Cooksin

by Rick Alan Rice

  * * * * *

  Tory grew tired of her own interrogation long before she got her answers, and after a while she determined that where Jake's mystery trip to Denver was concerned, the best she could do was prescind. She liked herself better that way anyway. If Jake had secrets...well, they didn't bother her if they didn't bother him – that's what she decided to feel. No harm, no foul. Maybe Jake did have a girl elsewhere and maybe there was a relationship in his life she knew nothing about. Tory's attitude had come to be that she'd had all the callow, superficial relationships she ever wanted to have in her life, and now she was ready for something more mature and understanding. She could take a little heartache, certainly more than she once could, back when her expectations had been so huge that they could never be satisfied. Jake and her were going to be different.

  Whatever his shortcomings, his secrets, she liked what he did for her, and she was willing to accept him for what he was. There were only those occasional weak moments when she felt that urgent need to nail him down, to make him captive to her view of how their lives should work together. But it passed. She was a big girl now, and she intended to stay that way.

  * * * * *

  Py spent the remainder of the day blissfully unaware of the human drama taking place around him. He was happy that Jake was back. His presence seemed to sort of cement things around the ranch, to provide the substance that gave order to the whole thing. It was strange, since Jake was never the one who handed out the orders, or who orchestrated events – Tory mostly took care of that. But somehow Jake's way of being, of doing things, made everything seem like it was happening as it should. Just having him around made Py feel better.

  Tory, finished with her interrogation of Jake, came around the side of the house to find Py stringing a trail of breakfast leftovers from the windrow to the back porch. "What are you doing?" she asked.

  Py turned around and looked at her, holding a forefinger to his lips, asking for quiet. He pointed over toward the trees, where the big black stray cat he'd been attempting to lure into the yard lay in the shade, giving itself a tongue-bath.

  "Are you still trying to get that cat to come to you?" Tory asked.

  "He wants to come," Py said, keeping his voice hushed, "I know he does. It's been a week now since he showed up. I just think he's being careful, you know? He's just waiting to make sure everything's okay before he comes in close to where we can touch him."

  "What makes you think he wants anything more than a hand-out?" Tory said, suspicious of the stray's motives, but touched by Py's belief.

  "He ain't taken nothin' from nobody, but he's stayin' around. I think he'd of run away by now if food was all he wanted. Besides, he's pretty heavy. He looks like he's doing just fine when it comes to grub."

  "Well, I don't want to be a spoil-sport, but I bet those pigs find that bacon you put out there long before that cat takes it," Tory said. "The chickens will probably get your bread. Besides, I don't think cats are much attracted to baked goods."

  "Well, then if this don't work, something else will," Py said. "I'll just keep trying."

  "Good luck," Tory said, going in the back door, leaving Py alone on the back step.

  "He'll come in sooner or later," Py said, standing fast in his mission to make a pet of the stray.

  CHAPTER 17 – Getting Personal

  The Longmont school year got off to a typically fast start. The boys on the high school football team had begun getting ready for their first big game a week before the opening class bell. The traditional non-league season opener against Fort Lupton was scheduled for the first Friday night of the school year, and nearly one hundred of the faithful – mothers, fathers, aunts and uncles, plus the regular complement of civic minded citizens and fanatical sports fans – drove the twenty miles to sit in Fort Lupton's ramshackle bleachers. It was an annual David-Goliath mismatch, Longmont High School being much the larger of the two schools, with a deeper well of players from which to draw. This year it had gone typically well for the Longmont boys, who won 34-0.

  Noticeable for her absence on the sidelines was Lily Walker, who for reasons unknown had decided to give up her spot on the cheer leading squad. She had been elected to the team every year, starting with her freshman, but over the summer, when it came time for her to go with the others to cheer leading camp, Lily mysteriously withdrew. Instead, her spot on the squad was filled by a little girl named Rosalinda, who had fallen just short of enough votes to win a spot on the team and had thus become first alternate. She accepted her promotion enthusiastically.

  The scandal around Lily's unexpected decision to decline one of the school's most coveted status positions was accompanied by other scuttlebutt that put the cheer leading saga to shame. There was a rumor going around that Lily Walker was involved with an older man – possibly much older – and it seemed that it was a rumor propagated by Lily herself.

  Every new year at Longmont High seemed to be heralded by a controversy around Lily Walker. When she was a freshman, Lily had reported to school amid stories that she had already begun to smoke and drink beer. The sizzle her sophomore year centered around her under-aged driving and the car – a used but shiny open air Buick Y-Job – her father had bought her to get to and from school, which had become a perpetual joy ride. Lily showed up a non-virgin her junior year. And now, as a senior, she had truly gone over the top, eschewing honor of any kind in deference to "an older man," whose exact identity was the only thing Lily was remaining secretive about.

  Lily's scandal this year had started much as they always had in the past, with a whispered indiscretion from her best friend, Betty Wilkerson, who was always good for passing on information about classmates. Usually Betty would know about anything Lily had done almost as soon as she did it, often because Betty accompanied her on these escapades. The Wilkerson girl, however, seemed to be protected by a salubrious nature that somehow placed her beyond public execration, whereas it was easy to imagine Lily guilty even in instances when she was not. Whatever the offense, it would usually be lighting up the communication grapevine long before the Principal, Gilbert McClelland, could get the student body settled in their auditorium seats to hear his remarks, which traditionally opened each school year. Principal McClelland would be somberly reiterating the guidelines, the school's code of conduct, and pre-admonishing recalcitrance in all forms, while the students before him whispered in each other's ears, passing on the poop.

  Lily had been someone to deal with, even as a freshman. Senior boys regarded her with rare respect, as she was already going places where girls their own age would fear to tread. Her status grew over time, and by her senior year she was considered distinctly different from the rest of the student body – formidable, almost beyond adult supervision. Principal McClelland's stern warnings certainly had no effect. Lily's sense for her father's power in the community, and her own fearlessness and sense of self, made attempts at reining her in seem impotent.

  For the most part, Frank Walker found it hard to cope with being the girl's father.

  He had been called in for conversations with Principal McClelland, and with Lily's teachers, on many occasions. He would sit and listen to their concerns, and he would express shock and sorrow at his daughter's delinquencies, and he would vow that things were going to change. But away from the school administrators, left on his own to face his little girl straight up and talk to her the way he was told she needed to be talked to – well, Frank couldn't seem to do it. His response was to block her from his mind, to stay so busy doing other things that he just didn't notice how bad things had become where Lily was concerned. Often he would entreat Rosa Villaman to intercede on his behalf, especially when it involved something having to do with Lily's femaleness. Frank felt inadequate when it came to these matters, though poor Rosa was hardly in a better position. Though she had raised Lily up from grade school, she lacked authority with the girl and had little impact as a disciplinarian. She couldn't be Lily's parent. That was Frank's responsib
ility, though for any number of reasons he just didn't seem up to the task.

  "Who is he?" Betty Wilkerson Lily asked for information about her secret lover as if just hearing about him might infect her with something. She giggled nervously. "How old is he, anyway?" Then she cringed. "I can't imagine touching someone like that. I mean, is he as old as your father?"

  "No," Lily said, "he's not that old. He's more like...thirty-six." And at that the two girls grabbed each other’s hands and seemed to wriggle a squeal out of their suddenly electrified bodies. "No – you're kidding me!" Betty said. "Thirty-six! That's older than Wiona Keefe's boyfriend. Remember him? The one she brought to last year's school assembly? The hairy one?" And once again the two seemed to shake all over just prior to joining voices in a high-pitched shriek. "Lily, how could you?" Betty said. "Why, I'd just die if I were to be like that with a hairy old man." "Shhhh!" hushed Lily, half-quieting her down, half enjoying the celebrity that entanglement with Jake Jobbs had afforded her. "All old men aren't hairy," Lily said. "At least mine's not." The thought set off another round of giggling and shrieking.

  The truth was, Lily was reporting her story somewhat after the fact. It had been nearly a month since she and Jake had last been together, not counting their brief run-in outside the bus depot. He had already started to cool the relationship by the time her father had fired him from the ranch. Lily herself had seemed ready to move on to the next experience, until school started and she realized that her dalliance was getting her some much desired attention. Now she was purposely vague on when last, and when next, she and her "man" would rendezvous. In truth, it was actually more comfortable for her this way than it would have been had Jake and her still been a real item. Now she was enjoying all of the social benefits with none of the danger or suspense.

  * * * * *

  "Daddy – Rosa said you wanted to see me."

  Frank turned to see Lily, standing in the open doorway to the stable. He immediately turned back to what he was doing, pulling tight the cinch on General, his big Appaloosa. "I'm about to ride out to 'thirty foot.' I was hoping you'd come along with me."

  Lily shrugged. "I guess, if you want me too..."

  Thirty Foot Cliffs were well known in Weld County, and though it was on Walker Ranch property, Frank was pretty casual about who paid visits. There was a small, clearwater spring there, which kids used as a swimming hole. Situated at the foot of the cliffs, and surrounded by century old cottonwoods and oaks, it was a scenic location. Frank's reason for going was more related to work than to leisure. There was a small canyon that backed up into a good sized grove of trees below the cliffs, and cattle were constantly wandering back up in there, separating themselves from the herd Frank had grazing within those fence lines. It made counting them tough, so occasionally Frank, or one of his hands, would ride back into the trees and drive the strays back out of the canyon.

  Frank finished with General's riding tack, and then moved over to the next stall, where Star, the little chestnut quarter horse he had given to Lily, was ready to be saddled. "Looks to me like you been neglecting Star," Frank said, pulling a Navajo blanket down from a storage compartment above the horse's enclosure. "You brushed her lately?

  Taken her out for exercise?"

  "I rode her last week – and I brushed her then."

  Frank moved to the front of the horse, grabbed it under the chin, and seemed to examine its eyes. "You gettin' enough attention, girl?" he asked the horse. "No sir, I don't believe you are." Frank turned and looked at Lily, who still hadn't walked but a few feet into the stable. "You ride dressed like that?" She was still wearing her dress from school.

  "I can ride fine in this," Lily said.

  "Well then, let's get your horse saddled up and take off before we lose any more light of day. Getting dark earlier now, you noticed?"

  "Yeah – I noticed."

  "Seems like the days pick up speed about this time every year." Frank kept talking while he threw Lily's custom saddle, a two- cinch Texas slick fork, over Star, then reached underneath the horse to pull tight the front and flank girths. "I think it's got something to do with school starting. You know, when Frank Junior played on the teams, I think I got to markin' the year by sporting events and holidays. First you got your football season, and that seems to fly right by. Homecoming is here and gone. Then you got Halloween. Basketball starts. Next thing you know its Thanksgiving, then Christmas. It seems like it goes faster every year – every year I get older."

  Lily stood with her arms crossed before her, watching her father ready her mount.

  By now she knew what her job was when it came to his conversations. He'd talk and she'd listen, and nothing he'd say would ever really have much to do with her, unless she'd failed to do something to his satisfaction, in which case he'd mention it. Mostly Frank just wanted to talk in her presence, so that later he could feel like they'd had a conversation. But typically it was not a conversation in the regular sense, with one person saying something, the other responding, and the first person adding something to that. Usually information gets exchanged in a conversation, somebody tells something to somebody else, and they go back and forth, trading words or insights. Frank's conversation wasn't like that. It was more one-sided, sort of angled toward economizing time and energy.

  "So how's school going?" he asked, as the two of them, astride General and Star, made their way out a field road that took them past a huge hay barn and, passed that, on toward the open fields.

  "It's going okay," Lily said. "Any new teachers this year?"

  "A few, but mostly the same old ones."

  "Are you seeing some friends you didn't get to see over the summer?"

  "Some, I guess. I see most of the ones I want to see over the summer anyway.

  It's no big deal."

  "Wasn't that way when I was a kid," Frank said, riding tall in the saddle, back straight and shoulder's level. "We didn't see anybody over the summers – we were all working for our fathers, too damned busy to come to town. It was a big deal for us once school started. It was the only time we got to see anybody."

  "It isn't that way now," Lily said. "Not for most, anyway."

  Frank seemed able to shrug off the loss. He shifted subjects, awkwardly trying to fashion some kind of an interchange. "How's your car? Is it running okay for you?"

  "It's running okay..." Lily batted a few gnats away, looking irritated by their presence. Her face became momentarily concealed behind an avalanche of blonde hair, which she used a toss of her head to put back in place.

  "You should've grabbed yourself a hat," Frank said. "Too late now."

  Frank glanced at her. "Yeah, I guess it is." He then gently kicked his boot heels into General's flanks and the horse picked up speed, moving to a steady trot. "Come on, let's make a little time," Frank said, and on his urging Lily prompted Star to keep pace.

  They rode for ten minutes, neither able to say anything to the other as their horses headed in the direction of the cliffs. Occasionally Frank would let Lily move slightly out ahead, just so he could look at her for clues as to who she was. It had never occurred to him to do such a thing before – she had always just been a beautiful little orphan growing up in his home. She'd been tiny and delicate, then cute and precocious. Then gawky. She passed through a vulnerable phase, had a brief flare-up of acne, then became ridiculous for a while, dressing in clothing that had been consigned to the attic, all of which was too large for her, and too out of date. These were her mother's things. Through it all, Frank stayed distantly amused, but never so much that it interrupted his routine. He had confidence that Rosa was seeing Lily through these phases. Frank even had doubts about the propriety of a Father being too involved with his own little girl. But just lately something about Lily had changed, and he was seeing something in her that was palpable to him, that crossed gender lines and that somehow resonated something deep within him. Lily was no longer a precious little alien. Somehow when he hadn't been watching, she had become a pers
on, filled with her own set of feelings, co-opted by the tragedy of life before Frank had even taken time to enjoy her pure. Recently it had hit him and it knocked a hole right through his heart. How is it he had missed the time, the moment? And why had it passed so quickly? Frank was not one for melancholy, but just lately he had found himself fighting back the odd tear. He had failed her as a father, and the devils of life had got her. He should have been there to save her, to prolong her child's perfection, but he'd been lost. Now he could feel the tragedy he had visited upon them both.

  Watching her ride, Frank astonished at how much she reminded him of her mother, Viola. He thought how beautiful she looked as she marshaled her little horse, her long hair flowing out behind, her dress riding high up on her strong, tanned legs. Lily was a sight at her age, a thoroughbred in her own right. A part of the father in Frank watched her with pride, while conscious of thinking that he would never let her be seen by others this way, dressed as she was in her loose-hanging dress and cowboy boots. The dress-length was below her knees, conservative enough for school, or for shopping around town. But for horseback riding? Somehow the wind played it tight against her body, and in it, astride that horse, Lily looked more like a woman than a schoolgirl.