“It’s going to take some getting used to,” his mom said. All the color had drained from her face and she looked really mad. “All I ask is for you to give it a chance and try to keep an open mind. Because we aren’t moving back.”
###
Sarah sat on the deck, sipped her wine and let the peacefulness of the night air fill her lungs and the empty places in her heart. Dinner had been a disaster, with Kevin sulking and Lyle and Jenny trying to lighten the mood. Sarah could feel herself slipping into the void of space where she’d spent much of the last two years, half present, going through the motions of every day life, but not really involved.
That’s what Kevin had meant, her being a downer. He was right. She suspected he and Lyle, Jenny and everyone else knew she was only partly in the moment most of the time. That’s why people kept their distance. Being in Colorado this past week had her feeling alive again. But she could feel herself backpedaling and she didn’t know how to stop the momentum.
So many people had advised them to seek counseling after Todd’s death. She’d resisted, thought it would be too weird, too weak, too slippery a slope to go down and ever get back up. Maybe her insistence on handling things herself, within the family, had been a mistake. Now that they were in a small town where the kind of therapy they needed probably wasn’t even available, she began to wonder if it might help. Typical.
“What are you sitting over there moping about?” Jenny asked.
Sarah sighed. Just the sound of it made her feel pathetic. “I’m just wondering if I should have put us all in therapy like everybody suggested.”
“Oh, pooh. That’s all you’d need is for Kevin and Lyle to use their dad’s dying as an excuse for everything that goes wrong in their lives. You don’t need therapy now any more than you did back then. You’re just a little lost at the moment. You’ll find your way. Hell, I’m starting to think being out here is just what you all need.”
Sarah looked at her surprised. Jenny had been supportive of her decision to move, always told Sarah to follow her instincts, that she was a good mother and to trust her gut. But at the same time, Sarah knew she’d been worried. This was the first time she’d heard Jenny admit the move was a good idea.
“Sarah, I know its hard hearing Kevin say what he did, but you can’t listen to him. He’s angry and upset, but he still loves you. He needs to know you’re sure about this and I think that’s why he’s pushing you so hard.”
Sarah watched the play of firelight flicker over Jenny’s features, her big soulful eyes and the button nose that softened the hard edges of her often biting personality. She could see her sister trying to organize her thoughts carefully so as not to say the wrong thing. She trusted the advice Jenny offered because she knew it came from her heart and intuitive mind.
“Don’t you remember when we were teenagers and we were mad at mom?” Jenny asked. “I don’t mean mad because she wouldn’t let us go to the mall or dumb stuff like that, but really mad.”
“Like the time I overheard her telling Mrs. Johnson you’d gotten your period?” Sarah asked. “You flipped out when I told you.”
“Exactly.” Jenny laughed. “I was furious with her for telling my personal business to a neighbor. She didn’t think it was a big deal. I thought she didn’t understand, couldn’t understand how humiliating it was for me to know that Mrs. Johnson knew something like that about me. I kept thinking, what if she tells Brad? What if Brad Johnson, the hottest guy in the seventh grade, knows I started my period?”
“You and mom didn’t speak for almost a week after the big blow up.”
“Do you know what I said to her during the big blow up?” Sarah shook her head. “I threw everything in her face I knew would eat away at her self-esteem. I told her she looked fat, she was the worst-dressed mother in school, she was an embarrassment to me, and I topped it off by telling her I hated her pecan pie.”
“What did any of that have to do with her telling Mrs. Johnson about you getting your period?”
“Nothing. I said it all to hurt her and make her feel small just the way she’d hurt me and made me feel small.” Jenny turned and looked Sarah in the eye. “That’s what Kevin’s doing to you. He’s hitting on every insecurity you have about this move to punish you, like he feels he’s being punished. But I also think, deep down, he needs you to stand up and convince him this is the right thing for all of you. If he sees you wavering about this he’s going to feel like the rug’s been pulled out from under him. He’s scared. He sees the uncertainty in your eyes and its making him worried.”
“Damn,” Sarah said. “You should have been a mother. That was good.”
Jenny smiled. “It was good, wasn’t it?”
“I am sure about the move. But when he’s like that, so angry and hateful, I don’t know how to convince him I’m doing this for him--for us--and not to punish him. We’ve all been through enough. I’m not trying to make it harder on him and Lyle. I knew this would be tough, but it’s harder than I thought.” Sarah reached out and took Jenny’s hand. “You sure you don’t want to move out here with us?”
Jenny squeezed her hand. “If this town’s full of Marlboro men like your Dodge, I may just have to put some serious thought into it.”
“He’s not my Dodge. You were the one he couldn’t take his eyes off.” Sarah almost winced when she heard the jealousy in her voice. She’d expected Jenny’s reaction to Dodge the moment she’d laid eyes on him. What she hadn’t expected was for it to bother her so much. Jenny raised her brows curiously. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound like that. I’m not sure where that came from.”
“I know where it came from and I’m damn glad to hear it. He’s hot. I’d hope you’d take an interest in a hot guy who’s taken an interest in you.”
Sarah snorted. “He’s not interested in me. He’s helping me with a few things because of some obligation. Then he’ll be gone.”
“He wasn’t obligated to lend you his truck or bring his horses out tomorrow. But he did, and he is. He was flirting with you earlier.” Jenny raised her hands when Sarah tried to protest. “I know flirting when I see it and he was flirting. And there’s not a thing in the world wrong with it.”
“I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Sarah, your husband was a wonderful man. I know you can’t replace him because I don’t think there’s another man alive who can walk in his shoes. But that doesn’t mean you have to wither away with nothing but your memories of him keeping you warm at night.”
“I’m not interested in replacing Todd. I’m not interested in anything with anyone. I can’t imagine ever being interested in someone like that again.”
“That’s because you won’t let yourself think about dating and moving forward. You’ve already moved yourself and the kids damn near across the country. Why won’t you even consider starting over in another way?”
“You’ve got to be kidding me. With all the hostility I’m facing from Kevin right now, you expect me to start dating again. That would send the kids right over the edge.”
“You wouldn’t be dating for the kids, Sarah. You’d be doing it for you.”
Sarah snuggled deeper into the blanket she’d wrapped around her shoulders. “I’m not dating at all. And Dodge is the last person I’d consider dating anyway.”
“Oh really?”
“Yes, really. Can you honestly see me with him?”
“I’d actually like to see me with him. But he’s not interested in me, he’s interested in you.”
“Where do you get that, Jenny? I just don’t see it. I think you’re trying to plant a seed in my head to get me back on the dating wagon. All you’re going to end up doing is making a fool of me.”
Jenny reached over and squeezed Sarah’s arm. “I’m going to bed. I’ll leave you to your thoughts.”
Chapter 9
Dodge let lukewarm water splash directly in his face before he shut off the shower and reached for a towel. He hadn’t slept well the last fe
w nights. He’d hoped the nearly cold water would allow him to wake up enough to shake off the dreams that had haunted him at night. He’d fall into bed exhausted from a day’s hard labor. Sometime after midnight, he’d sit up with a start, jolted awake and gasping for breath. His skin would be coated in a slick sheen of sweat and Wendy Hawkins angelic face the only recollection of his nightmare.
He could see her as clearly as if she’d been seated on the bed next to him, her golden blonde ringlets shining in the moonlight. She always wore the same wide eyed look on her face when she’d silently begged him to go along with her story and change the course of his life forever.
While he’d aged appropriately in his thirty-eight years of living, she’d remained the same, frozen in his memories as a shy nineteen-year-old. She used to run around in the shadow of his older sister, Isabel, sneaking glances his way when she thought he wasn’t looking. There were very few occasions when he hadn’t been looking and wondering how the soft roundness of her body would feel against all the hard planes of his.
He’d been eighteen, a senior in high school, and willing to jump on anything remotely female. There’d been something about Wendy, the way she’d pretend to ignore him and then go out of her way to rub against him or flash a bit of skin in the most innocent way. He’d endured almost a year of her harmless flirtation. He’d wanted her as badly as he’d wanted Mary Lynn Fletcher, the first of many girlfriends who’d finally agreed to let him have her when they were both fifteen.
Wendy was a tease. One night at the local pub, a place where the legal drinking age depended on how much money you slipped the bartender, he saw a golden opportunity with Wendy. She was there alone, or appeared to be when he first saw her. With the help of several beers, he’d decided to give her what, in his mind, she’d been begging to have for months.
As he sauntered to the table where she sat nursing a bottle of Miller Lite, intent on picking the label off with her hot pink fingernail, he was stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of the most intimidating man he’d ever seen. Dodge was big at eighteen, measuring in at near his present six-three, all sinewy muscle and lanky limbs. But he had nothing on the massive man who seemed to pound across the smoky bar and take the seat opposite Wendy in the dimly lit booth. Wendy smiled at him, that shy smile Dodge thought she’d reserved for him. She reached her hand across the table to link their fingers. His hands were big enough to crush her skull in his palm. Dodge stood there, right in the middle of the bar, flanked by feeble dancers and posters of exotic women in beer ads, just watching his innocent Wendy offer herself up to another.
And that’s where his friend Tommy Thornton found him, staring into the booth.
“What’s up, man?” Tommy’d asked, then let his gaze follow Dodge’s stare. Wendy and the monster were not only joined at the hands but were making serious attempts to molest each other with their legs under the table. “Whoa. Is that Wendy Hawkins? Damn, who’s that guy she’s with? He’s not from around here.”
Dodge couldn’t answer. He and Tommy stood rooted to their spots, gaping as Wendy and her new friend eased out of the booth and out the back door toward the parking lot.
“Do you think we should follow her? Make sure she’s okay?” Tommy asked. He was as innocent as any sheltered Hailey boy. Watching one of its better known young girls ushered out the back of a bar in the arms of a leather-clad unknown didn’t sit quite right.
“Yeah, I guess,” Dodge said.
They went out the same door the man had pressed Wendy’s back against when he pushed her outside. It had just swung closed when they saw Wendy in the passenger seat of an old Chevy Malibu, dented from one end to the next, snuggled up against the stranger. She spotted Dodge watching from the back alley and actually blew a kiss in his direction and laughed as the car pulled away from the lot.
“Damn, I never thought I’d see the day sweet Wendy Hawkins took a walk on the wild side,” Tommy said as he emerged from Dodge’s shadow. “Do you think she knows what she’s doing?”
Dodge watched the trail of exhaust from the Malibu’s tailpipe disappear into the cold spring night and shrugged his shoulders. “I would’ve wondered until she blew that kiss. I sure didn’t see that one coming.”
That was the last time he’d seen Wendy before she weaved a tale so contorted, so believable, it’d caught him like a fish on a line. Her lies broke every allegiance he’d formed with family and friends. Her one night’s walk on the wild side had cost a lot of people their pride and faith, and had left Dodge wondering how his family could be so quick to turn their backs on him.
As he looked at his reflection in the mirror, Dodge felt that same hardening in his belly he’d felt that night. He kneaded his side from habit after all these years, and tried to ease the weight that had settled there, heavier now than he remembered.
He’d considered driving out to her gravesite one Sunday after he’d been back in town for a few weeks. The dreams had started up again as soon as he’d returned to Hailey. He thought maybe if he went to her gravesite he could somehow make things right between the two of them. Maybe she’d let him have his peace at night. But he hadn’t done it, and knew he wouldn’t. If anyone saw him at her grave, they’d assume he was guilty. He already felt enough guilt where Wendy Hawkins was concerned. Besides, his dad was getting on in years. He still ranched, but the years were wearing on him. Dodge didn’t want old news rearing its ugly head again in what could be Donnie Dodge’s last few years. He’d carried the burden around long enough.
Dodge dressed quickly and went into the kitchen he only used for making coffee and storing beer. He let the heat of the coffee mug fill his hands, leaned against the old Formica countertops and thought about the time he’d spent at the Woodward ranch the day before. He smiled as he remembered the way Sarah screamed when his gentlest horse had whinnied while she’d petted his muzzle. That woman sure was jumpy around horses. She’d pretend to be fine and all the while have that scared look on her face. She’d damn near rubbed a hole in her jeans wiping her sweaty palms. He’d tried to be exasperated with her but he was just too entertained to be annoyed.
It hadn’t taken long to explore the property on the other side of the river, a vastly overgrown area ripe for grazing. Every time he stepped foot on the property he was surprised at its potential. He found himself itching to help her turn it into the showplace it was destined to become. He thought of Kevin, who’d done everything he could to irritate his mother. The kid was the polar opposite of his brother. Dodge saw shades of himself as a teenager in the gangly boy. The tension between Kevin and Sarah was so strong, he felt as though there was actual wattage in the air. He had to give Sarah credit, she certainly stood her ground with the kid. She had a long, hard road with that one.
And then there was Jenny. She’d watched him like a hawk, staring and making all sorts of sexual innuendos. She had an agenda, that was clear, but what she wanted he just couldn’t put his finger on. They’d had a nice dinner and he’d let the boys ride his horses. Lyle even helped load them back in the trailer while Kevin sulked and watched from a distance.
He rubbed his hands over his face, dumped the rest of his coffee into a thermos and headed out the door for another day of work.
###
Sarah carefully placed the phone in the cradle and turned to face her sister as she put the milk from breakfast in the refrigerator.
“Who was that?” Jenny asked. “And why do you look so worried?”
Sarah let her body fall into a barstool and shook her head. “That was Luis, the guy Paula recommended for the caretakers job. He’s changed his mind. He doesn’t want it.”
“So. Get someone else.”
“It’s not that easy. He was the only person Paula recommended and no one’s even called about my ad in the paper.” She shrugged her shoulders and rolled her neck from side to side to ease the tension that had settled there since Paula’s call. “I just don’t get it. He seemed real excited when we talked yesterday. He loved the h
ouse and said he’d be out today to do some repairs on the roof and fix the broken window. Now he’s just changed his mind. Don’t you think that’s weird?”
Jenny came around the bar and sat down next to Sarah. “Maybe his wife wasn’t as keen on the idea as he was.”
“He wasn’t married. He had a few cousins who were going to live there with him. Paula said they were good guys, that I’d be lucky to have them all working together. Damn it, now I don’t know what to do.”
“Why don’t you call Dodge and see if he can help?”
“No, he’s helped enough. I’ll just have to run the ad again, maybe put it in a couple of the surrounding papers and see what happens. I guess it doesn’t matter because the fences won’t be in until next week anyway. But I was hoping to have someone settled and ready to go by then.”
A loud horn blow from the garage had them both jumping in surprise. “I’m coming.” Sarah shouted down the stairs. “I forgot the boys were waiting.”
Jenny got up and placed a hand on her sister’s shoulder. “Go on, Sarah. If you’re going to get the kids to school this morning you need to get a move on.”
###
Hailey Junior-Senior high school sat on another rural offshoot of the Rifle Range, nestled among surrounding farms with circular pivots and stacks of hay piled in fields as far as the eye could see. The school consisted of a series of average sized two-story brick buildings, reminiscent of the old Atlanta city schools that had been torn down or remodeled into urban lofts or office buildings. From the road, Sarah saw a football field with small bleachers, an adequately maintained baseball field and metal outbuildings that she assumed were used by the physical fitness department. There were a handful of busses unloading children. She watched them talk in small groups and wander into the main hall of the building. The school was a fraction of the size of their school back home, a fact Kevin groaned loudly about as they pulled into the parking lot.
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