Counterpointe (31 page)

“I couldn’t have saved him, you know,” Sam said.

The village, lately filled with the sounds of grief, was now nearly silent. Javier was back in his own hut, his leg stitched and covered with both a modern bandage and a poultice prepared by Soraida.

“You worry that if you’d just been able to get Tatito here sooner it would have made a difference. But if I’d been right there when it happened, the outcome would have been the same.” Sam, the physician, saying what she thought was needed to make him feel better.

She took his slack hand in hers and rubbed firmly. “Javier told me the peccaries could have done a lot more damage if you hadn’t chased them off. And the tourniquet saved his life. You did well, Rob.”

He had a sudden image of Tatito, peeking from behind a tree, his eyes dancing with delight. He swiped at the tears running down his face. “He was such a sweet, funny little kid.”

“Yes. He was.”

“How do you stand it?”

“Losing patients, you mean?”

Rob nodded.

“In the beginning, you spend hours going over every move you made. Second-guessing every decision. Looking for explanations. You can’t keep doing that, though, not if you’re going to be able to function. So eventually you learn to go over it once and forgive yourself any mistakes you may have made, and then you try to learn from them.”

She wrapped her arms around herself as if she were cold. “After I lose a patient, I go to the beach and fly a kite. When the string is all the way out, I cut it loose and watch until I can’t see it anymore.”

“What kind of kites?” It was just something to say.

“Different ones. Dragon kites from Chinatown, elaborate box kites, even the two-stick ones you buy in the grocery store. I fly them all the time. I only set one free when I need to let go of something.”

Maybe he’d try that when he got home. Go to the Cape and set two kites free. One for Tatito and a second for his marriage.

When Sam left to go to her hut, he sat for a time, picturing an empty beach lapped by endless ocean with bright red and yellow kites soaring into the infinite blue of a clear sky. Trying to find comfort in it.

As Javier recuperated, Rob sat with him watching the village children play, remembering not only Tatito but the child he and Clare had lost. Given his pain at that memory, he knew Javier’s anguish was impossible to put into words even if they had been fluent in each other’s language.

“You were right,” Clare told Vinnie, as she hung up her coat. “I do need to find a job that pays a salary.”

“Well now, beautiful. Can’t say that’s a surprise. Had a feeling something’s been going on with you.”

“It is. I’m getting...a divorce.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Clare. Don’t sound like that’s what you want.”

Clare fingered the copper key John gave her at Christmas that she now wore to remind herself she was moving toward a new life. “Whether I want it or not, it’s the fair thing to do.”

Vinnie looked at her for a moment with a thoughtful expression. “I think the Father’s got big plans for you.”

“I very much doubt that.” Certainly none of the jobs she qualified for would even fall under a classification of “medium.”

“Now don’t you be that way, you hear me, beautiful? The Father’s taking real good care of you. You got to learn to trust.”

Vinnie’s comfortable relationship with God never ceased to amaze Clare. The other woman talked as if He were sitting in an easy chair in the next room, and Vinnie seemed to manage whatever difficulty life handed her by saying it was in the hands of the Father. Clare teased her once that she shouldn’t have to work so hard, then.

Vinnie quickly disabused Clare of that notion. “The Father expects us to do our part. Don’t just hand us nothing for nothing. We got to be partners.”

Clare fervently wished she had Vinnie’s certainty a higher power was watching over her...and Rob. But she didn’t.

Clare sat at the dining room table with a pad of paper, determined to make the decision about where she was going. Somewhere old or somewhere new? Salina maybe? There she would have family to provide backup. Which was a positive that might also be a negative if it weakened her resolve to be fully independent.

Or perhaps one of the big cities she’d spent time in—New York, Seattle, Atlanta. All would provide opportunities, although they’d be expensive, and it would take time to make new friends. Or what about Cincinnati?
 
She’d lived there seven years which made it familiar, and the city was both large enough to provide opportunities and small enough to be comfortable and affordable. The major negative was it meant returning to the place where she’d been almost as unlucky in love as Boston. Although she should be able to avoid the bits that held bitter memories, something that could also be said of Boston.

But her Cincinnati memories no longer stung, while any thought of remaining in Boston made her chest tighten. Perhaps because running into Rob would be more than a faint possibility, given the proximity of Hope House and Northeastern.

“I’ll...we’ll miss you,” John said when she told him her plans. He turned to pick up a tool. “When do you leave?”

“As soon as I get everything arranged.”

“Here, steady this, will you?” He was building containers for the garden.

Clare took the end of the board he’d indicated and held it in place. While he nailed it into position, she looked around at the complex pattern of planters designed by John and the men, trying to picture it in bloom. “You don’t belong here forever, John. You have a good brain. You need more challenge than...” She waved a hand taking in the tired house and yard.

He lifted his eyebrows.

“Remember, I’ve seen the kind of reading you do.”

He finished nailing the board in place, set the hammer down, and ran his hand over his forehead, leaving behind a smear of dirt. He reached out and caught her hand. “You aren’t wearing your wedding ring.”

“It’s not official yet. Rob has to sign the papers, but, well, I-I decided it was time.”

“Why not stay here, Clare? Where you have friends.”

“I thought you of all people would understand why I need a fresh start.”

He stood for a time still holding her hand, then he sighed and let her go. “I guess I do at that.”

“Cincinnati?” Lynne said.

A continuing experiment, saying aloud what she was planning.

“When are you going?”

“A couple of weeks.”

“Before Rob gets back?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t you think you need to talk to him? Whatever problems you were having. Maybe you can work them out.”

“He’s better off not seeing me.”

“So you get to make that decision?” Lynne was angry and making no attempt to hide it.

“I’m not the one who went away.”
And I’m not the one who cut off communication
.

“What do you call leaving Boston?”

“Getting on with my life.” Clare’s throat tightened. She’d been cruel but Rob was cruel as well. Not a word from him. Not in all these months.

Lynne sniffled. “He loved you so much.”

Loved
, Lynne said. Not
loves
. Clare knew that. No reason, then, for her heart to squeeze in pain.

“Are you okay, Tyrese?” The boy was having trouble sitting still and he kept rubbing his hands up and down his upper arms.

“Fine. I fine.” He straightened and sat stiffly as he continued to read, but when he walked out, Clare noticed he was limping. When she saw Anthony later, she asked him about Tyrese.

“He got in a fight,” Anthony said. “That bad-ass, Jamal, jumped him. He hurting a bit.”

“Jamal?”

“They been hassling Tyrese.”

“Who has?”

“Them Bull Sharks. His old gang.”

Clare mentioned it to Beck, who sighed. “I’ll speak to the police. Ask them to keep an eye out, and I’ll talk to Tyrese’s mom. See if she’s willing to move to a different neighborhood.”

The next day, Tyrese walked in, ducking his head when Clare looked up at him. He slid into the seat next to her and pulled a book out of his backpack.

“What happened to your eye?” And his lip, and dear God, his hand.

“Fell.”

Clare shivered with unease. “Only way you end up with a shiner like that, you fell into someone’s fist.”

“Nope. Just clumsy, ma’am.” Tyrese shifted around in his seat looking guilty as hell.

She caught his hand and uncurled the fingers. One was swollen twice its normal size and Tyrese jerked away when she touched it.

“You need ice and an x-ray to see if it’s broken.”

“No, ma’am. Don’t need no x-ray. I fine.” He opened the book with a definitive thump and she gave up for the moment trying to force him to accept her concern.

But if Tyrese wouldn’t talk, she knew who would. “Did you see Tyrese today?” she asked Anthony as he walked her out of Hope House.

Anthony nodded. “Man, he sure be hurting.”

“Do you know what happened?”

“Bull Sharks been hassling him.” Anthony did a little shuffle step and pretended to shoot a basket. “They ambushed him, but he getting smart. Mostly manages to avoid them. They ain’t good at hiding theyselves.”

“Do they know he comes to Hope House?”

Anthony appeared to consider that. “Don’t know. Tyrese, he tell me he real careful. You don’t need to worry. Pretty soon they find someone else they pick on.”

Clare did worry, though, especially when shortly after that, Tyrese stopped coming to Hope House.

After Sam worked on Javier’s leg, the healer had come and examined the wound. He questioned Sam about the sutures before insisting she use the poultice he’d prepared.

“I worried it would lead to an infection, but it seems to be healing faster than normal,” Sam told Rob and Jolley later.

That collaboration broke the ice with Soraida, who had previously avoided Sam, and the two began meeting regularly. When it wasn’t raining, they sat in front of Sam’s hut, Soraida talking while Sam took notes, or Sam talking while Soraida listened with an intent look on his face.