by N. C. Reed
“Sounds like there's more of a story there than just 'here we are again',” Beverly raised an eyebrow.
“Everybody has a story, Miss . . . Beverly,” Greg smiled again. “Thank you again for talking him down. I know him. He would have done it, I'm sure, but . . . it would have hurt him tomorrow in a way he wouldn't expect. Especially with Angela there.”
“I'm glad I was there to do it,” she nodded. Greg walked back to lend his efforts to the growing argument. She looked up at Mitchell.
“How about walking me home?” she asked him. “I know you're working but . . . I want to go home.”
“Part of the service, ma'am,” Mitchell smiled at her. Wrapping an arm around her shoulder, he started for the house.
***
“Gordon are you really going to allow this?” Angela asked.
“I'm not allowing anything,” Gordon shook his head, hands held out in front of him. “All of you marched over here and issued an ultimatum. You should have been prepared to shoulder the consequences of that act when you decided on doing it. Instead, you just assumed that Clay would give in. You were wrong and now . . . I don't know,” he looked back at the small group of people.
“I would never have imagined Malitha George being so cruel,” he shook his head. “It's likely better that they're going, considering what she did. If she’ll do it once, then she’ll do it again. Who will it be next time, Ange? And what will she accuse them of?”
“You know good and well she would never-,” she started.
“Do something like that?” Gordon interjected. “Except she did it today, and got caught. So now, I know good and well that she would. Next time it might be one of us.”
“She would never do that!” Angela almost shouted.
“She already did, once,” Gordon repeated. “That's what happens when you start something like this. You lose people's trust and then your credibility is lost. After that, no one wants to listen to you or be around you, and no one trusts that you won't do it to them. She did a truly evil thing today, Ange. I'm shocked you can't see that.”
“I agree it was wrong,” she nodded. “But if Clayton had just done what I told him, none of this would have been necessary.”
“Jesus, Ange,” Gordon exclaimed suddenly. “Did you hear what you just said? 'None of this would have been necessary'? The last thing we need around here is someone spreading lies like that! This could have led to someone dying! How necessary was that? What the hell is wrong with you!”
His wife stayed quiet, her face red at her dressing down. Maybe he had made her think. He hoped so.
“Are you going to make them leave?” she finally asked, looking back to where the Georges and the others were still arguing with Robert while John Webb was crying to Gary Meecham.
“No one made them do anything,” Gordon shrugged. “But maybe we're better off. I guess we’ll see what happens come morning.”
***
Clay had not gone home when he left the mob scene at the Troy farm. His blood was still cold and he knew that he was bad company in that condition so he pushed himself to burn away the adrenaline all the arguing had caused. He attacked the punching bag he kept in the barn with fury, hands and feet flying as he punished the canvas bag.
When he stopped, wringing with sweat, he walked to the door of the barn to look outside but instead began to run. There were no lights so he used his tiny flashlight to light his way as he ran behind the barn and out into the pasture. He didn't go in any particular direction, he just went, allowing what remained of the stress and strain placed on him in recent days to bleed away.
He was not going to back down. If he got rid of the people who were leading the charge, then his stress level would go down. He needed that. He needed less problems, and one sure way to get less problems was to rid yourself of the troublemakers. He already knew his mother wouldn't like it and suspected his father wouldn't either, though his father at least might not say anything.
He wondered what Lainie would say about Marla leaving, and then thinking about Lainie made him realize how late it was and how long he'd been out of reach. And how far into nowhere he was. Shaking his head, he turned for home, trying to figure out what he would say.
***
Robert Sanders watched the small mob make their way back up the hill, shaking his head at the foolishness that had been displayed tonight. He saw his mother crying on his father's shoulder and assumed it was because of Clay refusing to budge, but held no sympathy for her. His brother had done the right thing, unpopular though it might be. She would have to deal with it.
“Well, what a fun night,” Meecham declared, fake smile plastered on his face.
“No kidding,” Robert snorted. “What do you think will happen?”
“Well, as far as I'm concerned, they can go,” Gary shrugged. “John Webb is going if I have to drive him there myself. We gave him the opportunity to change and he has quite obviously not done it. We don't owe him anything.”
“What about the rest?” Robert asked. “The Georges, for instance.”
“That lie . . . it's probably best if they go,” he shook his head slowly. “I still cannot believe she would do something like that. I have always, always thought she was one of the finest women I knew. I did not see that coming, man.”
“No one else did apparently,” Robert agreed. “I'm going home,” he said suddenly. “The excitement is over and I've already had a hard day before this started. Looks like tomorrow is coming early, too. See you.”
“Night.”
***
“You okay?” Lainie asked at once when Clay entered the house. He was breathing hard and wringing wet.
“I'm good,” he promised, stripping his boots off. “I'm going to get a shower. I assume I've let supper get cold?”
“Don't you worry about that,” Lainie told him, frowning. “Take your shower and I’ll be here waiting for you with at least a warm if not piping hot supper.”
“I don't deserve you,” he sighed.
“No one does, really,” she smirked, and he laughed for the first time in what seemed like forever.
He emerged fifteen minutes later wearing clean sweats and with his hair still damp. He found a hot meal waiting as promised and eagerly dug in, realizing only when she sat down that Lainie was just now eating as well.
“You waited for me?” he asked, frowning.
“Of course I did,” she scoffed. “I hate eating alone, even if I am a cheap date,” she grinned and he had to laugh once more.
“So, wanna tell me what happened?” she asked.
“We had sort of a revolt, I guess,” he said calmly. At her stunned look he began to bring her up to date on the afternoon and evening's proceedings.
***
“Where you going?” Leon asked without his usual rancor as Marla Jones stacked her things next to the front door.
“Your grandson is kicking me out!” she snarled at him.
“Now is that really what's happening?” he asked her.
“We went to demand he stop letting that lesbian around the children or we'd leave and he chose them over us,” she retorted.
“Well, that sounds more like you bit off more 'n you could chew, don't it?” Leon smirked. “Hate to see you go, but you gotta do what ya gotta do.”
“Is that all you have to say to me?” she demanded as Leon struggled to get to his feet. Janice was there before he could struggle more than just a second, taking his arm gently and helping him get up.
“Have a safe trip?” Leon shrugged. “Don't forget to write, maybe? What am I supposed to say?”
“You could make your grandson see reason!”
“Whose reason? Yours?” Leon asked her as he headed for his bedroom. “I've seen your reason, thanks. You're not a bad person, Marla, but you are so close minded I don't know how you learn anything new. This has been going on for days and it's got to stop. If that means some of you leaving, well . . . we’ll just have to bear up under that pressure. S
o like I said; have a safe trip. Take care and don't forget to write. Or maybe don't be a stranger? Though I should add don't bring other strangers here with you.”
“You ungrateful old bastard,” she muttered.
“Yeah, yeah,” Leon had heard it before. “Don't forget heathen. Don't listen to her,” he said to Janice in a stage whisper. “My parents was married when I was conceived.” He made it into his room and sat on his bed, sending Janice to get Brick. When the big man stepped inside, Leon motioned for him to close the door.
“Keep an eye out tonight,” he ordered. “Marla is apparently leaving after some kind of ruckus with Clayton, and she's got a mean streak. Make sure she don't hurt us any. Okay?”
“Of course,” Brick nodded. “I shall see to it.”
“Then I'm going to bed. Seems like Clayton has this well in hand.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
The morning was somber. Had it not been for the noise, someone might have thought it was a funeral.
A semi-trailer was backed into the house used by the George family. Titus, Heath, Zach and Kade were loading furniture and luggage inside, with help from Jake Sidell and Sienna Newell. Others kept their distance, especially the Sanders family and anyone who had been part of the previous evening’s events.
There was a much simpler scene at the orphanage where Trisha Bonham and Joselyn Moore gathered their meager belongings and those of their children. Both had been crying but they had no one to blame for the spot they were in but themselves. They had known the truth when they decided to follow Franklin and Malitha George down the hill.
John Webb had been crying to his family all morning, but was getting a decidedly cold reception from his older brothers and was being ignored completely by his widowed sisters-in-law. Neither could stand his attitude and this was the final straw in their book.
“You made your choice, Johnny,” Lucas said sadly. “You knew the deal, knew what you were doing and did it anyway. You've been acting badly since we came back here, like a dog snapping at the hands that feed you. We've talked to you, they've talked to you, and you still do this. This is on you, little brother.”
“But I didn't know!” John protested. “Mrs. George, she said-,”
“When was the last time anything here was decided by mob rule, Johnny?” Samuel asked him. “I can tell you if you don't know; never. Things are done orderly here. It may not always be the way we want, the result may not always be the one we would ask for, but it's done fairly and orderly. You knew that, didn't you.” It was a statement rather than a question.
“Worse, as far as I'm concerned, you did all this knowing it could put us in a bad way with the rest,” Lucas told him next. “A less than fair man or family might have blamed us all for your actions and then where would we be? You think anyone else would let us lay around, not contributing in any way, just because we got hurt somewhere else? I can tell you right now it ain't likely. Ain't likely at all.”
“You endangered all of us doing this, John,” Samuel nodded. “The adults are one thing, but your sister is only fifteen years old. You could have cost her the safest place she could be right now with this bullshit. You want to be treated like a grown man, you need to learn to act like one. Maybe being on your own will do that. Apparently we can't.”
A similar scene was being acted out between Lainie Harper and her grandmother.
“Just letting him kick me out,” Marla said, her voice just shy of snide. They were sitting on the front porch of Leon's house, waiting for the truck to come and get her things.
“As I understand it, you made the choice to issue an ultimatum to him,” Lainie didn't quite smirk. “How's that working out for you?”
“You think this is all some big joke, don't you?” Marla snorted. “Just like him. Well, you wait and see who has the last laugh. And you,” she shook her head. “After all I did for you? This is the thanks I get? Really?”
“You can't be serious,” Lainie scoffed. “Thanks? How about my paying off that store you were so proud of? Wasn't that thanks? That Cadillac you drove before the Storm killed it. How about that for some 'thanks', Marla. I've been damn good to you ever since I got in a position to be that way. I never forgot you or what you did to help me. Ever. But once you tried to get me to leverage my relationship with Clay for you? We were pretty much done after that.”
“So him over me,” Marla grumped.
“Ain't that the way it's supposed to be?” Leon's voice made them both jump. He eased out onto the porch with Janice Hardy holding him steady, sinking into the chair he often called his throne. I can see most of my kingdom from here, he would joke.
“Man and a woman get together, they're supposed to cling to one another,” Leon went on once he caught his breath. “Not put other people above each other. Including family,” he looked directly at Marla.
“You know this is wrong,” Marla shot back.
“No, I don't,” Leon shook his head. “I do know this is a bunch of horseshit, that I do know. Raising all this hell over something so stupid. This whole place is in an uproar over nothing but a bunch of bullshit. Tell me something, Marla,” he looked at her again. “If those women came into your store spending money, would you take it?”
“That's different!”
“Is it, now,” Leon's raspy voice chuckled. “I figured as much. You would like 'em just fine so long as it was beneficial to you. Funny how something so simple as this brings out a side of folks you ain't never seen before.”
“I could understand Josh doing as he did. Didn't like it and tried to talk him out of it, but he made his decision in anger and grief, and I know what that's like. His poor family paid the price of following him without question, and I hate that to my bones. But at least I could see his reasoning.
“But you bunch?” he shook his head. “Where is your reasoning, Marla? And Franklin and Malitha, for that matter. I thought I knew Josh, and I thought I knew you three, too. Yet here you surprise me even worse than Josh managed to. Spewing hate so vile as to accuse a young woman of being a child molester. What would you do if someone accused you of such?”
“I'm not like her!” Marla exclaimed.
“No,” Lainie agreed. “She's better than you are, apparently.”
“I'd have to agree,” Leon nodded, speaking over Marla's indignant squawk. “If you can't see how heinous Malitha's lie was, then you ain't the person I always took you for. Reckon my judgment ain't near what I always thought it was,” he said sadly, his head falling to look at the porch flooring.
“It's not your judgment, it's the people around you,” Janice surprised him by saying. “It's not your fault if they show you false colors, Mister Leon.”
“What the hell do you know, anyway?” Marla asked the teen contemptuously.
“I know what it's like to be treated as something less than human,” the girl replied evenly. “I know what it's like to be considered expendable by the people around you. Thought of as something to throw away. I know that.”
No one spoke for a while as her words echoed through their minds.
***
“But why are we leaving?” Marcy George asked yet again.
“I told you why,” Malitha replied. “They're kicking us out!”
“I can't believe that,” Marcy shook her head. “They aren't that kind of people. What brought all this on?”
“Do you want to live here with that . . . abomination living near us!”
“What?” Marcy was stunned. “What are you talking about?”
“Those two homosexuals! Living and working here, one of them even caring for children!” Malitha clucked, as if that explained everything.
“I don't care about that,” Marcy replied evenly. “It's not like they hit on me, after all. They can do as they please so long as they don't force it on me. Who cares?”
The sound of Malitha's hand hitting Marcy's jaw sounded far too loud in the nearly empty house. Marcy slowly lifted a hand to her face, rubbing it softly as she looke
d at her mother.
For her part, Malitha seemed to realize what she had done and looked almost shocked at herself.
“Marcy, I-,”
“Save it,” Marcy told her softly. “I'd not want to hear it.” With her mother still stammering at her, Marcy George walked outside. She spoke softly to the boys loading the truck as she passed them by.
“Don't load anything from my room until I get back,” she told Titus Terry.
“Uh . . . okay?” Titus looked at her quizzically.
Marcy didn't elaborate as she stalked away from the Square and down the Hill toward the Troy farm.
***
“Heads up, Boss,” Nate Caudell said softly. “You got company.”
Clay looked up to see Marcy George stalking her way toward them, more determined than he'd ever seen her before.
“Well, shit,” he breathed rather than said as he stood. He hadn't counted on this, but in hindsight he should have. Marcy was sixteen, probably soon be seventeen. Grown up enough to have her say, or so she'd figure. Apparently she was coming to do just that. She never slowed until she was right in front of Clay, then came to an abrupt halt before him, looking him directly in the eye.
“Do I have to go?”
Caught completely by surprise, Clay could only form a one word response.
“Huh?” This was not what he'd been expecting.
“Can I stay?” Marcy asked him plainly. “I don't want to go. To Jordan I mean. Or anywhere else.”
“What happened to your face, Marcy?” Nate asked her. The girl's hand immediately went to her jaw before she could stop it.
“Nothing.”
“Marcy, what happened to you?” Nate pressed softly. He liked Marcy George. She was strong willed and high spirited, never afraid to get her hands dirty or to tackle a tough job.
“My mother hit me,” she admitted just as quietly. “I was complaining about leaving and . . . I don't care about those two. Gwen and Trudy, I mean,” she clarified. “I mean, who cares what they get up to in private? That ain't none of my business. But . . . this has become my home,” she looked back to Clay. “I love my parents, but . . . they've lost their damn minds. I'm not giving up my home for that.”
