Secret of Lies

by Barbara Forte Abate

  In light of Aunt Phoebe’s newfound popularity, my column had once again been picked up as a daily feature. And as much as I’d pined and prayed unceasingly for such a miracle, in recent days I’d found myself unable to focus my attentions on the distress riddled correspondences I’d opened, distractedly read, and subsequently abandoned on my desk. Neither caring about or able to see even a shadow of those things living beyond the tight circle of my own raging dilemmas, and yet somehow managing to muddle through my hours at the newspaper, knowing that when I returned home the first thing I’d see would be Ash’s car parked in the driveway like a taunting grin.

  “How come Ash hasn’t stayed for supper lately?” my mother finally got around to asking several days later.

  “I don’t know. I guess he’s busy,” I answered, striving to convey disinterest.

  “It’s been nearly two weeks. Why don’t you go out and ask him to stay tonight?”

  “I … well, I can’t right now. I have some stuff to finish for tomorrow’s paper,” I said, rocketing upstairs to my room before she’d taken the opportunity to counter my excuse.

  Hearing the screen door open and shut downstairs, I watched from my bedroom window as my mother strode across the yard headed for the barn, not quite surprised she’d taken it upon herself to ask him. And I waited, fervently hoping he didn’t accept her invitation–praying just as hard that he would.

  He didn’t.

  The rumble of thunder in the distance had been warning all morning of an approaching storm. A stiff wind had picked up over the past hours, whistling across the chimney top and chattering the windows in their aged wooden frames. Although the weather was still warm, there was an unmistakable hint of changing seasons creeping into the mid-September days.

  “I’m going out to pick the last of the berries,” Mom said, coming into the kitchen where I sat at the table sorting through the mail. “I have a taste for fruit cobbler.”

  “It looks like it’s gonna rain any minute, Mom. It’s been thundering for hours.”

  “It’s a ways off yet. I have plenty of time,” she said pushing out the door undeterred.

  I rolled the question of whether or not to trail after her back and forth like a ten thousand pound marble. It had been a long tedious afternoon at the newspaper and I’d been looking forward to sitting down and doing little of anything for the rest of the evening. Yet, the fact remained I hadn’t done anything with my mother in weeks other than share meals, and I recognized this as a potential opportunity to retrieve something of the lost sense of companionship we’d somehow mislaid in the months following my aching disclosure about Eleanor and Cal.

  Releasing an exaggerated sigh into the stillness piled-up around me in a dubious hedge, I pushed aside the clutter of mail-order catalogs and unopened junk mail envelopes, moving to stare out the window above the kitchen sink. I watched her lone figure as she trekked across the grass, but only for a moment before dashing out to catch-up.

  The wild fruit growing in the thicket of tangled vines and brambles just beyond the woods bordering the driveway was ripe and wrinkled.

  “Stevie, stop eating all the berries or I won’t have enough,” Mom scolded.

  I smiled, popping another into my mouth. It had been such a long time since I’d bothered or even thought about coming to pick here that I’d all but forgotten the pleasure of sampling the delicious sun-ripened berries.

  “Remember how you always used to send Eleanor and me out here to gather berries for dessert?”

  “Um hum.”

  “More made it into my mouth than the pail back then too.”

  “I always suspected as much.”

  The sky had grown visibly darker, the thunder closer.

  “I just felt a couple drops of rain,” she said, glancing up toward the menacing canvas of grey and black clouds swirled together like smoke overhead. “We have plenty now anyway.”

  Once we’d reached the yard, I handed Mom my berry bucket. “I’d better check that the windows are rolled up on the car.”

  “You should check Ash’s too, while you’re at it,” she called after me as she headed toward the house.

  Several fat drops splattered randomly against the windshield as I leaned across the seat to crank shut the passenger side window I’d left open. I’d slammed the car door with the intention of darting towards the safety of the porch when I remembered Ash’s car and my mother’s suggestion.

  His car was there parked in its usual spot alongside the oak tree out front, enough of a distance that I didn’t manage to reach the Buick safely before the sky opened, and within seconds–as I yanked at the reluctant door handle like a terrier clenched on a bone–I was nearly soaked through to the skin.

  With a final jerk the door opened and I leapt into the shelter of the car, frantically cranking the handle to shut one window, then reaching across the seat to close the other. The rain battered against the glass in a vicious onslaught, blocking out all other sound beyond its machine gun crescendo. There was nothing of the familiar visible through the curtain of water drawn taut across the windshield–only blurred shadows where I knew the farmhouse and barn to be; nothing of the enormous spreading oak only a few feet beyond where the car was parked.

  Surely it had to let up soon, I reasoned. At least long enough for me to run to the porch. The deep chill leaking through my wet clothes had pressed all the way to my insides and I questioned the logic of remaining in the car. If I just got out now and braved the deluge I certainly couldn’t have absorbed much more water into my pores than I already had.

  Yet it was the storm’s aggression that held me rooted where I was, readily concluding that ten more minutes of waiting made little difference either way.

  I closed my eyes, listening to the hammering of rain against the roof, finding myself thinking of how effectively the car’s interior held the essence of Ash–the familiar aroma of hay and saddle soap so ripe in its intimacy my imagination required little effort to sketch him there, sitting beside me. And if not for the cold damp discomfort of wet clothes molded to my skin like setting plaster, I could easily have fallen asleep–blissfully cocooned within the heavy crescendo of battering rain. Absorbed into the vibrant layered textures of Ash enwrapping me.

  And just where was Ash anyway? Had he been caught in the warm refuge of the barn to wait out the downpour, or was he comfortably settled in the kitchen with Mom enjoying a fresh brewed cup of coffee as they shared a chuckle over my predicament?

  Feeling oddly criminal, I stole a glance across the dashboard. The ashtray was partially open to reveal the glint of loose change and a half-empty pack of chewing gum, and as I shifted my gaze I noticed for the first time since my hasty entry that he’d left the keys in the ignition. I smiled, briefly entertaining the notion of driving myself up to the back door of the house; a stunt I might have very well attempted had I been able to see something other than an opaque canvas of rain in every direction. My eyes drifted to the closed glove compartment and for several long moments I stared at it, struggling with the temptation to open the latch for a quick peek at the contents. It wasn’t as if I truly expected to find anything particularly questionable secreted within the concealed recess, my curiosity largely stirred by the possibility of discovering some otherwise unknown facet of what it was that made Ash, well, made Ash–Ash.

  On the surface he appeared an honest hardworking man with clear and unpretentious aspirations. Yet it was altogether possible my perceptions had been formed in drastic error–the evidence leading to his true yearnings very well in existence right there in his glove compartment. It was entirely feasible that he coveted one, or possibly several, of those disgusting girlie magazines men seemed so fond of–maybe even carried photographs of his ex-wife tucked inside.

  And far more easily than I would’ve cared to admit, I surrendered to the whispered temptation of the devil on my shoulder insisting I twist open the knob of the compartment. Just one quick look. One harmless three-second glance, after w
hich I would make a run for the house.

  My disappointment tasted like chalk in my mouth as I stared at his meager collection of uninteresting possessions. No embarrassing photographs, magazines, or unearthed skeletons–just a neatly folded road map, the stub of a pencil, a tire pressure gauge, a nondescript assortment of odds and ends, and what appeared to be a handful of travel brochures.

  I reached for the brochures, thumbing through the glossy pages in confused surprise. Rather than advertisements for travel as I’d initially assumed, they detailed high paying jobs in foreign countries; occupations offering enticements of high salaries, exotic locales, and promises of limitless adventure.

  I replaced the pamphlets, feeling oddly disturbed as I closed the compartment. Was he planning to leave? Although I’d never expected him to stay working on our farm indefinitely, I hadn’t actually expected him to go anywhere either. Had he grown restless over his routine here? He’d never given any direct hints of discontent. At least nothing in proportions broad enough that I might’ve noticed. And what about my mother, had he mentioned any of this to her? He had to have known that she’d be disconsolate if he left us.

  A sharp rap on the window abruptly jarred me from my contemplation over Ash’s potential departure and I swung my head around to find the very object of my thoughts smiling at me from beneath the protective canopy of what looked distinctly like my father’s old black umbrella.

  “The cavalry’s here,” he said, opening the door.

  I stared at him blankly, instantly concerned over the question of how long he’d been standing there. Had he seen me fishing through his belongings? The possibility that he very well may have, bringing a rush of heat spilling over my face.

  “Are you coming out?” he asked, as the rain lashed against the umbrella. “You look like you’ve been taking a nap.”

  “Oh … um, I was just debating whether or not I should make a dash for the house.” I slid across the seat toward the open door.

  “We’ll have to share the umbrella. It’s the only one your mother could find and it took her a half hour to do that.”

  I said nothing when Ash put a protective arm across my shoulders as he led me toward the house, the comforting warmth of his body pressed against the thin wet fabric of my blouse shielding me from the chilling onslaught pelting against us like stinging pebbles.

  Just beyond where his car sat the tree branches of the huge old oak whipsawed in the wind, dozens of broken limbs littering the ground. “That old tree is really taking a beating,” Ash said.

  “It seems so,” I replied, finding it hard to think beyond the heat radiating against my side like a melting sun.

  “Speaking of damage, thanks for closing my windows. I usually remember myself, but only after it’s too late.”

  I mumbled a reply, relieved he apparently hadn’t caught me prying, since he surely wouldn’t be thanking me if he knew that my fingerprints were currently patterned across his possessions like wallpaper.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  I knew well enough to be grateful to our neighbor Malcolm for having obligingly driven me back and forth to work over the past several days, but as we headed up the driveway late one afternoon–Malcolm chattering enthusiastically for the second day in a row about an unusual variety of purple tomato newly arrived at the store from somewhere exotic and distant–I was no less elated than I was relieved to see Ash hovering under the hood of Daddy’s car as we neared the house.

  The De Soto had broken down earlier in the week and although Ash had offered to take a look at the engine at his first opportunity, my frustration had been growing at a steady clip as the days moved past and the car continued to sit unexamined.

  “Thanks, Malcolm,” I ducked my head and smiled through the open window, turning quickly before he had the chance to remember he hadn’t yet quizzed me on the mixed character of zucchini or the point-by-point personality traits of Bib lettuce versus Iceberg.

  Ash didn’t look up as I approached; the dark stain of sweat under his armpits and down his back, his cotton T-shirt clinging in wet patches along the rungs of his spine and across his shoulders, attesting to the fact that even here in the deep shade of the towering oak the air was stifling.

  I stood silently watching his grease-coated hands deftly rotating some undetermined engine part between his fingers. He lifted his head to glance at me briefly, but then dropped his gaze without comment.

  “It’s pretty hot out here,” I said conversationally, staring at the shock of blond hair that habitually fell against his forehead, if only for its familiarity.

  “Um hum.”

  “The radio said it hit ninety-eight by noon.”

  He said nothing, then, “Feels like it.”

  “Do you need a hand?”

  “Nope. I’m gonna stop in a while anyway.”

  “It’s all done then?” I smiled approvingly.

  He straightened, pulling an arm across the dots of perspiration gathered like heavy dew along his brow. “No, there’s a couple parts that need replacing.”

  “Oh.” I made no attempt to mask my disappointment.

  Now that I’d been driving for a time, I hated to be without my car. And I didn’t much like riding with Malcolm either. He was forever questioning me about my love life, or more accurately, my lack of one, to the exasperating point I actually found myself wishing he’d keep his conversation exclusive to fruits and vegetables.

  “It should be ready by early next week.”

  “Next week? I thought you said–”

  “The parts need to be ordered. You were also down a quart of oil. You should try and remember to check it once in a while.”

  “I’m not a mechanic.”

  “You’re kidding, right? Let me explain something.” He turned to pull a long metal stick from somewhere within the cluttered mass under the hood, the tip wet with a dark fluid I easily assumed to be oil.

  “This is your oil dipstick.” He held it up in front of me. “If it’s below this line you need to add a quart.” He indicated a notch on the stick with a greasy finger.

  “I’m not an idiot.”

  “No you’re not.” He turned his back to me, replacing the metal gauge.

  “If someone would’ve bothered to tell me about checking the oil I would’ve done it. But no one did,” I replied, reaching for the same unpleasantly terse tone he’d used on me.

  “That’s understandable.” He bent to pick up the tools he’d discarded on the ground, replacing them into his toolbox.

  “What?”

  “That no one told you. Would you have listened if anyone had?” he said, glancing up, his mouth surprising me with an amused grin.

  “Well yes, of course.” I felt the tickle of a smile skim across my lips. It was true I had a tendency to ignore advice–well meaning or otherwise–especially his. And as much as I’d come to enjoy giving counsel, I’d developed even more of a distaste for receiving it.

  “Really?” Placing both hands on the hood, he pushed it down easily, closing it with a sharp snap. “Then I guess you’ll want to know about the other basics like checking tire pressure, brake fluid, water–”

  “Absolutely.” I could feel beads of perspiration dotting the perimeter of my face where my hair touched against my skin. It felt hotter here than anywhere else I’d been all day–like dancing on coals in a fiery hell.

  He reached down and gripped the handle of the toolbox.

  “Okay then, if you’re really interested, I’ll give you a lesson in car maintenance after supper.”

  “Fine.” I had little idea of what particular expression passed over my face right then, but it was altogether effective in bringing the rich sound of laughter rolling from his mouth.

  “Try not to look so thrilled.”

  “Mom asked you to stay for supper?” I asked, ignoring his comment.

  He nodded. “Maybe it’ll cool off a little by then.”

  “Maybe.” I said, glad he was staying.

&n
bsp; “Thank you, Libby. As always, that was excellent,” Ash said, his plate thoroughly stripped other than for the skeletal remains of a modest steak.

  “You’re welcome, Ash. It’s nice to have someone enjoy their meal.”

  “It’s too hot to eat,” I said, aware she was referring to my own barely touched portion.

  I wasn’t being totally untruthful. It was too hot, but even more disconcerting was the rather disarming effect of Ash’s cornflower blue eyes occasionally gazing in my direction from across the table; an otherwise innocuous gesture wreaking havoc not only over my appetite, but on all tributaries flowing to pretty much everything else.

  I didn’t bother to point out to my mother that she hadn’t eaten much herself. That in fact, it’d been weeks since I’d seen her consume a full meal. I’d collared her with my concerns several times already, but she’d waved my worries away with little explanation other than she didn’t see the point of stuffing food in her mouth if she wasn’t hungry. And I’d declined to press further, assuming she was coaxing herself through another episode of depression; doubtlessly mourning the loss of our family as we both always would.

  “I think I’ll lie down for awhile,” Mom announced, rising from the table. “I have a terrific headache.”

  “It’s probably the heat,” I said.

  “Umm. I’m sure it is.”

  I stood then, beginning to stack the plates and gather cutlery.

  “Need help?” Ash pushed his chair back.

  “No–thanks,” I answered quickly, at once recalling what had happened the last time he’d helped with the dishes.

  “Alright, then I’ll go out and work on the car for a while.”

  I washed the meager collection of dishes quickly, but took extra time to wipe the counters and table with the wet dishrag, increasingly anxious over the prospect of receiving car maintenance lessons from Ash.