Sliding On The Edge

by C. Lee McKenzie

  “Hey! I’m not laughing at you. I think you’re cool, but you don’t give anyone a chance to know you. Maybe if you did, you’d find someone you like, or at least get along with.”

  “Friends make me nervous.” I walk toward the door. “I gotta go. I didn’t tell my grandmother where I was going, and she raises all kinds of hell when I break her rules.”

  Marta follows me to the front yard and onto the road. “See you tomorrow.”

  I shrug. “Sure.” I don’t look back, but I swing my hips a little more because I know she’s watching me—Shawna, who knows the ropes.

  That was weird. I wonder how it will be in class when I sit next to her. Will she still give me those ferret looks? Will I have to talk to her? What’ll I do if... no, not happening.

  I reach the grassy park and go left along the main street toward the highway with my thumb out. In about two minutes, a truck stops alongside me. Oh, no. It’s Kay’s truck with Kenny driving and Buster in the back.

  “Howdy, Missy!”

  “Are we back to Missy?” I climb into the passenger seat.

  “Yes, we are, because your grandmother’s about ready to thrash your backside from here to Las Vegas and back again for not telling her where you were off to this morning. I sure do hope you got a whopper of a story to settle her down.”

  “I went to see a... friend.” I never thought that line would pass my lips. Sweet River soft again.

  Kenny gives me the seat belt stare; then puts the truck into gear and rolls onto the highway. He looks at me from under his sweat-soaked tan hat. “You got a friend?”

  “Sure.”

  He nods.

  I shrug.

  Kay meets us at the front of the house, one hand on each hip, her face hard. Even from the truck I can see the red around her eyes. Man, does she look scary.

  Chapter 27

  Kay

  Kay woke that Sunday to the sound of Buster whining. She pulled her curtain aside and looked out. Why was that dog running down the road then back? She opened the window and whistled. Buster ran to the porch and pawed the front door until she let him in.

  She made coffee, finished her bookkeeping and by nine was caught up.

  Kenny had already taken up his spot on the porch, but Shawna hadn’t come out of her room yet.

  Kay tapped on Shawna’s bedroom door. She waited, listening, then looked inside. Shawna’s bed was empty. Kay went to the kitchen and filled her empty coffee cup and looked outside, but the backyard was empty. “Shawna?” She called from the back door and waited. When Shawna didn’t poke her head out of the barn, Kay pulled on her boots and walked across to Floyd’s. Maybe she had gone to see the black horse

  Floyd’s horses were grazing at the back of his property, but Shawna was nowhere in sight. Kay walked back to her barn and checked the stalls, then returned to the house, where Kenny had already taken up his post on the front porch with his Sunday paper.

  “She’s not at Floyd’s. She’s not in the barn or in her room.” Kay paced the length of the porch and back.

  “Now settle down. She’s around here someplace.” But he folded the paper and dropped it next to the rocker.

  Kay’s mind spun with all the possibilities of where Shawna might have taken off to, but with each step, she felt her heart thud harder against her chest. What if she’s run away? What if she’s on her way back to Las Vegas? She could be hurt. She could be lost. After all, she doesn’t know this area. I should have made plans to make Sunday less lonely. I know she hates the quiet and the routine. So why didn’t I deal with it? She stopped in front of Kenny, whose eyes were tracking her back and forth. “Kenny, we have to find her.”

  He eased himself up. “You stay put. She might show up and it’d be good for you to be here. That way you can give her a whack on her backside while you’re riled. I’ll take the truck and drive into town.”

  She has to be safe, Kay thought. And what if she isn’t? As Kenny drove down the driveway, she felt the sting of tears in her eyes. If Shawna was gone, the space she left behind would be bigger than Kay had ever imagined possible. In such a short time, and in spite of all the disruption... No. She couldn’t say disruption, because that wasn’t what Shawna’s being there had become. Somehow, this brazen sixteen-year-old had shaken her awake and alive. She worried about her. Yet she somehow felt the stir of hope—for this girl and her future. Even that word had meaning again. “Future,” she said, liking the sound in her ears.

  Kay wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. If Kenny finds her, and if she comes back safe . . .”I’ll make this work. I’ll get her the help she needs. I’ll do whatever it takes to save Nic’s girl.”

  When Casey drove up for work, Kay made another turn around the house and then out to the barn, just in case Shawna had gone for a walk and returned.

  “Did you see Shawna along the road when you came in?” she asked Casey.

  “No, Ms. Stone. Sorry. Is anything wrong?”

  She sighed. “I’m not sure. I think she’s just escaped Sunday on the ranch, but she didn’t tell me, so I’m a little worried.”

  He shook his head. “She doesn’t make it easy for you, does she?”

  “No.”

  “Must be Las Vegas manners.” He turned to go into the barn. “If you need me to help, let me know, okay?”

  She nodded. “Thank you, Casey.”

  As she walked up the back steps and into the kitchen, she heard the sound of the truck and ran to the front porch. Was Shawna in the passenger seat? Yes. Relief spread warm and clean through her. Then she got mad. What was she riding, a roller coaster? Fear. Relief. Anger. And a thousand pounds of doubt. She was up, down, around, and on her head. And all because of Shawna Stone, who sat next to Kenny Fargo, looking like she’d just come back from a vacation.

  Chapter 28

  Shawna

  Nobody ever worried about where I went or when I came home. I was the one who worried. I was the one who bugged the guards to find Mom inside the casinos and the bars, when she didn’t show up at the apartment by 6:00 A.M. I took care of me and Mom, when she crashed and burned. So what’s the big deal about going into town without telling someone?

  I get out of the truck. Kenny and Buster skirt the house and head straight for the barn.

  Cowards.

  In the living room, Kay paces in front of me, her hands waving all over the place, like she’s talking to God. She isn’t saying anything, but her body is shouting, and it’s got a vocabulary that can singe your heart. When she stops, her eyes stare out from behind one of those tragic Greek masks.

  “Do you know what it’s like to wait for somebody to come home and not know where they are or what they are doing or if they’ve been hurt or what—?”

  Do I! I’d like to tell her about some of those nights. Waiting for Mom. Wondering if she was coming back to the apartment or staying someplace else. And if she did come back, who or what she’d bring along. I shrug.

  “Damn it!” She punches the air and bolts to the end of the living room.

  My mouth drops. I’ve pissed her off, all right.

  “Why do you do these things? Do you want to hurt me? Do you want to make my life as miserable as possible?”

  “I didn’t think going into town was going to make you miserable,” I answer, and it’s not a lie.

  It’s like someone opened a valve on a blow-up mattress and let all the air out. She collapses in the nearest chair and stares at the floor.

  “I’m not used to being a grandmother. I don’t even know what grandmothers are supposed to do these days. Mine baked birthday cakes for me and told me bedtime stories.” She covers her face with both her hands and mumbles through her fingers. “You’re too old for bedtime stories.”

  “Wow, cakes,” I say, but I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I never thought about someone baking me a birthday cake.

  She stares at the floor. Then in a voice that sounds like she’s reining it in tight, she says: “Shawna, we have an appoi
ntment with a therapist next Wednesday afternoon, after school. We are going in there and we are going to find out what each of us has to do to get along together. I don’t care what you tell her or how you feel about going. I only care that each of us survives and maybe comes out somewhat whole at the end.

  She stands up and gives me that red-eyed look of hers. “I’ll pick you up exactly at 3:00 o’clock after school.” She disappears down the hall and she doesn’t exactly slam her office door, but it closes harder than usual.

  I never got mad when Mom snuck out late and hit the tables. I never yelled at her about being the responsible person and letting me know where she was going and when she was leaving. I never... And what if I had? What difference would that have made? I make a circle with my thumb and first finger and hold it up. “Zero. Zip. Nada.”

  So what’s with the queen? Why’s she so sensitive? Manual Entry #5: Keep Her Informed About Where You Go. Ha, like there are so many choices.

  I pound the cushion next to me and push my face into it. Lights dance behind my eyelids, and I lie there, trying to digest what Kay said. I think about what happened in the café with Casey and then with that creep, and why the visit to The Troll’s house weirded me out so much. “I don’t know how many more Sundays I can do here,” I whisper into the cushion.

  I stretch up from the sofa and walk outside. There’s still a lot of the day left, and no prospects of anything happening until dinner. Whoopie!

  I think about taking Magic an apple and talking to him. Then I think about never seeing him again, and my throat burns like it did when Casey told me about Texas and what it means for horses. I hate this place! I wish I’d never come here.

  I walk to the end of the house and look across at Drunk Floyd’s. Magic hangs his long neck over the top rail and rubs against the rough wood. The other two lean against the shady side of the barn and twitch their tails. Why’s that dumb horse standing there in the hot sun?I know why.

  “Stupid animal!” But I’m already walking into the kitchen. I grab an apple and cut it up the way he likes it. I stashed the vitamins from Rural Supply at the back of the cabinet under the sink, so I grab the now very legal bottle, shake out two pills, and hurry down the back steps.

  I climb up and over the fence and Magic has already taken a chunk of apple before I land. I grind the pills and stir them in the pan of water. He cleans the pan then nudges me until I rub the white spot on his head, something that pleases him now that he’s used to me.

  “Come on, let’s get out of the sun. Don’t you think it’s hot enough to cook your hide out here?”

  He follows me under the shade tree, eats the rest of his apple, and keeps nosing me for more. “That’s it. I’ll bring you another one tomorrow. Maybe.” He rubs against my side, the hair on my arms tingles under his hot breath. I bite my lip hard.

  I check the water trough and make sure all three horses have grass hay, but Magic, ignoring the fresh hay, trails after me as I make my way back to Kay’s.

  “What’s up with you today?” I reach my arms up around his neck.

  Stay, he says to me, or at least I think that’s what he’d say if he could. Ride with me.

  This is great, now I’m starting the Sweet River mind reading, only I’m reading what’s going on inside a horse’s head? “I... I... don’t know how, Magic.”

  I’ll teach you. Climb on that fence and put your leg over my back. I’ll teach you to ride. I’ll teach you to do a lot of things, Shawna. Try. Don’t be afraid.

  “I’m not afraid of anything. Why is everybody and... everything on the planet trying to tag me with that?”

  Magic snorts and paws the ground. Now he’s giving me that stare. That, “You-Can’t-Kid-Me, Kid,” look that The Queen uses.

  “Okay.” I glance away. “I’m afraid. You satisfied?”

  He shakes his head.

  “And if you tell another soul what I just said, I’ll punch your lights out, buddy! Besides, you’re not really so smart. If you were so smart, you wouldn’t belong to Floyd now, would you?”

  He butts me in my side with his head.

  Don’t be afraid.

  He turns, walks to the fence and waits for me to catch up.

  The best way to do anything that’s new and not too much to your liking, is to do it fast. But Magic is suddenly ten stories taller than he was a minute ago, and his back looks slick as oil. I’m going to fall and break bones. I just know it.

  He gives me another look. Well?

  “If I die, you are gonna hear from my lawyers.” Funny. I said, if.

  I climb to the top rail, balance; then swing my leg over Magic’s back before I give another thought to the prospects of not getting down again in one piece.

  He stands until I have a grip on his mane, and then he takes me with him. I cinch my thighs tight against his sides, squeeze my eyes shut, and wonder what in the hell I think I’m doing on the back of this humongous animal. I relax my grip and he picks up his pace. Now he is sort of jogging, or whatever horses do, and my butt is slapping against his back.

  “I’m not good at this, Magic. Slow down, okay?”

  You’ll get better. Riding is easy. It’s like breathing.

  “Right. And I don’t do that so good, either. Maybe I need breathing lessons before I take your riding lessons.”

  He shifts into another gear, and now I feel like I’m on a ship, rocking forward and back. I squeeze my legs tighter and lean over his broad neck.

  He slows, and I’m back to the butt-slapping again, until he drops to a walk and returns me to the fence.

  Now you can climb down. You’re free to go.

  I climb onto the fence and watch Magic walk to the barn.

  “I’ll bring you an apple tomorrow after school!” I yell.

  He doesn’t look back at me.

  “If you’re still alive,” I say. I kick the fence post hard. “Ow!” Hopping and holding onto the toe of my tennis shoe I ask myself, When... did you... decide to... ow... be stupid? I sit and pull my shoe off. My sock is bloody. You’re such a loser. And you can’t help it, can you?

  As carefully as I can, I peel the sock off. My big toe kinda waggles when I touch it. The nail is bleeding, and a dark bruise already covers it all the way to the joint.

  “It’s broken.” Casey is looking down at me.

  “Oh, no.” I drop my bloody sock and cover my face with my hands. Maybe if I block out all the light, I’ll be safe. I don’t want him here. I don’t need him here. I don’t want or need anybody or anything. But damn, I wish my toe would stop throbbing.

  I feel his arms reach under and lift me. I keep my face covered so I don’t have to see him, so I can’t see where he’s taking me. I can feel his chest rising and falling, his heartbeat against my side. I’m thinking about those movies, with strong men sweeping up sexy women and... and my toe is ready to explode. Why doesn’t he say something? If he says anything, I’ll pop him in the nose. My toe has a heart of its own now, and that heart is drumming so hard my whole foot throbs.

  “What’s this, something we have to shoot and put out of her misery?”

  I peek through my fingers at Kenny Fargo, who sits rocking in his favorite chair on the front porch.

  “Broken toe is all,” Casey says. He puts me on the step and walks away. “Shoot her if that’s what you need to do.”

  “Looks like you got yourself another friend,” Kenny said, nodding toward Casey’s retreating back.

  Chapter 29

  Kay

  Monday morning Kay dropped Shawna at school. “Shawna, are you sure you can walk on that foot today?”

  “It’s fine.”

  “All right, but call me if you have problems later.” Kay waited until Shawna limped inside the front door with her books hugged to her chest.

  After a few errands, she returned home and was putting groceries away when the phone rang. Kay answered, expecting a call from the vet.

  “Kay, it’s Jackie.”

  The flat,
nasal voice Kay would never forget jolted her as sharply as an electrical charge. Pictures from over sixteen years ago flashed in her head like a slide show. Nicholas, sitting with his elbows on the kitchen table, his hands covering his face. Jackie, standing next to him. Peter, standing near the back door, looking out. Where was she? Behind the camera, she guessed, because she couldn’t see herself. It was probably better that she didn’t.

  Kay gripped the phone tighter. “What do you want?” She didn’t waste intonation on the question, so her voice sounded as flat as the one on the other end of the line.

  “I’d like to talk to Shawna.”

  “She’s in school.”

  “When—”

  “She’ll be home after three.”

  “I’ll call back then.”

  Kay hung up the phone.

  The next call came before Kay’s hand left the receiver, and this time it was the vet. She made arrangements with him to come to the barn later and check on the gray. The rest of the day, she went from worrying over the gray’s condition to trying her best not to think about Jackie. But even while Kay sat watching over her horse, Jackie was never out of her mind.

  She walked between the barn and the house, talking to herself. “The last thing I need is that one back in my life. What are you talking about, Kay? She’ll always be in your life, as long as Shawna’s around.”

  At 2:30, Kay climbed into the truck. Buster jumped into the bed and they were on their way to pick up Shawna. It was a routine now, one she and Buster had built into their weekdays. It gave Kay time to think about her day, to worry over the gray’s temperature that Kenny couldn’t get down to normal, to remind herself to make Kenny’s apple pie as she’d promised, to put together a mental list of errands she still needed to do before dinner. The ten-minute ride was Kay’s break.

  She turned into the school parking lot and drove to the front. Shawna stood on the steps, her chin jutting out, her hip swished to one side, where she’d propped her books. When she looked up, her expression surprised Kay. It was the first time her granddaughter looked happy to see her. Something warm flooded the inside of her chest, and she had to grip the wheel to keep back the tears that threatened.

  Shawna limped to the truck and climbed inside.

  “How’s the toe?”

  “Whaddya think? It still hurts.”