Back | Next
Contents

EIGHT

At six, they load into Eli's rust-pocked Jimmy, smelling of two-stroke oil and gasoline.

On his way to a cut, he'll take them as far as Arcata.

Emerging from under firs into open flat land is for Karl a homecoming. Only two hours, now—they're that close. Even the wet paper bag stench from the paper mill straddling the bay smells good to him, now.

Eli drops them in the square near the post office, "If I didn't have to work I'd take you the whole way." He rolls down a window to peer up at brooding, high overcast. "At least the weather's fine."

Karl smiles at the joke, scanning cloud. Not knowing what to say, he waves, starts to turn away, but Eli catches him by the arm, "Tell her for me, tell her I'm sorry about what I said, that I was wrong. Nobody's that good with the baby, tell her that."

Karl says he will, laughs at his proffered hand, and follows them out on to the ramp. Two rides and a long walk along 101 later, they're dropped across the bridge in Ferndale.

Up Main Street Karl leads, passing Victorian storefronts, bright gingerbread façades bristling with cut shingles. Romy, hand locked in a belt loop of his jeans, follows, head up, agog. People pass. None look at them twice. At the end of the block he hesitates.

"Such a beautiful place," she says, breathless.

"The perfect tourist," he says teasing.

She looks hurt, "You don't like it?"

"I grew up here."

She nods.

To the right the Wildcat snakes up the coast range—the way home. Karl thinks it over, decides, takes her left across Main street. Might as well take her to see the peach palace while they're here. There might not be another chance. They round the block and she gasps, face lifted in wonder. Across the street waits a three story rainbow monstrosity of towers and cut shingles—a housepainter's nightmare in cedar.

"Like it?"

Topiary elephants and bears stand guard out front as spires ward off a zinc-plated sky. Christmas lights wink as they do every day all year long.

To him she holds out her hand, a blind woman's gesture, eyes busy with the kitsch monstrosity looming over them. "Oh..."

He takes it, getting a jolt of pure distilled awe through her trembling hand.

"It's..."

"Ugly?"

She looks offended, "Oh, no, it's the most beautiful house in the world."

So strong is her conviction, he has to check, but, no, it's the same—just an overdone, over painted Victorian. Not incredible at all.

But she is.

Watching her run her hands over box topiary, he changes his mind. If the palace can inspire such awe in her it can't be as ugly as he's always thought. He looks at her and has to fight off an urge to reach out to touch her right there on the street.

"It's not just for show? People live in it?"

"Have for a hundred years."

"Good." She nods, solemn, "It should be a home."

Funny town, Ferndale, Karl muses as they head back up the high street. Half artsy types, refugees from Frisco, from Sonoma, the other half townies who've lived there for generations, cattle families, sheep ranchers, dairymen from the floodplain along the Eel. They coexist, peacefully for the most part, but never mix.

Trudging up the steep grade at the base of the Wildcat, the road that will take them out and along the cape, a loaded hay truck stops for them. On top of the bales they ride, air warmer here near the sea, particles of alfalfa whirling in the wind about them. Ten miles out, he turns off to deliver his load and drops them.

No more than a mile from the crest, Karl can barely resist running. From there it's all downhill to the sea. He can smell it, see it in the cant of the spruce. She paces him, Willy trailing.

"Why such a hurry?"

"Want to get home."

Effortlessly, she keeps up. "We could wait for a ride."

"There's something up here I want you to see."

They round the last slow bend and a stench hits them a blow. Rotting meat, ripe as it gets.

She gasps, making a face, "What is that?"

She wouldn't know, would she? On 66 they cleaned up after themselves.

"Death."

"Of what?"

He puffs through his mouth, a trick he learned as a cop, "Deer, I hope."

They see the carcass as they come abreast of it, legs twisted at impossible angles. Romy squats by the corpse.

Karl, irritated at the delay, goes back, "What?"

"It was a deer?"

Its matted coat heaves and falls, maggots teeming just under the skin. "Doe, looks like."

She reaches out to touch the carcass and he snatches her wrist, "Don't do that."

She looks up, eyes puzzled.

"We don't touch dead things," he says, conscious of how it must sound—like an admonition to a two year old. But isn't that what she is? At thirty, never having been off the plat but once, despite her age, her intelligence, what does she really know about the world? Only what she learned on the net—nothing. With a rush of compassion he realizes what a warped view that must be.

"What killed her?"

He shrugs, "Car, truck maybe."

She looks back, letting him hang onto her wrist, flooding him with leaden sorrow. "Did she suffer, do you think?"

He follows her glance, skin drawn taut over ribs, pelvis, vertebra sharp and protruding. "No," he says, pointing, "neck's broken, see there?"

Noticing flies blackening the air in the salmon berry just beyond the right of way, he points. "There's a fawn."

She looks at him, eyes trusting, desolate. "It was hit, too?"

He stands, lets her go. "Maybe, maybe it starved."

She goes to hunker down by the small body.

Bink comes to sniff at the doe's hollow eye, backs off. Willy's seen enough, heads up the road, Bink close at his heels.

Karl takes her by the hand, pulls her to her feet, "Come on."

They take the long pull up the hill in silence. Near the top she finally says what's been on her mind. "You don't care when things die?"

"I care. Look, I raise animals. I kill them. I eat them. Things live, things die, new things live—life from death. It's the way it works. Getting all broken up about it doesn't change it."

"I know you're right."

A soughing overhead and they look up to see two herons pass over, wingspans a man's arms outstretched.

"They're so big, what are they?"

"Pair of great blue, headed for my ponds, I bet."

"Is that bad?"

He'd smile if he weren't working so hard to get his breath. "Bluegill can use thinning."

"You don't shoot them?" she asks, perfectly serious.

"Bluegill, no," he says, knowing exactly what she means, "I use a pole."

He gets a frustrated look, "The heron."

"If you're around me long enough you'll find out there are a few things I don't shoot."

Before she can answer, they crown the hill. This is it—what he wants her to see. Here, spruce open up, the hill falls away to rolling, tall grass whipped by wind from the sea. The road meanders its way over, around and down. Where land ends, sea reaches out, gray, scaled with cats paws driven by the wind.

Wind rocks him where he stands, keening through sitka overhead, pressing grass flat as it passes. He watches her for a reaction.

Her eyes, gray in this light, brim with tears, mouth slack with awe. He knows what he'll get if he touches her now, he feels it himself, has always felt it. Especially here. The sea, nothing between him and it now but a downhill stroll, nothing but a spreading of wings and a soar, an easy glide.

As if drawn irresistibly, she moves through waist high grass to the verge of a steep drop. Arms wide, cap off, hair snapping, she rocks. Eyes on her, he follows.

"God, oh, God how beautiful it is. And you live here?"

He nods.

"Tell me something," she says, voice raised against the wind.

"If I can."

She faces him, hair streaming, "In a world where there is a place like this, how can there be so much pain, so much cruelty, so much ugliness?"

He wonders she should ask. He's asked himself the same thing many times. "I don't know."

With the ghost of a nod, she turns back to the horizon. "Have you ever wished you could fly?"

It's as if he's having a conversation with himself. It scares him a little, thrills him too. "In dreams."

She turns, sadness and wonder on her face, "I'd give my life to fly right now."

I'd give mine to let you is what he wants to say. He doesn't. Teeth clenched to stop his tongue, to keep from making a fool of himself, he says nothing. Instead, eyes closed, he lets the wind rock him.

Home—he's home.

A growling catches his attention. Turning, Karl sees a coffee-colored truck labor up the hill behind them, round-faced driver at the wheel. Karl raises an arm, shouts, bounding back up to the road. It's Jack—got to be.

Senior year they spent Friday nights telling each other what big men they were going to be. Wasn't too much later Jeannie turned up pregnant, and Jack's been a brown-shirt ever since.

The engine drops to idle as it coasts to a rest beside them, big tires crunching decomposed granite. Door wide open in the cold, Jack looks them over from his throne wearing a smart ass smile. Slowly his eyes rove. Willy, Romy, Karl, then back at Romy, long enough to tell Karl he knows. He shakes his head, smiles, "Well, I will be damned."

"Hey, Jack."

"You and your friends use a lift?"

Willy finds a seat at the rear of the van on stacked boxes. Romy chooses to stand. On the way, Karl tells him what he can. Listening, Jack sneaks awed glances at Romy.

"Jesus," he leans close to whisper, "isn't that—"

"It is, watch the road."

"Jesus, Karl, Jesus," he says, hands white on the wheel, "You claiming the billion, that it?"

"No, Jack, that's not it."

Jack turns to watch him long enough that Karl thinks about grabbing the wheel. Somehow they stay on the road.

"Why the hell not?" he says soto voce.

Debating his answer, Karl watches the edge of the road fly by. "She's a friend, that's why. She goes back she's dead."

This time Karl's sure he'll go off the road before he looks back, "Then they were lying when they said she was kidnapped, huh?"

Karl nods.

"Jesus!" Another look back at Romy and he whistles low and long. When he looks at Karl, admiration is in his eyes. He laughs, the same laugh Karl remembers from twenty years before. "Well, I'll say this for you, buddy, you sure make some interesting friends. Mary know you're bringing her home?"

Karl hangs onto the doorframe as they wind their way down through pasture and rolling meadow.

He hadn't thought of that.

 

* * *

 

Eyes mated to land unrolling before her, Romy stands braced between two posts behind the driver, as the van carries them down the hills toward the sea.

"Incredible."

Over and over under her breath she says it. Never has she imagined a place so open, so empty. It frightens her, too. She's sure that's part of what she loves about it.

They pull up before what might be a century old store, clapboard siding faded to fog-gray. A sign painted in white on window glass tells her it's the Petrolia General Store and Cafe.

Under a giant cedar, they wait while Jack makes his delivery. Drawn to it, she runs her hands over flaking bark, remembering the bonsai she left behind. She understands, sees them now for what they were: stunted travesties of what they might have been. This magnificent being under her hands is how trees are meant to be.

Against the trunk, she presses her cheek, feeling the solidity of it, the strength. A tap on her shoulder and opens her eyes.

"Come on in, meet Mary," Karl says.

She fights the urge to run, to get back on the truck, to catch a ride out and not look back. With regret, she watches the truck pull away.

Karl heads up the boardwalk, motioning her after him.

She takes a step back, presses her hands against cool bark. She's not ready to meet his sister, not ready to meet anyone. "I'll wait out here, you go in."

"Come on, I'm waiting."

Still, she hesitates. What is she doing here? Why did he bring her? No good can come of it. Why won't he see that? "I've got a billion dollar bounty on my head and you want these people to see me? Are you out of your mind?"

He seems to consider, shrugs, "I grew up with them."

Can he be insane? "What's that suppose to mean?"

"It means I'm not worried about it."

"Why should you? It's not you they'll turn in."

As soon as she sees the look on his face she's sorry she said it. After what he's done for her, for them, it wasn't only mean, it was stupid. She expects him to turn away. He doesn't.

"Out here people don't much like government sticking its nose into everything. They won't turn in a friend of mine."

She thinks of Auri. "Not even for a bill?"

By his eyes she sees he's read her mind.

"Everybody isn't like Auri." He comes to get her, "Come on, I want you to meet her."

Though she's worried and afraid, she's relieved he brings her along. She doesn't want to be left alone here—not for a moment.

Dread hoarfrost on her heart, she follows him up the boardwalk. This will not be easy. It will not be pleasant. She wants to break free, to run, to go—anywhere. If only she had slipped back on the truck when she had the chance.

Chimes on the door clang as Karl pushes it open, leading her inside.

 

* * *

 

The smell of country sausage, hashed browns and Vermont maple hangs heavy on the air

It looks like they just missed breakfast. Behind the counter, Mary, back to them, washes dishes. Over a shoulder, she calls out. "Too late, griddle's cold, come back at twelve."

The cafe's quiet. Karl doesn't answer. She goes on with her washing, utensils clanking in the sink. Six or seven guys waste time over coffee, cattlemen mostly, sheep men. Guys he went to school with. A couple hands Karl knows by sight. They all know him—crazy guy up on the hill, Mary's younger brother. They watch. Nobody says a thing.

Childish joy cold as ice cream crystallizes under his breastbone as he sneaks up behind her. Of all the games they played as kids, this was the sweetest.

At the counter sits John Rock. In fifth grade he bloodied Karl's nose. Head taller, twenty kilo heavier, he looks on, amused. Three stools over, Karl slides into a seat. The bearing creaks as it turns, air hissing out of the cushion.

Exasperated, Mary sighs, "I said we're..." Seeing who it is, her hand goes to her mouth, voice trailing off, "closed."

Eyes brimming, she reaches over the counter to draw him roughly to her. "Oh, Karl." She slaps him hard on the back with the flat of her hand.

"Ow!"

"You jerk, why didn't you call? I thought something happened! That's for letting me worry like that."

"Glad to see you, too, Mare," he says, rubbing his back.

She sees Romy by the door, Willy outside with Bink. "And who are these two?"

Karl goes to get her, pulls her away from the collection of old potato mashers and eggbeaters Mary keeps by the door for tourists. The men at the counter follow Romy with their eyes. Mary dries red hands on an apron she's due to change for the lunch crowd.

"That's Willy out there with Bink, and this is Romy. Romy, this is my sister, Mary."

Romy takes her hand, smiling like she expects to be swatted too.

"Welcome," Mary says and fetches the coffee pot."So you made it, huh?"

He nods. "Made it."

She wipes her eyes with the back of a work-roughened hand. "For chrissake sit down. I'll fire up the grill and make you some breakfast. You look starved, both of you," she says, wiping the counter with a towel.

"I'll help," Karl says, going behind the counter.

Romy follows. "What can I do?"

Mary gives him a look that tells him he'll hear more about this later. She's never liked another woman in her kitchen. Karl can only wait to see what she'll do.

Mary slides the glass coffee pot across the counter, "You can top them off, if you want."

Romy takes the pot, every eye in the cafe following her as she goes. It's quiet enough to hear the coffee pot gurgle as she makes the round. At the sink, Karl dips his hands in to the elbows, hot water scalding.

Mugs are what she has in there, now. He brushes a mug clean, dips it in rinse water, sets it on the mat to drain. Scrub, dunk, drain. Done it since he was twelve. Always liked it. Must be the hot water—calming. He glances up and sees it coming.

Romy on her way back, in the mirror he catches the look in Rock's eye and knows he's going to do something. Sees it come like you can see a curtain of rain blow in from the sea. Rock follows her with eyes that say he can't believe his good luck, watches her move, the dip of her hips as she walks. From across the room Karl knows what he's thinking. No ESP, just his face. It says he's been waiting for a chance like this his whole life.

He turns, dries his hands, unhooks the Remington from its harness, lets it drop into his hand below the counter. Useless. Can't use it here—not on Rock.

What can he do? Can't fight the ox, can't make him human either. Rock is Rock—always has been. Karl moves close, wiping the counter with his left hand, Remington hanging by his thigh.

Romy turns to come back around the far end of the counter, gauging the space by the big man at the last stool, hesitates, then with a quick look at Karl, heads through.

Rock traps her wrist, "Come here, Sis."

Across the room, Willy slips in through the door light on his feet as a dancer, face primed for a deadly ballet. Afraid he won't be quick enough to stop him, Karl shouts, "No, Willy, no!"

Romy swings back, arm taut, turns, and without hesitation, tosses the pot in Rock's face.

Rock's up, bellowing like a steer, wiping his eyes.

Still in his grip, Romy stands her ground.

Eyes clear, he raises a big hand to slap her.

Mary screams. "Rock!"

By the barrel, Karl swings the scatter gun like a bat, Rock's wrist an easy target. Radius giving, Rock cries out, hugging wrist to chest like a wounded kitten, leting her go free as Willy waits behind him, arms poised to break his neck.

"No," Karl says again, and he backs off a little.

Squinting through burned eyes, Rock hurls a hackneyed litany.

Turning his back, Karl tosses the gun down on the back counter where it caroms mustards in need of refilling, goes back to work on the mugs.

"Dammit, Karl!" Rock half yells, half whines to his back, "You broke my goddam arm! What the hell'd you do that, for? It's busted! She's just one of those bitches from the plats, ain't she?"

Karl sets a mug to dry, turns, drying his hands, "Her name's Romy. She's a friend of mine. Anybody with the brains of a flying squirrel would have picked that up."

Rock tries a laugh, "Oh, yeah, I'll just bet she is."

"Rock..." Karl shakes his head, giving up. "Just get out. Go on in and get that taken care of."

With his left hand he snatches his cap off the counter, ducks around Willy, throws back the door, sending the bell off its hook to clang across the board floor. At the door, the big man hesitates. Karl isn't worried about him shooting him in the back. He may be a jerk, he's a neighbor too. "I could kick your ass right now with one hand."

Arms braced on the sink, Karl waits.

"And would have too, back in sixth grade, if they hadn't stopped me."

Karl smiles. "Fifth, Rock, and you're right." Nothing else to say, Karl goes back to washing.

"I didn't know she was your friend," he says as he goes out, door banging behind him. It's the closest thing to an apology he'll ever get, more than he would have hoped for in a thousand years. Guilt hot on him, Karl slams down the last mug. Drying his hands, he follows him out.

Rock's just climbing into his truck. "You need help getting down the hill?"

Rock slams the door to the old Chevy, rolls down the window as a mist drifts down out of a pewter sky. "I'm all right, but tell me something, will you?"

Karl steps out onto gravel, glad Rock's got a broken wrist, wondering if he could take him even now. He can guess what's coming. "What's that?"

"What's she like?"

For the first time in years he thinks about Kath. Rock's kid sister, so pretty, so headstrong, so smart, so attracted to trouble. Twenty years ago, fifteen, she ran off to L.A. with a Colombian white dope dealer. Never came home.

"A lot like Kath."

Rock's eyes darken and for a second Karl thinks he may climb back out of the cab and clobber him, but they change and he nods, seeing he means nothing but the truth.

"Then I understand why you did what you did."

Rock's tires spit gravel as he guns it onto the highway.

 

* * *

 

Regulars filter out, leaving them alone with Mary.

Tired, Karl slumps on a stool. Romy grabs a rag, rinses it in hot water, wipes down tables. She wants Mary to like her, she's on the right track.

Mary queries him with a raised eyebrow, "I thought she'd been kidnapped."

Karl doesn't know how much to tell. "Not by me."

Mary frowns, "But there's a bounty on her."

He nods.

"And you bring her in here? Is that smart?" She says it just loud enough for him to hear, sliding a tall stack of dinner plate size griddle cakes across the counter in front of Willy. He rolls one up, tears off a piece for Bink, feeds himself the rest whole.

Karl watches him eat. "I'm not worried about it."

"So, she's the last one, then."

He sees no reason to bring up Erin. "Yeah."

Mary watches Willy eat in awe. "Would you like some milk with that?"

Head down, he chews.

"Can he hear me?"

"He can hear. Frugal with words is all," Karl says. "Milk will be fine."

Watching Willy over her shoulder, she milks the box. Half the stack is gone. "Nice to see a man enjoy his food."

Karl's not sure it's worth the effort, but decides to give it a try. "Willy, this is my sister."

At the word, he raises his head, peers at her through small eyes, swallows, "S..."

"My sister, yeah, this is Mary."

He considers, lays down his fork to offer a deadly hand over the counter, "An honor to m...make your acquaintance, Mary."

Karl hides a smile, wondering where that came from.

Mary sets the milk in front of him, offers her hand. As Karl watches, the instrument of destruction that is Willy's hand wraps itself around Mary's small one. Willy shakes her hand gently, lets it go, "Good food, th..." he says, struggling, tongue against incisor.

Mary lays a hand on his, "You're welcome."

He goes back to his cakes.

With a smile sneaking into the corner of her mouth, Mary's eyes move from Willy to Karl, and back. Karl would give much to know her thoughts. He notices the gray in her hair, more than he remembers. He's glad to be back.

Mary serves Karl eggs on a hotcake and he minces them with a fork as she watches him from behind the counter. "So you were there when you called? I should have known when I heard about everything happening down on the plat that you'd be in the middle of it. Some people died out there, didn't they?"

He sops up a bit of yolk with a wedge of cake, "Yeah."

Exasperated, Mary sighs, "That's it? yeah? People are dropping like flies after a frost out there, you're right there in it up to your elbows, and that's what I get out of you? yeah? Well, I give up. I get you any more?"

He hands her his plate and she cocks her head across the room at Romy, "What'll she have?"

"Ask her."

This gets him one of her looks. "What'll you have, Romy?"

Eyes on her work, she shrugs, "You needn't bother."

"Griddle's hot, no bother."

Romy says nothing, looks at Karl.

"Give her same as me."

Mary sets her up at the stool next to Karl's.

He calls her over, but she keeps on working. Karl goes to get her, sits her down, feeling her embarrassment, a curious hesitance, an urge to run that scares him. "Eat. She's a good cook, best buttermilk cakes on the cape."

Back to them, Mary drops dishes into the deep sink and they clunk as they shilly-shally to the bottom. She snorts, "Only cakes on the cape."

Eyes down, Romy takes a bite. Smiling, Karl watches her eat. The way she eats reminds him of a cat. Dainty little bites as if she's afraid to get any on her. He half expects her to stop to wash up.

"I'm sorry," Mary says, "about your sisters."

Romy only nods.

"I heard about the bombing and the gas. Terrible. Fanatics, they said."

Not looking up, she sets down her fork, gets up, goes out, bell ringing behind her. Willy follows, Bink at his heels.

"What'd I say?"

"Nothing." He doesn't want to go into it. "Melvin take good care of the animals?"

She goes back to the dishes. "As good as he ever does anything other than cruise the ether. Nothing died, nothing got out, nothing starved."

Mary pauses, crockery clacking in the sink. "She staying long?" she asks, really asking so much more, asking about him, about his feelings, his life, about the scar inside him, about his loneliness, about what neither has talked about in five years.

He swivels on his stool, doesn't see her. From the window he sees her out under the cedar. Bands of panic loosen around his chest, letting him breathe. When did he start being so afraid? "I don't know."

"I mean, Karl, it's none of my never mind, but I guess I'm just slow or something. You've never been able to mention a Sister without spitting, and now you show up with one? I don't get it."

He wants her to understand, to feel what he feels. She's the only person in the world he needs approval from. "You'd like her, Mary."

She looks at him doubtfully, mouth a taut half-smile. "Oh, yeah?" Now she stops her scrubbing, turns, "You run away from it all, hide from it for five years, then bring home, right here into my diner, the sickest part of it all, the heart of all the Godlessness, the perversion, and you expect me to be happy about it? You know how people out here feel about things like her."

He keeps his eyes on his mug and his voice down, "Don't call her that."

"Why not? It's what you've always called them."

"I was wrong."

She goes back to her washing. "I think you need to start thinking with your brain, is what I think."

Karl drains his coffee cup, goes around the counter, drops it into hot suds. "I know it doesn't make sense, I know that."

"Not that it matters. When they make the cape another one of their wildlife preserves we'll all have to move off anyway."

"So you heard."

"We all heard. They came to visit. So, hey, why not have a good time? I don't blame you."

"Mare, it's not—"

Mel clomps downstairs, "Hey, Unc!"

Mary drops another stack into the suds, "Someone send up a flare, Mel got his butt out of bed before noon."

Halfway to the door, he sees Romy and turns to waxwork. "What is she doing here?"

"Down boy," Mary says, "she's a friend of Uncle Karl's.

By Mel's look, Karl can tell his stock just split four ways and doubled on the same day."Uncle Karl's?"

"That's what I said," Mary says, annoyed at Mel ogling Romy from the window.

"Does he know she's worth a bill?"

"I know, Mel, I know."

"They need a ride out," Mary says. "You mind taking them?"

"Mind?" Mel's eyes haven't left the window. "You're kidding, right?"

"I want you back here in half an hour."

"Is she really..."

"Yeah, Mel." Karl follows him out, "Really."

From the door, Mary calls. "You hear me, Mel? Half an hour."

* * *

 

Romy rides up front with Mel.

Karl, Willy and Bink in back.

At first, Mel says nothing, just drives. Romy can read men—in Mel she reads nerves. "There's something you want to ask, don't be afraid."

He looks back at Karl, then at her. "Did you know the ones that were killed?"

She nods.

"Is it..."

The last fifteen years of her life she's been around men. Men of all ages, all types, all personalities. The direct approach is the one she prefers. That's what she likes about children, about Willy, about Karl. "Go on, ask it whatever it is."

He works his hands, tight on the wheel as he guides the pick up along washboarded gravel, "It's not true what they say about you is it?"

Her heart sinks. This again. Is there no escaping it?

Resigned, she waits to hear it. "What?"

"All that about you falling in love with only one man, one man in a billion? It's just a come-on isn't it?"

She smiles at the surprise she feels, expecting something about sexual appetites, or the lesbian thing, but it's only this—the one question she can't answer. "A come-on?"

"Yeah, a gyp, a scam, you know, something to draw the squares in."

"Ah," she says, "might be."

He frowns, doubting. "You don't know?"

She smiles, understanding his surprise. "I've known sisters who fell in love, but just a few. For most it's just something we've heard of. Maybe it's true, maybe the others just haven't met the right one, I don't know."

"These guys are probably like really big, really smart, really rich, huh?"

She smiles at this, thinking of Villar, "No, they are quite normal looking really, like anyone. It's not looks, it's what's on the inside."

He stares, amazed.

Stomach wrenching, she reaches to guide the wheel around a curve. Ranchero fishtailing, he recovers, "They're not models, not geniuses or something?"

"Well, smarts counts for a lot, sure, kindness, too."

He watches her, eyes soaking her up. "Have you..."

There are limits to what she is willing to share, to admit—to him—or to herself. Romy watches out the window as they climb higher into the hills, "No."

He turns to look at her, "Really?"

"Really."

"Not even Uncle Karl?"

She swallows, looking closely at the teenager beside her. She must take care. "I like him."

"A lot?"

She nods.

He warms to it, "Like that?"

She wishes she could lie. It would be so much more convenient to lie. "Have you ever felt that way about someone?"

He nods.

"Did you always know for sure exactly how you felt?"

He looks at her and away. She can tell by his face he gets it.

"No."

She reaches to pinch the muscle behind his knee, making him jump, "Me neither."

He drives on in silence, and with relief, Romy sees the interrogation is past.

 

* * *

 

Karl thanks him for the ride, asks him not to mention Romy to his buddies on the net and sees his face fall. "I know it's a lot to ask, but I'd appreciate it, Mel. I'd rather some people not know we're here."

This catches his attention. His eyes widen. His hair seems to stand even straighter on the top of his head. "What kind of people?"

Here we go. "Some unpleasant ones."

Melvin looks from one of them to the other. "What would they do if they knew, kill you?"

Karl knows telling him anything is like putting up a bulletin board, but what choice does he have? He has to trust him. He knows it all already. "They might."

"No crap?" he says, amazed."But you could kick their butt, huh, Uncle Karl?"

This isn't going the way he hoped it would. "I could really use your help on this, Mel."

"Hey," he says, hurrying to the Ranchero, "You can count on me, Unc, I won't tell a soul."

Not reassured, Karl watches him as he heads down gravel, leaving them alone on the hill. Karl starts for the house but notices Romy's not following. Willy heads for the woodpile. "Hey, Willy, make that last a while, will you?" To Romy, he says, "What is it?"

As if she's listening for a sound, she looks around her. "This is where you live, have lived?"

"Born in that house right there."

"So close to the sea." She takes in hill, pasture, timber, "How much is yours?"

He shrugs, "What you see, all but what lies past the creek down there, that's Rock's place."

She frowns.

"Don't worry about Rock. In his way, he's all right. He won't bother you again."

She nods, reassured, "All the way to the sea?"

To him it's just the place, nothing to get out of joint over, but it's a thrill to see her moved by it. "All the way."

She looks at him, eyes sad, "Too much to lose."

A quill working its way through living flesh, the memory bites. She's right. It is. He may only have a few days. "Come on."

The house is quiet, cold. Dirty dishes wait in the sink where he left them only ten days ago. It seems more. Much more. In the fridge he finds milk gone sour and wishes he'd thought to get some out of the cold box at Mary's. He'll have to fire up the truck and go in tomorrow. He turns to find her watching him from the open door. "Come on in, stay a while. And close the door, it's cold."

She has to shove the door closed against the resistance of a swollen jam. "This house is old, isn't it."

"Only eighty, not too old—as houses around here go anyway. Been meaning to fix that, just give it a good shove."

A noise outside and she freezes, "What's that?"

He has to smile. "Willy's found the maul."

Relaxing, she works her way around, opening doors, peering into rooms, switching lights on and off as if fascinated by the old hardware.

A pace behind, he follows as she explores. It's a bit like following a new cat through the house. Up narrow stairs, he follows, treads creaking under them. "You're not going to hide in a closet are you?"

She frowns. "Why do you say that?"

"I had a cat did once, only came out to eat the first month."

She gives him a look that reminds him of one of Mary's, "I don't claw furniture, either."

He likes having her here. "That's good."

Upstairs, she leads him, snooping, and oddly, he doesn't mind.

Three bedrooms before them, she stops, "Willy and I sleep where?"

He opens his old room, slides up the window. "He can sleep here."

She opens his sister's room, peers inside at the bed, wallpaper, bare bulb hanging by woven cord from the ceiling. "What about me?"

"In here if you like."

She doesn't move, keeps her eyes on him. He's first to look away. What he needs is to be outside, in the wind, in the woods, in the quiet. At the door he hesitates, "You be okay alone for a while?"

She will.

Karl heads out to check on the sheep, the sow, and from there up into the spruce. There, in a trance-like state of lackadaisical effort, he thins saplings with a bow saw. Eyes, ears, pores soaking up mist, quiet, the citrus scent of pitch, he remains until the sun sags low in the sky.

Back inside, he sees she has gathered plates, and is running water for dishes. "You don't have to do that."

"Someone does." Curiously she watches him, "What?"

"I'm getting to sound like my mother."

"What was she like?"

Most people ask things just to ask, to make conversation. Romy asks because she wants to know. He takes down a photo of all four of them taken about thirty years ago. He's a gopher-toothed kid, head shorter than Mary, who's twelve.

His mother's got her arm around them both. His Dad sits in his arm chair, the one still by the stove. Same worn maple arms, same threadbare upholstery in hunter green. "That's the whole gang."

She turns off the water, braces a hand on the counter, reaches for the frame with a wet hand. Afraid to touch, she points, "You were so young."

"Ten."

"And that's Mary. My God, it looks just like her. And your mother, she had a wonderful smile. Mary looks a lot like her, doesn't she?" He laughs, and she smiles back defensively. "Well, she does. And your Dad, oh, he's got his pipe just like fathers are supposed to. Was he tall?"

"Same as me."

"I knew he would be. You were..." She turns back to rattle dishes in the sink, "...you were lucky."

All this, he thinks, all this is just stuff everybody says when they look at old pictures if they want to bother about it, so why does he believe she means it? He remembers she's spent her life telling people what they want to hear, acting interested when she's not, and he feels a stab of hurt. "Still acting, still saying what people want to hear?"

Her face he can see reflected in the window as it slams closed like a vault. Eyes holding his in the reflection, she lays down the dishrag. Before he can draw a breath she's out the door.

Spring pinging, the screen slams closed behind her. He lets his head hang, arms braced on the sink, water still running. Viciously, he slams it off.

He is such a jerk. He knows it's not true, knew it wasn't when he said it.

Breathless, he catches her down the hill from the house.

Her pace does not slacken.

"Slow down for a sec, will you?"

"Get away from me."

He reaches for her arm, brushes it as she yanks it away, gets a blast of hate. If anything was there before, it's gone now. "I didn't mean that."

She keeps walking, gravel crunching under her boots. They come to where the road swoops down past a stand of salmonberry and she heads down faster, if anything. "Yes you did, you're no different. You can't forget—what I was, what I am. I'm not listening to that. Screw that. And screw you, too."

Willy follows, not far behind, Bink dancing ahead nose to the ground, overjoyed at the chance for a walk.

He tries for her arm again, and she stops, turns on him, hands fists. "Don't touch me! Willy, don't let him touch me."

Willy stops, waits, squatting to give Bink a pat.

"Willy, what's the matter with you?"

"We've got an understanding," Karl says.

Disgusted, she heads away.

"What are you going to do?"

Ice. "Don't worry about it."

"Where will you go?"

The look. "Away from you."

She's moving. They're nearly to asphalt now. It's a long way back up—all uphill.

He hurries ahead, cuts her off.

She halts, waiting. "Will you get out of my way?"

"I'm sorry."

She laughs, "Sure you are." She heads around.

Getting the feeling he's treading dangerous ground, he blocks her again, "You can't go away like this."

"Watch me."

He can't let her get rolling again down the hill. Already he's winded. She gets away, he knows out of pure mulishness she'll go. He'll never find her, never see her again. He reaches for her wrist, "Come back up and we'll talk."

Effortlessly, she slips from his grasp, "I'm going, I said."

"I won't let you."

A smile twists the corners of her mouth, "Try and stop me."

A dare. Ire blinds him, makes him mean. He reaches for her upper arm, faster this time. She moves, does something, and the ground knocks the wind out of him, leaves him looking up at overcast.

Willy stands over him, points. "She's going."

"I can see that." He rolls over, sees she's already fifty yards down the hill. Fast as aching ribs will let him, he's after her.

A fluke. Whatever it is she did, she'll never do it again.

He grabs her wrist from behind, left one this time. Sensing only blind rage, before he can blink she's moving, twisting, and it's she who has his wrist. Down he goes again, gravel hurting him worse than he's hurt since being a football on the quay.

On his haunches, Willy waits. "She l...learned well."

"You taught her that?"

Willy nods.

Karl's longer getting up this time. His head throbs. Warmth spreads as the slash on his arm reopens. "Could you stop her?"

Willy barely smiles.

"Then why don't you?"

He shrugs, arms big as thighs braced on knees, "Free country."

"Yeah, sure it is."

Willy raises a finger, pointing after her.

Karl sits up, "I know, I know, don't say it—she's going."

He goes after her again, one hand cradling his ribs as he runs right on past her to give himself time to get set. There he waits, crouched in a wrestler's stance, aware of how ridiculous he must look out there on the hill, a woman half his weight striding for him. This time, he promises himself, she will not get by. Whatever it was she did, and he's never seen anything like it, she won't throw him this time.

He's breathing hard as she comes on, stride unbroken as if she expects to walk right over him.

This isn't good, but though he knows he could hit her, elbow her, kick her knee, flat palm her in the mush under her guard, he won't do that, won't hurt her. All he's got is his hands, soft holds, and he was never any damn good at them.

And she comes on so fast.

Same sky. Still like the inside of a tarnished silver pot. Gravel is no more comfortable here than it was back up the hill. He's done. His heart has started its thing. He can't breathe fast enough to keep up. His ribs creak like the farmhouse stairs with every breath, as her boots crunch gravel on down the road.

Not ten paces away, Willy squats, not precisely a smile on his face, giving Bink a good scratching, the little hedonist arching his back into thick nails, teeth bared in ecstasy.

Karl raises his eyes. "Romy," he says as loud as he can, which isn't very. "Stay."

When he can get his breath he says it again, no hope of her hearing. She's gone. He knows it and says it anyway.

"Please... Stay."

 

* * *

 

Melvin's a world away with the biggest news of his life by the time he hits the pavement.

Oh, sure, he feels guilty about telling, but he can't really believe his uncle would expect him not to. He can't be that stupid. He must have known he would go with it. He has to. It'll put him, and Petrolia, on the map. And he's not going to say anything about it? That's just plain nuts.

He runs it through his mind, savoring it like hard candy rolled over the tongue, the last Sister here in the middle of what everybody calls podunk. No more they won't. Not with news like this. And he knows about it. Melvin laughs out loud, wind blowing the sound away as he negotiates the curves while with another part of his mind negotiating cyberspace.

He clears his throat, lets them know who he is, and then, like it's nothing, like he's making conversation, he lets it drop.

He waits.

Nothing.

They think he's having them on.

He spells it out, letting them know he means it, letting them know he's clueing them in, doing them a favor, including them in even before the net's got it.

They kid him along, pump him for particulars, hoping to trip him up, firing questions from seven continents at him fast as he can take them. When they can't shake his story, they blow him off.

Mel's hands go white on the wheel. This is too much. The one time in his life he's got something to say and the stupid SOB's don't believe him!

By the time he's home, he's tried every hangout he can visit while behind the wheel and sent messages to those he can't.

It's like dropping pebbles down a well and never hearing them hit bottom. It's impossible. Somebody has to care, to listen—somebody.

Mary says something to him as he goes by her door, but he doesn't hear what it is, doesn't care. She wouldn't understand anyway, old cow with her dirty dishes and dishrags.

God, how he wishes he could get the hell out of here. If he didn't live in a hole like this somebody might believe him.

He slams his door, shutting her out. Still nothing. The biggest thing he's ever heard of happening right here, and nobody cares. There is no justice, he decides—none. As he throws himself on his bed, desolate with disappointment, he gets one tentative reply. An avatar he's never contacted before.

At last someone is interested.

Eagerly, he responds. Now, at last he'll be able to tell the story to someone who'll take him seriously. He'll show them who's a nobody from the sticks. Smiling in anticipation, Mel comes face to face with the the interested entity and, alone in his room, his smile fades to a twitch.

Stiffening on bare mattress, mouth open, eyes sightless, wide, Mel trembles in grand mal. Spit trails from the corner of his mouth. Talons of fear tightening his chest, he wants to ask what it is that has him, but he can't say it, can't say anything, can't scream, though he'd give his life to.

It's like touching live cable—he can't let go. And as he lies paralyzed, something very big, very dark, very strong stabs its way into his mind. Panicked by the unwelcome intimacy of penetration, he can do nothing about it.

He wants to scream, but from his mouth comes only a chokingwhine. Paralyzed, he can only wait for it.

Oh, yes, someone is very interested.

 

* * *

 

That's it.

His mind's made up for him.

She's gone. All because he said something so stupid he can't believe it.

Karl can no longer hear her. Ribs on fire, he can't roll over, so he lies where he is, watching blood cells tool around on his retina like bumper cars at the fair. A rock bores into his shoulder blade as he waits for his heart to slow. He's almost sorry when it does. If he could die here he wouldn't have to climb back up the hill to the house.

Bink sniffs at his ear, whiskers tickling, darts back to Willy before he can reach up to get him. "Sure, Benedict Arnold, go on, run away."

He's too old for this, being thrown around like he hasn't been since the academy. He didn't like it then. He thinks he hears something. Willy, he'll bet, come to get a good swift kick in. Why not, he deserves it.

"Come on," he says, "get yours in, too. Don't be bashful, better hurry if you want to catch her. And take the mutt with you."

Karl can hear him coming, boots on gravel. "Come on, God damn it, give me your best shot, I've got it coming. Then get your arse on down the hill after her, she'll need you."

Steps come nearer and a face blocks out a particularly interesting cloud. He squints, sees it's Romy, closes his eyes, concentrating on keeping his heart where it belongs. "Come to gloat?"

She looks down as if she wishes he'd get up so she could throw him again. It won't work, he's staying right where he is.

"Nothing to say? Fine, I'll do the talking." He looks up at the darkening sky, moon rising over the hill to the east. "Ever seen City Lights? Silly stuff, most of it, but the end, what did you think? When she knows him for a tramp? It matters to her, doesn't it? I think it does. I think it matters. I don't think that, even knowing who he is makes any difference. He's a tramp, that's all she has to know. Oh, never mind, I'm sure you've never seen it, it's old."

"His hands," she says.

"What?"

"That's how she knows him, the feel of his hands. And I think you're wrong about her, I don't think it matters to her what he is. She loves him."

He mulls this over, thinks of something, "When those guys grabbed you, you could have gotten away. Why didn't you?"

It's hard for him to read her face against the sky. "I guess I just didn't care that much. It would have been me, or another of us."

"And what about when I hauled you out of the lobby just before the bomb went off? Why not then?"

"I recognized you, the feel, the smell of you." She looks away through the dusk. "They say we're programmed chemically to accept one man—the one with the right code." Her eyes send a chill through him. "I thought it was a lie."

Slowly it dawns on him what this means, and he is afraid to breathe.

She offers a hand, "Come on."

He takes it and she pulls him to his feet.

Insides gone hollow, he walks with her up the road in rapidly fading light.

* * *

 

In the orchard a peahen flaps its way to a high roost, honking as it goes. He turns away from the path to the house.

She hesitates, "Where are you going?"

"To put the animals away." He closes in the pigs, then the lambs, tempting them inside with cob as she watches from outside the fence.

"Why lock them up?"

"There's an old panther up here with abscessed teeth can't catch deer any more, and a young cat looking for a territory of his own. Rock had six lambs torn up pretty bad one night last month. Dumb luck they weren't mine."

She glances around them, up into the branches of a big wolf spruce, "Lions? Aren't they dangerous?"

"Can be."

At the chicken coop she waits at the door as he lights an overhead bulb. "Come on in."

She squats next to him by an overturned barrel with a hole cut in the wall. Inside a cream-colored hen watches them suspiciously.

"See that hen?"

She nods.

"She's setting on our breakfast."

"So?"

"Reach under her and get them."

One black eye focuses on Romy.

She looks at him doubtfully. "Me?"

"Go ahead."

Tentatively, she reaches.

The hen pecks her hand and she jerks it away. "She pecked me."

Overhead, a dozen hens and a single cock cackle nervously. Karl hides a smile. She's afraid. He knew she would be. Face serious, concerned, he says, "Hurt?"

She rubs the back of her hand. "No."

"Okay, get the eggs."

Her look is an appeal. "But..."

"We let her set them overnight the yolks will be runny."

Romy looks at the hen, brow creased with worry. "She doesn't want me to."

"That's right."

Seeing he's not going to relent, she sighs, and under an alert pea-sized eye, moves her hand.

"Ow!"

He checks her hand, feigning alarm, "Any blood?"

Not finding this funny, she yanks her hand away. "There's no blood."

"Good. Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you, if you hold your palm up till you get under her it won't hurt when she pecks."

Incredulous, she stares, "Thanks for the advice."

"Hey," he says, hiding a smile, "that's what I'm here for."

Romy frowns, "She wants to hatch them, right? Did you ever think that maybe you should just let her?"

This is funny. The hen's really got her goat. "Uh, uh, I want to eat those eggs. She can hatch some other ones. Come on, let's go, I think I hear a cougar out there."

Eyes wide, she sees he's kidding, "Ha ha."

"She can't hurt you, go ahead."

She turns, annoyed, "I am."

This time she gets her hand under. The hen clucks resentfully, adjusting her stance over the intruding hand like a matron hiking her petticoats.

Romy smiles at him, face filled with wonder, "It's hot under here. Ah, found one."

She sets it in his hand, warm, smooth, dry, returning eight times for more. "That's all."

He rises, knees popping, "Let's go."

Still, she stays where she is, stroking the hen under her chin with a finger. "What will she do now?"

"About what?"

"Without her babies."

"She'll wait for some of the other hens to lay some eggs tomorrow and see you tomorrow night." He offers a hand, "Let's go in."

They climb the path to the house, where sparks from Willy's fire sail out the stove pipe.

In the dark, he can barely make out the pale glow of her face as she scans hills, sky, trees.

"Does it get lonely here?"

He tears his gaze from her face, haunting in last light, to seek the horizon out over the Pacific. How long will they be allowed to live? How long? It can't last like this. He climbs the stairs to the porch, holds the door wide.

"I didn't used to think so."

* * *

 

Sometime after the wind picks up he feels her next to him in something short and nylon slick. The feel of it sliding over her skin spurs him awake.

"Romy?" He faces her, sharing her breath, unable to do more than whisper. "Romy?"

Lips frantic birds on his face, chest, neck, she answers, voice breathy. "What?"

He holds her off, holds her still. "I can't be your sister."

"I don't want you to."

"I..."

"You what?"

"I don't want to do anything you don't want me to."

Her eyes reflect moonlight from the window. "You won't."

He smooths the hair from her face, and what he gets drives the breath from his lungs. "You want to leave?"

She teases his upper lip with a finger, sending shocks through him, "No."

Her shirt rends. Buttons popcorn off, skittering across the board floor. "Don't ever."

She's starving, desperate, careful of his arm, his ribs as she moves. "I won't, I won't."

He isn't careful, isn't thinking. Not about consequences. Not about tomorrow. Not about Raj. Not about EPA. What he does is feel—her under his hands, her mouth on his, the warmth of her breath on his skin, the smell of her hair tenting his face—all of it. And under it all he senses her mind, her life entwined with his, tendrils of thought, of emotion weaving their way around him, through him.

He holds her face in his hands. Mouth open for her, he strains against her, needing her inside him. He calls her name, begging, pleading as she moves on him. Not enough. Not nearly enough. Eyes tearing, he suckles at her tongue, moaning his soul into her mouth.

For her he's a junkie grown tolerant. She moves, he lives; she stops, he dies. With her name he begs. From afar he sees release. Not wanting it, not daring to turn away, heart, lungs, spine—he loses them all through his mouth on hers.

They lie as they fall. Over them he draws covers. Romy moans. Past the need for words, he answers with like. No words are as eloquent, as loaded with meaning. He won't move, won't let her. As long as they don't move it won't be over, and he doesn't want it to be over.

He's afraid—of what they've done, of what she'll do now, of his need for her—mostly of that.

Romy nestles to his neck, belly against his hip, breathing the long, low, rhythm of sleep against him.

Eyes wide, he thinks.

Now that it's too late, he thinks.

* * *

 

At dawn Karl reaches for her and skims empty mattress.

Gravel-eyed, he stumbles downstairs. Her he finds in the kitchen in one of Mary's long dresses, hair done up at the back of her head in a mess threatening to fall.

"You're here," he says.

Eyes sleepy, she drags around in a pair of his mom's slippers, shushing over linoleum. She sets a bowl on the table, "Yup."

He watches her work. What he sees is a good looking woman making oats and tea—the first woman he's been able to be himself with in a very long time.

"Sit," she says, and he does. She pours him a cup of tea. Too hot to drink, he tents his hands over it, steam venting through cold fingers. She slides a bowl of oatmeal in front of him, dry, solid, lovely, the way he likes it.

"Where'd you learn to make oatmeal?"

She dishes hers. "Watching the cooks in the kitchen. Vincent always had them make it like this. Too dry for you?"

He knows she's thinking about leaving. The thought makes him feel as if he's drowning. He was sucked under a waterfall once. This is like that. No way to fight it. "I like it fine."

"No milk."

Dread rises like flood water around him, tickling his upper lip. Last night, the touch of her abraded the top layer of his skin, leaving him raw and smarting in the cold air. The only cure, the only respite from pain is her skin against his. "We'll have to go in to get some."

She sits, cup of tea cradled between her hands. "Is it always this cold in the morning?"

"It's the humidity, the sea so close." He reaches for her hand and finds it stone-cold. She pulls away but he holds on. "You're not going."

She trembles in the thin dress, slipping her hand from under his. "I have to."

Rage a fist inside him, with his right hand he puts the bowl as one puts a shot, sending it to shatter in the sink. Chips of crockery chitter across the floor.

She jumps, sits stiffly, watching him with amused eyes, "Today."

"Why leave?"

She holds his gaze, "Why stay?"

He gets up, paces, awkwardly. Why must women talk about what doesn't need talk? It's redundant. It's stupid. It's hard—it's damned hard. "Where?"

In answer she shrugs.

"Raj will find you."

"It's best."

He stands still, looks around. At the run down house, the threadbare rug, the jeans he wears. In his mind he sees the luxury she came from, the gowns, the jewelry, the Tower, Vici's flat. And he knows why she's going. "It's hardly the plat, I know that."

"Don't be a fool."

"Can't help it."

"You think that's why I'm going?"

He laughs, bitter, "What am I supposed to think?"

"You're a fool."

"You said that."

She sighs in frustration, "I'll only bring them to you."

Numbly he faces her. So that's it.

"Get it, now?"

For him. She's going so he can keep the land. She'll die so he can keep it. That's the kind of woman she is. When he answers, his voice is quiet. "I get it." Karl rises, slips a hand behind her neck, another under her knees.

She watches his face. "What are you doing?"

Lifting her off the chair, he takes her to the couch where he wraps her in a wool Afghan his mother made right there in front of the stove. He can see her hands working. He warms Romy's feet in his hands. "You're ice, why didn't you make a fire?"

She looks at him, ashamed, then away, "Couldn't get it to light."

"You could have got me up."

"You were sleeping."

Gently, he runs a hand over her brow, down her hair, drawing her head back with every stroke.

Her eyes stay on him, unimpressed by his attempts at diversion. "I'm still leaving."

He knows she means it. She'll go the first chance she gets. He breaks kindling over his knee for a fire. "I won't let you leave." He lights it, squats, back to her, listening to the fire roar as it draws.

"I want you to stay, no matter what happens, no matter what, understand? I want you to stay."

"You hate me, what I am, what I was."

"You're wrong."

"You're lying."

He looks down at her, frustrated beyond what he can stand. She looks away and he sees it's him she doesn't want. Of course. Rising, he tosses his tea, already cold, down the sink, pours himself another from the pot, spout cracked and stained at the tip. Despair wells up out of him, dark blood out of an entrance wound.

How stupid can he be? How delusional to think she would want to stay with him. With him? A joke is what it is.

Arms braced on the cold rim of the sink, he gives up. "I understand. At least let me take you where you want to go. I've got a chip for you, money—you'll need them."

Behind him, he hears couch springs groan. She snakes cool arms around him and he sees how far off he is. He closes his eyes as what she is, what she feels, what she wants surges through him with the throb of arterial blood. Reaching back, he presses her hard to him. He'd forgotten how much it hurts, how much it tears at the insides. Now he remembers.

Welcome back to the world of the living.

"You understand nothing," she says, "nothing at all."

She's right, he doesn't.

Understanding isn't what this is about.

Not anymore.

 

* * *

 

The satcom hums.

Karl tries to think of who it might be, comes up empty. There's nobody he wants to talk to after yesterday, not even Mary.

He wonders, should he answer it at all. He shrugs. What does it matter? If they know the code they know where he is. "What?"

The wall lights and big as life Auri looks out at him pissed off as he's seen her. "Hello, Karl."

He stands transfixed. "You're dead."

She smiles, "Am I?"

"I saw you with a hole in your head a band could march through."

Auri stands at the rail, back to the sea, "You ignorant ass!"

Romy comes close behind him, "You're DMI, aren't you, Mother?"

"Don't call me that, I'm no one's mother."

Romy laughs. "You did it. I knew you would. If anybody would, I knew you would."

She's right, of course she's right. Karl can see that.

Romy smiles. "Mother's love outlives the grave? That why you commed?"

From Auri's look Karl can tell she's pricked her.

"I should have known no daughter of mine would ever do as she's told. If you had, I would be alive, now, you know that."

Romy expels a breath, neither a laugh, nor a sigh, "And I'd be dead."

Auri's image seems bewildered by Romy's reaction. He certainly is. And glad to see it.

"After all the heartache you've caused me, I just wanted you to know they're on their way."

"You bitch!" Romy says, voice the growl of a tiger.

"Now, now."

Though Karl knew it was coming, it's still no fun to hear. "Who?"

"Who do you think?

"Genie," Romy says.

"You'd do that, turn in your own daughter?"

"She's not my daughter. More like donated tissue, a pint of blood, not even that—she's been tampered with, hasn't she?"

She disgusts him. "You couldn't need the money, not now. Why then?"

"I don't like being defied, that's why. And, Karl, don't be difficult. We both know how difficult you can be, don't we? They'll get her anyway."

"Why do you care what happens, now?" Romy says, "You're dead!"

Auri smiles, the kind of smile boys get squatting over cats they torture, "I don't feel dead."

"What happens if they get her?" Karl says.

Auri shrugs, leaning back, "What does it matter? She'll go away, be forgotten."

"They'll pluck her organs. That's what you want, isn't it? You want her dead, gone, as if she never were."

"You know," Auri says, "something I've never understood is why in the name of Christ you care." An idea seems to strike her and she regards Romy through narrowed eyes. "You aren't forgetting your vows of celibacy, are you, my dear?"

"Why, Auri?" Karl asks. "Why now? Why not let it be over?"

She eyes them, first one then the other, "What a touching domestic scene. You two make me want to puke. I think it's revolting."

Eyes alight with wonder, with understanding, Romy smiles. "You're jealous."

Auri snarls. "What?"

"You heard me—jealous—of me, of us."

"I've never heard such tripe."

Karl sees it's true. It's the link that ties everything together, explains it all.

"Because in all the years," Romy says, "with all the money, with all the men, the women, all of it, there's never been one, not even one that wouldn't have sold you out if the price were right."

"You little tramp," she says, the words freshly steeled knives.

"Not even your companion," Karl says. "She set you up, you know that, don't you? Locked you out on the veranda. She knew they were coming, didn't she? Not even her. That's why you can't stand the possibility she might be happy."

Auri comes closer, face filling most of the wall, anger making her a crone. "They're on their way, do you hear me, on their way this second!"

Karl laughs, "They can take a number."

Romy drops onto a sway-backed couch, burgundy velvet worn bare on arms and seat. "No, you go ahead, do what you can to hurt us. It's what I'd expect. I won't say goodbye because there's no one here to say goodbye to." She snaps her fingers and the wall opaques.

Proud of her, Karl flops by her on the couch, springs groaning. So that's the way it is. Paolo and his bunch, the EPA, and Raj. They all know where he is. He sighs, losing himself in the flames behind the glass. Hopeless. All that running, and for what? For nothing. If anything they're an easier target here.

But for the crackling roar of the stove, the house is still. Outside, it blows. Low branches drag across the roof. Bink barks excitedly as Willy plies the maul.

"God, he's at it again, I'll have to fell a forest to keep him busy. Does he know how to do anything else?"

Slouching down, she nods, "He can do anything, just show him once." She comes to him, presses her face to his shoulder, sending waves of a vague happiness flooding through him. A contentment without hope, an odd mixture of despair and elation. It makes no sense. He knows that, savors it anyway.

"Tell me about your mother."

She's brooding over Auri, and he doesn't want her to. He smiles, running a hand over hair soft as moth wings. "Mom was very clean, always scrubbing the floor, that's why the linoleum's worn through in places in the kitchen. She loved us but she hated the messes we made. You know, if she were to come back from the dead right now, walk in that door, the first words out of her mouth would be, 'You slob, just look at my kitchen.'

"She got mad at you?"

"Did she get mad?" He laughs. "Sure, she did. Dad was pretty good at calming her down, though, most times anyway, made her laugh."

A bitter sadness filters through her skin. "If only I were...I don't know...."

"It's not you, it's Auri. It's not anything you did, or didn't do, are, or aren't—it's just the way she is."

"I know it shouldn't matter, I know that. I've never known her and I'm thirty years old. It shouldn't matter, it's just..."

"It matters. To all of us. It never stops mattering."

 

* * *

 

Outside, it's damp, dripping with dew, the air heavy with the tangerine scent of spruce.

Dressed in Mary's jeans and cowboy boots, Romy follows him out, "Where are you going?"

"Let the animals out."

"I'm coming."

Willy they pass in the orchard scattering feed from both hands, hens and peafowl pecking round his big boots. Bink dances, chasing birds twice his size.

"Willy found the birds," she says.

Her hand in his, he leads down to the lower meadow. The gravel road they walk leads through a fold in the hills densely overhung with alder, limbs hanging with dripping moss. Around them droplets fall, slapping a harp of matted leaves and ferns below. Those from high branches strike forte, those from lower, mezzo or piano— a percussion ensemble of subtle syncopation. In patterns both utterly simple and incomprehensibly complex, it patters on the brim of his hat, on Romy's hair.

Squinting, she looks up, "Is it raining?"

He shakes his head, "Just mist coming off the trees."

He watches her as she walks, head up, eyes on the branches roofing the path. Curious, he stops her, "Close your eyes. Hear it?"

By her face he sees she does.

"It's music," she says, whispering. "It's jig, it's adagio for Irish finger drum." She cants her head, combing sodden hair away from her ears with her fingers, listening. "It's raga, salsa, reggae—it's every rhythm ever played."

A dewdrop slips down her nose to span the crevasse between her lips. He tastes it. "You're wet."

She stays put, watching him, "Am I?"

Karl drops his hat on her head, "You asked me once if I went to church, remember?"

"I remember." Understanding, she raises her eyes, "This is it, isn't it."

He scans the canopy over them, "No one to get in the way. No noise. No words. Just God. Feel it?"

Slowly, she nods, "Here I do..."

In her he feels inadequacy. "You don't have to be anything, know anything, say anything. All the rules, all the names, all the rigmarole—that's man's. This...this is God's."

A faint bleating reaches them, insistent, grating.

Face close, she smiles, "Somebody's hungry."

At the pen, he hands her a scoop of molasses cob and she kneels, offering it. He watches as lambs nose their way in, toppling her in the straw in their eagerness to get at the feed. She rights herself, laughing, hands on the thick wool of their backs to steady herself. In her he sees none of the squeamishness, none of the fear, none of the silliness he's seen in city people around animals. He can see she was made for this, made to live a real life, made for the country.

Moving through lambs intent on their feed, he takes her around the waist, "Okay?"

Eyes on him, her mouth makes a slight up tick, "I'll live."

"Let's get back. I'll see if I can get the Ford running and we'll go on in for some milk. If we hurry we can get the breakfast dishes."

"I'd like that."

She takes his hand and they walk back up the hollow.

"Mary's okay," he says, "it just takes her a while, that's all."

She thinks before she answers. "She must have missed you very much."

That's what she says. What she thinks is that Mary wasn't counting on him bringing two recombinants home with him.

Poor Mary. He didn't even call ahead. Just walked in with them. How can he blame her? A few days ago he would have reacted the same way.

"Don't worry, " he says, thinking it's a damned odd thing to say.

He worries. He worries about Villar, he worries about the EPA, mostly he worries about Raj. Running his hand lightly down her hair, taking it in his fist, he tells her again, no idea who he thinks he's fooling. She's not stupid. She knows the score as well as he does.

The only question is who gets to them first.

 

* * *

 

Tuesday morning.

In the pickup they head on down.

The last of the lunch crowd heads out, leaving Mary at the sink washing dishes.

"Ah, thought I might see you. No milk, am I right?"

"Thought we might help you clean up."

Willy gets a tray from under the counter and buses tables. Romy wipes them down. Karl takes Mary by wet hands, leads her away from the sink to her stool behind the counter, sits her down, "I'll wash."

He plunges his arms in the sink and just as fast jerks them out. He can't figure how she can stand the water so hot. He adds cold, fishes around in the bottom for silverware.

From her stool, Mary watches. "I could get used to this." She goes to the door, flips the hanging sign in the glass so the OPEN side shows inside. "I'm taking the rest of the day off. Feel like some pasta?"

"You don't have to do that," Karl says.

"Oh, don't give me that. I've got to eat anyway." To Romy she says, "Hungry, Honey?"

Elbow to elbow with Karl, Romy pauses wringing her towel, opens her mouth. She is, Karl can tell, but doesn't want to say so. He smiles down at the suds. She'll learn soon enough that with Mary the direct way is the only way.

Mary sends Karl a crafty glance. "Sure you are."

He has no idea what Mary's thinking, but it seems an improvement over the day before and he'll play along. It's possible she's changed her mind about her. She's done it before, turned on a dime on something. Mare's never felt any compunction about changing mounts mid-river. Arguing with her has always been likely to give him whiplash.

Let this be one of those times.

Karl slides a heavy stack of plates away under the counter, "Mel at school?"

Mary shrugs, "Not there, they called. First day he's missed this year."

"Still here?"

"Not in his room, I checked. Been gone since before five."

"Kind of early for him, isn't it?"

"Anything before noon's early for Mel." She watches Romy clean salt and pepper shakers, putting the place in order. "You know, you wipe tables better'n anybody I ever had in here. Ever waitress?"

"No," Romy says, flushing, "but I don't mind it."

"Get here tomorrow morning at six and you'll learn real fast. I'm getting too old to be cooking and playing step 'n' fetch it to those yokels out there, too. I pay twenty an hour."

Romy finishes, hangs the towel neatly over the sink to dry. He nearly reaches out for her. She gives him a look warning him off, and he keeps his hands in the water. He's not sure how much Mary's guessed, not sure how much he wants her to know.

Mary calls her over to the big stove, "Come here, I'll show you how to make sun dried tomato pasta." Mary takes down a big pot, "Ever made it?"

At the stove, Romy hesitates, shakes her head no.

Karl watches, thinking Romy looks maybe a fast fifteen standing there in Mary's dress.

Does she recognize it?

He remembers last night and draws a slow, shuddering breath, eyes shut. Mary can be tough. She can be kind, too.

Mary nods, "Haven't cooked a lot, huh?"

"When I was young I wanted to learn. We weren't allowed in the kitchen."

Karl holds his breath. This is it—everything Mary despises. The life of privilege, immorality, the whole meddling with humanity thing. Everything he's heard her rail on for hours. It's right here in front of her in the shape of Romy. A woman with looks Mary has never had. He'll know in a second how it'll go. He watches Mary's hands go to her hips—not a good sign. He flinches.

Romy hangs back, smile failing, "I've never cooked anything but oatmeal."

Mary looks his way.

What does he see in her eyes?

Something gives in her face. "Well, don't go looking like that, it's no crime," Mary says, laying an arm around her neck. "None of us can help how we've been raised, not Karl, not me either. There's nothing you can hurt here." She glances at Karl, "Everybody's got to learn, don't they, Karl?"

Jaw clenched, eyes not cooperating at all, thanking God she's his sister, Karl scrubs at dried egg yolk. "Yeah."

"Come on, Honey, fill this pot half full with water and let's get cracking."

Filling the pan, Romy gives him a quick upturn at the corner of her mouth, and his stomach flutters. She carries away the pot and, elbow deep in scalding water, he gives thanks. For last night. For today. For Romy. For Mary. For every breath.They may not have long, but they have now.

"Okay, get us down an iron fry pan and pour in a dollop of oil."

Romy hesitates, "A dollop?"

"Go ahead, I'll tell you when."

She pours.

"That's a dollop. Now you know what this is, don't you?"

"A knife."

"A chef's knife. Take it and press it down flat over the garlic cloves. It breaks them out of their skins. There, you see?"

She does.

"When you've got a dozen or so cloves done, chop them small."

Painstakingly, Romy begins to slice as Karl watches. No longer worried, he hides a smile. He knows what's coming.

Mary sighs. "You weren't kidding, were you? You don't know anything. Here," she says, taking the knife, "this is how to chop."

Past them Karl sees Mel's truck pull up out front. Curious, Karl watches as with a shuddering jerk, it dies in gear. Funny. Mel worships that truck, rebuilt it from a rusted hulk. Karl's never seen him stall it before. If he did he'd probably spend a month taking the tranny apart just to make sure he didn't hurt anything.

Mary demonstrates how to keep the point of the knife on the block, chopping with the belly of the blade. Romy watches, intent. With the blade, Mary scoops up garlic, dropping it into hot oil where it sizzles and pops.

Up the stairs Mel pounds, hair wild, face pale. He bounds in, bells clanging back against the jamb as he throws open the door.

"Why aren't you in school?" Mary yells as he charges past, a small parcel clutched under his arm. The door to his room slams behind him.

"Nice seeing you, Mel," Karl says.

Mary frowns, sighs. "Now, we just want to sauté it, soften it up a little with the parsley and tomatoes. Grab that colander and you can drain the noodles. Then you can crumble in the feta."

Watching her, Mary steps back, leans against the counter, turns to Karl, a certain look he recognizes on her face, a look he loves her for.

Crumbling feta with her fingers, Romy flashes him a thrilled smile.

Mary looks around, "Where'd Willy get to?"

Karl heads for the door, "I'll get him." He finds him out in the steer's stall, feeding it spring grass out of his hand, Bink happily rolling in fresh muck. Back inside, they move two tables together. Mary throws a big tablecloth over them both. In the center Romy, eyes alight, sets a steaming bowl of pasta.

Mary calls for Mel. They sit. Romy serves. Plates full, they wait.

"Mel, we're not waiting!" Mary says.

The cafe's quiet.

"Let's say grace without him," Mary says.

Unwilling to leave Mel out of the circle, Karl shakes his head no.

"Oh, all right, then." Irritated, Mary heads for his room.

She never makes it.

Back | Next
Contents
Framed