In Plain Sight (16 page)
Sandy and Mac got along fine. It never occurred to me they’d have anything in common, but they’re both the kind of people who can find something to talk about with almost anyone. Turned out Mac has a granddaughter who is just getting into gymnastics, and he and Sandy had this whole lively conversation about balance beams and floor exercises and vaults.
It was well past dark by the time we finished dinner, but the night was clear and a half moon sailed grandly across the sky. I put on a jacket, and Mac got one from his motor home, and we strolled along the trail. On the way back I led him down to the little dock. Most of the houses across the lake were lit up, lights reflected in the water below, the reflections so clear that it looked as if another world existed down below the familiar houses. A silvery moon shone in that world too. We even saw a shooting star, which was a nice reminder of last summer.
Lights showed in the windows at Tara of the Ozarks, confirming that Leslie was home. Although, on second thought, I realized that wasn’t necessarily true. Leslie had the lights set on a timer system so they came on automatically whether she was home or away. For what reason she’d never shared with me, although I sometimes suspected she was somewhat intimidated by her oversized house. In the dark I couldn’t tell if the car was still down there by the boathouse.
Mac had taken my hand when we scrambled from the trail to the dock, but it was a purely practical gesture to keep me from slipping on the damp ground, of course. Definitely nothing personal or romantic. “How’s the fishing here?” he asked. “I hear there’s bass and catfish and crappie in these Arkansas lakes.”
“I see boats out there sometimes, and once in a while someone fishes off the shore. I don’t know if they’re catching anything.”
“Too bad I don’t have any fishing gear with me. I broke my pole down in Baja and never got around to replacing it.”
“Mike has equipment out in the garage. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you used it. We could go out in the boat in the morning.” I motioned to the skiff still tied to the dock.
“Hey, that’d be great!”
I told Mac he could park the motor home in the yard for the night, but he said he hadn’t had hookups for several nights and needed a sewer connection so he could dump the holding tanks. The practical complications of on-the-road living that never occur to those of us whose homes stay attached to one spot of earth.
We looked up RV parks in the phone book, and he called the closest one to make sure they had a vacancy. After he left I dug out Mike’s fishing equipment, much of which had once been my husband Harley’s. Most of the fishing flies were ones I’d tied for Harley. I felt a moment of nostalgia, remembering fishing jaunts we’d shared and the special “Ugly Bug” I used to tie for him. Would Harley mind if Mac used his gear?
No, Harley had always loaned it generously. Always loaned everything generously, for that matter. A good man, my Harley.
When Mac showed up next morning, freshly shaved, he’d already acquired bait and a temporary out-of-state fishing license from a local sporting goods store. He wore a battered straw hat, khaki shorts, beat-up running shoes, no socks. His knees were as knobby as I remembered. Although I had to admit there was something mildly endearing about their knobbiness.
I’d packed a lunch so we could stay out as long as we wanted. Mac had information about a “hot” fishing hole up at the northern end of the lake, and we took turns rowing. We were well out on the water before I remembered I’d planned to call Sgt. Yates this morning about the prowler at Leslie’s. But I could see now that the car was still there, and it was definitely light colored. So she must be home, and, knowing Leslie, the skulker was probably in more danger from her short-edged temper than she was at risk from him.
Better wear your steel-plated armor, fella.
It was a great day. Sunshine, gentle breeze. Three bright, deep-bodied crappie quickly snapped up the bait, and Mac plunked them into the ice chest he’d optimistically brought along to hold his catch. We saw a long-legged bird majestically poised in shallow water looking for fish of his own, and a big-eyed doe watched us calmly from shore.
We rowed into shore to eat an early lunch of leftover chicken and baked beans. This was beyond the private land, a government-owned area where homes could not invade, and only a couple of ducks quacked their annoyance at our intrusion. Mac tied the boat to a bush, and we settled on a grassy slope that smelled of damp earth and lush green growing things. A tiny green frog jumped out of the way when I spread a plaid tablecloth. A stand of cattails grew nearby.
We ate and drank the coffee I’d brought in a thermos, and afterward Mac lay back against the grass, hands pillowed behind his head, hat shielding his face from the sun. I thought he was dozing, but unexpectedly he said, “Sometimes, when I’m out on the road driving in the middle of the night, I listen to one of those evangelist preachers on the radio.”
I cautiously thought this could be good news. Mac’s deceased wife had been a Christian, but I already knew from our conversations last year that he was a confirmed skeptic. So a new willingness to listen to a radio message might suggest a change of heart. On the other hand, I’d heard some late-night preachers who, if I weren’t already a solid Christian, would have sent me skittering in the opposite direction. So what I said was a cautious, “Oh?”
“One night one of them was talking about God never abandoning his people. Always being there for them. He had some Bible verse, of course.”
“Perhaps the one in Hebrews: ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.’”
“Do you believe that?”
“Of course. Another one that comforts me is Psalm 46:1:
‘God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.’”
“They’re just words. I write words. Thousands of them.”
“But these are inspired words from the Lord.”
“Don’t you feel abandoned?”
“Me? No. Why would I?”
“Why? You lost your husband and son. You have no grandchildren. You have, for all practical purposes, been driven out of your home. You have a family of thugs after you. You were unfairly fired from your job—”
“My goodness, I didn’t realize I was so bad off. And you don’t even know about my bad hair days, the senior moment when I brushed my teeth with Ben-Gay, or the fact that I’ve come to the realization I’m never going to climb Mt. Everest, swim the English Channel, or wear a thong bikini.”
He ignored my facetious list. “Seriously, don’t you sometimes feel as if God forgot about you?”
I sat up straighter. “No, I certainly don’t. I might prefer that some parts of my life were different, but God isn’t a vending machine where you put your prayer in one slot and an easy solution pops out of another.”
Mac changed his argument. “Maybe he didn’t forget you. Maybe the whole God thing is just a … crock. Wishful thinking. A desire for an eternal justice to make up for all the injustice here on earth.”
“I look outside me and see all God created. I read my Bible and understand that Jesus died for me. I peer inside me and see him alive and well in my heart. No, I don’t think it’s all a crock.”
Silence. I wasn’t certain if that meant he was thoughtfully digesting what I’d said, gathering arguing points, or had fallen asleep. Then I was curious about his jumping-off point into this conversation. “Why are you out there driving in the middle of the night?”
“Sometimes I get restless. It’s only a few feet from the bed to the driver’s seat, so I get up and head for wherever I’m going.”
“Where are you going?”
“Well, you know, here and there. I’ve been from Montana to Baja to Florida this past year. There’s always a festival or an odd museum or some kind of doings or just an interesting new place to see and write about. And my kids to visit, of course.”
“Did it ever occur to you that maybe you’re searching for something?”
“Like what?” He slid the straw hat aside, and I saw alarm in the exposed blue eye.
“Searching for God. You’re wandering all over the countryside looking for him. You just don’t know it yet.”
I thought that interpretation might annoy him, but, oddly, he looked relieved, and I suddenly realized what he’d thought I meant. “You thought I was implying that you’re subconsciously looking for a companion in your travels. A
wife.
”
“A lot of women alone are eager to marry again.” A wariness in his tone suggested he’d encountered a few of them.
“It’s the statistics. What are there, ten of us for every one of you?”
“I don’t think the odds are quite that bad,” he protested.
“You were afraid I might suggest myself as a suitable candidate for the wife position?”
This time he sat up and studied me squarely. Finally, his expression a combination of miffed and surprised, he shook his head. “Ivy, I don’t think you’d marry me if I pulled out a diamond ring right here on the spot.”
“Hmmm.”
“Hmmm, what?”
“Hmmm, what size diamond are we talking about?”
Mac laughed. “Would it matter?”
“No,” I had to admit. I liked Mac. I enjoyed his company. We had good times together. But I wasn’t in the market for a bridegroom. “It wouldn’t.”
He hadn’t exactly offered marriage. I hadn’t exactly declined. But we both knew where we stood. He momentarily looked undecided as to whether he should be relieved or disappointed. Relief won.
“Good. That’s settled then.”
About that time a gust of wind startled us both. I looked up, surprised to find that dark clouds were rapidly eating up the blue sky. We dumped everything into the boat and raced for home. At least as fast as two seniors in a rowboat can race.
We didn’t beat the storm. It hit us a good fifteen minutes from the dock. We were soaked, hair flattened to our heads, clothes plastered to our skin, by the time we slipped and slid up the trail to the house. Soaked and muddy and laughing.
From then on, we laughed a lot; that awkwardness when Mac first arrived had vanished now. He elaborated on his travels: a Crawdad Festival, complete with Crawdad Queen. An encounter with an oversized and very grumpy lizard in Baja. A letter, which made its way through a magazine publisher to him, from a woman proposing marriage, after which she said she’d provide an introduction to aliens who had recently given her a ride in their UFO and might give him one too. He could write a book about it, she suggested.
Maybe the man had a right to be suspicious of female intentions, I had to concede. And I didn’t even have alien friends to offer as inducement.
I cooked the fish, frying them up crisp and golden and adding oven-baked fries and coleslaw. Mac offered enthusiastic compliments. Sandy mentioned her upcoming gymnastics meet in Fayetteville and invited Mac to come. He said he was leaving in the morning, but he’d try to be back this way in time for it.
Which was more than I’d known about his plans before that moment.
Later, Sandy’s Christian rock band friends came over for practice in the basement. Mac’s initial reaction was like what mine had been: shock at all the noise and blue hair. He never did go so far as to express approval of the group, but I noticed his toe tapping to the beat.
Before I fell asleep I had a thought. Mac was leaving in the morning, but perhaps he’d have time to go over to Leslie’s with me first. It seemed unlikely I’d encounter the skulker again, but I’d rather Mac was with me, just in case.
A plan that floundered before it ever got off the ground.
I found Mac’s note on the door:
Dear Ivy,
I decided to get an early start. Thanks for your hospitality. It was good seeing you again. You’re a great person to be caught with out in a storm! Maybe I’ll be back this way in a few days.
Your friend
Mac
I stood there with the brief note in my hand, pricked by disappointment that he was already gone and that the possibility of his return was definitely on the vague side. It was just as possible he wouldn’t return, that he’d be off to investigate anything from an Edsel rally to a dress-your-cat contest.
Following hard on the heels of the disappointment was a different reaction. We’d settled our relationship. Friends. No hidden agendas. Yet now he’d run off as if he suddenly feared I was going to pull out a fishing net and drag him in. I felt … betrayed. And angry.
I stomped around preparing breakfast, the eggs for French toast frothing under the furious attack of my eggbeater, the toast itself whapped into flattened submission with my spatula. Insufferable, egotistical male!
Yet Sandy’s reaction to Mac’s sudden departure was an unmiffed, “Hey, wouldn’t it be fun to be able to just pick up and go whenever you wanted? He’s a really cool guy.” It made me step back to reassess the situation, and by the time Sandy headed off to school, I was embarrassed by my petty internal outburst.
I was reading too much into Mac’s departure, which probably had nothing to do with me. Mac was simply being Mac. A man who might get up in the middle of the night and drive a couple hundred miles. A man I was almost certain was really restlessly searching for God, even if he didn’t know it yet.
But that was between Mac and God, not Mac and me.
And, who knows? Maybe God had an appointment with a late-night radio preacher scheduled for Mac last night, and he had to be on the road to meet it.
Go with him, Lord. Help him to find you.
Then a disconnected thought struck me. One that was much more disturbing than Mac’s sudden departure. He’d driven his motor home right into the yard to leave the note on the door, and I hadn’t even heard it! I could apparently be overrun by Braxtons arriving in cars, trucks, or tanks and never hear a squeak of warning. It was enough to make me want to set up warning barricades of tin cans in the driveway.
On careful consideration, however, the alarm slipped back to the be-aware-but-don’t-panic level. Sandy usually remembered to activate the security alarm system for the house, so Braxtons wouldn’t get inside without our knowing it. And what I’d told Mac was true: God is my refuge and fortress and in him I can safely place my trust.
So here it is, Lord. My
trust. Watch out for those Braxtons for me, will you?
