Thunder and Rain

by Charles Martin

  She started crying. She knew what was coming. “Sam—” She nodded, took a step back. “I told you once I saw the soul of a woman crack in half. Well, I caused the crack. It was me. If I stay here with you, I’m no different. Still that same me. Only way I can see to start over is to keep my word. To go back to the place where I got it wrong and make it right.” She was nodding, arms crossed. “Sam?” I lifted her chin. “I love you. I do. But—”

  She looked at me. “What about you? What about what’s right for”—she jabbed me in the chest with her finger—“you.”

  I shook my head.

  She whispered, glancing at the house. “We’ll pack up. Leave first thing.”

  “I been thinking about that, too. You don’t have a thing to be ashamed of. Neither of us do. I think you should stay right here. In Rock Basin. There’s an old saying around here that when you hit rock bottom, you start over. Some folks think it’s how we got our name. I don’t know. Anyway, you should stay. Build a life. Be my friend. Be Andie’s friend. She’s gonna need it. That may be hard. May be tough. But, your leaving here—that don’t feel right. You ain’t done a thing wrong. Done everything right. So, stay here. Let Hope grow up here. Brodie’ll look after her. Me, too. I don’t know how to do this any other way, but, if you’re leaving cause you think you got to hide or be ashamed, you got no reason.”

  I handed her the papers from my back pocket. “I went and saw the widow. Told her what I wanted to do. She said she was going to leave this place to me anyway, so she just gave me the deed. Signed it over. I took and had the attorney make it right. It says right here that you own this place. It ain’t much but it’s yours. And she threw in the truck. Thought you could use it.”

  She clutched the papers to her chest. Shaking her head. “I knew from the moment I met you that I could never have you. Every time I tried to walk inside you, and ask you to love me, I was bumping into the shadow of somebody that’d already been there.”

  I watched her and the hurt in me grew. Rising up. She’d been hurt so much. I was just one more in a string of many. She stepped back, then gingerly forward, pressing her forehead to mine. “I won’t know how to be around you.”

  I shook my head. “You be you. I’ll be me. We got nothing to hide from. Done nothing I regret.”

  She closed her eyes. “Cowboy, I’ll never find another man like you.”

  I lifted her chin. “Sam, don’t ever hang your head around me. Not around any man. You’re… you’re a gentle, welcome rain.”

  She smiled. Wiped away the tears. Tried to nod.

  I turned, walked to the steps. I knew she was looking. Wanted to know if I’d look back. I turned. My hat in my hand. “That day, on the river… you… well, not laying you down on the riverbank and kissing you until the day turned to night and the next day was one of the toughest things I’ve ever done.” I tugged my hat down over my eyes and left her standing on the porch, clutching those papers.

  I drove down to the river. Found Brodie cutting up hotdogs and baiting a trot line for catfish. I stepped out, pulled my sunglasses down over my eyes. “What’re you doing?”

  “Fishing.” The sight of him did my heart good. He asked, “What’re you doing?”

  “Was wondering if maybe you wanted to go shopping with me.”

  “What for?”

  “Something I need to get for your mom.”

  He dropped the hotdogs and wiped his hands on his pants. “Sure.”

  We drove to town and parked in front of the jewelry store. He smiled as we stepped out, walked in. We stared through the glass and I pointed at something that looked like what his mom had passed up twelve years ago. A rectangular solitaire set in a silver band. I asked, “How much?”

  The man behind the counter told me.

  I scratched my head. I’d never been too good at dickering for anything other than cows and old cars. “Does it have to be that expensive?”

  He smiled. “Memorial Day Sale starts this weekend. But we can start celebrating today if you like. And—” He held a finger in the air. “We got a two-week return policy if it doesn’t work.”

  I wasn’t too worried about that. I had just enough credit on my Visa to make it work. I handed the card to Brodie and said, “Pay the man.”

  Brodie was beaming.

  I steered and worked the clutch while Brodie shifted gears. We drove to Jill’s. She had a large barn out back. We circled the house, and I parked. Brodie and I stepped out. I was heading toward the house, but heard Andie talking in the barn.

  Evidently, she heard us, too, ’cause she came walking out sitting on top of May. Andie was wearing a hat, her jeans, a tank top, and her riding boots that Dumps had made her.

  Lord, that woman looks good sitting atop a horse.

  She hopped off and hugged Brodie. Holding him a long minute. He wrapped his arm around her waist and stood smiling at both of us. He nodded at me.

  I cleared my throat. Looking for a starting place. This was harder than I thought it was going to be. I brushed the toe of my boot on the back of my jeans. Brodie was standing next to her, his arm around her waist, her arm around his shoulder. She glanced behind her. Her hair had grown. The ends had been trimmed. No longer frayed. She whispered. Her word broke. “Hey.”

  I took off my hat, hung it on Brodie’s head. “I been thinking about how to say this and I don’t know… so, just let me try. Twelve years ago, you married a man who promised you one thing and gave you another. He promised you his heart, but when it came time to give it to you, he gave you half. Or kept, half from you. Depending how you want to look at it.” A wrinkle appeared on her forehead. I wasn’t making sense and she couldn’t tell where this was going. Her eyes shone glassy. I shook my head. “You and me, we got a lot of hurt here. But, I think—no, I know that at bottom, I caused it ’cause I never gave you the me that you deserved. The me that you fought for. All those nights—” I shook my head. “You dealt with the pain a long time, then when you couldn’t take it any longer you tried to ease it with what you could. Yes.” I nodded. “That hurts me. Images on the backsides of my eyelids that I see when I close my eyes. I don’t like them. But—” I reached up and untied the string that held the ring around her neck. “Long time ago we walked into a store and you bought what didn’t scare me. What didn’t cost me much. You didn’t ask for what you should have and I didn’t have the gumption to do what I ought. I wasn’t the man I should’ve been. Right there in that store I made you a promise. Told you I’d come for you. So…” Brodie smiled, reached in his pocket and laid it flat across his mom’s palm. “Andie, I don’t really know how to be all my heart is telling me I need to be but I know I want to. I know… I tried to give my heart away to another but I can’t give what I already gave. So, either give me my heart back, or let’s start over.”

  She stared into her palm. I was schoolboy giddy.

  That is until Dr. Earl Johnson walked out of the barn leading a horse. He was wearing a hat he just bought, tennis shoes, khakis, and blue dress socks. His face was puffy and bruised. Andie looked at him, then me. She handed May’s reins to Brodie, “You hold her a minute for me?”

  Brodie’s jaw was hanging down around his belt. He nodded. She walked me around the barn, out of sight. She eyed the ring. Turning it over in her palm. “It’s pretty.”

  I was starting to get a bad feeling about this.

  “There was a time when it was all I wanted.” She looked at me and passed it back across the distance between us. “When you were.” She placed it in my hand, crossed her arms. “Tyler, you gave me Brodie and for that I’ll always love you, but I don’t want to live with you anymore. Don’t want to be married to you.” She shook her head, patted her chest. “I don’t want your heart and all the ache that comes with it. You’ll always be a cowboy and I’ve had my fill of them.”

  “What about… him? Earl. He’s… he’s all hat and no cattle.” Not to mention married.

  She nodded. “Maybe. But he doesn’t hurt me. A
nd I’m tired of hurting.” She squeezed my hand. “Tyler, you’re a good man. In some ways, the best kind. In others—” She shook her head. “No more hospital emergency rooms. No more nights alone. No more. I just don’t want to be married to you anymore.” She walked around the barn, kissed Brodie and pulled him to her chest, climbed up on May, and clicked twice with her mouth. Earl failed to get his foot in the stirrup on the first and second try, finally succeeded on the third, pulled himself up into the saddle, and held on for dear life while the gelding trotted after May.

  I stood there, my eyes narrow, scratching my head. Andie and Earl disappeared into the trees leaving only their dust. The cloud settled on my lips and left me dry. Brodie looked at me. Trying to read my face. I didn’t know what else to say. I turned to him. “I had that pictured differently in my mind.” I looked toward the trees. “Saw that working out different.”

  Brodie nodded.

  I scratched my head and heard myself talking to myself. “Dying is easy. It’s the living that’s tough.”

  I don’t really remember driving home but when we pulled into the drive, Brodie said, “You mind if I ride Cinch a while?”

  I nodded. “Sure.”

  He threw a saddle on the old man and the two went ambling off over the pasture. I stood there, stumped. My thumbs hanging onto my jean pockets. Dumps walked out of the barn, saw me, and said, “Looks like it didn’t go the way you were hoping.”

  “You might say.”

  He disappeared back into the barn.

  I looked at my life. No cows. No car. No girl. A garden filled with weeds.

  If it hadn’t hurt so much it would have been comical. Problem was, it hurt. A lot. I rolled a cigarette, lit it, inhaled deeply, and blew gently into the breeze coming across my face. The smoke exited me, paused briefly in a small white cloud, was gathered by the breeze and washed back across me. I breathed in, filling my stomach. I did that several times. When I’d drawn it down to the nub, I flicked it into what remained of the tomato garden, walked to the house, slid the ring and its little blue box inside a sock, and set it in the top drawer of my dresser. The words “two-week return policy” kept ringing in my ears. I sat down on the end of my bed and put my hands on my knees. I had no idea what to do.

  Brodie returned about dark. I fried some pork chops and scrambled eggs for dinner. We ate in the quiet. The only sound was the clock ticking on the wall. It got so loud, clicking and clicking, I finally stood, pulled out the batteries, and set them on the counter. About then, the crickets cranked up out the window. I stood and closed it. Dumps stirred his eggs around his plate. “You gonna take the batteries out of them, too?”

  “Sorry.”

  Brodie was gnawing on a bone, sporting a greasy milk mustache. “Dad?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You can take the ring back, you know?”

  “I know.”

  “If you did, we could take the money and buy me a horse.”

  I nodded.

  “Dad?”

  “Yeah?”

  He stared at what remained of his pork chop. “She’s not coming back.”

  I nodded. “I know that.”

  “Dad?”

  “Yes.”

  He stared up at me. Shook his head. “She’s not coming back.”

  “You just said that.”

  He nodded. “Well… one of us needs to.”

  I ran my fingers through his hair. “We’ll make the rounds tomorrow. See if we can find you a horse.”

  We finished dinner in silence, and I did the dishes while Dumps and Brodie watched a John Wayne movie. Sleep did not appeal to me so I walked to the river. I couldn’t get my wife back and I couldn’t go back to Sam. She’d forever feel like second fiddle. I wouldn’t do that to her. She deserved better. She deserved to be somebody’s first choice. Not their consolation prize.

  The next morning, I drove to town. The salesman saw me walk in and his smile melted. I laid the sock on the counter. The shape of the box stuffed inside. He scratched his head. “Guess it didn’t work.”

  I spoke matter-of-factly. “No, it did not.”

  “I ’magine it wouldn’t really help matters for me to try and sell you something else?”

  “No, it would—” I stopped short. There were six billion people on the planet. About half were female and let’s say for simplicity sake, about a quarter of those were of an age that I could marry. I might bump into some language barriers but certainly, amidst three-quarters of a billion people, I could find one woman who wanted to marry a man like me. My feathers were a bit ruffled and I was borderline pissed, which is a bad combination when it comes to diamonds and money, but I turned to him, “Yes.” I set my hat down. “Yes, you can.”

  He showed me several different rings and to be honest, I let him upsell me. I imagine Brodie would punch my man card for letting him do it but giving back that ring was like giving up for good. It was like admitting I’d never marry again. I’d already set aside money for Brodie’s new horse. If I gave him that ring back and got a refund I’d spend the money on something—maybe another new horse, maybe an old Corvette—and then if a miracle happened and I wanted to get married, I’d have nothing to give and be right back where I started. So, I looked through everything he had and I picked out another ring that looked like something I’d want to give a woman. One rectangular stone bordered on each side by a small triangular diamond. Prettiest ring I’d ever seen. Cost me an extra thousand dollars. The salesman rang my card through his machine. He said, “You sure?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Well, I almost hate to offer it, but if you change your mind, I’ll extend your two-week policy out a few weeks, or longer, if you need.”

  I thanked him, drove home, put the sock back in the drawer and tried to convince myself that it was a good investment and not an emotional-compulsion buy, that even if I didn’t use it that Brodie would one day and, most important, that I felt better.

  Problem was, I did not. And when my credit card bill came in the mail in about two weeks, I’d be reminded of that.

  The weeks passed. I started back to work. Arrested a few men. Stayed out of and away from gunfights. We found Brodie a good horse. A four-year-old paint. He named him “Dingo,” for reasons I can’t understand. Fifteen hands. Smart. Lively. Tender when needed. A rare find. If Brodie wasn’t sleeping, he was sitting on Dingo. We went camping two weekends in a row. Loaded up the horses, packed some food in my saddlebags, and took off down the river. Slept under the stars. We talked, laughed some, and I marveled at the man that boy was becoming. Oh, and with the department’s allowance—and a loan I got from the bank thanks to Mike and the fact that I’m now gainfully employed—and against the captain’s better judgment, I bought a new white four-door Dodge 2500 four-wheel drive. And this time, I got an automatic. Brodie thought we’d really moved up in the world. I got the dealer to put aftermarket BFGoodrich tires on it. All the world was right.

  Well…

  I woke, I worked, I tried to be a father to Brodie. We spent hours setting on the horses. Me, Dumps, and Brodie tried our hand at growing tomatoes. On occasion, I slept some. Fits mostly. Never more than a few hours. I spent a lot of time on the porch, just swinging. I’m not sure why but it’s where I often found myself. And I quit rolling cigarettes. Not sure why. I just did. I turned around after a week and realized I’d not rolled one in a while. So, I took the tobacco and papers from my shirt pocket and threw them in the trash. I thought a lot about what Sam told me one time. “To walk with and alongside rather than without and alone.” She was right.

  I’d heard she’d had a few dates from some of the guys in town. An attorney, a rancher, a real-estate broker, and a guy that owned a Ford dealership. I was happy for her. Glad she had options. She deserved them. I hoped she was happy. Brodie said Hope was doing well in school. Even got a part in the school play. The Wizard of Oz. Not sure what role. She’d given away four of the five baby guinea pigs. Kept one for herself, to make
sure Turbo wasn’t lonely. She told Brodie she was glad to be down to two ’cause seven of those things make a lot of poop.

  I started driving to a nearby town to get my haircut. Figured it wasn’t too polite to walk into Georgia’s salon and act like nothing had ever happened. Figured that might be hard on Sam. Okay… hard on me.

  Oh, and the two-week return policy came and went. No matter how I tried, I could not bring myself to take the new ring back. Seemed like it embodied so many changes. So much about me that I’d resolved to change that I couldn’t take it back. I decided to eat it and let it collect dust in my drawer.

  One night I was driving home and passed by that church outside of town. The marquee read, ELDERS MEETING TONIGHT 7 P.M. It wasn’t audible but I swore I heard the name Frank Hamer. I pulled over, let the truck idle. Few minutes later, I attended my first elders meeting.

  Ten men sat around a big table, Pastor Kyle was officiating. I walked in, my hat in my hand. No need for introductions. I knew everyone. I nodded at each. “George, Fred, Tom, Steve, Pete, Dave.” I made my way around the table. When I got to Kyle I noticed his countenance had changed. He looked whiter. Pale. Sweating all of a sudden. I stood next to him, patted him on the back. “Kyle, how you doing?”

  He nodded. Maybe some more of the blood rushed out of his face.

  I pulled out my wallet, unfolded the yellowed confession, and stared at it. I pressed it flat, ironing out the wrinkles with my palm. I spoke to the group. “When I was a kid my dad told me a story. In 1835, a fellow by the name of David de la Croquetagne, better known as Davy Crockett, was up for reelection to the U.S. Congress from the state of Tennessee. He told the people of his district that, ‘If I lose, you may all go to hell and I will go to Texas.’ A man of his word, he did just that. That story stuck with me, as has that idea, that a man ought to do what he says he’s gonna do. That if he gives his word, signs his name to something, then he ought to live up to it. To own it.” I laid that piece of paper flat across the desk and looked at each man. “I’m sure you all feel the same way being that this is the Lord’s house and all.” I scratched my head. Looked at Kyle’s milk-white face. “My dad told me something else, too. He said this world is full of evil. Has been since Cain killed Abel. And there’s only one way to deal with it.” I tipped my hat. “Kyle.” I walked out.