I didn’t cry myself because I wanted to be tough for Clint. I went to him and wiped his tears while his hiccups went away. I tried to listen to the preacher when he read from his book, but all I could hear was blood rushing in my ears. I looked at Clint in that ring of begonias and all them people crowded around to watch us get married. The sky was so blue and the grass so green, and down at the end of the yard a creek was running over rocks that was round and furry with moss, like the ones I used to step on at home.
We had to use the Thompsons’ rings, but that was okay. Clint was saving up for the rings we really wanted. When the ceremony was over, we had a kiss that seemed too short for the mountains that was moving inside of me. Zelda took pictures and the flash was bright. Clint led me down the deck steps and everybody else poured into the yard behind us. The kids chased each other off looking like butterflies in their summer clothes.
Mr. Thompson was done firing up the grill for hamburgers. I closed my eyes and drunk in the charcoal smell of the rolling black smoke when he opened the lid. The others gathered up for a game of horseshoes. I drifted down the creek a little ways, to where I could breathe and take it all in. The wind picked up and blowed the smell of the grill toward me. The children came running along the bank and before I knowed it one of them, a girl with plaits, crashed into my knees. The shock ran all through me. I looked down and her face was like a little sun. She hugged my legs hard before she ran off. I shut my eyes and felt hot tears. I hadn’t been touched by a child in a long time. Someway it made me think of Johnny. It seemed like the Lord’s way of saying the day was blessed.
It was getting evening by the time I walked back toward the house. Clint had left me alone, even though I seen him looking for me. He knowed I needed to take it all in by myself for a while. Everybody else was full but there was plenty of food left over. I was too tired to eat. I sunk down in a lawn chair on the grass beside of Louise. Me and her watched Clint up on the deck. He was talking with Mr. Thompson and drinking iced tea out of a plastic cup. I could tell Louise cared for Clint by the way she looked at him. “That boy’s had a hard time of it,” she said. “But he’s been better since he found you.” Louise reached out for my hand to squeeze. Her fingers shocked me, like the touch of that child had done. She looked back at Clint and said, “He’s like one of my own sons. You know, I gave him my youngest boy’s clothes after he got killed on that motorcycle. It makes me cry just about every time I see Clint wearing something of Randy’s.”
I didn’t say anything, but I hated the thought of Clint in a dead boy’s clothes. I wondered which ones belonged to Louise’s son. Was it that knitted sweater I loved to see in winter, with deers leaping in a line across the front of it? Or them corduroy pants with a tiny hole in the knee that gave me little peeks of Clint’s curly leg hair? It bothered me something awful to think about. All of them fabrics, wools and flannels and cottons, that I touched and pressed and ran my hands over when I kissed Clint, wasn’t even his. They belonged to a dead boy. Then I thought of the worst thing of all. Clint said that silver rope chain I loved came from Louise. He wore it all the time, even in the water. I loved to see it shining on his collarbone. Now that chain would make me sick every time I looked at it, like a noose around Clint’s neck. I wanted to throw it away and burn all them clothes. Maybe he was even wearing some of them right then. That white dress shirt that was yellowed at the armpits, them jeans that was faded at the knees, that old belt threaded like a poison snake through the belt loops might have belonged to Louise’s dead son. I didn’t want to ask. I couldn’t stand to know. Clint was the only one that ever loved me right. Then I seen him laughing under the porch light with moths in his hair. His eyes shined whenever he smiled. I couldn’t believe I was his wife. Finally, I had a family again.
JOHNNY
I hitchhiked from the detention center to Millertown with everything I owned in a duffel bag, the books from the woods, my notebook, the silver lighter, and an address written on a scrap of paper. On the highway I watched the shopping centers and motels and rest stops go past, taking in how the scenery had changed while I was gone. When the man who had picked me up let me out of his truck, I paused in the street to look at the Odom house. It was tall and weathered and seemed to be leaning. A spring wind picked up and flapped the shingles, a few scattered over the rotten roof. I went up the porch steps and stopped at the door listening for movement. I heard the slow creak of floorboards somewhere inside. I had decided on the way to the house that if nobody was home I would break in, but it sounded as though someone was there. I reached toward the doorbell and then changed my mind. I went to a moldering couch under the window and sat down to rest instead, dropping the duffel bag at my feet. I had waited a long time. I could take another minute to catch my breath. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes.
When I opened them there was a station wagon pulling up to the curb, its engine dying with a rattle. A heavy woman struggled out from behind the wheel with a grocery bag in her arms. She came up the walk breathing hard, frowning up at me. She was wearing what looked like hospital scrubs, the top patterned with teddy bears. I couldn’t see her eyes for the shine off her glasses. I rose from the couch and looked down at her.
“Didn’t you see the sign?” she asked.
“Pardon me?”
“Sign right yonder over the doorbell. Says no solicitors.”
“Oh,” I said, putting on a smile. “I’m not selling anything.”
She smiled back, still sizing me up. “What do you want then?”
“I’m looking for Frankie Odom. Is this the right house?”
“Depends on what you’re after him for.”
I came down the steps to her. “Let me get that for you, ma’am,” I said.
“I can get it,” she said, letting me take the bag. “What do you want with Frankie?”
“We’re kin,” I said, climbing the porch steps ahead of her.
“Kin? I been taking care of Frankie two years now and I never laid eyes on you. You’re awful handsome. I believe I would’ve remembered.” She snorted laughter.
“Are you Frankie’s daughter-in-law?”
“Lord, no. I wouldn’t have none of them turkeys. I just set with Frankie while his boys are gone to work. Name’s Diane.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Diane,” I said, shifting the bag to offer my hand. She looked down at it, flustered, then gave my fingers a quick, moist squeeze.
“What kind of kin are you?”
I smiled again, standing close. “I’m Frankie’s grandson.”
“Huh. I thought I done met all of Frankie’s grandkids.”
I only paused for a second. “Did you ever hear of Frankie’s son named John?”
Diane stepped back and studied me. “I’ve heard tell of him. From what I know, none of the Odoms has seen hide nor hair of him for going on twenty years now.”
“Yes,” I said. “That’s him.” I willed the smile to stay on my face.