by Wendy Vella
The night was long and by the time Annabelle woke her for the last time as the dawn was breaking, Branna thought briefly about letting the curse that was forming on her lips loose, but Nurse Smith looked tired too, so she swallowed it instead.
“Okay, Branna, that about does it; the torture is over for both of us. Now, go back to sleep, and when you wake I’ll get you home.” Annabelle yawned after these words.
“You go get some sleep too, Belle.”
“Will do, and I’ll be right over there,” she said, pointing to the bed beside Branna’s.
“It’s good to see you again, Belle,” Branna finally found the courage to say the words she’d being thinking about through the long night. They hadn’t talked, because mostly Branna had slept, but it was still comforting to have her old friend here.
“You too, Branna, we’ll catch up soon.”
She wanted to, but it had been so long since she’d had a real friend like Annabelle Smith, in fact, probably since she was last in Howling, that she wasn’t really sure if she could still do it. She lay quietly as Annabelle settled into sleep and was soon breathing deeply, only then did Branna rise and swing her legs over the edge of the bed.
She felt like a wreck; her head hurt; she needed a shower, and her arm was in a really uncomfortable brace. Looking about for her clothes, she found them on a chair. Slowly and with one hand, she managed to remove her hospital gown and pull on her clothes. Finding some paper and a pen, she wrote Annabelle a note saying she’d gone home. Slipping on the sling that Jake had told her she had to wear along with the brace, she headed for the door.
The doors opened from the inside and then locked behind her as Branna made her way outside into the cool morning air. Shivering in her shorts and tank, she looked up and down the street. As usual, she’d reacted without thinking things through, and now it seemed she was going to have to walk home. Unlike Washington, Howling didn’t have ten taxis ready to pick her up the minute she stepped off the curb.
Making her way down the long driveway, she let the cool, crisp and quiet morning air settle around her. Howling had always tugged at something inside Branna. Once it had made her long for what she couldn't have. Long to belong to somewhere and to someone. When she'd first arrived to go to high school, she'd been numb with grief from the death of her mother and hoped this small town would help both her and her father heal; she'd soon realized that hope was foolish.
Reaching the end of the drive, Branna headed down the main street. There was no litter or drunken people coming home from the night before; here, all was quiet. Howling was a town where you could settle and be safe. Your children would be happy and allowed to run down the streets and go to the shops without fear of something happening to them.
As the years had passed for Branna, the town of Howling had become stronger in her head, not weaker. She’d often remember things from here, places and people, and it had been those memories, along with Georgie’s wishes, that had made her leave Washington, pack up her life and come here. If it didn’t work, she could always leave, but Branna had wanted to at least try and see if she could one day call Howling home.
She heard the car from some distance, and then a worn old green jeep pulled up beside her and the window was rolled down.
“Morning, Branna.”
The man looked familiar. His close-cropped dark hair was different now; in school, it was long, reaching his shoulders. His smile wasn’t wide, but then she remembered that too as always being that way. In fact, Buster Griffin had always looked solemn, when, in actual fact, he had a dry humor that had often made Branna laugh in school. He was still built like a bull, big and solid, but strangely, he had been one of those people who she’d always felt comfortable around.
“Hey, Buster, you’re up early.”
“I own the Hoot Cafe, Branna.”
He was also not a man of many words, she remembered, which suited her just fine.
“You break yourself out?”
“I did.” She wasn't about to ask him how he knew she was back. This was a small town; everyone knew everything about everyone…her arrival would have been telegraphed around town minutes after she’d driven through the redwoods.
“Get in then, and I’ll take you home.”
He made it sound like it was something he'd done regularly, that they had seen each other just the other day, not ten years ago. The door swung wide, and Branna didn’t hesitate. Climbing in, she was relieved that she didn’t have to walk home, as her head was starting to hurt and her wrist was aching. She had some nice strong pain pills that she would take once she’d made up her bed.
“Jake’s gonna serve you up when he finds out you’ve done a runner,” Buster said, as he made a U-turn.
“I didn't do a runner; I discharged myself.”
Branna shifted in the seat as Buster snorted. He was right, Jake wouldn’t be pleased, especially as he’d asked her to stay in the clinic, but then maybe he wouldn’t care, and why should he anyway? It wasn’t like they were even friends. She only remembered snatches of yesterday. Her memory was pretty fuzzy, but she remembered him carrying her, and holding her hand. Pushing aside the guilt, Branna looked around her for the source of the wonderful aroma that was filling the small car.
“Buster, where’s that amazing smell coming from?”
He reached one beefy arm behind him and pulled a huge basket into the front, placing it between them.
“They’re a new muffin I’m trialing in the café. Have one.”
Her stomach rumbled at the thought, so Branna picked up one of the sweet smelling treats and took a bite. Her mouth was filled with cinnamon and chocolate.
“Buster, will you marry me?”
“Jake already asked me, so, sorry Branna, it wouldn’t be right.”
She laughed and then took another bite, and another, until soon, she had eaten the entire muffin.
The rest of the short trip was accomplished in comfortable silence, as neither of them were talkers, both content to enjoy the peace and quiet of the morning.
When they arrived at Georgie's driveway, she said, “stop at the bottom, Buster, I can walk up.” Of course, he ignored her, as she’d known he would. The people of Howling understood manners; Branna's father had once told her that.
“Well, thanks again, Buster, for the ride and the most delicious muffin I’ve ever eaten. I’ll be coming into your bakery later to get a few more.”
He handed her another muffin silently, then turned the car around and left. Branna stood there in what was now her small corner of the world and breathed. This was going to be her home; she’d make it so. The place she could live and write in peace. The little house wrapped around her as she walked inside, and she felt Georgie again.
Thank you, my dear, dear friend, Branna thought, as she walked slowly through the house again. Thank you for giving me a place to belong.
Jake always woke early; it was a habit he’d formed after five years in the army that he’d never kicked. His nightmares hadn't woken him and to his relief, seemed to be getting further apart, so he felt rested and ready to take on the day. His run had taken him away from town and around the lake. Then, after a shower and breakfast, he made his way to the huge barn at the rear of his property. In there were cars that needed his time. Split radiator hoses and misfiring engines, all things he loved to fix, now that he was no longer fixing broken bodies.
The words flashed a vision through his head of a soldier and the arm he’d amputated. It wasn't the worst of the flashbacks he experienced, but still, it always shocked him to suddenly be back there. He could smell the blood, feel the heat, and hear the anguished cries. The flashbacks snuck up on him when he wasn’t prepared and he hated the way they made him want to drop to his knees, curl into the fetal position, and cry like a baby.
“Hey, boy, what are you fixing today?”
Coming out from beneath the hood of a car an hour later, Jake watched the long easy strides of Patrick McBride as he wandered in. He�
��d look like that one day. Like Jake, his father was tall, but his hair had started to pepper with grey over the last few years, and there were other signs of age, but all of them sat well on the man. At fifty-two, he was still handsome and there was no man Jake respected more. It made him sad that he’d never be the man his father now was; he didn’t have it in him anymore.
“Hey, Dad, you’re up early.”
“Your mother makes me walk with her some mornings if I don’t pretend to be asleep when she wakes.”
“That sucks.”
“Sure does, but the upside is that I get a cooked breakfast before she heads to the clinic.”
“Always a plus.”
Ducking back under the hood, he knew his father would be on the other side soon.
“How’s Katie?”
His father appeared and started poking about as he usually did, which Jake didn’t mind, as he was good with cars like him.
“It’s her break in a couple of weeks, so she’ll be home to annoy us for a while.”
Katie was Jake’s younger sister, and she was in L.A. at the police academy. They were close, and he missed her, as she did him when he’d gone away, but he also knew that like him, Katie would find her way back here when the time came to settle.
“Your mom was telling me that Branna O’Donnell was in the clinic. Sounds like a nasty knock to the head.”
“Yeah, stubborn woman. I had to force her to see Mom after I’d checked her over. It was pretty obvious she was concussed.”
“You remember her dad, son?”
Jake thought about that as he put a clamp on the fuel line. He could picture a man with Branna’s hair and pale skin, but not much else.
“He never taught me at school, but Buster had him, and said he was a hardass who didn’t put up with any crap,” Jake said. “I remember him telling that Simon Duffell off for knocking Lilly Belcher off her feet and not stopping to help her back up. He had me shaking and he didn’t even raise his voice.”
“He writes those crime novels under the name of D.J. O’Donnell.”
“Really? I love those books,” Jake said.
“Me too, have every one.”
“Hand me that screwdriver, Dad.”
“Your mother and I always believed there was something off with those two,” Patrick said, handing over the tool.
“Off how?” Jake stood to look at his father. He didn’t gossip or involve himself too much in the community of Howling, but people still talked to him and tried to draw him back in. But he was genuinely interested in hearing about Branna. She’d intrigued him in school, and after what they’d been through together yesterday, he had to say he was still intrigued.
“They weren’t close with each other, Jake, no hugging or kisses on the head, “Patrick said. “They were about as comfortable as strangers. I always felt sorry for that little girl; she looked lonely the few times I saw her.”
Jake thought back to when and if he’d seen Branna with her dad, but his memory couldn’t pick up anything, which was probably because, at the time, he was interested in Macy Reynolds’ breasts.
“She wasn’t one of the easiest classmates I ever had,” Jake said, getting under the hood again.
“Remember you moaning about her a time or two.”
“She didn’t smile much and was usually frowning or looking pissed off. She had a wardrobe filled with clothes that were from the seventies, and was about as approachable as a mountain lion,” Jake said.
“Did you ever wonder why, son?”
“I was sixteen, my main motivator was getting Macy to bend over so I could see down her blouse. Shallow as it makes me sound, Dad, I have to say that Branna O’Donnell’s moods didn’t worry me too much.”
“At least she had Georgie.”
“Yup, that woman was pretty much mom to every child who needed one in Howling,” Jake added.
His father agreed as Jake’s phone rang. Wiping the hands his mother said were his most precious gift to the world and why the hell wasn’t he using them for the greater good, on a rag, he pulled his phone out of the pocket of his overalls.
“Morning, Buster, you thought any more about my proposal?” A string of abuse followed his words, and then the smile fell from Jake’s lips as Buster came round to the reason for his call.
“What!” Jake couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You told her how stupid she is, right?” he added. “Thanks, I’ll catch you later, Buster.”
“Problems?” Patrick McBride said.
“Buster found Branna O’Donnell walking down the main street as he was heading to work this morning, which I’d guess was close to 5 a.m.”
“Your mother is going to be furious.”
“Yeah, well, it doesn’t endear her to me none either, but she’s all grown up now, she can go to hell her own way. I’m not lifting a finger to help her again.”
“I’m sure she had her reasons, son. Your mother said she was terrified just being in the clinic.”
Jake had seen the fear in those green eyes as she’d clung to him. She’d been terrified, but that wasn’t his problem either; he had enough of his own. Looking at the screen as his phone rang again, he didn’t want to answer it, but knew he had to or she’d just keep calling.
“Morning, Mother.”
“Yeah, Buster just rang me,” Jake said, as he dropped his head back and looked up to the roof of his barn as Doc McBride talked. “Can’t you go over?” Jake listened as she said how busy she was and how worried she also was about Branna O’Donnell. Jake felt the weight of her expectations settle around him. He was happy to disappoint most people in his life, but his parents were a whole other ballpark. They’d cared for him and pretty much been the best parents a person could ask for, so he owed them. Add to that the fact that he was breaking his mother’s heart by walking away from what he’d trained to do and the guilt factor weighed more than a 1966 Mustang.
“I’m working here, Mom.” He gave it one more shot, then listened a while longer as she talked at him. “I can’t believe you pulled out the tears,” he muttered into the receiver. “Yeah, yeah, all right already, I’ll do it.” Shutting off the call before she could launch into another reason why he should go check on Branna O’Donnell, he shoved it onto the bench. Pulling off his overalls, Jake then made for the sink.
“Problems?” Patrick McBride stood behind him.
“Because Branna broke herself out of the clinic, your wife thinks I need to check on
her because she’s too busy to do it herself.”
“And you don’t want to?”
“I’m not a doctor anymore, Dad, but no one seems to get that fact.”
“It’s harder for your mother to understand than it is for me, son. She wanted you to take over from her one day, and still can’t believe you won’t.”
Jake dried his hands, then turned to face his father. “I can’t, Dad; I can’t do it anymore.”
He saw the sadness, the pain of a parent knowing his child was suffering, but his father didn’t push; he wasn’t made that way. Both he and the doc hadn’t asked what had happened to change their son into the broken man he’d become, and Jake hadn’t volunteered the information. He wasn’t ready to go there, and wasn’t sure he ever would be.
“I understand that, but you can do this for your mother. It’ll take you twenty minutes tops, then she’ll be happy. And you go easy on the O’Donnell girl, Jake, not everyone grew up with parents who cared.”
“What does that have to do with Branna leaving the clinic? It was foolish, Dad, and dangerous. She has a head injury and the studies I read on that kind of thing were not something I would ever dismiss lightly.”
“It means some people don’t live within the guidelines we do and pushing aside the medical aspect of this, if Branna is as scared as your mother said she was about being in the clinic, then that probably outweighs common sense.”
“It was still a dumb thing to do,” Jake said.
“Maybe, but I’m sure s
he had her reasons, so go easy,” Patrick Mr. Bride added. “And before I forget, your mother asked me to invite you for dinner; we’re having steak.”
“Sounds good,” Jake waved a hand over his head before walking outside and jumping into his pickup. He kept telling himself to calm down, let the anger go, but as he pulled into the driveway a few minutes later, his insides were set to a slow boil. He didn’t need this shit in his life. Didn’t want to think like a doctor, or, for that matter, care. He’d come home to try and sort out his head and heal, if that was possible, but he wasn’t holding out too much hope. In fact, he was fairly certain he was going to end up the hermit of Howling, holed away in his shed with two dozen cats and people arriving with food now and again. Right about now, that sounded like a good deal.
As he reached the end of her driveway, he saw her, and his hands clenched on the steering wheel. “You have to be shitting me,” he said through his teeth. She was carrying a large suitcase over the ground towards the front door.
CHAPTER THREE
Branna was dragging a suitcase from her van into the house when she saw Jake McBride’s pickup come into view. She’d hoped that the McBride’s would just leave her alone when they heard the news that she’d left the clinic without being discharged. She hoped they’d get so pissed off they’d wash their hands of her. Seems that wasn’t the case, if the storm cloud slamming the door of his pickup had any say in it. Dropping the case, she stood straight as he approached.
“What the hell are you doing, you crazy Irish woman?”
Yesterday, her head had been too fuzzy to really check him over, but today she wasn’t so lucky. In school he’d been big, but his body hadn’t filled out yet, but now it definitely had. He was one of those rare men that were big and graceful; she admired his long, even strides as he stalked towards her. Curls the color of chocolate caramel stood off his head, eyes black as midnight, large fists clenched. His movements were easy, even though he was angry. He wore a worn gray T-shirt with a tear in the shoulder over a broad chest and old shorts that stopped above his knees…and he was indecently handsome.
