Walk Me Home (12 page)

Then they stared out the window for a few moments in silence.

It was right there, right in front of them, the specter of Teddy having to move out. But she refused to make room for it. She refused to shift out of the way and give it a place to sit.

“You like the snowman?” Teddy asked after a while, startling her slightly.

“It’s a little on the tacky side.”

“Thanks. Knew you’d like it.”

“I actually sort of do,” she said. “I feel like you’re the only one who cares about me.”

For a long moment—longer than she would have liked—Carly just listened to the sound of his breathing. Exaggerated, like a series of sighs.

Then he said, “You have no idea how much your mom loves you.”

“You’re right. I have no idea.”

“She’d do anything to protect you. Why do you think she won’t let you go? She doesn’t want anything bad to happen to you. Her love for you girls is…just…what’s the word? Fierce.”

“Yeah. Fierce. I feel the fierce. It’s a little harder to feel the love.”

Another series of sighs.

Teddy levered to his feet.

“I’m going out for a little while. You OK here by yourself?”

“Sure.”

She was disappointed, but she didn’t say so.

“You going to be around for a while? In case Jen comes home?”

“Yeah. I’ll be right here.”

She really didn’t have the energy or the enthusiasm to be anywhere else.

Jen came bouncing in about five.

Carly was still staring out the window. Well, again. She’d made and eaten a tuna fish sandwich. Gone to the bathroom. Then resumed staring.

“Where’s Teddy?” Jen asked, hanging up her jacket.

“Out.”

“Where’d he go?”

“He didn’t say.”

“That’s weird. He always says where he’s going. Oh, God,” Jen added, peering into the kitchen. “It was poker night? I mean, day? They played poker in the middle of the day? How’d he do?”

“Not well.”

“Maybe that’s why he wouldn’t tell you where he was going. Maybe he has to go out and borrow some money. Or steal it. Or do something horrible for somebody. You know. To pay off the gambling debt.”

“Would everybody leave Teddy alone?” Carly shouted. She’d set out to say it in a normally irritated tone, then lost control. “Geez, Jen! He’s the nicest guy mom ever brought home. You’ve seen some of the losers she’s paraded through here. Teddy is the sweetest guy in the world. And everybody dumps on him for it. I’m sick of it!”

She stared out the window a few seconds more, composing herself. Then she risked a glance at Jen. The kid looked a little shaken.

Carly looked back out the window again.

A minute later Jen appeared behind her chair. Carly felt the hard bone of Jen’s chin rest on the top of her head.

“I’m sorry, Carly. I was really mostly kidding.”

Carly sighed.

“I know. I’m sorry I got so upset. I’m just in a lousy mood.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing. Nothing happened. That’s just the problem. Nothing ever happens around here.”

Teddy came through the door at six with a pepperoni pizza.

“Your mom’s working late again,” he said.

Carly never thought, at the time, to ask how he knew. Her mom would have called the house before trying Teddy’s cell phone.
And Carly had been sitting ten feet away from the phone all afternoon. If that phone had rung, Carly would have known it better than anyone.

In deep sleep, in a deep dream, Carly was somewhere in the mountains—some mythical and unrealistic mountains—with Dean. She could feel his presence beside her, but the details felt fuzzy and indistinct.

Then she felt his hand on her forehead. Rubbing. Pushing the hair aside and rubbing her warm skin in wide, smooth strokes.

She bolted awake, suddenly knowing it was a real hand, in the real world. In her bed in the middle of the night. She instinctively slapped the hand away. Sat up straight, gasping.

It was only her mom. Carly could see her mom’s bright lipstick in the sliver of moonlight that shone though the filmy bedroom curtain.

“Sorry, honey,” her mom said. “I didn’t think that would startle you. I used to wake you up like that all the time when you were a little girl. You’d wake up real gentle that way. Guess I have to remember you’re not a little girl anymore.”

Her mom’s voice was cigarette-gravelly and deep, even though she hadn’t smoked for years.

Carly breathed deeply a few times, then set her head back down on the pillow. Looked up at her mom in the dim light. It seemed weird to have her there. It felt different. Her mom’s energy felt like something she’d either never witnessed or had long ago forgotten.

Carly’s mom stroked her forehead again, and Carly closed her eyes.

“Know where Ted was from three o’clock today to almost six?”

The question should have made Carly nervous. But the softness in her mom’s tone did not allow it.

“No. Where?”

“He was sitting at the restaurant with me. I gave him a free piece of pie, and he just kept nursing the same coffee mug, refill after refill. Probably poured him seven cups of coffee. He might never get to sleep tonight. Hell, he might never get to sleep again. And every time I had a minute in between orders, he’d tell me more reasons why I should think about letting you go. Like he’d remind me how it felt when we were sixteen. Not that we were sixteen together or anything like that. But still. He’d tell me stories of all the crazy sh…stuff…he did, and then he’d ask me about some of the stuff I did that your grandma and granddad—God rest their souls—never found out about. I think he was trying to remind me that kids get into all kinds of…what’s the word? Adventures. Half the time it’s OK, and the other half the time it’s not but they live to tell about it, and probably that’s how we learn to grow up.”

A brief silence.

“So…” Carly said, barely above a whisper, almost afraid she might jinx it. “Are you letting me go?”

“Ted told me you need to feel like I love you more.”

Her voice cracked just a little bit when she said it, and it brought a lump to Carly’s throat and tears to the back of her eyes. The only times her mom had ever cried, so far as Carly knew, was when they’d buried Grandma and then, two months later, Granddad.

It had to be a pretty serious thing if your mom was half about to cry.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Carly said. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s OK. Don’t be sorry. It hurt, but maybe I needed to hear it. I work so hard, two full-time jobs to keep food in our mouths and clothes on our backs. And I work extra so I can say yes to about ten percent of what you girls want, even though it’s stuff people can live without. But it’s stuff your friends have, and I know how that feels. And I say no to things like the lake ’cause I know what can happen to girls your age, and I want you safe. And I feel like that
proves it, you know? Like, why would I do all that if I didn’t love my girls more than anything? But then Ted said something that stuck with me. That maybe there’s more love in trusting your kid to be OK than in keeping her in a cage so you know for a fact she will be. Guess I’m used to having little kids. Little girls. Just being a plain old momma bear. I’m not so good at the other part yet. The later part. Letting you get older and not need me. Letting you girls go off and look after yourself.”

“I’ll be really careful and smart if you let me go.”

“One condition. If things go a way you don’t like…if anything happens you can’t handle, call. Right away. I’ll come get you, or Ted will, if I’m working.”

“There’ll be parents there,” Carly said, even though she was pretty sure it wouldn’t turn out to be true.

“Parents can’t be everywhere at once. Just be careful.”

Before Carly could even gather herself up to answer, her mom kissed her on the forehead and slid over to the door. Carly could see the shape of her, framed in the light of the hall. It was a good shape. Ask nearly any man who’d ever seen her.

“You really like this guy?” her mom asked.

“I don’t really know him all that well. Yet. But he wants to know me. And that’s something. Right?”

“If he’s a nice guy, then yeah. That’s a lot.”

“And if he’s not?”

“Then…I’ll kill him.”

She slipped out, closing the door behind her.

CRADLE LAKE, THE HIGH SIERRAS

December 19

Just on the other side of a tiny town with the memorable name of Fish Fork, Dean stopped the SUV at a little store along the forest road up to the cabin. It called itself Ned’s Bait & Tackle, announced with neon signs that seemed out of keeping with the gray-white granite mountains and the cone-laden firs. Ned’s also loudly announced cold beer and snacks.

Carly glanced over her shoulder at the fishing rods loaded in the back, their long, springy ends sticking out the rear window. But she didn’t look for long. Jerry was in the backseat with two girls from her school. They all looked at her as though she wanted something special from them. And as though that something was an imposition, whatever it was. So she straightened out and stared through the windshield again.

She was sitting in front between Dean and that guy she didn’t know. But she’d figured out through conversation that his name was Hunter and he was a senior. Not through her own conversation.
She’d done nothing but shut up and listen throughout the hour-and-a-half drive.

“Almost there,” Dean said to her. It was only the second time he had addressed her directly. The first time being “Hey” when she first got in at the middle school. “This’ll just take a minute.”

Dean turned his attention on Hunter, leaning and talking over Carly in a way that made her feel awkward and uneasy.

“Two cases,” he said. “Heineken. And three cartons of those night crawlers. Make Ned open the lids and really look at ’em. Make sure they’re fat and peppy. He’ll sell off the old half-dead ones if you’re not paying attention. And…wait…do you have split-shot sinkers?”

“Not many.” Hunter always seemed to say as few words as humanly possible.

“Get some, then.”

Hunter let himself out with a grunt, leaving Carly with a refreshing sense of owning enough room to exist again.

“Hunter’s twenty-one?” Carly asked Dean.

A chorus of snickers rose from the backseat. Carly kicked herself hard. Why did she always say exactly the wrong thing?

“According to his picture identification, yes indeed,” Dean replied.

“Ned doesn’t look too close, huh?”

Dean polled the backseat for an answer. “What do you say, guys? If you want two cases of beer, how many questions does Ned ask?”

“Depends,” Jerry said. “On whether you have enough money for two cases of beer.”

It did not turn out to be a quick stop. Apparently no one had anticipated that a car—even a big SUV—containing six humans, the luggage of six humans, two tents, two coolers of food, and enough
fishing gear for an army would not also accommodate two cases of beer. Hunter had to borrow a length of rope from Ned and lash them to the roof between the rails of the utility rack.

When they finally got under way again, Dean made a formal announcement.

“Listen up, guys. We have two neighbors up there close enough to see us or hear us, depending on whether we’re inside or outside and how loud we are. My dad made it clear he’ll check with them. So anything that would get me in trouble should be done quietly. No beer bottles left around. They go back in the cases, and we’ll lose them in a dumpster on the way home. Here’s the report I want: ‘Mr. Hannish, your son is an absolute angel, and his friends are so quiet and respectful. Why, they give young people a good name.’ And another thing. If you’re a girl, you’re not staying at the cabin as far as the neighbors are concerned. You’re visiting from a cabin on the other side of the lake. You ruin this for me, you’re on my shit list forever.”

“Maybe the neighbors won’t even be there,” Jerry said.

“Christmas vacation? They’ll be there.”

“Did I tell you we’re maybe expecting snow tonight?” Dean asked.

He’d told her. Or rather, he’d told the group at large. Three times.

“That would be kind of cool,” Carly said.

They’d been sitting by the lake for over an hour. Carly and Hunter and Dean. But Carly and Dean sat close together, with Hunter a few yards away. The boys were fishing. But not catching.

Everybody else was back at the cabin. Or somewhere.

“They’re just not biting this afternoon,” Dean said.

He jumped to his feet, set down the fishing pole, and began to take off his flannel shirt. Which struck Carly odd. It was only maybe ten degrees above freezing.

“Wouldn’t it be cool if we got snowed in?” Dean pulled off his T-shirt. “We’d have to stay here for Christmas. Till they got around to plowing that road.”

Carly stole a glance at his bare chest, then looked away. He was bulkier and more athletically built than she’d realized. It felt exciting and intimidating, both at the same time.

“My mom would freak.”

“Naw, it’d be cool. I’d grab those snowshoes out of the shed and walk down to Ned’s bait shop and call everybody’s parents from the pay phone. And I’d say, ‘We’re just fine here, but we’re stuck until they plow the road. Not our fault. Nothing we can do about the weather.’”