Simon Hart lounged in the last booth near the alley door at Crystal’s Cafe.
Not the best seat in the house but nobody on the street could see him and he could see everyone coming through the front door. Except now he couldn’t see anything ’cause a greasy old plastic menu was being shoved in front of his face.
“You ready to order yet, Mister?”
“No ma’am,” he drawled, sliding his eyes over the more than ample Crystal. “I told you, I’m waitin’ on someone. But if you’re so all fired up to wait on me then pour up another cup of coffee, sweet cheeks. You got the pot right there.”
The woman’s free hand went to her hip. She had the ugliest hand he ever did see. It was doughy and dimpled. Her nails were too long and thick and square to be real. They were painted orange with a purple stripe on the pinky. She wore a bunch of cheap rings that cut hard into her fingers and a heart shaped wristwatch as big as a bagel. Her face was almost as bad as her hands. Coyote ugly for sure. She shifted her weight one way and the opposite hip rose under her pink, polyester pants. Reluctantly, she refilled his cup like she’d rather be pouring it into his lap.
“This isn’t a library, you know. You can’t just sit here all day and take up space without ordering something or such.” Her lips pulled together tight, widening the tiny cracks around them. It looked like she was bleeding ’cause her lipstick was soaked into them.
“Yeah? Well, when the crowd comes in you be sure to let me know and I’ll give up my seat in this fine establishment,” Simon shot back.
“You just tell whoever’s coming that they better order or you’re both out of here. I’m not wasting anymore of my coffee on the likes of you.”
With a ‘humph’ she left. Simon wagered that Crystal there would be singing a different tune if Tessa was sitting across from him. It was amazing what looks and a little money got you: respect, class, service. Any damn thing you wanted. People just fell all over themselves trying to please someone who was rich or beautiful. If you were both, they just let you walk all over them.
Who would have thought Tessa would grow up so good. Damn, but he’d be on easy street if he’d stuck by her. Life would have been rich, indeed. Luckily, it still could be. The front door of the diner was opening. Simon sat up straighter and put his two feet on the ground. He raised his hand. He called out.
“Over here.”
His meal ticket had arrived.
Will Savick’s Office
4:18 p.m
.
“Ginger? I’ve got to go out, honey. You going to be okay with that paperwork on your own?”
Ginger looked up and smiled at Will Savick. She smiled as hard and sweet as she could because she thought he was something special. A lot of women didn’t care for a man like Will, but Ginger wasn’t a lot of women. She liked that he was just one big, long knot of muscle. She liked that he wasn’t married and that, far as she knew, he wasn’t seeing anyone. Even when he was a deputy, Will Savick didn’t have a woman calling to find out what he was up to. On top of that, Ginger liked the mystery of him. He was a man who played everything close to the vest – sometimes he kept his own counsel behind a smile, sometimes behind a sharp word, sometimes just with a look from those narrow dark eyes of his. Ginger would just give anything to know what it was that made that man tick. If she couldn’t figure that out, she’d settle for knowing just how far that ink on his arm went. She figured it went all the way up and over his shoulder and down his back and maybe even. . .
“Ginger! You got it covered?” Will barked.
Startled, Ginger’s hand went to the buttons on her uniform shirt. She always did that when a man got testy with her. You’d think now that she was wearing a uniform she’d be a little tougher, but experience told her that when a man yelled the next thing was he got rough.
“Sure, Sheriff. I’m on it. Figure I’ll be done about one if you want to go over it at lunch. I mean, if you’re not eating on the road.”
Savick’s lips didn’t even so much as twitch when she made the offer so Ginger stopped smiling. He checked his watch. His wide forehead was beetled; there was a little flush under his leathery tan. The man had spent a whole lot of time out in the sun, on the road with that biker group he used to ride with, and it showed. Funny how a man could change but still carry with him all the cuts and hits of what went on before. For Ginger that was just a little more sugar and spice on top of an already sweet thing.
“Just leave them on my desk. I’ll take a look when I get back,” Savick directed.
“Okay.” Ginger answered brightly.
If he’d bothered to look, Savick would have seen that she was clearly disappointed. She was running out of coy ways to suggest they get together. Soon Ginger would have to ask him straight out and if he rejected her then that would hurt. Worse, what if he laughed?
Sighing, Ginger pulled the stack of paper toward her. She watched her boss walk across the street and get in his car. She didn’t really wonder where he was going as much as she wondered how it would feel to give that poor leg of his a little massage or that tight little ass a good squeeze.
The Highway
4:30 p.m.
Will Savick cruised the highway like he was on vacation: window down, arm crooked, checking out the scenery. Wind and speed and cold made him feel alive the way few things did but speed wasn’t something he wanted people to take notice of right then. He raised a friendly hand to everyone he passed but still he thought about the cold inside him. Sadly, it would take a hundred years to thaw his old heart. He’d been so sure the uniform, the badge, the responsibility would do it for him. Savick even thought a good woman might settle him some but women never held his interest for long. One was just like another. All except one. She was interesting as hell. Her heart was frozen, too, but he was the only one who knew it.
He reached for his tobacco tin but decided against a pinch. The turn would be coming up soon now that he had come to the road marker, a memorial for some stupid kid who took the curve too fast. Less than a tenth of a mile later Will Savick left the highway and followed the ancillary road to another fork.
He pulled the car into a grove. He looked for a hiker, a neighbor, one of those environmental whackos hoping to find something to protect. You just never knew who might be looking your way.
Satisfied he was alone, the sheriff put on his jacket. Like his belt and tattoo, it wasn’t uniform issue. He turned the collar up high, went to the back door, knocked and waited. He heard a slither, a falling, a bending of things in the woods. Savick looked over his shoulder, unhappy that he was left standing so long. He knocked again and finally the door opened. The woman was as careful as he, opening the door slowly, standing back in the shadows, keeping to them even when he crossed the threshold. She closed the door with both hands then quite deliberately faced him.
“This isn’t going to be as simple as we thought,” he said.
Jake found me splayed out on the marble floor of a bathroom, drunk, stoned, puking my guts out into a bidet. It was supposed to be a party but I wasn’t having fun. I was ultra-famous by then. Italy was behind me but the memories of it were never far away. Sharon was gone. I was a mess. Preoccupied with the bidet, I didn’t notice Jake step over me, to get to the toilet. When he turned to leave, though, I lifted my head, looked at him as best my bleary eyes could and said:
“I’m so sorry.”
This, according to Jake, seemed not so much an apology as a lament that the world had come to this. He thought that was profound. It wasn’t. Still, he locked the door, sat beside me on the floor and took my head into his lap. I lay with my knees pulled up, my hands folded under my cheek; the fetal position preferred by abused women and abandoned children. In a million years, I never would have imagined that, at my lowest and ugliest, I would have found someone to love me. Or maybe Jake was thinking to make me over, make me better, save me from myself.
Any which way – love or challenge or cause – I was grateful to him. I never repaid him for saving me but I can pay it forward. I heard a whimper in this forest and followed the sound. Now I have found me a beautiful, hurt thing just like Jake did when he found me.
Here in the forest is a fawn, her back leg pierced by a trap. A step this way or that and she would have gone on: unhurt, still beautiful, not knowing of her narrow escape. I plant my walking stick and hold tight as I lower myself to the ground. I don’t want to scare her more than she already is.
“Okay, little lady, let me look there.”
I coo at her the way I think a mama should talk to a child. I never had a chance to use that voice with Charlotte so I take my best shot now. The fawn’s wide, dark eyes blink. Her front legs are bent, her chest is thrust out, her long neck is straight, her delicate head is turned my way.
She is so proud, so graceful, so delicately lovely. Her beauty brings to mind a question: would I have stopped if this were an ugly creature? Would Jake have wasted his time with me if I wasn’t beautiful? The fawn stirs like she is impatient with me for wondering these things. She tries to get up and there is more blood. It’s not a pretty sight anymore.
“Okay,” I whisper, mostly to give me the strength to do what I must.
The fawn’s eyes close slowly. She is trusting that I am not the one who set the trap and that feels like an honor. I touch the gleaming metal. Before I’m ready, the little doe’s front legs beat at the earth, startling me. She will do more harm than good if she tries to go too soon and I don’t want that.
Making noises of caution, I position myself as strong as I can. With my hands on either side of the trap I push and pull. I grunt. I sweat. Saving is a painful occupation. Jake must have been in a helluva lot of hurt all these years with saving me.
Finally, the trap gives. The fawn strains forward. Once, twice, three times she lunges, pawing at the ground as I do my best to give her enough space to escape. Just when I think I can’t hold on any longer her front hooves find traction. She is up and gone, scampering off on three legs, pulling the broken, bleeding one behind her. The trap snaps back with a horrible sound. I fall on it, unhurt, not an ounce of strength left.
My arms are caught under my chest. I close my eyes. I want Jake. If not Jake, I want someone to find me the way I found the fawn. It is just then that I do feel someone thinking about me. It isn’t Jake. This is a stronger, more determined mind reaching out to my weak one. I close my eyes tighter trying to make that person hear me back.
When the moment goes, I am so lonely I want to die. I have walked too far into the woods, the river is lost. I don’t know which way to go. The light is fading. Doesn’t matter. I see one thing clearly. The fawn has come back. She stands beside me, shaking on three legs and bleeding from the fourth.
I get up and gather her in my arms.