“Of course not,” Justin said. “You’d never do a thing like that. Why would they even think you would?”
The question raised two reactions in her troubled gut.
First, shame. That deep, sickening shame that sits in your heart and reminds you that no one will love you if they know the whole truth. If they find out who you really are. Second, it raised an answer to the question, one she had not considered. If they’d thought to set her up that way, they must have had a pretty good idea of what she’d been doing. Why have they never attempted to prove it before? she wondered. Are they suddenly far more motivated to try?
“I think we need to get some sleep,” she said.
“I’ll never get back to sleep after that.”
“Maybe you will,” she said. But she didn’t fully believe it. And she knew sleep was out of the picture for her. “Tell you what. How about if I sleep in the other twin bed in the guest room? Would that make it easier for you?”
“Yes, ma’am. Much easier. Thank you.”
Winston glared at her as she followed Justin to the door. He needs me more than you do, she thought, but did not say out loud. Winston set his chin down on his paws and sighed.
It struck her that she was going to have to find a new way to cover the animals’ extra expenses. She had no idea what that might be. And now she had at least one new mouth to feed. Allowing for the ravenous and often-present Pete, really more like two.
And yet, both underneath and above those worries she felt a great lifting of pressure. The feeling could only be described as relief.
Chapter Twenty: Pete
Pete left his house in the pitch-dark. He made it to the highway while morning twilight was still so newly arrived that he could barely see two steps in front of his feet.
Only one car had raced past him so far.
He heard the second one coming, but it didn’t race past. It slowed, then kept pace with him, creeping slowly by his side. He felt his belly turn to ice.
“I don’t want any trouble,” he whispered to himself. “No more trouble.”
He refused to look over. As though not seeing who was there might be enough to prevent the trouble he didn’t want.
“Pete,” he heard a woman’s voice say, and he knew immediately it was Dr. Lucy. “Get in.”
Pete sighed out a big puff of breath intermixed with exiting fear, and turned to look. She was holding the passenger door open for him. He dove inside.
He settled with his knees on her passenger floor mat and his chest and head resting on the seat. Mostly to keep her safe by hiding, but it was more comfortable than having to sit. He silently cursed the fact that he had just been getting back to sitting again when he went and reinjured himself by tearing that scab.
He comforted himself with the reminder that he had been saved miles of walking.
“Did you come out here just to get me?” he asked her.
His head was turned in her direction, but all he really saw was one side of her blue skirt. He also saw her pull a pack of cigarettes from her skirt pocket. He didn’t see her light it, but he heard it.
He knew before she answered that she hadn’t driven out here just to get him. Because he’d given her no indication of when he planned to come back.
“No,” she said, and he could hear the exhale—presumably of smoke—that came out with the word. “I had to go someplace this morning. Well. Maybe not had to. But I went.”
“Where’s Justin? Is he back at your house?”
“Yes. I wasn’t gone long.”
“Is he okay?”
“He is. He’s healing well.”
A silence.
Then Pete, who was wrestling with a surprising degree of curiosity, said, “I guess it’s none of my business where you had to go. Or didn’t have to go, but you went anyway.”
A long silence during which she smoked but not much more. Pete assumed she never planned to tell him. Which he figured was her right.
“I had to go out to that gas station on the highway just north of town,” she said.
“Oh. You needed gas?”
“No.”
Another long silence. During it, Pete pondered what he thought of as his rights. For example, his right to ask something of an adult and expect an answer. He figured they were more or less nonexistent at his age.
“I had to see if they’d been robbed in the night,” she said. “I know that sounds strange. There’s a story behind it, but I’d rather not tell it right now if it’s all the same to you.”
“Oh. Were they? Robbed?”
“No.”
“That’s good, then. Right?”
“Not really.”
“You wanted them to get robbed?”
“No. Of course not. Long story. It means someone didn’t tell me the truth. And it means money is going to be really tight for a while. A long while, I guess. I had something I used to be able to do for a little extra money, but now I won’t be able to. So it’s going to be harder and I’m not sure what to do, especially with Justin eating three meals at my house for the next however many days, and you eating one or two.”
“Right,” Pete said.
He angled his head up to see her face. To see how worried she looked. They passed under a streetlight, and he saw her eyes and decided she mostly looked sad.
She looked back down at him.
“What happened to your eye?” she asked.
“Oh, I’ve just been ticking people off left and right.”
“Your dad?”
“Nope. Not this time. My friend Jack. My ex-friend Jack. He’s mad because I don’t want to be his friend anymore. My dad didn’t hit me this time. But he did make me go to bed without dinner. So it’s too bad you’re worried about how to feed us, because boy, am I hungry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” she said, making a left-hand turn. Pete knew from experience that the turn put them on the doctor’s street. “I’ll figure it out.”
“No, I should worry about it,” Pete said. “You were fine before I came along. I’ll get a summer job.”
“Doing what?”
“I don’t know. Delivering papers. Mowing lawns.”
“Who can grow a lawn in the summer around here?”
“Right. Yeah. Well, I’ll do something. Whatever somebody’s willing to pay a kid to do. I just have to make sure it’s something my dad won’t find out about. Because he’d want most of the money if he found out. Dr. Lucy? How come you don’t practice medicine anymore?”
“Oh. That.” She slowed down and pulled into what Pete knew must be her driveway. “Not really my idea. I didn’t quit the practice so much. It quit me. Turns out the people in this neighborhood didn’t take very well to a woman doctor.”
“And you didn’t want to go someplace where they would?”
She stopped, shifted into park, and turned off the engine.
“I wanted to stay here because my father left me this house and land when he died. I’d never seen the place, and he’d never lived a day here because he bought it for his retirement, and he didn’t live that long. But I moved here sight unseen because it’s paid for. And then once I started collecting animals I couldn’t very well move back to the city. And it didn’t seem like such a bad deal at the time. Out in the middle of nowhere. Spending all my time with animals and none of it with people. You’re just full of questions this morning, aren’t you?”
“Sorry,” Pete said.
“You don’t have to be sorry. I’ve been answering questions for days and it hasn’t killed me yet.”
Pete was standing by the kennel runs saying good morning to his wolf-dog when Justin came out back to find him.
“Oh, hi,” Pete said. “The doctor told me you’re doing better. Healing.”
“Yeah. What about you?”
Pete noticed that Justin was staring at the bruise by his eye. But he hadn’t specifically asked about it, so Pete decided to see if he could skate around that issue.
“Oh, I w
ent and messed up. Tore the scab on the really bad welt. It bled a lot. Now I can barely sit down.” Pete let himself into Prince’s kennel run. Then, just as he was about to close the gate behind himself, he stopped and held it open just a few inches. “Sorry,” he said to Justin. “You want to come in, too?”
“No, thanks. He doesn’t know me as well as he knows you.”
And he doesn’t know me as well as I figured he did, Pete thought.
He remembered Dr. Lucy telling him it would be dangerous to try to keep Prince. That he could hurt a neighbor or start killing cats or chickens. “He’s not anybody’s puppy dog.” That’s what she’d said.
Justin knocked Pete out of his thoughts by speaking.
“Well, at least you don’t have much you’re needing to do. You can kind of take it easy while it heals again.”
Pete got down on his knees in the run. Prince hobbled over and sniffed his face. Pete held very still, hoping for a lick. Or even just a wag or two. But the wolf-dog turned and half walked, half hopped back to his bed, where he settled. He lay down mostly facing Pete, but at an angle. Pete figured that was going to have to do for progress.
“Not really,” he said to Justin. “I wish I could just sit around. I told the doctor I’d go get a summer job. She’s worried about money.”
“Oh. Well, that was nice of you.” Justin inched closer to the run. Intertwined his fingers in the chain link. Prince raised his head to look, then set it back down again. “What are you going to do?”
“Not sure. I haven’t had much time to think about it. But I figure I’ll go downtown. Go to the drugstore and the hardware store and the market. Maybe they need a stock boy or something.”
“You’ll have to get working papers.”
“I will?”
“Yeah. You’re under eighteen. So they’ll ask for working papers.”
“What do I have to do to get them?”
“I’m not sure.”
Pete sighed, still on his knees, unable to figure out how to sit comfortably on the concrete floor.
“I guess I shouldn’t bother trying to go downtown, then. I sure am tired of all this walking.”
“Maybe the doctor will let you ride her bike.”
“She has a bike?”
“Yeah. Didn’t you see it? It was hanging on the wall in the garage.”
“Hmm,” Pete said. “Wonder how I managed to miss that.”
They stood in the garage together, staring at it. As if it might be about to do something interesting. Pete still couldn’t imagine how he had managed to miss it last time. It was hanging on the wall not three feet from the dog bed cartons. And he was interested in bikes in general, because he had always wanted one, but his dad had never felt they could afford it.
It was painted a deep fire engine red, with chrome fenders.
He must have looked right at it last time but with his mind a million miles away.
“I feel like I ask her for an awful lot of favors,” Pete said.
“But you’re going out to look for a job so she won’t be worried about money.”
“That’s true.”
“It’s a girl’s bike,” Justin said. “Will you be embarrassed riding a girl’s bike?”
“Yeah. A little. But I still think it’s worth it so I don’t have to walk. And the seat is nice and narrow. Looks like it might hit me in all the right spots and miss the wrong ones altogether.” Pete thought about straddling the tree limb. How it had worked out better than expected. “And at least it’s not pink,” he added.
Pete found the doctor in the kitchen, hovering over a cup of hot coffee. Pete could see the waves of steam rising into her face. She was smoking a cigarette, leaning her forehead on the heel of one hand.
“I’m going out to look for some work now,” Pete said.
She seemed to bring her attention around to him gradually. As if forcing herself awake.
“Are you sure about this? It’s really my money problem. Not yours.”
“That’s not true. You’d have more money if you didn’t have all these extra mouths to feed. And if you hadn’t taken care of Prince for free. I’m sure, yeah. I just want to ask one favor. Can I borrow that bike that’s in the garage? I sure am tired of walking.”
“I can imagine you are,” she said, seeming more awake now. “I’ll have to show you where there’s a can of oil. You’ll want to oil the wheel hubs and the chain. And you’ll have to walk it to a gas station and put air in the tires. It hasn’t been ridden in years.”
“I can do that, sure. Ma’am? What do you know about working papers?”
“Not too much. It shouldn’t be too hard to find out, though.”
“Do you know what I’d have to do to get them?”
“I think they’d probably want you to have a physical exam. I might be able to sign off on that. But I’m pretty sure you’d also need a parent’s signature on the forms. Plus . . . I think you might be too young. I’m not sure what the cutoff is. Might be fourteen.”
“Oh. Too bad. That’s out, then. You just saved me a long ride downtown. I think maybe I’ll go around to the farms and ranches on the edges of town. See if anybody needs a hand. Maybe they wouldn’t be fancy enough businesses to want papers. Well. I’ll see what I can get, anyway. Thanks for letting me use the bike.”
“It’s a girl’s bike. Sure you want to be seen riding it?”
“Not positive, ma’am, no. But I sure am tired of walking.”
“Oh,” she said. And she stood. Carried her cigarette to the sink, ran water over it, and dropped it in the kitchen trash. “That’s a good point. You’ve been doing too much walking. I’ll put the bike in the back of my car and drive it to the gas station for air.”
“That’s very nice of you, ma’am. Thank you.”
“You boys stay here where it’s safe.”
He found Justin out by Prince’s kennel run, standing close to where the wolf-dog lay, and talking to him. But Pete couldn’t hear the words.
Justin’s head swung around when he heard Pete behind him.
“Oh. There you are. I was just talking to your wolf. And thinking. Did she say you could use the bike?”
“Yeah. She’s taking it to the gas station to put air in the tires. What were you thinking? I mean, if you don’t mind telling me.”
“I was just wondering if I should try to get some work, too. I’ll be eating here more than you will.”
“No,” Pete said. “You shouldn’t. You should let me go do this. You should stay here and lay low and be safe.”
Then he walked away, half wondering what Justin had been saying to the wolf-dog and half just plain feeling good. Feeling as though he could protect his friend by going off and earning the needed money so Justin could “lay low.” Maybe that could even make up for Pete’s failure to protect him in the past.
Anyway, he hoped so, and it was a start.
Chapter Twenty-One: Dr. Lucy
Two days later, at about six thirty in the afternoon, a knock on the door startled her and set her heart to pounding. She was in the kitchen, washing up the dinner dishes. Justin was out back feeding the horses and the dogs, and Pete was still gone on the third day of his job search.
Dr. Lucy thought about the police, but not as her protectors.
She thought about going upstairs to get the pistol, but didn’t. However bad things already were, she figured it had the potential to make everything a lot worse.
“I’ll be right there,” she called toward the front door.
Then she ran out into the backyard and found Justin feeding kibble to two of the greyhounds. He looked up, and his face registered alarm when he looked into hers.
“Someone’s at the door,” she said in a taut whisper. “Stay out back where you can’t be seen and don’t come in until I tell you it’s okay.”
Justin nodded, mute and clearly afraid.
Dr. Lucy trotted back inside. She smoothed her skirt as she walked down the hallway. Then she peered through th
e small insets of window in the front door.
A man stood on her porch. Apparently not the police. He was a black man, maybe sixty years old or more, with a stoop to his shoulders, a creased face. Short hair shot through with gray.
She found herself breathing more easily.
She opened the door. He was dressed in blue jeans and a white sport shirt, holding a battered fedora in his hands.
“Yes? May I help you?”
“Dr. Lucille Armstrong?”
“Yes.”
“My name’s William Wilson. I have a message for you from Calvin Bell.”
Oh, thank God, she thought. The not knowing had been straining her. Weighing her down. More than she’d realized. Until the moment it lifted.
“Please do come in,” she said.
She sat him at her kitchen table and offered him a cup of coffee. Even though she was anxious to hear the message. She was grateful to him for making the long trip, and it seemed important to treat him as a valued guest.
“If it’s no trouble,” he said.
“I’ll make a fresh pot. What’s left over from lunch is too old. Is Calvin all right?”
“Seems he’s okay, yeah. Please don’t go to any trouble.”
“Nonsense. It’s a long walk out here and the least I can do is make you a decent cup of coffee. So what’s the message? I’m sorry to be rude, but I’m anxious to hear.”
“The judge sentenced him to sixty days.”
Dr. Lucy stopped halfway to the coffeepot. She turned and walked back to the table. Sank down in a chair next to William.
“That seems like a lot. I take it the judge wouldn’t believe Calvin didn’t start the fight.”
“That judge never let him so much as open his mouth, ma’am.”
A long silence rang. After a few seconds of it, she got up and got back to the task of fresh coffee. She poured the old coffee down the sink and rinsed the pot.
Disjointed a thought as it may have been, she made a mental note to sneak over to Calvin’s again and water the plant.
“He was pretty desperate to get a message to you,” William said. “But he felt like he had to be careful, too. They wouldn’t let him use the phone again. And if he’d written you a letter, well, the prison people read everything, coming and going. He doesn’t want anyone to know where Justin is. I know you probably think that’s being too careful . . .”
Say Goodbye for Now Page 20
