Caitlyn muttered, “It wasn’t that difficult. Jess gave me good directions.” And she was setting her coffee cup down, not realizing there was a plateful of food sitting in front of her.
Jess barked, “Plate!” C.J. reached for it to snatch it out of her way, but neither one of them was quick enough. Plate and mug made contact with a loud clank, Caitlyn jerked and coffee slopped out and splattered onto the hotcakes and her hands.
She gasped out, “Oh, God-I’m so sorry.” But by that time C.J. had her hands safely wrapped in his.
That was the way he thought of it: safe. Lord, how fragile and fine they felt, her hands. And were they trembling or was that something way down deep inside of him?
“Didn’t burn you, did it?” he calmly asked as he was rescuing the coffee cup and brushing cooling liquid from her skin. As an answer she gave her head a quick, hard shake. “Well, no harm done, then.” He got the smile into his voice, but that was as far as it went; he’d never felt less like smiling. What he wanted to do more than anything was touch her face…brush away that stricken, frightened look with his fingers.
His mother was fussing over her, mopping up what was left of the spill with a dishcloth and scolding herself. “Hon’, I just set that plate right down there without thinking. I don’t know where my mind was. Don’t you feel bad, now. That wasn’t your fault, it was mine. Let me fix you some more hotcakes.”
“Oh, no, please don’t.” Caitlyn’s hands stirred in C.J.’s grasp, and when he reluctantly let them go she put one on each side of the plate and held on to it, guarding it like a big dog guards a bone. “These are fine. Really. I’ll just, um…” Her eyes lifted from the plate and darted here and there in a way that made him think of panic-stricken birds.
He watched her swallow, and a patch of color appeared in each cheek. And it came to him-he didn’t know where he got it, that faint flicker of insight, like lightning in the daytime. Maybe it was because he’d been thinking so much lately about what it must feel like to be blind, but all at once he knew, with absolute certainty, why she was looking so uncertain and scared. Hell, he thought, it’s bad enough trying to eat when everybody’s looking at you, when you can see what you’re doing. What must it be like to do it blind?
He coughed and rubbed his nose and said gruffly, “Hey, you want some help with that?” Her eyes flicked his way, and he braced himself, but instead of the expected bright flash of silver, they held the dark and stormy, defiant look that made him abandon the idea of cutting up her food for her, right quick.
The same unbidden insight that had told him of her fear now warned him of her pride. He picked up the syrup pitcher and poured a puddle over her hotcakes with a deft little flourish.
“Bacon’s at twelve o’clock,” he said in a casual tone of voice as he did the same for his own plateful. “Knife and fork on your right.” He cut himself a wedge of syrupy hotcakes, put it in his mouth, chewed, and after he swallowed said thoughtfully, “What I’d do if I was you, I’d stick my fork in close to the edge of my stack and cut off what I’d got stabbed. That way, you’ll know what you’ve got on your fork.”
Jess gave a hoot of laughter. “Say what?”
Well, okay, he hadn’t said it very well, but it was the best he could come up with on the spur of the moment.
But when he stole another glance at Caitlyn, he saw that her lips weren’t clamped together anymore. In fact, it looked to him as if they might be working on a smile.
A pleasant warmth spread through him, and he ducked his head and attacked his own hotcake stack with extra concentration on the off chance his sister might be watching him and catch reflections of it in his eyes.
With his peripheral vision he could follow Caitlyn’s progress as she picked up her knife and fork, gauged the size and location of the stack of hotcakes on her plate, cut off a chunk and lifted it to her mouth. Then he couldn’t help himself, he had to sneak another peek at her. This time her eyes were closed and there wasn’t any doubt about the smile. When the pink tip of her tongue emerged from between her lips to lick away a glaze of buttery syrup, his stomach growled and his mouth began to water in a way that didn’t have anything whatsoever to do with the food he was eating.
He took a careful breath and cast a guilty look across the table at Jess, and yep, sure enough, she was watching him like a hawk watches a mouse. No, not like a hawk, come to think of it; the expression on the face of his oh-so-superior, usually teasing big sister was a lot kinder and softer than that. He didn’t know what to make of it, but he wished to God she’d cut it out; she was making him squirm.
“So,” he said after he’d washed down his last bite of hotcakes with a big swig of coffee, “you’re getting around by yourself okay, then? Feelin’ okay?” When she’d nodded yes to both those questions, he said, “How’s your, uh-” and was pointing to his own temple when he realized what he was doing and added on “head.”
But just as if she had seen him, she’d already jumped in with “It’s okay-aches a little, but I guess that’s to be expected as long as there’s still swelling. The doctors said I just have to take it easy…let it heal.” Her fingers lightly touched the crown of bandages that encircled her head.
C.J. followed the gesture and felt a shock of surprise; it was as if he were seeing the bandages for the first time. They gave her a waifish, childlike look, he thought, like something out of a Dickens novel. Fascinated, he watched her fingers creep upward to pluck at the tufts of her hair. Like little golden rooster tails, he thought, or plumes of winter grass.
He was so taken up with watching those waving feathers that he forgot to worry about whether or not Jess and his mother were watching him, until Jess jumped in with, “That’s right, hon’-you just need to give it some time.”
Then he decided he didn’t care who watched him watch Caitlyn, because a little bit of a frown had appeared in the middle of her forehead, like a ripple in silk, and he couldn’t bring himself to take his eyes off it.
“What I was wondering-” she made a tiny throat-clearing sound “-what I’d really love to do is go outside. Do you think it would be-”
“I don’t see why not,” said Jess, getting briskly up from the table. “Long as you feel up to it. I’ve got to go to work, but C.J. or Momma can take you out after a bit.”
“I’ll take her,” C.J. growled, and he shot his sister a look to make it clear he considered that was his responsibility and nobody else’s. “I was planning on showing her around whenever she figured she was ready.”
Then he said to Caitlyn, and it came out a lot gruffer than he’d meant it to, “So, you want to go right now, or what?”
“Sure.” She pushed back her chair and stood up, and so did he. Then, of all things, she gathered up her dishes and was about to carry them to the sink when he moved to intercept her.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he said, taking hold of the plate in her hands.
“Clearing my dishes. What does it look like?” She was hanging on to the plate, and there was a stubborn edge to her voice that matched the steely gaze she aimed at his chin.
“You don’t-” C.J. began, but his mother interrupted him.
“Plenty of time for that later, hon’. Nice of you to offer. Right now you run along and let Calvin show you around the place. It’s just a perfect time to be outdoors-the weather’s so fine. This is my favorite time of year, Calvin knows. Yellow-flower season is what I call it.”
C.J. barely heard what she was saying. He was too busy trying to figure out the look on Caitlyn’s face-several looks, really-different emotions that flitted one after the other across her face like images on a movie screen. A comical “So there!” look first, as if she was on the verge of sticking her tongue out at him. But then that vanished and he saw hope and wistfulness, sorrow and despair, but in such rapid succession he couldn’t be certain he’d seen them at all. And finally, an almost angry sort of puzzlement as she realized that her hands, which had somehow gotten tangled up with h
im while he was trying to relieve her of her load of dishes, had come to be resting on his arms.
He realized it, too, about the same time she did. He looked down and saw them there, her fingers rubbing back and forth in a questing sort of way, burrowing down through the sunbleached hair to reach the tanned skin underneath, and he froze, rooted fast to the spot. Although “froze” wasn’t anything like the right way to describe what he felt, the heat that was suddenly pouring through his body, the electricity skating around under his skin, the heavy thumping in the bottom of his belly. Terrible things to be happening to a man while his mother and sister were standing beside him; put it that way.
“You two go on, now, I’ll do the washing up,” his mother said, making shooing motions at them with the dish towel she was holding. “Calvin James, put on your shirt.”
Caitlyn had snatched her hands away from him and was rubbing them as if she’d touched something she didn’t like. “It’s warm out, isn’t it? I won’t need a jacket…” She sounded as if she didn’t have enough air to breathe.
“You aren’t gonna need a jacket,” C.J. muttered as he retrieved the T-shirt he’d left hanging over a vacant chair and pulled it over his head. He felt half-suffocated himself, his body blooming with heat and his heart pounding in a way it never did after the easy, one-mile run over from his place. He was good and angry with himself, and it came out in his voice when he snapped, “Are you ready? Well okay, then, let’s go.”
He felt sorry and ashamed for his sharpness when he saw the eager look on her face, and the searching, almost childlike way she reached for him with her hand. He took it and placed it in the crook of his elbow the way he might have returned a lost bird to its nest.
“Okay,” he said with a more gentle gruffness, “this is the back porch. Watch your step, now…”
The screen door banged behind them. Caitlyn held her breath to contain shivers of delight…of anticipation and, yes, of sheer joy. At the bottom of the steps she paused, and C.J., obeying the tug on his arm, paused with her. She inhaled deeply, lifting her face to the sun’s warmth. “Smells good,” she said inadequately. “Like fall.”
“Yeah,” said C.J. Then, as she heard the eager wuffs and snuffles and felt the bump of warm bodies against her legs, he said, “Guess I better introduce you to the dogs.” He paused, then went on talking as Caitlyn gave a gurgle of laughter and dropped to her knees in a wriggling, licking, wagging pile of friendly canines. “The big quiet one’s Bubba. He’s a chocolate Lab and he’s got yellow eyes-looks like a lion without a mane. He’s my brother Troy’s dog-you met his wife, Charly-but they live in Atlanta and he’s a whole lot happier out here. Can’t say I blame him. Anyway, he’s getting up there-must be about ten, now, so he’s normally pretty well-behaved. Also the brains of the outfit. The other one’s Blondie. She’s young and a golden retriever, and as far as anything not having to do with retrieving goes, dumb as a bag of rocks. Makes up for it by being pretty and sweet natured, I guess. Just don’t count on her to bring you home if you get lost. She’s as apt to lead you into a pond.”
The words startled her, though she doubted he’d meant the remark the way it sounded, or had any idea of the notion-the hope-of independence that flashed through her mind. Could I? Could I walk out alone with the dogs to guide me? Do I dare try?
Before she could stop herself she jerked her face upward as if to look at him-an automatic response from a different life and futile now, of course-but it was to Blondie’s advantage and utter delight. A huge tongue slapped joyously across her face, and Caitlyn was caught between laughter, the instinct to cry for help and mercy and the practical need at that particular moment to keep her mouth shut.
She heard C.J. shout, “Hey, Blondie! Come here-fetch!” then give a little grunt of effort. The tongue retreated with a happy “Wuff!” and a scrabble of claws on gravelly ground.
Abandoned, Caitlyn teetered off balance and would have collapsed in a breathless, laughing heap except for the solid, furry body that moved in close to steady her at just the right moment. Nudged up against her side, Bubba gave her chin an encouraging lick as if to say, “You’re okay, now. I’m here.”
Murmuring, “Good dog…what a sweet ol’ boy you are…” she wrapped her arms around the big Lab’s neck and gave him a fur-ruffling rub. Then strong hands were under her elbows, and instead of the dusty, warm dog smell in her nostrils, there was that familiar, clean C.J. smell again. As he helped her up, just for a moment she felt the brush of his cheek-slightly beard-scratchy-against hers and the feathery tickle of hair. Something jolted under her ribs, and she caught at her next breath as if it were about to be taken from her.
“You okay?” he asked gruffly, and she felt the warm breeze of his breath, scented with coffee and maple syrup.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” Back on her feet, she brushed at herself and pushed away from him, moving a few steps and covering her breathlessness with laughter.
“Ground’s a little rough,” he said as he caught her hand and brought it firmly back into the crook of his elbow.
Caitlyn didn’t reply. Her feelings were a jumble-confusing, distressing-and as they walked on she kept her head turned so C.J. wouldn’t see them written on her face. Caty, make up your mind! What is it you want? One minute you’re dreaming of walking out alone, the next minute you’re terrified that he’s not touching you. You were scared when you let go of him. Admit it. You felt safe when he took your hand again. Safe!
But she knew safety that depended on someone else was an illusion. She’d learned from experience and example that no one could guarantee another person’s safety, that the only real protection she had against the terrors and monsters of the world was inside herself. Her own inner strength-that was her armor. Without that she would be naked as a hatchling bird.
As she walked she chanted to herself, like a pledge, a credo, a prayer: I must not lose my strength and my independence, no matter how good his arm feels here beneath my hand. No matter how nice it feels to walk like this beside his strong, warm body, I must not let myself like it too much.
“We’re back a good bit from the road,” C.J. said as they walked slowly along, feet swishing through leaf-covered grass, then crunching on gravel-no doubt the same gravel she’d heard the tires of Eve’s car drive over last night. “The house is surrounded by trees-some poplars, hickories and a few maples…but mostly oaks, so the leaves haven’t really started to pile up yet. There’s an old tire swing hanging from one of ’em. I played on that when I was a kid.”
The air did feel cooler now. They must be in the shade, she thought as she asked wistfully, “Have the leaves turned?” She’d always loved the colors of fall.
“A lot of ’em have. They’re not at their peak, though. Farther north, up in the mountains, that’s where they’re pretty, right about now…” He paused for a moment, and when he went on there was an odd little break in his voice…another of those emotional nuances she hadn’t yet learned to read? “There’s lots of goldenrod along the roadsides and fences, with pink and purple morning glories mixed in. All sorts of grasses and other flowers, daisies, I guess, maybe sunflowers, mostly yellow-”
“Yellow-flower season,” Caitlyn murmured, smiling. Her throat ached with longing.
“Yeah…” C.J. gave an uneven laugh. The fingers that covered her hand were stroking back and forth in a consoling sort of way. His voice became a soft sweet murmur, and she remembered that she’d liked the way it sounded a million years ago. “Anyway, where was I? Oh, yeah…there’s fields over there on the other side of the lane-some farmer leases ’em out to plant crops on. Sometimes it’s cotton, sometimes soybeans. This summer he had some kind of grain, but it’s been harvested already, so there’s just stubble out there now. Birds like it, though. You can see them flyin’ in and out, looking for the leftover seed. And the turkeys, of course-they love it. Wild geese stop over sometimes to feed.”
“Canadian geese?” Her heart gave a leap, and in her memory’s eye she s
aw the undulating arrows against a pale, cold Iowa sky. Homesickness washed over her, prickling her nose and eyes.
“Yeah. I don’t see any out there now, though. Sorry.” His voice was husky. “Maybe another time.”
He paused, while his fingers went on stroking the back of her hand, and out of the blue she found herself wondering what he looked like. Not in general, of course-she remembered him the way he’d looked that night, remembered his warm brown eyes that crinkled at the corners when he smiled, and the sweetness of that smile-but at this particular moment. Right now she couldn’t hear a trace of that smile in his voice. She didn’t know what she did hear-warmth, compassion, kindness…other things she couldn’t sort out or identify-and she couldn’t picture the face that went with the voice at all. Her face felt stiff and achy with the effort of trying to penetrate the blankness. Frustration was a fine vibration that ran beneath the surface of her skin.
She felt his body turn toward her, become a close and humid warmth, and the vibration inside her became a jumpy current of electricity.
“Okay. Over here-” his voice was a spine-stirring growl near her ear, and she felt foolish as she turned, clumsy under his guidance, as if she’d missed a step in a dance “-on this side is mostly woods, but there’s some cow pastures and hay fields with those big round bales still lying in ’em, and a pond down there, and a creek, too. And beyond that, more woods.”
“No houses?” Her voice cracked.
C.J. gave a little laugh. “Told you we’re out in the middle of nowhere. No, actually, Jimmy Joe-that’s my brother-”
“The one you work for, who owns the trucking company.”
“Right. His place is half a mile or so down the road from here. He used to run the business from there, until it got too big. Now he’s got a regular terminal on the outskirts of Augusta. Then, just about a mile down the road in the other direction is my place. It’s closer than that through the fields, but I like to come by the road so I can keep track of my time.”
Shooting Starr Page 12
