Just Down the Road (6 page)

He took a long drink of his beer, glad he didn’t have to offer to lead her around the floor. “You play tennis?”

“No. I wasn’t any good at that either.”

He stared at his drink, hoping that if he didn’t look at her she wouldn’t seem so nervous.

“Do you dance?” she surprised him by asking.

“I used to love dancing. I was pretty good too.” He stopped before she thought he was bragging. She probably wouldn’t be impressed that years ago he’d won a contest right here in Buffalo’s.

“Why’d you stop?” she asked after a few moments.

He was glad she wasn’t looking at him when he answered, “My partner died.” He said no more. He never wanted to spread even an ounce of his sorrow on anyone else.

“Oh,” was all she said.

They watched couples moving around the floor. It was far too early for the place to be crowded. He knew he should say something, but he couldn’t think of anything to talk about. What he had said probably depressed her. It had him.

For the tenth time he looked over at the bar and wished his wings were out. All he wanted to do was eat and go home. It occurred to him that the doctor probably wanted
the same thing. “Look, Dr. Spencer, I don’t want to cause you any trouble, and I’m not some kind of burglar who breaks into people’s homes to cook breakfast. I live alone and like it that way. I’m guessing you do too, so why don’t we just try to stay out of each other’s way. I had nothing to do with this setup tonight.”

“I know.” She finally looked at him. “Georgia’s been trying to set me up since I arrived. I guess you were just the next man she caught to put on my line. She seems to find it hard to believe that I don’t want, or need, a man in my life.”

He tried to smile, but he was too out of practice to make it seem real. “I know how you feel. She left me alone for a year after my wife died, but since then I’ve been avoiding her like the plague. This is the first time she caught me off guard.”

“You’re lucky. I’ve been tricked into an almost-date three times. Always a meal. Always a surprise extra single male shows up. The only way she got me to say yes to dinners out was if she swore she’d never try to set me up with anyone.”

Tinch almost felt sorry for the doc. “How about we pretend this wasn’t a setup? In truth, for once, I don’t think it was. So you don’t owe me any polite rejection and I’ll let you buy your own dinner. You’re not in my league anyway.”

For a second, he thought she looked offended. He rushed on. “Beautiful, smart women cross the street to avoid me, Doc.”

She smiled for a moment, then looked away, watching the dancers again. “Stop calling me Doc. My name is Addison.”

“You ever shorten it to Addy?”

“No. What’s Tinch short for?”

“Nothing,” he said.

“You’re not bad looking, Tinch. I doubt women cross the street to avoid you.”

“You would, Addison”—he tried out her name—“if you got the chance.”

“Probably,” she agreed, and they both laughed.

The return of Georgia and Greg and the arrival of the food put an end to their conversation. Tinch figured he’d just had the longest conversation with anyone in months without someone throwing a punch.

While he ate, he listened to Greg’s stories about the kids he taught. A few more couples pulled up tables and joined them, and Tinch thought about leaving, but he decided to stick around as long as the doc did. He could tell she was getting antsy to leave, so for once he decided not to be the first to disappear.

After they ate, everyone but he and Addison stood up to dance.

“Would you like to try it?” he asked politely.

“The answer is still no,” she said.

Tinch stood. “Then I’ll say good night. It’s time I—”

“Tinch!” a woman screamed from ten feet away. “Well if it isn’t Tinch Turner.”

He faced Addison as he fought down a groan. Howard Smithers’s wife, Donna Lee, who’d caused the fight the last time he’d been in Buffalo’s, was heading toward him in full sail. For a blink, his eyes met Addison’s and he wondered if he looked as desperate as he felt. All made up and perfumed, Donna Lee was a force of nature. Like tornadoes and fire ants, she left a trail of destruction.

“You’re not getting away from me tonight, Tinch. You owe me a dance, and don’t go acting like you can’t. I remember a time when you made every girl’s heart in this place beat faster just watching you two-step.” The woman was just drunk enough to be dangerous. She rubbed up against him like she was a paint roller and he was the wall.

“I’m sorry, Donna Lee.” Tinch held up his hands. “I can’t …”

“I’m not taking no for an answer. You gotta dance with me, tonight. Howard won’t be here for another half hour, and you can’t expect me to just sit around and wait for him, not when a fine hunk of beef like you is in the room.”

Tinch shook his head and fought past swear words to think of something to say.

Addison slowly stood by his side. “I’m sorry,” she said to the drunk woman a head shorter than her. “Tinch just promised he’d teach me to dance, and I’m afraid if I don’t do it now, I’ll never have the nerve again.”

Tinch breathed. “Maybe another time, Donna Lee.”
Like the day after the rapture
, he thought. “The doc’s right. I may never get her in here again to learn.”

Donna Lee looked disappointed as Tinch followed Addison toward the dance floor.

“Thanks,” he said when they were out of hearing distance. “You didn’t have to do that, but I appreciate it.”

Addison faced him. “It took me a few seconds to figure out that was the woman who started the fight that filled my emergency room last week.” She laughed. “You looked so trapped, I had to do something.”

He bowed slightly. “I owe you a dance lesson.”

She glanced at the other couples molded together. “Can you do it without being plastered against me?”

He raised one eyebrow as if she’d just told him a secret about herself. “Of course, Doc. How about I put my hands here?” He lightly placed his hands at her waist. “And I promise not to get any closer.”

She didn’t look comfortable, but she nodded.

He looked down at her shoes. “You got socks on?”

“Yes.”

“Then kick off those strange shoes. I don’t know anyone who dances in rubber clogs.”

She slipped out of her clogs and moved them to the edge of the dance floor. “What if someone steals them while you’re teaching me to dance?”

He laughed. “You’d never be that lucky, Doc.”

His hand nudged her to an open place on the wooden floor. In the same low voice he used when working with his horses, Tinch told her how to move, when to step, when to slide. After a few songs, she moved with the music easily and stopped watching her feet.

“You’ve danced before. Maybe not country, but you’ve danced.” It was a statement, not a question.

She didn’t answer. All her concentration was on her efforts to follow him.

“Rest your wrists on my shoulders,” he said. “And relax, pretty lady. Nothing about this is going to be painful. Just move with the music.” He could never remember dancing with a woman almost his height, but he found her slim body moved easily with his as if they were swaying to music blowing in the wind.

She touched his shoulders, but she didn’t completely relax. He fought the urge to pull her closer so she could follow him more smoothly, but he had a feeling she’d bolt just like a wild mustang.

The fourth dance turned fast and all the other couples began to circle the floor with a stomping promenade.

“Want to try this one?” he asked.

“No.” She dropped her hands off his shoulders and he released her waist. “I really need to be going. Will you …”

Before she could ask him to excuse her, he said, “I’m leaving too. Dancing with you was safe, but if Donna Lee catches me, I could end up fighting Howard, and I don’t want to do that.” He reached down and picked up her shoes. “Thanks for the dance, Addison. I may be wrong, but I don’t think it was as painful as either of us thought it might be.”

She nodded. “It wasn’t so bad.”

They crossed to the table, grabbed their coats, and walked out, waving at Georgia.

“Smile,” he whispered, “and she’ll think she was successful at hooking us up for once.”

“Good idea. Maybe she’ll stop trying and give up on me, at least.”

Tinch looped his arm around her shoulder and added, “I love a good conspiracy. When it dawns on her what she’s done, she’ll be going full out to break us up so we won’t blame her for getting us together.” He felt Addison stiffen, but she didn’t pull away until they were out the door, then she whirled and faced him.

“Don’t touch me,” she said. “I thought I made that clear. I’m not a woman who likes being handled.”

Tinch studied her a moment. Her voice had been angry, demanding.

“You got it, lady.” He felt burned. “You want me to walk you to your car?”

“No,” she answered as she pulled up her hood and darted down the steps of the bar.

He watched her run through the rain. He’d just danced with a woman for the first time in more than three years, and it hadn’t hurt like he thought it might. He hadn’t enjoyed holding her, and somehow that made dancing with Addison okay. The entire time he felt a strange kind of satisfaction he often experienced working with a horse. He felt like he was doing some good.

S
ATURDAY

S
EPTEMBER
17

H
ARMONY
C
OUNTY
H
OSPITAL

D
EEP IN THE NIGHT,
R
EAGAN
T
RUMAN SHIFTED ON THE
chair that served as her bed in her uncle’s hospital room. She’d been drifting between sleep and worry. Dr. Spencer came in just before sunset and talked to Jeremiah as if he still heard anyone, but she shook her head slightly at Reagan. Her uncle was no longer responding.

Logic told Reagan the time was near. No one lived forever, but she wasn’t sure she could handle being alone again. As she wiggled in her chair, she heard her uncle Jeremiah whisper, “Sun’s coming up, girl. We better get to the eastern chairs or we’ll miss it.”

Reagan moved to her uncle’s side, but he looked the same as he had for days. His breathing was so shallow she couldn’t be sure it was there. She took his hand. “I wish the
sun were coming up and we were home.” He loved watching the sun rise and set. She’d watched it with him most nights, even when it was cold or stormy.

She stared at him awhile, thinking of the hundred times he’d told her what to do to take care of the apple trees and how when she didn’t know something he’d always tell her to figure it out and do it. He’d taught her how to live an honest life when no one else had taken the time, and almost from the beginning he’d talked to her about what to do once he was gone.

She curled back into her blanket, smiling at all the times he’d fixed visitors’ cars or trucks just because he didn’t want his make-believe niece riding in something that wasn’t running right. She’d even noticed him rattling off in his old truck when he’d heard someone needed work done around their place and couldn’t afford to hire it out. When he’d return he’d never tell her much about what he’d done. It wasn’t his way.

Just as she slipped back to sleep, she heard him whisper, “Sun’s coming up. I don’t want to miss it.”

Reagan opened one eye and focused on the clock. Two fifteen. The sun wouldn’t be up for hours.

It never crossed her mind that sometimes a sun rises on one world as it sets on another.

T
YLER
W
RIGHT’S FAMILY HAD BEEN IN THE FUNERAL BUSINESS
for four generations and, though he cared very deeply about people, he rarely cried. All his life, dying had simply been the last step of living. Whether a person marched in head on into the next life or fought for every last breath didn’t matter; the end was the same.

Only when he’d been called to the hospital in the middle of the night, Tyler got up and dressed in his best to go pick up Jeremiah Truman. He couldn’t say he liked the man. In truth, he didn’t even know him that well, though he’d known of him all his life. Truman hadn’t been a man who looked for friends. He attended no town meetings, church, or social gatherings. He liked his life simple.