She felt she might cry, which was plain silly. The urge to simply slip away became stronger and stronger.
The puppy padded along with her to the trailer, beside and then in front, casting back looks at her and causing her to about stumble over him.
“You are gonna break my leg, dog,” Rainey said in a tone that caused the puppy to skitter out of the way, although not far. He knew in the manner that animals know things that she was leaving, and he didn’t want to be left behind. Sorry for her short temper, Rainey touched his head.
The sun had slipped away, leaving a thin band of gold on the horizon and deepening turquoise sky above. The handle to the trailer’s dressing room was cool. She threw her bags inside. They landed with echoing thuds.
Grabbing a halter and a Twinkie cake she had bought for the purpose, she went to get Lulu. While she was putting the halter on the mare, Harry came to the gate and held it open for her. She felt his eyes on her. She didn’t look him in the face, but she saw he had on the Levi’s jacket. The air was getting nippy.
Stuffing his hands in his front pockets, he fell in step beside her as she led Lulu to the trailer. Her heart did this crazy thing of pounding hard. She told herself to stop being silly.
“Looks like you got them together,” he said, inclining his head toward the house, where the windows were yellow squares in the growing dimness.
“I guess we did our part—I really appreciate your help through supper. I don’t think those two would be talkin’ yet, if it hadn’t been for you.”
He shrugged.
They reached the back of the trailer, and Harry jumped ahead to open the door. Rainey loaded Lulu, who entered as slowly and deliberately as an elephant, her hooves going thump-thump on the rubber mat. Giving the horse a pat, Rainey closed the divider, came out of the trailer and closed the door.
Still without looking at Harry, she walked to the truck and threw the lead rope in the back. That was when she saw the maroon nylon bag, sitting there behind the rear window.
She turned her head so quickly around to him that she about broke her neck.
His eyes met hers, and he came toward her. “Doyle gave me the bag. I forgot to buy one the other day.”
“Oh. Well, that was good he had one.”
They gazed at each other, her golden-green eyes searching his brown ones. She saw suddenly that the sadness was gone from his eyes. And then she heard very clearly, before he spoke, I’m going with you, if you still want me to, and she answered, Yes.
His lips quirked into a small grin. “I thought I’d go on to Amarillo with you, if the offer’s still open.”
She could not help smiling. “You’re welcome to come.”
For another moment they stood grinning at each other, and then she turned and slipped behind the wheel. She stuck the key in the ignition to start the diesel engine so it would warm.
Then, with her hand on the key, all manner of fearful doubts took hold of her.
“Harry?”
“Yes?” He stepped closer, propping an arm on top of the open door.
She wet her lips. “Look, I don’t want you to have the wrong idea…about me…about me askin’ you along. I’m not lookin’ for a hot weekend or anything. I’ve been married twice, and I think that’s enough foolishness for any woman. I’m not looking for a quick weekend affair.”
Only when she’d finished did she lift her eyes to look at him.
His brown eyes were intense on her. “I didn’t think of it like that,” he said, his voice sharp. “If you thought I thought that, then I’m the one who is sorry.”
She had hurt his honor, she saw. She certainly didn’t know what to say now.
He lowered himself into a crouch and looked up at her for long seconds. He said, “Rainey, as I see it, two things are going on here. One is that for the first time in my life I’m stepping out in my own direction. I’m daring to find some things out, and it feels more right than anything ever has before. I need this time to understand what I really want, and I know I’m doing right in that regard.”
His lips quirked in that crooked grin. “The second thing that’s going on is what I never in my life imagined, and that is a lovely woman has come into my life. A woman who fascinates me, who I’m feeling something for that I never felt for another woman. I don’t think I’m wrong to believe that there is something going on between us.”
There was no other answer but to shake her head. “No. You’re not wrong.”
“We get along well. I like being with you, and somehow you are helping me figure things out. Amarillo is as good a place as any for me to spend the next few days, is what I thought—” he paused and breathed deeply “—and also that I can’t just let you go out of my life without seeing where this may go.”
“Oh, Harry, I don’t know.” His boldness put her off balance. With him being so straightforward, she could not pretend to herself. She felt more for him than she had for any other man in a long time. But that scared her pants off.
“No promises and no strings,” he said in a calming tone, then added, “In case you haven’t noticed, Rainey, you are a woman traveling alone. Maybe you will need me.”
She felt a dawning surprise. “I’ve been travelin’ alone for a long time. I know how to take care of myself. I have Daddy’s gun.”
“And I know that any man who hassles you would have a hard time of it, too, but there are some men out there equal to you,” he said with thick sarcasm.
He gazed at her, waiting.
“I would like your company,” she said.
There was a lot more she might want to say, such as: I may be falling in love with you, and are you falling in love with me? How can you do that when I don’t even know who I am? I have nothing to give you…but I feel like I do need you.
Those things could not be said, however, at least aloud, although she wondered if he could hear her thinking.
With this disconcerting thought, she turned back into the truck and started the engine.
Rainey turned on the headlights and waited while Harry put the puppy in the truck bed. He slipped his lanky body into his seat and slammed the door securely.
“Enjoyed the visit, Uncle Doyle. See you next go-round!”
“I sure appreciate the hospitality, Doyle. Very glad to have met you.”
“Well, you folks know where we are. You come on any time.”
Neva peered at them from next to her father. “Good luck in Amarillo, Rainey! Thanks for the recipes.”
“Just remember what I told you about the cream gravy. Bye!”
“Goodbye!”
Rainey and Harry waved at the three people on the porch, who waved back, and then the truck was heading down the drive. Slowly, mindful of Lulu, she turned the truck north along the blacktop highway. The light was fading away in the west and the moon rising in the east. She caught sight of the puppy in the side-view mirror, pressing his face into the wind. She glanced over at Harry, who was easing his long legs.
With a vague feeling of déjà vu, she returned her eyes to the road and paid sharp attention, in case something or someone should unexpectedly appear at the ragged edges of her vision.
On the way to Amarillo, Harry told her how he had come to be out on a country road far from Houston. He had gone to visit a dying friend, Thurman Oaks, who had lived in Cool Springcreek, one of those small towns a person missed if they blinked while going through.
“Thurman was a patient in the hospital during my residency,” he explained, going on to talk about a man who stood six-two, his age of eighty-five having brought him down from six-four, and who had been a farmer, a cowboy, a wildcatter, a newspaperman and now a preacher of “The Word.” “That’s how Thurman describes himself,” he said. “And he sure went around talking it to everyone.”
She couldn’t clearly see Harry’s eyes, but she felt his passion and his caring for the elderly man.
“What did he look like?” she asked, wanting to picture the man.
“Loo
k like? Well…he was big, like I said, and what hair he had left was white and sort of shaggy down on his collar. He wore a mustache and a thin beard along his jawline.”
“Sounds like Santa Claus.”
Harry grinned. “Yes, I guess he did look like Santa Claus. He was jolly like that.” He went on to explain that Thurman had had cancer, and that the doctor in charge of his case had more or less dismissed him as being a lost cause.
“He said Thurman was too old, and there wasn’t any use in doing anything for him. He just tossed him aside,” he said in a bitter tone. “I couldn’t cure Thurman,” he admitted. “In a man of his age, the treatment would have brought on death quicker than the cancer, but with the proper support, he could live several good years, not simply exist. One of the things is to manage the pain. If the pain is managed, the human body can go on functioning for a lot longer. Too many doctors today just don’t count in the pain, both physical and mental.”
Harry would count in the pain, she knew, glancing at his intense face and remembering how he had been with the child, and before that the young man and his bloody nose. Remembering how he would get so very nauseous and yet continue.
“Were you able to do that for him? Manage the pain?” she asked.
“Pretty much,” Harry said with a slow nod, shifting himself in the seat and easing his long legs. “But I think it was mostly Thurman himself. He had such a strong state of mind. Despite his age and infirmity, he had a purpose in his life. He said God gave him life, and it was up to him to do the living as long as he was here.”
She glanced at him, saw his face illuminated by the dash lights, his brow furrowed.
“My mother used to say something like that. She used to say, ‘I’d best live today. Tomorrow I might be dead.’ Mama used to have all kinds of sayings.”
She experienced a sudden longing for her mother. She imagined running into the kitchen, where her mother might be sitting with coffee, and telling her mother all about Harry. But she couldn’t do that, would never be able to do that again.
“Thurman called for me, when he knew his time was near,” Harry said. “There I was, all messed up in my apartment, and I got his call. I was so messed up I barely wondered at him calling me, I just went running over there to see if I could do something for him, but you know what he wanted? He said he felt called to give me a blessing and a ten-dollar bill. He said it was the first ten dollars he’d made when he struck out wildcatting.”
She could picture it, the strangeness of it, and was thoroughly caught up in the story, gripping the wheel and listening for the why of it.
Harry said, “I looked at that ten-dollar bill, and I knew that I wanted to be a therapist to the elderly. I wanted to help them go wildcatting, like Thurman had done with life. You know, when people get old, they get forgotten, as if they and their problems don’t matter.”
She said to him then, in so many words: tell me about how you will do this. Tell me all. And he did, which got them a long ways down the road.
They stopped halfway to Amarillo at a small convenience store to get snacks and use the rest room. The store was old, one that had once been a chain, back when oil was high, but was now independently owned by a local person. Probably Iranian. It seemed that in the past few years Iranians were buying up half of West Texas. They came to study oil at southwestern universities and then stayed, probably because of both the headiness of freedom and the landscape, which no doubt resembled their own. The clerk was definitely a person of Middle East extraction, with a thick accent, perfect teeth and a beautiful, instant sort of smile that compelled one to smile back.
Rainey appreciated that, and she was also highly approving of the rest room facilities. To encourage such cleanliness, she made certain to compliment the man on the bathroom when she came out. Then she requested the last corn dog she saw beneath the warming light, a package of fig bars and a bottle of Lipton tea.
“Wouldn’t want to take a chance on you starving,” Harry said, coming up behind her with his own purchases. He pushed aside her hand with money and paid.
“You know a man likes to pay sometimes,” he told her as they stepped out the door.
“Two things I have learned as a woman—that if I pay my own way and drive my own vehicle, I can pretty much lead my own life.”
He gazed thoughtfully down at her. “Is that what you want most? To lead your own life?”
She didn’t know exactly what he meant, and her mind turned his words over with some agitation.
Then, at that fateful moment, she saw the puppy fly out of the pickup bed, land on the ground for a split second and race off growling. She had forgotten to tie him in the truck.
“Oh, puppy!” She raced off after him into the adjacent dark field, gripping the paper sack with the corn dog. Beneath a distant pole lamp, she saw a cat streaking ahead, the puppy not far behind. “Come back here, puppy!”
He didn’t, of course.
He disappeared into the deep darkness. And she wished she had named him. She thought that somehow, if she had named him, he would come to the call.
“Well, he’s gone,” she said, coming to an abrupt stop.
Pivoting, blowing right past Harry, who had come behind her, she stalked back to the truck, understanding in that moment that she had been abandoned. It did not matter that she had been giving up the puppy since he had come to her. He had abandoned her, and that was different than her giving him up. But it did not matter, because he was gone, and once they left, they didn’t come back. That was how it was, and there wasn’t any need to cry over it. Being hurt never fixed anything. Being hurt only hurt, and she simply could not stand being hurt.
It was an old familiar feeling. She felt she could hardly breathe, and that someone was drilling a hole in her heart.
Getting into the truck cab, she slammed the door, thinking hotly, If he knows what’s good for him, he’d best not say, “You wanted to get rid of him.”
Realizing she still clutched the paper sack with the corn dog, she smacked it onto the seat. Her throat got all tight. She didn’t want to cry and make a fool of herself in front of Harry.
She squeezed her eyes closed. Please, God, take care of that dog. I’m sorry…sorry for being so stupid. She swallowed and commanded herself not to cry.
When she opened her eyes, Harry was gazing at her through the window. He reached out and opened the door. She sure hoped her eyes didn’t look like she wanted to cry. Possibly he couldn’t tell in the dimness, anyway.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go call him again. Just give him a couple of minutes.” When she didn’t immediately move or reply, he added, “We aren’t in any rush to go, are we?”
“No…I suppose not.”
“Come on, then.” He motioned with his head, his hands being tucked into his pockets, and hunched his shoulders a little against the night cool.
She got out reluctantly. She didn’t think she could face the puppy not coming back. She thought of her mother lying in the casket, never coming back.
Then he took her hand in his, which was warm and secure.
They went back across the field, calling, “Here, pup! Here, dog.”
“Oh, he isn’t gonna come,” she said.
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes…I do.”
“No, you don’t.” His hand tightened on hers.
“We’ll probably get all sorts of dogs showin’ up,” she said drearily, and no sooner had the words cleared her mouth than, sure enough, two others came—a hound dog of some sort and a cocker mix.
“We are goin’ to be accused of stealin’ dogs,” she said. “Shoo…get!”
They succeeded in getting rid of the strange dogs and didn’t dare go to calling the puppy, for fear of bringing the wrong ones back.
Then, just when Rainey felt the last of her hope slipping away, there came a yip. Hope flickered anew. She looked at Harry, who was a black shadow, then stared into the darkness, holding her breath.
Harry whispered, “Here, boy.”
The puppy appeared, wriggling around their legs.
Rainey swallowed, squeezed her eyes closed and sank down on her knees, gathering the dog to her. Then she scooped him up and carried him back to the truck, leaning backward to balance his weight. There she broke off a piece of her corn dog and gave it to him.
“I guess I’m gonna have to keep you after all this trouble. I’ll have to give you a name.”
“Roscoe,” Harry said at her shoulder.
She raised an eyebrow at him.
“He looks like a Roscoe.”
She looked at the pup and said she thought he looked more like King or Duke.
They argued about the name as they got back into the truck. Rainey maintained that something of some substance was needed so that the puppy could live up to it, and Harry said he found the name Roscoe to have plenty of substance.
As she headed the truck once more down the highway, she glanced over at Harry. “Thanks,” she said.
“No problem,” he answered.
Then he motioned toward the dash, saying, “Mind if I find some other music?”
He tuned until he found what suited him—blues or jazz, Rainey thought with some consternation. Robert had really liked blues and jazz.
CHAPTER 15
Our Own Corner of the Universe
“Are you going to tell me about your husbands?” he asked, holding out an open bag of Cracker Jack.
Surprised, she glanced at him. Then she dug into the bag, saying, “I don’t know. Are you going to tell me about the women you’ve been involved with?”
“That would be a short story.”
She cast him a look that said, So tell it.
“I suppose I’ve had one sort of serious romance. Amy. My mother had these hopes for us since we were kids, because Amy was the daughter of my mother’s best friend. I liked Amy, and she liked me, and for a while there we worked up to something that was sort of serious, but then that turned into absolutely nothing except annoyance.
Lost Highways (A Valentine Novel) Page 13