“That was the good news,” said Troy, kind of scratching his head. “Bad news is, she came in drivin’ a U-Haul truck.”
“A U-Haul-”
“Seems she’s up and divorced her husband.”
“Oh, my God.”
“Yep. Packed up everything and moved here, lock, stock and barrel.”
“Bella didn’t need this.” Charly bit out the words, beginning to pace angrily. “What rotten timing. What a lousy thing to do to your sister!”
“Well,” Troy said in a placating tone, “from what Jimmy Joe tells me, she didn’t have a lotta choice. I guess her husband has a problem with gambling, or something? Anyway, he took everything-even mortgaged the house without telling his wife. Forged her signature, cleaned everything out, then split. The bank foreclosed on her, so she packed up everything she had left, including the kids, in the old U-Haul, and here she is.”
Charly clapped a hand to her forehead and closed her eyes. “Oh, my Lord,” she breathed. “Poor Bella.”
“Bottom line,” said Troy quietly, “she’s really needin’ me to finish that nursery for her, so her sister and the kids can have the spare room.”
“Well, of course-you should go back.” Charly was pacing again, frowning and fidgety, avoiding his eyes. “Listen, I keep telling you, you don’t need to stay here for me. You go on home. I’ll just stay here and wait for the-”
He snaked out a hand and caught her by the arm. She sucked in air as her head snapped around and her eyes burned at him like a tiger’s in the night.
“Hey,” he said softly, “come ’ere.”
“What?” she demanded in a hushed voice as he drew her slowly toward him. Her eyes were wary…still those of a tiger, but a frightened one now, ears flattened and fangs showing, ready to flee.
What do you want from me?
With pounding heart, deceptively relaxed, he guided her between his outstretched legs as he leaned, half-sitting, against the dresser. “Just come ’ere for a minute, and look at me.”
Look at me. Last night’s fear burned like old embers in her eyes, whispered like ashes in her voice. “What do you want?”
“What do I want…” Troy looked away for a moment, then heaved a sigh and brought his gaze back to her pale, tense face. “Look, you s‘pose we could manage to spend a night makin’ love and still look one another in the eye in the mornin’? Think we could do that? Jeez Louise, woman, what are you, some kind of shrinking maiden or somethin’?”
“That’s me,” said Charly with a dry laugh. “Definitely.”
He brushed her chin with his thumb, then leaned his body forward and gently, gently kissed her.
“Look,” he murmured, pulling back just enough so he could see her eyes-eyes that now held the warm, unfocused glow of confusion. Whiskey eyes. “I don’t know about you, but my feelings don’t crawl into a coffin come daylight. Nothin’ here’s changed. Yesterday I was your friend, last night I was your lover, this morning I’m still the same guy-friend and lover. Ease up, okay?” He brought his mouth to hers again, brushing his lips across the abashed beginnings of her smile. “And let’s get somethin’ straight. I’m not goin’ anywhere until you’ve got those issues of yours resolved.”
“Issues…” She laughed and leaned against him, and he could feel her body trembling slightly. He wrapped his arms and his body protectively around her, wishing he could protect her heart the same way.
“You know what’s really bothering you, don’t you?” he murmured, combing his fingers through her hair. Her head moved affirmatively against his hand. Then she turned her face into his chest in a quick little movement of denial, like a mouse looking for a place to hide.
“Dobrina’s right,” he went on, his voice growing husky. “You need to show your son that diary. He needs to know the truth.” She pulled herself slowly back, one hand flat against his chest as if, he thought, by pushing him away she would keep the words away, as well. He held her gently by the shoulders, denying her escape. “He wants to understand, can’t you see that? He wants to understand the reason why his daddy killed himself.” Her mouth popped open, letting a strangled sound escape. He touched her lips with a finger and finished softly, “Honey, he needs to know it wasn’t your fault.”
Her eyes turned liquid and spilled over. He felt his own eyes burning as he took her face between his two hands and brushed away the moisture with his thumbs. “You made a promise,” he said thickly. “And you never broke it. You didn’t, not even in that diary of yours, not on purpose. But Dobrina knew the truth soon as she read it, and so did I. Cutter’s gonna know it, too. Maybe not right away, but he’ll figure it out…that his daddy killed himself to spare you both from a lifetime of livin’ a lie.”
There was no answer, save for a long, quivering breath. And then she closed her eyes, and her face seemed to crumple in his hands. Nothing for him to do then but fold her in and hold her close and keep her safe while she sobbed.
“He’s not here,” Charly said as she opened the door of the Cherokee and climbed in. She sounded a lot more out of breath than she should have been, just from running down the steps of her father’s house. “Dobie says he went for a drive.”
“What do you want to do?” Troy asked, staring through the windshield, watching a squirrel scamper across the brick-paved driveway. “You wanna wait for him?”
His peripheral vision caught her headshake; he heard her seat belt click. “She says she thinks he might be up at the spring. She says he likes to go there sometimes.”
When he’s hurtin’. Troy could understand that. Sometimes a man just needed a quiet place to be alone in. A place…and time…to heal himself.
“Okay, then,” he said, reaching for the gearshift, “you wanna go for a drive?”
“Might as well,” Charly said grimly. “Before I lose my nerve.”
He glanced at her as he aimed the Cherokee between the gateposts and into the quiet street, but didn’t say anything. All the way through town and out on the highway and up the winding grade to the mountains, he drove in silence, listening to the pounding of his heart. Even Bubba was quieter than usual, maybe picking up the tension vibes the way dogs do, lying on the middle seat behind them, alert but still.
How must it be for her? he wondered. What was she thinking of now-the tiny baby she’d held for such a brief time in her arms, or all the years she’d missed, the first smile, the first steps, the lost teeth and skinned knees she hadn’t been there to comfort him through? Or was she only thinking of the tall, good-looking young man with the anger and hurt in his eyes? Troy couldn’t even imagine it. He’d never been a mother-hell, he’d never even been a father-so how could he begin to know what it must be like to have a child taken away from you?
He knew it had been a long time since he’d felt like this-adrenaline pumping, heart pounding, tension vibrating through his muscles and nerves like charges of electricity. He found himself preparing himself, focusing all his energy and concentration on what lay ahead, the way he once had before an important mission. And in a way, he thought, this might be the most important mission of his life; surely it was one of the most dangerous, this business of committing another human being’s heart, soul and happiness into his own keeping.
“I’m scared,” Charly whispered as they turned into the clearing at Mourning Spring Park. There was one other car there, a blue Mustang a dozen or so years old. Troy pulled in beside it and turned off the motor, then reached over and put his hand over hers.
“I know,” he said in a gravelly voice. So am I. “But it’s gonna be okay. You understand me? No matter what happens.”
But he didn’t think she heard him, or would have believed him if she had.
Cutter was sitting on a picnic table, the same one he and Charly had been sitting on that morning, when she’d told him about Colin, and how all this had come about. He had his back to them, although Troy knew very well he’d already marked their arrival.
Charly reached for the door handle a
nd yanked it open. Bubba was already on his feet, whining and chompin’ at the bit to get to that water, so Troy got out and opened up his door and let him go. The pup went galloping by Charly, who was making her way across the sun-dappled gravel with the diary hugged to her chest. Troy got Bubba’s leash out of the back of the Cherokee and then followed, hanging back far enough to give her room, but close enough so she’d know he was there if she needed him.
The dog went galumphing by Cutter and splashed his way into the stream, making it pretty hard for the kid to go on pretending he didn’t know they were there. He turned to look over his shoulder, impatiently frowning, and muttered, “What do you want?”
From where he stood, Troy could see Charly’s shoulders lift, and he knew she must be trying to pull in a breath, one that probably felt like shards of broken glass. When she spoke, though, her voice was steady and strong, and he felt an unheralded glow of pride.
“I’m glad I found you-Dobie told me you might be here. Look, I just wanted to tell you I’m going to be leaving soon. They’re bringing me a car either tonight or in the morning.”
Cutter grunted something Troy couldn’t make out and turned his back to her again. She took a step closer.
“Cutter, listen.” Her voice was so low, so vibrant with emotion that it seemed to Troy he could feel it in his bones rather than hear it. “I understand my coming here was a shock to you.” She gave a soft huff of laughter. “Finding you here was a shock to me. Look, I don’t want to upset you-that’s the last thing I ever wanted. I understand you don’t care to have me be a part of your life right now. But maybe someday-” she took a deep, unsteady breath “-maybe someday you’ll have…questions.” She held out the diary, a quick, jerking motion. “Dobrina wanted me to give you this. It’s, um, it’s my diary. I kept it the year…the year everything happened. The year before you were born. I thought-she thought maybe you should read it.”
Cutter twisted toward her, tense and shaking. “What do I have to say to you to make you understand? I’m not interested in anything you’ve got to say. If Pop and Dobie want you back in their lives, that’s their business. I don’t want you in mine, okay? Can I make myself any clearer? And you can take that book with you-there’s nothin’ in there I need to see, nothing you can say I want to hear.” The young voice cracked. He hauled in a breath and pulled himself up, clutching desperately at his pride. “Now, I’d be obliged if you’d leave me alone.”
Listening to that, Troy felt a strange sensation, like a cold wind blowing through him, chilling his body, drowning thought. He had no real sense of how long it was before Charly finally turned around and started back toward him, walking as though the ground underneath her feet were rocky. He didn’t hear anything except for the rushing in his ears as he guided her to the truck with one hand on her elbow. He whistled for Bubba, opened up the door for him when he came running, and it never even occurred to him to mind the mud and water he was bringing in with him. Something primitive in him was wanting to kill the kid for doing this to the woman he loved, even while the reasoning part of him was telling him nobody in this world was hurtin’ any worse than that boy was right then.
Except, of course, for Charly.
Troy helped her into the passenger’s side of the Cherokee the way he would have if she’d been old, or disabled. He shut her door and went around to his side and got in and started up the engine and backed slowly out of the clearing. And all the while she didn’t say a word, didn’t make a sound.
He waited until he’d pulled out onto the highway, then cleared his throat and said, “Well, we probably should’ve expected somethin’ like this. It’s awful early yet. He’ll come around.”
She shook her head. “No,” she said softly, “he won’t. You saw his face.” Troy was getting ready to argue with her when she suddenly gave a sharp little laugh. “He’s got too much of me in him. Lord, it took me twenty years to forgive my father. And I’m expecting him to do it in two days?”
She looked down at the book in her hands, slowly shaking her head, her voice going soft again, tired and sad. “Look, I tried, okay? It’s no use beating my head against the wall. All I’m doing is hurting myself. I don’t need this. I don’t need it.” She caught herself, then went on in a whisper, “At least…I know now. I know he’s okay. And he’s with people who love him. That’s all I wanted…”
“Well,” said Troy, easing his own aching chest with a breath, “maybe what you should do is leave the diary with Dobrina. If anybody can bring that boy around, she-Hey, what are you doing?”
What Charly was doing was rolling her window down. And before he could even think about stopping her, she’d already done it. She’d thrown the diary out of the car.
Troy gasped as he watched the little green book go arcing through the air, over the side of the embankment, to land somewhere in the underbrush below.
“What’d you do that for?” he yelled as he tromped reflexively on the brake, looking wildly around for a place to pull over.
“Just…get me out of here,” she said tersely, rocking herself with her arms folded across her waist, as if she had a bad bellyache. She sounded like her jaws were wired together. “Just…get me away from this town. God…” She leaned back suddenly, lifting her hands to push her hair away from her face in a gesture that was becoming familiar to him, then gave her head that little shake that settled everything back into its proper place. He couldn’t help but think how symbolic that was. “I can’t wait,” she said in a voice that was rough with passion, “to get back to L.A. Back to civilization.”
“Lady,” Troy growled, “you’ve got a pretty peculiar idea of civilization.” He wasn’t sure whether he was mad at her for what she’d done-throwing her diary away-although he was still jangling from the shock of that, for sure. Or the people-the fates-that had hurt her so badly. Or whether it was just the accumulation of everything he’d had to deal with over the past few days. Either way, it had finally happened. He’d reached the end of his rope.
And Charly knew it. She felt the sudden coldness of fear-not of him, not of Troy, she knew he’d never hurt her, not in a million years-but of losing something she hadn’t known was hers until that moment.
“Okay, maybe that was a bad choice of words,” she said, glancing at him uneasily. “I just meant-you know, some place where life is a bit more sophisticated. All this soap-opera stuff is getting to me.”
“Sophisticated.” He said the word, then snorted. “You know, Mirabella says that about you-‘Charly’s so confident, so funny and smart. So cool and sophisticated’-like it was a compliment. Well, hell, lady-let me ask you this-What does that mean, anyway? Can you tell me that?” He threw her a look, but she didn’t reply, and he went back to watching the road while she sat hunched and cold, watching a muscle work in the side of his jaw.
After a while he went on, in the slow, measured way people do when they aren’t used to making speeches. “All I know is, folks who live in small towns, particularly Southern small towns, are supposed to be unsophisticated. And folks who live in big cities are supposed to be sophisticated. So, what is it? Huh? You tell me. Some kind of dress thing? Knowin’ what wine to order? Bein’ in on who’s hip, who’s hot and who’s not? Does it mean big-city folks know more’n small-town folks?”
He gave a short, harsh laugh. “I’ll tell you somethin’, lady-when you live in a small town you learn more about human nature and the dirty little secrets people carry around with them, and what makes for good and evil, than anybody. You oughta know that.”
She opened her mouth to say something, but changed her mind when she saw he was only thinking, and hadn’t finished yet. She swallowed instead, and it sounded loud in the silence.
“Maybe,” he said after a moment, tilting his head a little to one side, “that’s what sophistication means. Not how much you know, but whether or not you give a rip. Tell me somethin‘-in L.A. when you hear a siren, what do you think about? Do you even notice? Does anybody? In a small town
, when folks hear a siren, let me tell you, they notice. They stop what they’re doin’ and they listen, and they’re tryin’ to figure out what kind of siren it is, and where it’s going. And if it comes down their street, they run out on their porches and front lawns to see it, and their hearts are pounding, and they’re wonderin’ who it’s for, which one of their neighbors is in trouble. And after it goes by, five minutes later they’re on the phone to their neighbors, askin’ who is it? What’s wrong? Is everybody okay? Can I help? And if it’s anybody they’re connected to even a little bit, the next day they’re goin’ up the walk with a covered casserole dish in their hands. And come Sunday, you can bet they’re gonna be mentioning those people in their prayers.
“Do they make mistakes sometimes? Do they rush to judgment? Do they gossip and find fault? Act mean and petty sometimes? You bet they do. But they care. Maybe that’s not very sophisticated, but you know what? I don’t care. Because that’s the kind of place I want to live in, where people care about one another, warts and all. And that’s the kind of place I want my kids to grow up in. You can go on back to your sophisticated city folks, lady. Tell you somethin’-peopte live like that because they don’t want the burdens that come from caring, and that’s the truth. And to make themselves feel better about it, less lonely, maybe, they call themselves sophisticated.”
On the last word the Cherokee jerked to a stop. Charly looked up, surprised to see that they were back at the Mourning Springs Motel, parked in front of room 10. Her vision blurred and shimmered.
“Here’s the key,” Troy said in a harsh and gravel-filled voice. “You’re paid up for tonight, if you need it.”
She could only stare at him, cold inside with fear and shock, unable to believe she could have blown it so badly. So suddenly.
His eyes…his beautiful eyes gazed back at her, dark with disappointment and pain. What do you want from me? She knew the answer to that question now-maybe she always had. Something she hadn’t been able to give him, then. Maybe she still couldn’t. But, dear God-had she lost any chance she might have had to try?
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