The Volunteer

by Barbara Taylor Sissel

  “My mom had to take my little brother to the dentist. Uncle Cort said it was okay to wait for her here.”

  “It’s fine.” Sophia comes down the rest of the steps to stand opposite him. He’s dark-haired like his father and his eyes are a vivid blue and have the same intensity she noticed in his dad’s mug shot. Although she guesses Thomas must be somewhere around fourteen or fifteen, he’s solidly built, taller and broader through the shoulders and chest than other boys his age. She has to look up to study his face. Fading patches of acne lie on either side of his nose; his jaw is peppered with new-sprouted stubble, not quite ready for shaving, although she imagines he’s tried it.

  But the child he’s leaving behind lingers in the still-soft curves of his face and she suffers an urge to brush her fingertips along his brow, touch his cheek. Nostalgia, she thinks. She so vividly remembers Carolyn at this age, her vulnerability, her awkwardness, the astonishing glimpses of utter poise. “I was going to have a glass of lemonade,” Sophia says. “Would you like to join me?”

  “I better not.” Thomas looks over his shoulder toward the street. “Mom’ll be here any time.”

  “How about if I tell Cort you’re in the backyard with me? He can tell her where you are.”

  “Okay,” Thomas agrees, but he’s wary.

  Sophia almost smiles. He’s wondering whether she’s crazy, a crazy old lady.

  o0o

  She finds Cort settling a tarp over the hydrangeas on the east side of the house. “I met Thomas,” she says walking toward him.

  Cort straightens, squinting at her from under the bill of his painter’s cap.

  “I’ve invited him to have lemonade on the patio while he waits for his mother. I hope it’s all right.”

  “Oh, no.” Cort lifts the cap in sharp underscore of negation.

  “No?” Sophia frowns.

  “I mean you shouldn’t go to the trouble.”

  “It’s no trouble. Carolyn baked oatmeal cookies this morning, a double recipe, we’ll never be able to eat them all. Besides, I’ll enjoy his company. Will you tell her where we are when she comes? Or would you like to join us?”

  Cort waves his hand in the direction of the ladder that holds a primer-dripped paint bucket and a couple of brushes. “I should finish this section.”

  “Well, if you change your mind.”

  “Thanks,” he says, but he sounds more disturbed than grateful.

  Sophia hesitates. She wants to say she understands, that she’s sorry, that she can’t imagine how difficult it is to stand by while time runs out on your brother’s life. It’s her nature, her profession, to reach out, but Trent Hunter is everywhere with this story. All day, without provocation or consent, her mind has kept wandering back to this morning’s segment on the codex. She has even had the bizarre thought that Russ might have had possession of it; suppose he’d hidden it here? It’s insane, completely insane to think such a thing and yet, there it is.

  She shades her eyes watching Cort ascend the ladder. “I’m surprised you don’t have reporters following you everywhere.” She lifts her voice slightly.

  He looks down on her. “After six years of me giving them the cold shoulder, they’ve figured out I’m a waste of time.” He picks up his paintbrush, holds it poised looking inquiringly at her.

  Sophia lowers her hand. She wonders if his cold shoulder has extended to Trent, whom she cannot imagine backing off a story for any reason. In the event Cort has talked to Trent, she wonders if her name came up, or Russ’s. She wants to ask; she wants to point out that eventually some reporter, if not Hunter, himself, will make the connection that Cort is painting Doctor Sophia Beckman’s house. The Widow Beckman. The one-time wife of prominent, but recently-expired, international investment banker, Russell William Beckman, who, by the way, also collected pre-Columbian art and rubbed shoulders with Louis Tilley. And, oh, lets not forget this, she’s a psychologist, the very one who interceded on Jody Doaks’ behalf.

  What a lot of coincidences, folks! Hunter’s voice rings through Sophia’s mind.

  “Trust me,” Cort calls from his perch, “I wouldn’t be working here if it meant putting you at risk of getting grilled by reporters. Any of those buzzards come around here I’ll boot them off the property.”

  Sophia shades her eyes again. He seems to be reading her mind and perhaps he’s speaking the truth. Perhaps he even means it. She thanks him and turning, retraces her steps. She won’t ask about the codex. It would be giving the whole matter more credence than it deserves.

  o0o

  While Thomas polishes off a glass of lemonade and two cookies, Sophia asks about school and teachers and learns he likes math and baseball. And motorcycles. He dusts his hands.

  She says, “Have another,” and she’s gratified when he does.

  “Your birdbath is about to fall over,” he informs her, gesturing.

  “Yes, and the grass needs mowing,” she says with a sigh, “and fence boards need replacing and the list goes on.”

  “I could straighten the birdbath, if you want.”

  “It’s awfully heavy.”

  He gives her a look. “I can handle it, no problem. You have some sand and a level?”

  “In the garage.” Sophia leads the way. “I gather you’ve done this before.”

  “I help out my uncle all the time.” Thomas shoulders the bag of sand. “He doesn’t just paint houses, you know. He renovates them, too, the old ones that are on the historical register. He knows everything about how stuff was built back in the day. He’s like a master craftsman. Mom says he’s an artist.”

  Thomas’s obvious pride carries a hotter note of defense as if he feels compelled to stand up for his uncle, or, perhaps, it’s the family’s name he feels compelled to protect. Either way, Sophia thinks, it’s regrettable. She watches him shift the basin off the pedestal and onto the ground and reiterates her amazement that Cort works by hand. “You don’t see that very often nowadays.”

  “Yeah, because it takes too much time and when you’re done, there’s no money in it. That’s how come he’s back house painting, because of—because Mom needs—”

  The money. The words hang in the air, unacknowledged and awkward in their suggestion of dire circumstance, along with Thomas’s embarrassment. He stoops, quickly, grabbing the bag of sand. Sophia wants to offer him reassurance, but she’s afraid it would only worsen the moment for him.

  He smoothes the sand he’s poured with his foot and says if they had a couple of flat rocks, he could set one on top of the other. He uses his hands, roughs out a square. “If I could make a base, the birdbath would stay straight better.”

  “Well, that’s a smart idea.” Sophia is impressed, delighted.

  He squints at her. “They’d have to be heavy.”

  “Follow me,” she tells him, “I think I have just what we need.”

  o0o

  Once the basin is reseated Sophia lays the level across the width of the bowl, eyeing the alignment. When she pronounces it perfect, Thomas crosses his arms. “Cool,” he says.

  And Sophia laughs at how pleased he seems to be with himself and from pure gratitude. “Thank you,” she says. “What do I owe you?”

  “I work for cookies,” he tells her and his sudden grin is unexpected, engaging.

  “I don’t guess you’d be interested in a job, would you?”

  “Seriously? You mean like yard work and stuff?”

  She nods even as she wonders at herself. Was hiring Jarrett Capshaw’s brother not enough? Is she really asking his son to come to work for her too? “I’ve let things go for so long, I could use your help. I could pay you, say, eight dollars an hour?”

  “For real? Man, that’d be great. I’m saving up to buy a motorcycle and I could use the money.”

  “I guess we have a deal then.” Sophia sticks out her hand and they shake on it.

  Thomas drops to his knees and begins settling the loose dirt around the pedestal with his hands.

  “
So, how old are you, Thomas?” Sophia kneels beside him, wielding the trowel.

  “I’ll be sixteen next month.”

  “I didn’t know you could drive a motorcycle at fifteen.”

  “The small ones.” He sits back on his heels. The prominent bones of his face—brow, cheeks, jaw—are white-ridged with late-afternoon sunlight. “I’ve got a Honda Rebel now, but what I really want is a Harley.”

  “Well, I have to admit those worry me.”

  “My mom’s the same way. She’s about to have a cow. She’s all on my case saying I have to talk to my dad first.”

  “She’s probably afraid for you. You’re so vulnerable driving one of those.”

  “No.” Thomas picks up something small, a pebble or an acorn, and tosses it. “It’s a bribe to try and get me to visit him. I guess you know he’s in prison. It’s all over the news.”

  Sophia murmurs assent; she keeps her gaze low.

  “I don’t want to see him. He’s an idiot and anyway he’ll be dead by this time next month—”

  “Thomas?”

  His chin comes up. “It’s my mom,” he says and he’s on his feet in one fluid moment, but too flustered to make introductions.

  The women take care of the business themselves, exchanging names. Grace Capshaw’s hand in Sophia’s clasp is small and fine-boned like the rest of her. It is surprising that someone of such petite stature can be Thomas’s mother. He seems to tower over her.

  Sophia smiles. “I hope you don’t mind, but I put your son to work.”

  “I see.”

  Sophia looks where Grace is looking, at the knees of Thomas’s dirt-stained jeans. “Oh, dear,” she says.

  “Miz Beckman offered me a job,” Thomas announces.

  Sophia doesn’t correct him and say it’s Doctor Beckman. She doesn’t particularly care to be addressed as Doctor. “I could really use his help,” she tells Grace. “Things are in such a state back here. I’d like to have him come regularly, starting tomorrow, if that’s doable?”

  “Sure,” Thomas says. He looks at his mom. “You or Uncle Cort would have to bring me, or, if that’s a problem, you could always give me back the keys to my bike.”

  Before he can finish, Grace is shaking her head.

  “Why not?” Thomas demands.

  “You know why not.”

  He looks at Sophia, blinking, irate. “I’m in trouble for getting into a fight I didn’t start with these punks who went after my little brother, who’d be dead now if I hadn’t been there.”

  Sophia gently disengages her glance. He’s hunting for support, but it isn’t her place to give it.

  “Thomas,” Grace is understandably perturbed, “for heaven’s sake, this isn’t the right time to discuss—”

  “C’mon, Mom, it’s only a couple more days until you’re going to give me back my privileges anyway.”

  “That’s enough, mister. If you’re finished here, Brian’s waiting in the car and Megan’s still at daycare. We need to go.”

  Thomas picks up the bag of leftover sand, the trowel and the level. “I’ll put this stuff away first.”

  Sophia and Grace watch him head across the lawn, pace clipped, offended.

  “I’m sorry,” Grace says. “Teenagers,” she adds.

  Sophia laughs. “My daughter’s twenty-six now, but there were days I thought she wouldn’t make it out of high school alive.”

  Grace’s smile is quickly gone. “I guess you’re aware of our situation? Cort said he mentioned it. Never mind that you can’t turn on the news without seeing something about us. But those reporters, they’re like vultures, they take everything you say and twist it.”

  “Then use it against you.”

  Grace glances sidelong at Sophia.

  “I’ve had some experience,” she says.

  “Because of Jody Doaks.”

  Sophia doesn’t answer.

  Grace pins her gaze to the middle distance. “Sometimes I think I’m going to lose my sanity before this is—” She hesitates.

  Over. The word hovers in Sophia’s mind.

  “Settled,” Grace says instead.

  But then she probably hasn’t faced what appears to be inevitable, her own widowhood. And under such horrific circumstances, Sophia thinks. “It must be very difficult.”

  Grace nods. Her lower jaw slides forward in a fight for composure. “I worry most about my children. I don’t want them to see that I’m scared.”

  “Have you considered talking to someone?” Sophia touches her temple. Don’t start, a voice warns.

  “Like you, you mean?”

  Something of Sophia’s regret must show on her face because Grace turns away, mouth pursed, blinking. Sophia’s heart swims. She bites her lip, but even she knows it’s useless. She’s under the influence of the same impulse that drove her to help Sharon Slade and look where that has left her: stressed out and exasperated with herself. But this feels inevitable somehow. Sophia feels as if there is a fist in her back pushing her. Pushing this. Whatever it is.

  Grace pulls a tissue from her purse; she blows her nose saying she doesn’t have the money or the time for appointments even if she were inclined to seek help. “Every day it’s something,” she says, “some catastrophe with the kids, or the restaurant, or the lawyers.”

  “You do realize it wasn’t simply my testimony that got Jody’s sentence commuted.” Sophia wants this much to be clear. “There were other witnesses called by the defense, other factors were considered.”

  “Cort told me that’s what you think, that he came here to ask you to get clemency for my husband.” Grace fixes Sophia with a look, a wan smile. “But what worked for Jody Doaks would never work in Jarrett’s case. He’s got all his mental faculties.”

  “Of course, I didn’t mean to imply—”

  The bite of Grace’s laugh is truncated, harsh. “If only Jarrett could be excused by pleading mental defect.”

  Sophia doesn’t respond.

  “If I were to see a therapist,” Grace continues, “it would be for my children’s sake, because I need guidance in how to help them prepare for the loss, the potential loss of their father. Even I know there isn’t much short of a miracle that can save Jarrett now.” A ragged edge of impatience wears in Grace’s tone as if she is tired of defending herself, her belief, albeit slim, that there are such things as miracles.

  Sophia looks toward the garage where the last of the sun’s rays silver the ridgeline. She clasps her elbows feeling a chill in the air. She feels her heart, its measured beating. What must it be like to know the exact day you’re going to die? To have the time fixed? A square on a calendar, a marked place. She looks at Grace. “I can’t promise a solution,” Sophia speaks over the voice of her reluctance, her deep misgiving, “but if you feel that talking things over would be of help to you, perhaps to your children, then I’m available for that. Say tomorrow, around three? I’m sure we can work out something reasonable regarding my fee.”

  Chapter 10

  Fall - 1979

  “I don’t think you should see Dad without me.”

  “You worry too much.” Jarrett glanced up from knotting his tie. Grace’s reflection floated behind his in the mirror. She was lying in his narrow bed where he’d left her to shave, shower and dress. She wasn’t wearing anything but the sheet and it was a major distraction.

  “You don’t know him the way I do. He’s up to something.”

  “Trust me, it’ll be fine.” Jarrett gave the silk knot a final pat, admiring his work in the mirror.

  Grace’s face, the top half, hovered in a section of glass above his shoulder. She’d levered herself up on an elbow and he could see her eyes crowded with something more complicated than worry. But he wouldn’t take the look apart, or even remember it, until years later, when he was jailed. Remembering her expression then, he’d wonder if he’d pushed her, would she have told him what was behind it, although, truly, he already knew. Her reasons for marrying him weren’t better than h
is for marrying her. They’d both had something they wanted to prove.

  But the morning of the meeting with her father, Jarrett was still fooling himself that Tilley was like him in that they both wanted Grace’s happiness. Jarrett figured what he’d hear from his father-in-law-to-be was a lecture about taking good care of his daughter, or there’d be a discussion about what Tilley expected from Jarrett regarding his future as a member of the family. Jarrett really did think—and it would prove to be a big mistake—that Louis was making an effort to be friendly.

  Jarrett found Grace’s reflection again in the mirror. The sheet had slipped to reveal the curve of her breasts, one rosy nipple and whatever focus he’d had evaporated. He went to her, kissed the hollow of her neck, the round cap of her shoulder, took his mouth lower.

  “Jarrett,” she whispered.

  “It’ll be fine,” he said fighting an urge to strip out of his carefully knotted tie, oxford shirt, and wool slacks, and climb into bed with her.

  “But—”

  “No buts.” He raised his head, reluctantly drawing the sheet back over her breasts, but unable to refrain from smoothing his hand across their fullness, a last caress. “I know there’s been a lot of bad blood, but that’s over. I promise. No matter what your dad says today, I’m not taking the bait.” He kissed her upturned mouth. “Who knows,” he said, “maybe he’ll offer me a job. What would you say to that, Miss Gracie?” Jarrett laughed.

  She didn’t.

  o0o

  What Louis offered Jarrett, initially, once he’d waved him into a leather wing-backed chair in front of his desk, was a cigar. “Cuban,” he said, sticking one between his teeth. “I get them flown in,” he informed with a wink.

  “They’re smuggled?”

  “Try one.”

  Jarrett declined. He didn’t smoke.

  Tilley fired up.

  Watching him, Jarrett reconsidered: maybe he should smoke, act like a big shot. Establish some kind of common ground. Hell, even a poor-ass loser like himself could hold a cigar.

  Tilley said, “You leave Gracie in bed?”

  “I don’t see where that’s any of your business, sir.”

  “When you’re screwing my daughter, you’re making it my business, boy.”