Gnome On The Range (3 page)

We live on the Bozeman’s Southside, ten blocks off Main. Each house was different, some original mining shacks from the town’s start to sixties ranchers. Mine fell toward the latter. It’s a mid-century modern one story with a flat roof and tons of character. Typical dingy basement. Redwood siding painted a dark gray-green with black trim. Deep set eaves gave the house a Frank Lloyd Wright feel. What made it special was the floor to ceiling windows. The family room, kitchen, dining room and master all had walls of glass that let the outdoors be a part of the house. Unfortunately, the huge windows let anyone see in. Neighbors, Peeping Toms. It didn’t discriminate either.

I loved my house. It had been Nate’s before we married, his parents’ house before that, and Goldie’s parents’ house before that. Nate’s grandfather bought it brand new in ’59, gave it to Goldie and Paul as a wedding present in the late sixties. They lived there until Nate and I married and gave it to us as a wedding present. I was perfectly content with china or a fondue set for a present. But giving the house to the next generation had turned into a tradition. Nate, being the selfish bastard he was, didn’t turn down a free lunch. Or a free house.

When Nate died, I’d expected to give the house back to Goldie and Paul and move out. Find something smaller for just me and the boys. They’d been practically babies then. Bobby actually had been. But Goldie insisted the house was mine now. I’d more than earned it, she’d said. She’d loved her son and still missed him, but she knew all Nate had put me through. Besides, she said the house was too big for just her and Paul.

And so I stayed and the house was mine. But three generations of West’s had put their stamp on the home. I’d always been a little nervous to mess with that, but I had to admit I was getting sick of Nate’s eclectic hand-me-down furniture. He’d died years ago so maybe it was time to pass on his furniture, too. This winter, I promised myself.

But with a great house with great windows came a whopping heating bill. Those windows were single pane, original glass which weren’t the best choice for Montana winters. Or little boys with aspirations of making it in the major league.

The Colonel’s house didn’t have quite as much vintage as mine. It too was a ranch, but all similarities ended there. It was wide and squat, had a shallow peaked roof, white siding with brick accents and was as vanilla as they came. He did have a pristine yard with the most amazing flowerbeds to add spice the house lacked.

Ty’s house was built at the same time as the Colonel’s, but had wood siding painted a mud brown with a bright orange front door. He’d bought the house from the estate of Mr. Kowalchek who had been ninety-seven when he’d died. The dearly departed had been the original owner and the man hadn’t done a thing since the day he moved in. The bathroom was probably avocado green. I could see Ty filling his days with updates and renovations that could last as long as his mortgage.

“What’s Mom up to today?” I asked the Colonel. He ate dinner with us often and tonight, brought a Jell-O mold for dessert. It was his specialty. I personally loved a good Jell-O mold as long as there were no weird vegetables or nuts in it that would ruin it. Today, it was in a bundt shape tiered with four different colors. Very impressive.

“Golf,” the Colonel muttered. “Damned if I know how that woman can play in that heat. It’s like a furnace down there. Chasing a little ball around for hours on end. Always sounded stupid to me.”

One thing about the Colonel was he didn’t mince words. You knew where you stood with him. At sixty-five, he had a full head of gray hair. Helmet head. His hair was too scared of the man to fall out. He wore crisp khakis and a white button down shirt, his standard uniform. Sometimes he wore shorts, but they were his khakis sheared into cut-offs.

“It’s not a furnace to her. She says Savannah is ‘like a soft baby blanket’ in July.” I thought Savannah, Georgia in July was a furnace. With the heat turned on full blast, windows closed and an electric blanket on top of you. Plus a steam sauna. Can’t forget the humidity. “She thinks golf is calming.”

The Colonel humphed. “If that woman gets any calmer she’ll be dead.”

“Mommy, I found a prehistoric car that used to chase the dinosaurs!” Bobby shouted from his sandy seat, his mask propped up on top of his dark hair. He held up a Matchbox car he got from a birthday party favor bag earlier in the summer. I raised my eyebrows and feigned interest. Satisfied with my attention, he shoved the mask back down and went back to his dig.

“When’s she coming next?” It might have seemed strange I asked the Colonel about my own mother’s comings and goings, but she talked to the Colonel ten times more than she talked to me. Not that she didn’t love me. But she loved the Colonel. And being two thousand miles apart made that love all the stronger.

“End of August when school starts. She wants to be here for the first week.”

Worked for me. I liked my mother. We got along well and when she came to town it was great. She took care of the little details of raising kids. Baths, story time, lunch boxes. It was nice to be taken care of for a change. A mother hen clucking at her chicks. She didn’t do laundry, but that I could handle.

Zach ran over and grabbed his gnome. “Can I go show Ty my George? He said this morning he wanted to see our booty.”

My mouth dropped open but I shut it before I could laugh. Actually, I wasn’t sure what I should laugh at first. His costume, his gnome or his pirate jargon. “George? You named your gnome?”

Zach nodded his head. “Sure, everyone needs a name.”

I wasn’t aware everyone included a ceramic garden statue, but I wasn’t going to ruin Zach’s fun. “Sure. Don’t go out front by the road, cut through the Colonel’s backyard to get to Ty’s.”

Zach was off like a flash. Bobby, realizing where his brother was headed, hurried after him, his gnome—whatever its name was—in hand.

“So, tell me about our new neighbor.” I was desperately curious about Ty. As the first man to make my pulse rise in forever, I wanted to know more. Even if I was too chicken to act on it.

“He’s from over by Pony. Parents have a ranch there. Cows. Lots of cows.” Pony is a tiny speck of a town west of Bozeman, right smack dab in the middle of nowhere. Beautiful country, but isolated. Even more so than Bozeman. Heck, with forty thousand people, Bozeman was like New York City by comparison. The Colonel shook his head. “I don’t mind eating ‘em, but I don’t need several thousand as pets.”

I rolled my eyes. There really was nothing to say to that.

“Went into the army right out of high school. Did two tours in the Middle East. Serious stuff. Came back with all his parts and now he’s a firefighter.”

The man’s entire life story in four sentences. I should have asked a girl to get the juicy details. I inhaled sharply, in the way a person would if they found a bee on their nose, when I realized I didn’t even know if Ty was married. It was impossible to remember if he had a ring on his finger. I’d been too blinded by his wide shoulders and blue eyes. I needed to get a woman’s inside scoop. First off, wedding ring. Then current girlfriend, bad relationships, what side of the bed he slept on. The important stuff. Kelly. I’d have to call her later. My best friend had the fast track on information I couldn’t get. With seven kids involved in school, swim lessons, soccer practice, orthodontist appointments and whatever else, she ran into every person in town I didn’t.

Or I could go right to the source. Which, based on the hooting and hollering getting louder and louder, was coming my way. Through the backyard tromped Fireman, Spiderman and Star Wars-man. I felt protected from flames, bugs and aliens. Two, though, were carrying garden gnomes so the image was slightly tarnished.

Ty had changed out of his volunteer T-shirt and now wore a pair of well molded jeans, white T-shirt and flip flops. Why did he make me so nervous? He exuded manliness, that easy way he moved, with a confidence in himself. Montana sure knew how to make a man. Testosterone seeped from his pores and I just sucked it right in. That was what I found so attractive about him. His appeal went beyond his good looks. I had been married to a good looker and he hadn’t exuded anything. Maybe ego. Not much had come out of his pores except bad-karma goo as he’d been so slimy Ty shook hands with the Colonel, smiled at me. Our eyes met, held. I melted inside. Other places, too. I smiled back. The boys yanked on Ty’s arms, breaking the spell between the two of us.

Ty cleared his throat. “Looks like you did well at the garage sales,” he said, enjoying the kids’ gnome enthusiasm.

“Yeah, George is great!” Zach exclaimed, placing his friend on the table next to the chicken platter.

“Glad the fire department put Zach on the ‘No-Fly List’ instead of arresting him outright.” Ty sat down and Bobby, still hugging his gnome, climbed up in his lap.

I felt like I was fifteen again. Just looking at him gave me butterflies in my stomach, made my palms sweat. I was afraid I might start to ramble and giggle. I laughed instead. I couldn’t help it. Nice to see someone poke fun at life’s little foibles.

***

An hour later, I left the boys with the Colonel to go to work. They were camping out in his backyard for the evening, the tent going up when I left. The sun was setting, pink and purple streaked the sky. The air had finally started to cool. I zipped up my hoodie sweatshirt.

“Camping will put hair on their chests,” he said.

Zach and Bobby didn’t look particularly excited about that concept.

“You get to pee outside,” he added, and the boys jumped up and down for joy.

I gave the boys quick hugs and kisses before they dashed over to the nearest pine tree to pull down their pants and water it.

“Don’t worry about anything. I’m more comfortable in a tent than inside anyway.”

“I’ll wake you when I get home and lug them into the house,” I said, then dashed off.

***

Later at Goldilocks, I opened a shipment of peek-a-boo lingerie. It was pink, it was stretchy and it was all see-through. It left nothing to the imagination and gave a ton of access to all the important places.

The store smelled like piña colada as a customer had dropped a canister of tropical scented dusting powder on the floor. It had taken me fifteen minutes to vacuum up what looked like flour, but its use was less culinary and more sexual, although there was some licking involved. The scent lingered. I probably smelled like it, too.

The phone rang. “Goldilocks.” Goldie listened, and then answered, “You got it stuck where?” She listened some more. “Uh huh.” And then some more. “We don’t give advice on medical conditions, but if it’s stuck where you say and you can’t reach it, then you need to go to the ER to get it out. Come in next week when you’re feeling better and I’ll give you a replacement, on the house.” Goldie hung up.

Nothing like customer service!

“So, I heard about the incident at the fire station this morning,” Goldie commented, gum popping between her capped teeth. My mother-in-law is seventy, five feet nothing, lots of dyed blond hair piled high on her head. She wore a black V-neck stretchy top, which showed off ample cleavage. Trim jeans and a pair of clogs. She aimed for under forty above the ankles, and went for comfort when it came to her feet.

Her husband, Paul, was her antithesis. Calm, quiet, reserved. He chose his words wisely. When he spoke, I listened, as it was always something good. I had no idea how they’d stayed married for almost forty years but, whatever it was, it was working.

Paul’s an obstetrician who’s delivered more than half the babies in town. Now he delivered those babies’ babies. He’d been on call when I went into labor with Zach, but I drew the line—even at nine centimeters dilated—at my father-in-law seeing my hoo-hah, so they’d called in an alternate. It was no small stretch that as a couple, my in-laws knew more about a woman’s hoo-hah than anyone else in town. She was the expert on fun, he the consequences.

“John Poleski was there with his wife and grandson. Fortunately he had that pacemaker put in last year.”

John Poleski was eighty if he was a day, shaped like a tall Humpty Dumpty and bald. He’d worked for the railroad on the highline near Malta, a small town near the Canadian border, for decades. I’d never seen him in anything but overalls.

I rolled my eyes at her as I rung up a sale for strawberry flavored body lotion and a DVD rental of Hit Me With Your Black Cock.

“Wish I’d been there.” She chuckled. “I’ve got to kiss my grandson for stirring things up.” Goldie was
all
for stirring things up. She’s Bozeman’s Stir-Things-Up Queen. She liked to stick her nose in everyone’s business, which was easy to do around here. “John also said you met Ty Strickland. He’s a
real
man. I bet he’s good with his hands.” She waggled her eyebrows at me.

I dreaded where this was going. I decided to take the high road. “I’ll definitely remember him when my snow blower stops working.”

She clicked her manicured nails on the glass topped display case full of the higher end toys. “Snow blower, my ass. He can take care of other things you need worked on, Jane.” She looked at me, her head tilted down to give me a beady-eyed gaze. “You need sex and that man can give it to you.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I grumbled walking over to the hanging racks with the lingerie.

“It’s been, what, three years since Nate’s been gone. How long before that?”

This was a typical conversation I had with my mother-in-law. She’d talk sex with the pope. Although I thought the pope would be more comfortable than I was at the moment. This was her son—her dead son—she was talking about. But she was the first to admit his elevator hadn’t gone all the way up and it had skipped the morals department all together.

“Obviously you did it to have Bobby and that’s been, what, five years or so?” She looked up in the air at her imaginary calculator.

“Holy crap,” I whispered. I’d have sex with the first guy who came through the door if Goldie would just shut up.

“Honey, I’ve known you since you were a little baby freshman at MSU.”

MSU, or MontanaStateUniversity, was practically downtown, in fact only a few blocks from my house. “Coming from a state like Maryland, I swear you didn’t know one end of a cow from another.”