The Perk (7 page)

Meggie held the doll up and said, "Look, Mommy, it's just like home."

"I'm home, Mama."

The sun was setting and Beck was sitting on the bench
inside the white picket fence under the big oak tree in a little clearing
overlooking the river. The three white gravestones gave off an orange tint as
they caught the last rays of the sun: Henry Hardin … Louise Hardin … Peggy
Hardin. Fresh flowers sat at the base of each stone.

He stared at his mother's marker, and he thought
of looking up from the junior high school football field and seeing her in the
stands with her hands folded and pressed against her face as if she were
praying—and she had been: while everyone else had been cheering her son on to
victory, she had been praying that her son not get hurt. A mother's prayer.

He thought how much he had missed her and still
did. And how much he needed her now. He wasn't man enough or father enough or
mother enough to raise his children alone. He had been a full-time lawyer and
a part-time father. A weekend dad. He had two great kids because they had had
a great mother.

He felt a presence and knew it was J.B. His
father stepped past him, bent over, and brushed invisible dust from his
mother's gravestone. Satisfied, he sat beside Beck.

"Luke doesn't say much, does he?"

"Not since Annie. Where are the roses?"

J.B. had planted rosebushes inside the picket
fence after they had buried Beck's mother here, but the roses were gone.

"Roses are like pretty girls," J.B.
said. "They need constant attention. Yanked 'em up, seeded this whole
clearing with bluebonnets. Figured your mom would like those more."

"How'd you live without her, J.B.?"

"Not so good. I needed her and you needed
me. But damned if I knew how to help you, son. Hell, I couldn't help myself."

"I hated you."

"I know."

"Why'd you get so hard?"

"I didn't get hard. I got scared."

"Of what?"

"Of not knowing how to raise you
alone."

Beck stared at his mother's marker and thought
of his wife. The women in his life always died.

"I'm afraid, too, J.B. I can't do this
alone."

"You don't have to, Beck. I'm gonna help
you."

They were almost to the house when J.B said, "Come
down to the winery tomorrow. I'll introduce you to Hector. We could use
another hand."

"
Me?
No,
J.B., I'm a lawyer. That's all I know."

"I was a goat rancher, now I'm a
winemaker. Man's never too old to learn something new."

Beck had not thought out his career plan when he
had decided to leave Chicago; his only thoughts were of the children. The law
had been his life for the last twenty years; now his two children were his
life. He had figured on leaving the law behind him, but he had to make a
living.

He had almost $1 million in his retirement
account, all in stock. The sale of the house had netted $100,000 and his
equity in the firm $200,000, which would be paid out over ten years. He had a
$1 million life insurance policy on himself, but he had had no insurance on
Annie's life. He never thought she'd die first.

Country life would be less expensive than their
life in Chicago, but even so, his cash wouldn't last long. So he needed to work.
Maybe he could open a small law office in town.

"Hell, Beck, the ten lawyers in town trip
over each other every time an ambulance runs down Main Street. Ain't no work
for a big-city trial lawyer here. Small town, you sue someone, no one'll ever
do business with you again."

"Well, I could've gone back to goat
ranching if you hadn't sold off the goats."

"Hell, less money in goats here than in the
law."

They walked on in silence, the evening breeze
off the river already cooling down the night air.

"You know," J.B. said, "Bruno Stutz
up and retired last month, a year left on his term. Heart condition. Which
came as a pretty big surprise to most people around here 'cause no one ever figured
the son of a bitch had a heart."

"Stutz was still on the bench? He was the
judge when I was here."

"You know, Beck, you could win."

"Win what?"

"The election."

"What election?"

"To be the new judge. Special election, September
fifteenth, to serve out Stutz's term."

"J.B., I've been gone twenty-four years.
No one here is going to vote for me."

"Might be surprised. Folks around here,
they haven't forgotten Beck Hardin."

They found the children in front of the TV.

"You kids ready?" J.B. asked.

"For what?" Meggie said.

"Fireworks."

J.B. opened the refrigerator and held out a beer
to Beck. He shook his father off. J.B. said, "Sorry," then grabbed
two root beers instead. He handed them to Beck and grabbed two more. They all
went outside and climbed into J.B.'s pickup. It was a Ford F-350 King Ranch Edition
with a diesel engine and a double cab with a bench seat in the back; there was a
booster for Meggie just like the one in the Navigator.

Annie.

J.B. drove out onto Ranch Road 16 and headed
north; he turned into the Lady Bird Johnson Municipal Park. They weren't
alone. Hundreds of other cars had already staked out their positions. But
J.B. drove deep into the park and then across the creek that cut through the muny
golf course like he had done it before.

"Are we by the driving range?" Beck
asked.

"Yep. My regular spot."

"You still come out for the
fireworks?"

"I like fireworks. Your mother did, too."

J.B. backed in and cut the engine. Everyone bailed
out. J.B. lowered the tailgate and spread old blankets on the grass. Luke and
Meggie and the doll sat on the blankets; J.B. handed the root beers down to
them. Beck and his father sat on the tailgate and drank theirs.

Nearby, parents were barbecuing in the last
light of the day. Kids were eating ice cream. Boys were throwing footballs
and Frisbees and flirting with giggling girls. Music was drifting over from
the Pioneer Pavilion. The heat had broken, and the evening air was almost cool.
There was a soft breeze. This too was just as Beck had remembered. But all
the good memories of this place had been blurred by his mother's death.

The sun soon set, the clear blue sky turned
black, and Spanish voices could be heard in the darkness, but their owners were
invisible. Meggie pointed up.

"Are those the fireworks? All those
sparkly things?"

J.B. laughed. "Why, petunia, those are
stars."

"We've never seen so many stars
before."

"They're up there all right, you just can't
see them in the city 'cause of the ground light."

"Can we stay for all the fireworks this
time?"

"You bet you can," J.B. said. "I
always stay till the end."

"We couldn't last year. Mommy wanted to, but Daddy said—"

"I had a trial. I didn't know it would be
her last … She loved fireworks, too."

Just then, explosions went off and the sky overhead
turned bright with red, white, and blue fireworks. The light faded, and the sparkles
drifted downward, as if they would fall down on top of them. Meggie held the
doll up.

"Look, Mommy, we're right under the
fireworks!"

"You got the catbird seat, little gal."

More explosions followed, one after another. About
halfway through the fireworks show, Beck thought he saw Luke smiling.

"We liked the fireworks."

Beck was tucking Meggie and the doll into bed.

"I'm glad, honey."

"We like grandpa, too."

"Good."

"We never knew we had a grandpa."

"Well, you do."

"He calls us 'gal' and 'darlin' ' and 'petunia.'
We like that. And we like our new home."

Beck leaned over and kissed Meggie on her
forehead. She smelled like strawberry shampoo.

"Kiss Mommy, too."

She held the doll up, and he kissed it. She
then snuggled it close.

"Let's say our prayers, sweetie."

She folded her hands, and together they
recited: "Dear God in heaven, we bow our heads, here beside our little
bed. In your loving care we're blessed, while we sleep safe at rest."

"Sleep tight, baby."

"What if we have an accident?"

Beck had forgotten the plastic sheet. He had kept
one on Meggie's bed at home, for her nightly accidents.

"I'll go find the plastic sheet."

"It's already on."

Beck reached down; she was right. A plastic
sheet covered the mattress.

"If you have an accident, come to me like
at home."

"Okay, we will."

She closed her eyes. Beck stood and turned off the
overhead light; the room was still dimly lit by a night light. He walked down to
Luke's room. His son was lying in bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. Beck
went over and sat on the edge of the bed. The boy had been crying again. He
brushed Luke's hair from his face.

"We'll make a new life here, son. It'll be
a good life."

"If it's so good here, why'd you leave and
never come back?"

"Because when my mother died, Luke, I got
mad, and I held onto it. I didn't let it go."

Tears came into Luke's eyes.

"Did you say your prayers?"

Luke turned his face to the wall.

"I don't say prayers anymore."

Beck sighed and patted his son's shoulder. He
loved this boy, but he didn't know how to help him. Just as J.B. Hardin didn't
know how to help his son twenty-nine years before.

Beck found J.B. on the back porch in his rocking chair reading
the local newspaper in the light of a gooseneck lamp. The white lab named
Butch lay on the floor. Beck sat in Peggy's rocker that still sat next to
J.B.'s.

"Got a seventeen-foot Bass Tracker boat for
sale in here," his father said. "Forty-horsepower Mercury
oil-injected motor and a fish finder."

"J.B., that's a lake boat. The river's not
deep enough to float a lake boat."

"Well, now, that is a drawback."

"You still religious about reading the
classifieds?"

"Never know when you might find something
you don't need."

"Like a lake boat when you live on a
river?"

"Exactly."

The night was quiet, and the breeze through the
screen brought the scent of the river up to the house.

"You do much hunting these days?"

J.B. shook his head. "Not since …"

"I left?"

"It never was about the hunting."

No, it never was.

"I tell you," J.B. said, "crime
around here's getting out of hand. Says right here, six Porta-Potties were
knocked over last week, four the week before. That's a damn mess, too. Hope
no one was in 'em at the time."

"A Porta-Potty crime spree?"

"Says here Crime Stoppers will pay $1,000
cash for information leading to the arrest of the perpetrators."

"A Crime Stoppers reward for a Porta-Potty
drive-by? In Chicago, unless there was blood, it wasn't even considered a
crime."

J.B. tapped the newspaper with his finger. "Nine
divorces last week. That's what happens when people get cable."

"You've got cable."

"But I don't got a wife." J.B. looked
up from the paper. "Beck, I'm gonna put Luke to work in the winery, if
that's okay."

"That's a good idea. How'd you know about the
plastic sheets on Meggie's bed?"

"Annie."

"She didn't start wetting the bed until
after Annie died."

"She figured it might happen. Smart
woman."

"Yeah. I've got to get smarter at this,
J.B., soon. This town got a bookstore yet?"

"Yep. Couple of gals run it, that and the art
gallery upstairs. South side of Main Street, just past the brew pub."

"I saw that, a microbrewery. The town has really
changed."

J.B. smiled, and Beck thought it was a good
smile. He couldn't remember his father ever smiling after his mother died.

"You ain't seen nothin' yet," J.B. said.
"Wait'll you meet those two gals. They're new in town, only been here ten
years."

"Lot of new people in town."

"Yep. When Clinton killed the mohair
program, he killed all the businesses on Main catering to goat ranchers. So
newcomers started all those businesses catering to tourists. Town went from
living off Uncle Sam to living off tourists."

"I'm gone twenty-four years and the place
turns into Disneyland."

"Santa Fe."

They drifted off into silence. Twenty-four
years since Beck had sat on this porch, but it felt like yesterday. Home it
had been and home it was again. But his mother was gone and his father was
different.

"You've changed, too, J.B."

"Man spends enough time alone, he'll
change."

"Being alone does it?"

"Being alone gives a man time to work
through every mistake he's ever made in his life. I've sat right here and done
exactly that the last twenty-four years. I don't aim to make the same mistakes
again … if you'll forgive me for back then."

Beck thought about his father's words for a
time. Then he said, "J.B., would you mind watching Meggie in the
morning? I'd like to take Luke out to the Rock."

"Sure, I'll keep an eye on the little
gal."

J.B. went back to the newspaper, and Beck's
thoughts went back to his life here. He wondered what his children's lives
would be like here; he hoped he had made the right decision.

"Any jobs in that paper?" Beck said.

"Diesel mechanic out at the granite quarry."

"I can't change the oil in the
Navigator."

"You could work at the turkey plant."

"I don't speak Spanish."

"Nursing home needs help."

"I figure watching after one old fart will
be enough."

"That'll be the day. Says here they have
chair dancing every Monday night. Believe I'd rather not dance than dance with
a chair."