Angel's Dance

by Heidi Angell

  “A bachelor? Trust me, there are plenty of people in town who aren’t too happy about it either… especially given Alice’s age. But I figure they can say what they want, none of them were doing anything about it!”

  Clear couldn’t help but smile at his attitude.

  “Well, it is good to know that a public servant is concerned about such things!” she smirked.

  “To hell with it. As long as they re-elect the chief I’ll still have a job. This was never supposed to be a permanent solution… but they’ve had so much loss already, and now I’m leaving them too.” He became very gloomy and his voice trailed off.

  “This must be difficult, being torn between your own kid and these kids that you’ve taken in.”

  “Actually it wasn’t so bad. They keep me busy, but I needed something to keep me busy after everything.” His eyes drifted again. “Until this whole mess happened, everything was looking up. Kat has become very close to all of them. She and Alice talk all the time. They were inseparable over Christmas break. She was even going to come visit this summer….” His fingers bit into the steering wheel and his knuckles turned white. Clear waited for him to continue, but the silence grew as he wallowed in his own thoughts.

  After a moment, Grant added, “So… uh… your turn.”

  Clear stared at him blankly, having no idea what he was talking about.

  “Mr. Fancy Pants?” He sounded like he was trying a little too hard to be nonchalant.

  “I, well… I have no idea who you are talking about,” Clear admitted.

  “The guy at your house?” Grant asked incredulously.

  Clear couldn’t help but laugh loudly. “Ah…” she said, after laughing so hard that her stomach hurt, “Right, Mr. Yarborough. He’s just a client. He came in from Glasgow to buy a horse. I only met him yesterday.”

  Grant cocked his eyebrow at her. “Really? Hmm…”

  Clear splayed her hands across her lap, studying her fingernails. “With Anne’s help, I have taken over the sales operations of the ranch. We have opened to a broader clientele. It’s been… good.” She could hardly tell him that the reason she had done it was to block memories of him out of her waking moments.

  He didn’t say anything and she didn’t know what else to say. Her heart full of sadness, she leaned back in the chair and began to do her own wandering in her own mind as she watched the road roll by.

  Chapter Three

  Clear woke suddenly, feeling very disoriented. Out the window she saw waves of wheat fields flowing by. The sun was just beginning to set. Her head was pounding slightly and her brain felt very muddled, almost as if she had been drinking. She tried to think about what she had been dreaming…. What had startled her awake?

  “You alright?” Grant’s gruff voice startled her and she felt herself jump.

  “Um…. I think so…” She peeked at him through her hair, wondering what she might have mumbled in her sleep, not sure she wanted to know. “Why?” What the hell, she felt that she had been on the tip of something… but couldn’t place it. Maybe something he overheard could help.

  Grant shrugged, never taking his eyes off the road. “Nothing in particular, you just squirmed a lot. Didn’t seem to be a very restful nap.”

  She chewed the inside of her lip. She knew it wasn’t, so his little insight wasn’t very helpful. “I… didn’t say anything?”

  “Nope. Were you dreaming about something?”

  “I don’t know,” she muttered, glaring out at the fields. “How much further?”

  “I figured we would stop for dinner and a motel in the next town, about an hour away.”

  “Oh… we aren’t driving straight through?” Clear loathed motels. It wasn’t so much the physical filth that bothered others, but the mental filth that tended to torment her alone.

  “I suppose if you would like to take a turn driving, that could be arranged, but I am dead beat.”

  Clear eyed the stick shift accusatorily. Her parents had taught her how to drive a stick, but she had never really gotten the hang of it and had a tendency to kill clutches. But was it worth the possible expense to make Grant let her drive? Then again, she wasn’t sure how abused this clutch had been. What really mattered was whether it was worth the possibility of being stranded out here indefinitely and the delay it would cause in getting to Chicago? As much as she hated it, she could not justify driving straight through and risking them breaking down.

  “I would…. but sticks and I don’t tend to get along.”

  Grant’s jaw tightened. She wasn’t sure, but suspected that he was trying not to smile.

  “I’ll cover the cost and I can get you your own room.”

  Clear turned out the window as her eyes went wide. She hadn’t even thought of that! ‘Geez, that would be uncomfortable!’ But he had already offered and she wasn’t going to refuse her own room. The car was feeling a little crowded as was. “Whatever works for you,” she replied nonchalantly.

  Clear stared silently out the window watching the sky change from soft golden hues to fiery oranges and reds, to the lighter and darker blues of night. She let her mind focus on the colors in hopes of releasing her subconscious enough to remember what she had been dreaming. As the velvety purple descended, the sky ahead began to lighten with the artificial light of the town. Frustrated at not being able to remember anything from her dream, she decided it was probably because it had nothing to do with Grant’s daughter.

  Clear stretched. “So, where are we?” she questioned.

  “Millston, Wisconsin.”

  “Wow, Wisconsin already?”

  Grant gave her a look. It was only for a split second, but she thought she saw something in that look, something that felt familiar. But then he was back on the road. “We’ve been in Wisconsin for a while.”

  “Hmm…. We never stopped for lunch, did we?”

  “You were sleeping…. Look, up there is a little diner, we’ll stop there.” Grant pulled into the diner parking lot and Clear got out of the car and stretched and stomped her feet. It was starting to get cool at night here and she sort of wished she had not packed her hoodie in her bag. She looked up at the diner as she stamped her feet trying to restart the circulation. Her body ached from head to toe. She did not think she had ever sat still for so long in all her life.

  The diner was a relic from the days when everyone did their traveling by car. Now the parking lot had a few heavy duty trucks, two cars (probably belonging to the two employees that could be seen) and a couple of RVs. Clear groaned, really not wanting to go in. But her stomach rumbled as she watched the plain little waitress pick up a huge burger. She looked sideways at Grant.

  “Well, shall we?” he nodded toward the diner. She took a deep breath and walked stiffly to the front door.

  The waitress seated them with a smile and offered drinks. Clear ordered a soda. She had a grimy taste in her mouth and hoped her breath didn‘t smell bad. Not that it really mattered, she supposed.

  Grant looked at the menu for several minutes then ordered coffee. Clear looked at him surprised.

  “I thought we were going to stop for the night?” she nodded towards the coffee as the waitress set it down in front of them.

  Grant nodded then looked at the coffee. “Oh, it’ll be fine.”

  The waitress pulled out a pen and a very wide smile for Grant. “What’ll it be, Hon?”

  Grant looked to Clear, “Ladies first.”

  The waitress turned to Clear and she couldn’t help but notice that the wattage cranked down a lot for her. The girl obviously was catering to the tipper.

  “I’ll just have a burger and fries,” Clear muttered, not sure why she was feeling irritated all of a sudden. It couldn’t be because of the waitress flirting with Grant, could it? She sighed and looked around as Grant ordered. There were four large men in one corner booth that all looked like they belonged to the big rigs outside. Two were laughing and chatting, while the third listened, but the fourth sat by morosely, looking
about as miserable as Clear felt.

  There was a couple with a young child sitting by the cook line and the child was curled up in her mother’s lap. The rest of the place was empty except for one middle-aged woman leaning against the juke box. The woman put in some quarters and an old country western song began to blare from the tiny jukebox. Clear didn’t know the song, but she cringed at the wailing tinny voice of what could only be Hank Williams. Even though she had grown up in Montana, where there was little else but country music channels, Clear had never been able to appreciate the music. She preferred classical and, strangely enough, hard rock.

  “…alright?” Clear caught the last part and realized that Grant had been speaking to her. She vaguely suspected that he had said something to her before and this was a second attempt to get her attention.

  “Hmm… wha… I’m sorry, what did you say?” She turned back to him and felt her anger spike almost uncontrollably. The shock of it made her gasp. It had been so long since she had felt this before that she had forgotten how it could be. She looked around again and tried to pinpoint where the emotion was coming from.

  “Clear, what is the matter?” Grant scooted in beside her on her side of the table and grabbed her arm. “Are you… you know?” he whispered.

  “I…I..” all she could do was nod. Where was it coming from? She just couldn’t really tell. When she focused on the morose trucker, nothing changed. She tried to shake it off, reminding herself that it didn’t matter and that she needed to focus on Grant and his daughter, not random stranger’s emotions.

  She physically shook herself and turned back to Grant. “Sorry… someone is really angry and… well, it is hard… to… hard to focus. So much for those great walls I had built up!” She slammed her fist into the table then looked at Grant in surprise as the sound echoed through the room.

  Grant wrapped his arms around her as she felt everyone in the diner turn toward her. She was absolutely mortified, but it did little to override the anger coursing through her veins. This was ridiculous!! How would she ever survive in Chicago?

  “Should we go?” Grant asked tensely. “Is there something wrong?”

  Clear shook her head. “No… I mean obviously there is for this person, but there is no clear intent or thoughts… just a lot of rage.” Clear pinched her fingers over the bridge of her nose. This anger building up inside was starting to give her a headache.

  “Are you sure you are ok? I mean… I can get the food to go if it would be easier.” He glanced around and was about to hail the waitress, when the family sitting by the cook got up to leave. Clear felt the anger grow immensely and put her head down hard on the table to keep from leaping to her feet and screaming.

  Grant’s hand went to her back and she barely suppressed a groan as the family walked by her. The moment the door closed the intensity began to decrease. Clear lifted her head and looked out the window. She shook involuntarily. Who in that family could be so angry? The mother was carrying the little girl and the father walked ahead to open the door. They seemed so normal. As the mother shifted the little girl, she looked up and met Clear’s eyes. The anger and hatred welled up in Clear again and she almost burst into tears. The mother put the girl in the car and then she and the father got in and started the car.

  Clear could feel the tears leaking out of her eyes, despite her effort to suppress it.

  “What? Is there something wrong with that family? Is he going to do something?” Grant tensed as the car pulled to the exit onto the highway. Now that there was more distance, Clear’s emotions were no longer completely hay-wire. She looked at Grant in surprise.

  “Why did you think it was the dad?” she queried.

  Grant blushed. “Well… it typically is.” Clear cocked her eyebrow at him.

  “What? Typically crimes of passion or rage are committed by men. It is a statistical fact.”

  “Why do you think that is, you suppose?” Clear wondered out loud.

  “Because most women are cold-hearted…” Grant muttered, then looked up and ahemmed. “Uh… well, psychologists say that it is because women feel more comfortable expressing their feelings and displaying their emotions. They also typically have a stronger network to share those emotions. Men tend to bottle things up and do not feel comfortable sharing their feelings, especially negative feelings, with others.”

  Clear shook her head. “It wasn’t the dad, and like I said before there were no images associated with it.”

  “Then how do you know it wasn’t the dad?” Grant grumbled.

  Clear was still wondering about his cold-hearted comment and off-handedly replied. “Because I am the psychic. It was the little girl.”

  Grant scoffed, “No way, she was asleep… besides little girls aren’t.. I mean they don’t… You looked like you were ready to murder someone!” he stammered toward the end.

  “I felt like it too. But that is the problem with kids. They haven’t experienced enough in life and they don’t know how to mediate their feelings. Everything is black and white at that age. Either they love you or they hate you.. and it can change in less than five minutes. The only ones who are worse than toddlers are teenagers, but they have all those hormones….” Clear trailed off as she realized Grant was guffawing at her. It made her feel distinctly uncomfortable. “What?”

  Grant’s mouth slammed shut. “Nothing… it’s just you talk… like… I don’t know, someone who’s raised a dozen kids… or a psychiatrist.”

  Clear felt herself blush. She shook her head, “No, it’s just easy for adults to forget once they grow up. If everyone could feel what I feel from kids, they would remember from their own childhood and would be so much more understanding.” She could feel herself blushing even more and was grateful that the food came at that moment so she could duck her head down and pretend to inspect it.

  Clear started shoving food in her face so that he wouldn’t ask any more questions. At moments it was easier for her to talk about these aspects of herself, because she had been doing it for so long now with Anne, but then she would remember who she was talking to (NOT Anne) and what he had done the last time she had shared something precious with him. As soon as she thought about it, she wanted to cry again. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose.

  “Pretty good, huh?” Grant smiled at her as she opened her eyes.

  She nodded shoving food in her mouth again. ‘Whatever, let him think what he wants.’ She would much rather he think that was what was in her head than have him really know what she thought and how she felt. Right now she felt more alone than she had felt in a long time. She suspected that any of the lonely looking people in this place were supplanting and heightening those feelings, but at the core she knew they were also her feelings. She had underestimated how strong her feelings still were for Grant and she now realized that she hadn’t gotten closure and she hadn’t had a support group to vent to and had kept all these emotions bottled up, or shoved to the side.

  She supposed she could have talked to Anne about them, but at the same time she didn’t really feel comfortable talking to Anne about it. What had happened that night had been one of the most intimate experiences in her life and she and Anne had only recently re-established their friendship. Because she hadn’t had the closure, she was still fighting this stupid feeling.

  She mentally squared her shoulders. She was not going to fall apart and she was not going to let Grant know one thing about any of her feelings. Right now she really needed to focus on Grant’s daughter and helping him find her. She took a sip of her drink to rinse the food down.

  “Well, at least this experience has taught us something,” Clear suddenly announced. Grant looked at her slightly confused. She shrugged. “At least we know it still works.” She tapped the side of her head and nodded out the window to where the car had pulled out who knows how long before.

  Grant looked out the window then looked at her. As the light of understanding lit his eyes, he began to smile. “And th
at is a good thing, right?”

  She smiled back at him and nodded, then looked out the window, once again dreading the possibility of being in Chicago. It worked alright, but with that many people how long would she be able to work?

  Chapter Four

  After they finished eating, Grant asked the waitress if she knew of a nearby hotel. She gave them directions and they rode in silence. Pulling into the parking lot, Grant glanced at Clear. “You want to come in, or wait here”

  Clear shook her head. “I’ll just wait right here, if that’s ok?”

  Grant nodded. “Be right back.”

  Clear watched him walking in and couldn’t help but notice how the light reflected off his soft curls. He walked up to the counter and there was an exchange with the clerk. He glanced out the window at Clear and then held his hand up to the clerk in the traditionally understood, just a minute sign. He jogged out and Clear quickly rolled down the window.

  “Uh… they only have one room left.”

  Clear swallowed. “Um… no problem.”

  Grant raised his eyebrows. “If you’re sure? We could try the next place.”

  “You aren’t gonna make it too much further. It’s no big deal.” She nodded trying to look more confident and unconcerned than she felt. ‘One room? Crap!’

  Grant jogged back in to get the room and Clear took deep breaths. It wouldn’t be too bad, she told herself. It wasn’t like they would be sharing a bed. There would be a bathroom to change in. She had pajamas. No biggie. As long as he had pajamas. Unbidden, images of his strong arms reflecting in the soft glow from the light let in by the shades came to her mind. God, she hoped he had pajamas!

  She jumped out of the truck and started grabbing her bags, ready to get this over with. She could stand it one night. She had to. This wouldn’t be a problem in Chicago, so one night was no big deal. She could do this.