“Congratulations,” said the old guy.
“Uh, sir,” Jarrett kept a civil tone, but with an effort, “are you the chef? Because I knew I wouldn't sleep if I didn't come back and tell the chef in person that the meal I ate here tonight was extraordinary, absolutely the finest I’ve ever had.”
Grace cleared her throat.
The old dude—Who is he? Please please don't be her boyfriend—was looking as if he might be considering defensive tactics.
Grace said, “He left me a great tip, Dad.”
Dad. She’d called him Dad. Jarrett restrained an urge to whoop like a fool.
“This is my father Louis Tilley,” she said.
Louis Tilley? The Louis Tilley? Jarrett swallowed. Not the chef, not the manager, but the goddamned owner, and not only the owner of this restaurant, either. Louis Tilley operated one of the largest food and entertainment conglomerates in Texas. Jesus. The guy was rich. So how come his daughter was waiting tables, working for slave wages and tips?
Jarrett stuck out his hand again; Tilley ignored it—again. Fine, Jarrett thought. Bastard. They eyed each other. Grace would say later they reminded her of a couple of mad dogs and even then, she was the bone between them. Whatever. The thing Jarrett would remember, with a degree of pride, was that he didn’t look away. Tilley was accustomed to intimidating people; he was clearly banking on it with Jarrett. It didn’t happen. Not then, not ever. Jarrett would always take some degree of satisfaction from that even after Louis was dead.
“You'll have to forgive his manners.” Grace’s gesture indicated her dad.
For her sake, Jarrett shook his head. “No, no, I’m the one who should apologize. It’s late and I’m keeping you. I’m really sorry, sir.” The emphasis was as put on as Jarrett’s grin. “I promise I’m not crazy. Here—” He took out his wallet, extracted a business card. “I’m the fleet manager over at R&M Pharmaceuticals and I’m also one hell of a good mechanic, best in the city. You ever need work done on your car, I’m your guy.”
Grace took his card. Her father didn’t blink.
“I hope you don’t mind if I call on your daughter, sir.” The pretty speech was a damn joke. Tilley knew it, but pretended not to. He pretended he hadn’t even heard, but Grace nodded and Jarrett smirked.
Tilley paid no attention. He said, “Let’s go,” addressing Grace as if Jarrett wasn’t there.
Jarrett thought about grabbing the starched front of Tilley’s immaculate dress shirt. The man was tall and heavy set, but Jarrett was taller and in better shape. He could have easily set Tilley on his ass. Instead Jarrett found Grace’s gaze and made a phone with his fingers near his ear. He wasn’t sure of her response. She seemed to hesitate. He thought she gave the tiniest shake of her head as if something had changed her mind about him. She tucked her hand into her dad’s elbow and they walked away.
Like they were better.
Grace didn’t so much as look back and it pissed Jarrett off. People like her and her dad thought they’d invented the system; they thought they were the only ones who knew how to work it. But if there was a reason for Jarrett to breathe it was to show jackasses like Tilley they were wrong. That’s what Jarrett thought that night watching Tilley walk away with his daughter. Later on, though, he would wonder, when he was left with nothing but time to wonder, whether all he’d needed was a look from Grace; maybe then, he could have walked away, too.
Chapter 7
Saturday, September 18, 1999 - 29 days remain
“Did you see how shaky Cort was when he talked about his brother yesterday?” Carolyn asks. “I feel terrible for his family. I wish there were something we could do,” she adds meaningfully.
“I can’t be involved, Carolyn. I’ve made it clear.” The words are more sharply spoken than Sophia intended, but she and Carolyn have made such a pleasant start to the day, first sharing breakfast and idle chatter, now washing the dishes together, she hates losing the mood.
“Why, Mom? Are you afraid the press is going to find out he’s here?”
“You remember how it was last time. I don’t ever want to look outside and see reporters all over the lawn like that again.” Sophia shudders. A new thought falls into her mind: Suppose there are reporters with Senator Slade at Phil’s barbecue today? Sophia hadn’t considered the possibility. She knows the risk involved, but Carolyn hasn’t a clue.
“Remember Carla Faye Tucker?”
“What about her?”
Carolyn slides a glass onto the cabinet shelf. “She said she found Jesus.”
“I think a lot of inmates make that claim.”
“But people really believed in her. She married a prison chaplain. The Pope spoke on her behalf. Texas executed Carla anyway.”
Sophia frowns. “I’m confused. The way you sounded off yesterday about the Illinois governor and his moratorium, I assumed you were in favor of the death penalty.”
“But in Jarrett Capshaw’s case, there are extenuating circumstances. Cort said the federal marshal didn’t follow procedure. He should have called out, announced himself and he didn’t. Jarrett had no way of knowing there were government agents all over the building. He didn’t know who he was shooting at. A man in the doorway holding a gun. It sounds terrible to say the marshal should bear some of the responsibility, but—” Carolyn shrugs. She shakes out the dishtowel, arranges it over the oven door handle.
Sophia rinses the sink.
“I guess I thought it wasn’t so much to ask, for you to have a look at Cort’s brother’s case. What could it hurt?”
Sophia shuts off the water. “You used to volunteer me to bake cookies for homeroom and you got angry with me then, too, when I had to refuse.”
“I’m not angry.”
“I hope not.” Sophia dries her hands.
“I broke my engagement.”
Sophia meets Carolyn’s gaze.
“Last night when Larry called.”
“Was that the plan, then? Is that why you came home loaded down with so much baggage? You aren’t cleaning things out, you’re moving back in.”
Carolyn shakes her head, but her meaning is unclear. She has pulled on an old flannel shirt of Russ’s over her T-shirt and faded athletic shorts. Raiding her dad’s closet is a lifetime habit. There’s a picture of her somewhere, in one of the old photo albums, that was taken around the time she turned three. She’s walking away from the camera, dressed in one of Russ’s shirts, hem dragging behind her like a bridal train. Sophia thinks she ought to hunt up the picture, show it to Carolyn. They could share a laugh, perhaps it would lighten the atmosphere between them.
“Do you feel like talking about it?” Sophia asks.
“Want more coffee?”
Sophia says yes when in truth she’s had enough. She prefers tea, but Carolyn is partial to coffee.
They sit at the table and while Sophia stirs sugar into her cup, Carolyn unwraps the customary chocolate kiss to drop into hers, but then she rewraps it. “I have to stop this. It’s a terrible habit.”
“You could have worse.”
Carolyn returns the candy to the crystal dish, that is already half empty, Sophia notes, and pushes her mug away.
“Larry was married before. I found the divorce papers in his files. I realize I shouldn’t have looked through them,” Carolyn takes her cup to the sink and empties it, “that you wouldn’t,” she says over her shoulder.
Sophia doesn’t comment. Carolyn’s confession has reminded her of the box full of love letters she’d found years ago in a closet at the farm. They’d been addressed to her mother, but Sophia hadn’t let that stop her; she’d read every one and every one had been signed with some tender closing: I’ll love you forever ...Until we can be together again ...You are the beauty of my life ...followed by the name: Teddy. And Teddy was not Sophia’s father’s name.
“It lasted less than a year.” Carolyn returns to the table and sits down. “He was married before he finished law school. It was over by the time he came to
Paris.”
“When you two met.” Carolyn had left college to go to Paris and work for a travel magazine. She had wanted something different, a year abroad. Russ hadn’t been happy about it.
“Supposedly that’s why he was there, nursing a broken heart. He put off telling me, he said, because he was afraid of losing me.”
“And so he has.” Sophia picks up her mug.
“Why do you sound like that?”
“Like what?” Sophia is startled by the edge in Carolyn’s tone. She sets down her mug.
“As if I’m the one who’s made the mistake.”
“That isn’t—”
“I don’t care so much that he was married, Mom, but he should have told me, don’t you agree? Everyone else knows. His parents, his friends. I’m the only one who didn’t. It’s humiliating. It makes me feel stupid.”
“I can’t imagine it was deliberate. There must be some explana—”
“I knew you’d think I was making too much of it.”
“But what I think isn’t impor—”
“Ah!” Carolyn tosses up her hands. “Why can’t you just be my mother for once?”
Sophia opens her mouth, closes it.
Carolyn presses her fingertips to her eyes.
The silence is so absolute that Sophia imagines she can hear the tick of the minute hand as it sweeps the seconds from the face of the clock on the mantle in the living room. She glances at Carolyn’s bowed head. She has a distinct sense there is something more working here than romantic trouble. “Cecie?” she finally says.
“Okay, so what if I look like a fool, this isn’t just about my pride being hurt.” She meets Sophia’s glance, blinking, distressed. “It’s about telling the truth. How good can a relationship be if you can’t tell the person you claim to love the truth?”
Sophia holds Carolyn’s gaze.
“What?”
“Nothing. It’s just— I guess what I want to say is that sometimes the past is better left in the past.”
“Is that my mother the psychologist talking or my mother’s own experience?”
“It’s— I—” Sophia stumbles, gestures. “It’s a combination, I suppose. I don’t know.” Her face grows warm. She doesn’t look at Carolyn even though she knows not looking is the act of someone who is guilty, who has something to conceal. She waits for Carolyn to call her on it, but she doesn’t.
She stands up and announces she’s going for a run, that she needs to clear her head. “What time should we leave to go to Phil’s?”
“We don’t have to go at all, if you don’t want to.”
“But I do. I haven’t seen Phil and Dorie since Dad’s funeral, plus the Slade’s are going to be there, right?” Carolyn reties a shoe lace. “Unless you’ve changed your mind about my situation being an embarrassment.”
“No,” Sophia says. She pushes her coffee away truly regretting that she drank any of it. Her stomach feels on fire. She takes Carolyn’s hand. “You and Larry will get through this. You’ll work it out, and I’m here, okay? To listen or—or in whatever way you need me.”
Carolyn lowers her glance from her mother’s face to her mother’s hand holding hers and it’s as if she finds the sight very curious, which Sophia supposes it is. She tightens her clasp. “I mean it, Cecie. I want to help, if I can.” In whatever way you’ll let me, she might have added.
Carolyn sighs; she frees her hand, but gently, and when she thanks Sophia, her gratitude, while tentative, seems genuine.
o0o
Sophia has wandered away from Phil and Dorie’s other guests to admire the climbing rose, an antique noisette named Rêve d’Or that is in full bloom on the pillars of the gazebo. When Dorie asked, Sophia had recommended the climber for the loveliness of its buff yellow blooms and its fragrance, but most of all because it is nearly thornless.
“It’s beautiful,” a voice at Sophia’s elbow remarks.
She turns into bright light and is rendered nearly blind. Still she recognizes the senator’s wife, whom she has managed to avoid until now. Sophia is already thinking of how she might escape as she offers her hand in greeting, as she says, “Mrs. Slade, how nice to see you.”
“Sharon, please. After everything you’ve seen me through,” she adds. She holds Sophia’s hand overlong in both of hers that are elegant and slim and the same warm shade of deep brown as her eyes. Her gaze is warm, too, filled as it is with the memory of the night she’d nearly lost everything she loved in the world. That was how she’d phrased it in her thank-you note to Sophia after Greg was released from the hospital.
“That night is still the worst one I’ve ever experienced,” Sharon says releasing Sophia’s hand. “That you were there is one of the more fortunate accidents of life. I won’t ever stop being grateful.”
Sophia’s smile is a polite reflex. She would argue the use of the word “fortunate”. If she weren’t afraid of offending Sharon, she would remind her they had spoken in confidence, that Sharon had given her word.
But even in hindsight, knowing the potential for exposure, Sophia couldn’t have walked away from Sharon that night. That’s what her husband, the senator, had done. The moment Phil and Sophia had arrived at the ER after Phil had received the Slades’ summons, Jasper had bolted through the exit door leaving his son’s fate to his good friend and ex-college roommate, Phil and the ER doctors and his wife’s fate to Sophia.
They had talked together through those awful hours in the way that a crisis situation seems to call forth, in the way someone talks when they are vulnerable and feel their dark night will never end. Sharon had been angry at Greg and at Jasper and terrified of losing them both. She had blamed them; she had blamed herself. Sharon had cried until she was dry and finally silent. And she had been so deep in humiliation and regret for having broken down, for having confided such intimate details to Sophia that Sophia had felt compelled to share her own story, not only to ease Sharon’s mind, but also to give her hope for Greg’s recovery.
It was something like that, Sophia thinks now. Anymore, her memory of it is unclear. It is a little like trying to recall a conversation you had while drunk. You can’t think of one single thing that was said, you just have a sickening sense of mortification, of unease.
Sharon finds Sophia’s gaze. “It’s still hard for me when I think that Jasper could just abandon me while our son—while he might have—” she breaks off.
Died, Sophia finishes in her mind and she hopes the shadow crossing Sharon’s expression is merely the recollection of bewildered anger and grief and not an ongoing effect. “It was a difficult time for you.”
“It wasn’t easy for you either, I know, but just hearing how you survived helped me so much. You gave me the strength I needed to cope. You said Greg would make it, that he would find his way through it the way you did and you were right.”
Sophia looks toward the pool. The crowd has thinned; luckily, she hasn’t seen anyone from the media. Carolyn is standing near the cabana talking animatedly to the senator. She had mentioned wanting his autograph for a friend. Sophia prays that’s all they’re discussing. But now it occurs to her that it’s quite possible Sharon never shared Sophia’s secret with her husband. The less said the better, Sharon might have decided. Although Jasper had acted out of an overwhelming and very human fear and a sense of helplessness, Sophia doubts the media or the senator’s constituents would view what he’d done with compassion.
“I’m sorry, if I’ve upset you,” Sharon says.
“No, it’s all right,” Sophia murmurs rather than the truth.
“You know, when you told me that catastrophe could be an opportunity to heal a relationship, I didn’t believe you. Up until I heard your story, I thought it was easy for you to be so calm and cool with your fine healthy daughter off at college. But after a while, I started to understand. We truly are better off for having endured that horrible time. We’re stronger in our marriage, as a family. I’m stronger and it’s because of you.”
“I’m glad I could help.” Sophia forces another smile. She fingers a rose, bending to take in its fragrance. “I was so sorry to hear of the loss of your husband,” she hears Sharon say and she straightens in dismay. “I wanted so badly to come to the funeral, to be there for you.”
“The flowers you sent were lovely,” Sophia interrupts. She doesn’t want Sharon to feel burdened with the need to explain, nor does she want Sharon to feel an obligation. If only it were possible, Sophia would wipe the memory from Sharon’s mind.
“But the flowers can’t begin to repay your kindness to me and to my family.”
“Please,” Sophia puts up her hand, “don’t give it another thought.”
o0o
She lets herself though the old iron moon gate and closes it behind her. Except for the small shallow lake and its weathered pier, the parcel of land that Sophia calls her secret garden lacks improvements or even an owner that can be traced. She has thought of buying the property and perhaps now that she’s on her own, she’ll look into it.
She traverses a path that is shaded by a towering mixed canopy of oaks and loblolly pines. The sweet autumn clematis that has gone to seed here is blooming and beneath its vanilla-scented fragrance, the air is redolent with sharper notes of dust and mold, the ancient process of ongoing decay. Eons of silence.
The light is green and swimmy. Shadows dart like fish.
At the pier’s end, she sits and, swinging her feet over the edge, she immediately spies a rare water boatman beetle. The bug is on its back working its legs through the shore-line sludge like tiny oars. A dragonfly swoops and rises quickly on gossamer wings. She bends back her head, closing her eyes, letting the sun warm her face, thinking of Sharon Slade. Yesterday’s chat. How peculiar it is that they have met only twice and yet Sharon is privy to every intimate detail of the darkest period of time in Sophia’s life. Sharon knows things about Sophia that no one else knows, outside of Russ and her mother. Sharon knows things about Sophia that she has never imagined herself saying out loud to anyone. In fact she was schooled to push the very thoughts from her mind. And her drug use, her old addiction, is the least of it.
The Volunteer Page 6
