Heart and Home (12 page)

I turned my face into his
chest to hide the grin that would give me away.

“Maybe that’s a good thing,”
he said.

“What about you? Do I make
you nervous?”

He was quiet for a minute,
and I wondered what his face looked like. “I won’t lie,” he started.

Becky’s hand on my shoulder
pried us apart, “I’m so sorry, it’s just that Marty just called and asked if I
could come home.”

“What’s wrong?”

Troy still had one hand
firmly resting on the small of my back while the other clasped my own.

“It’s Brennan,” she
explained. “Galen was sick last week, I guess now it’s Brennan’s turn, and of
course they never want Daddy when they’re sick.”

“Oh no.”

“If you guys want, I can
just call a cab.”

“No way, Becky,” I shook my
head. “If you need to go...”

Troy agreed, “We can leave
right away.”

“Are you sure?”

He drew away, but still
clasped my fingers for a moment, as if reluctant to let go. “Just let me grab
my jacket.”

Chapter Twelve

The chill of the night air
had a sobering effect as the three of us walked across the parking lot to
Troy’s Ford pick-up truck. My face and head still felt numb against the cold,
but I was also achingly aware of a raw feeling in my stomach from all that
alcohol. Tomorrow was not going to be good, I could already sense as much.
Becky and I stood huddled close as Troy walked around and climbed up into the
driver’s side, leaning across the cab to unlock the door. Of course, Becky
insisted that I hop in first and wedge myself between the two of them in the
front seat. I strapped into the lap belt and crossed my arms against the cold
as the truck roared to life.

It wasn’t a brand new truck,
but it had that new car smell about it. I didn’t move as his arm shot in front
of me to turn down the radio, and I realized that would be nothing compared to
the closeness we’d share once he started shifting gears. All part of Becky’s
secret plan, I assumed, looking over at her with a hint of vengeance that
quickly faded when I noted the worried expression she wore. Lower lip between
her teeth, she watched out the window as we started down the road, and Troy
made his first apology for shifting into my knee.

“Don’t worry, Becky,” I
muttered, reaching my arm around her and leaning in close. “He’ll be okay.”

“I know,” she nodded, and
offered a thankful smile. I noted a hint of glassiness in her eyes, and she
seemed to blink a few extra times to hide it. “I just hate it when they’re
sick, you know. You feel so helpless.”

I didn’t know what else to
say, so I just held her until we arrived at her house about ten minutes later.
“Do you want me to stay and help out or anything?” I asked.

“No, that’s okay. Thanks
though,” she slid out of the truck. “I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know.”

“Okay.” I started to
unbuckle my lap-belt so I could slide into her seat.

“I am really glad we got the
chance to spend some time together, Janice.”

“Me too.”

She leaned to the right, peering
into the truck, “Thanks so much for the ride home, Troy.”

“You bet, Becky. Take care.”

While we waited for her to
get inside, I scooted over into Becky’s set and strapped the shoulder harness
across my chest. As much as I enjoyed sitting so close to Troy, I really didn’t
want him to get the wrong idea, even if I didn’t have a clue what that wrong
idea was myself. Becky turned at the door and waved again before slipping into
the house, and then Troy pulled away from the curb.

The silence made the cab of
the truck seem empty, but there was a tension there too, and I wasn’t sure if
it was coming from Troy or me. He had already driven several blocks before I
said, “I hope her little boy’s okay.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“I can’t even begin to
imagine being responsible for someone else’s life like that.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” he
pressed his back into the seat behind him and relaxed a little. “You seem to be
taking care of things for your dad just fine. I bet you weren’t expecting that
at all?”

“No, but it’s not the same.”

“Sure, it is.” He insisted.
“It’s like the tables turn and we can’t help ourselves, even if they don’t want
us to take care of them.”

The headlights from an
oncoming car made my head ache as I stared into them. “Your mom doesn’t want
you to take care of her?”

“Hell no,” he laughed. “In
fact, she’d probably be happier if I’d let her check into one of those assisted
living communities so she could have her freedom.”

“But you don’t let her
because you want to take care of her?”

“It’s what my dad wanted me to
do.” I glanced across the truck at him and studied the hard look he tried to
wear to keep me from guessing what he was really thinking and feeling.

“He asked you to take care
of her before he passed away?”

“I came home from school and
went straight to the hospital, and it was like he’d waited for me.” I realized
then that maybe the hard look wasn’t distance, so much as it was painful for
him to remember. “God, he’d been mad at me for so long over that damn football
scholarship.” A sigh escaped him, and I noticed a tightness in his knuckles as
he gripped the steering wheel. “Said I was vain and selfish, thinking only of
myself, and maybe I was, but you know how it is when you’re young and full of
dreams. I had to get out of here and see if the world really was round.”

I laughed, “It isn’t.”

“Maybe not.” I was surprised
to see the tight muscles in his face soften into a grin. “In retrospect it
seemed just as flat out there as it is back here, but that’s something we all
need to find out on our own. My daddy thought his word should have been enough
to convince me. And as he lay there dying he made me promise him that I’d take
care of my mom and his farm because our family fought too long and too hard to
keep that farm, and he wasn’t gonna let me piss it all away on some useless
college education and a pigskin promise.”

There was a lump in my
throat, the kind that came with tears, and I swallowed hard against it.

“You don’t need a diploma to
work the land. All you need is common sense and your own two hands.”

“Troy…” but there were no
words. I couldn’t even begin to imagine my parents not supporting my decisions
about college, even if they never did lead to a worthwhile career in the end.
But to have all of my dreams washed away by someone else’s pride and plans—it
made me feel sick inside. Even worse, it made me feel guilty that my own
parents were so supportive.

“I tried go against him, and
hired help here on the farm, but my mom had an accident getting up the stairs
and I just couldn’t go back again. It was like I heard his voice everywhere I
turned.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“It’s all right,” the look
he cast across the space between us was soft, but the whole thing broke my
heart.

Before an awkward silence
swept in to stifle the rest of the ride, I asked the first thing that popped
into my head, “So, what were you going to school for?”

“Architecture.”

“Wow.”

I thought he laughed, but
couldn’t be sure, as another car passed us, and the headlights were blinding.
“I guess we’re both full of surprises.”

“No, it’s not that,” I
studied his profile in the shadows and wondered in a moment of tipsiness how he
managed to keep that perfect shadow of stubble that made me want to reach out
and take his face in my hands, to brush my cheek against his in a hurry to find
his mouth with mine. I was sure the next car to pass us would reveal the
obvious blush that darkened my face. “I mean, I guess it’s just sad that you
never got to finish.”

“It’s done now.”

“But don’t you think you
might like to go back if you got the chance?”

“You know,” a mischievous
smile lit up his face, “for a girl I could hardly get to talk to me this last
week, you sure do ask a lot of questions.”

“I talked to you,” I
protested. “Every time I saw you.”

“Yep, you did,” he nodded in
agreement. “But it was like you were afraid you might get cooties or
something.”

“Oh God,” I dropped my head
back onto my shoulders and stared at the ceiling of the truck. “I should have
seen that coming.”

His grin was amazing, and
while I knew it was the alcohol talking, I found myself wishing I hadn’t moved
over into Becky’s seat. His deep admission about his father and now this
blatant teasing was making me feel far too close to him, and I wanted to
intensify that feeling with a physical presence.

Definitely the alcohol.

“If you really thought I’d
never bring it up again, you were sorely mistaken.”

“I was obviously delirious
from having just fainted.” I pointed out.

“Speaking of which, you
haven’t had any other spells like that since, have you?”

Strange, I noticed as I
looked out the window we were passing by the abandoned
Sonesville Standard
building when he asked. The tingling numb of
alcohol dulled my senses, but my failure to respond quickly roused his
suspicions.

“Janice?”

“Just once after that,” I
said.

“Have you been to see a doctor?”

“I didn’t really see any
need to, I mean, I didn’t pass out that time. I just got that same weird
feeling like I might pass out.”

“You’re not worried that it
might be something serious?”

“It passed this last time,
so I didn’t think it was anything to worry about. Probably just stress.”

“You’re not on any weird
drugs or anything like that, are you?”

My resentment at his
insinuation scraped across the back of my throat in a scoff even he heard.
“What kind of question is that?”

“I don’t know, I just asked.
I mean people don’t just faint like that for no good reason.”

“Well, I’m not some big
freaking drug-addict if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“No, that’s not even what I
meant.”

“Whatever.” I crossed my
arms over my chest and stared out the window wondering how a single ride home
could be so emotional and nerve-wracking.

“Now you’re mad.”

“Well of course I’m mad! You
think I’m a junky.”

“They do still call
prescription pills drugs these days, don’t they?”

“Well either way, I’m not on
anything.” Except birth control, but I didn’t see any need to mention that.

He turned onto Main Street,
and we traveled toward the end of town where my family’s house was set apart
from the other houses on our block, like we had our own private section of the
street with a huge yard that my mother loved more than anything in the world.
She gardened every year in such a way that everyone walked by the house nightly
just to admire her green thumb. Now the thought of coming up on the wilting
eight-foot sunflower stalks that hugged the perimeter made me feel sick. There
were only a few moments left of our ride together, and the thought that it
could end so badly made my stomach shift in nervous agony.

“You know, I’m gonna be
honest and admit that I don’t know what I planned, but this is certainly not
how I envisioned this whole giving you a ride home thing.”

“No?”

“No ma’am.”

“Maybe it’s me,” I said. “I
did have a lot to drink tonight, and on top of all those drugs I must take...”

He reached for the turn
signal, the lighted arrow flashing right as he prepared to turn. I could see
his mouth tighten just before he said, “I should have seen that coming.”

What was I doing? I hated to
admit to myself that I liked the attention he was paying to me. It was the most
real attention I’d gotten from a man in months—years maybe. A
psychiatrist would probably say I was just trying to fill some void left by my
mother’s death, and maybe they’d be right. Troy was safe, a long line back into
the comfort and safety of the town I’d sworn off until the day I died.

On the other hand, who was
to say he really even wanted anything of the kind from me? Maybe I’d misread
the subtle signals he was sending. Maybe he was just a nice guy trying to look
out for a stupid girl who couldn’t stand up straight since her mother died.

Emotion moved through me
like a tingling spell and my eyes welled up with tears. God, what was wrong
with me? Surely it was the stress of losing my mom, and probably the alcohol,
but there was no way I was going to break down like some psychotic nutjob, not
in front of him. Especially after he’d just questioned my sobriety. I turned my
face toward the window and blinked furiously to keep the tears at bay, drawing
in several deep breaths to calm myself.

We were almost there, I
could cry at home.

The sound of the turn signal
ate away at the silence as he turned left onto my street. I looked forward, and
the house loomed in the distance. I just wanted to get out of that truck and
run for shelter before I embarrassed myself any more than I already had, but as
though he had some kind of insight into my ditch and run plan, he spoke before
we reached the curb.

“Janice, look,” he started
as I reached for the release on the seatbelt. “I didn’t mean to insult you, or
even insinuate that you were on drugs.”

“Don’t worry about it, Troy,
no harm done.” I clicked the button and the seatbelt slid across my chest.

He was obviously frustrated,
judging from the quick release of his breath. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he
muttered. “I mean, it’s not like I do this every day.”

“Really, Troy, it’s fine.
Thanks for the ride home.” I reached for the door handle.

“Janice, wait,” my hand
paused in mid-clutch. “Look, this isn’t how I imagined giving you a ride home
because what I really was hoping…” he paused, trying to find the right words. I
looked across the truck, the dim streetlamp cast shadows over his face. “I
wanted a chance to ask if I could see you again before you leave town again.”