by Ann McMan
On her way to Charlie’s tonight, she’d been following a pickup truck that was missing its tailgate. Right before she turned off Highway 58, something had rolled out of the truck bed and smacked down on the hood of her car. The noise it made was so loud, it scared the crap out of her. She pulled off the road to see if the object left any damage. It had. Of course. The dent on the hood was pretty deep, too—and when she looked back up the road, she could see a can of something still rolling around on the ground. Roma Jean had backtracked and picked it up.
Cling peaches in heavy syrup.
Just her luck. She knew her father would never let her hear the end of this, even though it wasn’t her fault. She kept the can of peaches just in case. Maybe she could make it up to him by baking some cobbler?
No. That would never work. She could just hear her mother saying Daddy couldn’t eat them kind of peaches because of his “sugar.”
She was praying maybe Charlie could pull the dent out with a plunger. That was partly why she kept waiting here on her: she didn’t want to risk having her father see the car before she could get it fixed.
Sitting outside Charlie’s house this long was creating other problems, too. She knew they wouldn’t be able to keep their relationship secret for much longer—especially if she kept hanging out on Charlie’s porch like some kind of fanatical Jehovah’s Witness.
She looked at her watch again. Charlie had said she’d be home shortly after her shift ended. Roma Jean couldn’t risk being late for supper, so she hoped Charlie would get there soon. As much as she wanted to, she could never stay overnight. That would be a bridge too far—at least when she was home from college and unofficially living with her parents. Her classes started in a couple of weeks, and she’d have more freedom then.
The ratty car came toward the house again. She heard it before she saw it. This time, it turned into Charlie’s driveway and parked beside Roma Jean’s Caprice.
She felt her pulse rate tick up. It seemed really quiet after the driver shut his engine off. The only sound came from a chorus of peep frogs that must’ve taken up residence in the abandoned above-ground swimming pool next door. For the first time, she realized that sitting outside hadn’t been the best idea. That insight made her feel even more nervous.
After a few moments, a skinny man with pale skin and a gaunt face climbed out of the car. Who was he? And whatever would she say to him about why she was sitting there on Charlie’s porch, so late on a Wednesday night?
The man approached her. She could make out the faded outlines of a tattoo creeping up above his shirt collar, on the sagging skin of his neck.
“Excuse me, young lady.” He inclined his head toward her. “Is this here where Charlene Davis lives?”
“Yes, sir,” Roma Jean replied because she wasn’t certain how else to answer him. “But she’s not at home right now.” Oh, real smart, she chided herself. Go ahead and advertise that you’re here all alone. Something about his sudden appearance was making the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. And nobody in Jericho ever called Charlie “Charlene.” Roma Jean had first thought about reaching for her cellphone, just in case she needed to call for help, but the man seemed pretty harmless.
“I don’t mean to trouble you none,” he continued, “but could you tell me when you expect her back?”
“Um. Any minute now. She’s on her way home from work.”
He stared at the cracked pavement on Charlie’s driveway.
“I won’t trouble you no more,” he said. “But if you don’t mind tellin’ her that Manfred stopped by, I’d appreciate it.”
“Manfred?” Roma Jean repeated.
“Yes, ma’am. Manfred.” He nodded at her and returned to his car.
He got back into his car, started it, and slowly backed out of the driveway. Roma Jean watched him leave, listening to the whine of his power steering until his car disappeared down the road. He drove off at the same deliberate speed—like he had nowhere else to be. This time, she noticed the palmetto tree on his license plate: South Carolina.
Okay, that was weird.
Who was this strange-looking man who showed up at this hour of the evening looking for “Charlene”? She’d just about decided to call Charlie and ask where she was when she saw the flash of headlights and realized that Charlie’s patrol car was making its way up the street.
Roma Jean walked out to meet her.
The smile on Charlie’s face could’ve lit up the night. Roma Jean felt the same little shiver she always felt when she saw Charlie. It was like an electric shock—only a lot nicer . . . and it didn’t leave burned marks.
“What a great surprise,” Charlie said, while she locked her patrol car. “How long have you been here?”
“About half an hour,” Roma Jean explained. “I can’t stay much longer. My parents will go ballistic.”
Charlie’s face fell. “I’m sorry I didn’t get here sooner. I had to drop off some paperwork for Byron. I was lucky he was out at Dr. Heller’s, or it would’ve taken me an hour.”
Charlie took a step toward her like she wanted to hug her, but Roma Jean knew she wouldn’t—not out here in the driveway. Then Charlie seemed to notice something on Roma Jean’s car.
“When did that happen?” she asked, pointing at the dent.
“Tonight.” Roma Jean sighed. “On my way over here. A can of peaches rolled out of the bed on the pickup truck I was following. Of course it landed on my car.”
“How close were you following?”
Roma Jean glared at Charlie. “Don’t go all deputy sheriff on me, okay? It was right before the turnoff on Redd Road.”
“Okay, okay.” Charlie held up her hands. “Don’t get spooled up. I won’t say anything else.”
“Good. I was thinking maybe you could pull it out for me?”
“Pull it out? How?”
“Don’t you have a plunger?” she asked. “You know,” she made dramatic plunging motions, “use some suction to pull the dent out?”
Charlie ran a hand over the dent. “Honey, I don’t think that’s gonna work here. It’s too deep. And the paint is cracked, too.”
Roma Jean was grateful Charlie didn’t make fun of her idea. “Great. How am I gonna tell Uncle Cletus I ruined his car?”
“You didn’t ruin it. Junior can fix this—pretty easily, I think.”
“Just my luck.” Roma Jean was frustrated. “Maybe if the dang peaches had been in light syrup, instead of heavy, we could’ve fixed it ourselves.”
Charlie smiled at her. “Maybe.”
“Will you follow me out to Junior’s tomorrow morning?”
“Of course.”
“Then you can drop me off at the library. I have to take the bookmobile out early.” She cast her eyes toward heaven. “I better try harder to avoid flying cans of fruit.”
Charlie laughed. “Do you wanna come inside for a while?” She sounded hopeful.
“I’d love to, but I can’t. It’s too late now. Mama will be sending out a posse if I don’t show up soon.”
Charlie’s face fell. “I’m really sorry I was late tonight.”
Roma Jean laid a hand on her arm. “It’s okay. Coming by here was just an impulse.”
Charlie covered her hand. “It was a good one. I hope you have a lot more of them.”
“That’s just it.” Roma Jean gave her a shy smile. “I have them all the time these days.”
Charlie squeezed her hand. “Me, too.”
“Okay. I gotta go.” Roma Jean opened the door to the Caprice. “Oh. I almost forgot. Some strange man stopped by here looking for you. He asked me if Charlene lived here.”
It wasn’t quite dark, so Roma Jean had no trouble seeing the color drain from Charlie’s face.
“Did he leave his name?” Charlie’s voice sounded strange—like it had traveled a long distance to be heard.
Roma Jean nodded. “Manfred.”
Charlie closed her eyes. She stayed silent for so long, Roma Jean began to worry.
“Do you know him?”
“Yeah.” Charlie let out a slow breath.
Roma Jean waited, but Charlie didn’t seem to be in a hurry to say anything else.
“Charlie?”
Charlie finally met her eyes.
“Yeah. I know him, all right.” Roma Jean hadn’t ever heard that cold tone in Charlie’s voice. She didn’t sound like herself. “I know him,” she continued. “He used to be my father.”
◊ ◊ ◊
This was the first time Sonny had been to services out at Bone Gap in more than a year. Heck. Two years. He’d been to Nelda Rae Black’s on Monday to spray for stink bugs, and darn if Nelda Rae hadn’t twisted his arm and got him to promise to come out to her tabernacle for preaching on Wednesday night. She said there was some “special feller” in town visiting that he might remember. But she wouldn’t answer any more questions about it.
Sonny always had been a sucker for mysteries . . .
He tried to get Bert to come out with him, but Bert said he was nuts.
“I ain’t goin’ all the way out to Bone Gap tonight. I gotta watch Chicago Fire.”
Sonny tried to argue with him. “If you weren’t so damn cheap, you’d TiVo them programs.”
“Well, if you weren’t so damn weak you’d never’ve let that Nelda Rae Black talk you into going, neither.”
Bert had a point.
There’d been no use asking Buddy to go with him, either. Wednesday nights were his “repair” nights.
You didn’t mess with none of Buddy’s routines.
Bert and Buddy had been at Sonny’s house for dinner earlier, just like every Wednesday night. They always had Salisbury steak because Bert said Sonny’s was the best—even better’n Nadine Odell’s, but nobody could ever say that out in public. They’d been doing these Wednesday dinners together ever since Buddy came back to live with Bert—after his ex-wife, Ruby, run off with that Bath Fitter guy. That’s how Buddy came to start fixing things over at Sonny’s. Bert’s double-wide didn’t have much extra room, so Sonny let Buddy use his dining room as his workshop. It didn’t take folks in town long to figure out this arrangement, and people started leaving things for Buddy to fix at Sonny’s house. Buddy would sit at Sonny’s dining-room table for hours, too, fixing all kinds of broken stuff with that dern car tape.
When Sonny’d left the house to drive out to Bone Gap tonight, Buddy was already hard at work, taping up a couple of lamps that had ripped shades and frayed power cords. Sonny had found them in a box on the front porch with a note attached: These lamps been in my wife’s family since James H. Price give them to her granddaddy back during the Great Depression. I was gonna throw them out, but she asked if maybe Bert’s boy could have a go at fixing them. Regards, James Halsey, Sr.
That’s how it always went, too. Every week, folks would drop stuff off for Buddy. It was kind of crazy, if you thought about it. But then, Buddy always did manage to fix whatever Sonny hauled in from the porch. Except that one Wednesday night, when some feller from Sparta drove up and asked if Buddy could reattach the back bumper on his Crown Victoria. He explained that he’d accidentally backed over some new-fangled kind of Japanese shrub Raymond Odell had planted at the entrance to the Riverside Café, and damn if it hadn’t ripped the thing clean off when he tried to pull forward. Sonny could see the bumper stuffed into the back seat of his car. Part of it was sticking out the passenger-side window.
Sonny had gone inside and got Buddy, but Buddy had said no. He could fix it temporary, but car tape wouldn’t hold it long without new clips soldered to the frame.
Good thing, too. Sonny didn’t want that bumper added to the pile of busted stuff piled up around his dining room.
Buddy was real scrupulous about fixing things in the order they was presented, and Sonny estimated he had about a month’s worth of Salisbury steak dinners to cook before Buddy even got close to being caught up.
Sonny scratched at his collar. He wasn’t used to wearing a dress shirt and tie and it was hot inside the tiny sanctuary. Seemed to him like they could’ve at least set up some box fans to move the air around. It smelled like mildew, too. Probably a lot of that came from all the cast-off hymnals that had been collecting dust in these old pew racks since Methuselah was in short pants. Nobody ever used them. They all knew the songs by heart. And it wadn’t like they ever sang more’n the first and last verses, anyway. He didn’t even know why they kept bothering with them altar calls. It wadn’t like everybody in three counties hadn’t already been saved . . . more’n once, too.
He supposed that’s why they said the Lord moved in mysterious ways.
Skipping all them middle verses must’ve been part of that plan.
He kept looking around the congregation to see if he could spot Nelda Rae’s special visitor. So far, he didn’t see nobody who stood out. Not unless you counted them Lear twins, who were sittin’ up front with new hairdos. His son, Harold had told him about two fellers who come into his shop wanting them Patrick Mahomes haircuts—with a twist. One wanted his top hair dyed purple; the other wanted his lime green. Harold said he did it, but when they left the shop, they looked like Tinky Winky and Dipsy from the Teletubbies.
Figures it’d be the Lear twins. Them boys always was one brick shy of a load.
He’d just about given up on seeing anything and began to wonder if he could slip out before the service got started when he saw a tall, thin man make his way in from the tiny vestibule.
Well I’ll be damned . . . if it ain’t Manfred Davis.
Sonny was stunned. Nobody’d seen hide nor hair of him since Sheriff Martin run him out of town more’n a decade ago. Last anyone had heard about him, he was working at some airbag plant down in Cheraw, South Carolina. There were rumors that he’d taken up with some new woman, too. A widow lady, they said. With a couple of kids.
Sonny hoped that last part wadn’t true—not after what all Manfred did to Charlie. He beat that girl so bad she ended up in the hospital. That’s when Sheriff Martin told him that unless he wanted to end up livin’ in a cell out at River North, he’d pack up his stuff and get out of town.
But here he was, big as life. Well. Maybe not as big. Manfred looked like he’d aged—he’d lost a lot of weight, and the little bit of hair he had on top was streaked with gray.
What was he doing back in Jefferson County?
And why did Nelda Rae seem so hell-bent on making sure he knew about it?
One thing was for sure: it wasn’t gonna be good news for Charlie Davis.
Sonny’s neck itch fired up again—and this time, it was runnin’ down his back.
A thought occurred to him. Nelda Rae knew him and Bert were still working out at Dr. Heller’s. He began to think maybe she wanted to be sure news about Manfred got back to Sheriff Martin. Everybody in the county knew about Sheriff Martin’s special . . . friendship with Dr. Heller—and that he spent a lot of time out at her place.
It would be just like Nelda Rae to be all up in that business, too. That woman was a menace.
Bert was right. Sonny was a sucker to let Nelda Rae drag him into something. He cursed his weakness.
Chicago Fire or not, he was gonna call Bert as soon as he got outta there . . .
◊ ◊ ◊
It was Maddie’s night to get Henry settled for bed. They’d been reading a bit of Henry’s latest “grown-up” book every night before lights out. Their dog, Pete seemed to enjoy these story times, too. He was already sound asleep on his blanket at the foot of Henry’s bed.
Roma Jean had suggested the book they were reading, Danny the Champion of the World. She thought Henry would especially like this story about the special bond between a boy and his father. As usual, Maddie found her instincts to be on point. Henry was wholly engrossed by the tale of a motherless English boy and his mechanic father, living in a Gypsy caravan behind a service station, and poaching pheasants from a nearby estate for food.
Maddie knew how much Henry missed his own father,
who’d left Jericho weeks ago to rejoin the Army transportation corps in Texas. James called Henry every week, and sometimes they’d do family FaceTime sessions. Maddie was happy that Henry was so engrossed in this dramatic tale about a young boy and his dad. She and Syd did all they could to be intentional about including James in conversations and to remind Henry that his father was still very much engaged in his day-to-day life. They were hopeful that when James got his first significant leave in November, he’d be able to spend the time with them at the farm. Maybe for Thanksgiving?
Henry had been quiet tonight at dinner, which was especially unusual when they splurged and ate at the café. The only real animation he’d shown was when the basket of hot biscuits with “fairy sprinkles” was delivered to their table. Maddie wondered if he’d come down with something. School had only been back in session for two weeks and already her clinic was overrun with cases of ear infections, conjunctivitis, and stomach flu. But Henry met all of her entreaties about his health with emphatic assertions that he felt fine. She wasn’t sure she fully believed him, but when Syd had nudged her leg beneath the table, she knew it was time to back off.
They finished tonight’s chapter—an exciting one where Danny helped free his father, who’d become caught in a trap while out hunting pheasants after dark. This led to a long series of questions about what “poaching” meant, and why it once had been considered such a dangerous and serious crime.
Henry seemed satisfied with Maddie’s explanation, but he wasn’t at all sure why someone could be thrown in jail just for trying to feed his family.
“It was a different time, Henry.” Maddie explained. “People who owned large estates maintained flocks of birds and other animals to hunt and shoot for sport. They didn’t want common folk trespassing on their lands to kill their game. Intrusions like that were considered to be serious crimes—like theft of personal property—and people who got caught committing those crimes could be sent to jail for many years, or worse.”