Danny J. nodded, keeping his head down.
Joey said, “Hey, give me a hug,” and opened his arms, holding his son tightly for a brief moment, before turning away to get in the truck.
Seeing the flowers on the seat, he handed them to Danny J. and told him, “Give these to your Mama and Jojo for me. They’re a little wilted now, but your Mama can probably bring ’em back. You know she can fix just about anything.”
Then he got in the truck and drove away, squinting with blurred vision and thinking that Charlene could fix just about anything, except him.
Danny J. carried the bouquet into his mother, who was in the kitchen with Jojo, putting sandwiches on the table. He noticed there were only three plates.
“Daddy said to give you these. He said they were for you and Jojo.” Carefully watching her expression, he held out the flowers wrapped in the red paper and saw her eyes jump. As she took the bouquet, he said, “They’re a little wilted, but Dad said he thought you could fix them.”
His mother’s eyes came to his. “I’ll try,” she said.
He watched her take the bouquet over to the sink, where she unwrapped the paper and put the flowers in a big jar of water.
Danny J. said, “Dad says he can’t come back until next week, but he left his horse. I have to go take care of it.”
As he went out the door, Jojo came after him. “I’ll help,” she said.
On the way to the barn, Danny J. told his sister, “Dad’s gone, and he’s not comin’ back.”
“How do you know?”
“I just know.” He clamped his jaw closed, to keep himself from crying. He thought that when he grew up he wasn’t ever getting married.
Charlene got out a green vase and mixed the little packet of preservative that had come with the flowers in the water. She cut the stems and arranged the flowers in the vase and set it on the table. By the time she went to call the children to come have supper, the flowers had perked up. She wished she could have done the same for Joey and her marriage.
Joey went by the house of a man who owed him two thousand dollars. The man scraped up five hundred in cash and gave him a check for the rest. From there Joey drove over to the Texaco to get his truck filled up. He was relieved to find Larry Joe still working. While Larry Joe pumped the fuel, Joey got out and washed his own windshield in the glow of the yellow lights coming on above. When he left, he handed Larry Joe three hundred dollars and said he hoped that helped with his school bill.
His son looked at him with wonder.
Joey said, “I know where I can come when I need a good mechanic. You know, lots of people tell me all the time how good you are.”
Larry Joe looked from the money to Joey and said, “Thanks, Dad.”
His son’s look and tone made Joey feel really good. He put a hand on his son’s shoulder and said, “Take care of your Mom.”
Driving to the Arnett ranch, he thought about packing up and leaving, but then Sheila was sitting on the porch, and she called to him, as she had been doing every night for weeks. This night he went with her. He had a strange feeling of needing her arms around him. Maybe he would stay put, if she held him. He also felt guilty about owing her so much. She had given him a great chance, and she’d given him her heart, too, however much she was able.
They went up to her room, and he made love to her in her big bed. She had lots of soft pillows on her bed. “Are you goin’ to move into Daddy’s room now?” she asked when they lay together all sweaty on the smoothest sheets he had ever felt.
“I don’t know. Maybe.” He didn’t mean that, but he didn’t want to get in an argument. He didn’t want to talk at all. His head was spinning, and he felt as if he could hardly breathe. He began to get worried that he might have a heart attack, like his father had done.
Sheila fell asleep, and Joey lay there for some time, fighting with himself, but then he gave in. He thought that the only one who would understand would be Charlene.
He slipped out of the bed and dressed, waiting until the front porch to put on his boots. It was dark, and he got the wrong boot for the wrong foot and had to switch. He went to his trailer and packed his things into two large duffel bags. Then he hooked his truck to his old three-horse trailer, loaded the three horses he owned into it and drove away. At the road he headed south, thinking of Fort Worth. He could sell that one good horse he had there. He sure hoped that check that old boy had given him was good.
The City Hall thermometer reads 87°
It was Jaydee Mayhall who told Charlene that Joey was gone. She had seen Jaydee about the divorce proceedings the first thing in the morning, and that afternoon he called her at the beauty shop to tell her that he had learned Joey had taken off.
She stood at the counter, clutching the receiver to her ear, with the scent of the permanent wave solution Dixie was using wafting around her, listening to Jaydee say in his long drawl, “Sheila Arnett says when she got up this morning, Joey was gone. That he left in the night, truck, trailer and horses. And nobody knows to where.”
No one needed to tell her Joey had gone. She had known he was going the minute Danny J. had brought her the flowers, and she had awakened in the night and lain there with the knowing, probably at the same minute he had driven away.
“Does it matter for gettin’ a divorce?” Charlene said, speaking low.
“Well, no. No, I can go ahead. It may take a little longer.”
“I don’t think I’m in any hurry,” Charlene said. “I’m about as single as it gets now.”
She told the children that night after supper. They were not surprised, either.
When his brother and sister had left the table, Danny J. said, “Will you watch me on the bucking horse, Mom?”
“Yes, I will. Your father has given you a good start. This is probably what he was thinking, that he has you started and now all you need is practice.”
Danny J. nodded, dropping his gaze to the table. Charlene went over and laid a hand on his shoulder. She started to say she was sorry, but that seemed like condemning Joey, and that would hurt her son even more.
She thought of Joey driving down the highway, while here she was with the responsibility of keeping these young hearts and lives on track. Please help me, Lord, to give my children what they need.
She said, “We have a light out there if it gets dark. Why don’t we go out now, while your brother is here to help, and you can ride that horse?”
They got Larry Joe and Jojo, and all four of them went out. Charlene caught Joey’s roan and saddled him and took her place on him in the pen. Apparently, while she couldn’t drive, she had not forgotten how to ride a horse. She didn’t intend to fail at this, she thought, kicking her heels into the gelding with determination. She had seen Joey do this a hundred times, and she would manage. Both she and Larry Joe helped Danny J. to get on the bucking horse, while Jojo cheered enthusiastically from the fence rail. After Danny J.’s third go-round on the bucking horse, Charlene wasn’t squinting so hard anymore.
With the kids down to bed, Charlene lay in her moonlit bedroom and spoke to Rainey on the phone, telling her about her decision to divorce Joey, and his decision to run off for good.
“You aren’t surprised, are you?” Rainey said.
“No. I guess deep down I knew this would happen. It’s one of the reasons I couldn’t go back with him. I was afraid I would end up like Sheila and wake up one morning, and he’d be gone. He’s running from himself, and once he started that, he couldn’t seem to stop.”
She thought of him driving down a highway somewhere right now, his truck the only one on the road in the night.
“I’m worried about him, Rainey. I keep thinking that if I had taken him back, maybe I could have helped him.”
“And that is exactly what he wanted you to do, too. Fix him. But do you really think it would have worked? My first two marriages are pure examples of the failure of this thought. Robert and Monte both expected me to make them right. Robert wanted me to praise
his every move, and Monte wanted me to be his mother. Well, I couldn’t do it. Nobody can save another person. That is God’s job.
“You did the right thing, Charlene,” she added.
“I know I did, but thank you for sayin’ it.”
When Charlene hung up, she lay for a long time, thinking of being a divorced woman. It no longer seemed the nightmare she had thought.
She was not afraid, she realized with surprise. The Lord is my shepherd…. And he was Joey’s, too.
Twenty-Five
The City Hall thermometer reads 88°
With her reading glasses perched on her nose, Charlene studied the shelves of vitamins and herbs at Blaine’s Drugstore. One could learn a lot more at the beauty shop besides who dyed their hair, who was not a natural blonde, who bleached her mustache.
Rainey’s swearing by vitamins E and C had been confirmed by Dixie and so many customers with youthful appearances that Charlene had put those on her list first. Iris MacCoy had told her to be sure and get a potent vitamin B mixture, saying, “It is the thing for a woman. Keeps my complexion like this. That and zinc.” Iris was awfully pretty, but Charlene knew her own complexion to be one of her best features. Charlene had always attributed it to genes inherited from her mother, that and the butter and olive oil she ate.
There was some argument about the zinc. Someone said that was for men’s sexual prowess. Charlene decided she would need to read up, but right now, when her nerves were so strung tight, she thought she should get a start. Then, seeing the prices of everything, she decided on getting only the calcium and cod liver oil tablets, which Oralee had said she absolutely must get, and all the woman had backed her up.
Somewhat daunted by the many brands and types to choose from, however, Charlene stepped over and asked Belinda Blaine to recommend some. Belinda was sitting behind the prescription counter, eating a candy bar and reading a People magazine.
“Mama, what type of calcium is it that you take?” Belinda said over her shoulder to Vella, who Charlene only just then saw through the doorway to the storeroom. To Charlene, Belinda said, “It’s the one Paul Harvey recommends. Lots of the women your age take it.”
Charlene didn’t think Belinda needed to say “your age.”
Vella came out from the back and picked out the bottle for her, saying, “Charlene, I know you are under a strain these days. This calcium will really help you sleep better.” She put the bottle in Charlene’s hand and picked up a small box from another shelf. “And if I were you, I’d start drinkin’ ginseng tea.”
“That’s chamomile tea for nerves, Mama.”
“Chamomile’s good, too,” Vella said, “but the ginseng will help your vitality. You know, that Larry King says he takes it.”
“You might want to get that ginkgo,” Belinda said, looking up over the top of her magazine. “It’s supposed to help your memory. Of course, you have to remember to take it in the first place.”
Charlene carried the calcium, cod liver oil tablets and the ginseng tea over to the checkout register before Vella could manage to give her anything else. She couldn’t afford anything else. She was annoyed with herself because she had allowed Vella to sell her one more thing than she had decided on. She was absolutely not spending another penny.
As Vella rang up her purchases, she said, “I heard that Freddy and Helen packed up and left for California, too.”
Charlene caught the “too” and knew the inference was to Joey leaving town. It had been the hot topic for the past week, made even more so because Sheila Arnett had reportedly been so mad, she had taken a .357 Magnum pistol and shot holes in the trailer that Joey had been staying in.
“Yes,” Charlene said. “They’re movin’ to Palm Springs.”
Vella was shaking her head. “I hear that Freddy and Helen haven’t even sold their house yet. They just packed their clothes and left everything. That must have been a real surprise to you all, and comin’ right on top of Joey and all.”
“No, it wasn’t a surprise,” Charlene said. She didn’t want Vella thinking their family did not share confidences. “We knew for some time that Freddy and Helen were moving. They’ll come back to get some things when the house sells, but they just needed to get out and have a vacation.” She accepted her change from Vella and took up the small bag.
“It sure was a shock to think of Freddy putting his car dealership up for sale. I didn’t believe it when I read it in the Voice. Then Perry told me he had heard it from Freddy himself. How is your daddy takin’ this move?”
“Daddy’s happy for Freddy being able to retire young.” That was the best Charlene could do. The entire situation was too complicated to discuss. She headed for the door.
“You let me know how you feel after a few days of drinkin’ that ginseng,” Vella called after her.
Walking back to the beauty shop, Charlene gave thought to her family. They had sure become the great topic of conversation in town, first Freddy threatening an IRS agent and ending up in the mental hospital, and now up and leaving town as if his shoes were on fire. Then there was Joey going crazy, and then even crazier, and being the cause of Sheila taking a gun to an innocent trailer.
The gossip, which Charlene knew not to trust, was that after shooting the trailer, Sheila had driven off in a mad fury to find Joey, but had returned and shut herself in her house.
“Do you mean to tell me that woman is so stupid that she would lose her mind over a man?” Rainey said, when she had telephoned. She was telephoning Charlene every other night, to bolster Charlene’s spirits. Rainey was a really good sister. She went on and on about how stupid Sheila Arnett was. That left Charlene free to feel sympathy for the woman, who had, like Charlene, been disappointed by a man and life in general.
Her thoughts moved back to Freddy. She had been at her father’s house when Freddy and Helen had stopped by. They had their car all packed, and Helen had not even gotten out. She had sat there behind her sunglasses, with her head wrapped in a scarf. Charlene had imagined her drumming her frosted fingernails on the seat, impatient to get out to Palm Springs and start being Californian.
At the very moment of parting, Freddy had suddenly given their father a big hug. Charlene thought a lot about that hug. How such a small touch could make things so much better.
As she went around the corner of the Valentine Voice building, Charlene remembered she was supposed to bring Oralee her fountain drink. She turned around to go get it.
Oralee was fixing Fayrene’s hair, and Dixie was going over a supply order, when Charlene came from the back room with a cup of the ginseng tea. She sat in her manicurist chair and propped her feet on another chair and sipped the tea.
“Well, what do you think of that tea?” Oralee asked.
Charlene sipped some more and thought a minute, then said, “I think it tastes like what I imagine cat pee with sugar in it would taste like.”
Oralee laughed so hard she doubled over, and Fayrene said, “Oh, let me taste that.”
The City Hall thermometer reads 83°
The UPS delivery man brought a package to Charlene at the shop. While large, it was not heavy. As soon as she finished up with a customer, she went in the back to open it. Mildred, whose hair Dixie had just finished, came back to see what was in the box. After a minute, Oralee appeared, too, saying, “Well, let’s see what your sister has sent.”
Charlene got the tape cut and opened the flaps. Inside was a bunch of foam peanuts. She dug around in them and pulled out a box of ginseng tea.
“Oh, for heaven sake, that will take forever,” Oralee said, producing a shopping bag. “Put those peanuts in here.”
With Oralee helping, Charlene emptied the peanuts into the bag and then began pulling out the rest of the contents: colorful and fragrant boxes of herb teas, bottles of every vitamin known to man, and containers of health powders claiming to cause rejuvenation. Charlene pulled them out and looked at each one, tears filling her eyes. At the bottom of the box she found a bright blu
e ball cap, and on the front it said, “Go Girl.”
“Where are you goin’ to go?” Mildred said, looking vaguely worried. “You aren’t movin’ off, too, are you, Charlene?”
Touched, Charlene kissed Mildred’s cheek. “No, I’m not moving off. But I’m goin’ along just the same, I guess.” She put the hat on and went to see how she looked in the mirror. She thought she looked quite youthful, even vibrant.
Charlene reflected that her life had changed very little with Joey out of it from when he had been in it. When she discussed this during one of her late-night talks with Rainey, her sister was quick to point out, “I could have told you that, but you wouldn’t have liked hearing it.”
Charlene continued to see to the meals and clothes and well-being of her children, to all the household tasks of cleaning and bill-paying, even the lawn upkeep, all that she had done when she had been married to Joey. The major change now was that she was no longer waiting to hear his step through the door or waiting for him to come to her in bed.
It was an immense relief to have given that up. She thought that if she had realized what a relief it would be, to have given up waiting breathlessly and to have given up on trying to change herself into the perfect wife so he would love her, she would have done it the first week he had walked out on her, and not put herself and everyone else through all the strain.
It came as a shock to her when, after a number of days, she threw out the flowers Joey had given her, which were now dead, and she realized, upon seeing them lying in the trash, that she had not thought of Joey the entire day. It was then that she realized she had gone so far down the road that he was only a small figure in her rearview mirror.
She was, she knew, on a road that was leading to herself. To the woman she really was. Sometimes she watched herself and was amazed. She discovered that she had a talent for soothing people. Customers would come in invariably looking frazzled and strained, sit at her table and give her their hands and soon be pouring out their hearts. It was therapeutic to listen to everyone else’s troubles, because it took her mind off her own.
Driving Lessons Page 25