Vin wasn’t sorry to be leaving work. This day had not done him any good, physically or otherwise. His back hurt, his head hurt, other things hurt that he was not about to put a name to. Just let him get to bed and take as much medication as it was safe to do and be unconscious as long as it took to wake up again not feeling this bad.Maybe he could be unconscious straight through dinner and not have to worry about eating or trying to get out of it.
The weather was mild as they walked out of the building and toward the parking lot, and a warm wind found its way around the trees. Pleasant weather lately surprised Vin. The way he was feeling inside, nothing less than thunder, lightning, and earthquakes could come close to approximating that turmoil.
Chris was just pulling his keys of out of his pocket, and Vin was just stepping off the curb into the parking lot when a woman walked by and stopped right in front of Vin.
“Hey! How’re you doing?”
She looked familiar, Vin knew he should know her, but his mind was barely turning fast enough to stay upright, much less remember faces.
“Well – I don’t know.” Was this a joke? Who was she?
“I’m sorry – you probably don’t recognize me without my lab coat on.” She smiled and waved a hand at her tan pants and sleeveless denim shirt. “I’m Amanda, the x-ray tech.”
“Oh yeah – no – I didn’t recognize you. How am I?” Why was she talking to him? “I’m fine.” He realized that for some reason, he didn’t want to lie to her entirely. “My back hurts a little.”
He wanted to say something more to her, something a man would say to a pretty woman who was showing even a casual interest in him. He was never as fluent at it as Buck maybe, but not every woman fell for Buck’s lines anyway.
“I appreciate you asking.” Vin told her. That was the absolute truth. He didn’t even notice that Chris had moved to the far side of his truck to give them a little space.
“Well, it’s not every person I’d stop and check on, you know.” And she was still smiling. “You’re just one of the nicer people I’ve had to work with in awhile.”
“The other patients can’t be that bad.” He said, puzzled. Amanda laughed – and put her hand on his arm.
“You forget, I work with Nathan and Rain.” She gave his arm a gentle squeeze. “When you come to the clinic to have those stitches out, come on back and say ‘hi’.” Then she smiled goodbye and walked away, leaving Vin nearly speechless.
“I will.” He felt his heart pounding, and for the first time in a while, it wasn’t from fear. He watched her go, and finally smiled himself.
Then he remembered what he must look like, dressed in clothes he slept in, hair hardly brushed, thin and bruised and in pain. He ran his hand over his face, and felt the two-thirty shadow of the token shave he’d given himself that morning.
“Do I look as bad as I feel?” he asked Chris as he walked to the passenger door of the truck. Chris appeared to give him a thorough look-over.
“No – you’d have to be dead to feel that bad.” He said. He sounded serious, but then he turned to watch the young lady walking away from them toward the Green, as though he read Vin’s thoughts. Vin scowled at him.
“I guess sarcasm must be a side effect of Viagra.”
+ + + + + + +
Vin sat at the desk in the guest room in Chris’ house. He rested his chin on his folded arms and stared at the two medicine bottles that stood a few inches away. Painkillers and muscle relaxants. Before this week, the strongest medicine he ever took was aspirin for an occasional headache, or Aleve if he pulled a muscle. Even those were few and far between. Now he was taking prescription painkillers like they were Lifesavers.
It wasn’t like he was a health nut or anything. He’d been known to drink his fair share of chocolate milk, and there’d been a weekend or two where his entire diet consisted of pizza, potato chips, and root beer.
Planned exercise wasn’t high on his list either, he figured he got enough exercise just doing his job everyday. He liked playing baseball when the guys got together. Him and Nettie had gotten into the habit of walking around the block at dark once or twice a week, and he mowed her lawn every Friday.
The last two thought made Vin turned his head down so that his eyes were pressed against his arms. He’d lost Nettie forever, he just knew it. He was in constant pain, he was becoming a prescription druggie, and he’d lost Nettie. As far as he could remember, he’d never done anything vicious or cruel to anybody else, why did his life get to be blown all to hell?
“I thought I brought you home so that you wouldn’t have to sleep at a desk?” Chris asked behind him. “Doesn’t sitting like that hurt your back?”
“It hurts no matter what I do.” Vin sat back in the chair, and added “Thanks,” when Chris set a glass of ice water on the desk.
“Then shouldn’t you be taking those pills instead of trying to will them into your system?”
It took a few moments for Vin to admit, “I’m afraid of what happened last time.”
Chris nodded that he understood, and sat on the bottom bunk. “You know that doesn’t matter Vin.”
“How would you feel if it happened to you? You’re not the one who’s got to wake up every morning and pretend nothing happened and act like everything is fine when you wish –.” He stopped there because he didn’t want to say it in front of Chris again.
“You wish you were dead.” Chris supplied anyway.
“I can’t help it.” Vin was afraid he’d make Chris angry. “I wish I didn’t wish it. But I also can’t see living like this for the next sixty years.”
“You don’t have to pretend nothing happened, and you don’t have to act like everything is fine.” Chris sounded a little annoyed, but at himself more than at Vin.
“If I gave in to how I really feel, I’d be a screaming wreck every seventeen minutes on average.” Vin said. Then he broached a subject that’d been on his mind since they left work. “How come you think she talked to me?” He didn’t often discuss women with Chris. He’d mention if he had a date if Chris asked what he was doing on a particular weekend. Later on when Chris would ask how a particular lady was, Vin would tell him they weren’t dating anymore. Never much more than that.
Frankly, he didn’t think Chris was all that good with any woman who wasn’t Mary.
“Because she cared you’d been hurt and wanted to know how you were doing?”
“I guess she must not have read my chart.” That seemed the most likely scenario to Vin. If she had read his chart, she would’ve walked to the other side of the campus to avoid him, not come right up to him and asked how he was doing. “She seems to have the same opinion of Nathan and Rain that I do though.”
“You think she wouldn’t talk to you if she knew?”
“No, I don’t think she would. I wouldn’t talk to me if I was somebody else and I knew what happened, even I wasn't the me it happened to.”
“Gee, I guess willing the drugs into your system does work.” Chris said after a moment.
“There’s that Viagra sarcasm again.” Vin picked up the bottle of painkillers and shook it. He was getting dangerously low. “Figures it’d be my luck that a pretty girl with a sense of humor would show some interest in me right when I’m starting my sexual identity crisis.” But then Chris looked kind of uncomfortable after he said that, so he tried to change the subject.
“I guess I’ll have to brave Rain and get this refilled tomorrow.” Indicating the bottle in his hand.
“Vin – if a woman is raped, it doesn’t make her more feminine, does it?” Chris asked. He was solemn and serious.
“Uhh, no.” Vin set the bottle down next to the other one. Then he minutely rearranged them and attempted to memorize the grain pattern of the top of the desk. Anything to keep from looking at Chris. “I just think it isn’t as bad for a woman as it is for me. I know that’s as stupid and prejudiced as Ezra and JD thinking I wanted this to happen. And God help me, I don’t wish this happened to Maria. I just wish it hadn’t happened to me.”
SEVENTY-THREE
Vin wished he was dead.That just didn’t come together for Chris, as he watched Vin trying to decide which if either he should take of painkillers or muscle relaxants. How could a man just calmly sitting there, taking a drink of ice water, be thinking about killing himself?
If Chris asked him a question, Vin would answer it. If he told him about a problem at work, he would help Chris sort it out. If he told Vin that Mary had tickets to the Irish Tenors and did Vin want to go – well, he’d probably stare at Chris a long time like he only just realized Chris had two heads.
But it would still be Vin being Vin.
How could he just be sitting there wishing he was dead?
Why didn’t he just not wish he was dead?
It seemed Vin couldn’t make up his mind which drug to take. He’d pick one bottle up, study the label, and then set it down again to repeat the action with the other bottle. He was in pain, there was no doubt. Chris could figure it was really bad though when the potential emotional pain was worse than the immediate physical pain.
“You gonna take one of those?” Chris knew Vin was afraid of what might happen again. Afraid of one more humiliation tacked onto the dozens he’d suffered so far.
“Maybe if I just took a hot bath it would feel better and I wouldn’t have to take any drugs?” Vin sounded like he was asking permission.
“Imagine how good doing both might feel.”
“I might fall asleep in the tub.” Vin said, and Chris couldn’t tell if it was a threat or a fear. He didn’t know what to say. He knew Vin wasn’t whining, these weren’t the idle complaints of a man with shallow hurts and nothing better to do. Still – Chris was used to fixing things: the car, the washing machine, problems at work. He was used to confronting a problem, assessing it, and solving it.
This problem had no easy solution. If it had any solution at all.
Well dammit, everything had a solution. It was just a matter of figuring out what the problem was.
“You’re in pain?”
“Yeah.” Vin answered on a long breath of resignation. He held the bottle of painkillers in his hand.
“Is it a muscle spasm?”
“No, not anymore. Doesn’t feel like anyway.”
“So, you don’t really need a muscle relaxant right now.”
“I s’pose not.”
“You sound like maybe you’d rather take one.” Chris said.
“Nahh.” Vin set the bottle down on the desk. “I was just thinking how nice it would be to be unconscious again.”
“Vin.” Chris said it distinctly and deliberately, wanting Vin’s full attention. When he had it, he continued. “You wish you were dead. Are you planning on doing anything to make that happen?”
“No.” Vin sounded surprised – and honest. “I don’t like wishing I was dead. I wish I didn’t wish it. I can’t help wishing it. But I wouldn’t do anything to make it happen. I wouldn’t it. But do you know what this feels like? I feel like I’ve spent the whole last week either up here in this room or out on your back deck. I feel like every minute something is sneaking up behind me ready to grab me. I dread having to use the bathroom. I feel dirty, no matter how many showers and take, no matter if I scrub my skin raw. I feel – I feel like every step I take, every move, every decision asks something of you, or takes something away from you. Like my every word is a complaint, my every reaction is fear, and my every movement is to hide behind you. I’m afraid that it’ll be too much.”
So they were back to that. Maybe they had never left ‘that’ – Vin’s persistent fear that he would drive Chris away.
“Do you know what it feels like for me?” Chris asked, and then Vin did give him the two-headed stare.
“Excuse me for asking, but am I supposed to care what this feels like for you?” He asked back, and Chris smiled at Vin’s flat expression and even flatter tone of voice.
“No, you don’t have to care. But I do want you to understand.” He became serious. Finally, for the moment anyway, this was a problem he could and would attack head on. “This isn’t like when Buck complains that Inez won’t give him the time of day. Or when Rain kept harping on that other doctor who got the Fellowship over her. Or when JD finished whatever crossword puzzle that was in record time, and I wished they would just shut up. I don’t want you to shut up. I want to be able to help you, and it bothers me when I can’t figure out what that is. But don’t ever ever feel that you’re too much. If I can listen to JD crow, and Buck whine, and Rain grouse over nothing - I’ll sure never walk away from you.”
Vin stared at him, in doubt, fear, or relief – Chris didn’t really care which one it was as long as the message was getting through.
“Are we clear on that?”
His answer was a very brief, rather shaky nod, and Vin turned his head down to stare at his hands in his lap. Chris wondered if he had cowed him into silence. After a moment, a soft but plainly grieved voice said, “You don’t have to yell at me.”
“I’m not yelling.” Chris said. OK, maybe he was a little, but he wanted Vin to understand.
“All you had to do was tell me.” Vin went on, a little too grieved, and Chris got the idea he wasn’t entirely serious.
“I’m not yelling.”
“I’m hurt you know, I’m not stupid. Maybe you shouldn’t double up on that Viagra. Just makes you cranky. Not like it’s my fault Mary won’t be home for another couple hours…”
At first Chris was thrilled that Vin was joshing him and he was just about to give him a good shake – but that would hurt his back. Then he thought he might whack him on the head – but that would hurt his stitches. He’d tell Vin he should take a painkiller, but Vin wanted to take enough drugs to be unconscious. Finally, Chris though he could suggest that Vin come downstairs and have something to eat, but Vin didn’t want to eat anything because he didn’t want to have to use the bathroom.
Vin wished he was dead.
Chris didn’t feel so thrilled anymore.
So he just let his frustration out on a long breath and gave a stern look to the lighthearted one he was getting from Vin, remembering how Vin accused Ezra of talking a crooked line.
“You’re welcome.” Chris said, answering what he knew Vin had really been saying.
+ + + + + + +
Mary called to say she’d be late, so for a little while it was Chris and Billy alone in the kitchen getting dinner started. Vin had taken a hot bath and two painkillers and was asleep in the top bunk up in his room. Billy sat on the kitchen table next to the bowl where Chris mixed up the ingredients for his “special” hamburgers. Cowboy waited very expectantly at Chris’ feet for anything that might fall.
“Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“Is Vin okay?”
“Uh, well, yeah. Sure he is.” With his hands thick with raw eggs and hamburger, Chris used his forearm to brush the hair back off his forehead. He wished he hadn’t sounded so surprised by that question.
“He doesn’t look okay.”
“Well, he’s in a lot of pain.”
“But if he’s in a lot of pain then he’s not okay.”
Why did children have to see things so clearly?
“A person can be in pain and still be okay.”
“But he doesn’t look okay.”
The tenacity he gets from his mother. Chris thought.
“He’s in a lot of pain.” He repeated. Billy audibly huffed, and scowled at his father.
And that he gets from me.
Chris always knew he’d have to tell Billy about the facts of life; he just never thought it would be these facts in this lifetime.
“You know Vin’s friend Maria?” he asked. Billy nodded. “Last Friday, some teenagers tried to hurt her and when Vin tried to stop them, they beat him up. There was three of them and he couldn’t -.” Couldn’t what? Get away? Make them stop? “ – Maria got away safe, but they hurt Vin.” Chris thought it would be too much to tell Billy about cracked ribs and a broken spine. “He’s got a lot of bruises and stitches in his scalp, so he’s in pain.”
“But how come why did they beat up him when they were the ones being mean and somebody shoulda been mean right back to them?” Billy asked.
“Because they’re bullies.” Chris said, using an image he figured Billy would understand. “Because they figured they could get away with it and they did.”
“But that’s not fair. They shouldn’t do that. Somebody should be mean to them.”
“And hopefully someday somebody will be mean to them.” Chris said, and thought to himself God-willing that somebody will be me..
SEVENTY-FOUR
Vin wondered if he should be worried that sleep felt so good. Especially when he knew it wasn’t the well-deserved rest of a hard day’s work, but simply the result of swallowing two bitter tablets with half a glass of ice water. But it did feel really good to be lying in the top bunk of Chris’ bunk bed, with the fan cooling the room off, and the sound of summer going on outside the window. His back didn’t hurt at the moment, the bed was comfortable – and nothing unpleasant had happened.Given the usual course of the painkillers, he’d been asleep probably two hours. That might make it dinner time. Which was good because he was getting hungry. Which was bad because he didn’t want to eat.
Didn’t life just get better and better?
He ran his hand over his face to scrub the sleep away, stretched as much as he dared, and turned onto his side to contemplate either getting up or staying where he was. He felt his nose run and he wiped his hand across. Great, he was probably getting a late summer cold too. His hand came away bloody though, a dark smear from his knuckles to the back of his thumb.
Great.
He managed to climb down off the bunk bed while keeping his already bloody hand pressed against his nose. More than anything else, he worried about getting blood on Chris’ shirt. Chris was nice enough to let him keep wearing it twenty four hours out of every day, he didn’t want to give it back to him dirty.
When he did give it back to him.
Vin found tissues in the bathroom and in a few minutes his nosebleed had stopped. He washed his face and washed his hands and gave himself a long look in the mirror. The bruises under his eyes were just about gone, and they might just be exaggerated by exhaustion anyway. Even without those bruises and that exhaustion, he didn’t look like he remembered himself looking before. He looked older, and worn down. What did Chris say today? He’d have to be dead to feel as bad as he looked.
So, how did he feel?
He felt – well bad wouldn’t begin to cover it. Horrible, empty, doomed, worthless, filthy, wrung out and wasted might begin to cover it. But then he’d also have to add weak, powerless, ineffectual, frightened, spineless and cowering.
Alone too. He couldn’t forget alone. Even if Chris and Buck and even Mary were looking out for him, he was still in this by himself. Even if he wanted to, even if he tried, he could never explain to them what precisely happened and why and what he was going through now on account of it. They could say they were sorry, they could keep an eye on his eating habits and his fledgling drug habit, they could do anything and everything they wanted to do for him or with him or to him – but they would never be a part of what happened to him. The pain, the shame, the fear, the long term physical consequences. They were all his alone.
Vin sat on the edge of the tub and put his head in his hands. He sat there a long long while.
+++
“So, how was he today?” Buck asked. He and Chris were on the back deck, grilling the hamburgers and setting up the picnic table for dinner.
“It was not a good day.” Chris told him. “For most of the day, everything was ’fine’, then he got sick after lunch, and he still wishes he was dead.”
“Sick how?”
“Sick – uhh –.” Chris took a fast glance around to make sure Billy was out of earshot. “It – hurt.” Buck nodded and Chris was grateful that he seemed to understand what they were talking about without having to elaborate. And then Buck elaborated for him.
“Was there blood?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t ask.” Chris said, sounding a little more cranky than he intended. “I asked him if he wanted me to get Nathan and he said he’d rather catch on fire.” Then fortunately, Buck let the matter drop again.
“Did you get that other little matter cleared up? About what you think about why this happened to him?”
“Yeah, I think so.” Chris shut the lid on the gas grill and sat on the top step of the deck. Buck sat on the picnic bench a few feet away in the grass. “I think I figured it out and I think I got him to understand.”
“What’d you say to him?”
Chris debated telling Buck exactly what he’d told Vin. It made him sound too smart or too noble, too something. He shrugged noncommittally. “I told him that anybody – including me – who thinks he’s less of a man isn’t much of a man himself. That being - raped” he practically whispered the word, “doesn’t make him less of a man anymore than it makes a woman more feminine.”
“Wow – where did that come from?”
“I have no idea.” Chris admitted, feeling slightly embarrassed. “They just came out when I was talking to Vin. You know, I’m worried about those painkillers he’s taking. He falls asleep after every dose. That can’t be right. It can’t be good for him.”
“Hmm…I wonder if he should get a second opinion? An objective second opinion. Seems like Rain thinks nothing is wrong, and Nathan thinks everything is wrong. I wouldn’t be against Vin seeing another doctor.”
“I’ll mention it to him.” Chris stood up to check the grill and the hamburgers. “That Dr. Hyde at his apartment building seems like a good guy. He might be okay.”
“You mean after you run the background check on him?” Buck asked, laughter in his voice. Chris almost objected then remembered Buck knew him even better than he knew himself.
“Background check, fingerprints, medical license review, and his grades from high school if at all possible. I’m not risking Vin where I don’t have to.”
Buck didn’t say anything and Chris finally turned to find Buck watching him with an amused expression on his face.
“What?”
“Nothing. Just nice to see you in protective mode.”
“He needs to be protected Buck. He needs – a lot more than he’s been getting out of life recently.”
“Yes he does.” Buck stood up and finished laying out the paper plates and plastic knives and forks. “I’m glad he’s got you to take care of him.”
++++++++
When Vin finally did come downstairs a half hour or so later, Buck was coming from the kitchen headed for the sliding glass doors and the backyard.
“Hey, we were about to come get you. Supper’s just about ready. Mary’s working late so Chris is chief cook tonight. C’mon out, we’ve got ice tea and lemonade out there.”
“Okay. Um – Buck? Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.” Buck stopped dead in his tracks and gave Vin his full, concerned attention. “Chris said you weren’t feeling well today, is everything okay?”
“I’m okay. I was just wondering…” he trailed off, trying to think of what he wanted to ask, and how he could ask it without sounding stupid. “There was a girl who talked to me at work today. A woman. She’s the x-ray tech for Rain and Nathan.” He stopped there, not sure how to go on.
“Sooo – what’s your question?”
“Why did she talk to me?”
“Why wouldn’t she talk to you?”
“Because.” Vin gestured towards himself. “I needed a shave, I was dressed like this, I must’ve looked tired.”
“Well Vin, some women prefer the scruffy sort.”
“I was beyond scruffy. I was – I was –.” He was more things than he wanted to say.
Buck crossed his arms and lowered his voice. “Do you think she knows you were raped? Is that why you’re wondering why she talked to you?”
“Yeah. Sort of.” Then Vin thought about it and sighed. “No, a girl like her, even before I was attacked I’d be wondering why she was talking to me. But still – yeah. She must’ve read my chart. She must have some idea. Why would she talk to me?”
“Why wouldn’t she talk to you?” Buck asked again. Vin knew he didn’t have an answer that would satisfy Buck, so he didn’t say anything. Buck asked, “What did she talk to you about?”
“She asked how I was feeling and said I was the nicest person she’s worked with and that when I have my stitches out,” he indicated his scalp, “I should stop back and say hi. We – me and Chris – were in the parking lot, getting ready to go home. She was walking by.”
“So she seems like a nice person?”
“Yeah.”
“Pretty?”
“Oh yeah.”
“So why are you worrying about it?”
“Because.” Here came the stupid part, Vin knew. “I don’t want to hope for something that doesn’t exist. I want to know why of all the times in my life a pretty girl would talk to me it has to be now.”
Buck started to answer, then didn’t say anything and seemed to be considering it. Vin wished he’d never said anything. Buck wouldn’t understand. Buck never had a problem talking to women, and the only time he worried was when a woman didn’t talk to him. How could Vin expect him to understand what it felt like?
“No, never mind. It doesn’t matter. Forget I asked. C’mon -.” Vin started to walk to the sliding glass doors, but Buck stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Vin, I can’t tell you exactly why she talked to you. I can tell you that most likely she had a chance to talk with you while she was doing your x-rays and she found something there that she liked well enough to care how you’re doing and ask when she saw you outside of the clinic. Does it mean you’re going to get married? No. Does it mean you might go on a date, maybe. Does it mean that you are a man who deserves to have a nice, pretty woman talk to him? Yes, definitely. So that’s all you need to go with right now. Don’t jump ahead and worry about what might or might not go wrong. You don’t read the last page of a book first do you?”
“Actually…I do.” Vin said. What Buck told him made sense, and made him feel a little better. Leastways, he could stop worrying about it right now.
“You read the last page first.” Buck said. He seemed more incredulous at that than Vin worrying about Amanda.
“Yeah, I want to know who’s going to be alive or dead by the time I get to the end. I don’t like -.” He stopped abruptly, but had to say it anyway “ – nasty surprises.”
Buck looked at him a minute, then gave him a brief but warm hug. “We’re going to get you through this Vin.” He said. “I promise, the last page of this book says ‘Happy Ending’.”
SEVENTY-FIVE
“I’ll get it!” Billy raced into the house, with Cowboy expectantly on his heels. Vin watched him for the third time jump up and hurry to take care of something Vin needed. First it was a glass of water to take a painkiller, then he dropped his fork into the grass and needed a new one, now he’d asked Chris if they had mustard without horseradish in it.“Chris you know better than to give that boy sugar.” Buck said from the other end of the picnic table.
“He didn’t have sugar, he’s just been – helpful.”
“Only helping Vin, seems like. I asked if you had hot sauce and I had to get it myself.”
Vin stared down at his plate while a sickening thought took hold of him. It couldn’t be – Chris wouldn’t – would he?
“Vin?” he heard Buck trying to get his attention, but he turned to Chris instead, sitting across the table from him.
“You told him, didn’t you?” Vin asked. Even Buck seemed surprised at the question and turned a sharp look on Chris.
“No, I didn’t tell him what happened. I told him -.” But Chris was cut off by Billy’s noisy reappearance.
“Here it is! I got it!” He plopped himself and the squeeze jar of mustard down next to Vin. “I’m taking care of you.” He said proudly.
“Yeah you are.” Vin agreed. “How come?”
“’Cause Dad said you got hurt by bullies taking care of Maria and that’s just mean and somebody should be mean back to them and…” The rest of his proclamation was drowned out by the nausea that suddenly overtook Vin. He’d only eaten a little bit of his French fries and macaroni salad but he was in serious danger of losing that. He stood up fast and tried to get into the house before he got sick.
“Vin?” Three voices followed him into the family room and he could hear Billy asking, “How come he left?” but he couldn’t hear Buck’s answer to him.
By the time Vin got to the half bathroom, the acute feeling of sickness had passed, so he went back to the kitchen to sit at the table and try to catch his breath. Chris wasn’t far behind but he’d hardly set foot into the kitchen and Vin couldn’t take anymore.
“Just leave me alone, will you?” he snarled. It seemed to catch Chris off guard, but it wasn’t enough to make him leave.
“Are you all right?”
“No! I’m not all right. What d’you think? Nothing is all right. Everything keeps getting less and less all right the longer I keep going.” A few seconds passed, and Vin rested his head on his arm on the table. Maybe he could just get out of here and go – somewhere. Not home, he didn’t think he could stand being alone in his apartment. He could go – no, not to Nettie’s. Not to JD’s. Not to Ezra’s. Buck was here. That left Josiah but it was Thursday night and on Thursday nights Josiah had the AA meetings in the parish hall.
Vin sighed, but it sounded more like a moan.
“I didn’t tell Billy what happened. “ Chris said. “Only that you got beat up because you helped Maria.” He paused, but Vin didn’t answer him. “I didn’t tell him – that. He’s too young to understand all of that.”
“Would you have told him if he wasn’t too young?” Vin asked, looking up at Chris.
“I don’t know.” Chris said after a little thought. “Before this, it never occurred to me that I might have to tell him about – things like this.”
“Great, now I’m the poster child for progressive parenting.” It sounded snotty, and he realized he meant it to. “I have to get out of here.” But there was nowhere to go. He stood up from the table, but he knew there was nowhere to go. “What’d you have to tell him anything for?” Vin knew, even as he asked it, that Billy would’ve asked Chris about his black eyes and why he was living with them now.
“He could see you’re hurt. I tried to tell him you were fine but he didn’t believe me.”
“Yeah.” Vin muttered an agreement. “Yeah, I know.” He sat back down at the table. He had nowhere else to go.
“You gonna come back out and eat?” Chris asked and Vin just shook his head. “Want me to bring it in here for you?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I’ll come out. I don’t know.”
Chris waited and Vin didn’t know what to say to him. If he went back out, he didn’t think he’d be able to eat anything. If Chris brought it back in to him, well he didn’t think he could still eat anything even if he was by himself. But he didn’t want to be by himself. But he didn’t want to be around anybody either.
“Did your parents ever -.” He started to ask Chris, but he didn’t quite know how he was going to ask it. The painkiller was kicking in, and he could feel the exhaustion settling heavy over his eyes. “If somebody ever tried to take something from you, did they tell you what you should do about it?”
Well, it was a confusing question to ask, so it was probably a confusing to hear, so Vin went on, trying to explain.
“When I was in high school, the beginning of my junior year, just after my Dad died, I was living with my Aunt Diane. I don’t know if she was really my aunt, really. I think she was my Mom’s brother’s second wife who had been married a couple times after she divorced him anyway. Anyway, she was the closest relative they could find for me. Like that was any great shakes. But anyway, the start of my junior year, some kid stole my backpack. I saw him carrying it walking to the bus stop and I grabbed it back from him and we got into a fight. Not a big fight, just a couple of punches and some shoving. But when I told Aunt Diane, she told me nothing I had was worth fighting over. You know what I mean?”
He looked up, hoping Chris had followed him through the long story. It seemed he had, he was leaning on his hands on the back of a chair, watching Vin intently.
“It was like she was saying that I should just let anybody have anything of mine they wanted because nothing I have is worth anything anyway.”
“Do you believe her?”
“Sometimes. Especially now. Y’know? Like it wasn’t the things I owned that were worthless, it was the fact that I owned them that made them worthless. So now I feel that way a million times more.”
“Where’s your Aunt Diane now?” Chris asked.
“Why?”
“Because I’d like to go run her down with my truck.”
+ + + + + + +
Nettie thought at first that she’d make some of Vin’s favorite chocolate oatmeal cookies, then tomorrow she’d bring them to the campus and they could have a talk and get everything straightened out. Then she thought she should make Cowboy Coffeecake instead, and get some drive-thru tea on the way over there and they could sit on one of the benches on the Green and talk and get everything straightened out.
Sitting there, in her dining room, in one of her upholstered rocking chairs, holding her favorite picture of Vin, Nettie knew that if she could just get Vin to sit down and talk with her, they could get everything straightened out and she wouldn’t feel so miserable anymore.
Finally, she decided to just do it. She put down the picture, picked up her keys, went to her car and drove to Chris Larabee’s house.
+ + + + + + +
Well, Chris got Vin to come back out and try to eat his dinner. He could see that Vin was making a brave if mechanical attempt at it. He could also see that Billy was busting to ask what was going on but Buck must’ve warned him off because he was only shooting looks down to Vin and not saying anything. The silence was awkward and getting uncomfortable and Chris looked over at Buck, hoping he might have something to get a conversation going. But Buck only looked as desperate as Chris was feeling.
Just as Chris was about to make up some maintenance problem at work that he could ask Vin about, he heard a car pulling up the driveway. It wasn’t Mary’s car, or her parents’ car, and it didn’t sound like any of their friends’ cars.
“I wonder who that is.” He started to ask, but he was stopped by the look on Vin’s face. He’d gone pale and his eyes were wide with fear.
“Nettie.” He said.
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