33 The Return of Bowie Bravo (9 page)

“Anything you need from the grocery store?”

“Nope, I’m good.”

He was dismissed. He got that. So he gave her a nod and he left.

At dinner that night, it was pretty much the same. She treated him with cool politeness. Johnny babbled away about his day at school. It was snowing by then. Johnny said he hoped it would “Snow and snow and never stop.” He wanted to build a snowman after school the next day.

Once they’d eaten, Bowie helped clear the table. Glory put the dishes in the dishwasher and wiped down the counters without saying a word to him, avoiding eye contact the whole time.

He gave up and went out to the barn as soon as the kitchen was in order. If she didn’t want him around her, fine. He could take a hint.

Johnny came out to say good-night. He brought a book with him so that he could read Bowie a story. That was kind of fun. Johnny in the rocker and Bowie whittling in his easy chair, the fire keeping the workshop nice and toasty, Johnny reading a story about a spoon. There were lots of illustrations. Johnny would read the one or two sentences on the page and then hold up the book so Bowie could see the pictures.

It didn’t take long for him to read the whole thing. “Bowie?”

“Hmm?”

“Tomorrow night, I will bring a book that a grown-up reads to a kid. And you can read it to me.”

He was definitely making progress with Johnny. He told himself to be grateful for that. “Fair enough.”

After Johnny left, Bowie finished the train car he was whittling and then he went outside, where the snow was still falling, soft and thick and silent, covering everything like a fluffy frozen blanket. He tipped his face up to the sky and felt the snowflakes on his cheeks, his mouth, against his eyelashes. There were maybe a couple of inches on the ground by then.

Johnny just might get lucky and be able to build himself a snowman the next afternoon.

The snow kept on until past noon the next day. And then the sun came out.

Johnny arrived home from school with one of his older cousins, one of Glory’s sister Trista’s kids. Glory wrapped his bandaged hand in plastic to keep the moisture out and then gave him a big snow mitten to wear on top of that. Then he and his cousin built their snowman in the front yard. Later the two of them came knocking on the workshop door. Bowie was sanding the table he’d built. They had a lot of questions—about his tools and about why he used “old wood.” He answered them as best he could.

That night, he read Johnny four chapters of
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Before Johnny slogged back through the snow to the house, he got Bowie’s promise that he would read the book to him every night until they reached the end.

Friday was more of the same. Glory avoided eye contact with him when he saw her in the morning at breakfast and that night at dinner. She said maybe two sentences to him all that day. He told himself he was fine with that. He was slowly forging a relationship with his son.

And that was all that mattered.

That night, he read to Johnny some more. It was great, sitting there in his easy chair, reading the story out loud. Johnny ended up pulling the rocker over closer, so he could peer over Bowie’s shoulder at the illustrations. He asked a lot of questions and Bowie would stop reading so they could discuss the answers. They read a lot more than four chapters.

And it was after nine when Johnny finally put his jacket back on and returned to the house.

Saturday morning, Glory was up and waiting for him when he came in to get the breakfast started. She had her mug of tea and she was sitting at the table in a bulky brown sweater, her shoulders all hunched up. He knew just from her body language that she was pissed off about something and he was about to catch hell for whatever it was.

“I need a word with you before Johnny comes in here.” She spoke low and intensely, like she was playing a spy in some espionage movie or something.

“Sure.” He tried to stay upbeat.

She accused, “He came in at nine-fifteen last night.”

“Sorry. We were reading and I lost track of the time.”

“I want him in bed by eight. Eight-thirty at the very latest. Please send him back to the house absolutely no later than eight-fifteen. And don’t make eight-fifteen a habit. Really, for all intents and purposes, his bedtime is eight o’clock.” She had her mouth all pinched up again.

“If you don’t watch out, Glory, your mouth might stick that way.” The words were out before he remembered that he wasn’t going to cop any attitudes, that he had a lot to make up for and he had no right to get all up in her face about anything.

She pinched up her mouth even tighter. “What my mouth does is no concern of yours.”

He felt his temper rise. And he told it to back the hell down. “Yeah, well, no problem. I got that. Loud and clear.”

She took a moment, sipped her tea, set the mug down with care. “Will you please have him back here on time at night?”

“Yeah, I’ll make sure of it.”

“Thanks.” And she grabbed her tea, got up and left the room.

He told himself that if she wanted to be a bitch, well, that was her problem. His job right now was to fix the breakfast. He put the bacon on the griddle and assembled what he needed to make French toast.

Johnny came in still wearing his pajamas. “It’s Saturday,” he announced. “I
love
Saturday! Bacon. I
love
bacon. Can I help? I want to help.…”

Bowie had him set the table and then allowed him to dredge the bread in the cinnamon-flavored egg mixture. Because Johnny had only one usable hand, that got a little iffy. But they worked it out.

When the food was ready, Johnny said, “I’ll get Mom.” He took off and returned alone. “She says she’s busy and she’ll eat later.”

“Good enough,” Bowie said, laying on the fake cheer.

After breakfast, Johnny wanted to get his sled out of the barn and use it in the big, sloping field behind the house. “Will you ride my sled with me, Bowie?”

Bowie looked down into Johnny’s hopeful, happy face and he felt about ten feet tall. He felt so good that he almost didn’t care that Glory was seriously pissed at him for no real reason he could understand—and had barely spoken to him for the past three days. “Yes, I’ll ride your sled with you. But ask your mom first,” he added. “Make sure she doesn’t have something else planned.” Why get her any angrier at him than she already was?

Johnny raced off to ask her.

Glory gave her permission. Bowie wrapped Johnny’s stitched hand in plastic and put on the big mitten for him and they played on the hillside until around noon, when Glory called Johnny in for lunch.

She didn’t invite Bowie. He tried not to be resentful that she failed to include him. After all, they more or less had an understanding that he made breakfast and was welcome at dinner, but for lunchtime, he was on his own.

He went to the diner. Charlene wasn’t there. The waitress said Brand’s wife usually stayed home Saturday except late in the afternoon, when she came in to close up. Bowie missed her. Charlene always took time to chat with him while he ate.

After the meal, he stopped by to see his mom. But the girl she had helping her out with the cleaning said she’d gone to Grass Valley to buy groceries.

Back at Glory’s, he went inside to use the bathroom. The house was silent. Nobody home.

Feeling glum and lonely, he retreated to the workshop, where he started on the chairs that went with the table. Working helped lift his spirits, helped him to get his mind off Glory, whom he shouldn’t be stewing over anyway.

That evening, he’d been invited to Charlene and Brand’s. He knew Glory and the kids were going, too. But he didn’t ask her if she wanted to ride over there together. He had a feeling she’d find some excuse not to ride with him—and the last thing he needed was more rejection from her.

Hadn’t he had enough of that already?

He went and picked up his mom and they rode over together.

All in all, it was a good family evening, he thought. He got to hang out with his brothers and the food was great. After dinner, the older kids—Brett’s two boys, Charlene’s niece Mia, and Johnny—went into the living room to watch a movie.

Charlene got him aside in the kitchen when he helped her clear the table and asked him if he would consider making a crib for the baby she was having in a few months. He told her he’d be happy to, although it would be several weeks before he could have it finished.

“I’m due in mid-April,” she said. “Do you think you could have it done by the first week of that month?”

“Tell you what. How about the end of February—March first at the latest?”

She beamed. “That would be great. Stay right there. I’ll just get my checkbook and take care of the price right up front.”

He stopped her. “Forget the checkbook. I’ve been trying to figure out what to get for my new niece or nephew, and now I know.”

“Bowie, no.” She frowned. “I can’t take advantage of you that way. Brand showed me pictures of some of the work you’ve done. It’s just beautiful.
And
we looked you up on the Dunn Woodworkers website. I mean, you’re famous. You’re listed as one of the top ten woodworkers in America.”

He laughed—but he was thinking about Glory again. He’d bet his best table saw that
she’d
never checked out his website. “I would say that ‘famous’ is a little over the top. Buck is famous.” His oldest brother was a well-known author and adventurer. He lived in New York City, with his wife B.J. and their two kids.

Charlene kept after him. “I only mean, well, it just feels like I’d be taking advantage of you to ask you to build us a crib for free.”

“You didn’t ask, Charlene. I offered.”

“But I—”

He cut her off. “It’s a baby gift. Stop arguing.”

She thanked him then, and let it go at last. They rejoined the others in the dining room, where the adults were having second cups of coffee after generous helpings of Charlene’s excellent apple pie with homemade vanilla ice cream.

Glory’s chair was empty, which didn’t surprise Bowie. Sera had been fussy all evening. Glory had probably gone somewhere more private to try and feed her. He took his seat and said yes when Charlene came by with the coffeepot.

Maybe twenty minutes later, Glory appeared looking flustered, her pinned-up hair coming loose around her flushed cheeks, a still-fussing Sera in her arms. “Charlene, dinner was wonderful, but Sera’s seriously colicky. I really think we’re going to have to head home.…”

Bowie knew he should just let it go, but he couldn’t help responding to the look of misery on her face—and he hated to hear poor little Sera cry. “Here, let me have her.”

Glory froze. Her mouth got that pinched look. But then Sera wailed again. And Glory gave in with a long, weary sigh. “Thanks,” she said, and seemed to mean it.

He got up and took the baby. Sera kept wailing. He rubbed her little back, rocked her from side to side. “You fed her?”

Glory nodded. “And changed her.…”

“Sit down,” he said. “Have another cup of that awful herb tea you drink. I’ll walk her around a little.”

She went to the table and joined the others. He left them all in peace and took the baby on a little tour of Brand and Charlene’s house—from the soaring slate entryway, up the stairs and along the upper landing that looked out over the living area below. He passed the master suite and a purple room stenciled with butterflies that he knew had to be Mia’s. The third bedroom looked like a guestroom. It was simply furnished with dark blue walls. He went in there, sat on the bed and laid Sera, tummy down, along his forearm, her head cradled on his hand.

She quieted immediately. There was something about that position that seemed to soothe her.

After maybe twenty minutes, when his arm started to get tired, he tried lifting her to his shoulder again. She settled against him without a peep, sound asleep.

He considered going out to join the others again. But it was peaceful up there in the blue bedroom. And the noise and activity downstairs might just get her stirred up again. So he sat there on the bed for a while longer, listening to Sera’s shallow, even breathing as she slept.

Another fifteen minutes passed. By then, he was thinking that she was sleeping soundly enough for him to chance getting up and going downstairs.

Glory appeared in the doorway. She saw him. And she stopped there, her hand on the doorframe. For a long moment, she hesitated on the threshold, just staring at him.

And he gazed back at her. He was way too aware of how the light from the hallway brought out the gold gleams in her dark brown hair, of how big and sad her eyes looked.

She hadn’t had an easy life, and he needed to remember that. First she’d gotten pregnant by the mixed-up troublemaker he used to be. And then, when she finally found a good man, he’d rolled down a mountain and ended up dead—leaving her pregnant with a second child.

It wasn’t his fault that she’d lost her husband. But it
was
his fault that he’d given in to her that first night she came up to his room at the Sierra Star. It
was
his fault that he’d taken her love when he had so little to give her in return. It
was
his fault that he’d left her and Johnny, that he’d waited so long to come back and make things right.