Potter Springs (8 page)

IN THE THOMPSON
garage, Ben Thompson, immense gut hanging over faded Levi’s with the loops popped off, stirred the boiling pot like a tobacco-chewing
wizard. Flames from the outdoor cooker, a wrought-iron instrument attached to a propane tank, cast a rosy glow to his complexion.
“Come here, Mark. Need your help. It’s time for the malt.”

Mark rose from his position on the dusty Coleman cooler. Amanda slept inside, Dragonlady hovering over her, with the men relegated
to the outdoors. Or the garage anyway.

Obedient, Mark got the big plastic spoon, and stood at attention next to Ben.

“Now stir fast, try not to let any stick to the bottom. It’ll burn if it gets stuck. Don’t want a charcoal taste.” Ben poured
the thick caramel-colored liquid into the unfurling steam. “Smooth and steady, there you go.”

Malt dissipated in the water, making a rich brown liquid. “Smell that?” Ben sniffed theatrically, the aroma like hot, sweet
cereal. “Amber ale. Gonna be a good one. Ready in time for the season opener. Nothing better than a cool one and a kickoff.”

Mark murmured his agreement, still stirring.

Ben shuffled over to the garage refrigerator, a nonreturnable olive green that Katy had deemed “horrid” upon delivery, according
to family lore. The door opened with a
shlooping
sound when the airtight seal popped, and refrigeration poured out like fairy frost. Bottles tinkled in a mismatched melody
as Amanda’s dad dug for a specified brew.

Back at the pot with two bottles, Ben used his key chain to pry off the lids then handed one to Mark. He paused to take a
deep sip and Mark did the same.

“How’s the job search?” The folding chair groaned under Ben’s weight.

“I’ve got a few more interviews lined up next week. Katy’s been a big help,” Mark said.

“I bet. Her web knits far and wide through the greater Houston area.” Ben gestured with his drink, arcing from corner to corner,
invoking a horizon image.

“I wouldn’t have these contacts without her. My résumé doesn’t exactly scream
ad exec.”

“You know”—Ben stared into the bubbling pot-“you don’t have to go where she tells you.”

Mark bristled. “I’m not. I think the agencies would be a good start for me. And when Amanda gets well, maybe she can go back
full-time.”

“What about that job in the Panhandle? With Ervin whatshis-name?”

“Plumley. Ervin Plumley. In Potter Springs.”

“That’s the one. Ever call him?”

“Just to check it out.”

“Nice guy?”

“Ervin? Yeah. Seems like it anyway. Retired coach, real enthusiastic. Said he needs somebody pretty soon. Before the board
changes their mind about the position.”

“How’s the pay?”

“Okay. But they’d give us a house, and the cost of living’s low.”

“Sounds like a pretty good deal.” Ben accentuated this observation with a hearty belch.

“Maybe. But it’s too far. And Mandy…” Mark looked at the house, his wife hidden inside like some sort of a wounded Rapunzel.
“Like I said, I’m making a change.”

“I don’t know about you,” Ben said. “But me, I’d take my bride and get the heck out of Dodge. Make a
real
change. Start your own lives. Away from”—he stared at the screen door-“outside influences.”

Mark thought of Amanda, ensconced inside her pink ruffled room, Katy running interference and keeping him at bay. He wondered
when he’d get to bring his wife back home. The tiny apartment they could no longer afford as his severance dried up like rain
in the Houston heat. “You trying to get rid of me?” Mark took another drink.

“No, son. Trying to help you. Besides, aren’t you from the Panhandle? Lubbock, right?”

Not technically the Panhandle, but close enough. “Yep.”

“So, in a way, it’d be like going home.”

Home. To windswept plains and broad fields of dancing yellow grass. Sky wrapped around the earth like a quilt, thin and high.
Weather riding up like a herd of horses, clouds thundering in, seeing lightning from forty miles away. A land where sunsets
were gifts brought from afar in colorful and glorious splendor.

No city smog, no traffic, no mother-in-law or failed ministry. A new start.

With no history. No credentials.

Mark shook his head, the idea too overwhelming to be tempting. “I can’t think about moving right now. I’ve got enough on my
plate getting Mandy better. Finding a job.”

“In advertising.”

“Yes.”

“Sales and things.”

“Along those lines.”

“Sounds fulfilling.” Ben revealed no hint of sarcasm. “Really working with people.”

Mark’s heart twitched. A whisper of the call tickled his spine. He felt no call at all to advertising amongst the slick and
shiny. But maybe that’s what he’d been doing all along.

He sighed. “Enough already. I’ll call Ervin, see if the job’s still open. But I’m not promising anything.”

“I’m not the one you owe your promises.” Ben creaked out of the chair to check the simmering brew. “She’s inside. And she
needs you now more than ever.”

H
ere, put this in on the side.” Ben Thompson grunted, sweat streaming from his forehead as he jostled the bed frame up the
U-Haul’s ramp.

“Don’t you think over there, where there’s more room?” Mark gripped the other end, the metal pinching his palm.

“Nah, this’ll work.” Ben gave a mighty shove and the bed frame tugged a tear in the corner of the couch. “What else we got?”

“That’s about it.” Mark looked away from the fresh gash in the furniture. “One more lamp, I think. Honey, do you have anything
left inside?” Mark called to Amanda, who sat with Dragonlady under the shade of a magnolia tree. He couldn’t hear their words,
but the women’s postures crackled with tension.

For all Mark knew, Katy was orchestrating a last-ditch effort to keep Amanda in Houston.

Thankfully, it didn’t look like it was working.

“No, just my purse. I’ll go get it.” Amanda stood with effort, looking none too steady.

He hated they had to leave so soon, without the luxury of time that Amanda needed. But with the apartment lease up, and Ervin
Plumley raring for their arrival, postponing the inevitable seemed foolish. They’d have to pay more to stay, and Mark figured
he could take care of his wife just as well in Potter Springs as in Houston. Maybe better, without Dragonlady hovering, ready
to strike.

“No, let me.” He halted Amanda’s progress, squeezing her shoulders. “You say good-bye to your parents and we’ll head out.”
He went inside and made a final check of the apartment, then locked the door behind him. Holding her purse in one hand, he
balanced the lamp and a fake plant under his arm.

In the parking lot, Ben embraced Amanda. Great tears rolled down his face as he hugged his daughter tight.

She kissed his cheek, her own eyes dry, and whispered, “Bye, Daddy.”

After closing the back of the rig, Mark started the U-Haul and blasted the air-conditioning. He retrieved Mr. Chesters’ carrier
and shoved it in the small space behind the seat, and received a heated hiss in response.

Clearing Amanda’s side, he set her new atlas on the console. He’d bought it at Wal-Mart for five dollars, a little treat for
the road. He had wandered in the store-what do you give a woman who leaves hearth and home to follow you out west, to chase
after your dream when hers died in a hospital in Houston?

He sensed something had broken in her that day, had flowed out with all that blood. She couldn’t seem to shake her sorrow
and Mark didn’t know what to do to help her. He forged this crazy plan and hoped a change would spark her spirit.

Instead of flowers or candy, or even a piece of jewelry, he bought her a map. Something to look at, to navigate by. To see
they had a future, and it was real.

When Amanda parted from her father, Mark held the door open and ready. He helped her inside, lifting her tenderly onto the
cushioned seat. He paid extra for the deluxe cab model, and when she sank into it, he sensed a gratefulness that he had done
at least this one small thing right.

Holding her close, he caught a scent of copper pennies. “You all set?” The tired in her eyes made his voice catch.

“Ready.” She clicked her seat belt into place.

Ben came up to the side of the truck and patted it as if it were a thoroughbred. “Got that Toyota latched tight. Shouldn’t
give you any problems.”

“Thank you. For everything.” Though Mark had refused financial help from Amanda’s parents, Ben’s simple advice had made the
difference. A catalyst to snap him out of his fog and see the truth.

She needs you now more than ever.

They shook hands, and Mark took his place in the driver’s seat.

Katy came around for her good-bye, poking her frosty blonde hair through Mark’s window.

He braced the steering wheel. “Thanks for every-”

“You take care of my daughter, Mark.”

Her voice was so low he barely caught it.

“You hear me? Take good care of my daughter.”

She didn’t smile when she said it.

“I plan to,” Mark replied. He gunned the motor and, with his bride secure in the passenger seat, left imaginary skid marks
on Houston.

*   *   *

TUMBLEWEEDS CHASED EACH
other over the highway like long-legged spiders dancing in ghost ribbons of red dust. Under the wheels of the U-Haul, the
lifeless branches fragmented, pieces spiraled behind them in a sharp-edged wake.

For the greater part of the trip, Amanda sat silent, perched atop a mountain of maxi-pads. She shifted only to change the
radio, and to alleviate pressure on her tender parts. Mostly she looked out the window and watched the trees thin as the landscape
grew flatter and the sky grew larger as if it would swallow her whole.

“Mandy?” Mark turned down the radio, speaking loudly over the U-Haul’s incessant roar. Wind whiffled through invisible spaces,
making conversation difficult, if not impossible.

“Hmmm?” Amanda didn’t look up from her new atlas. On the map, Potter Springs looked flat and ugly, with no green hatch signs
for trees, no blurry browns for mountain ridges. Just thin black and blue lines, like varicose veins, weaving sparsely through
a sea of white.

“You getting hungry at all? There’s a town ahead, about forty more miles. We can get gas, take in the scenery.”

Since leaving South Texas, the landscape had bleached to a burnt gold color, dotted with panting cows and divided by fencing.
As if the poor beasts had strength enough to wander.

Amanda knew Mark sought to coax her from herself, to fill the growing gap between them. She wanted to reach him too, but everything
within her seemed to fold in on itself, curling up, trying to heal. She just didn’t have the energy to do more.

“No, I’m not all that hungry.” The stale smoke smell in the rented truck made her nauseous, and the toast from this morning
sat in her stomach like two slabs of cement. To be nice, she added, “But a break sounds good.”

“Okay, then.” He smiled, as if pleased with her effort, and the sound of the road reigned again.

In the flat expanse, the vegetation itself seemed to struggle for refreshment. For life. Each dot on the map proved to be
a wasteland of peeling houses and junked-out farm equipment. Trees tilted sideways and old grocery stores boasted boards instead
of windows.

Amanda looked for mile signs like oasis markers, hoping they’d enter Mayberry country soon.

They hadn’t spoken much since The Big Talk. The one where Mark laid out possibilities for their future, plans that included
leaving Houston, her job and her family for a new position at a rinky-dink church in the middle of nowhere.

Maybe it was the painkillers, but his vivid descriptions about the high plains and the wide, open spaces had worn her down.
That old connection tugged at her. Her lover, her mate, imploring when reason argued otherwise. She’d never been reasonable
when it came to Mark, just instinctual. Stepping in time to his music, naturally matching the rhythm of his heart.

And now, when her own heart beat slower, duller, wrapped in a cloak of pain, she simply trusted him. To make the decisions
when, for her, rising out of bed seemed a daunting task. They would go to Potter Springs, together.

Just the two of them.

Like it used to be.

Somewhere south of nowhere, an eighteen-wheeler lay flat on its side like a vanquished Goliath, felled by the mighty invisible
wind. Sparkly blue paint shot reflections as they passed. The trucker stood alongside the rig, scratching his head.

“Should we pull over?” Amanda stared as they whizzed by.

“No, a cop’ll be along any minute. He’s got a radio for help. And we’re supposed to be in Potter by dinner.”

Sure enough, the next mile brought the flashing lights of a state trooper.
Probably by now,
Amanda thought,
another trucker was already there.
She hoped so anyway. The man looked so lost.

“How much farther?” she asked, even though she could see for herself on the map.