Kenny was pulling too high on the rope. The colt couldn’t get his head down, Cynthia thought, and then Kenny did, too. He loosened the rope, and the colt lowered his head, arched his back and started bucking. Kenny’s whole body flopped, but he stayed on.
Cynthia could tell he’d had enough. He tried to yank the colt’s head back up—let him run it off—but all he did was lose his concentration. He went off backward over the rump, landed hard on his shoulder blades, and rolled. The colt took a run down the field, a dim silver glow in the distance, like the gleam of a coin underwater.
She walked down the field toward Kenny. He was sitting up, his legs stretched out in front of him. He looked up at her, but his eyes weren’t right, he didn’t seem to see her.
“You all right?” he said. He remembered the colt knocking her flat.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” she said.
Kenny laughed and stood up. Then he sat back down.
“I’ll be okay,” he said. “Give me a second.” A black smear of mud across his face made one eye seem startlingly white when he opened it. He was shivering. They retrieved his rope and started walking back.
In the house, she guided him through the dark to the bathroom. She didn’t dare to turn on any lights, but the big bathroom had no windows. She flipped on the light, the fan, and the heat lamp, and sat Kenny on the closed lid of the toilet.
She twisted on both faucets in the big tub and let them blast. In the red light, she saw Kenny’s lashes were caked thick with mud. She marveled how he missed getting it in his eye.
“Give me your clothes,” she said. “You can’t go home like that.” His jeans were black with mud up to the knees and a smear of green manure cut across the shoulders of his jacket. He shrugged out of the jacket one arm at a time, and turned around to step out of his jeans. She hung his blue parka on the back of the door and made her way through the dark house to drop the jeans into the washer. No one would ask about her clothes, old ranch jeans she wore to do chores.
On the way back, she took a bottle of beer from the refrigerator. Kenny was in the tub when she opened the bathroom door. The room was misty and hot with steam, and it smelled like something that had been dead a while. She picked up Kenny’s stiff socks and tossed them out the door into the hall. She sat down on the floor and opened the beer.
Kenny sank underwater, and when he came up his hair was slicked back dark. His face was flushed from the heat, but his forehead gleamed white. At the curve of his hairline, new, wispy hairs made him look sweet, like a small child. She reached up for his jacket and wiped at the manure with a wet washrag.
“Give me a towel,” he said. She stood up and held out one of the big towels. Kenny stood up behind it, wrapped it under his armpits, and stepped out of the tub.
“You can get in,” he said.
She looked in the tub. The water was nearly black. “No thanks,” she said. Kenny laughed and she pulled out the plug. Kenny wrapped another towel around his shoulders and sat down on the carpet.
“It’s nice here, isn’t it?” he said. “I’ve never been in a bathroom like this.”
“It’s like this in hotels,” she said.
“I’ve never been in a hotel.”
“Never?”
“I was in motels, when I was little. My dad was in the air force.”
Cynthia stood in the tub, peeled off her clothes behind the shower curtain, and dropped them out. She pushed the showerhead away from her, turned it on full blast, and felt for the right temperature. She craned her neck to look at her shoulder. Her arm and hip and leg were marked with mottled blue and red bruises, like deep thumbprints. Suddenly, the steam and hot water made her feel sick deep in her bowels. She thought she might throw up, or pass out. She sat down on the hard porcelain bottom of the tub, the water streaming down her face, into her nose and mouth. She reached up and turned the faucet off.
“You okay?” Kenny said.
“No.” She swallowed saliva. “I need a towel.”
The towel came around the curtain. She held its softness up to her face, pressing into it. She had to concentrate on not throwing up.
“What’s the matter?” Kenny said. He was standing up. “You okay?”
The waves of sickness weakened. She took a deep breath, stood up slowly, and wrapped herself in the towel. She drew back the curtain. The smell of manure and beer and Kenny’s socks was thick in the steam. She stepped out of the tub.
“Open the door,” she said to Kenny. She stepped past him into the hall. In the cool air she could breathe. She felt it on her face, deep in her lungs.
“I have to lie down,” she said, and moved toward the bedroom.
She crawled under the sheets and lay there, sweat beading on her forehead, the wet towel warm around her.
Kenny didn’t know what was wrong. At first, she wouldn’t talk to him, and he felt abandoned, as if she weren’t any longer there.
“Please. Tell me what to do,” he said.
“Just sick,” she said. “I’m okay now.”
But then she was quiet for a long time. Kenny stood by the bed until his eyes saw red spots in the blackness. His wet hair dripped, one cold drop, then another, down his back. He was shivering.
He went back to the bathroom and pulled on his shirt and underwear. He had no idea where his jeans were.
Cynthia still hadn’t moved in the bed. He thought maybe she was sleeping. He pulled back the covers and crawled in. The sheets were freezing cold. He inched over to Cynthia, curled up on his side, and curved himself behind her back. She was wet. He could hear the slow, even pull of her breathing. Carefully, he brought the covers up over his shoulder and hers, and wrapped his arm around her. Gradually, the wetness grew warm. Cynthia slept, but Kenny stayed awake. Every inch of his skin was awake. He closed his eyes and skimmed along a shimmering surface, like a water bird, just barely touching down from time to time into the sea.
28
Lenna sat at her desk, downstairs in the courthouse, listening to the other women talking back and forth. A heavy file drawer slid open and shut.
Outside the window, she heard a bird sing, a fluttering, high string of notes up in the trees. She hadn’t realized until that moment that she hadn’t heard a bird all winter. Every place she’d ever lived before, birds came even in the winter. But in this high valley only scavengers, the ravens and magpies, stayed. She pushed back the urge to go to the window and look.
To her, this was the sure sign. Winter was over. She felt the warmer air like a reprieve. She felt lighter now that it was spring. She’d let Kenny stay out late. He was only fourteen, but it was so close to Easter vacation. He had been sleeping when she left for work. It amazed her how much he could sleep. For the first time since his father died, she had the sense that she was taking care of him. She swung around and rolled a printed form into her typewriter.
When her phone rang, she stopped typing and answered, her voice light and friendly. The sheriff was on the line. He asked her to step back to his office.
Over the winter, she’d come to like the sheriff and the deputy. In the last few weeks, she’d taken all the overtime she could and found herself many nights in the overheated, empty building with only Jeff and the dispatcher listening for calls on the phone or radio. After they carried food across the street from the café to feed the jail inmates, she sometimes ate her meal with them.
She walked through the hall to the back of the big building. Her heels made satisfying clicks along the polished floors. She came in the back way, through the jail and into Jeff’s office.
Two elderly people stood at the counter, applying for driver’s licenses, she thought. Then, past the swinging gate in the sheriff’s enclosure, she saw Kenny and Cynthia. They sat side by side in wooden chairs facing the sheriff. The first thing she noticed was Kenny’s jeans. They clung, wet, to his thighs as if he’d gone in swimming. And his boots were caked black with mud.
The sheriff stood and swung back the gate for her to c
ome in. She looked at him, then at the kids. She couldn’t understand what was happening. It seemed so odd to see Kenny there. She’d left him at home sleeping.
“Sit down,” Jeff said, hauling a chair over. She hadn’t even brought her purse. She sat down, but she kept wanting to reach for her purse and hold it in her lap.
The sheriff turned to the older couple standing at the counter.
“Mr. and Mrs. Leavitt,” he said tentatively, as if he might have the name wrong. The woman nodded. “This is the boy’s mother, Lenna Swanson.”
She couldn’t look at the old people. She looked at Kenny. His hair was whirled in a cowlick, as if he had just woken up. He wouldn’t look at her. He stared down at his hands, clasped together between his knees. Cynthia glanced at her, but her eyes didn’t make contact. Lenna hadn’t seen her since she’d ridden Kenny home on her horse.
“What’s the matter?” Lenna said. “Jeff?”
The sheriff stood up and strode over to the Leavitts. “Could I ask you to wait outside for a minute?” He indicated the door that led out to the main hall.
When they were gone he turned to Lenna, a typed report in his hand.
“The Leavitts are friends of the Moyerses’. They drove in early this morning and found the kids at the ranch. In the big house. They want to file charges.” He read from the report. “Trespassing. Breaking and entering. At least unlawful entry. The kids say they didn’t break in. The place was open. I have a man up there checking for damage.”
He glanced at Cynthia. “Earl’s on his way.”
The sheriff’s office seemed suddenly stark and official to Lenna. Her pulse raced, and she couldn’t shake a sense of the confusion.
“Kenny,” she said. He looked up at her, his eyes resigned and blank. “I thought you were home . . .”
“Apparently,” the sheriff said, “they broke in last night and —”
“We didn’t break in,” Cynthia’s voice interrupted.
The sheriff ignored her. “Broke in and spent the night.”
He looked at Lenna, as if this news would hurt her. She tried to take it in. “They spent the night,” the sheriff said, “in the Moyerses’ bedroom.”
Darkness closed around her in a black pool. At the bottom of the pool, she felt the shame of the whole town knowing, of what would happen to Kenny at school.
“What can I do?” she said. “What do we do?”
“I have a call in to Roddy’s folks. They have to press the charges.”
“Does he have to stay here?”
“I should keep ’em.”
“No,” she said, the word coming out, involuntary. She could feel the tightness in her nose and eyes, the start of tears. She blinked hard.
“No, Jeff,” she said. “I need to take him home.”
The sheriff reached over and laid a broad hand on her arm. She felt the heavy weight of it.
“I want to take him home.”
“You’re in no position,” Jeff said, “to take care of this at home. A few hours in jail will do him good.”
He suddenly wasn’t her friend, or anyone she knew.
“What about Cynthia? Are you going to keep her here, too?” she said, struggling to keep the tears out of her voice.
The sheriff laughed.
She felt as if he’d slapped her. The meaning of it, the loud, coarse laugh, the sense that she was stupid to think they’d keep a girl in jail, stunned her. She was suddenly nowhere near crying.
“I’m taking him home,” she said. “Now.”
She left her chair and took a step toward Kenny. At that moment, Earl Dustin came in from the outside door. Kenny stood, then Jeff.
“Earl,” the sheriff said. But Earl Dustin didn’t answer. He remained in the doorway, his hat tipped low over his eyes. His narrow face was gray, his lips set hard.
He pushed open the swinging gate, walked over to Cynthia, took her by the arm, and ushered her toward the door.
The sheriff stood in front of Lenna. His black leather holster and gun seemed huge to her.
“Hold it, Earl,” he said.
Earl stopped at the door, turned around, and stared back at the sheriff. “You know where I live,” he said, and slammed the door.
The air in the room was charged with fear and anger. Jeff stood, red patches rising in his cheeks, staring after Earl. He glanced at Lenna and jerked his chin toward the door.
She let Kenny walk in front while she held back the urge to reach out and touch him, and let the heavy door close on its own behind her.
When they were home, she sat Kenny down in the rocker. He hadn’t said a word in the car. She took clean sheets from the cupboard and made up a bed on the couch. Upstairs, she found pajamas and brought down Kenny’s quilt and pillow.
She watched him struggle to pull his boots off, bending as if he were stiff or hurt. Chips of dark mud fell and broke on the floor, but she barely noticed. She went into the kitchen and put water on while Kenny undressed. She looked in once, and saw his white, narrow shoulders. And bruises. Deep purple bruises, nearly black. She swallowed hard and turned away.
She brought him a cup of hot chocolate and sat beside him while he drank it. The sun shone bright on the wooden floor, and a fly buzzed in the heat trapped on the windowsill.
“What happened?” she said softly.
“Nothin’,” Kenny answered. “I got bucked off.” He looked up at her, too tired to care. “We were only riding colts.”
She didn’t ask for more. She watched him swallow the last of the chocolate and carried the cup to the kitchen. When she came back, he had stretched out under the quilt, his head on the pillow and his eyes closed.
She sank into the rocker and turned the radio on low. Out the window, a rusty-breasted robin skittered down onto the dry grass, pecked at the ground, and flew away.
Lenna rocked back and forth. After dark, she’d go back to the office and pick up her purse and coat. Tomorrow she could call in sick.
29
The sky was clear, a soft, hazy blue, and the sun shone bright. Cynthia knew it was warm outside. She sat on her bed, staring out at the hay fields, at a mirage of green that only distance allowed her to see. Up close, the sprigs of new grass disappeared against the dark soil. Her dad was sleeping, and the house seemed closed up, stuffy. She wanted to go down and practice, her fingers almost ached with a need to work them. But her dad had been up calving heifers most of the night.
More than anything, she missed calving. It was hard to believe only two years had passed since her father decided she needed her sleep. She used to get up every four hours in the night to go check the heifers. The ground, soft with manure and old hay, sucked at her boots in the daytime, but at night it froze in a crust that crunched under her boots. She used to love walking around the heifers when they were bedded down, their breath white in her flashlight, the sound of their hard breathing making it seem as if they were all in labor. But heifers were tricky. Some never showed signs the way old mother cows did. Sometimes they calved standing up, their bags still small and round, as if they had no milk. With the old mother cows you watched for their bags to grow so heavy that the swollen pink teats didn’t hang, but stuck straight out on all sides. Calving had been the only time her dad ever needed her, ever thought she was worth her keep.
Since he’d picked her up at the sheriff’s office, he had hardly said a word to her. He didn’t even talk about what heifers he thought were coming along. As the days went by, she began to see the new calves, sleeping folded up and tiny in some slight hollow in the field, and it was as if they belonged to some other rancher and had nothing to do with her.
It was her mother who had sat her down, talked to her, as if they were coconspirators. Cynthia tried to tell her mother what had happened. That nothing had happened. It was Kenny’s mother who had called and talked to the Moyerses. Roddy had never told Cynthia she had permission to play the piano, but they never even thought of pressing charges. Still, it was all the same to her mother,
to the kids at school. The minister thought it best she not sing or play at church anymore.
Cynthia didn’t care about that. She was glad not to go. But judging from the weight of it—the whispers at school, the high tension when she’d first gone back—she might as well have turned up pregnant. Only Mr. Everts had acted like himself.
Her mother even suggested Cynthia take a trip, stay with her aunt Helen in New York for a while. The unfairness of it burned in her. She and her mother and the town all lived in different universes. It bound her to Kenny because they shared a secret. Only the two of them knew the night at the ranch house had been simple—a logical, simple thing.
She wondered why Roddy was somehow above it all. A football hero. Nobody had asked a single question about her dates with him. Where they’d gone or what they’d done.
She missed Roddy, missed the easy physical touch of him. The way when they made love, she knew, just knew, it was a good thing. It made a crazy kind of sense to her that the whole town stared. The world had finally come out and said what they’d thought of her all along. But they couldn’t touch what she knew. Roddy had felt good to her. And that feeling could not be wrong.
Finally, spring had come, but she couldn’t go out. She wasn’t allowed to leave the house except for school. She couldn’t even take the bus. Her mother dropped her off and picked her up.
Still, she didn’t feel confined. A strange sort of power was growing inside her—as if she could tap a chair and make it slide across the floor. She knew a different world was out there. All she had to do was go and find it.
She tiptoed down the stairs. Her mother had gone shopping, and the house seemed unreal—so barren and quiet. The rooms smelled faintly dusty.
On the mud porch, she tugged on her boots and stepped out the door. The spring sun fell on her face and her arms. She thought she might just go sit in the hayloft, look down at the nursing calves in the field. Smell the steam rising from hay heating under the tin roof.
Love and Country Page 19