Spit and Grit

by Jeanie P Johnson

  “His wife just died, Butch. He needs to give her the respect she deserves. Me being there is not going to help.”

  “You are probably right. I’ll send her a telegram the next time I go into town,” he tells me.

  Butch takes me into town so I can deposit the check in a bank. He sends the telegram to his mother. Christmas passes and Butch and I spend it alone together. I fix a big dinner. We find decorations in the attic, which we use to decorate a tree that Butch manages to find and cut down. His family sends gifts. I send gifts to Ma and Billy. I give Butch handkerchiefs that I have embroidered his initials on. He gives me a ship he has carved with a dolphin as the figurehead. He paints Blue Dolphin on the side of it. I can’t believe he gave me something like that when he loves me the way he claims he does. It’s his way of telling me he understands how I feel about Randolph. He’s getting ready to let me go, I think.

  Butch starts sleeping in another room. He tells me he wants to slowly get used to me not being next to him at night. He still holds me at times and kisses me. It makes me sad. Everything seems to be changing and I don’t know if it is for better or worse.

  One February morning, we hear a knock on the door. We never have visitors, so this is unusual. Butch goes to answer the door, but I am close behind him. We find Granger standing there.

  “Hello, Granger,” Butch says. “This is a surprise.”

  Butch puts his arm around me, drawing me next to him. I think he wants Granger to believe that we have fallen in love and he has no chance with me any longer.

  “Come in,” he says at last, as we step back and let Granger enter.

  “Sorry to show up unannounced,” Granger mumbles. “I just came by to see how things were going.”

  “You mean between Mazy and me?” he asks.

  “I’m thinking of leaving. Think I’ll get a spread of my own,” he says. “Pa is willing to help me get something set up. You know Ruth died, don’t you?”

  “Ma wrote us,” Butch tells him. “Come in and have breakfast with us. We were just getting ready to eat.”

  We walk into the kitchen. We hardly ever use the dining room since there is only the two of us. I busy myself getting another plate from the cupboard and putting it on the table in front of Granger. He looks up at me with sad eyes, but he doesn’t say anything.

  “When are you taking off?” Butch asks.

  “It depends on a lot of things,” Granger says.

  “What things?” Butch asks.

  “Are you going to marry, Butch, Mazy?” he asks me suddenly.

  I widen my eyes and then look at Butch.

  “She’s free to do as she pleases,” Butch says in a low voice. “We haven’t decided on it for certain.”

  “Do you still love me, Mazy?” he asks. “Or has Butch managed to steal you from me?”

  “I might have loved you once,” I say slowly. “I just never knew if I really did, Granger. I was always confused cause you kept pushing and I kept balking. I left Randolph because I couldn’t live on the sea, but I wasn’t even certain if I loved you or not. Then I find out you are married.”

  “What about the night in the Branding shed?”

  By this time, Butch has gotten up from the table.

  “I’ll leave you to talk,” he says and goes out the back door.

  “That was crazy, Granger. Neither of us knew what we were doing. It was all that wondering what had happened to the other and wondering if you had made a mistake, or I had made a mistake. It was just our bodies talking, Granger, not our hearts. You had been so set on me, and then you see me with Butch. You were married, Granger. Even if you couldn’t love Ruth the way you thought you loved me, you could have at least tried to love her. After all, she had comforted you when you couldn’t find me. You know she cared about you.”

  “She used me, Mazy. We got into a big fight, the day you left. She admitted she was carrying a child before she met me. That is why she had the baby early. It wasn’t early, Mazy, it was right on time, only she couldn’t push it out. She wasn’t big enough to let the head pass. I’m sorry for what happened to her, but I never loved her and I started hating her when I discovered the truth about the baby.”

  I sit there stunned. My heart goes out to Granger, but I realize at that moment that too much has happened for anything to go back to the way it used to be. The way it used to be, I didn’t even want to marry Granger. I realize I don’t want to marry Butch either. If I married Butch, Granger would always be there, reminding me, wanting me. I don’t think I could face the turmoil of it all.

  “I am sorry for the way she used you, Granger. I hope you can find someone who does deserve your love. I sure don’t, Granger. I never wanted to marry you in the beginning, but you kept pressing me, and then it seemed like I had no choice, seeing as how I was going to have a baby.

  “Your love for me is too strong, Granger. I could never match it. I would always feel guilty or smothered by it because I couldn’t love you in the same way you seem to love me. I’m not marrying Butch either. He is just a good friend. He was trying to save me from what your love might do to us, seeing as how you were married and it didn’t stop you from trying to have me. I should never have met you at the Branding shed, Granger. I’m glad I didn’t end up carrying your child because of it.”

  “I’ll never stop loving you, Mazy,” he murmurs.

  “You will have to try,” I tell him.

  He gets up and walks to the door.

  “Thanks for the breakfast,” he mumbles. “Tell Butch goodbye for me.”

  Then he is walking through the door, not looking back.

  My heart is pounding in my chest. I have let Granger go and I am going to have to let Buck go as well.

  A few minutes later, Butch comes into the kitchen. I am still sitting at the table, rolling the little dolphin on my chain between my fingers.

  “I saw Granger leave. I take it you aren’t going with him.”

  “No. I think I want to go home, Butch. I have money now. I can find my own way back to New York in the spring.”

  “I’ll miss you, Mazy,” he smiles sadly.

  “We can still stay friends,” I tell him.

  “It just won’t be the same though,” he replies.

  “Nothing ever stays the same,” I murmur. “If Granger could make it out here easy enough, I think we can make it back to my place as well,” I point out.

  “Guess we’ll leave in the morning then,” he tells me.

  We don’t speak much on the trip back. There isn’t anything to say, I think. Buck gives me all the little-carved creatures he made, he says to remember the time we spent at the beach house. I think I will miss the beach house as much as I will miss Butch. He probably loved me more than Granger did, considering all he wanted was for me to be happy. I think Randolph wanted me to be happy as well, and even though he only told me he loved me once, when he was trying to get me to eat, he must have loved me as much as Granger did, but in the same way, Butch does.

  When we get to my place, Butch gets down and unloads my things from the wagon, then he unhitches, Rocket, and hands me the lead rope to the filly.

  “She’s still yours,” he tells me. “Like Granger, I don’t think I could stand looking at her once you are gone.”

  I reach my arms around Butch’s neck and kiss him, and then he is climbing up in the wagon and is riding away.

  Ma comes to the door and sees me.

  “I didn’t expect you home so soon,” she says. “Guess you aren’t going to marry Butch after all?” she asks.

  “I never was, Ma,” I tell her.

  “Go put the horses away then,” she says and turns back to the house.

  I put Rocket and Mazy in the coral and close the gate, thinking of the time that the cows got lose in the storm and Granger came out to help me round them up again. I turn away from the gate, but my path is blocked, and a shadow falls over me. I look up and take in my breath.

  “Hello, Mazy,” I hear him say, and the
n I am falling into his arms, crying and pulling myself up to him and kissing his mouth. He is kissing me back with all the passion I am feeling at the moment.

  “Randolph. You are here, you are here,” I breathe when our lips part.

  “I was getting ready to leave when your mother told me that you planned to marry Granger’s brother.” He looks down and lifts the dolphin on the chain with his finger. “I see you got my gift,” he smiles.

  “I found a plank with Blue Dolphin written on it. Did your ship sink?” I ask suddenly.

  “We all got safely to shore though,” he tells me. “I was thinking I might try living on the shore for a bit. I have three other ships, but they all have captains to sail them. Your Ma tells me you have been living in a beach house. Do you like living by the ocean?” he asks.

  “It reminded me of you,” I tell him. “I got the check that Martin sent. That’s how I knew you didn’t go down with your ship.”

  “It seems Martin saw reason,” he chuckles. “Now the only question is, are you going to see reason?”

  “What reason?” I ask.

  “All the reasons I love you,” he tells me. “It’s going to take a lifetime to relate them all to you though. I just wondered if you had the time to spend?”

  “All the time in the world and more,” I breathe, and then Randolph is covering my mouth with his, and I realize what love actually feels like as my heart swells and my body trembles and I lean against the only man I could ever truly love.

  THE END