by Larry Watson
“I’m sorry, George. Does everything remind you of over there?”
George Real Bird exhales a cloud of smoke. “Only the stars. Or the sun. Or wind. Or clouds.” He looks up at the night sky. “Speaking of which, if these clouds would move out we’d have a great view of the full moon.” He points up and off to his left. “Right. Up. There.”
“I see you’re not wearing your leg tonight.”
“Don’t need it to smoke. But I was wearing it all evening.”
“I appreciate that you’re giving it another try. And I know your mom does too.”
“Yes’m, Miz Edie, I’m-a-tryin’.”
“I mean it.”
“So do I. I plan to take you up on that promise to go dancing. I think the damn thing needs an alteration though. Maybe shorten the inseam.”
Edie laughs politely. “When I first came out here, something reminded me of a summer night long, long ago. Dean and I—Dean was my first husband—”
“I can keep track. Dean. Yeah.”
“And we were living in an apartment downtown right above the bakery. Summer nights—my God, it was stifling. Anyway. We woke up one night to the sound of a car horn honking. Both of us got up to look, and down in the street was Dean’s brother, Roy. He was sitting in a little red convertible. An MG, maybe? Something new, for sure. Back then it seemed like Roy had a different car every month.
“When he saw us he waved for us to come down. We didn’t sleep in much, but I put on a robe and I think Dean pulled on a pair of gym shorts.
“‘Let’s go for a ride,’ Roy said. Dean didn’t want to go. He had to get up and go to work in a few hours. We all had to go to work. But Roy and I talked Dean into going. The car was a little two-seater, and the twins sat in front. I sat in the back, sort of. Up on the trunk. Like in a parade. But there wasn’t a soul on the street to see us. I’d been so hot in bed, and riding around, with the wind blowing my hair back and cooling me off . . . it just felt wonderful.
“After we drove around the streets for a while, Roy headed out of town. West. No one was on the highway either. At least that’s the way I remember it. Nobody but us. I don’t know how far we went. Quite a ways. Because when we turned around and headed back toward Gladstone, the sun was coming up.
“‘Let’s not go back,’ I said. ‘Let’s just keep going.’ Totally impractical. Totally impossible. But Roy looked over at Dean. Dean just shook his head. I knew we’d never do anything like that again.”
George clears his throat and asks, “And what was it you were doing?”
“I’m not sure. Riding around in a convertible on a summer night? There must have been more to it. Leaving? I still don’t know. But we came back. And here I am.”
They fall silent for a long moment. Then Edie says, “When you said something the other night about Jesse being trouble, what did you mean? Specifically.”
“Well, he’s doing a little dealing.”
“Drugs, you mean?”
“A little weed. Some pills. But I believe he has bigger plans. Men like him, they always have plans.”
Then George must see something in Edie’s expression that tells him he mustn’t frighten her further. “But your granddaughter? She’ll be okay,” George says. “Both those boys are crazy about her. They’ll look out for her.”
Edie takes her cell phone out of the pocket of her robe and looks at its silent, closed shell. “I hope you’re right.”
TWO DAYS LATER the message arrives.
Edie’s been keeping the phone right beside the computer at her desk, and when she hears the ping she picks up the phone and flips it open and reads the message.
Name on mailbox is Solon north of Bismark
Edie’s about to respond when a door opens in the back of the office. She pauses, her finger hovering over the phone’s keyboard.
A minute passes, then another, but neither the dentist, the hygienist, nor a patient appears.
Finally Edie types a reply.
I’m coming. Leaving tomorrow. Give me more info if you can.
FROM HER BALCONY Edie watches the parking lot. When she sees Rita’s Ford F-150 truck pull into the lot, Edie goes back inside. After ten minutes have passed—enough time for Rita to kick off her shoes and perhaps pour herself a glass of wine—Edie calls.
“Hey, are you up for a road trip?” she asks. The cheeriness in her voice must sound forced to any ear.
Rita laughs. “Where to?”
“Lauren sent me a text. Apparently things aren’t working out, and she’d like to come back to Gladstone. I’m heading to Bismarck tomorrow to pick her up.”
“Not working out how?”
“She didn’t provide any specifics. But in the company of those two? I can only imagine.”
“Is she in trouble, did she say?”
“She didn’t. I’m thinking she’s probably just tired of babysitting them.”
“I wish I could,” Rita says, “but I’ve finally got an appointment for George at the VA hospital. We’re leaving real early for Fort Harrison.”
“Is there something—”
“No, no. But they’ve agreed to look at that leg and see if he needs to be refit. It’s funny. As long as they know he got the original leg at another facility, they’re willing to say maybe there’s a problem.”
“Well, for sure,” says Edie. “You’ve got to go. I understand.”
“The thing is,” Rita says, “it was so hard to get this appointment I don’t dare reschedule. You know, he’s finally trying with the leg, and if it turns out it just needs an adjustment—”
“Please. Now you’re making me feel bad for asking. I bet we’ll be back before you. You’re not going to try to do it all in one day, are you?”
“We’ll play it by ear. My cousin’s daughter lives in Helena. We could probably stay with her. Maybe,” Rita says, her voice brightening, “you should ask Mr. Aldinger if he’d like to ride along with you.”
“I’m sure he’d pay for gas!”
“And the motel,” Rita says with a laugh.
Edie doesn’t laugh along with her.
“Are you worried about making this trip, hon?” Rita asks.
“I just thought it would be fun. A couple of chicks on the open road. Sort of a senior version of Thelma and Louise.”
“Maybe I can check the bus schedule. George is a big boy. He doesn’t need to have his mommy drive him.”
“Oh, stop, stop. You take George. That’s where you need to be. Somebody has to make those army doctors do right by him. I’ll be fine.”
A small clink comes across the line, the sound perhaps of Rita’s wineglass hitting the telephone’s mouthpiece. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”
“Well, I’m a little uneasy about having a teenager live with me. You know me. I’ve got my routines. And it’s not a life that’ll be very appealing to a young woman.”
“Maybe once Lauren comes back here the boredom will get to her, and she’ll want to hit the road again. Back to her mother maybe.”
“I believe,” Edie says, “that door is closed. And locked.”
“Well, ours is open. Why don’t you come on over? We’re going to order a pizza and I’ll pour you a glass of wine.”
“Thanks for the offer. But I believe I’ll fry an egg and get to bed early. I’d like to get an early start in the morning.”
“You and your fried egg. Okay, hon. Have a safe trip. George will have his cell phone, so you know how to get in touch with us.”
EDIE GOES TO the bedroom where Jesse slept, the room that now will be Lauren’s. She has not put any bedding back on the bed, and the bare mattress gives the room an institutional look. From the closet shelf Edie takes laundered sheets and a pillowcase, a thin cotton blanket, a bedspread, and a pillow. But after she makes the bed, the room still looks underfurnished. A motel room perhaps.
She goes to the kitchen, and from the drawer under the toaster she takes the envelope of photographs. She takes out three: o
ne of Jennifer holding an infant Lauren and smiling in fear and amazement at the baby cradled in her arms; another a school portrait of Lauren in perhaps second grade, front teeth missing and hair tamed in pigtails; and finally another mother-and-daughter picture, both of them wearing matching red turtlenecks and kneeling in front of a spindly Christmas tree. Jennifer still looks amazed but no longer afraid, and though Lauren is only eleven or twelve, she already possesses the wide-eyed, dimpled prettiness she’ll carry into adolescence. Edie takes these photographs into the bedroom and inserts them into the frame of the mirror attached to the dresser. There. A teenager’s bedroom.
EDIE BOUGHT HER rolling suitcase before a trip to Minneapolis for a dental convention. It was only her second trip on an airplane, and she’d heard how important it was to carry on luggage rather than check it, and she’d gone to J. C. Penney and picked up this maroon-and-green plaid number. As she rolls it across the parking lot now, the collapsible handle twists in her hand, and the wheels don’t track straight.
Standing in the lot near Edie’s car is a tall man dressed in a short-sleeved white shirt and khaki trousers. He’s smoking, and his back is turned to Edie. At the sound of those clattering wheels, he turns around.
“Roy?”
“Might as well take my car,” he says, and he pats the top of his black Toyota Highlander as though it’s a pet.
Once again Edie asks the question that is his name. “Roy?”
“Were you expecting someone else?”
“I wasn’t expecting anyone.”
Roy opens the passenger door of his car. “I just don’t think my legs could handle a trip in that little Honda of yours.”
“A trip?”
“I thought we’d take a drive to Bismarck together. If that suits you.”
“Did you come to rescue me, Roy? Is that it?”
“I don’t have a bad leg anymore,” he says. “Because now the other one is in such sad shape they’re a matched pair.”
“Answer me. Because I don’t need you here.”
Roy Linderman smiles the smile that has closed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of deals over the years. “You? Rescue you? Shit, the Edie I knew people needed rescuing from, not the other way around.”
“Don’t bother, Roy. What are you doing here?”
“Your friend Rita called me.”
“What did she tell you? How did she know how to find you?”
“Whoa, whoa.” Roy backs up awkwardly. “My name and number are in the Billings phone book. And she said you’re taking a little trip and you might like some company.”
“‘Like some company’? Or need some company?”
“Hey, hey, Edie. Take it easy. Your friend is concerned about you. You don’t need me here, I get that. And I don’t need to be here. Let’s say we’re doing it for Rita. Come on. Hop in the car. We can hash it out while we drive.”
Roy takes a set of keys from his pocket and presses a button on the fob. “Here,” he says. The liftgate opens like a yawn, and Edie steps back as though something in the vehicle’s dark interior has frightened her. Then Roy walks over to her, picks up her suitcase, and slides it into the back right next to his own black rolling bag.
“You won’t smoke in the car,” Edie says.
“Is that a question or a command?”
“I’m not getting in if you plan to smoke.”
“I promise,” he says and raises his right hand as if making a pledge.
Once they are both settled in the soft leather seats and their seat belts are securely fastened, Roy Linderman looks over at her. There’s something he wants to say, it’s apparent in his eyes. Yet when he finally speaks—“This is the hybrid,” he says, “it’ll get better mileage than your Civic.”—it’s equally plain that those are not the words he might have rehearsed over the years for the occasion when Edie Pritchard once again climbed into a car with him.
“TELL ME ABOUT this granddaughter,” Roy says. They’re on the highway, and he has the Highlander doing eighty, as easy behind the wheel as he’s ever been. “She anything like her grandmother? And I have to say—I’m having a hell of a time with that. You a grandmother, Edie? God damn!”
“You have a hard time! Try living it. She’s . . . oh, I don’t know. She’s eighteen and thinks she’s more grown-up and sophisticated than she is, which might be why she’s unhappy in whatever this latest chapter is.”
“But she’s . . I mean, wherever she is, it’s of her own free will, right?”
“I believe so. But she’s with these two brothers—”
“And we know what kind of trouble that can mean,” Roy says.
Edie stares out at the low hills in the distance. “I’m aware of the irony here.”
“Rita made it sound like they’re just a couple of fuckups.”
Edie turns to Roy. “One of them has a gun. A pistol. I saw it in his luggage.”
“Shit, this is Montana. Who doesn’t have a gun? Hell, look in the glove box. No, no, I’m kidding. You remember that trip we made up to Bentrock? Those brothers? What the hell was their name?”
“Bauer.”
“Bauer. You got a pretty good memory. That’s right. The goddamn Bauer brothers. And then Dean went out and got himself a pistol. What the hell was he thinking anyway?”
“Dean had a gun? My God.”
“Nothing came of it.”
She raises her eyebrows as if she can’t quite believe he’d say something like that. “Roy. Please.”
“Yeah,” Roy says. “Okay. Sorry.”
“Dean seemed to believe,” Edie says, “that the more of himself he kept from me, the more I’d love him. I tried very hard to cure of him of that. Obviously I couldn’t.”
“That whole episode with the Bauers seems like it happened on another planet.”
“Another century,” Edie says. “Another life.”
The terrain they drive through has begun to change. The ocean of grass that previously surrounded them is broken now by an occasional outcropping of pale sandstone that looks like a whitecap on that sea. Then, mile by mile, the grass becomes sparser until the jagged rocks burst through, larger and larger, like bones. They’ve entered the Badlands. A country of compound fractures.
After a few minutes of silence Roy returns to the subject. “You were saying. The brothers?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe Rita is right. I hope so.”
“As I recall,” says Roy, “not everyone was happy with you and Dean as a couple.”
“That would be your mother.”
“Dad sure liked you.”
“Or were you talking about yourself?”
He doesn’t reply.
“But to answer the question you’re not asking,” Edie says, “no, my granddaughter and I are not close. But she called me.”
“And you answered.”
“What can I say? I’m a good dog. I come when I’m called.”
The landscape smooths out, and once again they’re traveling through rolling grassland.
“Go over this again for me,” Roy says. “You know she’s in Bismarck but not where in Bismarck?”
“Not in Bismarck. Someplace outside the city. A farm she said.”
“Christ, Edie.”
“I’m working with what I’ve got. And if it doesn’t suit you, turn around right now and I’ll do this on my own.”
“I’m just asking if you’ve got a plan. That’s all.”
“You know as much as I know.”
“Oh, I doubt that,” Roy says. “I doubt that very much.”
THEY’VE BEEN ON the road for less than an hour when Roy has to stop for a cigarette. He pulls off the highway near Beach, just inside the North Dakota border. The rest area is built on a small rise, and the elevation is enough to allow Roy and Edie a view of the highway they’ve just traveled, gray strips cutting through green-and-yellow undulating countryside. The trees are so distant and few they look like black bristles caught in the creases of hills.
Roy
and Edie sit at a picnic table full of messages, initials, and symbols that have been gouged into the wood over the years: LW + SG. I ♥ Jamie. Go Fuck Yourself. Eat me. Hawks Rule. Lilya 4ever. Edie mindlessly runs the tip of her index finger over and over in the grooves of that 4.
Roy lights a second cigarette from the butt of his first. He inhales deeply and then tilts his head back and blows the smoke up into that huge, vacant blue sky.
“Don’t answer this if you don’t want to,” Edie says. “But what was it like at the end? With Dean.”
“Mom never said anything on one of your visits?”
“I wasn’t about to bring it up.”
“Yeah. I get that. Well. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. I mean, not good. For sure. But all things considered . . . Yeah. It could have been worse.”
“You don’t want to talk about it,” says Edie. “I understand.”
“This is something you really want to hear? Okay. This was a couple months after you went back to . . . where?”
“Granite Valley.”
“And he was at our place when you left, right?”
“Just for a night, I thought.”
“It turned into a few. But that was okay. It was long enough for us to get a hospital bed moved into Mom’s place. A tight fit, let me tell you. But it gave him a little more comfort. You know, with its adjustments and all. Hospice provided it. Hospice—they were champs. Anything we needed. The bed. Drugs for the pain. Which Dean tried to avoid. I finally said, ‘This isn’t like running a damn race. It’s not like you’re a winner if you can push through the pain. You don’t want to suffer. Mom doesn’t want to see you suffer. I don’t want to see you suffer. Take the fucking drugs.’ So he did. And they helped. You could see that. Before, he had this strained look all the time, and then he relaxed and looked more like himself. Anyway, one night he and I were watching a ball game. Then he said he was tired and was going to call it a night. This was during the playoffs, mind you. But I helped him get settled. Then I went out in the other room with Mom. She was watching Dallas. She couldn’t get enough of that show, and I couldn’t fucking stand it. I had enough soap opera in my life at the time. So I closed my eyes, and I dozed off for a few minutes. I woke up when the news came on. Mom was just tiptoeing back into the room after checking on him. ‘How’s he doing?’ I asked. She smiled and said, ‘Sleeping like a baby.’ And I knew. I just fucking knew. I was in there like a shot. But he was gone. Call it a night? Shit, he sent me away so I wasn’t there to see the end. So, yeah. It could have been worse. It could have been a hell of a lot worse.”
