Barbara Samuel (28 page)

She laughed, shocked at the graphic phrase in spite of herself.

“Maybe,” he said more seriously, “we’ll find out we can’t be together for some reason or another. It happens. We’ve both been around the block enough to know that”—he shook his head—“things come between people.”

“Yeah.”

“But for now, this is good. It’s really good, me and you.” He said it quietly, earnestly. “Let’s just be with it while it’s here, eh?”

She nodded, and weary, rested her head on his chest, just breathing him in, the scent of Thomas Coyote who held her as if she were a precious, precious thing. It had been a very long time.

Joy stood on her porch, awkwardly, surprised that Ricardo—“It’s not Ricky,” he’d told her, “only my family calls me that”—had walked her up to the porch, even though she told him she was okay, that she could limp that much, just not walk around the block. Truthfully, her toe was hurting now and she was really, really sleepy, like she’d been running around all day when it was only being outside. When she stood still, it was almost like she could feel the river in her veins, lulling her to sleep. “Well,” she said, turning to hold out her hand to him. “Thanks.”

He grinned at her, and his teeth were so beautiful, so white and big in the dark that Joy felt her heart flutter a little bit. His hands were in his pockets, but he made a show of taking one out, his fingers lacing between hers in a way that was so forward she shouldn’t like it, but she did. “Can I call you, Girl with Wrong Hair?”

“Not if you call me that.”

He laughed. “Okay, can I call you, Joy?”

“Yeah,” she said, and that flutter came again. But she didn’t want to seem like some dumb high school girl; she wanted to be more sophisticated than that, and she added, “Please.”

He took a pen out of his back pocket and handed it to her, holding out his arm. “Write it down for me.”

His forearm was dark and smooth and it gave her a
little jolt to put her palm on it, to write her phone number beneath the vein along the inside. She thought she could feel his breath on her shoulder, but when she looked up, he only smiled and took his pen back. “Good night, Joy,” he said.

“Night, Ricardo.” She went inside, and rested just inside the door for a minute so she could collect herself before she went to the kitchen, where she’d seen her mom’s head a minute ago. And suddenly, it seemed so good to her, so rich to be in this house, to have her mom waiting up with a friend of her own sitting with her, that she rushed into the kitchen and flung her arms around her mom’s neck. Luna caught her, laughing softly, and Joy smelled something strange and rich in her hair— maybe like the river, or Thomas, her boyfriend, or something. “Did you have a good time?”

“Oh, yeah. I mean”—she thought of how sad Maggie had been, but Ricardo had been so cute!—“yes and no. I’m worried about Maggie. Oh, it was sad over there tonight. Maggie cooked all this food and her mom didn’t even get up. Just her uncle and her grandma and me to eat it, and I know Maggie did it for her mom.”

“Is that the daughter of the man who was killed last spring?” Thomas asked.

“Yeah. You know her?”

“I think so. Her mother comes to see my grandmother for herbs and things like that.”

Joy’s stomach flipped over. “You’re the
bruja’s
grandson?”

“Bruja?”
He laughed. “Is that what they say about her? I guess so.”

Oh, man, oh man, oh man.
Maggie would be so mad at Joy when she found out that Joy’s mom’s new boyfriend was the same guy Maggie wanted for her mom! Still, maybe Joy could help a little. “You should
tell your grandma that she’s really sick, that Sally is really sick. She needs something. Not just that charm.”

Thomas cleared his throat, frowning. “My grandma’s not a psychologist or anything. She’s just an old woman who prays.”

Joy bit her lip. “I know. But I’m worried about my friend. She’s been okay, you know? But she was like all sad tonight, trying to pretend it was okay, but it wasn’t. And Mom, I didn’t tell you this, but she has a shrine to Tupac and she makes offerings to it, like he’s a saint or something. I think she doesn’t know what to do.”

For a long moment, Luna was quiet, then she said, “I’m not sure what I can do, Joy. I’d like to help because you care so much about this girl, but I’m not sure what you’re asking for.”

“Can I just bring her over sometimes, over here?”

“Of course.”

“And maybe, Mom,” Joy said, earnestly, just thinking of it suddenly, “you could just talk to her mom whenever you see her. Maybe you’ll see something or whatever.”

Luna nodded. “I can keep my eyes open.”

“Me, too,” Thomas said.

The phone rang, and startled, Luna answered it, worry on her face. A worry that cleared immediately. “Sure,” she said, “Hang on.” Lowering the phone to her stomach, she said with a smile, “It’s for you. A guy named Ricardo with wonderful telephone manners.”

Her tummy flipped. “I’ll take it into my room. Good night you guys!” She rushed into her room and clicked on the remote, and heard Ricardo’s voice pour into her ear. “What’re you doing?”

The road to hell was paved with good intentions. Luna truly meant to keep an eye out for Sally, the widow having such a hard time adjusting, but she simply forgot in the new world of juggling her life at a much more hectic pace. It was one thing to take care of herself and her life without a car; it was proving to be much more difficult with two of them. A small example was the milk situation. Joy drank a lot of milk, which meant bringing gallons home from work instead of the quarts she usually carted. She didn’t mind walking with a bag of groceries, but a gallon of milk weighed a ton, and Joy drank about a gallon every other day.

That was only one small example. Luna hated it that Joy walked home in the rain one day, hated it one evening when Joy remembered, well past dark, that she needed a special set of pens for art class the following
morning; even the night Joy had had a stubbed toe and wanted to go around the corner to Maggie’s house. Not to mention, who wanted her daughter out after dark?

So there were the hassles of not driving and wondering why she still didn’t. But even the difficulty wasn’t enough to prevent the feeling of panic that filled her at the idea of actually getting behind the wheel of a car again. Kitty had bought Luna a car over a year ago—a sobriety/birthday present. It was a cute little blue Toyota, and Luna knew how thrilled Kitty had been to be able to afford to give it to her.

But Luna had climbed into the adorable little thing and had had a panic attack. A full-scale, all-out, can’t-breathe, I’m-gonna-die panic attack. And that was the last time she tried. Kitty just patted her shoulder and said it would be in the garage whenever she was ready. Frank drove it sometimes, just to keep it in good condition, but it was Luna’s car.

Whenever she was ready for it.

Beyond the driving headache, it was also insane at work—the back to school, end of summer rushes. People were putting up jam and veggies and acting like winter would mean not being able to go anywhere. And her head was crowded with thoughts of Thomas, whom she hadn’t been able to see but once, for a very short, hot brace of kisses on Wednesday afternoon, and conversely, worries about Marc and what his next trick might be.

And then there was the problem of her mother. Or rather her father. Elaine had called Luna at work on Wednesday morning. “I think you need to go see Mom today,” she said without preamble. “And realize we need to just sell that land because the whole thing is breaking her heart.”

“Hi, Elaine,” Luna said dryly, stacking vases.

“I’m sorry, Lu, but you’re not thinking about this, and I think Mom is really handling it badly.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Did you even know Frank is out of town this week? Do you ever go see your mother?”

Luna sighed. She always got aggressive when she was worried. “Of course I go see her. I see her all the time. It’s just been busy this week and I haven’t had a chance. Did you talk to her or something? Is there something wrong?”

“I think there is, Lu. She sounded weird last night. Like not really there, or something.”

“I’ll go this afternoon.”

“What about the land?”

“I haven’t even had a chance to think about it, Elaine. Let’s not do anything rash, okay? I think we need to at least see it.”

“I don’t need to see it. Do you realize he was living not forty miles from me since I’ve been in Raton? That sucks. And then why’d he have to do it like this?”

“I know. It’s not fair. But I’m not going to feel happy about selling it until we see it. Maybe not even then. Maybe it was his way of making up to us.”

“I could buy a brand new house, Lu. You have one. I don’t. I live in this crummy apartment.”

Elaine made more money than Luna did, but she took a deep breath. “I’ll think about it, I promise. Okay?”

“Fine. Call me about Mom.”

“I will.”

When Luna came in that afternoon, she said to Joy, “Let’s go see Grandma.”

Joy, stretched out on the couch with a paperback novel in her hands, sighed heavily. “Do we have to walk?”

“How else?”

“It’s too far. I get sick of walking all the time. It’s hot and my toe hurts.”

“Fine.” Hearing her sister’s petty tone in the word, Luna bit back her annoyance, which was mostly directed toward herself anyway. More kindly she said, “Okay. I’ll go alone. No biggie.”

Joy huffed. “Are you ever going to get a driver’s license?”

“I don’t know.”

“If I get a New Mexico license will you get me a car?”

“I already have one you can drive.” She flipped through the mail, separating bills from junk from personal. Not that there was ever that much personal mail anymore. Everybody used e-mail. “It’s a nice Toyota.”

“How old do I have to be to drive here?”

“Sixteen. And you’ll need a job, too, to support the habit. Gas, insurance, upkeep, all of it.”

Joy flung herself back on the pillows. “Oh, like anybody could pay for any of that on five dollars an hour.”

“It’s pretty expensive, all right.”

“What if I can get my dad to pay?”

Tempting. “Nope. It’s your responsibility.”

Another huff. “Forget it. I want money to ski.” She sat up, very straight, horror on her face. “But if you don’t have a car, there’s no way to get there, is there?”

Stricken, Luna sank down in the chair. “Uh, no. Good point.”

“Don’t you think it’s just a little bit immature of you to just keep avoiding the issue of driving like a normal person?” Joy flung one arm over her head, her bracelets rattling down her arms in a tinny wash. “Hitching rides with everyone, getting your mom to drive you to the store when you need a lot of groceries or you have to pick up your daughter from the airport?”

“Maybe.” Luna shrugged. “Lots of people don’t drive.”

“Yeah, epileptics and old ladies!”

A prickly wave of irritation rose in her chest, whipped right through her shoulders to her arms, and she wanted a cigarette urgently. Why had she thought it would be a good idea to quit smoking just as she brought her teenager to live with her again?

What wasn’t she saying? “I don’t have to be what you want me to be, Joy. I only have to be somebody I’m comfortable with.” She took a breath. “I was honestly thinking earlier today that it is hard on you that I don’t drive and I need to think about it, but you have to give me some time.”

Joy lowered her eyes, picked invisible stuff from her jeans. “Whatever.”

Luna stood. “I really am worried about Grandma, so I’m going to walk up there. Do you want to go or stay? There’s frozen pizza if you get hungry, and I’ll be home by seven or eight.”

“I’ll just stay here. Maybe I’ll go see Maggie after a while. And Ricardo said he might call.”

“Do you have homework?”

“I did it already.”

“All right.” Luna popped a kiss on her head, even if she didn’t want it, and headed out.

It was hot in the late afternoon sunshine, probably close to ninety, which was hot for September, but not unheard of. It wasn’t more than a mile and a half to Kitty’s house, but it suddenly did seem like a long way up those hills, crossing all those streets, and dodging cars on the narrow lanes in between. Feeling winded, she stopped, hands on her hips, wondering if she wanted to go after all. But the truth was, it wasn’t about Luna. It was about her mother. She couldn’t stand to
think of Kitty sad and alone, and she wasn’t the type to be able to ask for help.

Luna started walking. It wouldn’t take more than a half hour and Kitty would bring her home later.

But … out of the mouths of babes. Why
was
she still avoiding driving? She could have reinstated her driver’s license eighteen months ago, and instead, she’d just drifted along, walking everywhere. Why?

She didn’t really have an answer, and still didn’t have one when she rang her mother’s doorbell, feeling sweaty and stinky and out of breath. As she waited for Kitty to answer, she noticed the cottonwoods that shaded the courtyard were really starting to turn color now, a cluster of bright yellow leaves standing out amid the green. It was always such a surprise, every year, to look up and notice fall.

Kitty answered the door in her bathrobe. She had on no makeup. Her feet were bare. A kindling of alarm went through Luna. “Mom! Are you sick?”

“No.” She shook her head vaguely. “Frank had to go to Arizona for business and I’m just taking a couple of days to lie around.” She pulled a crumpled tissue out of her robe pocket and wiped her nose. Her eyes were red-rimmed. Weary. “Come on in, honey. I’ll make you some tea.”