Somewhere Safe With Somebody Good (22 page)

‘Since we’re in the Children’s section,’ he said, ‘I’ll ask a child’s blessing.

‘God our Father, Lord and Savior, thank you for your love and favor, bless this food and drink we pray, and Irene who shares with me today. Amen.’

‘Amen.’

‘I learned that from my first-grade teacher, Miss Sanders—I don’t recall if she was married, we thought all teachers were Miss, devoted to us exclusively. We prayed in school back then, saluted the flag, all sorts of wonderful stuff we can’t do anymore.’

‘My mother was a schoolteacher,’ she said. ‘She wasn’t my birth mother, she was an aunt by marriage. My mother died when I was born.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Though I never knew her, I miss her very much.’ She gazed beyond him, grave, then looked at him and said, ‘How is that possible?’

He considered this. ‘I suppose there’s a sense in which you did know your birth mother—she carried you close to her heart for many months, you inhaled and exhaled her amniotic fluid, which provided everything you needed for life and good health. Most important, she’s how you got here in the first place and began making a valuable difference in the world. All of that, it seems, forges a pretty close relationship, much to be missed.’

She looked at the sea of books, unable to speak.

‘Perhaps you could give me a tutorial,’ he said. ‘I’m old at book loving, but new at bookselling. Would you be willing to explain why you choose one book and not another?’

‘These,’ she said, ‘are the ones I like so far. All the open ones are
under consideration. And that stack is definitely not making the cut. Where shall we begin?’

‘Let’s begin with the books you like,’ he said, interested.

•   •   •

B
Y
THREE
-
THIRTY
, gone from the window were
The Secret Garden
,
Sense and Sensibility
, and all twelve volumes of the obscure classic
Swallows and Amazons
.

He called his wife to come give him a hand with the
O
window. Got the answering service. Huffed a wing chair to the window. Thumped the stuffed cat onto a rug by the chair. Installed a floor lamp. Screwed in a bulb.

With Irene McGraw’s help, he unrolled the October banner. Placed a book on either end to flatten the thing for the next thirty days. Looked up and waved to whoever pecked on the glass.

One by one, he distributed
O
titles. Stacked
Of Mice and Men
and
Oliver Twist
on the table by the chair.

Went looking for a title to place on the cushion of the chair.

‘
One Hundred Years of Solitude
,’ suggested Irene.

Did that.

Displayed
O Pioneers!
by the cash register, with a
15% OFF
sign.

Washed his hands at the coffee station.

Done.

•   •   •

A
T
FOUR
O
’
CLOCK
, Irene left with twenty-one books, ranging from picture to young adult. She had, in every sense of the term, made his day.

‘Guess!’

‘I don’t know,’ said Hope. ‘After all you did last week, I’m afraid to think it. Four hundred and . . . maybe ten dollars?’

‘Four hundred and ninety-nine dollars and twenty-seven cents. Plus I found some loose change under the wing chair cushion in Poetry, and put that in to make an even five hundred.’

Tears. Not hers. His.

•   •   •

H
E
TORE
OPEN
THE
BOX
in the garage and dug through the Styrofoam peanuts.

Beautiful. He was thrilled.

He grasped the butt with his right hand, and laid the shaft across his left palm. Giving the cue a slow turn, he examined the workmanship of the inlaid forearm and its striking design. He looked at the collar, the ferrule, the tip. Definitely a pro stick as far as he was concerned.

•   •   •

A
FTER
THEIR
EARLY
DINNER
on Friday, he sat with Cynthia in the kitchen.

‘I’m just going to love him.’

‘That’s the hard way,’ she said.

‘With God’s help, I want to be something like grace to him. I don’t know how the shrink stuff works and I don’t want to pretend to know or try a bunch of fashionable strategies. So, if it works, it works, and if it doesn’t, maybe he and I will both learn something in spite of ourselves.’

‘You know he’s frightened of attachment, of any real closeness. It’s what he wants most from you, but he’ll keep trying to push you away.’

‘I’m not going away.’

‘Let me pray for you.’ She took his hand, rested her shoulder against his.

‘Lord, you know how crucial this time with Sammy will be. Open
his heart, we pray, to your love and to Timothy’s. I ask you to give Timothy your words, and to anoint all that he says and does to draw Sammy into the circle of your astonishing grace. May it be a tender time, somehow transforming in ways we can’t know. We ask all this, believing, but ask this far more—that your perfect will be done in Sammy’s life and in the lives of his siblings. Thank you, God, for second chances, for without them, I wouldn’t be here tonight to lift this petition. In the marvelous name of Jesus, we are thine own forever.’

He kissed her hand. ‘You’re my best deacon.’

‘Flu season this year is terrible. I know we had our shots, but a lot of people who had a shot are sick as cats. I do not have time to be sick.’

‘If I get sick,’ he said, ‘I’ll quarantine myself.’

‘Where?’

‘I’ll sleep downstairs with Barnabas.’

‘In that case,’ she said, ‘maybe I’ll just get sick with you and we’ll finish off the soup.’

She took the ladle from the drawer and bent to her task at the stove. ‘This may be Puny’s best chicken soup ever. I’ll put it in three containers. Give them my love, and please use a sanitizer before you go over, and be sure and wash your hands when you come back. Also, it might be good to hang your clothes on the peg by the side door and have a really hot shower first thing.’

The fire crackled and spit.

‘One more thought,’ she said. ‘I’ll put wipes by the door. Could you please wipe the doorknobs when you come home—outside
and
inside?’

Florence Nightingale was alive and well and living in Mitford.

•   •   •

‘L
ORD
HELP
, R
EV
’
REN
’, I’
M
HALF
KILLED
.’

‘You look it,’ he said to Harley. He stood in the doorway of the tidy basement bedroom next to the oil burner. ‘Cynthia sends her love,
and to prove it, she sends hot chicken soup. Interested?’ Starve a cold and feed a fever? Or was it the other way around? He could never remember.

He lifted the lid from the container; Harley sniffed the air.

‘Are they any noodles in it?’

‘Sure thing.’

‘Yessir, I’ll have a shot right out of th’ jug, thank ye.’

Harley drank soup and lay back on the pillow. ‘Boys howdy, that ought t’ do it.’

‘Where are your teeth?’

‘Law, I don’t know, I ain’t even thought about ’em in two or three days. Maybe on th’ kitchen table.’

‘Let me pray for you.’

‘Yessir, an’ pray for our boy in there, he’s been sick as a houn’ dog. An’ pray Kenny don’t git it, some of us has t’ work f’r a livin’.’

‘Will do.’

‘An’ pray f’r th’ furnace man t’ git th’ rattle out on Monday mornin’. Ever’ time it starts up, it rattles an’ bangs ’til a man could jump out th’ winder buck-naked.’

‘Here we go,’ he said, bowing his head.

•   •   •

S
AMMY
SAT
FACING
THE
WALL
on the far side of the bed, his back to the open door.

Not knowing what to say, he knocked.

‘What?’ said Sammy, not turning around.

‘Cynthia sent hot chicken soup.’

‘I don’ want n-nothin’.’

He made the sign of the cross.
Your words, Lord
.

‘I have something for you.’

‘I don’ need n-nothin’.’

Sammy’s shoulder blades as sharp as wings, the vertebrae delineated. So young, so old. He stood transfixed by the sight of Sammy’s bare back and its articulation of despair.

He wanted to tell Sammy that he was loved, that he was forgiven, that there could be a new start, a real beginning. He wanted to say, You’re safe with us, you’re surrounded by people who care for you and we won’t let you go. He wanted to pray aloud for whatever succor the words might conceivably offer. But he was mute.

He took the cue to the bed, carrying it horizontally in both hands.

At the altar of defeat, he laid the stick of grace.

Then he turned and went home to the yellow house where he had been given everything and more, none of it especially deserved.

•   •   •

A
CCORDING
TO
CALLER
ID, it was Henry Talbot.

‘Father, thank God you’re there. Please pray for . . .’ The voice broke. ‘. . . my husband.’

‘I’m praying for him faithfully. And for you, Mary.’

Mary Talbot tried to speak, but could not. He was going to say that he would do anything he could, but there was the click, and he stood for a moment holding the receiver.

•   •   •

T
HEY
HARDLY
EVER
GOT
TO
HEAR
the innocuous buzz of their doorbell, installed in the seventies by a former priest. Most people came to the side door, and UPS and FedEx historically dropped off in the garage.

Eight-fifteen was late for a visitor; he was already in his robe and pajamas following the prescribed hot shower.

He switched on the front porch light and opened the door.

Dooley was grinning. ‘Hey, Dad! Let’s go
car-shoppin’.’

D
ooley was in the lead and there was Father Tim bringing up the rear.

Hessie peered through the window of the Woolen Shop. They were running along the street close to the parked cars, and laughing.

What had happened to his freckles? Had they been surgically removed? Or do freckles at some point just vanish on their own? His cowlick had also disappeared—that had been her favorite Dooley feature when he was a boy.

Whoa, look at that—muscles, even. The grubby little kid in overalls had turned into one good-looking hunk, pardon the expression.

And what was it about Father Tim that seemed different? Loose, that was the word, as if he were as light as air, just springing along.

She opened her notebook and entered a reminder:

Google fade frkles

•   •   •

A
FTER
THEIR
FOUR
-
MILER
and a shower, he wrangled Dooley into lunch at the Feel Good.

‘Hand-cut,’ he said, pushing the fries to Dooley’s side of the table.

‘That’s a really nice cue you gave Sam. But nobody gets why you did it. I mean, he thinks it’s some kind of joke or a trick. I think it scared him; it didn’t make sense.’

In his experience, grace hardly ever made sense. ‘If he’s going to shoot pool, he needs a decent stick.’

‘He probably thinks he should be punished for bustin’ the old stick, and he knows you know he took yours off the rack, so it hacks him for you to make a move he can’t understand. It’s like you’re trying to pull something over on him.

‘Clyde would have half killed him for what he did; Clyde half killed him for breathing.’ Dooley called his biological father by his given name. ‘Anyway, I brought him a new one, too, so now he has a backup.’

‘Good shooters need a backup,’ he said.

‘But think about it, Dad. I gave him a really great pool table. You and Cynthia let us put it in your dining room. You took out all your furniture so he could do what he loves. How many people would do that? How can he get his head around that kind of thing? When I was a kid, I could never understand why you were so good to me, I thought you’d end up knockin’ me down or kickin’ me out, it didn’t make sense for you to be good to me. Sometimes I hated you for it, because I didn’t know what was in your head.’

He listened; ate a couple of fries.

‘So here he is,’ said Dooley, ‘actin’ like a creep. And here we are, givin’ him all this great stuff. Is that th’ message we want to send?’

‘For now, anyway.’

‘When I’m home on the twenty-sixth, I’m going to seriously work on ’im about his teeth. They’re a mess. I’ll take care of the money; he needs to get that behind him.’

‘You’ll have to catch him first.’

‘And the stuttering. It holds him back; other pool shooters give
him a hard time. Maybe I’ll work on that when I’m home for Thanksgiving.’

Dooley pushed away the ketchup.

‘I thought you liked ketchup on your fries.’

‘I do, but Lace is tryin’ to get me off sugar. There’s a lot of sugar in ketchup.’

‘Lace . . .’ he said, wanting to talk about that.

‘I asked Harley if Sammy’s cool with his rent,’ said Dooley. ‘Sammy’s paying on time. It was a good decision for me to quit paying his share. He doesn’t want to be out in the cold like he was when he ditched Clyde. He’s proud to be livin’ down there—it’s warm, it’s clean, it’s cheap. Sammy’s no derp just because he acts like one.’

Dooley reached into his pants pocket, pulled out a phone, looked at it, took the phone in both hands, and used his thumbs to . . . whatever.

‘A new kind of game?’ he said.

‘Talkin’ to Lace.’

‘Talking?’

‘Texting, Dad.’

‘So how’s she getting along?’

Dooley put the phone in his pocket. ‘She didn’t say.’

That gate was locked, he may as well get used to it. ‘You know she’ll be home on the eighteenth. Any chance we can get you back our way?’

‘I’m slammed.’

‘What’s on for tonight?’

‘Sammy and Kenny—we’re goin’ out for pizza. Dutch. Then Bud’s ball hall.’

‘Sammy’s better, I take it.’

‘He’s not contagious at this point, but Harley probably is. I can’t get the flu. I’ve got something goin’ on at school Monday and Wednesday.’

‘Let’s talk about what we can do for Kenny.’

‘He wants to go home to Oregon; he’ll be here a year this December. He said he’d like to leave early January.’

Kenny had knocked on the door at Meadowgate Farm last Christmas Eve. Though hoped for and prayed for, his arrival was nonetheless unexpected. He had appeared out of the blue as the siblings he hadn’t seen since he was seven or eight years old were getting in costume for a Nativity pageant in the kitchen. It had been the Christmas miracle people wish for but seldom get.

‘I don’t want him to go back,’ said Dooley, ‘but I understand. He misses his mom and pop.’

‘Did you talk about college?’

‘He’ll work hard to make it on his own, but I know he’ll need help. He doesn’t think he should take money from us to go to school in Oregon.’

‘That’s not the point.’

‘I told him that. He had great grades in high school, and a year in community college. He thinks he can get into the university in Eugene. It’s about thirty miles from his grandparents, he could probably live at home—maybe take a bus, buy a used truck, I don’t know.’ Dooley was the older brother, for sure; he had the worried look of a parent. ‘He’s got a girl in Eugene.’

‘Well, there you go.’ He would also regret losing the wise and amiable Kenny, who, among other virtues, had a good way with Sammy. ‘I’ll split some of his expenses with you. You’re going to need a good chunk of cash when you finish buying out Hal’s practice.’

Dooley laughed and Dooley grinned, but Dooley seldom smiled. Here was a smile to remember.

‘Thanks, Dad. Thanks.’

‘What about you?’ he said. ‘Tell me about you.’

‘I joined the University Chorus. That’s the Monday and Wednesday night stuff. Rehearsals. Brahms. You love Brahms.’

‘That’s great! Proud of you.’

‘A hundred and twenty singers. Big concert in April, full orchestra.’

‘Wow. We’ll come hear you in April.’

‘I thought I could forget about singing, but I really want to do it, I need to do it. Music is in my head all the time. The singing helps me figure things out.’

He realized Dooley had been staring at him intently.

‘What?’ he said.

‘You’re lookin’ like a wild man.’

‘Me? A wild man?’

‘Your hair is really long; you’re headed into a ponytail. You should let me cut it.’

He laughed and Dooley laughed with him. Dooley had cut his hair once. Not a good idea.

Wanda Basinger was on the move with her coffeepot. ‘I hear your boy’s in town,’ she said. ‘This him?’

‘Mrs. Basinger, Dooley Kavanagh.’

Dooley stood. ‘Pleased to meet you. Congratulations on your new place. Serious fries.’

‘Well, thanks,’ said Wanda. ‘Nice manners you’ve got there.’

‘Prep school.’ Dooley grinned. ‘They made me do it.’

•   •   •

L
AST
YEAR
, he met the improbably named Bud Wyzer at the ball hall in Wesley, and watched Sammy shoot a few games with a trio of hustlers from the college. Sammy had whipped them badly, which had not gone down well with the college president’s son.

Bud was a good man, he would be helpful.

While Dooley was catching the deep sleep of the clinically exhausted and university-educated, he sat at the kitchen counter and consulted the phone book.

‘Bud, Tim Kavanagh. Hope to see you soon. Would you keep an eye out for our boy, Sammy Barlowe? You were kind to do that once
before. If you see anything going on that shouldn’t be going on, I’d like to know about it. Grateful for your help, Bud, here’s my number.’

Little drops of water, little grains . . .

He rang Harley and made his proposal. Good. Okay. Done.

He made another quick call, put on his best jacket, and went to the kitchen. His wife was making egg salad, a Dooley favorite which wouldn’t be turned down next door, either.

‘I’m going to apply for a job,’ he announced.

‘About time,’ she said, giving him a smooch like he hadn’t enjoyed in some time.

‘Hooray!’ said Puny. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, that was Puny Guthrie on emergency call to catch up Dooley’s laundry.

‘Applying is one thing,’ he said, snapping on his clergy collar. ‘Getting the job is another.’

•   •   •

T
HEY
SAT
ON
A
MEMORIAL
BENCH
in the rear churchyard.

‘Something must be done about the hedge out front.’

‘Th’ hedge. Right.’

‘Pruning, feeding—and a new dressing of mulch wouldn’t hurt.’

Bill Swanson blinked.

‘The roses also need to be pruned back, hard. And right away. I recommend a light feeding of bone meal, fish meal, sulfur, magnesium sulfate, Epsom salts. But first, the beds will want refurbishing.’

‘Refurbishing,’ said the senior warden, blank as printer paper.

‘New soil, new mulch. New all around. And of course the old Sunday school has to be dealt with—get the vines off, dig out the roots, replace the gutters—or the building will come down in a heap one of these days.’

‘Right, right,’ said Bill, not knowing what else to say.

‘You may even want to go forward with liming and fertilizing the lawn.’

‘A lot of mowing comes with that. Who has time?’

‘So, if a parishioner volunteers to get the work done—fine! Great! If not, we’d like to have the job starting next week. When Father Brad comes, he may, of course, want to go another way—also fine.’

Bill looked at him, overwhelmed.

‘Free,’ he said. ‘We’ll do it for free, myself and a couple of helpers.’

‘
Free?
Since when have I turned down free?’ Swanson’s relieved smile, followed by a dark look. ‘Is that free labor and free materials or just free labor?’

‘Both,’ he said.

‘Wow,’ said Bill.

•   •   •

A
S
HE
WAS
WALKING
HOME
from Lord’s Chapel, a gust of wind plastered a vagrant piece of paper against his pant leg.

Attention Merchants Of Mitford’s Main Street:

Wash your windows—make ’em shine, people!!

Set an example—use the litter bins on Main!!

Sweep your sidewalks daily!!

And remember—no postings on display windows! It’s a town regulation!

Be living proof that—

Mitford Takes Care of Its Own!!!

Office of the Mayor

He stopped at the next trash bin, tossed in the broadside. No, no, he would never move to Linville. The laughs were better in Mitford.

•   •   •

A
FTER
D
OOLEY
’
S
NAP
and the job interview and the communal Great Folding of Laundry, they dug out Dooley’s laptop.

‘Look up the top ten best-gas-mileage sedans,’ he said.

Toyota Prius. Volkswagen Jetta. Ford Fusion Hybrid. Toyota Camry Hybrid. Volkswagen Passat . . . too many websites, way too much information.

‘I surrender,’ he said. He had more fun walking, all those years ago. ‘Is the Minivan still your best shot?’

‘Mini Cooper. Yeah. Yes. Hatchback.’

‘What do we have to do?’ He was exhausted just thinking about buying a car.

‘We can run down the mountain tomorrow after church, the dealership opens at one o’clock, and I’ll leave from there for Athens.’

In his mind’s eye, there was the Mustang, backed in and headed out to pasture. For something like four thousand dollars, he could have it fixed and enjoy the manifold comforts of the old shoe.

‘It would still be an old car,’ said Dooley, reading his mind. ‘Four thousand today, a couple thousand tomorrow. YOLO, Dad.’

‘YOLO?’

‘You only live once.’

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Okay.’

‘I already called. They have exactly what you need, you can drive it home. You’ll love it, Cynthia will love, it, Barnabas will love it. And it can kick a little asphalt if you’re in the mood.’

‘What color?’ he said.

‘Blue. Your favorite.’

High five. Dooley’s laughter.

‘Stick with me, Dad.’

‘I’m stickin’,’ he said.

•   •   •

S
HE
SAT
IN
HER
CHAIR
in the bedroom, eyes closed, barefoot. He pulled up the footstool, took one of her feet in his lap, massaged the instep. ‘It seems it’s always about me around here. What about you? What’s going on? How’s the book coming?’

‘My eyes . . .’ she said, giving them a rub.

‘Cornflower blue! The color of a volcanic lake!’

‘All those years of painting tiny feet and minuscule claws and infinitesimal whiskers.’

‘Voles,’ he said. ‘And cats, of course.’

‘Voles and cats and moles and mice and owls and baby birds—so many
feathers
with birds. The strain . . .’ She closed her eyes. ‘Poor Miss Potter, her eyes were her undoing. That’s one reason I liked painting portraits in Ireland. People’s heads seemed so . . . huge; the strokes could be so bold. It took more than a single marten hair to get the job done.’

‘New glasses, maybe. I’ll drive you to the eye doc.’ He hated his need for her to be ever strong, fearless, and wise.

‘I think I’m beyond new glasses.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Surgery.’

The word frightened him, always had. ‘It could be the light in your workroom, there’s so little of it. The new room we talked about in Ireland—that would be the very thing. All those windows facing north! It would help, I promise.’ He felt a deep urgency to fix this for her.

‘Besides, your workroom shelves are groaning under the weight of your art—and no place to store anything else. Stacked around the walls, overflowing the hall closets . . .’

She smiled. ‘It’s okay. I’ll put some things in the auction.’

‘You need the new room, Kav’na. Let me do it.’