Honor Redeemed

by Loree Lough

  “The one marked Goodwill?”

  He winced. “Maybe. I, ah, never noticed. Sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” she said, reaching across the table to pat his hand. “I think the Goodwill people will agree that Rowdy needed it more than they do.” She tucked in one corner of her mouth. “But I’m the one who should be sorry, for interrupting you. You were saying?”

  “Well,” Matt continued, “after I wrapped him up, I put him in a box.” He stopped, trying to remember if there’d been anything written on it, and came up empty. “So, since I didn’t know if you’d want him buried in your backyard, or at a pet cemetery, or if you had planned to have him cremat—”

  “No.” She shook her head hard enough to dislodge a curl from the ribbon holding her ponytail in place. “Definitely not that. I want him here.”

  He took a sip of the coffee. “Then first thing in the morning, I’ll …” How could he say “dig a hole” without sounding crude and tactless? “Anyway, I’ll take care of that, too.”

  “It’s the weirdest thing,” she began, “because as much as I loved him, you’d think I would have had a plan, wouldn’t you?”

  “Hey, I’ve written articles on that topic, so I know that most people go to their graves without anyone having a clue as to how they’d like to be buried, or even if they want to be buried. I could recite the stats, but it’s late, and I’d probably bore you to sleep.” He took another swallow of coffee. “But here’s one example for you: when Faith died, I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. We were young. Stupid. Thought we were invincible. Never gave a thought to dying, or drawing up a will, or anything like that. Heck. I was so uninformed I couldn’t even put together an intelligent question to get information about any of it.”

  Her face wrinkled with an “Aw gee” expression. And then Honor said, “I’m sure the whole thing was hard on you, in a thousand different ways. Especially with a job and two infants to take care of.”

  Hard barely cut it. Matt remembered spending a couple of hours in the hospital chapel, crying his eyes out, trying to wrap his mind around the fact that one minute, he had a pregnant wife, and the next, he had a dead one … and two helpless infants. He sang the line “I Get by with a Little Help from My Friends.”

  She balanced an elbow on the table, rested her chin on a fist, and stared. After a second or two, he said, “No way I’ve got spinach in my teeth, ‘cause I never touch the stuff.”

  “Really? But it’s delicious, and so good for you!”

  “So are a thousand other things. I think I’ll stick with those, if it’s all the same to you.”

  Honor continued studying his face, and it unnerved him in ways he couldn’t even describe. “What?”

  “Your eyes are bloodshot.”

  Because I blubbered like a baby out there in the garage, that’s why.

  “And puffy.”

  Blubbering like a baby will do that to a guy. “Like I said. It’s late.”

  “Fair warning …”

  “Of?”

  “I’m liable to blubber like a baby with no advance notice. Happy and smiling one minute, bawling like a calf the next.”

  And so she’d done it again. If Matt could figure out how she managed to penetrate his thick head, and read his thoughts, maybe he’d have a ghost of a chance at blocking her.

  Her mouth slanted with a small sad smile. “I think it’s sweet, for what it’s worth.”

  “What is?”

  “That you cared enough about him to shed a tear or two.”

  A tear or two? More like a thousand or two!

  Out there in the garage, washing Rowdy, wrapping him in a favorite blanket, gently laying him in the box that would be his coffin, Matt was reminded of all the deaths he’d been too proud, too macho, too Marine to fully mourn. Seeing the dog in that condition whipped him back to Manhattan, where even the thick gray ash wasn’t enough to soak up the blood that had pooled in the skeletal shadow of the South Tower. Matt pictured fellow rescue workers, crushed as they dug for signs of life amid twisted metal and pits of still-burning debris. He remembered the comrade in arms, deployed to Afghanistan on the same transport plane, who deliberately threw himself onto an IED one dusty, sunny morning to spare others in the unit. Rowdy’s whole life had been made up of moments like those, and like every other heroic first responder—cop or firefighter, EMT and SAR member—he’d been willing to sacrifice himself, if that’s what it took, to get a hard job done. Almost as heartbreaking as Rowdy’s death, itself, was acknowledging how much more he would have contributed to the world, if not for a crazy, unexplainable, irreversible moment in time. And that’s what had opened the blasted floodgates!

  “You can’t dig a hole tomorrow,” she was saying. “The ground’s frozen solid.”

  Matt pinched the bridge of his nose and stared at the ceiling. Of course, she was right. Why hadn’t he thought of that? “Maybe if I get an early start, I can—”

  “Matt. No. You could wrench a muscle. Or catch your death. I’ll call Rowdy’s vet. Maybe he’ll have a suggestion.”

  Aw, babe, he thought, looking into her lovable, freshly scrubbed face, yer breakin’ my heart. One of the things that first attracted him to her had been the music in her voice. She had a talent for finding a note in every vowel and consonant that gave each word its own Honor-written melody. And the warmth and wit that beamed from her eyes, whether she was talking or concentrating on a task or off in la-la land, daydreaming. He missed both, mostly because he knew how much effort she’d put into the standoffish façade, designed to keep heartache at bay.

  He wondered if she had any idea how much effort he was putting into staying on this side of the table, when the only thing he wanted to do was scoop her up and carry her off to a place where sorrow and shame didn’t exist. But Elton had been right; Honor was strong and tough, and in time, she’d get through this heartache with the same grace and dignity she’d come through everything else.

  When it was just the two of them, she stripped off that façade. A big risk, because what if, like so many others, he’d use her vulnerability? He loved her all the more for trusting him. So why was he sitting here, folding and refolding a paper napkin until it felt like the chamois cloth he used to polish his car?

  He got up and, on his way to her chair, tossed the napkin into the trash can. When he turned to face her, she stepped into his outstretched arms and tucked her face into the crook of his neck. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  No, thank you.

  She stepped back, then took his hand and led him into the living room, where Rerun had sprawled out on the couch. “Poor thing,” she said, leaning into Matt’s side. “This will be harder on him than it is on me.”

  Leave it to Honor to consider a dog’s feelings over her own. She was right, of course, because Rowdy’s rescue missions were pretty much the only times they’d been separated.

  “He probably thinks Rowdy’s out on some SAR business, that he’ll be back in a few hours, same as always.”

  Yet again, she’d echoed his thoughts, but the hitch in her voice when she said Rowdy tugged at his heart, and he gave her hand a little squeeze. “Your fingers are freezing,” he said, sandwiching her hand between his own. “How ‘bout if I build you a fire?”

  In place of an answer, Honor more or less shoved him into the gigantic overstuffed chair beside the woodstove. “No, you’ll burn the house down.”

  “Hey, I know how to build a safe fire. Been doing it for—”

  Honor climbed into his lap. “I haven’t used it in forever. God only knows how much creosote has built up in that stovepipe.” She put her head on his shoulder and sighed.

  “This … ,” she patted his chest and snuggled close, “this is better than a fire, anyway.”

  “I’ll say.”

  “I wonder if they talked about it, afterward.”

  Maybe this mind-reading stuff was contagious because Matt knew exactly what she was talking about. He rested his chin in her curls.
“I can almost hear Rowdy, giving Rerun an accounting of the day’s events, with Rerun going ‘No way!’ and Rowdy saying ‘Yuh-huh!’ ” He chuckled to himself. “Remember that old cartoon, with the goofy little dog and the big grumpylookin’ one?”

  Honor laughed softly. ” ‘Where y’goin’, Ralph, what’cha doin’, Ralph, can I come with ya, Ralph, huh, huh, huh?’ “

  “All while the little guy is jumping back and forth over the big one’s back.”

  “And he puts up with it because secretly, he likes the little one.” She shook her head. “Yeah, that pretty much describes it, all right.”

  Small talk. Chitchat. Usually, he hated it. But this? This felt as normal and natural as breathing.

  In the comfortable silence that followed their cartoon talk, he wondered if Honor would get another dog to replace Rowdy. Would it be a puppy, or some mutt rescued from the pound … not that any dog could take Rowdy’s place. It wasn’t likely she’d put Rerun to work as a service dog. He did the dog math and frowned because, at thirty-five, Rerun was considered too decrepit for rescue work. He thanked God humans didn’t measure a man’s usefulness that way because he only had three years on the mutt!

  Sooner or later, one of her SAR pals would announce that their rescue dog was about to deliver a litter. Would Honor adopt one of those and train a Rowdy Number Two?

  Way too soon to talk about that now, but he’d have time, later.

  Her soft, steady breaths puffed warmth into the hollow of his throat, and Matt realized she’d fallen asleep. He leaned his head against the back cushion and closed his eyes, wondering what would Harriet would think when he rolled in, rumpled and disheveled and needing a shave.

  If Honor woke up before morning, she’d have to do it on her own. No way he intended to disturb her, not even if his arms and legs went so numb he couldn’t feel them at all.

  Yeah, he had time.

  Plenty of it.

  He had the rest of his life.

  20

  I hate to admit it, but if I hadn’t given Mercy my word, I’d stay home tonight.”

  “I guess that’s understandable.” Rowdy had only been gone three days, and as far as he knew, Honor hadn’t left Rerun’s side for a moment. “But it’ll do you good to get out, take your mind off all the sadness for just a little while, focus on something joyful.”

  “You’re right. I know that. I just feel weird, leaving him alone so soon after losing his lifelong pal.”

  If Matt was there with her, instead of on the phone, he’d give her a hug because boy, she sure sounded like she could use one. “He’ll be fine, and so will you.”

  “So what did Harriet say when you dragged yourself in after sunup yesterday morning.”

  He had to laugh. His helpful neighbor had gone to bed after the 11:00 news, as usual. The minute he walked in the door, he heard her up there in the guest room, snoring like a chain saw when he rolled in at dawn. How the boys managed to sleep through the racket, he didn’t know, but it sure made him yearn to be ten years old again. “She said I was a thoughtful and considerate young man for getting up early—without waking her or the kids—to get breakfast started.”

  “You mean you cook, too?” Honor sighed. “What did you make?”

  Why the extra emphasis on the word too? he wondered. “Not so much what I made,” Matt said, “as what I did. I set out bowls, spoons, napkins, and the kids’ favorite cold cereal. I was sitting at the table, drinking coffee, and reading the paper when she came downstairs, and she never even asked what time I got in.”

  “Not to be disrespectful, but it really isn’t any of her business.”

  “I guess.”

  “And she’s right, you know.”

  “About … ?”

  “You are thoughtful and considerate. I can’t believe you sat there all those hours under my bulk.”

  “Bulk. Don’t make me laugh.” Although memory of the way his left arm had gone completely numb was enough to make him flex his fingers. At one point, an hour or so into her nap, Matt considered the possibility that he’d suffered permanent nerve damage, and how ridiculous he’d look, trying to explain to his doctor how it happened.

  “I still don’t get it. Why didn’t you wake me up?”

  Because it felt good, knowing you trusted me enough to fall asleep in my arms. Too soon to admit something like that? Matt groaned because he’d never known a woman who roused more emotions in his heart or more questions in his head. “I dozed off myself, that’s why.” And he had … for a second here, and a second there.

  “Is Harriet staying with the boys again tonight?”

  “No. They’re invited. Austin says he can’t get hitched if his two favorite kids aren’t there.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad. It’ll be good to spend time with them again.”

  “Yeah. They’re looking forward to it. It’s their first wedding.”

  “I can’t wait to see them in coats and ties.”

  “Better look fast, then, because I have a feeling that stuff will go flying before the preacher says ‘You may kiss the bride.’ “

  Honor laughed—not quite the lyrical sound he’d grown to love, but close. “So we’ll pick you up at three.”

  “I’ll be ready and waiting. But really, wouldn’t it be easier if I just met you there?”

  “For you?”

  “Of course not, silly. For you. If I drive myself, it’ll save you coming all the way over here and—”

  “Whoa. Ten whole minutes out of my way. Careful. With gas prices where they are, I might be tempted to charge you for the extra mileage.”

  “Matt …”

  Laughing, he said, “Honor, … we’re not gonna start this again, are we?”

  He heard her sigh but pretended he didn’t. “Be there in two hours,” he said and hung up. He understood why she’d been hovering over Rerun, but she needed a break from the whole Rowdy incident. Besides, the forty-five-minute drive there and back gave her and the boys an additional hour and a half together—important if this Matt-and-Honor thing was going where he hoped it would.

  It took longer than expected to get the boys into their suits, which made him glad he’d started getting them ready an hour ago. Matt couldn’t decide which was the bigger challenge, keeping them still long enough to make a Windsor knot in their matching blue-striped ties or flattening their stubborn cowlicks. Well, he thought, grinning into the rearview mirror, at least the ties look good … for now.

  “What do you bet she’ll be on the front porch when we get there?” Steve said.

  But Warner disagreed. “Maybe if Rowdy hadn’t got runned over, but—”

  “Hadn’t been run over,” his twin corrected.

  “What. Did you write the dictionary or something?”

  “The rules of grammar are not in the dictionary.” Steve tapped his temple. “Some things, you just know.”

  “Then what are those little slanty letters for, huh, genius? Dad says they tell you what part of speech the words are. Like … like the n is for noun and v means it’s a verb.” He frowned, then met Matt’s eyes in the mirror. “What’s a verb, Dad?”

  Steve exhaled a sigh of frustration. “It’s an action word, dummy.”

  Matt watched Warner’s eyes narrow.

  “Oh, you mean like, when I say, ‘I’m gonna punch your lights out,’ punch is the action that makes it a verb?”

  Now Steve was frowning, too. Some days, Matt thought it best to let them work things like this out on their own. This wasn’t one of those days. “Knock it off, you two. And I don’t want to hear any of that nonsense at the wedding, either, you hear?”

  Warner leaned closer to Steve and whispered into a cupped hand, “Then I guess I’ll have to make sure Dad doesn’t hear it when I call you a stupid-head.”

  “Warner, don’t make me stop this car.” As he braked, Matt nearly laughed out loud when the boy’s eyebrows arched. If he hadn’t seen Honor’s front door open, he probably would have said, “But Dad, you
already stopped the car.”

  Steve pointed at Honor’s picture window. “Hey, Dad, is that Rerun?”

  “Yeah, but don’t say a word about how he’s behaving. Honor’s still pretty broken up about losing Rowdy. If we pay too much attention to paws-in-the-windowsill Rerun, she might just change her mind and skip the wedding.”

  “She’d never do that,” Warner said.

  “How do you know, stupid-head?”

  “Da-a-ad, he called me—”

  “Steven. Enough.” Then, “How do you know Honor would never cancel plans to go to the wedding?”

  “Because she’s nice. And nice people don’t break promises. And she promised Mercy that she’d be there.”

  Honor was locking the door as Matt thought from the mouths of babes.

  “Wow,” Steve said, leaning around his twin to get a better look.

  Warner pressed his nose to the rear passenger window. “She looks real pretty, doesn’t she, Dad?”

  He’d seen her hair pulled back into a ponytail and stuffed under a baseball cap, but that glamorous twist was a first. “Sure does.” Matt wished Austin and Mercy had decided to wait until summertime to get married because Honor’s long black coat hid her dress. She’d look gorgeous in something gauzy and formfitting, but because of the season, Mercy had probably opted for velvet and lace. Who do you think you are all of a sudden, he thought, getting out of the truck, Christian Dior? The closer she got, the more his nerves jangled, and Matt didn’t know if he liked feeling like a some snot-nosed boy, come to take his best girl to the senior prom.

  As he opened the door, she leaned into the pickup’s cab and said “Y’know, I think you’re the three most handsome fellas I’ve ever seen in person.”

  “What do you mean, in person?”