Gun Lake (28 page)

Jeff.

Todd
.

He thought of the boys and wanted to see them. He was tired of feeling guilty and feeling hurt for not seeing them. It was his
right
to see them. His legal right. They were his flesh and blood, and he’d done just as much to bring them into this world as Collette had. Well, initially, anyway.

Things hadn’t always been like this. He and Collette used to have good times. Lots of laughter. Collette used to be a different person back before Jeff was born, before they became parents, before Collette started giving all her attention to the boys and not to Don. Why did the laughter and the love have to stop? He understood that things change. He understood that she wanted to be a good mother, but come on. He was still her husband, and he still needed some love and attention.

Excuses. All excuses. All lies and excuses because you’re one lousy excuse for a husband and a father
.

“Shut your pie hole,” he told the inner voice. It was like he had lived with Collette so long that her voice echoed in his head, even when she wasn’t here.
Turn down that volume! Put the boys to bed! Get some milk! Stop drinking so much! What is your problem anyway?
Naggy naggy nag. On and on.

He needed more beer. It was only eleven, and he still felt thirsty.

“Gotta get some more,” Don muttered to himself.

You need to stop
.

“You need to just back off and shut it.”

Why are you doing this?

“I didn’t start it.”

Don…

He closed the door behind him and shut out the noise. It would be the start of another long night for him.

“WHERE ARE YOU GOING?” Sean asked Kurt before he had the chance to open the cabin’s door.

“Breakfast.”

“You’re going to that grill again, aren’t you? To see her?”

Kurt didn’t blink, but just stared back at Sean. Sean could tell he surprised the guy He also could tell that Kurt looked, well, different. He looked a bit more spiffed up. His hair didn’t look as grimy as it usually looked. He still had the beard, and that was good, but he had trimmed it around the edges.

“I know about your little love interest at the restaurant.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kurt said, moving past him and heading outside.

“Come on.”

“What?” Kurt said, his sunglasses on, the hot day already blazing.

“Where’s the trust?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m not an idiot,” said Sean. “Craig told me about the girl. You might just want to be careful.”

Kurt looked back at Sean. “The more times I go there, the less people notice me.”

“And this lady?”

“She’s fine.”

“Fine as in ‘hot mama,’ or fine as in ‘no problem.’”

“She’s not a problem,” Kurt said.

“You sure?”

Kurt looked defiant, his jaw stern and his gaze firmly on Sean. “Stay out of it. This is my business.”

“It’s all of our business.”

“Really? Like the reason we even came up here? Which you have so generously shared with us.”

“We’ve gone through this.”

“You have your business, and I’ve got mine.”

Sean tried to stare him down, but this time Kurt’s defiant gaze didn’t give way.

“Aren’t you the one who said that we’re in the middle of nowhere, that people aren’t looking for us up here? And that we should just enjoy it?”

Sean smiled. “Just don’t forget who you are, Kurt.”

“Funny—it’s only been recently that I started to remember.”

Kurt walked off and headed down the street.

Sean watched him go. Then he crossed the room and poured himself another cup of coffee from the pot that Ossie had brewed. Ossie had found a drip-style pot in a Wayland thrift store and had gotten in the habit of starting it when he got up early to pray and do whatever it was he did.

He drank it strong and black and stood there and knew that things were falling apart. The tight fist of his control had turned into more of an open palm. Soon things would be falling out of his grip entirely. It wasn’t just Lonnie he had to worry about. Wes was getting restless. Ossie was moping around. And now Kurt was losing his mind and thinking he could—what? romance a woman? What was he thinking?

But it was all right, Sean thought. There would still be time to do what he needed to do before everything fell apart. The more he thought about it, in fact, the more he realized that tonight would be as good a time as any.

He had waited long enough.

For the third morning in a row, Kurt walked into the Lakeside Grill and nodded to the young girl who showed him to his table. And for the second morning in a row, he asked if he could have Norah as his waitress, meaning the girl had to show him to another table.

Kurt sat and looked around, feeling like a junior high boy looking for the girl he gave a valentine to. As much as he hated to admit, Kurt knew that Sean had it right, urging him to not forget who he was. What had he said in reply? That he was only starting to remember who he was. Could that be true? Starting to remember what? How to feel? How to be an ordinary man with emotions and needs?

You can never be an ordinary man
.

He didn’t need to look at the menu, but he scanned it anyway. Soft footsteps walking up to his table made him look up.

“Good morning, again,” Norah said to him.

She looked different this morning. She wore a little more makeup perhaps. Not bad. Not bad at all. She looked—and Kurt had thought this might have been impossible—even more beautiful than previous times he had seen her. Her hair looked shiny and full, pulled back into a long braid that trailed down her back.

“Hi,” was all he could manage.

“So, are you stalking me?” Norah asked him with a smile.

The joke actually made him freeze up. He knew she intended humor; he could tell from her smile and eyes. But was there a little truth to the accusation? Was she worried? Should she be? Yesterday he had spent two and a half hours in the restaurant. They had talked off and on, during her breaks. But in the end, Kurt had not been able to ask her out again. Or ask her to do anything. He’d left her with a nod and a smile. Would today be the same?

“I’m really kidding,” she said to him. “I was wondering if you were going to come in today.”

He ordered something at random. He didn’t come here to eat, anyway, but to feel like a normal human being, like a decent man. The coffee and the waiting and the relaxing—these were such good things. And the lovely woman who actually knew his name—well, the name he’d given her, anyway—and who enjoyed talking to him and kept coming by his table and sharing little bits and pieces of conversation—she was almost miraculous.

Today he would ask her out.

Are you crazy?

Yes, maybe he was crazy. Maybe this was a fantasy just like getting out had been. And look at him. Look at him now. He was on vacation—from his life, from the law. From everything, including the future.

You can do anything you want on vacation.

As he waited for his plate of eggs and toast and watched No-rah pour another cup of coffee, the heat rising from the cup, Kurt decided he would ask right then. It never hurt to ask, right?

“Do you have any plans today?”

She stood holding the coffeepot, looking at him. “I do have to work.”

“After work.”

She smiled, almost as if she couldn’t help herself. He felt like a loser, like a little kid.

“No,” Norah said. “I don’t have plans.”

“Would you like—I don’t know—I don’t know the area very well—but would you want to maybe—”

And before he could mumble anything else, Norah gave him one quick reply.

“Sure.”

KNOCKS. FAINT. DISTANT.

she’s coming back finally I’m sorry for everything I’ve done let me kiss your feet don’t ever leave me I need you to go on and without you I can’t—

Then the door opening and footsteps, heavier than he might have thought them to be.

He drifted back down through clouds and past the murky air and onto firmer ground.

Don opened his eyes, and the light in the room struck him as blinding. It took him a good few minutes to manage opening them fully.

“Don,” a voice said, and it didn’t sound like Collette.

“Don, man, get up,” the voice said again and he managed to keep his eyes open and get adjusted to the light. He propped his body up on the couch, and the whole world swayed back and forth like he was on a pirate ship in a typhoon.

This was a bad one.

“Don,” the voice said, and he looked and saw Steve Reed staring at him. Staring hard.

“Man, you look like a walking nightmare.”

Don sucked in a breath and tried to fight the urge to throw up. He was a pro at fighting it off, but this truly was a bad one.

What’d I do now?

“Do you know what time it is?” Steve asked him.

Don shook his head. Then regretted it.

“It’s close to noon.”

Did he have to work?
Oh, yeah. Oh, no…

Don cursed out loud.

“I told them you called in sick this morning. It’s fine.”

Don squinted and wondered how his living room could get so bright. He just wanted darkness again. He needed to sleep this off.

“You don’t remember, do you?”

“Huh?” Don asked.

“Calling me at like—I don’t know, three or four.”

“No.”

“Didn’t think so,” Steve said, shaking his head, still giving him that intense look. “You were out of your mind, to say the least.”

“What’d I call about?”

“You ran out of booze, I think. Wanted to go out. Talked about Collette. You don’t remember anything?”

Don shook his head.

“At least you were home, thank God,” Steve said. “I was afraid at first that you were driving around or something. That’s why I called in for you this morning. Most of them know, by the way.”

“Why’d you come?” Don asked, finally managing to think a coherent thought.

“I wanted to come and let you know that you’re taking a vacation.”

“Huh?”

“Yeah. A week’s worth, maybe a little longer. That’s what I told Alex.”

Don cursed at the name of the sheriff and asked what he had to do with anything.

“You’ve used up your sick days, Don. People know that a sick
day to you means a sleep-it-off day. Alex is getting tired of it. And he knows. He’s heard rumors.”

Again Don cursed at the sheriff, the big boss. What did he know about work, about marriage, about anything? The guy was on his second marriage to some young bimbo—his trophy wife.

“He’s got the ability to make your past fifteen years obsolete. I talked to him and told him you’re gonna straighten things out. You don’t know how close he was—”

“To what?”

“To canning your tail. I had to talk him out of it.”

Don cursed again.

“Yeah, that’s fine, but you gotta give me some slack, Don. You’ve got a week, maybe a little longer. But you gotta clean your act up. And I can’t do it for you. I’m here for you—I told you that. I’ll even talk to someone about getting you in a treatment program. But you’ve gotta make a choice. You’re the one who has to pull it together.”

“It’s not that bad. Just got a little away from me last night.”

“The past few years it’s ‘gotten away’ from you. You gotta shape up, Don.”

Don got to his feet and stood there gritting his teeth in anger. “I don’t need to shape up anything,” he began to say, but then his stomach said otherwise.

He stumbled toward the bathroom, and for once, something went right for him. He made it just in time.

THEY HAD BEEN OUT driving around and found a sign that read “Horseback Riding.” David had urged her to check it out, and now, half an hour later, they were both on horses.

David said he’d spent a lot of his youth on horses and was eager to ride again. Norah was reluctant, having been on a horse
maybe once in her life. David and the owner of the stables helped her onto an elderly mare who was “guaranteed to be gentle.” Looking at the droopy eyes and knobby knees, she hoped the animal was guaranteed to make it through the next two hours. But the horse started out willingly enough, following David on his big gray horse and a small group of other riders.

The two of them followed a guide who led them along a wooded trail. They clip-clopped slowly, steadily, both the guide and David making sure Norah was fine and her mount was fine too.

Norah found it amusing, doing this. Guys didn’t want to do things with Norah. They wanted to do things for her, or to her. But David wanting to ride horses with her—it amazed her in a sense. He acted like he was experiencing something he treasured, something that had been taken away from him a long time ago, and something he wanted to share. She felt honored somehow.

“When was the last time you rode?” Norah asked him.

“A long time ago. Too long.”

“You’re still pretty good. Not that I would know the difference.”

“Well, a trail ride like this you can’t really call riding. Last time I was on a horse, I remember we—”

David stopped his comment.

“What?” she asked.

He looked away, his face clouded by something unseen.

“Oh, I just—the last time I went riding, it was with some friends. I just remember—I still remember it very well.”

“Where was it?”

“Down in Georgia.”

“You’ve gotten around.”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“So how long will you be here?”

“Maybe a couple weeks or so. You?”

“Oh, I’m here indefinitely. I’m going to save up money and buy me one of those cottages on the lake. A boat. A Jet Ski.”

He studied her and she knew he knew she was fibbing.

“Yeah, maybe I will too,” he said.

“Then we could go riding more.”

“You’re getting the hang of it,” David said. “You’re a natural.”

“I think I’ll be sore tomorrow.”

“Yeah, you will.”

They rode for another hour down winding paths through the forests. Norah kept her horse close to David’s so they could continue to talk. The afternoon sun was actually mild for an August day. Norah realized that she’d gone the whole time without thinking of Maine, of Harlan, of her other life. Maybe this was a brief and momentary diversion, but it worked. It was enjoyable. And it took her mind off her loneliness, her fears.