinks, a variety of thoughts moving across his face like the flickering light of a campfire. I don’t recognize any of them, his thoughts. I can’t read them.

  “You were up three or four times during the night.” He takes another step, and his eyes look sad. “You must’ve gone in there at some point.”

  “I did no such thing. I slept like a baby.”

  I had, hadn’t I? I don’t remember getting up. Certainly not three or four times. And I feel very distant and disconnected from the rank, dark yellow liquid in the toilet bowl. I would know if it was mine.

  I put my hands on my hips. “Just admit it. You forgot to flush.”

  Rand shakes his head wearily but gives me what I want. “Sorry, dear.”

  I huff and shove a hand into my pocket, rubbing my penny between two fingers. “All right. Now what should I take out for dinner? You want to grill brats?”

  Fridays are good days for grilling. We still have a couple of venison cheese brats left over from last season. Those normally don’t last more than a few months before we eat them all—those Milligan Meat folks sure know how to make them—but I saw a package in the bottom of the chest freezer this morning. It was just sitting there. I don’t know how I missed it all year.

  “That would be fine,” Rand says.

  He returns to the kitchen to read the ag reports, and I dig the brats out of the freezer in the laundry room and set them in the sink to thaw. From the window above the sink, I can see the mountain. I don’t know how many times I’ve studied it as I washed dishes or rinsed vegetables or scrubbed stained clothing in the sink, but it is as familiar and mysterious to me as Rand’s face. I know each crease, each bend. Every rise and fall. I’ve noted every season as it has come and gone. Yet I wonder if I know them at all, these faces.