An Everyday Hero

by Laura Trentham

  “Don’t talk with your mouth full, Emmett.”

  He might as well have been fourteen again, sitting at the kitchen table being smothered in banana bread love. Why had he been in such a hurry to grow up and leave home? Why hadn’t he appreciated the bubble of protectiveness instead of railing against it?

  When she placed a third slice on his plate, he pushed out the empty chair next to him with his foot. “Why don’t you sit down and have some with me?”

  She hesitated but returned with a half slice and a cup of coffee, her genteel manners making him feel like an animal. He picked up his fork and cut off a wedge when what he really wanted was to bite into the loaf. At the rate he was eating, he would need to start working out again.

  “I saw Alfie out at the barn. The man doesn’t ever change,” he said merely to jump-start the conversation.

  “Age creeps up on us all, Emmett. It’s the way of life.” Something in her tone made his stomach bottom out. Her sudden smile lightened the moment. “What brings you by the house?”

  “I needed to borrow a ladder to clean the gutters at the cabin.”

  She patted her mouth with a napkin, her body rocking forward enough to signal her need to admonish him to be careful because of his leg. He tensed. Instead, she nodded. “I can’t remember the last time it’s been done. The farm keeps your father so busy.”

  She rose and collected their plates. He shifted in his chair to watch her put them in the sink, her back to him. Something about the droop of her shoulders set off warnings.

  He rose and came up beside her, resting his hip against the counter. “What are you not telling me?”

  “Nothing.” She dried her hands on a dish towel and disappeared into the pantry.

  He followed and blocked the door like a crossing guard. “I might agree except Alfie insinuated—”

  “It’s nothing you need to worry about.” His mom collected a fresh bag of flour and a can of peach pie filling.

  “Is the farm in trouble?”

  His mom took a step forward, but he didn’t budge. She made an exasperated sound and popped her hip. “The farm is fine. Your dad’s not getting any younger, you know.”

  She jabbed the can of pie filling into his stomach. He stepped back and took the filling instinctively, letting her sidle around him.

  “Is Dad having health issues?”

  His mom pulled a Southern Living cookbook off the packed bookcase in the corner and flipped through it, her gaze downcast. “His cholesterol was a bit high at his last physical, but otherwise he’s as healthy as an ox.”

  If it wasn’t the farm and it wasn’t his dad, then … “What’s wrong, Mom?”

  “It’s probably nothing more than stress and exhaustion. The doctor is running more tests.” She licked her index finger and kept flipping.

  “What prompted the tests to begin with?”

  “I was feeling worn down. Turns out I was anemic.”

  “Okay…” He drew the word out as his mind turned the information over. “Can’t they give you iron supplements for that?”

  “Yes, but the doctor wants to rule out any underlying causes. I’ve got an appointment to get scoped next week.”

  The lump in Emmett’s throat grew into a boulder. “Are they talking cancer?”

  “That’s always a possibility at my age, of course.” Her serenity with the unknown was enviable. “Or it might be stomach ulcers or a host of other things. God’s will be done.”

  Emmett grit his teeth. He trusted medical science far more than the intangible hope preached every Sunday morning. “You’ll follow up on everything the doctor wants you to do, right?”

  “Of course I will.” She turned another page. “Aha, there it is. Skillet cobbler. Betsy Shannon’s husband was released from the hospital this morning. Massive heart attack, but they say he’s going to be okay. Lots of family in, so I’m going to take them dessert.”

  He didn’t remember Betsy or her husband. “That’s real sweet of you, Mom.”

  “Can you stay for dinner?”

  “Not tonight.” He wasn’t sure how to sit across the dinner table with his mom’s news as the centerpiece and the realization that his parents hadn’t told him because … why? Had they only wanted to protect him or had they worried he was too unstable to handle bad news? “The gutters need cleaning before the afternoon storm rolls in.”

  “Tomorrow, then? I’ll make pot roast.”

  He couldn’t deny the hope in her eyes. “I can’t turn pot roast down.”

  “I need to thank Greer.” She gave a little laugh.

  “For what?”

  “For making me promise not to bring you any more food. Hunger is a powerful motivator.”

  Emmett drew in a deep breath, everything becoming clear. Instead of resentment or anger, amusement surfaced. Greer had awakened his appetite in more ways than one. “I’ll let her know next time I see her.”

  “Are you going to see her soon?” The glance his mom sent him under her lashes was rampant with curiosity.

  After the way he’d ended their encounter Saturday night, he wasn’t sure Greer wanted to ever see him again. He owed her something—an apology for starters—he just wasn’t sure how much he had to give. “I hope so.”

  Leaning in, he kissed his mom’s cheek and took a deep breath, the smell of baking mingling with her signature perfume. He wasn’t sure what it was, but she’d worn it for as long as he remembered.

  He shoved his hands into his pockets and headed to the front door, his gaze on his feet and his mind miles away. He pulled the door open as his dad pushed, throwing them both off-balance. Emmett grabbed his dad’s shoulder, and his dad grabbed Emmett’s waist in a weird dance position.

  “Sorry,” Emmett said before his worry and frustration at being kept out of the loop got the better of him and he whispered, “Why didn’t you tell me about Mom?”

  His dad gestured him outside and closed the door behind him. “Let’s walk.”

  Although his brook-no-argument tone grated and reminded Emmett why he’d been so eager to grow up and leave the nest, he complied. They were silent until they got halfway to where he’d parked his truck in the shadow of the barn.

  “How serious is it?” Emmett asked softly.

  “We don’t know yet. It could be minor or cancer or something in between. Won’t know until she’s scoped.”

  “What happened?”

  “She passed out in church one Sunday morning while singing ‘Nearer, my God, to Thee.’”

  “I’ve faked having to go to the bathroom to get out of singing that plodding behemoth.”

  His dad barked a laugh. “Not my favorite either.”

  “When did this happen?”

  “Two weeks ago.”

  Emmett stopped short and muttered a few choice curses. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “You have enough going on without piling on more troubles.”

  “I’m not fragile.”

  “Neither is your mother. She’ll be fine.” His dad spoke with the conviction of a true believer.

  “And if it turns out to be something bad like cancer?”

  His dad’s face sagged for a moment, betraying his age and worry, before reassembling into a mask of strength. Maybe his mom needed him to be artificially strong, but Emmett would appreciate the unvarnished truth.

  “Then we’ll fight it.”

  They entered the dark barn. Through instinct or self-preservation, Alfie had disappeared like a sprite.

  “Do you need help?” The question was out before he could stop it.

  “With your mother or the horses?”

  “Either. Both.”

  His dad rested his arms across the stall of Daisy the pregnant mare and didn’t even look in Emmett’s direction. “Got someone in mind?”

  The offer from Colonel Harrison played on repeat in Emmett’s mind. He wasn’t sure if he even wanted the job on base, but if he accepted, Fort Knox and Madison were close enough for him to manage
. “Don’t be obtuse. Me, of course.”

  His dad turned his head to look out the barn door. There was nothing to see but white fences and June bugs skipping along the swaying grass.

  “Do you want me to come with you to Mom’s appointment?” Emmett asked.

  “There’s no need for theatrics.” Only his dad would equate offering support as making too big a deal of the situation. “How long has it been since you’ve ridden?”

  “Since that last time I was home before…” Would his life forever be classified in terms of before and after? Emmett clanked his prosthetic against the steel gate. “Not sure I can ride anymore.”

  “A good rider uses his hips and knees to control a horse. Why don’t you at least give it a shot?”

  He couldn’t see a way out, but even more, he didn’t want to look for one. It was time to test his limitations. “How about before dinner tomorrow night? Mom’s promised me a pot roast.”

  “I’ll have Eddie Munster saddled and ready.” He clapped Emmett on the shoulder and headed out, hands in pockets, head down. The same way Emmett walked when deep in thought.

  Emmett waited until his dad disappeared inside the house before climbing into his truck and heading back to the cabin. Emmett set up the ladder and began decluttering the gutters. The promised storm sent him seeking cover on the porch, but it blew through quickly, and he got back to work. Once he got used to climbing up and down and finding his new point of balance on the ladder steps, the work became mindless.

  Maybe a new point of balance was what he needed in general. The inability to recapture the moment before his world exploded was difficult to accept. Yet no amount of Jack or hours of rocking or guilt would turn back time to save his leg or his men. His life would never be the same, but the corollary wasn’t that his life had to be worse.

  As the sun sent orange fingers of light across the sky like a fist closing into darkness, the sound of a car shifted him on the ladder. Of course it was Greer. She seemed to appear to him at crossroads, representing choices to be made. Opportunities to be accepted or rejected.

  She slid out of her car and shielded her eyes to look up at him, but didn’t say anything. With her hair twisted off her neck and dressed in a form-fitting T-shirt, a striped skirt that fluttered above her knees, and flip-flops, she could have starred in a magazine ad for a beach resort, luring vacationers like a siren.

  She deserved a good grovel. When a woman like Greer offered a fraction of herself, a man would have to be an imbecile to turn her down. Just call him Emmett the Imbecile.

  With his focus on putting things right between them, he descended the ladder, only realizing when he approached her, he’d lost any self-consciousness about his leg or the hitch in his step.

  In the South, food was the glue that united a community. Families came together over Thanksgiving meals and churches gathered for potlucks. Food was offered as a form of sympathy or when forgiveness was sought.

  “I’m sorry for being an idiot. Can I make it up to you? I have steaks and potatoes. This time I’ll cook,” he said.

  They held gazes and much passed between them in only a few blinks, leaving a foundation of forgiveness, which was more than he felt he deserved.

  “I like my steak medium well if you’re taking orders.” She brushed past him to the porch steps, pausing to give Bonnie a rub behind the ears. “She looks good.” Over her shoulder, she added, “So do you, by the way.”

  A zing went through him. If he wasn’t mistaken, her gaze was flirtatious as it traveled his body. Maybe he hadn’t completely blown his chance after all.

  “Now that I’ve started, I can’t seem to stop eating. Pretty sure I killed half a loaf of banana bread with my mom earlier, and I’m still hungry.”

  Instead of settling in on one of the rockers, she followed him into the kitchen to help. Once the potatoes were in the oven, a salad put together, and the steaks marinating, he asked, “You mind if I clean up? Steaks won’t take long in the cast-iron skillet.”

  “Go for it. I’ll make myself at home.”

  He retreated for a quick shower. With his hair dripping cool water down his neck, he rifled through his drawer for a pair of cargo pants. They were all dirty. His only option was dirty pants or clean shorts. He murmured a curse and pulled on the shorts before reattaching his prosthetic.

  As an engineering marvel, his prosthetic was a thing of beauty. Its dark gray lines reminded him of modern architecture. He’d had the option of a flesh-toned leg, but he wasn’t going to pretend the device was a substitute for the real thing.

  With a clean T-shirt halfway on, he paused. Music drifted through the closed door. Not a radio, though. No, it was his guitar in the hands of a gifted musician. All Emmett’s self-consciousness was swept away by the song—classic Dixie Chicks—as he walked out of the bedroom.

  Greer looked up from playing and smiled, but didn’t stop singing. “Cowboy, take me away…” Her gaze took him in from head to toe but didn’t linger on his legs. He stared right back at her. The oven’s beep silenced the music.

  “That’d be the potatoes.” She leaned the guitar against the coffee table.

  As he made his way to the kitchen to heat the skillet, he said, “I thought you were done with playing.”

  “My mental block broke loose during a session with one of my foundation clients, Ally.” She propped her shoulder against the jamb leading into the kitchen and sketched out her interactions with the teenage girl in stark facts, but he could see behind them. For better or worse, Greer was emotionally involved.

  “How do you feel playing again?” He glanced over as he forked the steaks into the super-heated skillet. The poof of smoke and aroma had his mouth watering.

  She tilted her head back and closed her eyes to answer. “Like a well that had been drained refilled. It was the strangest feeling. Ally wrote the lyrics to a haunting, painful song. A melody popped into my head fully formed, and I was playing before I second-guessed myself.”

  “Selfishly, I’d like to hear you play more often. Why don’t you ask Becky if you can play one night?”

  “No one wants to hear me. They want a professional.” She scuffed her flip-flop against the wood floor and didn’t meet his eyes.

  “You are a professional.”

  “Not anymore I’m not. I’m a bartender who needs to figure out what’s next.”

  He shrugged and let it go. If she wasn’t ready to examine her baggage, he wouldn’t bust down the door. “You could teach music.”

  She shot him an incredulous look. “You think schools would trust me to mold young, impressionable minds?”

  Laughing, he transferred the skillet to the oven and set the timer. Taking on a more serious tone, he said, “It sounds like you’ve managed to break through to Ally. She blew off everyone who tried to help, and now she’s written an amazing song with your guidance.”

  “She did the hard work.” Her obvious pride reflected how attached she’d become to Ally.

  The oven beeped again and he pulled on an oven mitt to retrieve their sizzling steaks. “Inside or outside?”

  “Outside.”

  They fixed their plates and headed to the porch. Balancing his plate on the rail, he cleared the small side table of empty beer bottles and the half-empty bottle of Jack he hadn’t touched for days. She was close enough for him to make out the striations of green and brown in her irises.

  “It would mean I’d have to go back to school.” She picked up their conversation as if the thought had been rolling around her head since he’d tossed it in her direction.

  “I’ll bet the community college could get you started.”

  “I don’t have any money.”

  “You could take classes during the day, bartend at night.” Or play. He took a bite of steak to occupy his tongue.

  “What if I’m not smart enough?” She poked at her potato.

  “You’re plenty smart.” He took a bite of his steaming loaded baked potato and nearly moaned. How had
he survived on frozen food and chips for so long?

  “I have enjoyed working with Ally and the other two veterans Amelia assigned me.”

  “I’ve been replaced?” He widened his eyes in fake astonishment. “What are they like?”

  “Neither of them have shot at me, so an improvement?” Her smile took any sting out of her tease.

  “But not as interesting as me, huh?”

  While she sketched out the two men’s histories, he polished off his potato, skin and all. His plate was clean while she still had most of her potato and half her steak left. He eyed the meat like a wolf.

  She laughed, and without him asking, pushed the steak onto his plate. “You weren’t lying about your appetite.”

  He mumbled a thanks around a bite of her steak.

  She finished her potato and rocked in the chair, her gaze on the horizon. “How’re your parents getting on?”

  “Fine.” His polite response was knee-jerk, but troubles tumbled like a rockslide he couldn’t keep contained. “Actually, no, they’re not. Mom is getting some tests run next week and Dad’s worried.”

  She stopped rocking. “What’s going on? I hadn’t heard anything.”

  “Apparently she passed out in church a few weeks ago. Turns out she’s anemic, which can have many causes, one of which is cancer.”

  “Oh my. I’m sorry, Emmett. How is she handling the situation?”

  “She invoked God’s will like any good Christian, but that’s bullshit. God doesn’t save you because you’re worthy or sinless or whatever. It’s chance and genes.”

  “But she finds comfort in the thought and a good attitude can go a long way.”

  “What if she doesn’t follow up with a specialist or—”

  She squeezed his hand—hard. “It’s your mom. You’re scared.”

  “What if—” He swallowed, looked at his feet, and shook his head, unable to put his worst fears into words.

  She tilted her head. “Surely you can’t think any of this is your fault?”

  “No. Maybe? What if the stress worrying about me brought on ulcers or triggered some negative reaction in her body? I’ve seen big men, strong men, crumble under stress.”