The Sweet Spot (9 page)

She turned off the overhead light on her way by the door and clicked on the lamp on
the nightstand. Its yellow aura formed a warm oasis in the shadowed room. Her flannel
nightie billowed as she sank onto the bed, the dregs of the day bitter at the back
of her throat. She’d be wide awake until the pill took hold. The past crept out of
the dark room in her mind to attack with slashing claws.

Casting about for something to distract the beast, her glance fell on a paperback
on the nightstand.
Healing Wisdom: Easing a Path through Grief.
A parting gift when she’d been asked to leave the grief group.

She’d put the book down and forgotten all about it.
It’s probably some pompous load of cow pie.
Now she brushed the dust off, turned it over, and read the back cover. It appeared
to be a collection of quotes, meant to soothe mourners. Char opened it and the first
line her eyes focused on:

There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the
year’s course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the
word “happy” would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.

—
Carl Jung

It sounded like her well-meaning friends’ advice—time healed all wounds. What a load
of crippy-crap! As if hearts and flowers sprinkled on blunt-force loss would help.
Before she could stop herself, she read the next entry:

Parting is all we know of heaven and all we need of hell.

—
Emily Dickinson

Char snapped the book closed. Now, there was some wisdom she could get behind. She
dropped the book on the nightstand, turned off the light, and slid into bed. The shiver
that snaked up her body was only partially due to cold sheets. Maybe the pill would
take hold faster tonight.

The cold white light of a flashlight moon spilled in the window as she lay huddled
on her side of the bed, staring at nothing. Would she ever get used to sleeping alone?
She scooted to the middle of the bed and spread-eagled her arms and legs. It felt
wrong, so she rolled back to her side of the bed. She ached for her charmed life,
when her son dreamt little-boy dreams down the hall.

Jimmy would slide in beside her and pull her into his arms. They’d lie like spoons
in a drawer and talk about the day. Well, Jimmy would talk. She would listen to the
deep rumble of his voice, as she slid seamlessly to sleep. Cradled, sheltered, safe.

A tear slipped to the pillow. Only time’s veil separated her from that glittering
dream, and if wanting was enough, she’d be there right now. Instead, she lay here,
her heart as cold as the sheets. God was a cruel jailor, taking both her precious
possessions, one after the other.

The tailwind of regret hit, and Char shifted, restless.

It’s not really fair to blame God for what you had a hand in, Charla Rae.

Was that her mother’s voice in her head?

Jimmy had tried. For months. On a night much darker than this, he’d lain facing the
wall, on the far side of the bed. Not because he wanted it that way but because she
couldn’t stand to have him touch her, have anything touch her.

After all, that’s what the pills were for, weren’t they, Missy?

Go away, Mom
.

Then one night Jimmy’s deep voice had shattered her dark refuge: telling her he’d
reached his limit. He had tried everything, but she’d gone somewhere he couldn’t follow.
He had to let go.

She understood then, saw clearly the fork in the river, but in the churning current,
sinuous shapes slid past, baring teeth. Hungry, guilt-tipped teeth. Petrified to numb
cowardice, she let him leave and floated away on her life raft of Valium.

Face it, Charla Rae, he didn’t leave the marriage first.
You
did.
The voice in her head wasn’t her mother’s. It was hers.

If only I had it to do over again… The cold, damp spot under her cheek had spread,
so she shifted to a fresh spot on the pillow. No. Given the meager resources she had
left at the time, she’d done all she’d been capable of: survive.

The past’s veil was inviolate. All she could do was get up tomorrow and begin with
what she had left. She rolled over, punched the pillow, and willed herself to sleep.

Two hours later, she snatched the phone from the charging cradle in the bathroom,
then stalked back to bed. “You happy now, Mother?” She almost snapped on the bedside
light but flopped onto the tossed sheets instead. This would be easier done in the
dark. She hit speed dial.

“Charla? What’s wrong?” His deep rumbly voice held no sleepy edges.

“Nothing that an exorcism wouldn’t fix, Jimmy.” Realizing she lay facing his pristine
pillow, she rolled to her
other side, to the accusatory glowing numbers on the alarm: 2:30.

“I’m sorry to call you so late. But I had to. I saw that little girl in the store
the other day. The one you had out here the day you came to pick up the bulls? I know
she’s not your girlfriend.”

“Char, I—”

“No, let me get it all out before I lose my nerve, Jimmy.” Rev. Mike said confession
was good for the soul. But stripping naked in church would have been easier than this.
She swallowed. “I’m sorry too, for pushing you away. After B—” She took a shaky breath.
“You know, after. I couldn’t have done anything else. But I want you to know. I know
what I did was wrong.”

“Oh, Charla—”

“I can’t do anymore tonight, Jimmy. I’m sorry for this too.” She hit the “end” button.

A
spot above JB’s right eye beat to the rhythm of the throbbing engine as he hit the
lever to drop the bucket on the skip loader. “This job’s not all glamour, he says.”
Since he’d taken the job as manager of the feedlot a week ago, Junior assigned him
nothing but work like this—clearing a month’s worth of manure from corrals.

“Right up my alley, huh? When I finish, I’m putting this job right up
his
alley.” JB adjusted the bandanna tied around his face that did little to block the
stench. The sun seared his shoulders and the humid air clung like a damp wool blanket.
This job sucked now. By summer it would be excruciating. They’d find him passed out,
facedown in a foot of cow brownies. At the end of the row, JB raised the bucket and
drove to the railcar-size Dumpster to drop his load. Pulling upwind of the mess, he
shut down the Bobcat and yanked off his hat. A stray breeze tickled his
sweaty scalp, and he raised an arm to wipe his face on the sleeve at the crook of
his elbow.

It wasn’t just this job eating him. Benje came to him in dreams most nights now. Waking
to the breath-stealing guilt seemed a fair trade to see his son’s face. He yearned
for the ranch and working with his bulls. He wanted the soul-feeding routine of
home
.

Home? Hell, he didn’t even have a place to lay his head.

This month’s expenses had devoured the rent money. Come Monday, he had to either be
out of the apartment or face eviction.

His knees cracked like pistol shots as he jumped from the tractor. Once he told Junior
where to put this job, he’d run down to the 7-Eleven off the interstate to see if
they needed help. Crappy pay, but spending the summer in air conditioning looked pretty
good about now. He swiped his sweaty neck with his bandanna and started the long walk
to the office.

A wall of air conditioning hit him like a slap as he opened the door. He stood savoring
it as he wiped his feet. Gilda, Junior’s big-haired Jabba the Hut receptionist eyed
him over her glasses to make sure he made a good job of it. She had the temperament
of a harpy and struck fear into the heart of more than one hombre. Junior hired her
decades ago to keep order and collect his receivables. Needless to say, no one owed
Junior money.

“Hey, gorgeous. Junior in?” Spying his boss through an office window, JB walked back
and knocked on the door, ignoring Gilda’s exaggerated sniff as he passed. As he stepped
in and closed the door behind him, Junior looked up from his computer screen.

“Beef futures are up at the close of the bell, JB. That’s good for us.”

“I can see how that affects the quality of manure dropped in the south corral.” Ignoring
the chair, he stood across the table from his boss.

Junior’s button eyes sharpened and his lips pursed. “You got something you want to
say to me, JB?”

“Yeah, I do.” He leaned his knuckles on the desk. “If you wanted payback for what
happened between Char and me, you’ve done it. Can we stop playing this little game
now?” The exasperation of the past two weeks rang in his voice. “You hired me to be
your manager, then gave me every scut job on the place.” He ticked off the offenses
on his fingers. “First, you had me castrating and cleaning out feed troughs that hadn’t
been scraped in months. Then you wait for the first hot day, and I’m skip-loading
manure.” He shook his head. “This isn’t a job, it’s hell. I quit.” He strode to the
door.

“Got your attention, did I?”

Hand on the knob, JB spun and glared.

Junior opened his hand, gesturing to the chair. “Sit down, JB. Now that you’re listening,
I’ve got a story to tell you.”

He hesitated, hand on the door. Ten more minutes wouldn’t matter. Curious in spite
of himself, JB strode to the chair and sat.

“You know that Charla Rae’s dad, Ben, and I go back a good ways.” Junior leaned back
in his oversize executive chair and steepled his fingers. “No one knows this but him
and me, so I’ll trust you to keep my confidence.”

At JB’s nod, he continued. “He and I ran with the same crowd but didn’t know each
other well. We were all farm
kids, full of beans and ourselves, wanting something to happen.”

His unfocused gaze strayed to the window. “Ten or so of us were out to the fairgrounds
for the rodeo, and we ended up at the racetrack. You know they race the quarter horses
there every night during the county fair.” He sounded wistful. “We watched for a while,
and couple of us decided to bet our date money for the week.” He smiled, but it looked
sad. “I bet on a gray filly. Still remember the name, Silver Dollar. The guys thought
I was throwing away money but all I could see were the odds. At twenty to one, if
she won, I’d turn a twenty into four hundred twenty.”

JB leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “You won, didn’t you?”

Junior nodded. “I won. Big time.” His smile broadened and his face lit up. “I tell
you, I was legendary. Four hundred bucks in the sixties was a lot of money, especially
in these parts. I strutted the halls at school for a week. The girls noticed me. Hell,
I even took Gilda out.”

Junior laughed at JB’s horrified expression. “Hey, she was a looker back then.”

He sobered. “I’da been better off losing those twenty bucks. See, I found I liked
being the big man. But it’s like trying to balance on a ball: When you step up, the
view is great, and everyone looks up to you. Then you start slipping off, and you
scrabble to get back on top again.

“I took the money I hadn’t blown and went down to Austin on the weekends. They used
to have a dog track there.” He shook his head. “I was hooked. On the excitement, the
money, and most of all on how people looked at me. Like I was somebody, you know?”
He shot a pointed look across the table.

“I couldn’t make the trip to the track every weekend, so I discovered the world of
bookies. I could bet over the phone! Problem was, I was lucky. I was on top of that
ball, and I loved it. I got way too good for this little burg.

“Right up till I woke up one morning into the bookie for two grand. If four hundred
bucks was a lot of money back then, two thousand was unthinkable. Turns out, my buddy
the bookie had connections, and he wasn’t a patient man.”

JB rested his chin in his hand, a bit irritated as he grasped the moral of the story
but captivated just the same.

“Ben Enwright did some snooping around and found out. When he came to me, I thought
it was over, thought he’d tell everyone. That was the only thing I could think of
worse than the bookie’s threats.” Junior reached over and snapped off the computer
monitor. “How stupid was that? A man had threatened to drown me in the Pedernales,
but I thought it would be worse if everyone knew how dumb I was.” He shook his head.

“Ben didn’t, though. He said he’d help me. Told me that if I’d give him my solemn
oath to never gamble again, he and I could work all summer and fall, and we’d have
the money to pay off the debt.

“I was stunned. Why would he do that? I asked him, but he just smiled and told me
that, underneath all the bullshit, I was a good person. Besides, he said, it was an
investment; I’d have to agree to pay him back.” Junior smiled, looking out the window.
“With interest.”

JB resented lectures. He resented preaching. More than anything, he resented condescension.
“I’m a little old for bedtime stories, don’t you think?”

Junior raised a sausage-fingered hand. “Hey, you’re the one who asked me why you got
all the crap jobs. I want
you to understand why I’m protective of the best man I’ve ever had the privilege to
know.” His eyes were small but piercing. “And that includes his family.”

JB pushed the chair back and strode to the door. Junior had been manipulating him
all this time. And here he’d been sweating his butt off, trying to prove something
to the shifty little turd.

“JB?” If it had been a demand, he’d have walked out. The quiet request made him turn
to the fat little man in the big chair. “Ben taught me that everybody deserves a second
chance.”

He jerked the door open.

“You coming back after the weekend?”

JB didn’t turn. “You’ll know if you see me coming.” He walked out.

JB had hoped to work a deal with the landlord, to pay this month’s rent in installments.
That would be tough to do now that he was out of a job. Again. He leaned back and
put his stocking feet on the coffee table, put the laptop on his thighs, and fired
it up.