Love in a Small Town (13 page)

“Well, hello, Mr. Hayes,” Odessa had said—Mrs. Stirling she’d been then, although she and Stirling were separated at the time. Her voice was warm as a summer night, like always. “How are you this lovely evenin’?”

“Fine, I guess,” his dad answered, his voice clipped, as always.

Tommy Lee had wondered later, despite not wanting to think about it at all, how those two had gotten so far past that inane greeting.

The plan was to let his dad drop him and Molly at the gymnasium, and after the dance had gotten under way good, he and Sam would slip back to Molly’s cottage for the vodka. Sam’s mother was busy with her Saturday night card game, so they “borrowed” her car. Sam dropped Tommy Lee off up at the driveway to the cottage and drove on to turn around and pick Tommy Lee up on the way back.

Molly’s mother was supposedly going out that night, but when Tommy Lee got down to the cottage, he found her Impala station wagon sitting there in the dark. The cottage was dark, except for a light shining from back in the bedroom. He could hear music and faint laughter, too, and he knew Odessa was in there with someone, but he figured he could slip in the kitchen door, get the bottle and get out, and she’d never know. She wouldn’t have known, either, if he hadn’t been drawn into spying on her. It had been the sound of the male voice; something in the tone had made him go look.

Even as he tiptoed through the living room, he knew what he was going to see and told himself not to go look. Then he was standing there and staring into the bedroom, and there was his dad, waltzing Odessa around the room. Another thing he remembered was how Odessa’s dress was partway unzipped in the back. He couldn’t believe what he saw, but then his dad’s head came around, and he was looking straight at Tommy Lee, who stood there with the bottle of vodka in his hand.

Tommy Lee wouldn’t ever forget the look on his dad’s face, either.

“Oh, my God,” he heard Odessa say, but he was already running from the cottage. He didn’t hear his dad say anything.

It had been hard to look his dad in the face for a couple of weeks, but other than that things went on at home as always. He and his dad never discussed the matter. Tommy Lee had never expected his parents to act lovingly toward each other, and they still didn’t. Maybe his father was a little more silent.

Tommy Lee couldn’t imagine why, after all these years, Odessa felt the need to dredge up the whole thing, but here she was saying, “Your daddy was a lonely man, Tommy Lee. Surely you had to know that. Once—only once—it got too much for him, and he sought some comfort. Was that so horrible a thing?”

“I never said it was.” He half turned to look at her. He could have said he understood more than she knew, but he wasn’t about to say that. What he knew was his knowledge and didn’t belong to this woman.

She said, “I don’t know what he said to you, or how . . .”

“He never said anything.”

She regarded him. “No, I suppose he wouldn’t know what to say. I was surprised when he took me up on my invitation that night. He was such a closed man.”

Tommy Lee was amused. He couldn’t resist saying, “Once with you—how do you know there weren’t others?” As soon as the words were out, he felt like a heel for dishonoring his father . . . and for throwing dirt at this woman he didn’t particularly care for but for whom he did hold a measure of respect.

“I knew your daddy enough to know. We grew up here. Oh, he was older than I by a number of years, but Valentine was very small in those days. I also know a bit about men, and he wasn’t the type. He was just so sad that night that I prevailed upon him. I did once have a way with men,” she said, not at all boasting but as a matter of fact. “That night we were both painfully lonely, both desperately needing comfort. We were both human, Tommy Lee.”

“Like I said, that was years ago, Odessa, and none of it matters now. Dad’s gone, and anyway, it had nothin’ to do with me.”

Odessa shook her head. “Oh, it had a lot to do with you. Your mother and daddy stayed together because they both loved you and neither would give you up.”

“How do you know so much about what my parents felt?” Tommy Lee cut in.

“Your daddy told me some that night, and I knew both of them enough—and knew enough of human nature—to piece together the rest. Somewhere a rift developed between your parents, and it got wider and colder, until neither of them could come together again. Yet, neither would break the marriage. Not only did they have you to think of, but a divorce would have meant scandal. It was one thing for me to get divorced as I did—people expected me to act outrageous. But people expected your mother and father to be staunch and upright. Their families would have disowned them, and your father stood to loose half his land, and he wasn’t going to do that for anything. So the two of them lived their lives together while loneliness ate at their hearts until there wasn’t anything left.”

Tommy Lee didn’t like Odessa talking about private details of his parents’ lives—of his own life—and making it out that they were pitiful, while she had the answers.

“And what about the way you lived, Odessa? Was that so much better for you and your daughters? Don’t you think Molly was hurt by your continual marriages and affairs? Why do you think every time I happen to say a cross word to her, she’s got to run off and hide?”

He had meant to lash out, but he immediately regretted it when he saw her flinch and draw up straight, as if from a slap.

She said, “I came today because I felt the need to tell you that I was sorry for what happened back then. Oh, I know it is awfully late to make apologies, but . . . well, I felt the need. I’ve felt so badly about it for so long, and if you don’t need the apology, I certainly need to make it. I’m not apologizin’ for what I did with your father,” she clarified. “I’m only sorry that you saw what should have remained a private matter for Thomas. That was a cruel thing to have happened, for both of you. And I don’t want you to think less of him. Thomas was a fine man, a fine father.”

He felt badly about hurting her feelings, but as she went on telling him what a fine man his father was, he began to get annoyed again, so he said quickly, “I know my father was a fine man. I always knew that.”

He reflected that he’d had a few doubts after seeing his father with Odessa, but the years of making his own stupid mistakes had erased those doubts.

“Oh, well, good,” Odessa said. “I’m glad to know that.”

She was looking shaken, and Odessa shook up made him feel very uneasy. They stood there for several awkward moments, and then Odessa came toward him. Her steps and manner were once more firm, and he felt relieved, except that she had something more to say, and there wasn’t anything he could do about it, short of stuff a rag in her mouth, which wasn’t likely to work for very long.

“Another thing I wanted to tell you today was that I don’t disapprove of you. I never did disapprove of you. It only came out that way. I was annoyed with you for so long because you took my Molly from me. I was jealous because instinctively I knew that you could give Molly what I never could. It was selfish of me, and I knew it at the time, but there you have it. I was much more selfish in those days.”

“Odessa . . . I didn’t mean to . . .”

But she waved him silent. “You have been good for Molly, and I can admit that now, for what it’s worth. I would like to see you and Molly work this out.” She searched his eyes, questioning.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I just don’t know how I feel right now.”

She sighed. “Well, I’ve been there once or twice myself.”

Then she put a hand on his arm; it was soft and cool and in that instant he thought he understood what his father must have felt when she touched him. Odessa Collier could still have a way with men.

She said, “I’m going to give you advice, so brace yourself. Feelin’ free to give advice is one of the few things I like about being sixty-four.”

“I thought you were only fifty-seven.”

She smiled at that, and he felt eased. “You are a good soul, and you know, I believe I’m only sixty-three. I’ve lied about my age for so long, I get confused.”

She sighed again and then lifted her chin. “When you get my age, you will see that life is so very short and we should never waste time being cold and lonely. That’s what Molly is running from, and well she should. For all my failures, I never raised my daughter to settle for less than all the passion life has to offer. Don’t settle for less, either, Tommy Lee. You won’t do Molly or yourself any favor if you patch this thing up simply because it is the easiest thing to do. If you can love her, truly love her, then do that and nothing less . . . but if you can’t, then have the balls to let her go."

She gave his arm a little pat and stepped out from the shop, immediately putting her hand up to hold her hat on. Odessa always had been abrupt, as if she planned entrances and exits with drumbeats.

He watched her drive away and thought about how she had said “have the balls.” A term like that coming out of her genteel mouth was startling. But she had always done that; shock value, he thought. Odessa always had enjoyed livening things up.

Molly was a lot like her. Molly looked pure and virtuous and refined, but underneath that exterior beat a heart that burned blue flame. He remembered the first time he’d gotten Molly’s blouse off—in the backseat of Sam’s old Chevy—and discovered that her bra was bright red. The combination of purity and sensuality could be a little confusing . . . and it was a powerful turn-on. Cool, she seemed, and then he would touch her, and she would come at him like a fierce hot wind.

Standing there, staring at the dust Odessa’s car had raised, he realized that all Odessa would have had to do was touch his dad’s arm, and it certainly would have been enough. He felt very sad for his father, and foolishly grateful to Odessa for that one night she had given him.

He turned back to his work, intent on losing himself in it, but after five minutes or so, he realized he was just standing there staring at the engine. He set his socket wrench aside and found the pack of cigarettes he had bought the other night. After about four puffs on one, though, he put it out because he felt a little sick. He got another Coke from the refrigerator and went out the back door of the shop and sat down on the step to drink it. He reflected that he had become as dependent on soft drink as he used to be on cigarettes. Maybe the change was good, though. He’d do soft drinks for another ten or fifteen years and then switch to something else; he might stay healthy by never spending his entire lifetime on one bad habit.

Thinking of his lifetime he suddenly felt very empty. So empty that he thought he might cry. He was alone; there wasn’t anyone to see. But he couldn’t cry. The only time he could recall crying since he was a small boy was at his father’s funeral. The main reason he had cried then was because his mother hadn’t, and that had upset him considerably. His mother’s stony face had seemed to make all of life seem futile.

His mother lived down in Florida now, in a retirement community. She had left as soon as all the legalities had been taken care of after his father’s death. Everything had been settled in only about two weeks, because his father had had his affairs in the same perfect order as he’d always kept the barn. Tommy Lee thought his mother seemed happy now, at least content. He called her once a month. He hadn’t called to tell her about him and Molly, though. His mother didn’t care to be told of problems, and he didn’t see the need, anyway. Anything he and Molly did wasn’t going to affect his mother, whose life, like her apartment, was as neat as ever.

The urge to cry faded, leaving him bone-deep discouraged. As near as he could figure it, Odessa had been trying to tell him not to end up like his parents had, but hell, she didn’t need to tell him that. He’d been trying not to end up that way all of his life. And look at where he was—alone in the same house they had been alone in.

He thought that maybe he was destined to follow the same course as his parents and be miserable all his life and that maybe Molly was destined to go off on the same course as her mother—she had a late start, but she had left him, as Odessa had done all her husbands.

Maybe it was like it said in the Bible: the sins of the fathers visited on the children. Maybe there was no escaping it, and that thought gave him a sliver of panic.

He thought of calling Molly, but—as his panic gave over to anger—he decided against it. He’d been the one to call the last time. Now it was her turn. It couldn’t be all on his side. And he didn’t want to take a chance that she would brush him off. He figured he’d done his part. She knew where to find him if she wanted to make contact. Besides, he thought, sinking, he had no idea what to say to her.

He felt guilty because he had such a difficult time knowing or showing how he felt. It was work to show how he felt. Loving someone took a lot from a person, and the truth at that moment was that Tommy Lee didn’t feel he was up to giving whatever it was that Molly needed. He felt used right up.

* * * *

Rodney Cormac came just before five to pick up his engine. He was a big man in Big Smith overalls, with small eyes set in a fleshy face. “Is it ready?” he asked right off, to the point and acting as if he were in a hurry.

“What are you puttin’ it in?” Tommy Lee asked, as he rolled the engine out on the hoist to the bed of Cormac’s pickup truck. Normally he wasn’t much for chitchat, but this afternoon Woody Wilson had gone fishing instead of coming in to help, which meant the only person Tommy Lee had spoken to all day had been Odessa, and the dog.

“Ain’t sure yet,” Cormac said, his voice clipped.

“Well, if you have any trouble with it, you don’t hesitate to get back to me,” Tommy Lee said.

“I won’t,” the man said, and looked nasty, as if to convey the idea that he might come punch Tommy Lee’s face in if the engine let him down.

Tommy Lee had run into that attitude before—not often, because his work was good and there were few failures due to anything he did or didn’t do. Sometimes, though, these hot-rod guys could be hotheads and blame him for their own mistakes, and would come looking to take their frustration out of his hide. There’d never been anyone Tommy Lee couldn’t make back down. He could appear really tough if it was required. He’d learned a long time ago, back in his teens when he hadn’t been so muscular, that he’d do best to appear a cool killer. Guys left him alone that way. He hadn’t been in more than three or four fights in his entire life, although he’d been in a lot of arguments.