What the River Knows (31 page)

Scott stared at the gruff old man, not sure whether to be hurt or touched by the comment. “Thanks for the advice, Chief.” He stood up to leave the office. “And thanks for the time off.”

“I didn’t say it to be mean, boy.” The chief leaned back in the old leather chair, and stared at the line of photos on his wall, officers from the Department’s past. “Just makin’ an observation from seein’ too much around here.”

Scott looked down at the floor. “Well, thanks, Chief.”

“Quit goofing off and get back to work, Aylward, before I change my mind.”

“Yes, sir.” Scott spun and left the room, more comfortable with the whispering dragon chief than the gentle one. He knew Chief had his back, but he really didn’t want to feel like a son to him. He had had a wonderful dad, and now he had none.

Bates looked up as Scott came into their office. “So, you goin’ to see your momma for Thanksgiving?”

“Not till the week after.” He settled in front of his computer again.

“Yeah, that’s what I meant.” Bates rolled his chair closer to Scott. “So that means you are coming to our house for Thanksgiving dinner?”

“I’m working a street shift seven to three.”

“Trust me, we’ll either still be eating or will be eating again.”

Scott logged in to Facebook. The last thing he wanted was to be trapped in the circus that was the Bates family home on a holiday. Kids and in-laws and cousins and neighbors—it was raucous and far too happy to suit Scott this year. Sadly, he reflected, had he just found Rica sooner, convinced her to have children earlier, that circus could have been his house. “I’ll see. Depends on if I get off in time.”

“We’ll have food for at least a week, rookie.” Bates rolled back to his desk. “If you don’t come by the house, I’ll be forced to bring the food to you.” He picked up his coffee cup, sipped, and poured it on the plant. “No partner of mine is going to make me eat pumpkin pie and stuffing and candied yams without sharing in the pain.”

****

Scott solved the dinner dilemma by stopping by for a few minutes at two while he was on patrol. He only had thirty minutes for lunch, then protested that he had to get to the station to file reports for the next shift. That allowed him just enough time to accept a small plate of leftovers and a huge piece of pie. He insisted the kids had grown a foot each, and that Bates’s wife was the second best cook in the world (the first being his mother) before escaping into the quiet of the patrol car. Except for a minor bumper scrape where someone misjudged distance in backing out of a driveway full of dinner guests, the day was quiet and peaceful.

As he drove home end of shift, he thought about calling Al to see if he wanted to do dinner, but then remembered he had flown back to New York to be with his sons. On impulse, he pulled into a convenience store and picked up an overdone burrito and a salad. He settled into his recliner with his sad dinner and clicked on the TV, then glanced at the laptop on the end table beside him. Kyle had been a lonely boy with no one to turn to for companionship except Delia. Not so very different than Scott at this moment. Maybe he and Kyle were more alike than he wanted to think. He bit into his burrito and decided the salad was the better choice.

Chapter 67

Charlotte checked the oven one more time. The turkey breast was still the pasty beige that said it wasn’t done, instead of the crisp golden brown that Devlyn liked. The yams and mashed potatoes were done, but would have to be heated in the microwave without Devlyn finding out. The green bean casserole would be overdone by the time the turkey browned, and she couldn’t start the crescent rolls until the turkey came out of the oven. Devlyn’s mother must have been one hell of a cook, Charlotte reflected, to make Devlyn such a stickler for perfection on those special meals.

And yet, such a procrastinator on her own projects. As Charlotte studied the old window that looked out on the tired back yard, she remembered the first time Devlyn had brought her to the house on the river, just a scramble over the dike to the meandering waterway. The house set on a dead end road south of the city in a forgotten part of the county. No Jehovah’s Witnesses called here, no traveling salesmen stuck flyers in the door. The mail carrier didn’t even deliver; Devlyn had a post office box in town.

“And I wanna put French doors here, and build a deck to a flagstone patio,” Devlyn had said, waving an arm grandly around the room before dropping it comfortably around Charlotte’s shoulder. “My momma left me this house.”

Charlotte took in the faded sixties wallpaper, the sun-bleached gold satin drapes that covered the tall windows. “It has a lot of potential.” Gutting it, and ripping out everything that represented a memory to Devlyn, was all it would take, and that, Charlotte later learned, would never happen.

“Momma never changed a thing in the house after daddy died.” The arm snuggled Charlotte closer. “Daddy came from Louisiana bayou country, never liked living far from a river, but the oil job was here. They got this place when I was just little, ten or twelve or so.” The arm relaxed. “Daddy and I went fishin’ every night we could, kept a trotline out most nights. He had some friends that let us hunt on their land along the river, so we had deer and turkey, pheasant and quail and rabbit a lot.”

“Sounds like a Waltons kind of existence.”

“Not always.” The arm tightened. “Daddy could be…harsh when he’d been drinkin’ and things didn’t go his way.” A heavy sigh shuddered through Devlyn. “Momma never wanted a man around after Daddy. Said they was good to have and good to be rid of.” They paused before a china hutch full of carnival glass reproductions from a seventies fad. “She got her a job at a restaurant, cookin’, and worked there till life and the cigarettes wore her down.”

Charlotte felt something, premonition perhaps, shiver down her spine. For a moment, she had the urge to fake a stomach upset and ask Devlyn to take her home. In retrospect, that would have been best. Instead, desperate to feel protected, she had ignored the whispers in the back of her mind and become entangled deeper and deeper into Devlyn’s world.

“And then I quit school and got the job at the airplane factory in Wichita. Made as good a money as my daddy did, kept momma and me right comfortable.” Devlyn’s face scrunched up in what Charlotte learned to recognize as deep thought. “But it don’t seem to go as far anymore, so I haven’t been able to make my improvements.” Improvements, Charlotte also learned, was Devlyn-code for dreams that would never come true, in fact never even be attempted.

Charlotte wondered once again why she had ever been attracted to rough, uneducated Devlyn with whom she had so little in common. Maybe it was because Devlyn made her feel like the adored little woman, more woman than she had ever felt. But even before Mags re-entered her life, she had begun to tire of the play she was acting, and probably would have already left by then had she not given up her apartment so they could save money for the “improvements.” She dropped into one of the old chrome kitchen chairs and went back, for the hundredth, or maybe thousandth, time over the “if-onlys” that might have kept Mags alive.

One more time, she looked through the oven door instead of opening it and making the cooking take longer. For two cents, or maybe even less, she would pack her things and be gone before Devlyn came home from work. Pack her bags and leave, run to another town and start over once again. Except that she had nowhere to go, no one to turn to, no refuge where Devlyn could not find her. And because of what she knew, Devlyn
would
find her.

Chapter 68

“Hey, bro.” Scott’s brother greeted him at airport baggage claim with a quick bear hug. Then he let Scott loose and looked around. “You leaving Rica to pick up the bags?”

Scott cleared his throat. “She didn’t come.”

When his brother looked at him sharply, he went on. “She asked for a divorce, Denny.” He looked down at the single carry-on that was all the luggage he had brought. “We go to court second week in December.”

Dennis put a hand on his shoulder. “Damn, Scott, I’m sorry.”

Scott took a deep breath. “That’s why I asked you to pick me up by yourself.”

“I understand.”

“I couldn’t tell Mom over the phone.” They started walking to the parking lot. “How do you think she’ll take it that I’m a failure at marriage?”

Dennis stopped abruptly. “It takes two people to make a marriage, and it takes two people to break one, Scott.” He started walking again. “She might not take it as hard as you think.”

Scott scurried to catch up. “What do you mean?”

Dennis stopped again. “It’s just that we always thought Rica was a bit too, well, demanding of you.” He put his hand on Scott’s shoulder again. “And you tried everything to please her.”

“Really?” Scott had thought the world adored Rica as he did. “You guys didn’t like her?”

“I didn’t say that, Scott. It’s just that Alicia and I could see warning signs of potential for friction. Not to say that we expected you to split, but that we could see how there could be some strife there.”

“And Mom?”

“She never said much, but we could see the worry in her face when Rica would get on you. Don’t get me wrong, Mom—all of us—appreciated how much Rica went out of her way to help when Mom was in the hospital and rehab, but we were always afraid that the two of you were just too different in temperament.”

“That I guess we were.” With much to think about, Scott fell silent.

Dennis stopped when they reached the car. “You’ll get past this, Scott.”

Scott stared at his brother over the top of the Camry. “That seems to be popular opinion.”

“I’m serious, Scott. It will hurt like hell, but gradually, it will hurt less and less, and then one day, you’ll realize you don’t hurt anymore.”

“You sound like you’ve been through it.”

Dennis shook his head. “My best friend at work did, about four years ago. He shared a lot of what he got out of counseling with me. After I picked him up at the bar a couple of times.” He opened his door. “But now, Vanessa, you may have to take her for ice cream to make it up to her.”

Scott tossed his bag in the back seat. “I know she idolized Rica.” The guilt weighed on him again.

“Not as much as she idolizes Uncle Scott.” He started the car. “And ice cream.”

Chapter 69

When they pulled up in front of his brother’s house, Scott sat waiting, staring at the windows that cast golden pools of light in the deepening gray outside. Dennis reached out to squeeze Scott’s shoulder. “The only way past it is through it, Scott.” He opened his door. “Just remember we love you here.”

With a sigh from the depths of his pain, Scott unfolded from the car and followed his brother up the sidewalk, across the porch and through the door. He caught Dennis and Alicia sharing a look, and then Alicia crossed the room to wrap her arms around him. “Scotty, how good to see you.”

By then his mother had reached him, slowed by the pins in her hip. She simply put her arms around him and rested her head against his chest. He held her gently, alarmed by how frail she seemed, afraid he’d break her if he hugged her as hard as he wanted to. Her hair was grayer and thinner, as was she, since he had last seen her.

Vanessa bounded into the room. “Hey, Uncle Scott.” She gave him a big grin, because with his mother and her mother hanging on to him, there was no room for her. “Where’s Aunt Rica?”

Both Alicia and his mother stiffened in Scott’s arms, and he saw his brother shoot a look at Alicia. “Scott came alone this time, Nessa,” Dennis explained.

“Why?” Only a twelve-year-old could be that direct.

Scott disentangled himself from Alicia and his mother. “Because we’re getting a divorce, Nessa.” He took a step toward Vanessa. “She wanted it, and I don’t have much choice but to agree.”

Vanessa spun and ran toward her room. He heard a door slam down the hallway and felt Alicia’s hand on his shoulder. “Talk to her later, Scott, when she’s had time to process.” She moved toward the couch. “Talk to us now.” His mother reached up to stroke his face before she allowed Alicia to help her to her chair, a recliner especially made to make it easier for her to get to her feet.

Dennis settled into his chair, and all turned expectant faces toward Scott. He paced the length of the braided rag rug to the piano bench and then turned. “We’d been having some issues for a while, and then I was late for a party her work people had, and then one thing led to another, and she went to stay with her friend Heather a couple of nights. Then—” He took a deep breath. “Then she told me she wanted a divorce.”

Alicia spoke first. “Scott, if she wants out of it, there is nothing you can do.”

“I know.” He looked down at the piano. Nessa must be taking lessons. None of the rest of them played. “I’ve been in counseling.”

“Good, then you know that.”

Finally, his mother spoke up. “Scotty, I never said anything at the time, but when she would get upset with you about this or that, I often wanted to tell her to shut up and appreciate the good things about you.” She pressed her lips together. “But she was your wife and you loved her, so I tried my best to love her, too, to see the good in her.”

Scott stared at his mother, shocked at the anger in this mild-mannered woman who never said an ill word about anyone. “Wow, Mom, I never knew you felt that way.”

“I was trying to be supportive of you, dear.” She folded her hands in her lap. “And Rica was so sweet in so many ways, but I just felt she was too hard on my baby.”

He sighed. No way around it, he would forever be his mother’s baby. He might as well accept that as inevitable, just as divorce from Rica was.

“See, Scott.” Dennis spoke from his chair. “I told you we’d stand by you.”

Scott faced them all. “I don’t know what to say.” He looked down at the floor. “I’ve been so afraid to tell you, so ashamed.”

“Scotty, there is nothing to be ashamed of.” Alicia stood up and put her hand on his shoulder. “We haven’t been around you a lot, but Denny and I could see you were trying hard, and we thought Rica was far too critical. If you both wanted to work on it, I’m sure you could have worked it out, but it takes two giving two hundred percent each to do that.” She squeezed his arm. “One person cannot hold a marriage together alone.”