The House On The Creek (31 page)

So they’d retreated along the edge of the yard, and bundled up on the floor of the gazebo to listen to muted laughter and music, and watch the blinking white lights. And smoke cigarettes.

His mom would kill him if she found out. He hadn’t cared much the night before. He’d been too filled with piss and venom after reading his father’s letter. He’d been really PO’d, ready to kick a hole in the wall or do some damage with his fists.

And once he’d stopped swearing and punching his pillow he’d wanted to cry.

So he’d gone looking for distraction instead, and Roddy always provided distraction. It hadn’t taken any effort at all to get his friend to steal his dad’s dirt bike. And it had been totally cool to race that bike on the back roads and through the woods.

Roddy mumbled in his sleep. Chris’s feet were quickly going numb. The wind was coming back, rattling the trees, but it was an easier breeze, warmer than the bitter cold of night.

It was time to go home. If they waited much longer his mom or Jack would do a drive by home, and when they noticed the house was empty the shit would hit the fan.

He sat up, intending to kick his friend awake.

And bellowed loudly when a hand reached around white lattice work and grabbed his jacket.

“Come on out.” Everett leaned into the gazebo. The hazy beam of his flashlight lanced through the early morning and blazed across Roddy’s pasty face. “Both of you.”

Chris was sure he’d die from the shock of it. He still couldn’t quite catch his breath, and when Everett traced the flashlight over empty beer cans and a small pyramid of cigarette butts his heart almost jumped into his throat.

“We’ll clean it up,” he said quickly. He scraped as much of the mess as possible onto a tarp. “All of it.”

Everett was grim. “I don’t doubt it. How long have you been in here?”

“A little while.” No way was he going to admit playing Peeping Tom through the parlor window. “Not the whole time. We went down to the Creek for a while, to test
The Wolverine
out.”

“I thought she was the
Richard Tilletson
.”

“I changed her name.” Chris challenged, “I can do that, can’t I? I mean, we haven’t painted it on her yet or anything.”

“You can call her whatever you want,” Everett said mildly. “But you shouldn’t be out by yourselves on the Creek in winter. Especially in the middle of the night.” He played the flashlight around the gazebo. “You unplug the lights?”

“Yeah.” The tiny flashing lights had begun to drive him nuts soon after Roddy started snoring. “They’re not broken or anything. Just unplugged.”

Chris nudged Roddy again, harder. “Hey, wake up, would you?” Roddy mumbled, and rolled onto his stomach.

“Your buddy’s playing opossum,” Everett said. He reached down, and grabbed Chris’s friend by the collar of his windbreaker.

Roddy let out a girly shriek and sat upright, scattering beer cans with his Doc Martens.

Chris was disgusted. “He’s not my buddy. He just has a ride.”

Everett’s shadow stretched over Roddy’s knees. “Funny, he doesn’t look sixteen.”

“He’s twelve,” Chris said when Roddy refused to speak. “But his dad lets him dirt bike on the back roads.”

“I suppose it’s a better solution than hitching,” Everett said, resigned. “Where did you park the bike?”

“Up Creek Lane,” Chris said. He wished Roddy would stand and behave instead of blinking like a dumb owl. “Right off the asphalt where nobody would hit it. We wore helmets and everything. And Roddy’s a good driver.”

“He’s not driving back this morning.”

Everett hoisted Roddy upright. He clicked off the flashlight, and tossed it into the gazebo.

“Leave it there. Your friend’s drunker than bejeezus. Leave it,” he ordered when Chris began to gather up the tarps. “You can clean up later this afternoon.”

Chris dropped the tarp, and a beer can rolled from the folds.

“I can walk him home,” he said, hopeful. “It’s not that far.”

“You’ll come with me,” Everett said, in a tone that could have frozen butter, and lifted Roddy into his arms.

They had to stop once to let Roddy puke into a boxwood, and then again when he tried to kick Everett in the stomach. By the time they reached the house Chris was miserable. The last thing he wanted was for Everett to think him a no good boozer.

And a sneak, to boot.

Even worse, Jack was waiting for them under the empty party pavilion. He didn’t say a word, but the look on his face made Chris hunch his shoulders.

They crossed the porch in a group. The house was silent, most of the lights dimmed. Two men were asleep in front of the parlor television, and the oldest woman Chris had ever seen was dozing on in a needlepoint chair pulled up against the banister.

He remembered the chair, remembered how happy his mom had been when she found it buried at an estate sale, and he hoped the old lady didn’t drool on the needlepoint.

“Upstairs,” Everett said, jerking his chin at Chris.

He started up, trying not to drag his feet. Everett followed after, still lugging Roddy. Jack was already on the phone to Chris’s mother. Chris couldn’t hear what was said, but he figured it probably wasn’t anything good.

Chris focused on Roddy’s dangling feet so he didn’t have to think about anything else. The Doc Martens his friend wore were scuffed and worn about the soles. Chris knew the boots were a gift from Roddy’s granda, but Roddy liked to tell everyone he’d stolen them from Macy’s.

Roddy wasn’t quite as rough and tough as he wanted everyone to think.

The long hallway ended, and Everett stopped. “Here,” he said, nodding to the door.

Jack reached past Chris and turned the knob. Chris fumbled until he found the light switch. The room was tiny, and had only one bed and a rocking chair. A fire burned low in grate, and his mom’s work clothes were hanging in the open closet.

Everett dumped Roddy onto the bed and left the room without a word.

Jack said, “There’s a bathroom down the hall, if he needs it. Better not let him sick up on your mother’s rugs.”

Chris winced. “Where are you going?”

“To sit and wait. You’d better do the same. I imagine you’ll spend the rest of the year explaining this one away.”

Chris peeked at Jack’s face and wished he hadn’t. Even so, he was his mother’s son and had her pride.

“I had some things I needed to take care of,” he explained, chin high.

Jack bent at the knees until he could look Chris in the face.

“I suppose you did,” he said. “And I’m not saying I don’t understand. But you could have chosen a better time to piss into the wind.”

Chris stared between his feet. “Do you think Everett’s very mad?”

Jack coughed. “Can’t say. But I’ll tell you, Christopher, I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes tonight. Or tomorrow, for that matter. “

He left Chris alone in the room with Roddy’s soft snores.

Abby sat in the delicate rocking chair, dawn streaming through the windows at her back, and watched the two boys sleep.

Roddy Green slept like a comma, arms wrapped around his knees. He snored to beat the band. Chris sprawled in a straight line, hands above his head, ankles crossed, mouth agape.

She could still see the tracks of dried tears on her son’s chin.

Abby pressed the heel of her shoe against the floor and set her chair quietly rocking.

Chris had been defiant and then apologetic. He’d tried excuses and explanations and promises. And then, when she’d refused to soften, he’d spouted crocodile tears.

But what had started out as carefully crafted drama had quickly turned to real heart ache. He’d crawled into her lap, and wept against her shoulder, the first real tears she’d seen him shed in a long time.

Angry as she was, Abby had been glad to see the dam burst.

Her son had sobbed out all the loneliness and frustration and fear of a boy abandoned by his daddy. And then he’d wiped his nose, and cussed until he was red in the face.

And she’d let him, just this once, because she thought maybe the occasion called for a bit of healthy anger.

“He’s a no good son of a bitch,” Chris had muttered, staring hard at the embers in the grate. “He wouldn’t even give me a chance.”

She’d stroked the damp hair from his brow. “His loss, kiddo. But I’m sorry.”

“He didn’t even sign the stupid letter himself.” Chris’s mouth set into stubborn lines as he brushed lingering tears from his lashes. “It was a rubber stamp. A
fucking
rubber stamp.”

The emphasis made Abby want to laugh and cry at the same time. “I think you’ve used up your dirty word allowance for the year, champ.”

To her relief he smiled slightly before he laid his head back down against her shoulder.

“I’m sorry I ran off,” he muttered a few minutes later. “I didn’t think you’d find out.”

“Mothers always do.”

“Yeah.” He heaved a sigh that sounded suspiciously like relief. “Everett’s pretty mad. Think I’ve earned a whupping?”

“Maybe.” Abby bit her lip to keep amusement back.

“You wouldn’t let him, would you?” Her son opened guileless blue eyes wide and tried his best to look innocent.

“After this stunt? I just might.”

Chris’s brow wrinkled, and Abby had to gnaw the inside of her mouth to keep from smiling. “Do you think he really would? Whup me, I mean.”

“If you ran off again?” Abby tilted her head and considered her son. “I think he just might.”

Roddy grunted in his sleep. Chris stirred and almost rolled himself off the shared mattress. Abby waited until he settled back to sleep, and then climbed to her feet.

The fire had gone out at last and the room was turning cold. She hadn’t had time to change out of her party clothes, and beneath the thin silk gown she shivered.

She crossed to the bed, and pulled the cotton spread up over Chris. Smothering a sigh, she dragged a free edge of the blanket over Roddy’s shoulders. She couldn’t help but remember another young truant and the tender heart he’d managed to hide from all but his childhood companion.

Abby rubbed her hands together for warmth, and then lifted her chin. It was time to set things straight. Neither she nor her son would be able to move forward until she had.

The house was quiet when she slipped from the bedroom and into the hall. Some of the guests would be waking soon. She glanced out a window, and was relieved to see the caterers’ van parked in the drive below.

If all went as planned breakfast would be steaming on the sideboard before the first of Everett’s clients stirred.

She wondered if Everett had succumbed to sleep. But the door of his suite was ajar, the room empty.

She hesitated for a moment at the top of the stair. She thought she heard the murmur of male voices from below. Tiptoeing so as not to wake any light sleepers, she felt a moment of pride at a job well done. The floorboards didn’t betray her with a single squeak.

Two silent caterers were cleaning up evidence of the night’s frivolity. Two more were busy laying out fresh linens in preparation for breakfast. A young man dusted down the kitchen countertops, and another swept up the snowfall of cocktail napkins littering the floor.

Abby lifted a hand to the caterers in thanks, and followed the echo of voices down the front hall to the parlor. The door was shut, but she could hear the argument from beyond clear as day.

“I work at my own whim and I’m not interested in living by a schedule.” Jackson said in the smooth as silk voice Abby new meant trouble.

“I’m not asking you to schedule your life any more than you already have. From the looks of things your clientele is more than willing to wait on your work.”

That was Everett, in his deep Southern burr, sounding more amused than angry.

“Because they know they’re waiting on a one of a kind piece. And you’re wanting to make me a franchise.”

Abby couldn’t help herself. She set her hand on the door and pushed. The latch clicked but neither of the men in the parlor seemed to hear the sound. They certainly didn’t look up when she stuck her head around the door. Probably because they were too busy having a stare down under the Christmas tree.

“Not a franchise,” Everett said. “A good artist doesn’t use the ‘F’ word. I’m talking a small expansion, under Chesapeake Renovation’s umbrella. People need to know you’re out there. Stickley didn’t become a household name because the man hid behind his pride.”

Abby stared, frozen. Jack turned on his heel, took three long strides across the parlor floor, and then returned to the Christmas tree only to scowl at the decorations.

“Stickley’s an unusual case. Most artists don’t like the ‘B’ word, either.”