The Road Home

by Michael Thomas Ford

  “Have I told you about my daughter?” she asked.

  “You have a daughter? I thought you said you lost your baby.”

  “I did,” Lucy said. “But I had another. Her name is Theresa, although now she calls herself Chloe. She’s thirty-nine, or will be on the twenty-eighth.”

  “Does she live here?” asked Burke.

  “Phoenix,” Lucy told him. “With her husband and two children.”

  “Why don’t you see them more often?”

  “When Theresa—Chloe—told us that she was engaged to David, Jerry and I told her we thought she was making a mistake. She was in college, a junior, and he was her art professor. I told her it would never last and that he would leave her for another student.”

  “But he didn’t?”

  “No,” said Lucy. “They’ve been together almost twenty years. The twins are eighteen. They just graduated from high school. Chloe sent me pictures.”

  “It sounds like she’s gotten over it,” Burke remarked.

  “I wouldn’t go that far,” said Lucy. “For the first five years she wouldn’t speak to us at all. She returned birthday and holiday cards, moved without telling us where they were going. Then David convinced her to make contact. He’d started to go to AA, and it was part of the whole ‘asking for forgiveness’ thing, I guess. Anyway, that’s when Jerry and I found out we had three-year-old grandsons. Things got better after that, but it’s really only been since Jerry died that she’s made any real effort.” Her face had a hard look to it, which Burke had never seen before. “I’ll never forgive her for that,” she said.

  “I can’t imagine what it must have been like,” Burke said, not knowing what else to say to her.

  “One of the great lies we tell ourselves is that just because we’re related to people, we have to like them,” said Lucy. “This will sound terrible, but I don’t like my daughter. I love her. I love her very much. But I don’t like who she is, and I don’t like what she did to us.” She glanced at Burke. “It’s a horrible thing to not like your child. Even harder than knowing that your child doesn’t like you.”

  “I don’t dislike Dad,” Burke said.

  “I’m not saying you do,” Lucy replied. “And I’m not saying he doesn’t like you. I’m saying that there’s nothing more complicated—or fragile—than the relationship between parents and their children. It’s like no other relationship there is. And no one tells you how to make it work. Either you find your way or you don’t.”

  “So what’s my way?”

  “I just told you, you have to figure it out for yourself.”

  “How can I when he won’t talk about anything?”

  Lucy sighed. “All you can do is try,” she said.

  “That’s a shitty answer,” said Burke.

  Lucy nodded. “It sure is,” she said. “But it’s the only one I’ve got. If they had a pill that would fix every dysfunctional family in the world, don’t you think they’d be selling it?”

  “I don’t think the world is ready for that kind of happiness.”

  “Probably not,” Lucy agreed. “So since we’re being all huggy bunny, how about you tell me what’s going on with you and Will Janks?”

  “Nothing,” Burke said instantly. “Why?”

  “I thought so,” said Lucy, obviously disbelieving him. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to say anything to your father. Or Mars. I’m just being nosy.”

  Burke groaned. “I don’t know,” he said. “It’s all a little weird. I mean, he’s Mars’s kid, and he’s really young, and he has a girlfriend. It just sort of happened.”

  “At least you have good taste,” Lucy said. “You have that in common with your father, anyway.”

  “He started it,” said Burke. “Not that I didn’t think he was attractive. But I never would have . . . if he hadn’t . . . if . . .”

  “No need to explain,” Lucy assured him. “We’ll just call it a summer fling, how about that?”

  “I guess that’s what it is,” said Burke.

  “Do you want it to be more than that?”

  “No,” Burke answered. “Yes. Maybe. There are a whole lot of ifs in that answer.”

  “I don’t like what Theresa did,” said Lucy, “but I will say this for her—she didn’t let what Jerry and I thought about her relationship with David stop her from listening to her heart.”

  “She could just as easily have been wrong about him,” Burke argued.

  “That’s not important. What’s important is that she took the chance,” said Lucy. “It’s something I wish I’d done more of when I was younger.”

  “You don’t regret marrying Jerry, do you?”

  “Oh, no. Not for a minute. But there were other men—and a woman or two—I said no to because I thought it would be too complicated. Jerry was an easy choice. Not a bad one, but an easy one. Your father was slightly more risky.”

  Burke laughed. “I have to admit, I’ve sometimes wondered about that. The two of you are so different.”

  “That’s what I like about it,” said Lucy. “But it’s also something I had to get over. Jerry and I were very similar. I always knew what he was thinking, what he wanted, even if he didn’t say it directly. With Ed I never quite know. That’s why it’s interesting.”

  “Are you saying I should take a chance with Will?”

  “I’m not saying you should do anything. But don’t not do it just because it might be hard.”

  Burke made a vague noise. He wasn’t sure he agreed with his father’s girlfriend. Taking chances was a romantic idea, but there were practical considerations, and with Will there were a whole lot of them. On the one hand, he was sweet and funny, and his enthusiasm both in and out of bed was electrifying. On the other, he seemed to be unwilling to change his life in ways that would make it possible for them to be together. Unless he changed his stance about that, it rendered all the positive points moot. But there was always a chance, wasn’t there?

  “We’ll see,” he said. “One thing at a time. Dad might be an easier thing to cross off the list first.”

  “List?” Lucy said. “Your life isn’t a list.”

  Burke scratched at his arm. It was itching ferociously. He watched flakes of dead skin fall away like snow. His wrist ached. He wondered what Will would say when he saw him looking like he had a pterodactyl limb.

  “Don’t shut down on me,” Lucy said. “Let’s talk this out.”

  Burke fixed her with a look. “You first,” he said. “Let’s talk about these ‘one or two’ women you passed up.”

  Lucy grinned. “Touché,” she said.

  CHAPTER 26

  “It makes sense,” Sam insisted. “Amos and Thomas were lovers. Tess was their cover. Nobody would have thought it was odd that Thomas lived on the farm, too. It was the perfect situation.”

  “Then how do you explain Peter Woode?” asked Burke. “And the fact that Tess had at least two children?”

  “The children are easy,” said Sam. “Amos fathered both of them. Tess was pregnant when he died, which is why she married Peter Woode so quickly. That way everyone would think Grace was his daughter.”

  “But how did she get pregnant? You know, if Amos and Thomas were gay?”

  “Maybe they used a ladle,” Sam said, grinning. “I don’t know. Maybe Amos wasn’t the father of either of them.”

  “Which brings us back to Peter Woode. Explain him.”

  “Okay,” Sam replied. “Now just go with this. Amos befriended William Holburne during the war. Maybe William saw something in him, or the other way around. It doesn’t matter. Then Amos found out William was really Elizabeth Frances Walsh. He’s gay, right? So he understands not being like everyone else. He also knows the infantry is no place for a young woman. They stage William’s death. That wouldn’t be difficult. Then Amos sends William to live with Tess and Thomas. Only, he can’t be William anymore, in case someone recognizes the name. That’s when Peter Woode is born.”

  It took Burke a moment t
o work through the twists and turns of Sam’s story. When he got to the end, he said, “I still don’t get why Tess married Peter.”

  “Maybe she was a dyke,” said Sam. “Maybe she just wanted other men to leave her alone. Maybe she loved him and didn’t care what was between his legs. It doesn’t really matter.”

  Burke rolled the window next to him down farther, letting in warm summer air. It smelled of hay. In the field that ran along the road, clover grew high, the purple heads bobbing in the breeze.

  “Well?” Sam said after several minutes had passed.

  “It makes sense,” said Burke.

  “You don’t sound totally convinced.”

  Burke shrugged. “It’s just that we can’t prove any of it.”

  “Why do we need to prove it?” Sam asked.

  “It’s a mystery,” said Burke. “Mysteries need to be solved.”

  “Not always,” Sam rebutted. “Isn’t it enough that we’ve figured it out? It’s an amazing story.”

  “I guess,” Burke admitted.

  “You like things you can see,” said Sam. “Things that are solid, right? You don’t like unknowns.”

  “Who does?”

  “I do,” Sam told him. “I don’t care if I can prove any of this. I just care that it might have happened—that it probably did.”

  “But don’t you want to know that you’re right?”

  “It would be nice,” Sam admitted. “But only because then we could tell the story to other people. And we can do that, anyway. Think about it. The story would make a great book.”

  “There’s one thing I still don’t understand,” Burke said. “Why did Cain Hague run away? And why would he take his parents’ wedding rings?”

  “Why do teenagers do anything?” said Sam. “Maybe he was mad that his mother was remarrying. Maybe he loved his dads and didn’t like Tess. We don’t know how much of a mother she was to him. It’s just another part of the puzzle.”

  “This means Peter Blackburne killed his uncle,” Burke realized. “You know, if Grace and Calvin were sister and brother.”

  “But they never knew it,” said Sam. “More tragedy. Practically Shakespearean.” He pulled the car to a stop in a small parking lot beside a row of shops. “Here we are.”

  The Colton Beresford Gallery had a large plate-glass front window. In it hung a very large painting—about five feet on each side—of a German shorthaired pointer dressed in a black antebellum gown and holding in her paw three long ribbons that were attached like leashes to the necks of three identical red-haired little girls.

  “It’s called Mrs. Humphries and Her Grand Champion Old-World Children,” Sam told Burke.

  “It’s brilliant,” proclaimed Burke. “Who did it?”

  “An artist named Sarah Higdon,” Sam said. “She specializes in anthropomorphized animals. It could easily be too cute, but what she does is comment on human society by turning us into animals. Wait till you see her other stuff.”

  As they entered the gallery, Colton appeared from somewhere in the back, dressed in black jeans and a black V-neck cashmere sweater with a white T-shirt beneath it.

  Eyeing him, Burke couldn’t help but remark, “It certainly looks like a New York gallery in here.”

  Colton laughed. “You can take the boy out of New York,” he said.

  Burke was already looking around the space. First, he headed toward more paintings by the artist whose work hung in the window. As Sam predicted, it was unlike anything he’d ever seen. Most of the canvases were large, and most featured cows, rabbits, or pigs.

  “They’re oddly moving, aren’t they?” Colton asked, coming to stand beside Burke. “See how the cow is naked and the pigs are waving Bibles at her? Sarah says she’s the cow and the pigs are the people who told her she was evil for not conforming to what they thought a good girl should be. It’s titled Judging Venus.”

  “You see more in them the longer you look at them,” Burke said.

  “That’s what good art does. Come take a look at these.” Colton led him to another wall, which featured a dozen intricately constructed religious icons. They were made of pieces cut from food packaging—mostly candy wrappers and breakfast cereal boxes. Although the pieces were small enough to resemble mosaic tiles, there was enough of the original lettering and design visible to make identifying the brands fairly easy.

  “Religion as a consumer product,” said Burke, looking at a particularly beautiful Madonna and Child made from Froot Loops boxes, bubble-gum wrappers, and the silver foil from a Hershey bar. “Clever.”

  “Pop art, Vermont style,” Colton joked.

  The rest of the art in the gallery was equally interesting. In addition to paintings, Colton was showing pottery, glass art, and even several large sculptures built out of old machine parts. Although Burke couldn’t picture a lot of the things in a New York gallery setting, it wasn’t because they weren’t good enough. It was because they were in some ways too good. They didn’t try too hard, and they didn’t make the viewer have to try too hard.

  “So?” Colton asked after Burke had wandered through the gallery’s four large rooms. “Shall we do a show of Burke Crenshaw photographs?”

  “I still don’t know,” said Burke. “Not that I don’t like the gallery,” he added quickly. “It’s great. The work you have here is fantastic. I just don’t know that I have anything to say.”

  “Just keep thinking about it,” Colton told him. “If you get inspired, you know you have a home for your work.”

  “The images from the farm are interesting,” Burke said, thinking out loud. “But they’re not enough. Something is missing from them.”

  Colton patted Burke on the back encouragingly and turned to Sam. “Are you going up to Destiny this weekend?”

  “I think so,” Sam answered. “I haven’t been in a while, and they’re doing a full-moon circle.”

  “And just maybe you’ll have a repeat with Pussy Willow?” Colton said.

  “It’s Dandelion, and for your information, he happens to be a very nice guy. He’s a social worker in New Hampshire.” Sam looked at Burke and quickly looked away. “But no, I’m not expecting him to be there.”

  “Sam dragged me to one of these things,” Colton told Burke. “You have to see it to believe it. All of these fairies singing and dancing to drums around a bonfire. Half of them naked. It’s crazy.”

  “Fairies?” Burke said. “Isn’t that kind of anti-PC?”

  “Radical Faeries,” said Sam. “It’s what they call themselves. Basically they’re pagan men. Some women, too. Some trans. They don’t really define themselves in any particular way, so it’s hard to explain.”

  “Like I said, you have to see it for yourself,” Colton said. His face brightened. “You should go,” he said to Burke.

  “I don’t know,” Burke said. “I’m not sure I’d fit in.”

  “If I can fit in, you sure can,” said Colton. “I’m a nice Presbyterian boy, and nobody tried to sacrifice me to the Horned God or anything.”

  Sam rolled his eyes. “Nobody sacrifices anything,” he said. “Stop giving him the wrong impression.”

  “Not true!” Colton objected. “There was that guy who threw the doll thingy into the bonfire.”

  “It’s called a poppet,” said Sam. He looked at Burke. “It’s a figure made out of branches and leaves and flowers and whatever else you want to use. You put your intention into it and burn it to release your charge.”

  “Of course,” Colton said. “How silly of me for thinking it was a doll.”

  “You don’t have to come if you don’t want to,” Sam said to Burke.

  Burke was about to thank Sam for giving him an out, but suddenly he heard himself say, “Actually, it might be nice. If nothing else, it gets me out of the house.”

  “It’s pretty rustic,” Sam said. “Cabins. Outdoor showers. A lot of walking. It might be bad for your leg.”

  He doesn’t want me to go, Burke thought. He doesn’t think I can ha
ndle it. Or maybe he’s embarrassed. Whatever the reason, the usually unflappable Sam seemed nervous. Again, Burke was surprised to find that this made him more determined to go.

  “I think I can manage,” he said. “That is, if you don’t mind.”

  “No,” Sam said a little too quickly. “I don’t mind at all. Okay, then. We’ll go. It will be fun.” He smiled brightly.

  “Take your camera,” Colton told Burke. “You might find that inspiration you’re looking for.”

  On the car ride home Sam said, “You don’t have to come to Destiny this weekend if you don’t want to.”

  “No, I do,” said Burke. “It sounds . . . interesting.”

  Sam scratched his beard. “About the camera,” he said. “It’s considered bad form to take pictures of people without their permission.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m not going to play National Geographic photographer.”

  “I didn’t mean it that way,” Sam replied. “I know you wouldn’t do that. It’s just that sometimes people treat these gatherings like they’re freak shows. Not often, but enough that it can be a problem. The Faeries are pretty much anything goes, and if you’re not used to it, it can be a little bit much. But everyone respects everyone else’s boundaries.”

  “Got it,” said Burke. “So, are you a Faerie?”

  Sam took a moment to answer. “Sort of,” he said. “I’m more of a garden-variety pagan. But I like the Faerie energy, and they put on really good gatherings.”

  “Explain the pagan part. I mean, I have a basic idea, but what exactly does it mean?”

  “To me?” said Sam. “Because again, every pagan can have a different idea of what it means.”

  “To you, then,” Burke said.

  “To me, it means living my life in a way that allows me to be everything I can be.”

  “Didn’t the army use that line?” Burke joked.

  “We had it first,” said Sam, smiling. “To me, it also means helping others become the people they’re meant to be.”

  “Like Freddie Redmond.”

  “Like Freddie Redmond,” Sam agreed. “It’s really a way of approaching your life more than anything else, or being connected to the world and the other creatures in it. There can be other things, depending on your particular approach. Magic. Deities. Rituals.”