A Father, Again

“Mr. Tucker, Em. He does have a name.”

No comment. Emily set the shoe box on a shelf Rianne had designated specifically for student accessories. “Do you like my science title page?” her daughter asked.

Beth Baker, Em’s third-grade teacher, was doing a unit on the water cycle. Studying Emily’s work—a wreathed shape of earth, water and sky in various co-existing forms—Rianne smiled. “Great stuff, Em. Did you think this—” she traced the circle “—up yourself?”

“Uh-huh. I still have to color the rivers and lakes. See?”

“Yes, I see, and the sky, too. And the border. Don’t want any white space left.”

“No, and Mrs. Baker said we can hand it in soon’s we’re all done with the unit.” The picture went carefully into a Duotang.

Rianne shut off the library’s lights. “Let’s go home, love.”

The moment they stepped through the entrance doors, Jon came away from the truck in an expeditious move.

“Hi,” he said, voice low, quiet. The sunglasses went into a shirt pocket.

Catching his look, Rianne had the odd feeling that, conditions permitting, he might have set an intimate hand at the back of her waist. But then, he was opening the door, taking Emily’s bag. “Hey, Bo Peep. How was your day?”

“Fine.”

“No nasty ole boys snitchin’ a kiss or two?”

A tiny giggle erupted. “No-ooo! That’s yucky.”

“Good,” he said. He took Rianne’s bag as well and set both on the floorboard of the crew cab. “Wouldn’t want you running off and getting married.”

“Mr. Tucker!” Emily covered her mouth in shock, but her eyes danced behind the round-rimmed glasses.

Oh, Jon, Rianne thought. She was blindsided by his kindness, his goodness. Do you know what you’ve done?

In less than eight hours big, beard-shadowed Jon Tucker had Emily smiling. Giggling. Laughing. Emily who never tittered with a grown man. Duane had seen to that. “Can’t you read yet, Emily Rose? Can’t you add? Come on, get with the program.”

Rianne shuddered. Why hadn’t she left years ago? Because you were afraid. Afraid you’d lose custody of the kids.

No matter. She should have found the fortitude, the courage. For Em and Sam she should have—

Jon cupped her elbow with a work-roughened palm. “Rianne?”

“I can manage the step, thank you.”

“Hurry, Mom. I’m starving.”

“Hang on, short stuff. Your mom doesn’t want to rip her stockings getting in.”

“I can manage,” Rianne repeated and held his gaze until he stepped back.

Another quick, silent trip home. Jon pulled in behind her Toyota. Rianne and Emily climbed from the truck.

“’Bye, Mr. Tucker.” Her daughter ambled toward the backyard, book pack swinging from her skinny little arm.

“See you, Bo Peep.” Shoving the sunglasses onto his head, he slammed the truck’s door, then came around to Rianne, scowling.

Now what? His moods changed quick as the weather.

She said, “Bill Martins at the Garage Center said you were responsible for fixing my battery. Thank you. And for the rides.”

“That why you were ticked at the school? Because I fixed your car?”

“No.” She wasn’t about to explain Duane. “It’s been a long day, that’s all.” She dug into her purse, began writing out a check on the hood of the truck.

“What’re you doing?”

“Paying you what I would’ve paid Bill.”

Her heart fluttered when he snatched the pen out of her hand. “Forget the damned money. I didn’t do it for a reward. The battery was one I had lying around.”

Slowly, carefully, Rianne turned. “If you won’t take payment for the battery I still owe you the cost of installing it.”

“I don’t want your money, Rianne.”

For a long moment his eyes pinned her. Her heart thumped like a drum. She took back the pen. “How much?”

“Two hundred dollars.”

She choked. “Two hundred—”

Not a muscle moved in his hard face. “Take it or leave it.”

She studied her car. A used base model, bought the year she married Duane, the year she’d had Sam. Dented, decrepit, dying.

Jon remained motionless, thumbs hooked in his front pockets, feet planted. Let your eyes warm a little. Just a tad, like they did with Emily. They continued their cool scrutiny.

“Fine,” she snapped. “Two hundred.”

Where she’d get the money, she didn’t know. But she would. As sure as God made apples and pears, she would prove to Jon Tucker and every man like him that she could navigate life’s bites with the best of them.

Finished, she held out the check.

Without a glance, he stashed it in a pocket. Tilting up her chin with a knuckle, he said, “There’s nothing wrong with being a woman, Rianne. Remember that next time a man wants to help you into a vehicle.”

They’d never been this close, inches close. Black rings surrounded his irises, pools of wishes and dreams and fantasies into which she could dip her heart.

Her mouth moved, as if to speak, as if to—

He strode to the driver’s door and leapt into the cab. Full-throttle, the truck backed out of the lane. He didn’t go home. Instead, he gunned it all the way down the street.

She didn’t move. Couldn’t.

Around her silence dropped like a shackle.

Chapter Four

After school, Sam headed for the bike racks at the east door of Misty River High. Unlocking the safety chain from the front tire of his Schwinn, he contemplated asking Joey to sleep over Friday night. With a couple of sleeping bags downstairs, they could watch videos, eat popcorn, talk girls.

Ashley Lorenzo was kind of pretty. He’d caught her looking at him a few times. Once, in study hall, she had even given him a smile. And she never looked at his hand.

Pulling his bike from its stall, Sam saw his friend walk through the doors. “Hey, Joe-man. You riding today?”

“Nah. Bikes’re for little snots.”

“You rode yesterday,” Sam pointed out.

“Yeah, well, yesterday’s history. ’Sides, walking’s better. You get to talk to girls.”

Sam considered that. Across the street he saw Ashley, bag on her shoulder, strolling off with a couple other junior-high girls. Tomorrow he’d leave his bike at home.

“Wanna double anyway?” Sam asked.

Joey debated. Shrugging, he ambled over and perched himself between the handlebars.

Sam peddled out of the school yard. It was tricky balancing a guy twenty pounds heavier on the bike, but Sam wanted muscles and muscles came when you worked up a sweat. “Got much homework?” he asked, peering around Joey’s sturdy frame.

“Nah.”

“Want to do something after?”

“Dunno.”

They were coming up to the intersection leading away from school property. Sam brought the bike to a crawl, checking both ways before striking off across the pavement.

“Hey, Joe!” a thick voice called.

“Code-myster. What’s up, man?” Joey jumped from the handlebars, forcing Sam to stop midway in the street. Cody Huller swaggered up with Mick Lessing. Sam avoided both boys when possible.

A car, waiting for them to cross, honked at the idle group.

“Yeah, yeah,” Huller grumbled with an arrogant glance. “Don’t get your tail in a knot.”

A woman poked her head from the driver’s window. “Come on, you guys, I’m late for an appointment.”

“Hey!” Huller barked. “Chill, okay? This is a school zone.” He ducked his head and flung out his arms in a sarcastic winging of the entire surroundings. With a salute Sam wouldn’t have dared offer in a hundred years, Huller moved toward the opposite curb. Joey snickered. Sam hoped the woman didn’t recognize him.

Huller said, “Claw-man, let Lessing here see your hand. He’s never had a close-up of a cripple before.”

Both laughed. Three girls walking by made tsking noises. Red splashed Joey’s cheeks. His effort to grin failed.

Sam’s chest tangled with a snake. Claw-man. He looked at Joey. His friend looked away. O-kay. Thanks, dude.

Readjusting his bookpack, Sam pushed his bike back to the street and hopped on the seat. “See ya around, Joe.”

“Yeah.”

“Running, wimp?” Huller singsonged. “Can’t take the heat?”

Sam skidded to a stop. A year older than Sam, Huller stood six inches taller and reminded him of a weed his mother yanked from her flower beds last year. Skinny and ugly. “I’m not afraid of you, loser.”

Joey’s jaw dropped. Lessing hooted.

Huller stepped into Sam’s face. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

With one hand, the kid shoved Sam back against his bike. Hard. He stumbled, went down, the bike twisting clumsily under him on the pavement. The rear wheel axle caught him in the lower part of his spine, arrowed pain straight up to his skull and down to his toes. Tears pricked his eyes.

Lessing giggled.

Joey stepped forward. “Hey, Cody, take it easy, man.”

The bigger boy swung around. “Who’s side you on, Fraser?”

Joey backed off, flashing a what-can-I-do? look at Sam.

Ignoring the sting in his back, Sam scrambled to his feet, left fist clenched at his side. A hot ball of rage coiled in his stomach. “You sonuva—”

Huller leaned forward. “Say it, cripple. I dare ya.”

Sam spat on the ground between them. Fury blinded him. Through the red haze he saw his father sneering at him. He saw his mother cowering on the floor. He hauled back and rammed his fist into Cody Huller’s gut.

The older boy staggered, surprise glittering in his slitty eyes. He rushed Sam. Together they hit the pavement. No time to consider pain or bruises. Huller slammed a fist into Sam’s face and his left cheekbone sang with pain. Then all he could do was cover his head while Cody Huller had his way.

To Sam it felt like hours, though it probably lasted no more than five seconds. Suddenly, Huller was snatched away.

“What’s going on here?” Mr. Kosky boomed. “You boys got nothing better to do?”

The high school principal helped Sam off the pavement. Dirt ground between his molars. He touched his tongue to a lip split like an over-ripe grape. His left eye dripped water worse than the leaky tap in the bathroom at home. Around them students gathered, gawked. Street traffic slowed to a crawl.

“He started it.” Huller pointed at Sam. “He punched first.”

“That right?” Kosky asked.

Sam looked away. Right or wrong, he wasn’t saying. Let the principal think what he wanted.

Trouble was, the man had the body of a compact engine. Muscled forearms, solid thighs, a barrel chest. Hard to ignore a guy like that training his hawk eyes on Sam. “You need to get some antiseptic on that cut, son.”

To the other three standing on the sidewalk, gazes shifting everywhere, Kosky ordered, “Cody, Joey, Mick. I want you all in my office. Immediately. You, too, Sam.”

“I didn’t do nothing!” Huller cried. “It was his fault!”

“We’ll deal with it in the office, Cody.” The principal scanned the crowd. “The rest of you go home.”

The crowd of students began splitting up. By suppertime, the whole school would know. By tomorrow, half of Chinook Elementary would have heard from their older brothers and sisters.

Shame washed over Sam. Emily. He imagined her big eyes brimming with panic again. He’d bet every cent he had in the meager savings account his mom had opened for him that tonight his sister would sleep with her blankey and for the next week gnaw her pinky until it resembled a raw breakfast sausage.

As for his mother’s reaction…forget it.

Rianne unlocked the back door and waited for Sam and Emily to proceed into the house. Barely half over, the week was turning into a spiel to rival CNN news. First, her car battery, then Jon and his outrageous installation fee, and now Sam played action hero and reaped a two-day school suspension.

Pointing to the kitchen table, she said, “Sit, both of you. We have some things to discuss.”

Sam dropped his bag and threw himself onto a chair. “What for? Everything was said in Mr. Kosky’s office.”

Hugging her bookpack, Emily sat across the table, myopic eyes on her brother.

“What I need to say is private.” Rianne leaned against the counter. She couldn’t sit, not while anger churned her blood. Sam’s eye looked awful. Beneath it, puffy half moons pushed the lids to a slit. Yellow antiseptic—which Greg Kosky had applied—colored the boy’s thin cheekbone.

A ringing quiet fell. Sam jiggled the toe of one dusty sneaker. He refused to look at Rianne.

Emily stuck her little finger into the corner of her mouth.

On the floor by the corner window, Sweetpea lounged on a small flowered mat with her two-week-old offspring tumbling playfully around her. The animal gave Rianne a squint-eyed look, licked the face of Squeak, a scruffy-tailed, dappled kitten that walked with its hips to one side.

Rianne took a deep breath. “Sam, I understand why you hit Cody. He said some cruel things.”

Sam looked out the window. “He called me a cripple.”

“Yes, he did,” she conceded, wondering if her heart could shred further. In Greg Kosky’s office, with students and parents present, the Huller boy had admitted to the fact.

“Just like Dad used to.” A tear dripped from Sam’s wounded eye. He swiped it with the heel of his hand and winced.

“Yes, just like your father,” she echoed, wanting to hold her son, shield him, protect him from all abhorrences in the world.

Sam lifted his head, fighting not to cry. “When Cody pushed me all I could see was Dad and—and you. I had to stop him.”

Without delay, Rianne knelt in front of her child and clasped his dirt-stained hands. “Sam, don’t let your father’s behavior influence your emotions when someone hurts you verbally. It isn’t right.”

“What Dad did wasn’t right either, but you let him do it.”

She squelched a cry. Oh, Lord, she had to make him see. She had to show him that fists, foul words and rages were not the way to solve problems or get what he wanted, when he wanted it.

“Do you think I’m proud of that? I kept forgiving your father, hoping he’d change, hoping I could change him. It took me a long time—years, in fact—to realize he never would, that what he did was not a demonstration of love, but a weakness of spirit.” She squeezed Sam’s hands. “Honey, you are not weak of spirit. You’re strong, good, beautiful. Inside and out. If someone can’t see that, it’s their loss, not yours.”

He jumped up. “I hate who I am! I hate that I don’t have normal hands like every other kid! Why was I born this way?”

Battling tears, he ran down the hall. Seconds later, his bedroom door slammed hard enough to slip the pictures on the walls. The kittens wrestling with the mat wobbled hurriedly to their mother’s comforting body.

“Mommy?”

Emily slid from her chair and came around the table. Wrapping her arms around Rianne’s neck, she straddled her lap and hugged her close.

“It’s okay, honey.” Rianne stroked the child’s hair. “Sam’s just upset about what happened today.”

“Will we have to move away?”

Her heart constricted. “No. Sam likes it here, and so do you. This is only a little bump in the road.” She hoped.

“Then why did he say those things about his hand?”

“Because he’s hurting right now.”

“That boy wasn’t nice,” Emily murmured.

“Some people aren’t.” Life fact number one.

A hush fell. Sweetpea purred reassuringly to her family. Emily snuggled closer. “Mr. Tucker wouldn’t say those things.”

“He doesn’t have a disease. He has an individual hand, is all.” No, Jon would never hurt Sam. Jon was a man. Not a coward.

A good man.

A decent man.

A man—two hundred dollars be damned—she could fall for. If she was interested. Which I’m not.

She kissed Emily’s hair. “Let’s scrounge up some supper.”

“Mom?”

“Yes, sweets?”

“I think Mr. Tucker would beat that kid up, don’t you?”

Rianne cupped her child’s face and willed the kink in her stomach to loosen. “Emily, Jon would not lay a finger on Cody Huller. Ever.” Perhaps her certainty had to do with what had happened more than twenty years ago with Gene Hyde.

The corners of Emily’s mouth lifted. “Me, either. Not really.” She settled a cheek against Rianne. “I like it when he calls me Bo Peep,” she said shyly.

Rianne gave her a hard hug. “I do, too, sweetheart.”

“He’s nice.”

“Mmm.” And handsome. And kindhearted. And… Oh, Rianne, do not go there.

The flashlight beam flickered a third time on the other side of the juniper border. Edging along the wall of his unlit kitchen, Jon felt the hair at the back of his neck climb.

Someone was in Rianne’s backyard.

He checked his wristwatch. Ten fifty-four. Who the hell was skulking around on a night swarthier than sin? On a Wednesday night, no less. A school night. Except for the dim wash of yellow in her kitchen window—the stove light he guessed—Rianne’s house had been dark since ten o’clock. Again, he checked the time. Two minutes.

Three.

He waited. Peered through the black pane. Five minutes.

Whoever it was hadn’t moved more than four feet, or lifted the flashlight higher than six inches off the ground.

Twenty years on the force spurred him into action. Silently, he went through his dark house to the front door. He’d ambush the bastard from her carport. Face to face.

Slipping into a pair of chewed-up sneakers, he went out the door, crept down the veranda steps. The day had closed with a bank of dirty, gray clouds; night prevailed in starless slumber.

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