The Other Brooks Boy (Texas Wildfire Series) (20 page)

"Thank you,
Maddie for coming to my defense with Ryan."

Maddie rolled
her eyes. "I'm so sick of him. He's been a brat forever and needs to quit
treating you the way he does. It's ridiculous the way you baby him, Mom. And
it's even worse how he works you. It makes me angry."

Cara thought
about Greg telling her much the same thing. Sometimes the truth is hard to see
about relationships right under your nose ... the forest for the trees thing,
she guessed. She smiled softly at Maddie. "How'd you get so wise, my
darling?"

Maddie squeezed
her hand and smiled back. "Good raisin', I guess."

The interview
went about as Greg had expected it might. These schools knew all they needed to
know about you long before they sought to interview you. It was more, then,
about personality than anything else. Either they felt him a good match for
their program, or they didn't. He wasn't sweating it much either way. And he
sure hadn't put much energy into making a decision about whether he'd accept
any position offered, wouldn't until it was necessary to do so. If they offered
him the position, he'd think about it then. Until then, he was trying to get
through each day without killing someone, or getting fired from the job he had
now, or calling Cara and begging her to take him back on whatever terms she
wanted.

God, his life
sucked
.

He had survived
the last month, getting by on anger and principle, but all that evaporated into
the ozone layer the minute he heard her voice on the phone Thanksgiving Day.
He'd managed until then, but talking to her, pretending it wasn't killing him,
and spending Thanksgiving Day holed up in a hotel alone had shot him down a
vortex of self-pity and depression, and he hadn't managed to find a foothold up
yet.

He'd
tried.  He'd reconnected with Rand, who was always a good ear, just
searching for a way out of the black hole. And he'd been great medicine,
recognizing the mess Greg was in and arranging to meet him in Waco. They spent
a fall Saturday golfing together, and Rand had shared some astonishing news
with Greg about his long lost daughter, given up for adoption nearly twenty
years ago who had recently found Rand.  It made Greg feel better.  At
least he knew someone who had some happy news, some good stuff going on, but it
wasn't the panacea he was still looking for.

Maybe it would
be best for all concerned for him to take the job in California. It would be a
fresh start. It just might be the thing.

It wasn't home.
That was for sure.

And he'd be out
there without a friend or ally to his name. Funny, he'd not ever been in that
sort of situation. He'd been born and raised right here in Austin and surrounded
by family, life-long friends, and familiar enemies. If you were gonna make
them, they'd damn sure better be known to you.

Maybe, just
maybe it would be a good thing to start fresh in California.

***

Ryan was
ruminating on things, Cara could see. Frequently, he had a quiet,
wool-gathering quality about him that wasn't normal. What he was making of any
of it, she couldn't have said. But the very fact that her fifteen-year-old son
thought of anything outside of girls and sports was bound to be an improvement
over the usual.

His sixteenth
birthday arrived on the tenth of December, and Cara took him to get his
driver's license. It was just something she was going to have to learn to live
with, his driving. He passed the written exam with flying colors and made only
one deductable error on the driving exam, so she felt a little better about it.

He had searched
the Internet and found a used, small SUV he was asking her to buy for him, but
she knew next to nothing about cars and felt so out of her element with the
purchase. It had fairly low mileage and seemed to be in good running condition,
but she might have been buying a pig in a poke for all she knew. Still, he was
thrilled with it and washed it that very day in the driveway despite chilly
winds and overcast skies that threatened rain later in the day. It did her good
to see him happy for a change.

Happy, in fact,
would have been a lovely change in her, but she didn't seem to be able to hold
on to any for more than a few minutes of distracted time. It always came back
to her that she was in no position to be happy without Greg.

She'd heard
nothing about the job in California, and Barbara had no news to share about it
either. Cara considered asking Maddie to call him with something benign, some
uncle advice type thing and ask him about it while she had a captive audience,
but she couldn't quite bring herself to drag Maddie down into the pathetic
abyss with her. She only hoped that no news was good news.

Christmas was approaching.
Cara bought a few gifts: new rims for Ryan's new vehicle and a new laptop for
Maddie. The rest of her shopping she did online and with very little excitement
for the season. They did manage to get their Christmas tree out of the attic,
assembled, and decorated with about two weeks to spare.

"I love
it," Maddie declared, her eyes full of the promise of the season,
twinkling reflections of the lights on the tree. "Don't you?" She
turned that dazzling look on Cara, and Cara felt a vestigial tremor of the
excitement she used to feel about her kids and Christmas.

"I do love
it, Maddie," she said. The tree was past its prime, having been stored one
too many summers in the hot attic, but with a little fluffing, it spread its
branches as always there in the corner of the den near the fireplace and wore
well the twinkling lights, homemade ornaments from Christmases past, and a few
newer ones Cara had bought at a day-after-Christmas sale a few years back.

Ryan was
half-in, half-out of the decorating game, enthralled in a basketball game on
television instead, but they finally coerced him into placing the angel on the
treetop, a job Jason had always performed with the help of one of the kids on
his shoulders. Ryan needed nothing more than a step stool to reach it easily,
and perched the familiar white angel with the golden halo up there proudly,
then stepped back to take in the big picture. "Looks like Christmas around
here finally," he said, and smiled broadly. It made Cara smile, too.

She was cleaning
up a few dishes in the kitchen a while later when Ryan walked through and
stopped, turned her around by the shoulders to face him, and enveloped her in a
bear hug the likes of which she hadn't had from him in months. She placed the
backs of her forearms around his back, careful to keep her wet hands from
dampening his shirt, and hugged him back, laughing at the sheer unexpectedness
of it. He kissed her cheek.

"I love
you, Mom," he said, then turned and headed back toward the den.

"I love
you, too, Ry," she said, still bewildered as to why he felt inclined to
hug her and tell her that, but she enjoyed it utterly. He stopped at the
doorway and smiled back at her, an unusually poignant and tender offering, then
winked and left her there with her heart in her throat. Her kids were growing
up so fast.

***

Barbara called
the week before Christmas to make plans for the holiday. Cara had decided that
she'd have the meal at her house, as Barbara had hosted Thanksgiving. They had
always traded off in that fashion.

There was an
unusual pause at the other end of the line following her announcement though.

"Or, not.
Would you rather host it?" Cara asked.

"No. It
makes sense, of course, for us to celebrate Christmas at your house. The kids
will want to play with their gifts and all. It's not fair to make them leave
all that to come over here," Barbara said.

Cara didn't
remind her that her kids were well past that stage. "Well, what's wrong
then? I can tell you have some hesitation."

"It's
Greg."

"Oh."
Strange that Cara hadn't thought about him coming. The estrangement had become
her norm. Her unhappy norm, but her norm, nonetheless.

"He won't
come, Cara," Barbara said sadly.

It made her
heart hurt. "You've talked about it?"

"No, not
precisely. But he was relieved, I think, when his interview took him away at
Thanksgiving so he didn't have to make that decision," Barbara told her.

"Yeah, and
what's happening on that front?"

"You know
as much as I do, dear. He's told me nothing about the job, or whether he'll
take it."

"I see,"
Cara said. She didn't know what to do, fully aware that the situation put
Barbara in a bad place. "Barbara, I know this is hard for you. If you feel
you should cook there and not come be with us, we'll try to understand. We did,
after all, get to have Thanksgiving with you, and he didn't."

"Would you
prefer that?" Barbara asked. Cara could plainly hear a measure of hurt in
her voice.

"Absolutely
not. What I want is for us
all
to be together. You have no idea,"
Cara said, but stopped herself from saying more, not sure her voice wouldn't
break like her heart was.

There came
another long pause, then Barbara sighed. "I'll talk to him and get back to
you. In the meantime, you plan to do it there. Your kids deserve to have a
normal Christmas, just like always."

Cara might have
laughed at that, had it not been so preposterous. There was nothing around here
that was
like always
. Nothing.

***

Greg walked
across the crowded parking lot of the mall toward his truck, Christmas gifts in
hand. Shopping was not his forte, but he'd knocked it out in one day, thankful
to have it behind him. Arms full, he struggled to fish his keys out of his
pocket and became aware of a car trolling along behind him, probably waiting
for his parking spot. He quickly stashed his purchases in the cab of his pickup
and waved at the waiting vehicle to indicate he was hurrying. Everybody was so
damned impatient this time of year.

"Hey,
Greg," someone called, stopping him from climbing into the truck. He
turned to find Ryan behind the wheel of an unfamiliar SUV pulled up close
behind Greg's truck.

"Hey,
Ryan," Greg said, uncertain about the mood. Ryan's expression didn't give
much away, but he might have driven right on by with Greg none the wiser. Greg
took it as a good sign that he hadn't.

"Saw you
walking across the parking lot and thought I'd stop and say hello," Ryan
said, hanging one elbow out the lowered window.

"Glad you
did. Guess you got your license, huh?"

"Yeah.
Passed with flying colors," Ryan told him proudly. It almost felt like old
times when they'd been close, when something as legion as getting a driver's
license wouldn't have passed without some celebrating between them.

"No
doubt." Greg looked over the vehicle. "And this is your new
ride?"

Ryan beamed like
a pair of
brights
coming at you on the highway.
"Sure is.
What'da
you think?"

"Sweet,"
Greg said, smiling. He remembered his first car, wished, from time to time that
he still owned it. He walked over to the SUV and leaned a hand on the door
frame. "So how are you? How's school?"

Ryan shrugged
noncommittally. "Okay, I guess. Ready to be out for winter break."

"That means
finals this week, right?"

"Yeah.
Sucks."

Greg laughed a
little. "I'm sure."

"Heard you
were thinking about moving to California." Ryan's expression was a mixture
of inquiry and dread.

"Still
pondering," Greg told him.

Ryan nodded a
little, then looked off through the windshield, and they were quiet for a time.
"You have time to catch a burger or something?" Ryan finally asked.

The olive branch
in all its glory. Greg grabbed it with both hands. "You bet," he
said, then grinned. "You driving?"

Ryan grinned,
too. "Sure. Hop in."

They went to a
little burger dive around the corner from the mall, which was, thankfully, not
too crowded, and chose a booth in the back where they could talk.

Greg couldn't
help but grin at Ryan across the table, so glad to be back in touch with him.
He seemed so different, certainly more so than two month's worth of absence
might have brought. There was a centered calm about him that was new. Greg
liked it.

"So, how
have you been?"

"Okay. Been
doing a lot of thinking lately," Ryan told him.

"Don't hurt
yourself, man."

Ryan grinned a
little lopsidedly. "Yeah, some of it was kinda painful."

"That
right?" Greg asked, losing his smile.

"Yeah.
There's been some heavy shit goin' down at home." Ryan messed with a
napkin wrapped utensil pack on the table top, his gaze on that instead of Greg.

"Everybody
okay?"

Ryan looked
bemused. "Depends on what you mean by
okay
."

"You know
what I mean," Greg said.

Ryan finally met
his gaze. "Then, no. Everybody's not okay."

Greg waited
patiently for Ryan to say what he needed to say, but his gut was
churning,  and a hundred thoughts went tumbling through his mind. Was Cara
sick? Was she seeing someone new? Someone else Ryan didn't like?

"Who's not
okay, Ry?" Greg asked when the wait became too much to bear.

"Hell, I
don't think any of us are, really. We're just doin' our thing every day, but
nobody's happy with any of it." He leaned back against the booth cushion
and sighed. "I've been feeling really lousy about a lot of stuff."