Such Rough Splendor

by Cinda Richards

  “She knows it, Ernie,” Mac said patiently.

  “The hell she does!”

  “Ernie, she’s in here talking with her brother. Now, will you climb down for a minute?”

  Amelia glanced up as Ernie poked his head into the room. She gave him a little wave.

  “I don’t understand this,” Ernie told Mac. “Do you understand this?”

  “No,” Mac assured him, “but I try not to let it worry me.”

  “What’s the other thing?” Bobby asked.

  “I’m… going home now,” Amelia said.

  “Does he know it?” Bobby asked, jerking his head in the direction where Mac still stood with Ernie.

  “No.”

  “Are you going to tell him?”

  “Of course I’m going to tell him,” Amelia said in annoyance. “I’m…”

  “You’re what?” Bobby asked when she didn’t go on.

  “I… love him.”

  “Then why are you going?”

  Amelia sighed. “Because—maybe that’s not enough. Because what I feel for him gets in the way of everything else, and I’ve got to get far enough away so I can tell what’s happening.”

  Bobby stared at her for a moment. “You going to hassle me about the hospital?”

  “No, Bobby. You do whatever you have to do. I told you, you’re my brother. I love you. I just wanted you to know you could still tie up a loose end if you wanted to. I’m going home—oh, and if you care anything about Beth, you might want to let her know what’s happening with you.”

  “It’s not as bad as it looks,” Bobby said quietly. “I was just—trying on an old hat.” He gave a small shrug. “I don’t think it fits anymore.”

  Amelia smiled at him. No, she didn’t think it fit anymore either. “Call me, will you? When you can.”

  Bobby nodded, and Amelia walked back to the doorway. “Are you ready to go?” she asked Mac. “Or would you rather stay here?”

  “No, I wouldn’t rather stay here. What kind of crack is that!”

  “I was only asking, Mac. Given our last meeting—and Wyona—I don’t know how you think I’d know.”

  Mac followed her to the truck, and Amelia drove them back to the McDade place, Mac frowning all the way.

  “You know when I said there was a reason Pearl knew my name?” he said when she pulled into the yard.

  “Yes,” she said, turning off the motor. The moon was shining through the cottonwoods, and the night wind made the shadows inside the cab of the truck move wildly about.

  “Well, what I meant to say is that there’s no recent reason why she knows my name—and that’s all I’ve got to say about it.”

  “All right.”

  “I mean it, Amelia.”

  “All right,” she said again.

  “Are you—upset?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s—not recent.”

  “Then are you going to kiss me or not?”

  Amelia smiled. She could barely make out his features in the moonlit night.

  “Not there!” he said in alarm as she leaned toward him.

  “Poor Mac,” she whispered, kissing the place he indicated just to the left of his mouth. “More?”

  “Right here,” he said, tapping his left eyebrow.

  “More?” Her kisses were soft and ended with a light touch of her tongue.

  “No, that’s it,” he said sadly. “Everything else hurts.”

  Amelia laughed softly, taking his hand in hers and gently caressing his fingers. His beautiful, gentle, beat-up hands. She loved them. She looked up at him. “Mac, I’m going home,” she said, and he took his hand away. “Mac, I have to be where I can think—I told you that—”

  “By God, you’re going to do it to me again, aren’t you? No!” he snapped when she would have taken his hand again. “You give me everything you have to give, and then you just—take it all back again.”

  “Mac, don’t make it any harder than it already is.”

  “Don’t make it any harder?” he said incredulously. “Look, lady, there’s one thing you don’t understand. I want it to be hard for you. I don’t want you just breezing out of here. I want it to be the hardest damn thing you’ve ever done in your life!”

  “Mac, I told you I had to think!”

  “Can’t you think here?”

  “No!” She dropped her head for a moment, then looked back up at him. “I’m—afraid, Mac. I’m afraid it isn’t real. I’m afraid it’s some kind of nostalgia thing—like you had with Marlene.”

  “This is nothing like what I had with Marlene, dammit! Amelia, I love you!”

  “I have to go. I have to!”

  “All right! All right,” he said more quietly. “I promised you, didn’t I? I promised to do anything I could for you.” He looked out the truck window toward the hills and the road that led into Chimayo. Then he opened the door and climbed painfully out, leaving her sitting in the moonlight alone.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  BOBBY RETURNED WITH Pop’s truck sometime during the night, and no one in the household slept. Amelia made her travel arrangements early, packing with her usual expertise and wearing the same white linen suit—cleaned and pressed but somewhat the worse for wear.

  Mac insisted on taking her to the airport, his face grim and haggard from sitting up most of the night with Bobby, his silences overwhelming. He had nothing to say to her, and at some point during the morning he recruited Ernie to drive “Louise” for him because he could hardly walk.

  When it was time to go, Bobby carried her luggage, putting it into the back of the old green truck while a tearful Rita hugged Amelia one last time, waiting until he could hug her as well.

  “Don’t worry about him,” Bobby whispered into her ear. “Ernie and I will take care of him.”

  “Thank you, Bobby,” she answered.

  Ernie arrived, and Mac immediately grabbed him by his shirt front. “You’re not drinking, are you?”

  Ernie sighed, letting Mac smell his breath. “No, I ain’t drinking. You know I can’t drink and drive. I can’t even drink and walk. Now, are you getting in this truck or do you want me to walk a chalk line?”

  “You’re really funny, Ernie,” Mac said sarcastically.

  “I know it,” Ernie said mildly, holding open the door with great ceremony for the injured. “I’m a clown, remember?”

  Pop walked around to the other side of the truck with Amelia, handing her something wrapped in a paper towel as she got in. “I ain’t done with it,” he said, “but I want you to go ahead and have it. It ain’t much—just something Mac’s mama showed me how to do.”

  Amelia started to unwrap it, but he wouldn’t let her. “Not now. Wait till you get on the plane.” He reached out to pat her gently on the cheek, and Ernie started the truck. Amelia was acutely aware of Mac’s body next to hers, but he still said nothing. And the trip to Albuquerque continued in silence, with only the country-western music on the radio and Mac’s studied interest in the passing scenery that had to be more than familiar to him. Sixteen miles out of Albuquerque on Interstate 25 he suddenly reached for her hand, sliding his rough fingers between hers and holding on with a desperate grip.

  And he continued to hold her hand, finally letting go when they were in the airport and her flight number had been called. He hobbled along with her as far as he could go, and she couldn’t keep from looking at him, at his big cowboy hat with the feathers, and his scuffed-up boots and faded jeans, at his handsome beat-up face. She waited until last to look into his eyes.

  “I love you,” he said gravely. “I want you to marry me. If you—if you decide you can’t—can’t make it out here with me, don’t send me a letter, all right? A man ought not have to get two Dear John letters in his life.”

  “Mac …” She wanted him to understand, but there was no time.

  “The man wants your boarding pass,” he said, looking away.

  She let the man with the
clipboard have her pass, trying to see Mac around him.

  “Bobby’s going to be all right,” Mac said as the man held open the door for her to come through.

  Amelia nodded. “You’ll let me know about Scooter, won’t you?”

  “Sure,” he called over the man’s head. His voice was raspy and strained.

  Amelia watched him as long as she could, standing where she could see him until the door closed. She was going to remember that stricken look on his face for the rest of her life—that look that came when he knew she was really going, and he bowed his head.

  Amelia didn’t unwrap Pop’s gift until she was home, leaving it in the pocket of her suit jacket because she knew she’d cry. It was a half-finished wood carving, and it was her—in her “thumbtack” garb, the face she recognized as her own smiling out from under Mac’s too-large hat. And she did cry over it, sitting on her front porch in the swing until it got too dark and she couldn’t cry anymore. She went inside the old house that was somehow both familiar and strange, moving listlessly about. Everything seemed so cluttered to her—even the horizon seemed cluttered. It was so hot. She could hardly draw a breath after her weeks in the New Mexico high country. She telephoned Miss Lilly to relieve her of her house-sitting duties, exchanging pleasantries she didn’t feel and giving a travelogue that left her exhausted. But she couldn’t sleep. She lay in her own bed, listening to the whippoorwills and the katydids and seeing Mac’s face at the airport. The humidity was too high, she told herself. And she was too alone. She could call Mac, she thought, staring at the telephone by the bed—but she didn’t. And no one called her until three days later—Bobby—just to let her know he’d made peace with the rules committee.

  “Have you seen Mac?” Amelia couldn’t keep from asking.

  “No, Amelia. I’m at the hospital. Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” She had no answer to that, and she could only wait until she did. She had come home to think, and that’s what she did, taking long walks along Coy Creek—not the actual name of the slow-moving body of water, but a name her father had given it because it was sometimes there and sometimes not. She slept late—or perhaps she was still on Mountain Standard Time—and Bobby called again, this time to talk about Senepol cattle from the Virgin Islands he thought might do well on his East Tennessee acreage. Amelia made a point of not asking about Mac, and Bobby didn’t mention him.

  She missed Mac so! She began to listen to country-western music, something she had never done in her life except at the McDades. She mentally categorized the lyrics: “drinking songs,” “cheating songs,” and “songs about Mac.” Those were the blatantly erotic love songs, which led to a blatantly erotic dream that relived his tender passion:

  She was searching for him in a strange place she should have recognized but couldn’t, calling him over and over.

  “What, baby?” he answered, but she couldn’t see him.

  “Mac?” she called again, her voice echoing in this shadowy place.

  She saw him suddenly, waiting for her, but it wasn’t shadowy anymore. There was sunlight in her eyes, and she couldn’t see his face. She reached out for him, and she could feel him, feel his warm body against hers.

  “Come love me,” he whispered, his hands going into her hair as his mouth came down on hers. “Your beautiful hair,” he whispered, because somehow it was long again and his fingers raked it free of pins. She could feel them falling all around her as her hair came tumbling down around her shoulders.

  “Love me,” Mac said again, kneeling, his arms around her waist. She could feel his mouth at her breast, feel him inside her as they lay together in the big four-poster in her upstairs bedroom.

  “Do you love me?” he asked, never once abating in his sensuous rhythm.

  “Yes,” she said urgently. “Yes!” Her body strained against him.

  “Tell me. Tell me!” he demanded. “Why don’t you tell me?”

  “I love you, Mac,” she promised. “I love you!”

  “Darlin’ Amelia,” he whispered into her ear—and he was gone, leaving her with her desire feverish and unsated.

  “Mac!” she called to him. “Mac!”

  The sun was shining brightly into her bedroom.

  “Mac.” She came awake whispering, knowing that she’d said his name out loud.

  Why didn’t he call? Clearly with him it was out of sight, out of mind. She was short-tempered and edgy, and she worried that he’d been injured worse then he’d let on, or that he’d been injured again.

  In her better moments she understood his silence. She had wanted to be free of him so she could decide, and he was giving her what she wanted. And the solution to her dilemma was quite simple really. Mac couldn’t live here, not ever. It had taken him a long hard time to know where he belonged. He was such a rarity—a man who had found his niche, who was happy in his life’s work.

  All I have to do is give up my life here and follow him.

  “I have to be sure,” she said out loud. But there was no way to do that, and she knew it. She had to take the chance for happiness with Mac in New Mexico—or she had to let it go.

  In desperation she drove one hot afternoon into Knoxville to shop for things she didn’t need with money she couldn’t spare, strolling listlessly around the shopping mall and then coming home again, having bought nothing. When she got out of the car she saw a small glint of silver on the front walk. She walked to it, bending down to see.

  It was a Hershey’s kiss. She picked it up thoughtfully, seeing another glint of silver out of the comer of her eye. Another one lay farther up the walk, then another, then one on the bottom porch step and another on the edge of the porch. She followed the trail, picking up each one as she came to it, her heart pounding.

  She rounded the corner on the porch, her hands full of chocolate kisses. Mac was sitting on the swing, the rest of the bag of chocolates in his hand. He was wearing his cowboy clothes—his faded jeans and his patched lucky blue checked shirt and his lucky belt buckle. His face was so much better, and she stood staring at him, too overwhelmed to speak.

  “Bait,” he said finally, shaking the bag a little, a grin playing at the corners of his mouth.

  “Oh,” she said softly. “I see. Are you… hunting for anything in particular?”

  “Well, yes,” he said. “I’m pretty particular.” He made no move to get out of the swing, and she still stood a few feet from him, her hands cupped around the chocolate kisses.

  “I’ve… been here a while,” he offered, his eyes moving lovingly over her face and her body. “I didn’t hear your ghost though. Are you sure you’ve got one? What does he do anyway?”

  Amelia swallowed and searched for her voice again. “He … calls his mother. In a nasal… New England… accent.”

  “Nope,” Mac said solemnly. “Didn’t hear him.”

  “How—how did you get here?”

  “‘Louise.’ ”

  Amelia looked around the yard. She saw no ancient green truck.

  “I left her down the road at Miss Lilly’s. I was afraid if you saw it”—he gave a small shrug—“you’d keep going.”

  “No,” she said, her voice barely a whisper.

  “No?” he asked, and she didn’t answer. “I… missed you,” he said, and she nodded, looking too deeply into his beautiful hazel eyes, causing them both to have to look away.

  “Listen,” Mac said, looking back at her. “You might as well know I’m not here because I got caught on the 1-40 and couldn’t get off. I got up a few mornings ago. Pop said, ‘Where are you going?’ I said, ‘Tennessee.’ He said, ‘It’s about damned time.’ I tried to stay away, but this is about as long as I can take it. I miss you, Amelia. I came to get you and, dammit, that’s all there is to it. I’ve got things worked out with Marlene—and Scooter and I need you. I love you, honey. I came to take you home.”

  She bit her lower lip and took a small breath, reaching out and taking the bag of kisses out of his hand.

  “Do I
… get to have all of these?” she asked, avoiding looking into his eyes again.

  “Everything I have is yours,” he said quietly.

  “I’m glad you got things worked out with Marlene,” she said, putting the bag and the kisses she had in her hands on a small wooden table on the porch. A robin ran and listened in the front yard.

  “Pop and Rita send their love,” Mac went on a little desperately. “And Scooter wants you to tell him a Sissy story. And Killer Fred—he’s all depressed—misses you like hell. Pearl says hello—Bobby thinks he wants to come back here and raise cows—and Ernie—he’s—Amelia, how long are you going to let me rattle on like this? Are you going to marry me or not?”

  She looked out across the front yard, her eyes traveling over it lovingly. That would be good, she thought. If Bobby raised cows here—maybe with Beth—he could have the house. Daniel would have to pacify Kerry some other way.

  She looked back at him. Mac. Her cowboy-rancher-pilot-Judas-goat-mother-figure-recruiting sergeant. Her lover. Her compañero.

  “Are… you interested in making a baby?” she asked him abruptly, and he tried not to grin.

  “I’m pretty damned interested in making one with you,” he answered. “Amelia?” he said, getting up from the swing.

  All I had to do was say your name, she remembered him saying.

  She gave him a slow, welcoming smile. “Well, that’s it then. I’m marrying you.”

  And, in keeping with his ten-year fantasy—she was all over him.