by Helen Conrad
"I like to think it was a message from mom and dad saying they love us very much, and that they still do wherever they are. It'd be a real disappointment to find the real truth is something closet to 'Harry's Discount Silverworks'. I just don't need to know."
"Wow," Blake said. He was looking at the locket again, but he wasn't trying to find anything in it anymore. It felt different now - a relic that had meaning and heft all its own.
"And she just left it here. Dropped it under the damned porch and left it." Kate was biting her upper lip, looking like she was ready to shout or cry or something. Instead she smiled and laughed. "I'm relieved she didn't pawn it somewhere."
"Don't you think you're being too hard on her?"
"Yes, but you know what? You can only care about something or someone so much and keep giving and giving and being disappointed before you have to give up."
There was a long silence. Kate looked out the window, and Blake tried to look like he was doing the same, but he was really looking at Kate. She was much paler than when they were kids. Must have spent much more time inside with books and convicts than out in the real world. He wondered if she could really like that, a girl this vivacious living in courtrooms and prison visiting centers.
"You know, I do have a porch that needs mending, and I've got the rest of the house to start fixing up."
"That's right. Hey, is there anything else in here you want me to do, while I'm here. I mean..."
Kate shook her head and looked at him with a stern expression. "The only thing you broke was the porch, and judging from the way you've dealt with that you aren't exactly Mr. Fix-it. The rest of the house is mine. March!"
************
Kate was upstairs, holding a large screwdriver in one hand and a flashlight in the other. She'd braved the light switch in the bathroom and it worked for about ten minutes before the bulb burnt out. It was just another item to pick up at the store, she figured, but it was good to know that not all the lights in the house would explode at the very thought of turning on. She'd have to go through the whole place, one by one, to figure out where some rewiring needed to be done.
With the looks Blake was giving her, though, she got the impression he thought she needed some rewiring, herself. It wasn't his fault. Not really. He hadn't spent the last ten years trying to prop up a girl who refused to stand on her own two feet.
If Kate were more comfortable with psychobabble, she'd call herself an enabler. She preferred plainer talk: Kate thought of herself as a sucker.
It was an almost cruel irony. The great idealist lawyer sister with the junked-out sister she turned her back on. Maybe that was what happened, though, Kate thought. You try and take on the problems of the world, the direct ones that you can have most real effect on just slip from your grip like melting snowflakes.
So it felt good to be tackling the real problem of the tub. She'd turned on the shower earlier, and there was a trickle of water, but no real pressure. If she'd enjoyed showers that were the equivalent of being drooled on by a dog on a high shelf, she'd be in seventh heaven. As it was, Kate needed to fix it.
"Sure the water’s off?" she yelled down to Blake. He yelled something back which sounded a lot like “yes”. Kate went at the faucet with her screwdriver, loosing it from its moorings. There was a sound like radio static, and then a great torrent of water shot past and around the faucet, tearing it from the tub. The water then shot in a steady stream, soaking all of Kate in a matter of seconds.
Had it happened to someone else, she was sure she would have laughed her head off. Right now, she wasn't in the mood.
"BLAKE!" she shouted.
The water started to slow down to a steady stream, and then the steady stream became a trickle. She could hear Blake's footsteps as he strolled up the stairs.
"I got the water off for you. What did you do to yourself?"
"I think I found where the water pressure problem was," Kate said in a very dry tone.
"You probably should have waited for me to shut the water off before you did that. Hey, the faucet came all the way off."
"Really? I didn't notice," Kate said. Unfortunately, the screwdriver had been knocked out of her hands so she couldn't kill Blake off right then and there for being obvious. Instead, she just kicked some water at him.
"What was that for?"
"For getting me wet. I'm never going to get this thing fixed."
"Are you going to try and blame me for this?" Blake said.
"Yes," Kate said, not missing a beat.
Blake swore under his breath. He dug in his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. "I'll take a look at this. If you're in such desperate need of a shower, you can go to my apartment and take one. Just don't go through my stuff," Blake said with a little half-smile.
Kate rolled her eyes. He was coming in, being a he-man and saving her day. Probably didn't think that she was capable of fixing everything in the house that she intended to. Well, she had no intention of being saved here. He could just forget it.
"Look, Blake, this is my problem. I'll take care of it."
"So I didn't break it?" Blake said.
"Well, you kinda did," Kate said. He did tell her the water was off when it wasn't. Or at least she thought he did...
"If I broke it, I'm fixing it. It isn't a tough proposition. I already took all the wood out of your car. Go ahead to my place."
He gave her the address. Kate wanted to protest and send him packing. This was presumptuous - she was fixing the shower because it needed doing, not for some pressing need. After all, she could go a day without a shower. A whole day after a long and sticky car ride...
"I'll go in the back way so nobody gets any wrong ideas," Kate said, and she was out of there like a shot.
************
It was nearly four in the afternoon before Blake had made his way back to his apartment, and his back ached like it had not for many a moon. The porch was not up, not by a long shot. He'd built a decent frame to secure the thing to the house, but he wasn't sure if he could rely on the foundations of the old porch to make this one stable.
He pulled his car right next to the P.T. Cruiser. They were equally filthy, since driving up around Kate's house gave cars ample opportunity to squirm around in the mud. She hadn't come back to her house in hours, and he was curious to know what she'd been getting up to at his place. It was Spartan, but it must have been a welcome change from the near ramshackle of the old house.
Tonight Blake had to be on Emergency call and tomorrow he was out on patrol. Crime wasn't a huge problem in Whispering Pines, but to have no cops on duty would be a sure guarantee that something was going to happen. His hands were full of groceries - he'd bought a pair of steaks and some potatoes for dinner tonight. He figured it would be a decent apology to Kate for not getting the work done on time. He balanced the groceries against the door, and reached for the spare key in his back pocket, and as he put weight on the door it started to sidle open.
It was a quasi-acrobatic move that kept the groceries from tipping over onto the ground, and by the time Blake had everything in hand again his back was turned towards the door.
"You left the door open, you know," he called.
Blake backed into his apartment and set the groceries down on top of the counter. On the back of one of the tall chairs sidled up next to the bar Kate had piled her dirty clothes. Blake hated having clothes left out there in the living room, but he was nervous to touch them. Whispering Pines didn't have much of a singles scene, and it had been literally years since he'd had to deal with picking up women's clothes.
Had it actually been since he'd come back from San Francisco? Blake never thought about it, but it must have been. He'd not touched a woman in three years. My God, he thought, when you retire from life you really do it whole hog.
It wasn't that big a deal, he decided. Priests go their whole lives without female companionship, and he had felt himself under a sort of penance in all his time away fro
m Seattle. Better to abstain from it all. Reasoning couldn't make longing go away, though...
He heard Kate mumble something, syllables that made no words. Sleeping sounds. He turned from the counter and saw her there on his couch, her back to him with her arms tucked in at her side. She turned a bit in her sleep, and he caught a quick glimpse of her face.
She was beautiful, especially there in her sleep. It's because she ain't talking, he thought. There was something to that. When she was asleep the guile was away from her face. That smirk that always made him wary of anything she said was gone. Without her irony, Kate was a truly beautiful woman.
She murmured again, and turned back on her side. As she did, her white blouse was caught under her arm and was pulled up a bit, revealing the side of her stomach. Blake was about to look away, like a schoolboy, but something on it looked strange. Was it a tattoo? He sneaked closer. No, it wasn't a tattoo. The red mark running down her side was a scar. It was like a fork of lightning thrusting upwards from her hip.
Blake sat down on a chair opposite her and stared. He couldn't help himself. It must have been a terrible wound to leave a scar like that, but he didn't see Kate limping or any evidence that she was recovering from a wound. At least nothing physical.
Blake’s mind twisted as though it wanted him to leave this alone. He grimaced and knew exactly what he was missing. He’d smoked back when he started on the force, before it was made illegal to do so in county buildings. He was a disciplined man, but for the first time in years he wanted a cigarette. He had a lot of thinking to do, and he needed something to keep his mind occupied and relaxed. He had nothing, though, but himself.
Kate woke up and wanted to go right back to sleep again, but she caught Blake looking at her and decided to stay awake. He was leaning back in his chair against the window, and behind him the sky was filled with red clouds, like something had set them afire. It was gorgeous. Kate couldn't help but be flattered that Blake chose to look at her rather than the splendors of nature.
"Hey, don't you know there's something creepy about watching people while they're asleep?" She smiled, but Blake didn't smile back. He was still looking at her, but it didn't look like he was seeing her. Kate sat up and tugged her clothes into place. "Jeez, I'm all ruffled. You didn't ravish me, did you?"
"What? No. Ravish you. That's silly." He stirred in his chair and looked very uncomfortable.
"Well, can't blame a girl for being protective of herself. Say, sun's almost down. What say you and me catch a bite to eat?"
"I picked up some steaks. I was going to barbecue them as a... sort of an apology." Blake was on his feet now, heading for the kitchen area. The apartment was far cleaner then Kate had expected a man's bachelor pad to be. So clean, in fact, it looked like a hotel room. There was nothing personal in the place at all, except for one small photograph frame face down on the glass coffee table. Something made Kate leery of looking at it when Blake was gone, and now that he was here, it seemed gauche.
"Steaks? Are you sure you don't want me to cook those?" Kate stood up and walked over to the kitchen. Back when she was a kid she did all the cooking for the family. In San Francisco she mostly ate out, but the opportunity to prove she was still a fine preparer of meals was something she didn't want to pass up.
"I can manage, thanks," Blake said.
"No really, I want to help." Kate walked in the kitchen and looked at the stove. It was gas powered. She'd been used to electric, but this would do in a pinch. "Where are your pans?"
Blake backed up into the corner of the kitchen like a cat getting ready to defend itself. "I'm going to cook the meal, Kate. And for God's sake, I'm not going to pan fry it. There's a barbecue on the balcony."
"You've got a balcony?"
Blake pointed to the large glass window on the far side of the living room. It was covered in blinds, but beneath that, sure enough, was a balcony. It wasn't very wide or long. Besides the barbecue, there was a single folding chair and a large pile of firewood.
Kate threw open the door and headed out onto the balcony. Blake's apartment was part of a complex just a couple blocks from the main road, so it was first somewhat surprising that the view from the balcony was so fantastic. But that was Whispering Pines. Forests and lakes and mountains every which way you turned.
These were the things she loved so much as a child without even knowing it. She couldn't know it, without having lived in the city without these things for so long. The mountain air was crisp, and the smell of the trees was invigorating. Being surrounded by nature was like being home again.
"I bet you spend a lot of time out here, don't you?" Kate said. She looked down at the folding chair. There was a book there, some thriller with a leather bookmark in it. The pages were curled and puffed up from water damage and yellow.
"I read out there. Or at least I intend to." Blake walked behind Kate and had to squeeze close to her to get to the barbecue. He'd showered while she was asleep - she could smell the soapy scent on him.
Same soap I just used, she thought.
"Good book?" Kate asked. Blake opened the barbecue and dumped a bag of coals into it. He looked down at the book, and furrowed his brow.
"I haven't started it. It's been out here for two years. Well, you know what they say about good intentions."
"If it were Dostoevsky, that would be good intentions. This isn't even mediocre intentions."
"I'm about to cook you a steak, least you could do is lay off for a few minutes," Blake said.
Since wisecracks come naturally to me, it would be an effort to stop, so the least I could do is actually just what I'm doing, Kate thought, but did not say. Blake was right - it wouldn't kill her to cut him some slack. She moved past him, squeezing back into the apartment.
"I'll get this all started in a moment," Blake said.
Kate didn't reply. She looked again at the face down photograph, and curiosity overtook reason. He was out there on the balcony, and he was concentrating on something else. Kate didn't see the harm - maybe it was some sweetheart that he left in Seattle and was pining over.
Kate grabbed the photo and flipped it over, keeping her body between it and Blake to block his view. It was a picture of a young black girl, smiling like an angel. She had braces on her teeth and glasses. The picture looked like a cutout from a photograph - half of somebody else's arm was in the shoot, going round the girl's back. The photo didn't fill out the frame, and it looked sad and strange there, like it was floating out in space.
"What are you doing?" Blake said, his voice filled with urgency. Kate set down the picture. Caught red handed. He wasn't a bad cop.
"Cute kid," Kate said. "Yours?" She turned around, and when she saw the expression on Blake's face she froze. He grabbed the picture away from her and set it back down on the glass table. He glanced at it and closed his eyes. Kate couldn't tell if he was about to be furious or if he was going to cry. He slapped the photo down and it landed against the glass with a large cracking noise.
"I'm sorry, Blake. Bad joke."
"Why did you look at that? That wasn't there for you," Blake said. He was starting to look nervous, and finally he turned away from Kate and went back out onto the balcony. Kate reached out for the photograph again, but stopped herself. This isn't something you want to get involved in, Kate thought. But the ice had been broken, and she could tell something was hurting in Blake.
This was quick work, she thought. Just yesterday we were practically at each other's throats and today... Thank God he broke my porch, Kate thought. Maybe it was just that they were both lonely, and both back in the small town they thought was restraining them when they were children. Whispering Pines wasn't what was holding them back now.
"Blake?" Kate called as she headed out to the balcony. The fire was raging in the barbecue, but Blake wasn't minding it. He was staring out at the view. The clouds were darkening as the sun cycled down, and a wind of deep chill was blowing now. Kate tapped Blake on the shoulder, but he didn't respond.<
br />
"Blake, I'm sorry. I didn't want to pry."
"That's all right. Guess it's in your nature," he said, and his voice was gruff.
He wasn't going to make this easy, thought Kate. Better to ease into it.
"Looks ready for the steaks," she said, pointing at the barbecue.
"What?" Blake said, then he looked. "Oh hell, that's getting too high. Why didn't you tell me?" And like a switch had been thrown, Blake was changed. This is going to be a long evening, Kate thought as she watched the fire burn.
************
Fire would sustain here, thought Joe Bob. He was standing on the eastern part of Mr. Sticha's old property, now his own, on the place where he was laying down the foundations for his new structure. It would take him all day to build that thing, but it would have taken most men the better part of a week. The cinderblock walls would be high enough so that he could stand in here without a person knowing, hidden from the casual passerby. At the same time, the hillside and brush would help disguise it.
Just a dozen feet away was a concrete bunker Mr. Sticha had dug underneath the ground. Mr. Sticha was something of a crank, sure that the reds were going to "let fly with the nukes" and that the only things left in North America would be roaches and, thanks to his bunker, Mr. Sticha. Joe Bob wondered if, unless one knew ahead of time, anyone would be able to tell Mr. Sticha from a cockroach. Maybe they could, but they wouldn't compare him favorably to one.
Joe Bob walked to the bunker, stepping around the leaf-covered dirt that surrounded it. It was uncovered now, but in a matter of minutes he could hide it under leaves and a sheet of tarpaulin and no one could ever see the wooden trapdoor that lead into the hiding place he was building. Joe Bob had modified the function of the bunker a great deal from Mr. Sticha's paranoid intentions. He had his own.
He knew he was probably going to have to deal with Kate and her nosy ways. And maybe Blake, too. He had to keep them out and he didn’t want any sign of what was below. He had his plans. No one was going to get in his way.
