Dark River Road (19 page)

Color washed over Mama’s face, and Chantry wondered what he meant by that. But then a woman came out to say that Mr. Quinton would see them now, and Mama took Mikey’s hand and followed her. Because he didn’t know what he was supposed to do, he trailed behind, but felt Chris’s dad watching them as they went to a room off the end of the entrance hall.

Bert Quinton sat behind a huge ornate desk set in front of a bank of windows that looked out over the back of the house. The dry creek bed that had been put in that summer was visible, white stones gleaming against grass that stayed green all year round.

Chantry had only been this close to old man Quinton once before, and he hadn’t liked it then any better than he liked it now. There was something scary about him, an intensity and strength of purpose that made Chris’s dad seem washed out by comparison. Bert Quinton had influence. He had the governor’s ear. Some said he had his hand in the governor’s pocket, too, but Chantry didn’t see how that’d be possible.

Now he looked at Mama and Mikey and Chantry from eyes that were hard and sharp, and seemed to be able to see clear inside his head and know what he was thinking.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Lassiter. I appreciate your punctuality.” He had a curiously soft voice for a man who could say hard things on occasion, and sat back in his chair without getting up like most men did when a lady entered the room. “Please. Be seated.”

Chantry stood back, holding Mikey’s hand while Mama took the chair he indicated with a careless wave of one hand. Every time he saw old man Quinton he was reminded of somebody but he wasn’t sure who. There was just something about him that made him think of someone else—like the godfather in that movie. Arrogance. Contempt. Or a willingness to employ cruelty if he thought it useful to gain his own ends.

Mr. Quinton lifted a few papers from his desk and held them in one hand, looking at them as if deciding what to do. Then he looked up at Mama.

“My secretary prepared the necessary paperwork. There are so few available spaces, you understand, that they must be assigned carefully. The most needy child receives treatment first, and on down the line. You understand that, don’t you, Carrie?”

Mama’s hands went so tight in her lap that her knuckles got white. She nodded. “Certainly I do. That is why I appreciate your efforts on my son’s behalf. Your kindness and generosity are a blessing to our family, Mr. Quinton.” Her words sounded stiff.

A faint smile lifted one side of his mouth. “You’ve been an exemplary addition to our educational staff. You’re dedicated to your pupils and to the school. Save for a few minor quibbles of late, I’ve not regretted hiring you for an instant.”

Chantry knew what he meant. The
quibbles
had to do with him. He stepped forward. He just hoped he got out the words without choking on them.

“Mr. Quinton, I apologize for what happened last night. I’m sorry.”

Sharp eyes shifted to him and got even sharper. He sat back in his chair and it didn’t make a sound even though he was a big man. He let the papers he held go flat on the desk and put his hands together, finger-ends to finger-ends as he studied Chantry for so long he began to feel his throat go tight and his stomach knot up like it did when Rainey got on him. This was different, though. Rainey was just all fists and bluster. Bert Quinton held real power, and he knew it and made sure everyone around him knew it. He could change lives with just a word or two.

“An unfortunate incident,” he said softly after a moment, and Chantry nodded.

“Yessir.”

“Not the first time young men have come to blows over family honor, but I trust it won’t happen again. Chris felt it his duty to protect his cousin from—unwelcome advances.”

Chantry stared at him. Mama made a faint sound but he couldn’t tell if it was dismay or surprise. He’d told her the truth, but now Mr. Quinton was saying something totally different.

“I’d never do anything to hurt Cinda,” he said finally when it seemed that Mr. Quinton expected him to respond.

“There are ways of harming impressionable young girls without touching them. Cinda has always had a soft heart. Not particularly wise, but sympathetic. I trust she’s learned her lesson now and there will be no more such incidents. You’d do well to take a lesson from this also, Mr. Callahan. Families can get hurt by the actions of their children. Do we understand one another?”

It was a not so subtle threat. He understood it very well.

“Yessir. I understand.”

“Excellent. You and your little brother will wait out in the hall while your mother and I finish our discussion.”

Chantry took Mikey’s hand, and with a glance at his mother sitting rigidly in the chair in front of that huge desk, they left the office and he closed the door behind them. Mikey walked awkwardly in his leg braces, and he lifted him onto a striped satin bench set against the wall.

Mikey played with the stuffed bear, dancing it over the beige stripes and humming softly to himself. He envied him. It’d be nice to be totally unaware of trouble, to just accept whatever came without worrying about it.

He didn’t feel like sitting down and stood with his back to the wall, arms folded across his chest and his head pressed against satin wallpaper that matched the bench. It was secluded back in this part of the hallway, though he could see all the way to the front door. Beveled glass windows on each side of the wide door let in plenty of light. A staircase curved up at one side.

In a few minutes he heard steps on the stairs, and wasn’t too surprised to see Chris come down them. He paused at the bottom, and turned to look at Chantry. His face was pretty battered. His lips had swelled up to the size of orange slices, and one eye was swollen shut. Ugly bruises darkened one side of his face.

When Chris started toward him, Chantry pushed away from the wall, tensing. He sure didn’t need any more trouble, not here, not now.

“My dad said you came to apologize,” Chris said when he got close, and Chantry sucked in a deep breath and nodded.

“Yeah. Sorry it happened.”

“No, you’re not.”

Chantry didn’t say anything, just looked at him. Chris stared back. After a minute, he looked down at Mikey and the stuffed bear. Then he looked back up at Chantry.

“You gonna take that bear everywhere with you?”

“I
 . . .
gave it to Mikey.”

Chris nodded. “I told my dad we had a fight over you and Cinda.”

“I figured that much.”

“Say any different and I’ll deny it.”

It was as close as he’d come yet to admitting the real reason for the fight: Tansy.

“I’m not exactly in a position to say much of anything,” he said then, and Chris gave him a look like he knew that already. They stood awkwardly for another moment; then Chris just turned around and left.

Chantry leaned back against the wall. Life sucked.

Old man Quinton signed the papers
Mama needed, and the surgery was set for the second week after school was out. Mama made all the arrangements, and said Chantry would have to go with her. She didn’t say it out loud, but she knew it wouldn’t work if she left him behind with Rainey.

Chantry fretted about leaving Shadow at home, and finally asked to board him at the clinic while he was gone to Jackson. Doc said that’d be fine, and he’d give him a discount. With Doc, that usually meant free these days. For some reason, he seemed to think Chantry deserved it.

Or maybe he just wanted to help out Shadow, because he said a couple of times how much he liked that dog. “He’s smart. Quick. Make a fine stock dog. You got a winner there, Chantry.”

Trials came up soon, and Chantry had decided to enter Shadow. He’d paid the fee back in January, and had the money set aside for the Nursery class. He just had to figure out a way to get to the trials that’d be held over in Clarksdale at the end of July. Maybe Rainey’d take him, since he hoped to get a big paycheck out of the dog.

Mikey’s surgery was scheduled the same week as Chantry’s fifteenth birthday. He’d be in Jackson on his birthday, and Mama had promised they’d celebrate two birthdays at once even though Mikey’s birthday wasn’t until September. It’d be just like new for all of them, she said. He worried that if something bad happened, he’d never forget that it happened on his birthday.

Jackson wasn’t as big as Memphis, but it was sure a lot bigger than Cane Creek or even than Clarksdale. The hospital sat near the Interstate that looped through town, with cars whizzing by so fast they were just a blur at night. Chantry sat and looked out the window the night before the surgery, his stomach tied in knots and everything around him seeming to fade.

Mikey was so little he was lost in that big hospital bed. He liked the attention, and was so cheerful that all the nurses said he was the best patient they’d ever had. He didn’t even complain when he got stuck with needles that drew blood, needles that would give blood, and needles that injected medicine into him. He’d just flinch and hug that damn white bear harder against him, and everyone said how brave he was.

Mama went downstairs to get them something to eat, and Chantry sat with Mikey. He had his own TV up on the wall, and was fascinated with the variety of programs offered on cable. He watched cartoons for a while, and then some documentary, with equal delight.

“Hey sport,” Chantry said when Mikey flipped the channel with the remote, “why don’t you try to rest?”

“That’s okay. I hafta watch. It’s got sharks. I like sharks. If I don’t wake up again I might not get to see them.”

Chantry went real still. Then he turned to look at Mikey, but he had his eyes trained on the TV and sharks swimming on the documentary channel.

“What’d you say?” he got out, his voice sounding all raspy.

Mikey didn’t look at him, just watched the flickering images up on the screen. “I want to see the sharks.”

“You’re gonna wake up,” Chantry said so fiercely that Mikey finally looked over at him, his eyes big and wide. “You hear? You’ve got to if you want to see the sharks for real someday. So don’t you even think different.”

Mikey sighed. “I might not, you know. It’ll be okay if I don’t, Chantry. I don’t want you to worry. You got enough to worry about.”

God. Chantry couldn’t say anything for the hard lump in his throat. He just stared at Mikey while everything around him seemed to dissolve. He thought of the angels in that picture that looked so much like Mikey, and then he thought how scared he was that Mikey might be one of them soon. Then all he could think was that he wouldn’t be able to stand it if that happened.

After a minute he got up and went over to stand by Mikey’s bed. He took his frail little hand and held it, looked down at the difference, his so big and brown and Mikey’s so tiny and pale. His eyes burned like he was going to cry, but he didn’t, just stood there.

“Want to lie down next to me, Chantry?”

“Sure,” he got out, and lay down in the bed next to Mikey, still holding his hand so tight it was like he could just give him some of his own strength. He’d wanted to give blood, but his wasn’t a match so he couldn’t. He hadn’t been able to do anything for Mikey except be here. And now he wondered just how much good that would do.

“You like sharks?” Mikey asked.

Chantry glanced at the TV. “Sure. Someday I’ll take you to see real ones.”

Mikey seemed happy at that even though Chantry didn’t watch the TV as much as he did his little brother. He didn’t move from beside him all that night except to go to the bathroom, and when a nurse suggested he move to the cot set up in the room, he just looked at her and shook his head. Mama didn’t say anything either. And he didn’t tell her what Mikey had said.

They came early to get him the next morning. Chantry was still awake. They walked with Mikey all the way to the doors of the operating room, and then had to stop there. Mama leaned over and whispered, “I love you enough,” and Mikey grinned drowsily.

“I know.” He looked so small in that big bed being rolled down the hall, and Chantry saw his little hand come up for a last wave just before the doors closed behind him. He looked over at Mama, and she had tears running down her face but she didn’t make a sound. After a minute, she turned and walked away and he went with her.

It took all day. Chantry couldn’t focus on anything, not TV, or the traffic outside, or the way all the trees were so pretty and green. He even tried to read but the words were just like chicken scratches in dirt. Nothing made sense. Mama bought him a hamburger and he only got half of it down. She didn’t eat either, he noticed.

Finally, the call came for Michael Lassiter’s family and the doctor came out to the waiting room. He smiled at them, and Mama clapped a hand to her mouth as he said Mikey had done just fine and he’d be good as new in a short time. Chantry let go of the breath he’d been holding. He heard all the technical stuff the doctor added after that, but none of it mattered. All that mattered was that Mikey was going to be all right.

Two days later, they celebrated Chantry’s fifteenth birthday and Mikey’s first as a new boy. He said he was like Pinocchio now, a real boy at last, and Chantry thought if that was true, the doctors would have fixed his feet as well. But it seemed like nitpicking to think that when the best news was that Mikey would recover. Some things just had to be endured, and maybe Mikey’s twisted feet was one of them. Besides, Mama had a way of getting things done. She’d manage it.

Mama was as happy as could be. She had a big cake brought to the room with sixteen candles on it, fifteen for Chantry and one for Mikey, and all the nurses came in to sing Happy Birthday and embarrass him. Mama laughed and said his face was really red, and one of the pretty nurses who didn’t look but about twenty gave him a big kiss on the cheek so that his face got even more red.

To his surprise, he got several cards, some with money in them, and Mama said that he’d have to write thank you notes to everyone before he left. She gave him twenty dollars and said she wished it could be more, but he hadn’t even expected that. It cost money to be here, and even though transportation was covered, it’d cost more once they got back home, too. Mikey would have to have medicine for a while yet.

Before they left the hospital to go home, Chantry went down to the gift shop and picked Mikey out a present. It was a big gray stuffed shark, with jaws open wide and white felt teeth. It cost most of his birthday money, but it was worth it. He went back upstairs and gave it to him in the plastic bag, and Mikey pulled it out and grinned.