Play It Safe

by Kristen Ashley

  Cecily wasn’t showing her face in town and Janie told me she was doing what she needed to do in Elk but otherwise keeping a low profile. Rumor had it she was terrified.

  I didn’t have it in me to relish this. They had kids. This stuff was not nice and although they’d brought it on themselves and arguably deserved it, their daughters didn’t.

  I also didn’t know who did it. It could be Gray’s uncles but it also could be anybody. No one believed Buddy didn’t back Pete, everybody respected Gray and the filling in of the blanks from Casey about what Buddy did to Gray and me was spread far and wide, this, I knew, was by the Brothers Cody. Unfortunately, this wasn’t felonious so no charges could be lodged. But this also didn’t sit well with Mustangians as a whole.

  So it could be anyone.

  Further, I didn’t relish it because Buddy was not the kind of man to put his tail between his legs, sell his house and slink off to the next county, never to be seen again.

  He was the kind of man who would want payback.

  Considering what he’d already done, this could mean anything and after it was achieved, if Gray and I remained standing, Gray wouldn’t be able to control his fury.

  I did not see good things.

  So now I was doing the dishes and baking a cake and my man was in town picking up nails or something to continue working on the barn. Sonny was out there and I heard a hammer pounding. I also knew one of Jeb Sharp’s boys was at the mouth of the lane. I knew it because, it was a long way, but I could see the pickup sitting there. I also knew it because Gray would not leave me alone unless he knew Sonny and that pickup were there with me.

  So he left me alone.

  Therefore with this backup, I was surprised to hear a vehicle approaching and when I turned my head to look out the side window I was further surprised to see the SUV heading down the lane without the pickup following it. An SUV heading down the lane wasn’t a surprise, the fact I’d never seen that particular one, though, was.

  I shoved the last dish in the dishwasher, closed the door, dried my hands and headed out of the kitchen, down the hall and out the front door. I was standing on the porch when the SUV stopped and parked. I noted Sonny coming into view, his eyes on the SUV but he didn’t approach. I didn’t know if that was strange or not.

  Then I watched as a woman got out.

  Her hair used to be blonde, you could still see traces of it, but now it was turning an attractive blend of white, silver with hints of light gray. It was wild and she, rightfully, regardless of her age, kept it long and left it free. Its waves and curls tumbled down her shoulders and back and, except for the fading color, it reminded me of mine.

  She wore jeans, a blouse that was way cool, managing to be very feminine and attractive but still practical. She had a pair of scuffed, old cowboy boots on her feet. I placed her in her fifties, I’d say early fifties but I couldn’t tell. She had great skin, lovely features, was fit but not slim, rounded and she was clearly lucky with genes. It could be she hid her age or it could be she always would naturally.

  She looked at me, turned her head to take in Sonny then she looked back at me and started my way. She didn’t come to the steps but instead approached the side of the porch where she stopped three feet away, her eyes, the entire way, never leaving me.

  “You don’t know me,” she started, telling me something I knew before I could get out a greeting. “I’m Eleanor Cody.”

  My breath clean left me as I stared at Gray’s mother.

  I’d never seen her, never even seen a picture of her, she was wiped clean from Chez Cody. And I’d never seen this woman in town, I would have remembered her. This wasn’t surprising because, regardless of all that happened, I’d spent approximately four whole months in Mustang. I’d seen and met a lot of people but I hadn’t seen and met everybody.

  I forced myself to breathe at the same time my mind ticked over ways to play this.

  I started by introducing myself. “I’m Ivey Larue.”

  A small smile played at her mouth and her brown eyes twinkled briefly as she replied, “I know.”

  Of course, everyone did. Being who she was, she would too.

  I looked at her then looked at Sonny who hadn’t moved, didn’t look like he intended to approach but also didn’t look like he intended to retreat.

  Keeping an eye on things.

  My eyes went back to Eleanor Cody.

  “Would you like to come in?” I offered and that got me another small smile, this one with no twinkle but a hint of sadness and a shake of the head.

  “Don’t see Gray’s truck, reckon he’s not here,” she answered. “Reckon, he comes home, he won’t want me in his house.”

  There was a reason for the sadness in her smile because this was definitely true.

  “Yeah, but he’s made it clear this is my home and I don’t mind,” I said quietly.

  Her head tipped a bit and she studied me a moment.

  Then she righted her head, took a step forward and suggested, “How about you swing for awhile and I’ll take a rest on the porch?”

  A nice compromise.

  I nodded, moved to the swing and sat down. She moved to the porch and sat on its edge, body turned toward the barn, her eyes again never leaving me.

  “Like they’re all sayin’, you sure are a pretty little thing.”

  My heart clenched because her son felt the same way and told me, repeatedly.

  “Thank you,” I whispered then smiled. “You aren’t so bad yourself.”

  She smiled back and rested her weight in a hand on the porch.

  “Do you want a pop, some lemonade? A glass of water?” I asked.

  “No, Ivey, but thanks.”

  “Okay.”

  Her eyes moved toward the barn and I leaned forward in the swing to see beyond the house. Sonny was moving back to do his work.

  “Gray okay with all this?”

  This was Eleanor and she was speaking softly and tentatively and I looked back at her to see her eyes still on the barn.

  “No,” I answered honestly and her gaze came back to me. “He’s angry, feels threatened, feels I’m under threat and his options are so limited they’re non-existent so he’s frustrated. So, no, he’s not okay.”

  She nodded then murmured, “Abel.”

  “Sorry?” I asked and she focused harder on me.

  “Just like his father. Abel. Don’t let those uncles of Gray’s make you think differently. Knew Gray’s granddad, knew Miriam, so don’t know where Olly, Frank and Charlie got their brand of ornery. Miriam could be ornery but not like that. All the Codys could be wild but when they settled, they settled and that was it. Olly, Frank and Charlie are a mystery for the ages. Didn’t know, down under the surface of what they show everyone, it wasn’t all good and that no way would Miriam step out on her husband, I wouldn’t believe they were Codys.”

  She was right about that.

  “Abel, he was pure Cody,” she went on. “Fair. Patient. Controlled. But you threaten something or someone he loved, it’d rile him, rile him enough to take action. But he would not mete out unjustifiable justice no matter how angry he could be. See my son grew up like his father.”

  “Yes,” I agreed.

  She drew in breath then her eyes slid from mine to my ear and she announced, “Talked to Prisc.”

  Oh God.

  “What?” I asked.

  Her eyes came back to mine and she repeated, “Talked to Prisc. Priscilla. She’s a friend of Cecily Sharp.”

  “I know. I’ve kind of met her.”

  “Good girl,” Eleanor said quietly but my back went straighter and I replied, “I disagree.”

  Eleanor held my eyes for a long time and it was like she was psyching herself up and I would know why when she again spoke.

  “I understand that, Ivey, but sometimes folks do stupid things for equally stupid reasons. That doesn’t mean they aren’t good people.”

  Well I knew that was a fact. I’d had ten years of livi
ng it.

  I fought against holding my breath but I did hold my tongue.

  Eleanor didn’t.

  “Don’t know you, what I do know of you, I know you’re a good gal. Know my son loves you. But I don’t know what he’s told you about me so I don’t know if you want to hear this and, even if you’re polite enough to let me to have my say if, once you hear it, you’ll care. Abel didn’t. Miriam didn’t. And Gray didn’t. Then again, they didn’t let me get close enough to share. Don’t know you but I’ll tell you what they never let me tell them.”

  And with this preamble, she launched right in.

  “Abel wanted children, not just a son, a passel of them. Before we got engaged, all through when we were engaged and after we got married, he talked about it all the time, filling the house with Codys. His brothers might be hard to take but he loved them. They grew up close, had good times, family times, brothers being wild and getting into trouble times. Six people in this house, I used to love coming here. My parents both died when I was young, raised by my aunt who never married so I never experienced anything like that. Those men and Miriam, way she was. It was loud, always something going on. Someone in trouble. Someone telling a joke. Someone laughing or fighting or up to something. Abel, he wanted that, he wanted to fill this house again with that. And me, well…” she hesitated and looked to the barn, “I couldn’t give it to him.”

  Shit.

  There you go.

  Shit.

  “Eleanor –” I started and her head turned back to me.

  “Norrie,” she corrected me softly then continued. “Lost babies, again and again, lost them. You know that?”

  I nodded.

  She nodded after me.

  Then she kept going.

  “Each one, I felt it. I hope you never know, Ivey,” she leaned in, “but I felt it.”

  I kept my peace. It was hard, she felt it and I felt her words but I kept my peace. And I did this because I sensed that was what she needed from me.

  She leaned back, drew breath and went on.

  “Abel felt it more. Hurt worse, can’t tell you how bad it hurt, right to my soul, to lose my babies then have to watch Abel trying to pretend he wasn’t hurting worse than me. Each one I lost, feeling that, watching that, having it settle in me, I asked myself what do I do? What do I do?”

  She looked to the barn again and told me what she did that I already knew.

  “I left. I thought, if I did, he’d find someone who wouldn’t give him that hurt but who would give him what he wanted most in this world.” Her voice dropped to a whisper when she finished, “I had no idea what that was, was me.”

  Oh God.

  I closed my eyes.

  When she spoke again, I opened them to see hers on me.

  “By the time I heard he hadn’t moved on, by the time I figured out I was for him what he was for me and he didn’t care he didn’t have a house full of sons and daughters, just as long as that house had me, it was too late. I came back, I stayed and I tried, but it was too late. I knew, that hurt he was feeling when I lost my babies, it was losing those babies but what I didn’t see was most of it was watching me lose them, knowing my hurt. I was too late understanding that too.”

  When she didn’t speak for awhile and I knew she was done, I said gently, “I’m sorry, Norrie.”

  “Me too, Ivey, me too.”

  Yes, she was sorry. Very sorry.

  God.

  I nodded.

  She again spoke.

  “I told you that because I want you to know. What you do with it,” she shrugged, “up to you. I lost Gray with his father; I’ve come to terms with that. Wake up, every day, live with it and I don’t like it much but I made a stupid decision based on stupid reasons that were emotional and I lost my boy with my man. I also tell you that because I reckon there are reasons Prisc did the stupid things she did. But now, what’s gone down, she’s not liking what she’s feeling and she wants to do right. She couldn’t go to Gray or you, definitely not Miriam and probably not anyone else in Mustang. So she came to me.”

  Here we go.

  “And she told you?” I prompted.

  Norrie didn’t hesitate. “She told me she lied about seeing you go off with your brother, she didn’t. She told me Cecily was the one who cleared out your stuff. She told me she, herself, had seen your note to Gray because Cecily showed it to her. And she told me that Cecily took all of it to Buddy and Cecily told her and Courtney that Buddy burned your note and tossed your stuff in the garbage.”

  I figured this and now all the blanks were filled but, just like with Casey, I hated to have it confirmed. I hated knowing that all the stuff I left behind, stuff I bought with money I earned, was thrown in the garbage. I hated that Cecily, Priscilla, the unknown Courtney and the despicable Buddy Sharp read the desperate and sad note I wrote to Gray where I told him why I was leaving, that I hoped I’d be back and just how much I loved him.

  And I hated knowing it was long since discarded ash.

  “She also told me she didn’t like it then and tried to talk Cecily and Courtney out of it but Cecily is Cecily, Courtney is Courtney and she got nowhere. Before the plan was put into action, they froze her out. She learned her lesson, not the right one but the one they were teaching her, and she got on board. She’s never liked it and now, Gray’s barn going down, those horses going down with it, she can’t live with it. So she’s told me and she’s also gone to the station and told Lenny. It’s just information to him, he can’t do anything about it, just closing the loops but she did that too. She’s frozen out now from Cecily and Courtney but she no longer cares. Learned the hard way that no friendships are better than toxic ones.”

  I guessed that was right though I still didn’t understand what motivated Priscilla. Then again, I hadn’t had very many friends but I lucked out in the fact that the ones I had were the best kinds to have.

  “I don’t know what to do with this, Norrie,” I told her, she tipped her head again and gave me another small smile.

  “Nothing, something, whatever you want. But you deserve to know and you deserve to have the option to do something if you want. So now you have both. It’s your choice.”

  I nodded.

  She stood and I knew by her manner she was done, likely keen to get away before Gray came home so I stood with her.

  “Best go,” she muttered.

  “Right,” I muttered back.

  She looked up at me. “Thanks for giving me time, Ivey.”

  “Thanks for taking the time to come and talk to me, Norrie.”

  She again studied me and the small smile back. The sad one.

  Then she whispered, “Glad Gray found a good, strong one.”

  Oh God.

  She kept going.

  “Hold on tight, Ivey.”

  “I will,” I promised and I would, I knew that definitely.

  She nodded and moved toward her car.

  I called, “Norrie,” and she stopped and turned back. “I’ll tell Gray what you told me.”

  She shook her head. “Not why I told you that, sweetheart.”

  “I know, but I’ll still tell Gray.”

  She held my eyes then she nodded again. “Okay, Ivey.”

  “Be well,” I said softly.

  “You too and stay safe.”

  It was my turn to nod.

  She moved to her SUV, got in, started it up and drove away.

  I watched the lane.

  Then I went inside to check on my cakes.

  They were out and on the wire rack cooling when the backdoor opened. I turned to it to see Sonny had swung his upper body in, hand still on the knob.

  “You good?” he asked, his eyes sharp on me.

  “Yeah, Sonny. I’m good,” I answered quietly.

  “Lived through Abel losin’ her,” Sonny announced and I blinked.

  He wasn’t done.

  “Lived through him bein’ stubborn and not taking her back.”

  I drew i
n breath. Then I nodded.

  “Man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do even if what he’s gotta do is a fool thing to do.”

  “I guess that’s right,” I replied.

  “Know it is,” Sonny returned but he wasn’t done. “When I thought history repeated, ticked me off. But it didn’t. So what you learn from this, girl, all ‘a this shit, and where you find it in you to lead Gray, is that this shit is life. You got it worse than others but everyone has their crosses to bear. You bear ‘em then you keep on keepin’ on and you do it together. ‘Cause shit always passes and you got enough sweet, it always sweeps away the bitter. You and Gray, this’ll be done and you’ll taste your sweet.”

  “Sonny,” I smiled, “I’ve had enough bitter to last a lifetime. Now I’m baking cakes in a kitchen that, when I first walked into it, I knew I wanted to walk into it dozens of times every day for the rest of my life and it’s the kitchen of the man who I looked at once and I knew. I knew. And, honey, you know exactly what I knew. There’s nothing that can take away that kind of sweet.”

  Sonny stared at me. Then he smiled.

  Then he bitched, “I’m dyin’ out here in this heat. I’m gettin’ back to hittin’ it and you’re bringing me a glass of lemonade. Lotsa ice.”

  Then he disappeared behind the closed door.

  And before I started on the frosting, I took out a glass of lemonade with lots of ice to Sonny.

  * * * * *

  Five hours later…

  “Should I not have told you?” I asked quietly.

  I was lounging mostly on Gray but partly on the couch and I’d just told him all about his mother’s visit. The TV was on but I’d hit mute. I had Gray’s undivided attention and he had mine.

  I just couldn’t catch hold of any of the expressions warring for prominence on his face.

  Then he settled on one and that was mild annoyance.

  “Why would you not tell me?” Gray asked back.

  “Just that…” I paused, “you’re dealing with a lot. You don’t need more.”

  “Firstly, dollface, don’t ever keep anything from me and especially not something important. Secondly, this is a small town, learn that, shit gets around. You keep something from me it’s likely I’ll find out about it. And lastly, yeah, we’re dealing with a lot. But I’m not about to have a nervous breakdown.”