The Way of Women (2 page)

Least of all The Lady.

What direction would life have taken had this not happened?

The anniversary commemoration had attracted international attention around the now-quiet mountainside. Media events and photo ops could be had at various points as the world today remembered Reid Blackburn, Harry Truman, David Johnston, and the others who perished. A bronze plaque listing the names was comforted by a recently planted grove of trees. The visitor read the names and remembered many of the
individual lives they represented. It was difficult to be present at the base of such an altar of loss, but far more difficult not to have come, not to have remembered.

It had been called a holocaust, a natural disaster of mega proportions, an act of God. But looking down at the river twisting its way between banks of ash, like café au lait in a silver frame, one could see alder and willow now taller than saplings, their green leaves sparkling in the sun.

Life does return and it can be good again, can’t it?

The visitor lingered and tried to recall how much had changed over the span of twenty years, what had grown out of the soil of grief. The visitor sensed a hint of green just now beginning to show within. But there was so much to overcome. So much to remember.

T
he scream ripped through him again.

He jerked upright in bed as the cold damp sheets slid away from his sweat-drenched body. Fumbling for the half-empty bourbon bottle on the bedside stand, he ignored the glass and raised the bottle to his lips. Warmth flowed around his internal core as the liquid glugged down his throat.

Cowlitz County Sheriff Frank McKenzie was not by nature a screaming man.

He had not screamed that night twenty-two months ago when he had returned from a fruitless search for a reported lost child and found his wife and ten-year-old son murdered. He had not screamed at the note stuffed in his son’s hand lying on the table:
Now we’re even
. He had not screamed when the killer was remanded to a psychiatric hospital.

Maybe all the screams just echoed in the empty caverns of his mind. He was never sure.

Empty mind. Empty heart. Empty life.

Frank hoisted the bottle again. Empty. He flung it across the room in a slivered crash against the far wall.

Sig, a mammoth-shouldered German shepherd, whined low in his throat and shoved a cold nose into Frank’s shoulder. Sig had the best tracking nose in all of Washington State. He was also the most loyal friend and guard a man could have. But Sig had been up on the mountain that night with Frank, not in his usual place guarding Barbara and Jacob.

Frank flopped back on the pillow, a rip in its case. The stench of his own unwashed body and bed made even him wrinkle his nose. Sig inched his muzzle under his master’s flaccid hand lying on the sheets. After a moment, the dog lifted gently, a persistent hint. Frank mechanically massaged the dog’s ears and the back of his skull until they both dozed off.

When Frank awoke again, the shard of silver dawn had succumbed to the onslaught of morning. Sunlight stabbed his eyes. The clamor of the phone crashed in his ears.

Muttering profanities, he reached for the missing bottle.

Sig barked. A short, sharp demand.

“Sig, shut up!” Frank fumbled for the insistent phone. “Yeah!”

“I’m sorry to bother you this lovely morning …” The female dispatcher’s voice clearly belied her words.

“Then don’t!” Frank started to drop the phone back in its cradle. His glance slid over the dirty laundry hiding floor and chair. A framed 8 × 10 photograph of Jacob hugging Sig hung lopsided on the wall above the pile of glass.

“Frank McKenzie! Don’t you dare hang up that phone!” Her tone penetrated his fog.

He brought the receiver back to his ear.

“And don’t you swear at me either!” She took a deep breath. “Now.
Let’s start this conversation again.” At the sound of his muttering, her voice sharpened. “I don’t care how big a hangover you have, you agreed to take those homeowners through the roadblocks up to Spirit Lake this morning at eight. You’re late!”

Frank blinked at his watch. She was right. 8:05.

“Tell ’em I’ll be there in half an hour.” He slammed the receiver down, cutting off her reply.

A
family that loved one another and showed it, that’s all she wanted. Katheryn Sommers glanced around the room, being careful not to catch anyone’s eye. Brian, so much younger than the others, melted into himself, watching his brother and sister carry on what they called a “discussion” but which left others feeling ready to jump in to break up a brawl.

“But you haven’t looked at all the facts.” Kevin sent his sister a look of disgust.

“Sometimes facts aren’t the only important criteria.” Susan’s green eyes, so like her mother’s, flashed as she tapped her younger brother on an arm, still tanned from attending college in Arizona. “You, my dear brother, forget all about intuition, gut reaction. Remember that time I—”

“You don’t need to bring that up again. You’re just like an elephant. You never forget when someone else makes an error in judgment.” His eyebrows flattened, his tone needled.

“Kids, let’s …” Katheryn stopped, knowing the futility of interfering.

“Why? I don’t forget when I make a mistake either. But then, that’s not so bad because I make them so rarely.” Her teasing smile made him grate his teeth. “My intuition, you know …” She tossed her head enough to send auburn hair, usually worn in a braid, over her shoulder.

“Yeah, right, Miss Perfect. What a pile of—”

“Okay, time out.” Katheryn formed the universal sports T with her hands. “Kevin, you and your dad take Brian out to shoot some hoops. And no, it’s not raining. Blow off some steam.”

Kevin rolled his eyes, started a rebuttal, but instead unfolded his six-foot-four athlete’s body. “Come on, Chip, I’ll take you two on.”

Since Brian’s first birthday, ten years earlier, Kevin had called him Chip, as in “chip off the old block.” Katheryn was sure Kevin often referred to his father as the old block, albeit never aloud or at least not in her hearing.

“I’ll go.” Susan stretched as she stood, her pregnancy just beginning to show. “I can still take you on the court.”

“No, this is a guy thing. You can help me in the kitchen.”

Katheryn turned to go but stopped short. “Honey?” She kept the sharp reproach from her voice with studied calm.

David Sommers blinked and brought his attention back from wherever he’d been. She’d known he’d not been seeing anything out the window, but staring, his mind off somewhere else, inside himself, shoulders slumped as if the load were caving them in.

“Go with the boys, okay? Run off some of their energy at the hoop.” She repeated the information without succumbing to sarcasm. She knew he hadn’t heard her the first time. And often he didn’t the second time either.

He nodded as he stood. “You coming, Suz?”

“Nope, Mom says she needs help in the kitchen.” Susan watched her
father walk one beat faster than a shuffle, snag his Windbreaker off the hall tree, and go outside.

She watched her mother as the closing of the door echoed behind him. “How long has he been like this?”

Katheryn massaged her lower lip with the tip of her tongue. “Been coming on for some time.”

“Has he had a physical lately?” Capable Susan, who’d begun by specializing in pediatrics but switched to psychiatry instead, had just finished her residency and was starting her own practice.

“Yes, I insisted.” Katheryn led the way to the kitchen. “The roast will be ready in about half an hour. I thought you could peel the potatoes.”

“Of course.” Susan opened the drawer to get the peeler while her mother fetched the potatoes from the pantry. “So, have you any ideas what triggered the depression this time?”

“The usual. Midlife crisis. Male menopause. He didn’t get promoted to dean of the English Department. All of the above and then some.”

“Why was he passed over?”

“I wish I knew.”
I wish he would talk, tell me
. She trapped another sigh. One only bred another, and she was afraid a chain reaction would lead to her sobbing. The only control was not to start.

“Mom, you know Kevin and I don’t mean anything by our discussions. It might sound worse than it is.” Susan touched her mother’s arm and smiled when they looked into each other’s eyes. “I know about returning-home behaviors. We both do.”

“I know, I guess.” Katheryn twisted her mouth, wishing she could believe anything of late. Other than God is in His heaven and all is right with the world; the first half believable, the second in serious question. At least in her world.

“There are some studies, you know, on male menopause. I could look them up for you, see if they fit.”

Katheryn turned on a burner and set the pot with water for the potatoes on to heat. Keeping her hands busy gave her mind free rein.

“If it’s ordinary depression, one of the antidepressants might help.”

“I’d thought of that. But you know how your father is about taking pills.”

Susan rinsed off the peeled potatoes and took them to the stove to cut into the steaming water. “How small you want the pieces?”

“We’ll mash them.”
Like I feel, cut up small and mashed to mush
. This time the sigh ambushed her.

“Need more than this?”

Katheryn checked and nodded. “I’ll use the leftovers for potato cakes tomorrow. Your dad loves those.” Although sometimes she wondered why she bothered, making special things to tempt his appetite, going out of her way to provoke a smile or sometimes even an argument. All to no avail. Her husband existed in some gray parallel universe. Often she speculated that he lived there by choice, making no effort to change.

“You ever thought of screaming at him?”

“Gave it up for Lent last year and never bothered to pick it up again.”

Susan snorted in the back of her throat. “Bet you feel that way more often than you want to admit.”

Katheryn knew her daughter was using some of her counseling tools on her mother, but she felt more relief than resentment. The latter reared its ugly head most often in the middle of the night when David slept in the recliner in the family room rather than in the bed beside her. He said he slept better there, that the television acted more like white noise. She’d even considered moving a television into their bedroom, but the
thought of sleeping through a war movie or another western made her shudder.

“You want me to try to talk with him?”

Katheryn realized she’d been staring out the window, not even seeing the shadows of the guys at the hoop. Good heavens, was this a contagious disease?

“Better you than me, but don’t take it as an affront to your expertise if you draw a blank.”

Susan started to say something but stopped midword.

Katheryn glanced at her daughter. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, at least I think so.” Awe painted Susan’s face. She laid a hand on her rounded belly. “Mom, I think I just felt the baby move. Like tiny wings fluttering?” She stared at her mother.

Katheryn rolled her lips together, fighting the burning behind her eyes and nose. “The first time?”

“Uh-huh.” Susan stared down at her middle, holding her breath. Her face lit from within, incandescent and luminous, transforming her features.

“He’s real, Mom.”

“He?” They both whispered as if loud talk might frighten away the flutters.

“Jonathon David, for both our fathers.”

“Could be a girl, you know.”

Susan shook her head. “No, your first grandchild is a boy.”

“Dinner ready yet?” Kevin stuck his head around the door.

“Fifteen minutes. Time for two more games of HORSE.” Katheryn stabbed the potatoes. Holding the fork in the air, she shook her head ever so gently. “Think I’ll hold off on knitting a blue sweater yet.”

“Bet you money.”

How often had she heard that challenge. But Susan used it only when she was double-dog certain she was right.

“Maybe I’ll use variegated yarn.”