Jodi Thomas - Twisted Creek

I started to ask why he was still here-weekenders were long gone by now-but he didn’t look like he wanted to talk. So I just smiled and nodded at him. He returned the greeting, minus the smile.

Nana and I served the soup and corn bread. The storm seemed to grow worse, but no one said anything. Mary Lynn whispered to her dog, calling him Posey. Willie complimented Nana several times. Timothy read as he ate his meal without looking up from the book. Mrs. Deals picked at her food and Luke leaned over his bowl as if he could make his big frame disappear.

When Posey barked as the fat cat crossed the store, I knew I had to step in. “I’m sorry to bother everyone,” I said, noticing Mary Lynn looked frightened. “Does anyone mind if Miss O’Reilly’s dog joins us this evening?”

I wasn’t at all surprised when everyone spoke at once.

Mrs. Deals said some of her best friends had been dogs.

Willie swore the dog smelled better than he did, and to my surprise everyone else nodded.

Timothy got up and went over to Mary Lynn’s table. He asked if he could pet Posey.

Mary Lynn nodded shyly.

Then everyone settled back in their chairs at their tables for one and finished their meals. I smiled and looked around, catching blue eyes staring at me. To my shock, Luke winked.

While Nana offered everyone dessert, I moved to the shadows and reached for my ledger book. I knew I didn’t have time to draw, so I gripped the book as I studied the guests, each alone like a castaway on an island. Five strangers together in their solitude.

Except for Luke, they took their time eating. Mrs. Deals sliced off small birdlike bites of her pie. Mary Lynn stopped often to cuddle her dog and remind him to be good because he was a guest. The sad young man only ate when he turned a page. Willie watched the storm.

When Luke stood, he left a ten-dollar bill beside his plate and went out on the porch. The others took their time and paid at the cash register. I thanked each one, but didn’t try to make useless conversation.

Paul Madison asked if he could buy a few groceries. I turned on the lights in the grocery area so he could shop.

When Nana brought a small to-go bag for Mary Lynn’s dog I thought the woman might cry. Everything about her told me that she was a proper old maid, living alone, probably gardening and quilting. Everything, except her eyes. They darted as if from fear. She reminded me of a child who’d been struck by so many people she feared a blow from everyone she met.

“Next Sunday?” Mary Lynn asked as she hugged her dog tightly. “You’ll be open again for dinner?”

“I’m planning on it,” I said.

Mrs. Deals, who was putting on her galoshes, snapped, “I’d like the same table.”

“You’ll have it,” I smiled, knowing that was probably as close to a compliment from her as I could hope for.

The melancholy young man lifted one finger, silently making his reservation.

I raised my voice so everyone could hear. “All your tables will be waiting.”

They filed out with only a nod toward one another. Willie turned his flashlight on the path for Mary Lynn so she could make it to her car and Timothy stopped to talk to Luke.

I saw him pass something to Luke, but I couldn’t tell what it was.

I helped Nana with the dishes, then curled up beside the window and sketched the dinner party. The sounds of the lake blended with the soft rain, making this place seem a million miles from anywhere.

Timothy’s outline covered one page. Luke, eating alone at the counter, covered another. Mrs. Deals, with her very proper stance, another. Mary Lynn, hugging her dog as if he were her only friend, another. And the last sketch I drew before I closed the ledger was Nana leaning back in the porch chair snapping peas. The strength of her hands showed through in the lines; peace brushed her face.

About midnight, I moved to the huge bay window that overlooked the lake. I stared out into a world that seemed washed clean by the rain. The moon was high, but I could see a tiny twinkle of light from across the lake. Mary Lynn’s place, I thought. And the circle of security lights up on the rise-that must be Mrs. Deals’s big house.

I’d met them, I thought, these odd people the sheriff had called “the Nesters,” and I knew, strange as they all were, that they were somehow my people. My destiny.

Monday

September 23, 2006

Midnight hours

Luke silently paced along the porch in front of Jefferson’s old store. He felt restless. It was too rainy to either swim or build a fire. He loved both. Swimming had been his exercise of choice since he’d been in college and he liked watching the fire climb up the night sky. Campfires always reminded him that he was a quarter Indian. He liked the idea that his roots had dug into this land for thousands of years. Sometimes, when he swam in the lake or ran in the woods, he swore a wildness in his blood warmed as if he were home.

Turning over in his hand the patch that Timothy had given him, Luke stared at it once more. The symbol of the code talkers, a special group of men, all with Navajo blood, who had used their language as a code that the Nazis never broke. Luke had heard of the group, he’d even seen a few movies that mentioned them, but he’d never realized how different they must have been. For the first time since his grandfather had died, he wished he’d listened closer to the stories his grandfather and Jefferson had told.

Timothy said he found the old patch among a box of patches he’d collected from World War II. He’d said Luke could have it. That it would mean more to him.

The boy was right. Luke closed his hand around the Marine patch. It meant a great deal.

He was aware someone still moved around in the store and guessed it would be Allie. She usually turned off the twinkle lights when she went up the stairs. He’d watched her a few times, locking the doors, checking the windows as if the tiny locks would protect from everything in life.

He had a feeling she’d make a go of this place, but it could cause problems. As long as this lake was a dying community, the drug dealers would feel safe. If it started to prosper, they’d have to find another place…or run her out. He couldn’t shake the feeling that they were moving in from the outskirts. He’d found more damage besides the fires. After he’d talked to Timothy, Luke had checked out the Andrews dock. More than the wind had destroyed the landing.

If someone wanted the people out here to leave, it wouldn’t be that hard to make life tougher on them. Drug dealers wouldn’t worry about the old men, or even people like Mary Lynn and Mrs. Deals, but cabins like the Andrews one brought successful businessmen out to fish.

Luke decided it might be wise to take a few weeks more of his vacation time and hang around.

Someone touched his shoulder and he twisted away, almost reaching for his Glock before he caught her in the corner of his vision.

“Sorry,” she muttered. “I always seem to be touching you and I know you don’t like it. But it’s kind of like trying not to think of the word elephant when someone says not to.”

She moved a few feet away. “I just came out to say thanks for fixing the old potbellied stove this morning. In another month we may need it to keep the place warm.” She dug in her pocket and pulled out a ten. “You don’t have to pay for the meal. We traded work for food, remember.”

Somewhere she’d gotten the idea that he couldn’t afford food and Luke didn’t know how to tell her otherwise. He’d been wearing his oldest fishing clothes when he’d met her and she seemed convinced he was broke. If he told her he had a job, she’d ask what it was and then his cover would be in danger of being blown.

“I wanted to pay,” he finally said as he stared at her, wishing she’d look up at him and not at the money in her hand.

“Oh, all right,” she answered in a tone that said she was trying not to hurt his feelings.

“And another thing.” He was just tired enough to let his guard down an inch. “I never said I minded you touching me.” He could name every time she had. The accidental brushings of her arm against his. The way she patted him when he was working. The times she’d passed by and let her hand brush his shoulder.

Allie finally looked up at him. “You don’t?”

Luke closed all the extra space between them. “No,” he whispered, almost touching her lips. “I don’t.”

Before he thought, he pressed his mouth to hers and kissed her. She was so close he could feel her whole body shake and react, but he didn’t pull her to him.

For a few heartbeats she let him kiss her, then slowly she kissed him back. Not a soft, chaste kiss or a hot, passionate one, but a solid kiss of longing that whispered hesitance from the past and promises of the future.

Before he lost what control he had left, Luke stepped away. “Good night,” he snapped, and turned into the rain before either of them said or did anything else.

He was halfway back to his cabin before he noticed the rain pounding down on him. “Hell,” he mumbled. With the mood he was in, lightning could probably strike him and he wouldn’t notice.

He laughed. Maybe it already had.

After staring at the rain for a while, I walked back inside, turned out most of the lights, then curled into the bay window. The rattle of the storm behind me seemed to echo my thoughts.

I flipped open the ledger and looked at what I’d drawn.

Tall, lanky Paul Madison, who bought groceries for one, had stood at the door, an arm tightly around his sack, the stare of a lost man on his face.

Shy Mary Lynn and her pet. Though her body had settled into a middle-aged plump, she’d looked, frightened, with huge child eyes into the night.