by Lisa Wingate
I went to my bedroom, changed into shorts and a T-shirt from some long-forgotten discipleship weekend, and splashed water on my face to tamp down the heat of emotion. Rather than breaking apart and spending another evening with my head buried under a blanket, I sat on the sofa, pulled out my briefcase and laptop, and spent the time catching up on case files.
While I was working, I started a file on Birdie. The more I thought about it, the more I knew that we had to get CPS involved, one way or another. There were so many risks in Birdie’s situation – Len’s mental capacity, the dogs and other animals she might come in contact with, water-related dangers, undoubtedly firearms in the home, the questions about Birdie’s mother. What if this mother, whoever she was, simply came back and picked Birdie up? They could disappear without a trace. A child in Birdie’s situation needed to be monitored by the legal system and assessed in terms of physical, emotional, and educational needs.
Setting the computer aside, I rested my head against the chair and let out a long sigh, trying to sort through all the potential problems. I wanted to talk it over with someone – with Mart. I wondered where he was, and why he hadn’t come by with the form for Daniel, and what his thoughts about Birdie’s situation were now… .
The cell phone ringing woke me, and I sat up, confused. I’d been asleep long enough to have lost track of where I was and what I’d been doing. Picking up the phone, I answered, blinking the fog from my eyes.
Mart was on the other end. “This is Mart McClendon.” The greeting seemed strangely formal, as if my voice had caught him by surprise. “Sorry to be calling so late. I got tied up with a stolen-boat case. I figured I’d get your voice mail.”
“No, you got the real thing.” I glanced at the clock. Eleven thirty. Down the hall, Dustin’s music was blaring, the bass rattling the walls, so that the house seemed to have a heartbeat. “I was up working.”
“I didn’t mean to catch you by surprise,” Mart apologized again. “I just didn’t want to head in for the night without letting you know I can bring the water safety form by tomorrow. I got a little more information about Len and Birdie this afternoon, though.”
Head in for the night … I wondered where he was, and why he was working at almost midnight. I felt mildly guilty for the fact that he felt he had to call me. “We can wait until morning to talk, if that’s better.”
“Nah.” I heard the rumble of an engine behind his voice. “I was just on my way home. Wanted to call while it was on my mind.”
I was on his mind, fluttered through my head, bright and giddy like a bluebird. I quickly shooed the thought away. It. He’d said it was on his mind, as in the issue involving Len, and possibly the water safety form. “Where are you?” Blood prickled into my cheeks. That sounded like an invitation.
“Down here on the lake. I saw your light on.”
He saw my light on? So he hadn’t expected to get my voice mail, after all… . Something did a hitch kick inside me. I stood up and walked to the window, gazed down at the expanse of velvety blackness that was the water. Above the hills, the moon rocked on its back, a large, lazy half circle, casting a silvery trail across the water. I scanned the expanse for boats. Tonight the lake was as still and silent as ink in a well. “Where?” Standing on my toes, I gazed toward the Scissortail. Maybe he’d been flagging buoy-zone violators again.
Red and green navigation lights came on and glittered against the water below our dock. “Right here,” he said. “See me now?”
I’m coming down there. The words were on the tip of my tongue, but I looked down at the old T-shirt and shorts, slid a hand over my lopsided ponytail, and thought, I can’t go out there like this … in the middle of the night. “Oh, okay, I can see you now.” What a completely bland, uninteresting thing to say. Backing away from the window, I had the unsettling thought that if I could see the boat, he could probably see me standing in the window. “What did you find out about Len?”
“I should probably just catch you tomorrow.” His voice was flat, no longer throaty, warm, inviting. What was the undercurrent I heard in those words? Disappointment? “It’s complicated.”
You are absolutely no fun, Bonnie complained in my head.
I pictured myself slipping into the flip-flops from the back porch, running down the hill, the dewy grass cool and slippery underfoot. I tasted the night air, heard the water ripple softly, bending and changing the moon glow, making it dance.
You shouldn’t. You have absolutely no business going down there. He’ll think it’s an invitation. Besides, you look terrible. What if the neighbors see …
“Hang on a minute, I’m coming down.” My heart zinged into my throat, and before I could do one more thing to talk myself out of it, I went silently through the back door and slid my feet into the flip-flops. At the Blues’ house, a little dog barked warily. Pressing a hand over my mouth, I snickered, feeling like a schoolgirl sneaking out after curfew. Even as a schoolgirl, I would have been afraid to sneak out at night. I’d heard too many warnings about the reasons I shouldn’t, couldn’t, had better not.
Freedom, life, exhilaration swirled through me as I dashed down the hill in the moon shadow of pecan trees. An owl hooted, and I stopped short, then laughed silently at myself and continued toward the water, my feet landing in the wet grass, splashes of dew flicking upward, showering my skin with cool pinpoints. I felt alive for the first time in recent memory – as if in this moment, running alone through the night, I could leave behind everything I dragged with me during the day. Here, in the darkness, I was free of those burdens, free of myself.
When I neared the water, I could hear Mart’s boat bumping the dock in the darkness. By reflex, I reached for the light switch as I passed the electrical box, but then I left it be. There was enough moonlight to see by. At the end of the dock, Mart was throwing his mooring line over a post. He stepped off the boat, a tall dark figure silhouetted against the moon.
My heart rose into my throat, and a rush of possibilities whirled through me – fast, wild, out of control. Stopping at the edge of the grass, I smoothed my clothes, tried to catch my breath. Mart waited, leaning against the railing near his boat, his long legs crossed comfortably, his head tilted as if he were watching me approach.
I wondered how much he could see. Maybe the faded T-shirt and oversized shorts didn’t show in the moonlight. Maybe I looked like Julia Roberts, striding down the beach in a scene with warm, false lighting.
Not likely, but the fantasy was a confidence booster.
“Hey.” Mart’s greeting seemed quiet, intimate. “You get your feet wet?”
I realized that my flip-flops were making squishy, flatulent sounds as I walked. So much for the movie-scene image. Julia Roberts never made squishy sounds when she walked.“It felt good,” I said, a giddy giggle in the words. “In all the years we came to the lake, my mother never let us walk down here at night. She was always afraid we’d step on a snake or catch some disease from a mosquito bite.”
“Doesn’t look like you’re afraid.” It was probably one of the nicest things he could have said to me. He had no way of knowing that, of course.
“I’m not.” It was a lie, but I wanted it to be true. Stopping beside him, I rested my palms on the railing and gazed at the water. “It’s gorgeous out here.” Mother didn’t know what she was missing.
“It is,” Mart agreed. “It’s my favorite part of the job – being on the lake after dark.”
“I can see why.” Taking in a long draft of moist air, I tipped my head back. A million stars poured out across the sky, so bright and close it seemed as if I could feel their heat on my skin. How foolish I was to have wasted evening after evening curled up on the sofa crying, when something so incredible was right outside my door. Here, with soft currents strumming the shoreline and the black velvet sky stretching toward the horizon, it was hard to feel as if anything could be wrong in the entire world. “Guess I should get out more.”
“Guess you should.” From the
corner of my eye, I saw him reach down and scoop a pebble off the dock, then skim it across the lake. “You really haven’t seen it until you’ve seen it from the water. How about a ride?”
A tingle of expectation slid over my skin, featherlight – and for just a moment, I imagined speeding over the surface in the darkness. In the fantasy, Mart was at the wheel, his smile wide and white in the moonlight, a challenge of sorts.
I looked at him, caught his face in moonlight, and his smile was the one I’d imagined. “It’s worth the trip,” he said, his eyes dark, fathomless.
The breeze tickled loose hairs on the back of my neck. I wanted to say yes, to build a wall between myself and reality, and glide onto the lake with him. But even now, a dozen hesitations were pressing at the edges of my consciousness, like the sentries of an oncoming army. What if Dustin came looking for me? What if I couldn’t think of a thing to say out there? What if, once we were in close proximity in the dark, it was uncomfortable and awkward? What if it gave Mart the impression that all of this was leading somewhere?
What if he meant for it to?
That last thought rushed through my mind like a vehicle hydroplaning out of control. A squeal of brakes quickly followed. “I really shouldn’t. I have so much work to do.”
Nodding, he rested one leg on the dock railing, so that he was half sitting on it. He crossed his arms over his chest, as if he were perfectly happy to hang out here on the dock with me. “Maybe another time.”
“Maybe.” I felt like such a loser. So much for fun and impulsive. I was back to my boring self. I rested my elbows on the railing, sighed, felt freedom just out of reach.
“Maybe tomorrow night.” The invitation in his words was obvious. My body quickened in response, and loneliness pinched in some broken part of me. Did I really have it in me to … to … What? What was he was asking for?
He was leaning toward me, his head inclined slightly to one side, waiting for an answer. “No pressure or anything, just a ride on the lake,” he said finally.
I chewed my lip, trying to come up with the right thing to say. For some reason, no didn’t seem like the right thing. I wanted the invitation to remain open.“I’ll have to see how Dustin’s doing tomorrow. We didn’t have the best night tonight.” Most certainly I didn’t want Dustin to see me jetting off in the company of his nemesis, the game warden. With all the problems between Dustin and me, and his latent resentment toward Mart, that would be a disaster.
“Fair enough,” Mart agreed, as if I didn’t need to explain further. Still, I felt I did, or maybe I just needed to talk to someone.
“Dustin is having such a hard time settling in. Everything here is different for him – the house, the neighborhood, the kids. It being just the two of us, instead of …” Without meaning to, I’d stepped onto the slippery slope of divorce history. This wasn’t the time and place to get into it, but somehow, the truth came spilling out of me anyway. “Dustin misses his dad. They were close, but …” There was no way to put a good light on the past, no way to say it that wasn’t humiliating. “His dad has … moved on to a whole new life, I guess you’d say. Dustin doesn’t understand it. It’s like he’s lost everything at once – his friends, his house, his school, his dad, his church.” His faith. Our faith.
My fingers gripped the rail, its texture rough and weathered, earthy and real. I shook my head, swallowing a rising lump in my throat, feeling as helpless and confused as the fourteen-year-old boy I’d just described.
“He hasn’t lost his mom.” Mart’s voice was an island in the storm, something solid.
“Sometimes I think he’d like to.”
“Well, you know, sometimes we’re hardest on the people we know we can count on not to ditch us no matter how lousy we act.”
I turned to look at him, wishing I could see this face. This wise, tender side of him was so out of keeping with the badge and the uniform and the gun. “Spoken like someone who has experience with kids.” Suddenly I found myself on a fishing expedition – trolling for details again.
“Just nieces and nephews, and the kids I run into on the job,” he admitted. “I tend to catch a lot of kids at the moment that they’re about to realize they’re not as big as they think they are. I can remember being in their shoes. My brothers and I got in more than our share of scrapes growing up. You put a kid in a tight spot, and the first thing he wants is his mama – believe me.”
“Thanks.” I felt a stone lifting from the pile weighing on my heart, shucking off into the lake. I heard it sinking to the bottom, disappearing. “I just hope things go well when school starts. I hope he’s over the obsession with this … Cassandra girl before then.”
Mart clicked his tongue against his teeth, producing a speculative sound. “Cassandra. We’ll be seeing Cassandra in the water safety class, actually. Her folks don’t come from big money like the other delinquents in the boat.”
“Oh, great. I was hoping at least that complication would be gone before school started.”
Mart chuckled. “Well, now, Mom. A cute girl’s the best motivation I know of for regular school attendance.”
I groaned inwardly at the idea of Dustin taking up an interest in girls when everything else was such a mess. He had enough issues to deal with right now. “He just doesn’t need any more disappointments … temptations … whatever. I don’t know what to do to make it better for him. I try to talk to him about things, but it’s like he cringes every time I walk into the room.”
Mart leaned closer, so close that the space between us felt intimate. “He’s a fourteen-year-old boy, and you’re his mom.” His voice was low, as if he were divulging a secret.“There’re things a fourteen-year-old boy can’t tell his mama.”
“He never used to be that way.” The sentence trembled with a ridiculous amount of emotion. I pressed my fingertips to my forehead and closed my eyes, embarrassed.“Sorry. Some psychologist, huh?” I needed to steer this conversation back to the information Mart had learned about Birdie. We’d drifted way too far into personal issues, and I was making an idiot of myself.
“Could be there’re some things they don’t tell you in psychology school.” Mart chuckled softly, an empathic sound. “He’s in that rough period when everything changes with boys. One minute, you’re a stringy little kid, chasing frogs, and your mama is your best girl. You go to sleep, and you wake up three inches taller, with a voice you don’t even recognize. Next thing you know, there’s a whole world of girls out there who look interesting.You can’t exactly tell that to your old best girl, can you?”
I buried my face in my hands. “Ohhh, I’m not ready for this.” Dustin’s entire childhood flashed before my eyes. Why did he have to pick now to become a teenager?
Somewhere in the storm of mom emotions, there was a small island of comfort. Perhaps not all of Dustin’s issues were related to the divorce. Perhaps some of this was normal – just growing pains.
“It’ll sort itself out.” Mart’s voice was kind, surprisingly close. I felt the nearness of him, and when I looked up, he was a tall shadow blocking the stars.“Be patient,” he said quietly. Suddenly, his presence there felt so normal, so reassuring and right.
I butted him softly with my shoulder, the way a friend might after a joke. “That’s not my strong suit, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“I’ve noticed.” He chuckled again, and I knew I should move away, but I leaned into him instead. The palm of his hand slid over my cheek, brushed my hair, tilted my face upward. I didn’t stop it.
His eyes met mine in the soft glow of the night, and I felt the dock shifting, breaking free of the land, drifting out onto the water. I raised a hand, braced it against his chest, felt the strong cords of muscle underneath. His fingers slid over mine, lifted them, and he pressed a kiss, featherlight against my skin. The sensation burned through me like a flash fire, and I caught a breath, then let it go, shivered with a strange expectation at the touch of his skin against mine, his arm slipping around me, strong, soli
d, unexpectedly natural. The pad of his thumb caressed my chin, tipped my head back. I closed my eyes, felt his breath, then his lips touching mine.
The night swirled like a vortex, a whirlpool of sound and sensation, desire and surprise. I abandoned myself to it, let myself be swept away on the water, the storm too powerful for the anchors of fear or hesitation. For now, there was only Mart and me, floating off into the night, free of all ties to shore.
All good things come to those who bait.
– Anonymous
(via Nester Grimland, retired
mechanic and regular customer)
Chapter 16
Mart McClendon
My mama had a theory that I’d never settled down and found the right woman because that first heartbreak with the pretty student teacher had left behind some sort of lasting damage. She was sorry she’d ever let me sign up for the play.
When I kissed Andrea, I sure wasn’t thinking about that student teacher, but I did feel like Robin Hood. I felt like I’d slipped into the stronghold, stolen something valuable, and whisked it off into the night. Some sappy, poetic line from the play – stuff about the moon and the stars and Maid Marian’s lips – dredged from my memory banks. Luckily I was kissing Andrea right then, so nothing stupid spilled out my mouth.
Everything about that moment, even the random lines in my head, seemed to suit, though. I didn’t understand those lines as a fourteen-year-old lovesick boy, but now I could relate to Robin Hood’s motivation.
Moments like that have to end, of course. The thing about borrowed time is that it always runs out quicker than you want it to. Andrea pulled away a little, and I let her go, and for a minute, we stood a few inches apart, her face turned upward, her eyes searching mine.