Chapter Thirty

Sierra sat cross-legged on her bed. Mom was sleep, and the apartment was quiet. The only light came from her laptop. She rubbed her temples and took two gulping breaths. This was it.

The email from the professor she had met at the university contained two names, two addresses for Rice alumni who had known her father. Dr. Louis Bernard had a Johns Hopkins email and a Maryland address. There wasn’t an email for Dr. Joseph Wheeler or a telephone number, only an address in Tonkawa Creek, Texas. She looked it up. It was in East Texas, population four hundred and thirty, just over a hundred miles north of Houston. But she couldn’t find any other contact information for this man on the Internet.

Sierra stood and paced the carpet between her bed and the wall, her hands behind her. She wanted to talk to these men face-to-face. When they spoke about Dad, she wanted to see if they drew back like the Rice professor had, or if they smiled and began chatting the way old friends do. She didn’t want them to have time to think about it if she sent letters. She leaned her head against the cool glass of her window. This man in Tonkawa Creek was her best option. She couldn’t call him or email him to set up a time though, and how would she get there?

It was time to act grown-up. That meant not relying on Carlos to drive her there and not upsetting her mom about the whole thing. She’d just go. This man wasn’t an ax murderer. The Rice professor said Dr. Wheeler had been Dad’s roommate at Rice, and they’d earned their PhDs at Cornell together. Sierra picked up her plush kangaroo and held it to her chest as she sat back on the bed.

She’d find a way to reach him.

 

Saturday morning she left the apartment with a plan. Outside the apartment gate, she looked across the bayou to Mr. Prodan’s neighborhood. It would be nice to speak to him about Dad and the professors, but he was Mom’s friend now.

So she turned the opposite direction and caught a city bus to the Greyhound station, where she boarded another bus to Tonkawa Creek. She had a whole row to herself. Sierra pulled on her jacket and rested her head against the cushion, tuning out the beat from a nearby iPod.

In no time, they’d left the city behind. Freeway turned into interstate, and malls gave way to acres of pine. It was like a movie about the deep South as they sped by shacks and rusted cars and dirt roads. Old people sat on porches and cows grazed in meadows.

Shortly before noon, the driver pulled into a gas station and called out, “Tonkawa Creek!”

She was the only one who exited the bus.

Cars whizzed by on the road, but they all appeared to be going somewhere else, heading for towns where they had Walmarts and McDonalds.

Aside from the convenience store and post office, nothing even indicated this was a town. A white steeple poked out of the trees, and down the road, a little brick building perched on the edge of the highway. She closed her eyes to the empty place. She could do this. She’d come all this way so she could.

The man at the post office shot an amused glance at her sandals when she showed him the address. “Yeah, I know it. You cross the interstate and follow it about a mile or two. You’ll find Tiber Pines Road, just a dirt road. It’s about two, maybe three miles down that road.”

Sierra thanked him and began trudging up the road. When a gap in traffic left room, she sprinted across the interstate to the center turn lane, then waited again to dash to the other side. A truck honked at her as she hiked up a hill along the grassy shoulder. Finally, she found the turn off—a dirt track, lined on both sides by pine forest. She hiked up and then down its inclines.

Sierra didn’t go far before she needed to remove her jacket and tie it around her waist. It was a mild March day, but the sun shone overhead now. She fanned her hands to keep gnats from swarming into her face. A woodpecker drilled in the distance.

What brought a history professor way out here? It would be a long drive to any college, and none of those of any reputation. She wiped her sweaty palms against her jeans. This man’s life wasn’t her concern. What mattered was that he would tell her about Dad’s.

After what seemed ages, she found a rusted gate. Next to it, overgrown ferns almost hid a wood sign with the name Wheeler engraved into it. She unlatched the gate and tramped down a gravel trail.

Horses grazed on a hill in the distance. On this side of the meadow stood a neat farmhouse that had rockers on the porch. She didn’t see a car. It was so quiet, Sierra grew nervous, wondering if she’d come all this way for nothing. The place looked empty.

She looked around as she approached the house. Tools were strewn about in the yard—a saw and some kind of cable.

Once on the porch, she cupped her hands around her eyes to see through a picture window. In the living room, books and periodicals lay piled on the furniture, but no one stirred.

Sierra knocked and waited, knocked again. No answer. She followed the wraparound porch to the back where a barn stood next to a pond before the property fell into more forestland.

A man came out of the barn. He looked about fifty and was as different from her dark, scholarly father as anyone could possibly be. His age showed in the wrinkles around his eyes, but he stood tall, probably six and a half feet, and fit with a full head of wheat-colored hair. He wore work clothes covered in sawdust. This couldn’t be Dr. Wheeler, could it?

Standing at the barn door, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief, he watched her walk across the yard to meet him. She hadn’t thought what she’d say when she met him. She could hardly throw out, “Hi, I’m Gary Wright’s daughter and I need to know who he was.” The way he glared at her, she didn’t think he wanted company anyway.

The first words out of his mouth confirmed it. “You’re on private property.”

But as she drew close, he worked his jaw. “Well now, if you aren’t the spitting image of your daddy.”

Sierra hadn’t expected that down-home accent. She didn’t know what she’d expected, but not this man. He didn’t appear as if he’d ever set foot in a university classroom.

She held out her hand. “I’m Sierra Wright.”

“I know who you are, little girl. Didn’t I just say that?” He ignored her hand and put his arm around her shoulder. “I’ve been praying hard for you and your mama. It’s good to see you. Where’s Miss April?”

“In Houston.” A drawl slipped into her words, as if Dr. Wheeler’s accent were contagious.

“You drove out here by yourself?” He glanced down the road for her car. “Guess you are driving age by now, aren’t you?”

Sierra coughed. “I took the bus actually.”

He gave her an even glance. “Is that right? Well, come on inside. I’ll get you a drink.”

Inside the old-fashioned kitchen, he poured a glass of iced tea for her and gulped down an entire glass himself before pouring a second glass. She studied him. He felt familiar. Had she known him once and forgotten him?

He shuffled papers and books off a sofa, but threw up his hands. “Oh, it’s nice enough outside. Let’s go on out.”

They sat on the edge of the porch. Sierra’s legs dangled over the side, and a golden retriever came sniffing at her ankles before coming to heel at her master’s feet.

“So what brings you out here, munchkin?”

Sierra stared off into the trees and reached down to scratch the dog’s ears. She cleared her throat. “Dr. Wheeler, it’s been almost three years since my dad died.”

He held up a hand. “Call me Joe.”

“Joe,” she said quietly. “I can hardly remember him—my dad. Someone told me you might be able to tell me something about him. I can’t … I mean I don’t seem to remember …”

“They do seem to slip away, don’t they? The memories of our loved ones.” He looked straight at her. “It hit me hard. Haven’t been the same myself since. Can’t imagine what it was like for y’all. I did try to check up on April, but I know how it is. When you lose someone, writing back to well-meaning friends is just one more thing you’d rather not be responsible for.”

He stood. “Let’s walk over to the meadow.”

The path was worn, and though it led uphill, it made for an easy stroll. “Your mama told you I was the last one he spoke to?”

A little jolt hit her chest. No, of course Mom hadn’t said anything. She never talked about Dad at all. “My mother didn’t mention it.”

“We ran into each other at the conference in Rome. Had lunch, and I could tell he wasn’t doing good. Lifting his fork seemed more than he could manage.

“Before we parted ways, he said, ‘I’m doing it for them, Joe.’

“I said, ‘Doing what? For who?’

“Your daddy smiled at me and said, ‘You’ll know.’ I thought he was too tired to make sense. I told him he ought to sit the next session out. Get some rest. He looked at me and said, ‘That’s exactly what I intend to do.’”

Joe picked up a twig off the path and broke it in two. “I should’ve known. We’d been friends for over twenty years. If anyone knew how much he struggled, I did. I should’ve figured it out.” Joe swallowed hard.

Sierra looked back at the path. He should have known what? They’d covered a lot of ground, and the house was in the distance, almost hidden by the cypresses on its eastern side.

“Believe me, I never would have let him go, if I’d had the slightest inkling.”

Inkling of what? Was he somehow supposed to have guessed a van would lose control as Dad crossed the street?

Joe’s voice cracked. “I should have asked him what he meant. If I’d known, I’d have walked that mile with him. I’d have stepped in front of that van myself to stop him.”

A buzzing rang in Sierra’s ears. The grass turned a fuzzy green; the sky faded.

She knew what Joe was telling her.

But it couldn’t be true. Mom would have told her if he’d … if it hadn’t been an accident.

“I’m sorry, little girl. I can’t tell you how many times I wish I had that day to do over.”

His words sounded like they came from a tin can, but she forced herself to respond through stiff lips. “It wasn’t your fault.”

She kept walking somehow. Eu merg, tu mergi, el merge, noi mergem. She desperately began conjugating verbs. It wasn’t Joe’s fault. It wasn’t Dad’s fault. It just was.

“Sierra-girl, are you okay?”

Sierra nodded. She even smiled. “I’m fine. I just … what did he have for lunch that day?”

“I don’t guess I recall.”

She worked hard to keep the smile. “It’s all right. I just wondered.” She walked on, though her legs had turned to rubber and the ground felt too soft to hold her up. “I guess you wouldn’t remember a thing like that.”

Had she said those words? Or had she only thought them? Everything seemed so unreal that she couldn’t say.

He stopped, dropping the twig, and looked hard at her. She tried to return the look, but his face was too hazy, and she stared off into whiteness. No one’s fault; no one’s fault. It’s just how things were.

“You didn’t know your daddy killed himself, did you?”

She tried to form the words, but the terrible buzzing swallowed her attention.

The world bleached itself of all color. She had a vague sensation of his hands around her shoulders—large, hard hands—and then the feel of grass beneath her, prickling her neck and arms. She closed her eyes to shut out the awful glare.

The ringing finally stopped, and she could put two thoughts together. She opened her eyes and saw the colors that should be there covered in shadows. She sat up.

“Easy now.” Joe sat beside her, gripping her arms. “Let the blood work its way back into your head.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.” She didn’t know what she was sorry for. The words just rolled off her tongue.

“Hey, now. I never would’ve told you. I thought you knew.”

“My mom knows?” she asked.

He chewed his lip. “I gave her the news myself.”

The dog nuzzled at her hand, and Sierra burrowed her head into its fur.

“I can’t remember him,” she said. “I tried, but no one would talk about him.”

 

Joe helped her up and insisted she lean on his arm as they walked back to the house. From a rocking chair on the porch, she looked out at the horses grazing while Joe went to get a glass of ice water for her. Too tired to drink, she put the glass against her face and let the coldness chill her flushed skin.

“Why did he do it?”

Joe sighed as he sat in the rocking chair next to her. “You ever met your grandparents?”

“Not my dad’s parents. I think they died when I was little.”

“Crazy as loons. I went home with him one summer to meet them up in Kansas when we were roommates in college. My sophomore year, it was. They were threatened by your dad’s genius and didn’t much take to me either.”

“Threatened?”

“Gary’s mind was like a sieve. He read every book in the town library before he finished junior high. He heard a fact, and it was burned into his mind forever. He picked up languages the way other boys picked up baseball stats. But were his folks proud? No, they called him proud and too good for the likes of them. He wanted to please them. But there was no way with a mind like that he could be content with anything but learning and lots and lots of it.”

Joe leaned his head back. “I thought he’d be okay. He’d make peace with who he was. But they were always in his head, accusing him, telling him he was prideful, odd, wrong. The more he pretended they didn’t exist, the harder it was for him. The more he was driven to work. Hours and hours, days and days, without sleep or food, until he collapsed. He had his first breakdown when you were a little tyke.

“I thought, Well now, that’s a good thing. He’ll get help finally. But the more time he spent with the doctors and on the medicine, the worse he seemed to get. A group of us men fasted and prayed and laid our hands on him, but he kept getting worse and worse. I thought—and I’m no psychiatrist—but I thought, Why doesn’t he go home? Tell that crazy family that God made him brilliant for a reason, and if they were any kind of sane, they ought to be supporting him. Maybe if he’d tell them what’s what, he’d get rid of the manic studying and guilt. But he just bottled it up inside.”

He paused. “But then maybe that’s just my thinking. The doctors said it was a matter of brain chemistry. So likely it was more complicated than the problem with his folks.”

“You were my dad’s friend.”

“I was. We were pals from our freshman year at Rice.”

“Did he … Was he ever okay?”

“Sure. He was always serious, but he was a normal guy. He went out for pizza, made jokes, was fun to hang out with. You could always see them in his eyes though, those ghosts.”

Sierra looked up at the towering pines by the fence. “I try to see him—in my memories, I mean. But there’s nothing.”

“Maybe it will be easier now that you know.”

“Maybe.”

Joe leaned forward and turned her face with his hand so that she had to look straight at him. “Gary had his failings, but he loved you.”

He dropped his hand. “I remember lots of times seeing him with you cuddled up on his lap like a kitten. That’s what he called you. Kitten. Had pictures galore of you on his wall. I swear, according to Gary, you were the smartest, most beautiful, and sweetest-tempered child on earth.” Joe winked at her. “But looking at you now, I guess he was right. He loved your mama, too.”

“But it wasn’t enough.” She dug her fingernails into her palms.

“No, I guess not. Sometimes, there isn’t enough to make something right, not the kind of right we think God ought to give us. But I happen to think you and April are the reason he hung on as long as he did.”

She closed her eyes. She’d worried when Mom hadn’t wanted to talk about Dad. And when the professor had grown cool at Dad’s name, and when Carlos had suggested there might have been something wrong with him, the worry had turned into a hard lump of panic. But he hadn’t been anything horrible. Just sad.

She thought of the closed door to her parents’ bedroom, one of the few images she could remember. She remembered now. The light in the study would be on all night. She’d find him in there sometimes, working feverishly over something, when she woke in the middle of the night. And then during the day, the door to the bedroom would be closed, and Mom told her to whisper so they wouldn’t disturb him. Her mother treated Dad’s sleep like gold. Was there anything that would have made him join the waking?

Joe touched her arm. “Why don’t we go back inside and look at some old photos.”

Sierra stood. “I feel as if I should remember you.”

Joe smiled. “Understandable why you wouldn’t. I was around a lot when you were a baby. But after grad school, your folks moved to Virginia, and I only saw you once in a blue moon.”

They walked back into the house, and Joe began digging among stacks of books until he found a photo album. He showed her pictures of Dad hanging out with his friends. Joe had been the best man at her parents’ wedding. Dad looked happy enough. But then Joe pulled out some photos of the time he visited them in Virginia. Mom must have taken one of them—the two men stood side by side, leaning against a wood rail fence. Dad’s eyes looked puffy, and while Joe had filled out, Dad had put on a serious amount of weight.

“It was the medicine,” Joe said. “Made him gain thirty pounds in a month. When that round didn’t work, they tried another. Some medicines worked for a little bit. Some made him worse than ever. But it was my feeling no medicine could undo what his folks did to him.”

There was something eerie about the photos. In one photo, she could look at it and think, Here’s a man who’s got his life ahead of him. And in the next, she could see, This is a man who might not make it.

He patted her knee. “It’s about time for you to head home, isn’t it?”

“No, I don’t think so.” Sierra looked away, but from the corner of her eye, she could see him looking at her, weighing his words.

“I guess she doesn’t know you’re here.”

Sierra inspected her feet.

“There ain’t such a thing as running away, little girl. Your daddy tried that one, and it didn’t do him one bit of good. If you want some kind of life, you’re going to have to go home first. Face your mama. Face the memories of your daddy. Once you face the things you don’t like, you can decide what to do.”

Sierra looked out at the lawn, the horses, the country road, all so far away from the cobbled paths of a university. She jutted out her chin. “But you ran away. You have a doctorate, and you’re out in the country with no one but horses to teach.”

He chuckled. “Maybe I did run away and maybe I didn’t. After your dad … And then my wife left me. It seemed time to come home to where it all started. I don’t call going home running away myself. I call it a sabbatical. But I’m sure there’s some who disagree.”

“I’m sorry, Joe,” she whispered.

He put his giant hand on her cheek. “Hit me with your best. I can take it. I’d rather see you duking it out over trying to be brave any day. You feel what you feel. And pretending you don’t will only take you to a darker place.”

“I can’t go back.” She balled her hands into fists, as if she could make it true. “My mom lied to me, Joe.” She ducked her head. She’d have to go home. Where else would she go?

“Your mama can’t take any more loss. Go home and tell her what’s on your mind.”

Sierra didn’t answer.

“You’re not going home alone. I want you to know that.” She looked up to see him studying her. “The more sin-scarred the world is around you, the deeper God’s compassion. He never leaves the side of the brokenhearted. Do you hear what I’m saying?”

He didn’t let go of her gaze until she gave him a brief nod.

 

Sierra didn’t take the bus back. Joe wouldn’t hear of it. He set her in his Jeep Cherokee and drove her to Houston himself. Dusk was settling by the time the freeway widened to ten lanes.

Rain must have fallen during the day. Car lights shone and tires swooshed and hissed against the slick pavement. By the time she directed him to their exit, night was pressing in.

He gave her an uncertain look when he pulled onto their street, and Sierra pulled into her own corner of the seat. What must he think of their choice of apartments? He parked inside the gates under a yellow streetlight and sat behind the wheel, staring at the complex.

A couple of teenage boys dressed in low-riding jeans and oversize jackets meandered by at a measured pace, bumping into the Jeep on purpose. Joe’s eyes flashed murder. “April,” he muttered under his breath, “why didn’t you tell me?”

He started to get out, but Sierra put her hand out to stop him. “If you don’t mind, I’d rather talk to my mom alone.”

He took out a pen and wrote a phone number on her hand. “You tell her to call me. There’s no reason for you all to be living in a place like this.”

“I’ll tell her.”

“God bless, kitten.”

Joe didn’t drive away until she waved at him from inside the apartment. She breathed a sigh of relief the place was empty. The answering machine flashed. Mom wouldn’t get home until nine. Carlos wanted her to call. She deleted both messages.

Standing in front of the wall of art she’d made with Mom and that crazy picture of the woman and child in the center, she remembered Joe’s question: Why didn’t Mom tell him they were living like this? Mom was good at keeping secrets, wasn’t she? With her smiles and cheery voice, she never once let on that Dad’s accident wasn’t so accidental.

Sierra felt light-headed looking at the painting. Where was Dad in the center tile? Where was the truth?

She put her head into her hands. Where was anything at all?

She took a hot shower, and by the time Mom got home, Sierra had pulled on her sweats and burrowed under her covers with the lights turned out. Mom looked in, and Sierra closed her eyes, playing the role of sleeping daughter.