Love in a Small Town

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

  The urge to cry faded, leaving him bone-deep discouraged. As near as he could figure it, Odessa had been trying to tell him not to end up like his parents had, but hell, she didn’t need to tell him that. He’d been trying not to end up that way all of his life. And look at where he was—alone in the same house they had been alone in.

  He thought that maybe he was destined to follow the same course as his parents and be miserable all his life and that maybe Molly was destined to go off on the same course as her mother—she had a late start, but she had left him, as Odessa had done all her husbands.

  Maybe it was like it said in the Bible: the sins of the fathers visited on the children. Maybe there was no escaping it, and that thought gave him a sliver of panic.

  He thought of calling Molly, but—as his panic gave over to anger—he decided against it. He’d been the one to call the last time. Now it was her turn. It couldn’t be all on his side. And he didn’t want to take a chance that she would brush him off. He figured he’d done his part. She knew where to find him if she wanted to make contact. Besides, he thought, sinking, he had no idea what to say to her.

  He felt guilty because he had such a difficult time knowing or showing how he felt. It was work to show how he felt. Loving someone took a lot from a person, and the truth at that moment was that Tommy Lee didn’t feel he was up to giving whatever it was that Molly needed. He felt used right up.

  * * * *

  Rodney Cormac came just before five to pick up his engine. He was a big man in Big Smith overalls, with small eyes set in a fleshy face. “Is it ready?” he asked right off, to the point and acting as if he were in a hurry.

  “What are you puttin’ it in?” Tommy Lee asked, as he rolled the engine out on the hoist to the bed of Cormac’s pickup truck. Normally he wasn’t much for chitchat, but this afternoon Woody Wilson had gone fishing instead of coming in to help, which meant the only person Tommy Lee had spoken to all day had been Odessa, and the dog.

  “Ain’t sure yet,” Cormac said, his voice clipped.

  “Well, if you have any trouble with it, you don’t hesitate to get back to me,” Tommy Lee said.

  “I won’t,” the man said, and looked nasty, as if to convey the idea that he might come punch Tommy Lee’s face in if the engine let him down.

  Tommy Lee had run into that attitude before—not often, because his work was good and there were few failures due to anything he did or didn’t do. Sometimes, though, these hot-rod guys could be hotheads and blame him for their own mistakes, and would come looking to take their frustration out of his hide. There’d never been anyone Tommy Lee couldn’t make back down. He could appear really tough if it was required. He’d learned a long time ago, back in his teens when he hadn’t been so muscular, that he’d do best to appear a cool killer. Guys left him alone that way. He hadn’t been in more than three or four fights in his entire life, although he’d been in a lot of arguments.

  “My work comes with my own personal guarantee,” he told Cormac, assuming his quiet threatening manner. “You have trouble, you come see me.”

  Cormac’s little eyes blinked, disappearing for a second into his fleshy face. “Well, I doubt I’ll have trouble,” he said. He bobbed his head at Tommy Lee and then hefted himself up into the cab of his pickup. He paused and said, “My son’s got a Ranger engine needin’ to be rebuilt. Think you could handle it?”

  “If he doesn’t mind me squeezin’ him in. I’ve got two I’m workin’ on for some racin’ fellas.”

  “Well, I’ll tell him. Thanks.” He gave another nod and drove away.

  Tommy Lee stood there, feeling as if he was spending too much time watching people drive off. He went to the telephone and called up Woody Wilson’s house to see if he was home yet, but his wife said Woody had called in to say he wouldn’t be home until the next day.

  Tommy Lee hung up the receiver and felt really alone.

  As he was closing up the shop, the dog Jake came running up, wagging his tail. Tommy Lee was absurdly glad to see him. “Where you been all day, fella?” he said, petting the dog, who then followed him over to the house and up onto the back porch, But Tommy Lee couldn’t coax him inside.

  “Suit yourself,” Tommy Lee said, figuring he was being pretty silly trying to get a dog in the house anyway. The dog coming with him wasn’t going to make entering the empty house any easier.

  This had been the hardest part of the past days, coming into the empty kitchen. He’d cleaned up the broken plates and washed up all the dishes, and now the kitchen was not only empty but perfectly clean, a sure sign of Molly’s absence. No supper cooking, no radio going.

  He pulled Cormac’s check and the copy of the invoice he had given Cormac from his pocket and laid them on the counter. Molly had run up the invoice last week, so it’d been ready. Normally Tommy Lee would lay the checks from customers on the counter, and then Molly would take care of the records and depositing the check. He wasn’t quite certain what to do now. He could operate the computer, if he had to, but mostly he avoided it. He decided to leave the check and invoice right there. He thought maybe Molly would return home soon and take care of them, although his hope for that was fading fast.

  He went over to the little laundry room and began stripping out of his dirty, greasy clothes, putting them straight into the washer. The telephone rang, and the sound made him jump. He answered it on the second ring, practically holding his breath, wondering if it was Molly and what he would say to her. He wished he had clothes on. He felt a lot more vulnerable standing there buck naked.

  “Daddy?”

  It was Savannah, and hearing her voice, Tommy Lee was at once glad and disappointed.

  “Has Mama come home?” she asked. “I called Grama’s house several times, but I can’t get anyone.”

  “No, she isn’t here,” Tommy Lee said. “You’ve probably just missed them over there. Try tonight. . . . Your grandmother doesn’t drive much at night anymore.” He wondered where Molly had gotten to. “Have you called your mother’s office?”

  “Yes. I got her machine and left a message.”

  “Well, she’ll call you soon.”

  Savannah said, “I just can’t believe you and Mama are separated. What are you going to do, Daddy?”

  Tommy Lee didn’t know what to say to that, but luckily he didn’t have to say anything right away because Savannah went on to say that he and Molly couldn’t simply throw away twenty-five years. Suddenly she was crying and saying things he could hardly understand, and Tommy Lee was walking around at the end of the telephone cord, wishing Molly were there to deal with their daughter. And wishing he had his clothes on, too. He might have told Savannah that he had to hang up because he was naked, but saying something like that to his daughter was too embarrassing. Besides, he had begun to worry about how Savannah’s state of mind might affect her baby. He began to panic, feeling that he had to do something and totally at a loss as to what.

  Finally he said, “We’re just going through a period of adjustment, honey. It’ll be okay. Quit makin’ such a big deal out of it.”

  Tommy Lee thought it was his tone more than what he said that made her quit crying.

  She said, “That’s true. I think Mama is goin’ through a midlife crisis. They’ve been runnin’ a series on the middle years on Good Morning America.”

  She went on about the changes that happened in middle age, making Tommy Lee feel like he was ready for either the rocking chair or the nut house. Then, at some point while Tommy Lee was thinking about this, she changed the subject to Stephen and chattered on for a bit about her husband’s hopes of another promotion. Stephen was an ambitious fellow, and Tommy Lee was satisfied that he would provide well for Savannah, who was a little immature still. He only wished he had more in common with his son-in-law.

  Stephen was all retail business and golf and football; he not only didn’t know who had won the last Daytona, he didn’t know who raced. He even had to take his car to one of those quick-lube places fo
r an oil change.

  “I love you, Daddy,” Savannah said just before hanging up.

  “I love you, too, honey," Tommy Lee managed to get out past the lump in his throat.

  Savannah telling him she loved him boosted him considerably. He felt as if he was a pretty good father and had managed the telephone and his daughter’s little crisis quite admirably after all. He went up the stairs and into the shower with a lighter step.

  But he began to sink again as he pondered Molly’s whereabouts. She would have picked up the phone if she was at the cottage or the office, he felt certain. She never could allow a phone to ring and not answer it, like he could.

  “It might be one of the kids needing us,” she would say.

  Years ago, when the telephone company first came out with call waiting, she had been the first to sign up, just in case she might be on the telephone when one of the kids got hurt at school. She used to make certain the kids had quarters tucked in their shoes, so they could call home if an emergency came up.

  She was the one who insisted on having her own office, he thought with irritation. She ought to be in it. And if she wasn’t at the office or at the cottage, where was she?

  The suspicion as to whether or not there was another man crossed his mind just as he was drying off. The thought struck him so hard that he stopped and stared at himself in the mirror.

  He supposed he should have wondered before about another man. It was possibly pretty short-sighted on his part not to have thought of it. Not even to have considered it. Molly would have said that it just went to show how he took her for granted. He had never been a jealous type of man, and this had been some annoyance to Molly.

  “You don’t think another man might possibly even look at me,” she said once.

  “Yes I do,” he defended himself. Sometimes he found himself under attack and didn’t know how or when it started. He thought to say, “You’re a very pretty woman."

  As if she didn’t hear him, she said, “Do you think I’m so undesirable that I couldn’t possibly attract someone who might want to have an affair?”

  “Of course I don’t. I just trust you, that’s all.” He thought his trust a good thing, but she was acting like it was an insult.

  “Sometimes trust is boring,” she told him. “Sometimes trust makes a person feel as forgotten as that big old safe in the garage."

  Molly liked him to be attentive, and he had come to understand this and tried to remember to be attentive. Recently Molly had said, “I don’t want you to try to be attentive. If you have to try, I don’t want it.”

  He wondered why trying should make it of less effect. It seemed the results should be what mattered. Sometimes he had to try his best just to get out of bed, but he made it, and that was what counted.

  He showered and dressed and went back down to the kitchen, where he stood for several minutes with the refrigerator door open. Disgusted with what little there was in there, he slammed the door closed and grabbed his car keys.

  He vaulted over the side of the Corvette, started the engine, and sped it back out of the garage bay. Shifting quick and hard, he spun the tires as he raced up the drive. He had to slow up, though, as the Corvette rode too low to take a chance on speeding on the sandy road, and besides, a couple of Eulalee Harris’s chickens were clucking around in the middle.

  Chapter 9

  What Are We Fighting For?

  The parking lot of Rodeo Rio’s was all but empty at just before seven on Monday night. It being summer, the sun was still bright. Tommy Lee pulled the Corvette to a stop near the door, beside a Jeep Cherokee. He was glad to park so close to the door, since he didn’t have the top on his Corvette.

  Inside he saw a couple of men playing pool, a man and woman at a booth, and a couple of people at a table in the back near the large television. CNN flickered on the screen, but all Tommy Lee could hear was George Strait singing out from the colorful Wurlitzer. He went to the bar and ordered a steak and a Mexican beer. Rodeo Rio’s only offered two things on their food menu: a third-pound hamburger or a T-bone steak.

  At the same moment the bartender passed across the foaming glass of Tecate, Winn Ketchum came out the office door nearby.

  “Well, hello, Tommy Lee.” Winn stuck out his hand as he came forward. “It’s been a while.”

  “Hello, Winn.”

  Tommy Lee shook the man’s hand, and the two of them traded a bit of b.s. for a minute. Tommy Lee asked after Sam, and Winn said Sam was out in Santa Fe right now.

  “He was in overnight last week,” Winn said, folding his pudgy arms. “He’s met this gal that has her own plane, and she dropped him off on her way to Dallas and picked him back up on her way back.”

  “That’s convenient,” Tommy Lee commented.

  “You know Sam. Women just about kill themselves to do things for him. I haven’t yet figured out why.” Winn grinned and tugged at his ear.

  The bartender called to Winn, “Carly’s on the phone.”

  Winn waved at him. “Tell her I’m comin’.” He looked at Tommy Lee. “Gotta run. . . . The wife’s waitin’.” He kind of glanced around. “Molly not here with you?”

  Tommy Lee shook his head. “Not tonight,” was all he said.

  “Well, don’t be a stranger, hear?” Winn said and clamped a hand on his shoulder as he left.

  Tommy Lee ran his gaze over the tables for a moment, then sauntered over to an empty pool table. His game was a little rusty these days, but he knew he’d warm up. He’d once played a lot of pool. He and Sam and sometimes Molly.

  Rodeo Rio’s had been around since Tommy Lee was a kid, but it was greatly changed. About five years ago Sam and his older brother Winn had bought the place and expanded it with the television area and went to serving hamburgers and steaks and mineral water to those who wanted it. The old small stage remained, with better speakers. The pool tables were fancier, and there was an exhaust system to take care of the cigarette smoke. Rodeo Rio’s sat out on the highway to Lawton and was classy enough to get folks coming down on the weekends while retaining a friendly, down-home atmosphere. Tommy Lee stayed too busy these days to come here often. He usually only came when Sam was in town.

  Sam Ketchum was still Tommy Lee’s best friend, even if they didn’t see each other very often. Sam had made a successful career in jewelry design and lived mostly out in Santa Fe, where he had a fancy adobe house and studio.

  “My heart’s in Valentine,” Sam always said, “but my livelihood’s in Santa Fe.”

  He returned to Valentine every few months, staying in an apartment over Winn’s garage. He had his interest in Rio’s with Winn, and he kept a few pieces of jewelry placed in shops in Lawton and Oklahoma City. Also, Molly was his accountant.

  Tommy Lee knew a lot of people, but he thought of them as acquaintances. He never had had a lot of friends; he’d never wanted a lot of friends. He’d had Sam and Molly and that had always been enough.

  In thinking of it, Tommy Lee guessed Sam hadn’t changed all that much since high school days and was pretty much living the life he had always said he would. He was a free man, having been divorced twice and with no children. Tommy Lee envied him a little.

  He looked up and saw a woman bringing his steak. She was immediately familiar—a slim woman with dark hair curling past her shoulders and a sexy rolling way of walking. But what made her name click in his mind were her big breasts bobbing beneath the Rodeo Rio’s tight-fitting T-shirt.

  Annette Rountree, Gordy Rountree’s little sister. Tommy Lee could recall her as a girl with pigtails. Whenever he and Sam went to Gordy’s she had always been peeking out from somewhere. Sometimes Tommy Lee would smile at her, and she’d smile back. He used to envy the guys he knew who had sisters and brothers. They all said he was crazy, but they hadn’t lived in the silent house he had.

  Annette cast him a slow smile as she stopped at the table where he’d set his beer. “Is right here good?”

  “Yeah . . . that’s fine. Thanks.” />
  Since Annette was so slender, her big breasts seemed all the more striking, and there was much speculation as to whether or not they were all hers. Molly said that breasts made bigger by implants were hard and tended to stick out. Annette’s did tend to stick out. Of course, Tommy Lee only gave them a quick glance. He didn’t want to be caught looking.

  He forgot to lay down the pool cue and carried it over to the table. That made him feel more foolish than he already did—he was feeling foolish because he didn’t often eat alone in a restaurant. Actually, he couldn’t remember ever eating alone in a restaurant.

  Annette set his plate and silverware in place. Tommy Lee propped the pool cue against the wall and asked her politely how she was and how long she’d been working at Rio’s. It seemed he could recall her working at the Main Street Cafe.

  “Oh, I’ve been here about three months now,” she said. Suddenly he was looking right into her face, and she was giving him a curious look. “You don’t come in here often.”

  “No . . . usually when Sam’s in town, I guess.” He thought maybe he imagined how she looked at him. He wouldn’t let himself look at her breasts.

  “I brought you a glass of water and catsup and steak sauce,” she said, pointing at each thing. “That steak sauce is Winn’s own recipe. It’s real good. Do you want anything else?”

  “No . . . no, this is fine. Thanks.” He pulled out the chair but remained standing until she walked away.

  He scooted his chair in place and looked at his plate a minute and felt dreary. The salad wasn’t anything more than a couple of cherry tomatoes sitting in lettuce. The T-bone steak laid across the oblong plate, and a thick piece of buttered toast lay atop part of it. They didn’t get fancy here at Rio’s.