The Girl in the Window (17 page)

All the stuff where things really happened was miles away out by the interstate, though.

There was a bunch of big stores there, fast food, hotels and stuff. His mom worked at one of those stores, but she didn’t make much money, which was why they lived where they lived.

They drove between farm fields thick with corn or soybeans or whatever.

What was amazing was how it smelled out here, what it looked and felt like, not close and tight like in town, but open. The air here smelled sweet.

It had been dark and he’d been kind of drunk on beer when he’d come here last so he almost didn’t recognize the house when they finally arrived, pulling into a long driveway beside a faded white fence outside of a big red barn.

The house was a typical farm type house, two stories, nothing fancy, a little worn from the weather with a broad front porch and a porch swing.

Next door was a house with a bright, shiny, new coat of paint.

None of it was like the shabby blocks of fake brick apartments where he and his mom lived after his dad had split, the cheapest place she could find for them to live.

This house didn’t have sheets or blankets covering some of the windows instead of curtains, like some of the apartments and houses around theirs.

Then he saw the horse and he knew where he was.

It was beautiful, that horse, big and black, but it looked wild now, tossing its head, pacing agitatedly around the paddock.

The beauty of the horse was what had drawn Jeff when they’d been ramming the roads for lack of anything better to do. Jeff was on the football team at school, and he played on summer teams as well. A big guy, he was one of the cool kids at school. Jeff had wanted to ride that horse. He’d talked about nothing else for day but what it would be like to ride a horse like that one. Big and fast and wild. He’d tame him, Jeff had sworn.

One day he would, he’d say, and nobody could stop him.

Nobody but the two people on each side of Tyler.

He chanced a glance at Beth, who was really kind of pretty and wasn’t too old.

At first when she’d come running out in her nightgown and grabbed up that rake, he’d thought she was pretty stupid to go up against Jeff like that. Jeff was tough. Jeff would just take that rake away from her.

When Jeff looked at his buddies, Tyler had seen that mean look appear on their faces, and he’d been sure of it. Then he’d been afraid for this girl, had wanted to shout at her to go away, to run, because when they got that mean look on their faces things could get really bad.

He looked at Josh from the corner of his eye, remembering how he’d looked when he’d vaulted over the fence. Then it had been game over. Jeff hadn’t looked so tough then.

Tyler saw Josh look at the horse, saw he and Beth exchange a look. Both were worried, concerned.

Josh’s mouth was tight and his eyes looked sick.

“It’ll be okay, Josh,” Beth said, softly. “Let’s get something to eat first. Have you had anything to eat, Tyler?”

“Why are you being so nice to me?” Tyler blurted.

That was the one thing Tyler couldn’t figure out. His own dad had taken a hike on him. He rarely saw him, and when he did it was just for a few hours. It was like his own dad didn’t know what to do with him. His mother didn’t get it, either, although she tried. But she was his mother, so she almost had to like him.

Beth looked at Josh and then back at Tyler.

Reaching across the back of the seats, Josh squeezed her shoulder lightly in encouragement.

She took a visible breath and her mouth twitched a little wryly.

“I had a friend named Ruth,” Beth said. “She was a very wise lady. She told me to always treat other people the way I wanted to be treated, so that’s what I do.”

That had been during the bullying period, when she’d come back from school scuffed and bleeding.

Ruth had also told her that if she didn’t stand up for herself, there would always be another bully.

Smiling a little at the memory, she continued. “She said it didn’t matter how they treated me back, they could still be mean to me, and there was nothing I could do about that. I couldn’t change them, and the more I tried the more they would fight me. The only person I could change was me. It only mattered what I did. If I wanted to be treated well, with love and respect, then I had to treat others well. You might get meanness back still, but that didn’t matter. That’s their choice and they have a right to it. What matters is you. If at the end of the day you can go to your rest saying you did your best then it was a good day. They have to make their own choices.”

She looked at Tyler.

“So do you. It’s your choice now what you want to do with yourself.”

Her eyes went to Josh.

“We’ll just keep treating you the way we want to be treated,” she said.

Josh smiled in return.

“So,” Beth said, “are you hungry?”

In answer, Tyler’s stomach growled. He could feel his face color in embarrassment.

With a grin she said, “I take it that’s a yes.”

Tyler found himself grinning back.

Josh, for all his worry about Fair, suddenly found that he was starving, too.

“Might as well make breakfast for everyone,” she said, as they got out of the truck.

Putting his fingers in his mouth, Josh whistled, and Beth winced at the sharp loud sound, an arm around Tyler’s shoulders.

“Breakfast!”

“Warn someone when you’re going to do that, would you?” she said, laughing.

He grinned, caught her in a one-armed hug and pressed a kiss to her hair.

“Ruth was a very smart woman,” he said, softly, in Beth’s ear.

With a wistful smile, Beth said, “My foster mother. She was a very smart lady.”

It was a revelation.

Suddenly Josh understood at least part of her story, and the reason he’d never seen her next door.

They’d put her in foster care.

What had happened in that house
? he wondered, watching as she and Tyler preceded him into his house, turning to wait for the boys. It would have to have been bad for them to have taken her away.

It explained so much, her reticence, the shyness.

Then the boys were coming, Will and Tony faster, Russ more slowly behind them.

Stepping into the kitchen Josh caught Beth in an unguarded expression, sheer delight on her face as she looked around the room at the appliances.

It hadn’t occurred to him that this was the first time she’d been inside his house.

He wasn’t half the cook she was but when he’d bought the place he’d gutted the old kitchen and replaced all the appliances in anticipation of a someday wife-to-be.

Some men talked about being free but he’d never been one of them. As far as he was concerned they were full of it. He wanted a wife, a life that was settled and happy, a house full of kids, a home, and family. A life like the one he’d grown up with.

So he’d prepared for it.

In awe, she said, completely unselfconsciously and unaware, “I think I love you,” as she stroked a hand across the stove appreciatively.

Looking at her in his kitchen as she set to work, seeing her eyes light up as she found another new toy, watching the way she tucked her hair behind her ear or tossed it back over her shoulder when it got in her way, Josh knew he did.

She just looked right there, as if she belonged.

Knowing she didn’t know what it was she’d said, he said, “I’ll make coffee.”

It was the one thing he knew he did well.

By the time everyone was washed up and ready Beth had a pan heaped full of scrambled eggs, but not just your garden variety scrambled eggs. These were redolent with garlic and rosemary, touched with some cheese she’d found in his refrigerator that he couldn’t remember buying.

Tyler had been put to setting the table first, then making and buttering the toast.

Everyone was introduced to the boy without explanation. Josh gave them all a glance and shook his head at the question in their eyes. That story could be told later. All of them knew what had happened the previous night, it wasn’t necessary to tell them Tyler’s part in it. Let them get to know the boy when he wasn’t part of the ‘gang’ first.

When everyone was finished and the plates were being gathered, Beth looked at Josh and Russ.

Both men nodded. They’d be ready.

“Come on, Tyler,” she said.

Puzzled but obedient, he followed.

She walked across the yards to her garden. The corn was already surprisingly high. Her tomatoes were plump and red. A whole row was dedicated to herbs, and there were more in a kitchen garden by the house, partly because it smelled good to step outside and smell them right away.

“These are carrots,” she said to Tyler, gesturing to the long tasseled heads fluttering above the ground. “Like most things, you don’t always know what you’re going to get when you start, but we’re going to need two good-sized ones.”

She pulled three, not satisfied that one was big enough, and carried them over to the spigot outside the house to rinse the dirt off.

“Do you like carrots?” she asked, looking to Tyler.

Tyler shrugged. “They’re okay, I guess.”

She handed him the smaller one. “Take a bite of that.”

Obediently he bit into it, and looked at her in surprise. It was sweet.

She smiled. “That’s the difference between fresh grown and store bought. I’ll pick some for you to take home to your mom.”

Taking a deep breath, she stuck the other two in her back pocket.

“Okay,” she said. “Let’s see how it goes. Go join the men in the barn.”

Tyler nodded, still puzzled, but he went.

For a moment Beth stood just looking around at the house and the fields. The sun was almost too hot, burning down on her shoulders. A breeze fanned the feathery heads of the corn and over the wheat in the field across the way so that the grain rolled like waves in the ocean. The corn was far higher than knee high, and the Fourth of July was still a few weeks away.

The air smelled fresh and clear, with a touch of sweetness to it that she could never define but loved, a uniquely summer smell that you couldn’t get anywhere else but in the country.

Finally she looked across to the paddock, and then walked toward it.

Pacing in his paddock, she knew Fair watched her, was aware of her. He was clearly unsettled, nervous.

She moved slowly, bending to gather some of the tall, lush green grass from the low point where water gathered between the yards as she went. A longer piece went around it to tie it into a neat bundle.

Carefully not looking too directly at the horse, she walked across the yards toward the fence with its faded white paint.

The horse watched her in return, his restless pace slowing. He tossed his head.

Beth knew the others were in the barn, prepared to come out if she needed it.

All but Josh.

He stood out of Fair’s sight, but as she walked toward the fence he came to join her.

There was concern for both her and the horse in his eyes.

At just that moment the light hit his eyes, brought out the highlights in them and her heart did a long slow roll.

In that moment he looked beautiful with the sunlight gleaming in his thick hair, the light finding the gold in it, accentuating the good strong lines of his face, his long lean body, the strong muscles of it.

Suddenly she was breathless.

He reached for the gate, knowing without needing to be told what it was she wanted to do.

“Be careful,” he said, his voice low.

She nodded as she stepped through, the sheaf of grass moist and cool in her hands, her heart thudding almost painfully.

Josh’s heart was pounding nearly out of his chest. He didn’t want to risk losing either her or Fair. They had to try, but still he remembered what Fair had been like in the beginning, fighting them, kicking anytime anyone had tried to get near. They’d had to rope him just to get a halter on him, and Josh had wondered if the folks at the sale had doped the poor animal to make him appear even reasonably docile. Yet still Fair had been nervy and frightened when he’d arrived at the farm. Or maybe the drugs had just worn off.