Lost Highways (A Valentine Novel) (5 page)

Every Heart Has a Story

S
he slept until the sun was high, a light sleep from which she would drift up at different sounds—the telephone’s ring, a squeaking door, the rustle of her passenger rising, when she’d peeked and seen his long bare legs as he slipped into his trousers, then the gurgle of water through pipes, and a truck driving off.

She slept as well in this bed as she did in her own. While she had not been in this house for several years, it seemed perfectly familiar and comfortable. The family—the Valentines on her daddy’s side and the Overtons on her mother’s—was spread out over southern Oklahoma and Texas, yet despite the distance, as strong a bond remained as if they all lived on the same street. “We carry the family traits in our blood,” her mother had often said. “Good or bad, can’t be denied.”

Uncle Doyle’s wife Thelma had been her father’s sister, so to all the Valentines, he had become a Valentine, no matter what the legal papers said. Having been an orphan, Uncle Doyle himself often forgot that his name was Smith. When reminded
of it, he would say that there were plenty of Smiths, so they wouldn’t miss him.

The quilt under which Rainey snuggled bore the characteristic Vs of all the quilts made by Grammy, her father’s mother, and there were the same scents in the house from the laundry soap favored by the women of the family, as well as the tendency of the elder men to smoke Camels.

Finally, awakening as slowly as she had gone to sleep, she stretched lazily and then looked over at the opposite empty bed, gazing at it for several long seconds. For some reason she pictured her passenger hitchhiking away down the lonesome highway. Going out of her life in the same strange manner in which he had arrived.

She wouldn’t be surprised if he had gone, she told herself, getting up to pad downstairs in her big denim shirt, panties and sock feet, not bothering with either her jeans or combing her hair. Not being a cheerful morning person, even at ten o’clock, she would not attempt any unnecessary effort until she’d had her coffee.

The house was silent, the shades drawn in the living room and dining room, both of which went generally unused. They were neat, if dusty.

The kitchen, annoyingly bright with sunshine, was empty. There was hours-old coffee, thick and strong, left in the pot, and she found a single clean cup in the cabinet. Poured it full, one teaspoon of sugar. She drank deeply and then had to cough.

Another couple swallows of coffee and she became sufficiently awake to see the kitchen in its entirety. She saw with a little shock that it was a terrible mess.

She had noticed a certain disorderliness last night but had been too tired to see the true scope of the situation. Rolled up newspapers not yet read, mail, files and books, dishes covered
the table. Food encrusted dishes were stacked in the sink and spread across the counters, along with an open bag of chips and several slices of stale bread, and some little things that looked like tomatoes but might have been shriveled red peppers.

She wondered if Uncle Doyle was depressed. She had recently read an article in the newspaper about older people getting depression, and one of the signs was a letting go of cleanliness.

Well, where was her cousin Neva? Why wasn’t she looking after her daddy better than this?

No doubt Neva was busy with her own affairs, Rainey thought, a doleful feeling about life in general washing over her. Everyone was busy with their own lives, and that left people like Rainey and Uncle Doyle all alone in theirs.

Except that she wasn’t quite as alone as she had been the day before, she thought, remembering both the dog and her passenger as her gaze lit upon a deep-blue sport coat hanging on the back of one of the kitchen chairs.

She reached out and laid a hand on it.

Seeing no one through the window over the sink, which gave a limited view at best, she went to the door and stepped out on the porch. The puppy was there and came immediately to wriggle around her legs. He did not jump on her, a point in his favor. She hated dogs that jumped on a person, and this one just sniffed and wriggled.

Then she saw the curious sight of her passenger bending down by the front tire of her truck.

“What are you doin’?” she called, going to the edge of the porch. She could see what he was doing, of course, but she wondered if he should be exerting himself like that in the hot sunshine.

He looked around at her, then straightened slowly. “You had a flat tire. I’m changin’ it.”

“Well, do you think you should be doin’ that…since you had a concussion yesterday?”

He was changing her tire in his silk shirt and rayon trousers, but she didn’t comment on this, getting distracted by the surprising sight of his muscular shoulders beneath his shirt and the way the sun shone on his dark hair.

Returning her gaze to his face, she said, “I could have done it. You shouldn’t be exerting yourself, and you might get your shirt dirty.”

“I can do it fine,” he said, walking forward and brushing one hand against the other, the gold of his wristwatch catching the light. “I was not diagnosed with a concussion, and the least I can do for you is change your tire.”

She saw then that he was looking at her legs, which reminded her that she wore only her shirt and socks. She supposed he’d seen a woman’s legs before…and if he could think to look at her legs in such an appreciative manner, his head was obviously okay.

He squinted up at her. “You picked up a nail somewhere, and it gave you a slow leak. You’ll need to get it plugged. I’d have sent it with your uncle—he went into town to get some part for his baler—but I didn’t see the flat until after he’d left.” His gaze drifted back to her legs.

“Thanks.” She pressed her legs tight together. “I’ll take it to town this afternoon. Have you had breakfast?”

“Had a piece of toast and coffee with your uncle. I’m not much of a breakfast person—and your uncle’s coffee is strong enough to stand a person up all day.”

“It’s strong, all right, but it’ll wear off at an inopportune time. I’m a breakfast person, no matter what time I get up, and you really should eat. I’ll find somethin’ to cook, if you want to come on in when you get done.”

She went upstairs and put on her jeans, not wanting him to get some mistaken idea about her. And she combed her hair in an effort to look more proper.

Proper really wasn’t exactly her strong suit, she thought, recalling how she had asked a veritable stranger to come along with her. She was very honest, though. Even Freddy said this. He would say, “Rainey is honest, even if she is a dingbat.”

Slowly lowering the brush in her hand, she stared long at her reflection in the mirror, her spirit faltering as she wondered if she had once again given in to foolishness. What had she expected by asking Harry to come along?

Things so rarely turned out as one expected.

There was a huge bowl of brown eggs in the refrigerator, and some sausage links that looked fairly fresh, a carton of milk that smelled okay, even though it was out of date. She managed to scrape together a healthy breakfast of scrambled eggs, sausage, biscuits and gravy, and even a tomato that wasn’t too old.

“Is that all you’re goin’ to have?” she asked, concerned by the single scoop of eggs and lone biscuit her passenger put on his plate.

“I’m not all that hungry.”

“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and it’s almost lunchtime, besides. Your body can’t make much energy with that little bit.”

“What you’re having is a heart attack waiting to happen,” he said, motioning at her plate.

“People have gone overboard about this fat thing,” she said, lifting a biscuit thick with butter. “A body has to have fat to process vitamins.”

He took a bite of his biscuit and looked mildly surprised. “This is really good.” he said.

“Well, if there’s one thing I can do, it’s cook. My husband Robert used to say that I could stop a war with my biscuits.”

Her ability to cook had always seemed like her saving grace, making up in part for her tendency toward foolish mistakes. Of course, her talent in this endeavor had also indirectly caused a number of her foolish mistakes. Her mother had said that her good cooking was the main reason men had always so quickly proposed to her. Rainey had married only two men, but she’d had at least half a dozen real proposals. For a time she had avoided cooking for a man for this reason—because it seemed that as soon as a man ate one of her meals, he would ask her to marry him.

Remembering this, she suffered a flash of anxiety. What if he was running away from his wife and children and fell in love with her cooking?

This gave her pause. Running from a wife and children was, in her opinion, a much more serious offense than almost any type of criminal behavior. Of course, she was getting carried away with wild suppositions, but the disturbing speculation did serve to point up the fact that she hadn’t really considered before what he might be getting away from. She had been so worried about his concussion and felt such empathy for his confusion that she had not gone any further.

“This is really delicious,” he said with enthusiasm, reaching for a second biscuit.

“Thank you. You aren’t married, are you? You aren’t runnin’ away from a wife and children, are you?”

He looked up, startled. “No. I’m not married.”

“Oh. Well, I guess it isn’t really any of my business.” She felt silly and rude and wished she had controlled her tongue.

“I haven’t ever been married,” he said, in a sort of dazed tone.

She looked at him. He blinked and looked down at his plate,
and he sat there holding the biscuit and looking intense, his jaw-line very tight.

She had a strong sense that he was working up to a further explanation, and she suddenly wondered if she really wanted to know what he was getting away from. She didn’t want to be disappointed in him. Not truly knowing him, she had attributed to him a very good character, if confused, and now she realized that this might not be the case at all. A great dread of being disappointed in him washed over her.

She was certain he would have told her everything at that moment, if she had asked, but she was saved from doing that when just then a vehicle drove up, and the puppy went to barking his fierce little puppy bark.

Through the window of the door, Rainey saw the little puppy dash off the porch, and then heard her Uncle Doyle let out a yell.

“Ye Gods and little fishes,” she said, opening the door to see the puppy darting again and again at her uncle’s ankles. She hurried out to grab hold of the pup.

“That’s a feisty little fella you have there, Rain-gal. I left by way of the front door, and I guess he didn’t see me go.” He touched the puppy’s head. “You’re pretty good at takin’ care of Rain-gal, pooch.” The puppy, satisfied that things were now in control, wagged his tail.

“He isn’t really my dog, Uncle Doyle. Someone dumped him on me. He didn’t bite you, did he?”

“Naw…he’s just all show. Probably make a good companion for you while you’re travelin’ all over creation,” he said with some censure, then went on to the sink to wash his hands, adding, “I’m sorry about the kitchen mess, darlin’. I forgot all about it.”

Spying a book and the file folder from Aunt Pauline still on
the table, Rainey deftly moved them, tucking them behind a canister on the counter. If her uncle happened to spy them, no doubt he would open them, and then he would get to reading and forget to have his meal. And Lord knew that Uncle Doyle didn’t need to skimp on meals.

Uncle Doyle’s thinness always gave her a little ache in her chest. He was so skinny, he disappeared when he stood sideways. She felt she must
feed
him.

She washed him a plate, and he sat at the table, complimenting her on her cooking so much that she became uncomfortable.

“Been a long time since I had such good food, Rain-gal. Her cookin’ is somethin’, idn’t it?” he said to Harry. “There ain’t many women can look like Rain-gal and cook on top of it, but all them Overton gals are like that—good lookers and good cookers.

“When Rain-gal and her mama were here last, I had a fella from the Ag Department down in Austin pull up out there and get the scent and come in, and the next thing I knew, my hand came in and set down, too. Those two men kept eatin’ and lookin’ at Rainey and her mama, too, even though Coweta was past seventy-five then. By dang, I thought I wasn’t never gonna get them men outta here.”

“Uncle Doyle, how’s your alfalfa this year?” she said to change the subject. When not immersed in his reading, Uncle Doyle could talk a blue streak. “Uncle Doyle retired from being a county agent and is experimenting with improvin’ alfalfa,” she explained to her passenger. “He’s helped put new seed on the market.”

She watched her passenger take yet another biscuit and, following Uncle Doyle’s example, put a piece of sausage on it and spoon gravy over it. She was pleased, but a little worried, too. She doubted that her passenger was used to rich foods. Little
sparks of worry went off in her mind; she had possibly corrupted him with her gravy, which was rich and could be habit forming.

“It was awful wet this spring,” Uncle Doyle was saying, “and the alfalfa got a lot of weeds. I’ll bet we had as much rain this spring as y’all did down in Houston, Harry,” he said.

Rainey realized he was speaking to her passenger. Harry. She stared at him, and he shot her a sideways glance.

“Weather patterns are goin’ a little crazy these days,” Uncle Doyle said. “Why, I can remember how parts of this country out here used to ‘bout go to desert in the summer when I was a boy. Now we got thick grass and even trees growin’ all over, and the Red has water in it most of the time. There’s some says it’s all the radio waves.”

She said, “I haven’t ever been to Houston, but I hear it is really humid there.” She kept looking at her passenger and wondered what all he had discussed with her uncle that morning. What he might have told Uncle Doyle that he hadn’t bothered to tell her.

“It can be,” he said. “Think I’ll get another cup of coffee. Anyone else want any?”

“I’ll take a half a cup,” Uncle Doyle said. “I clean forgot, Rain-gal, but Charlene called here this mornin’. I wrote a note and put it somewhere….” He looked around with a puzzled frown, then patted his shirt pockets.