No Place Like Home (15 page)

“Why aren’t you mad at me?” he asked finally.

“I am. But I think you got more punishment than you really deserved already. No point to me adding anything to it.” Crumbling bacon into the bowl, I said, “You want to tell me how it happened? I don’t see you as the type to rile up a gang.”

“It wasn’t like that.” His thick hair fell forward, hiding his face for a minute. “We were just down there—where we were that one day it flooded at the two rivers?”

“The confluence?”

“Yeah. We went there. Just were sitting there on the hood when this kid comes running through the field, yelling and screaming about some girl, and before we knew it there were all these other guys coming after him.” He scowled. “It gets kind of fuzzy right there, but the kid fell down, slammed right into my legs and I bent down to help him, and—” He stopped. Peered at the counter, scratching with his thumbnail at an old scorch mark, went on. “He was covered with blood and it got on my hands real bad until I could figure out where it was coming from, and then I could see it was bad. Really bad, so I put him down and put my hands on it, and then all these guys were yelling at us, telling us to give him up.”

Carefully I didn’t look at him and heated the cast iron skillet. The butter sizzled into it, spitting and popping, and I poured in the eggs with their teeny tinge of green and chunks of bacon.

“I didn’t really know what to do, Mom. I don’t know how I could have let him go. He woulda died, I mean I know it, and even then, I was so scared when they were kicking me and hitting me that I was afraid it would be me who died if I didn’t let him go and I couldn’t think what to do.”

I closed my eyes against the vision of the cop coming to tell me my son was dead, beaten to death, instead of what I’d got. “You weren’t fighting?”

“I swear I wasn’t. I just held on to that kid, keeping my hand on that cut. He was young. Like maybe thirteen. Skinny and crying and choking.”

“So when did the cops come?”

“Somebody must have called before, because they were all over the place really fast. Like three minutes after these guys showed up.”

The eggs were finished and I put them on a plate for him, found a napkin and a fork and put them beside the plate. I touched his arm. “I’m proud of you, Shane. You were really brave.”

“No,” he said, head bent. “I was scared.”

“But you did the right thing anyway, and you saved somebody’s life. That’s a big deal, kiddo.” I moved away to cover my emotion, picking up the skillet to take it to the sink. “A really big deal.”

“Mom?”

I turned, and saw what he needed. It was there in his big blue eyes, in the almost quiver of his lip, in the trembling of his hand that couldn’t hold his fork. I went to him and put my arms around his shoulders and let him put his big head on my shoulder. That was all. He couldn’t let himself sob—maybe he could do that later in the privacy of his room—but there were some tears. Mainly, it was the hard, deep hug of a boy who needs an anchor, and that was easy to give. So easy. I smelled his hair and rubbed my hand on his long, young spine, and eventually he took a deep breath. “Thanks,” he said, and let me go.

ABE’S ASS-KICKIN’ APPLE PIE

(written in pencil on a much-stained sheet of paper with MARION CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTE across the top)

8 cups apples

¹
⁄
₄
cup butter

¹
⁄
₂
cup brown sugar

¹
⁄
₄
cup granulated sugar

2
¹
⁄
₂
Tb flour

1
¹
⁄
₂
tsp cinnamon

pinch salt

1 Tb lemon juice

1 tsp vanilla

Cut apples into thin slices. Cook in large pan with
¹
⁄
₂
cup water. While cooking, add butter. Mix sugars, flour, cinnamon, and salt in bowl. After apples are tender, add sugar mix, lemon juice, and vanilla to apples. Allow mix to simmer 10–12 minutes. Remove from stove and allow apples to cool. Once cool, place in pie crust. Be sure to slit holes in top crust. Sprinkle top with sugar if desired or mix 1 egg with 2 tablespoons water and brush over top crust. Also can add raisins to apple mix or mayhap nuts. Cook in oven 425 degrees for approx fifty minutes.

For gingersnap crust:

2–3 cups crushed gingersnaps

¹
⁄
₄
cup melted butter

¹
⁄
₂
cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

Juice and grated rind of
¹
⁄
₂
lemon

Toss crumbs with melted butter. Combine sugar, cinnamon, lemon juice, and rind to form paste. Line bottom of dish with 1/3 of stuff. Add apples and cover with remaining crumbs (can put layer in middle if desired).

Chapter 10

We ate late, just after sundown. The day had been miserably hot—I’d been right about the temperature, which had topped out at 102—and the weary swamp coolers, thumping all day in relentless, fatigued rhythm, upstairs and down, barely stirred the air. I made iced coffee and was glad for the cold, chunky salsa, the prosciutto ham and provolone cheese and sourdough bread. I’d brought a jar of cracked olives—my grandmother’s specialty—home from the restaurant, and we ate the finger food while watching the moon rise. No one talked much. Michael was obviously not well, though he did his best to hide it. I saw the strain around his mouth, drawing up the flesh around his eyes, and I nudged him along when he appeared to be ready to stop eating. Over and over, just one more bite. An olive. A sliver of ham. Butter on the bread.

When we were close to finished, I jumped up. “Malachi, I forgot! I saved you a pie. Want some? Apple with some vanilla ice cream, maybe?”

“Sounds great.”

“Michael?”

He wanted to please me, and it was his favorite. “A little. Not too much ice cream.”

“Shane?”

Dully, he raised his head and I saw that his left eyelid, which had dropped a little when he was tired since babyhood, was at half-mast. “Nah, thanks. I’m going to bed.”

He helped me gather the plates and carry them to the kitchen, then went upstairs. A few minutes later, I heard the low strum of his bass coming through the floor and knew he’d be okay. The guitar was his way of unwinding, exploring his emotions. He used it like I used cooking.

I’d saved the most beautiful of the pies for Malachi, and admired it again as I cut pieces for all of us. I’d heard from my sister that my father had eaten nearly a whole one by himself the first time he sampled it, and the thought of thin, elegant Romeo eating so much at once gave me a smile as I carried the warmed slices out to the porch.

“What’s that about?” Michael asked.

“My dad. He loves this pie. I was just wondering if he ate a whole one this time, too.”

The smell of cinnamon and the undernote of gingersnaps filled my nose and I took a bite, closing my eyes to fully appreciate the full depth of the flavors, mingling, swirling, dancing—

“What
is
this?” Malachi cried.

I started to say, “It’s—”

He jumped up and spat over the rail. Stunned, I wondered if he was allergic to one of the ingredients, and felt immediately guilty.

But anger, like vibrato, moved in his low, dark voice. “Michael.”

Mildly, he looked up. “It’s just a pie. Sit down and eat. Or don’t.” He lifted a forkful to his mouth.

“It’s Dad’s pie.”

“Yeah. I’ve been cooking it for years.”

Malachi picked up the plate and, using the fork with a gesture that was plainly, deeply contemptuous, sent the pie sailing over the rail. Berlin, always ready, jumped up and trotted out into the yard to see what had been discarded.

Shocked by both his rudeness and the surprising evidence of very deep anger in what seemed to be such a mellow personality, I only stared at him. His body was rigid with fury, his shoulders straight and hard, his body poised for a fight. “Michael!” he said again.

Laconically, Michael said, “Jewel, I must apologize for my brother’s rudeness. He’s not usually such a redneck jerk, but every now and again, it does come through.” He gave his brother a hard look, the one that would have had Shane hanging his head in a half second. It took about three seconds to work on Malachi. Then his body sagged and he put his hands on his hips. Red flushed his cheekbones.

“My brother is right,” he said after a minute. He looked at Michael with shame. “You were generous and kind, and I just acted the fool. I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right,” I said. “Come sit down. You can have ice cream by itself if you want.”

“I don’t know,” Michael drawled. “Anybody who acts like that oughta have to give up dessert for a day.”

Malachi didn’t grin. Didn’t even smile. His jaw worked, showing a long cord in his neck. “Don’t, Michael.”

“Gotta get over it someday.”

“No,” Malachi said precisely. “I don’t.” With a shake of his head, he lifted a hand, started to say something, then just waved it all away. Without another word, he stalked off, those hard-heeled boots making a deep thump on the wooden floor of the porch. He disappeared, and a minute later we heard the bike start up and roar away.

“Uh, you wanna tell me what just happened?” I asked.

“Let him tell you when he gets back.” He pushed the plate back, most of the pie still in a lump of ice cream. There was a fragility about his shoulders as he did it, a release of whatever he’d been hanging on to in Malachi’s presence. “I think I need you to help me upstairs.”

“Oh, God, Michael!” I jumped up and rounded the table, seeing now the melting in him as he let go, a crumpling like the Wicked Witch of the West. “You can’t keep hiding how sick you are from him.” Scolding to hide my fear, I bent and let him loop his long, stick-thin arm around my neck. “If you don’t let him know—”

It took a lot for him to stand up, a fierce kind of concentration that’s hard to describe unless you’ve seen it. Just so much effort to stand straight. A host of possibilities rushed through my imagination—explanations that didn’t all lead to a crisis. “I’m going to call Jordan,” I said.

“No.” The word was breathless, but fierce. “Maybe tomorrow.”

Tomorrow. That was his way of dealing with all of this. Tomorrow he’d be better. Tomorrow he’d take action. Without a word, I helped him inside and we took the stairs one agonizing step at a time, pausing often to let him catch his breath. Sweat poured from him, and there was the sour, hot smell of illness in it.

You might think it was wrong of me, not to call my sister or take him to the hospital no matter what he thought, but I’d promised him early on that I’d never force him to do anything against his wishes. He made me swear on my mother, which is not something I’d ever do, but a blood oath was not a possibility, considering.

I got him to bed and took off his shoes. He was so weary he collapsed against the pillows like a puppet, angles of elbows and shoulders falling akimbo. I turned on the lamp and brushed a lock of hair from his face, seeing the blue veins below his skin. His breath was raspy but steady and I took the big metal washbasin from the stand, filled it with warm water that smelled of lavender, and carried it back into the room. Through the walls pulsed the low sound of Shane’s guitar, a heartbeat kind of sound, threaded through with Shane’s lovely tenor as he worked out a song.

Michael smiled. “He’s damned good.”

“Yeah.” I undressed him matter-of-factly, then washed him the way Jordan had showed me—it had been very awkward at first, bathing him like a child on those increasingly less rare times he found it beyond him—but it pleased me now to be able to do it. He hated the faintly metallic scent of illness on his body so much. “You want something else to put on?” I asked, giving him the painkiller I knew he’d need.

“Just the bedspread.” His voice was thin, and as I bent close to cover him, he picked up my hand and kissed it almost exactly as Malachi had this morning. “Night.”

“Who kissed your hand that way, Michael? Your mom or your dad?”

He opened his eyes, the blue a deep ocean shade that revealed nothing. “Ask Malachi.”

I turned off the lamp and headed back downstairs to clean the kitchen. At the foot of the steps, I heard the bike, the sound of it mellow against the crickets whirring now as if in benediction. I went outside to gather the rest of the dishes. Big fat candles burned against the night, and I bent to blow them out.

“Oh, darlin’!” Malachi said from the other side of the rail. “Don’t you know you never blow out a candle? You’ll blow away all your good luck.”

“Ah! Well, that explains a lot.” I picked up the plates, scraping and stacking them. “I am sorry about the pie, Malachi. I didn’t know it would upset you.”

“It’s not your fault.” He leaned his arms over the rail, his mouth sad. He stared at the plates with a faraway expression. “Can you leave all that? Come for a ride?”

“Why don’t you help me carry it in, and then we’ll go? Otherwise we’ll have five million ants in the morning.”

“I can do that.” We piled them in the sink and turned off the light. I didn’t even need a little jean jacket, the night was so warm.

“Any place you like particularly?” he asked. “Somewhere there might be water to overlook?”

“I can think of a few.”

He handed me a helmet and paused, frowning. “Why the change of heart?”

“What do you mean?”

“I thought I’d have to coax you to get you to take a ride. You’re always so . . . wary.”

“Am I?”

His eyes narrowed faintly, and I saw him look at my mouth, then back up to my eyes. The thrum of sexual energy crept into the moment, and we stood there thinking of kisses, wondering about what this little ride might mean. He nodded. “You are.”

I tugged on the helmet. “Sometimes, I just get tired of thinking.”

He made a soft, slightly bitter noise. “Amen, sister. Let’s ride.”

And we did. Rode into the night with a soft, warm wind spinning around our limbs. I twisted my hair into a long cord and tucked it into the front of my shirt, anchored by my bra, and leaned into him without apology, putting my arms around his hard, long waist, my torso against his back, my thighs tight against the outside of his. I closed my eyes and let go, let go of me, of Shane and Michael and the past, and lived just in the moment. This moment, with a big healthy man on a motorcycle, a man I liked even if he was a sex god, a man—it surprised me a little—with whom I felt comfortable just being myself. It was kind of a rarity these days.

I directed him to a bluff to the west of town that looked out over the reservoir. Houses had cluttered the mesa considerably since I’d last been out here, and we had to drive a lot farther than I anticipated to get away from them, but finally he parked and we got off the bike to settle on a cluster of boulders overlooking a steep drop to the water below.

“This is great,” Malachi said, shoving his fingers through his hair.

I nodded, admiring the shimmer of lights, white and red and green, that marked the city. “I used to come out here when I first started driving.”

“Alone?”

“Sometimes.” I grinned. “Sometimes not.”

“Good girl.”

“Now that’s where you’re wrong, Mr. Shaunnessey. Not a good girl bone in this entire body.”

He chuckled. “That’s what I like about you, Jewel.”

I tucked my feet closer to my body and wrapped my arms around my knees. “Yeah, men always like that slut thing.”

“That’s not what I meant.” He inclined his head. “I meant that you think you’re this bad girl, and you’re not. Not at all.”

“Obviously you haven’t seen enough of my résumé.”

“I know what I see.” He touched me then, just a single finger running down the outside of my arm, and it did what he intended for it to—gave me a rippling little shudder down my spine. “You’re the one they turn to.”

I looked at him, narrowing my eyes. “What does that mean?”

He put his hand on my knee, safe but ready, and I didn’t do anything to dislodge it. “You take care of them, all of them. Even your dad, you know, you give him all this space, and I don’t know that he really deserves it. But you do it with everybody.”