8. BUTCH

April 1982

If anybody wanted to know why that kid never talked, I could’ve told them. That’s what happens when your mom grabs you by the hair, clamps her hand over your mouth, and gives you a good shake while screaming in your face, “Don’t you ever talk to people! You don’t talk to anyone!”

That’s what Val did to Wavy when she was about three years old. I don’t know what she thought a three-year-old could tell anyone, but I guess Wavy played in the sandbox with the neighbor’s kids, and the neighbor said something that made Liam nervous. More likely the neighbor noticed people going in and out of the house all hours of the day and night. Not everybody is as stupid as Liam thinks they are.

Liam and I go way back, and I owed him for keeping my name out of it when he got arrested, but watching Val rattle that kid’s brain was the end of the line for me. Never mind how long we’d been in business together, I was ready to knock that crazy bitch on her ass. I didn’t have to, because Liam grabbed Val’s arm and said, “That’s enough, baby.”

I never heard another peep out of that little girl. Years later she warmed up to Jesse Joe Kellen. He was one of the local yokels we hired when we moved the operation to Powell. Not much more than a kid when Liam hired him, he was a big thug with a face like a plank. Always looked half-stoned, even though he wasn’t, and didn’t hardly open his mouth when he talked.

Sometimes, Kellen brought Wavy around the lab barracks when he played poker or dominos with us. She’d hang around watching the game, and bring us beers. Like a little waitress.

Kellen and her, they were cute together. She’d lean on his shoulder, look at his hand, count his chips. Him being so much bigger, it was funny how he acted with her. He talked to her like she was an adult. She always whispered in his ear, so you got the idea they were having a conversation. I don’t know what she ever said to him.

One night, Kellen got up in the middle of a hand and said, “I’m gonna go up to the house for some beer.”

“Let’s just finish this hand,” Vic said.

“She’ll play for me.” Kellen gave his cards to Wavy and started up the hill toward the trailers.

We laughed, but she got up in his chair, took her next card, and folded.

Scott won that hand and when he went to deal, he skipped Wavy.

“What, Scott, you don’t like taking money from kids?” I said.

So he dealt her in. She lost fifty bucks on that hand, but she won the next one. Kellen had been down by almost two hundred dollars, but now he was up again. The next few hands, she won more than she lost. Her dealing left a lot to be desired since she had a hard time shuffling, but at least you knew she wasn’t cheating.

Kellen came back with beer about the time Scott and Vic decided to show her how the big boys played. It pissed them off that she’d managed to win some money, so they upped the ante and put down bigger bets. Even though it was his money, Kellen stood back and watched her play. Didn’t tell her what to do.

A couple hands in, Wavy apparently got some cards she liked, because she kept raising. Next thing you know, there was almost five thousand bucks on the table, and that was too rich for Vic.

Seeing she’d raised almost everything she had in front of her, Kellen reached into his pocket, and handed her a roll of bills. Big enough she could barely close her hand around it. All business, Wavy snapped the rubber band off and started counting out hundred-dollar bills.

“You do understand that’s real money, little girl? This ain’t Monopoly.” Scott grinned and raised another two hundred.

Wavy slid the last of her chips out to see him and then the pile of cash she’d made: a thousand bucks. Raised him.

Scott looked down at the chips he had left and the roll of bills she had left. Took him a good minute before he folded. The kid had just taken us for more than a grand a piece. She went to pitch her cards in, but Scott slapped his hand on them.

“Hey, you didn’t pay to see,” Kellen said.

“Come on, this isn’t Vegas. Just a friendly poker game, right?” I was curious.

Kellen looked at Wavy and she shrugged. Scott flipped her cards over. Pair of fours.

We busted up laughing, Vic clutching his sides and sobbing, “You do understand that’s real money, little girl?”

Kellen laughed so hard he laid down on the floor next to Wavy’s chair and cried.

Scott, he about cried for real. Wavy watched us with this little smile on her face. She had a hell of a poker face.

Laying there like a beached whale, so weak from laughing he couldn’t get up, Kellen said, “Wavy, tomorrow we’re going into town and buy you anything you want. Anything at all.”

Giggling behind her hand, she put her foot on his chest and nudged him.

He took ahold of her leg and said, “First thing, I’m buying you some new boots. You got holes in these from too much walking.”

Right up until that moment it was sweet and funny. Odd couple that they were, they had a real connection. Then he tugged her boot off and kissed the bottom of her bare foot. I could see him doing that kind of thing to his own kid, but she wasn’t. She was somebody else’s little girl.


 9. WAVY

July 1982


I waited by the porch to Sandy’s trailer, where the old gray cat lived. At night, the big yellow light over the garage cast shadows into my hiding place. People walked by and didn’t even notice me crouched there.

Dee and Lance left, probably going to the barracks to fuck. Sandy sat on the porch smoking and crying, talking to herself: “I don’t know why I put up with it.” When Butch came, she went inside with him.

Danny left in the Charger and brought back beer. While he carried a case to the lab barracks, I snuck out of my hiding place and stole two cans. When Danny came back, he looked at the torn-open case in the trunk and yelled, “That’s not funny, you assholes! Don’t be poaching brewskies.”

I started to think Kellen wouldn’t come, or that he wouldn’t be alone. The night he brought the snake tattoo girl on his bike, I did something reckless. I went into the trailer to get him. After that, he came to me on his own, so it had been worth the risk.

I sat down on a cinder block and slipped my boots off to bury my toes in the cool silt under the porch. I listened for the Panhead, but it never came. Finally, Old Man Cutcheon’s truck pulled into the yard, groaning as Kellen stepped out.

He jingled his keys as he walked across the yard, clouds of dust kicking up around his boots. Only when he put his foot on the bottom step did I climb over the railing. Step out sooner and someone else might see me.

Kellen walked across the deck, making the floorboards thump. From inside, Butch called, “Fee fi fo fum!” Sandy giggled.

Careful to stay to the side of the front window, I stepped out of the shadows. Sometimes Kellen had business and couldn’t come with me, but tonight he was waiting for me step into the light.

“There you are. I was up to the house looking for you, but the Corvette was there, so I didn’t go in,” he said.

Uncle Sean was there all the time now.

“Fee fi fo no?” Butch called from inside the trailer.

Hearing that, I hurried back to my hiding place. Kellen came down the stairs while I put my boots on. When he walked around the porch, I picked up the quilt and the cans of beer, and followed him across the yard, going away from the sound of Butch and Sandy.

“Is that Kellen?” Sandy said.

“I thought so, but there’s nobody out here.”

In the meadow, I had Kellen all to myself. He smelled good. Sweat and motorcycle and wintergreen. No stinking weed smoke. No perfume. No sadness. He smelled like love. Between the cottonwoods and the bluff, I spread out the quilt and offered him the cans of beer.

“Dang, you even brought me beer. We need a better system. Some way for you to let me know where you are.”

I liked that he wanted to know, but I also liked him not knowing. Sometimes waiting and being disappointed was good, to remind me he didn’t belong to me. Nothing belonged to me. I shrugged and lay down on the quilt, which didn’t smell like Grandma’s house anymore, unless I closed my eyes and concentrated.

“How are these new boots treating you?” he said, as he pulled them off.

He bought me new ones every year to start school. This was the sixth pair, to get me ready for high school in August. Seventh grade was at the old middle school, the last year before they closed it. For eighth grade, I would be going to the new high school in Belton County, which was an hour each way on the bus. “You’re not riding no two goddamn hours on the bus. I’m taking you,” Kellen said. He didn’t care that it was farther.

The boots for eighth grade had to be bought early, because I not only wore out the old ones but outgrew them, too.

I nodded, but didn’t open my eyes, to test an idea. If I kept my eyes closed, would it be easier to send Kellen a message? I waited but nothing happened, except that he went on talking while he took his boots off.

“You know, I still got a whole lotta poker money burning a hole in my pocket.”

“Yours.” I squinted harder, making stars sparkle inside my eyelids.

“Only what I started with is mine. You won the rest. Shit, Scott isn’t gonna live that down for a long time.”

Smiling made it harder to send my message, but I liked winning and having Kellen kiss my foot. I crept my toes across the quilt to find Kellen’s feet, which were hard as hooves. I went without socks, when I forgot to do laundry, but he didn’t own any socks. Still, I liked to pet his feet with mine. Touch his hands with mine. Rub my cheek against his. I liked how we were different, but the same.

Lying back beside me, he spread his arm out to make me a pillow.

“You didn’t go swimming tonight?” he said.

“Before. With Donal.”

“That’s nice. Is he in bed now?”

I nodded and wiggled closer so I could press my face into his armpit. Sweaty but clean.

“You need to quit squirming and lay still,” he said. He was ticklish.

I swallowed a giggle and stayed where I was to tease him. He always wanted me to say the stars, and if I didn’t do it soon enough, he got impatient.

“Ursa Maj—”

I poked a finger into his side to stop him and he laughed.

“What? Not Ursa Major?”

We waited, trying to trick each other. The kind of trick I liked.

“Orion?” he said.

“Noooo.”

“No? Oh, right, we won’t see him until October. I guess that means I can keep wearing his belt until then.”

I put my hand over his mouth to make him be quiet. The message I was trying to send was, “Kiss me.” He did kiss my hand before I took it away, but that wasn’t what I wanted.

“I promise I’ll be good,” he said.

Wiggling around to get comfortable, I put my head back on his arm. Then I looked up at the sky and found my place. Looking at the stars was like opening a familiar book. I made him wait a little longer, since he didn’t pay attention to my message. He must have gotten it late, because after a minute, he kissed my hair. When I turned my face to him, he kissed my lips, too.

“Cassiopeia,” I said.


 10. KELLEN


Waking up in the meadow was Wavy’s favorite thing. She was more likely to talk first thing in the morning, too. I might get a whole dozen words out of her before the sun came up. I might even get the three I liked best.

Me, I loved falling asleep in the meadow. The hay rustling around us, the stars overhead, owls in the cottonwoods. Wavy curled up next to me so we were like two animals bedded down in the grass.

That night, I was glad I skipped the beers. I remembered things better when I was sober. Like Wavy’s cheek stuck to my arm with sweat, and the wind ruffling her hair against my neck. I kissed her hand and pressed it over my heart.

“Hmmm,” she said, already half asleep.

A car drove down the road to the south, going too fast. After it passed, crickets filled up the quiet. A while later, another car came down the road, scattering gravel. I was just about asleep when a squealing thud jerked me wide awake. I sat up and Wavy woke up with a whimper, clutching at me.

The car engine clunked and died.

“Somebody just wrecked up on the road. I’m gonna walk over and check it out,” I said.

I wanted Wavy to stay there, but when I pulled on my boots, she did the same. We struck out across the meadow toward the road and, when we came over the rise, I could see headlights off to the southwest. The road curved there, with a fork to the north for a service road to the stock tank and windmill. There was a cattle guard across the ditch between iron gate posts. Car musta took the curve too fast.

When Wavy broke into a run, I knew she’d figured it out, same as me. Two cars driving away from the farmhouse in the middle of the night? One was probably Val.

Cutting through the hay, Wavy left me behind. When I got to the ditch, the passenger side headlight blinded me, skewing up at the wrong angle. I tripped over something and landed hard, gravel digging into my elbow. I hauled myself back up and ran like I hadn’t since I played football in high school.

One of the gate posts had cut through the car’s hood, ruptured the radiator, and rammed the engine right into the front seat. There was antifreeze and gas pouring onto the road, turning it to mud. The driver’s side was down into the ditch, and with the engine in the way, I couldn’t see any way to get to Val. She was pinned behind the wheel and covered in blood. Dead for all I knew. For all I cared really, except I didn’t want Wavy to see that.

Wavy jerked open the rear passenger door, getting ready to crawl into the backseat before I caught her. She tried to pry my hand off her arm, so I grabbed her around the waist and tossed her over my shoulder. Even with her kicking and pounding on me, I didn’t dare let go of her.

Headed down the road toward the ranch, with the headlights at my back, I saw what I’d tripped over coming out of the meadow. Donal, laying face down in the ditch. I set Wavy down, but when she saw her brother, she went crazy trying to get to him, so I had to drag her back.

“Don’t, Wavy, don’t! You can’t move him. You can’t.”

She dug her nails into my arm where I had her around the waist, but she stopped fighting.

“If he’s hurt, his back or his neck, you can’t move him, okay? Promise?”

She nodded and when I let go of her, she crawled to Donal and touched his hand. I woulda checked for a pulse, but it didn’t matter. If Donal was alive, we needed to get help. If Donal was dead, we needed to get help.

“You’re faster than me, Wavy. You gotta run and get help.”

She stood up and looked west down the road, then east. Trying to decide which was closer.

“Go down to the ranch and tell them what happened. Run as fast as you can,” I said. I wanted that to be the right thing.

She ran west, toward the farmhouse.

She was gonna call 911.

The day I wrecked, I sent her to call Liam, because you don’t call 911 if you wreck your bike a mile from a four-thousand-square-foot metal barn full of meth-making equipment. But when your little brother’s lying in a ditch, maybe with a broken neck, things like that don’t matter.

I got down on my hands and knees in the road next to Donal. I put my ear as close to his cheek as I could and held my breath. So soft I almost couldn’t hear it over the wind in the hay, Donal breathed in and out. In and out. Whatever happened, Wavy made the right choice.


 11. DEE


“Thank God we weren’t cooking tonight,” Dee said. The cops had been less than a mile from the barn. If Butch had been cooking, the cops would have smelled it, but they didn’t. And nobody got killed. The cops said getting thrown out of the car probably saved Donal’s life. All he ended up with was a concussion and a broken arm. If he’d had on his seatbelt, the engine would have crushed him.

The other good thing was that when the ambulance came, the only person the cops talked to was Kellen. He kept them away from the trailers.

Liam freaked out anyway. Of course, he loved Val—she was his wife—but listening to him cry and carry on pissed Dee off.

“She’ll be fine,” Dee said as they drove to the hospital in Garringer. She’d smoked too much crystal trying to get herself jump-started. So had Liam, because he couldn’t stop talking.

“This whole deal is my fault. If I were living at the farmhouse, taking care of her like I promised, this wouldn’t have happened. I’ve gotta fix this. I’ve gotta make this right.”

“It’s gonna be okay, baby.” Dee kept saying that, because if something got fixed, it might fix her out of the picture.

At the hospital, there wasn’t enough crank in the world to make Val look okay. They glimpsed her through a window, lying in a bed with tubes running in and out.

“I’m her husband,” Liam said, so they let him into the room for a minute.

Dee got in with a lie: “I’m her sister.”

Val was fucked up. A Frankenstein monster with stitches running across her forehead.

Liam cried for a good ten minutes after he saw Val. Dee held him, relieved. Yes, he loved Val, and he had the hots for Sandy, but Dee was there for him when there was a problem. He needed her.

People came and went all day: Sandy, Scott, Vic, Butch, Lance, Ricki. In the evening, while Liam was in the bathroom topping himself up, Kellen showed up with Wavy. They looked rough around the edges, but at least they hadn’t been at the hospital all day, unlike Dee, who felt like someone had run a cheese grater over her nerves.

When Liam saw Kellen talking with Butch, he headed right for them and bailed into Kellen.

“What the hell happened?” Liam said.

“Like I was telling Butch, I was out in the meadow and heard the crash. I don’t know what happened, except Val went off the road and hit that cattle gate. I’m sorry the cops came out, but it looked really bad. That’s why I called 911. And the cops didn’t go near the ranch.”

“I mean, what happened? Why was Val out driving?”

“I don’t know,” Kellen said.

“How can you not know? You were at the house, weren’t you?”

“No. I was in the meadow.”

“Don’t lie to me, you son of a bitch.” Liam jabbed his finger into Kellen’s chest.

It scared Dee when Liam got wild-eyed like that. As big as Kellen was, Liam would take him on when he got in that state.

“I wasn’t at the house.” Kellen’s voice was too soft for Liam to hear when he got crazy. “I think Sean—”

“You think I don’t know how you’re always hanging around, trying to insinuate yourself into her bed?”

“It’s not like that. I never—”

“You think she’d ever have a use for some slob like you? What? You think she’s gonna divorce me and marry you?”

“What’re you talking about?” Kellen said.

“Liam, don’t.” Butch put a hand on his arm, but Liam shoved it away.

“I oughta fucking kill you for coming around my wife even thinking that kinda shit.”

Dee held her breath, waiting for it to all blow up. Kellen took a step back and brought his hands up, ready to field a punch. The nurse at the night station stood up and reached for the phone. God, if she called security, they’d have a problem. Liam couldn’t back down from a fight when he was tweaking, especially if cops were involved.

“Look,” Butch said. “I don’t know what’s going on in your head, Liam, but you need to stop and look around. Kellen isn’t here for some—”

“You don’t know, man. This fucking asshole’s been going around my house every goddamn day, acting like he lives there.”

“He brought Wavy to see her mother and her little brother. That’s why he’s here.” Butch put his hand on Liam’s arm again and turned him toward Wavy, who stood there watching in that eerie way she had. Like the little girls from The Shining.

“I just brought Wavy to visit. I didn’t mean to cause trouble,” Kellen said.

“You didn’t. You’re okay,” Butch said. “Right, Liam? He’s okay?”

“He’s okay. Yeah. I’m sorry, Kellen. I’m just all turned inside out.”

“It’s alright. I’m gonna take Wavy home now.”

“Dee, you better go spend the night with her,” Butch said.

Dee glared at him. Like hell she was spending the night in an empty house with that creepy little girl while Liam was with Val.

“Wavy doesn’t even talk to Dee. I’ll go and sleep on the couch,” Kellen said.

Butch seemed like he might keep arguing, but Kellen was already turning away. When he put his hand out to Wavy, she took it.

KELLEN

Riding down in the elevator to the parking garage, Wavy leaned against the opposite wall, staring at nothing. When the doors opened at the second-level parking, she walked ahead of me to where the truck was parked.

“Where do you want to go?” I said. “You want to stay down at the ranch with Sandy?”

Wavy turned around and took a few steps backwards so we could look at each other. She pointed at me.

“You want to stay with me? Or you want me to stay with you?”

She nodded. I knew she was gonna say that. And I knew I wouldn’t sleep on the couch.

Unlike everybody else, me and Wavy had already been into the farmhouse and seen what Val did before she wrecked. Broken dishes and food all over the kitchen floor. In the living room, the coffee table was split in two like somebody had jumped on it. One of the couch legs was busted off and the cushions were cut open. Lying in the middle of that mess was a used syringe and a pair of lacy panties. Val even went into Wavy and Donal’s rooms, ripped the sheets off the beds, broke toys and tore up library books.

Driving out to the farmhouse, we didn’t talk about what to do. I parked the truck in the drive and we walked down into the meadow. The quilt was right where we left it, no worse for having spent the day out in the hayfield. The two cans of beer were warm, but I cracked one and drank it.

Wavy said all the stars, but we didn’t make a game of it. After she fell asleep, I was still awake, listening to the quiet, thinking about what we’d have to do in the morning. While Wavy swept and mopped, I figured I’d haul the things Val had destroyed out to the trash barrel and burn them. I kept thinking about that, picturing what needed to be done, because that was as far as I could think. After we cleaned up the house, I didn’t know what we’d do next.


 12. DONAL

August 1982


I didn’t remember Mama and me having our wreck, but I remembered Mama and Uncle Sean fighting. Just like she does with Daddy. Screaming and hitting and breaking stuff.

“I hate you!” Mama kept saying.

“Where is it? Where the fuck is it?” Uncle Sean yelled. He went stomping all around the house, tearing things up, even worse than Mama does when she’s mad.

After he left, Mama said, “I’ll show him.”

I was hiding under the bed, but she came and dragged me out and said, “Put your fucking shoes on. We’re leaving.”

Then I guess we went for a ride and had our wreck, but I didn’t remember that.

I got a cool cast on my arm and everybody signed it. For a while it was just Wavy and Kellen and me at the farmhouse, and I liked that. Wavy was happier, and when Kellen and me made jokes at dinner, she laughed out loud. I wanted us all to sleep together, but Kellen was too big, so he slept in Wavy’s bed and she slept with me. Mostly.

Then Mama got to leave the hospital, and Daddy said, “I want you to come live with me.”

I thought that would be cool because there were motorcycles and puppies and firecrackers down at the trailers. Maybe I could get a bike, too.

Plus Wavy made me eat good-for-me stuff. Oatmeal and green beans. At Daddy’s house, Sandy let me eat Pop-Tarts and frozen pizzas.

Also, Mama scared me. She was different people. “Wait,” Wavy said. Her rule was Don’t talk to Mama until she talks to you. Wait until you know which Mama she’s going to be. If Mama said, “Oh God, I’m so alone,” it was okay for me to hug her.

If Mama said, “Worthless motherfucker. I’ll show him,” you better watch out. Even Kellen didn’t like to come in the house when she was like that, and he was lots bigger than Daddy.

Before Mama came home from the hospital, Sandy helped me pack my stuff. We packed Wavy’s clothes, too, while she sat on the bed, touching her quilt.

“We can take the quilt with us, honey.” Sandy stuck her hand out, getting ready to do something stupid. Only Kellen and me got to touch Wavy. And she could hit hard. Boy, I didn’t want to see that.

“Don’t touch her,” I said.

“Wha?” Sandy was kinda stoned so she was being silly.

Wavy stood up and Sandy started to fold her quilt.

“No,” Wavy said. When Sandy didn’t stop, Wavy said it loud: “NO.”

“You don’t want to take your quilt?”

“It’s not her quilt,” I said. Grandma, who I didn’t remember, made the quilt for Wavy, but I knew the rule. Nothing belongs to you. I knew the rule, but I didn’t like it. My stuff was mine, like the pocketknife Uncle Sean gave me. If somebody tried to take it, I’d sock them.

Sandy put the quilt back on the bed and took the other stuff to the car.

First thing, when we got down the hill, I showed Wavy the puppies in the garage. It was okay for animals to touch her. She petted them and let them crawl on her lap.

I wanted to light firecrackers, but it was getting hot outside, so I said, “Let’s go watch TV.” That was something else we didn’t have at the farmhouse. Wavy had her little TV with rabbit ears, but Sandy’s trailer had satellite.

Only when we went inside, Daddy and Kellen and Butch were there.

“Hey, come here, kiddo,” Daddy said. Then he saw Wavy.

He yelled, “Sandy! Sandy!” until she came. She musta been in the shower, because she had a towel on her head.

“What the fuck is she doing here?” Sometimes I thought Daddy couldn’t see Wavy, but he pointed at her.

“But you said you wanted the kids to move down here. You—”

“I said, ‘The kid.’ Donal. Not her.”

“You—what do you want me to do?” Sandy said.

“Get her out of here. Take her back up to the farmhouse.”

“I’ll take her,” Kellen said.

After Wavy left, I didn’t want it to be fun living at Daddy’s. It wasn’t fair if I had fun and she didn’t. But there were puppies, and then Daddy bought me a motorbike and taught me how to ride it. Anyways, Wavy didn’t really want to live there, and I still got to see her. Sometimes she came with Kellen, and sometimes she snuck in to see me. Some mornings, before anybody else woke up, I went across the meadow to the farmhouse. That was the best. 

13.KELLEN

Plenty of times I’d wanted to beat the crap out of Liam, but never as bad as I did when he told Wavy to get out. Her whole face went blank, and stayed that way until we walked out to the front drive. She scowled when she saw the Willys.

“The bike’s at the shop,” I said. “I got tired of it being dinged up. We’ll have to ride in the truck for a while.”

Wavy shuffled her feet, but she let me take her hand and help her up into the truck.

“You know, this is Old Man Cutcheon’s truck. Good truck. Plus, it’s the same age as his son. He thinks that’s good luck. He sold this to me a couple years ago, when his grandkid was born, and bought himself that new Ford. He’s still proud of this Willys, though. Says it’s never broke down on him.”

She knew all about the truck; I was only trying to fill up the quiet.

“You wouldn’t want to live down at the trailers anyway. It’s noisy and they smoke. Makes the place stink. You wouldn’t like that.”

When I turned to go up the road to the farmhouse, she said, “No.”

I couldn’t blame her for not wanting to go up there. Val laid up in bed, with a nurse there—some stranger. I turned around and drove the route we took around the lake on the bike, but it wasn’t the same in the truck. I was sorry I’d sold the Barracuda, even though I made good money on it. Piss poor timing on my part. Once we reached the Powell city limits, there were only two options: my house or the shop.

“Is there somewhere you want to go, Wavy?”

After a second, she pointed at me.

“Yeah, we can go to my house.”

“Live with you,” she said.

“You can’t live with me.”

She pretty much had been while Val was in the hospital. That had to end now.I didn’t know what else to say, so I drove to my place and pulled into the carport. Wavy sagged back in her seat, staring out the windshield at the faded asbestos siding on the garage. She looked so small and tired, like my ma before she died.

“It’s not me, Wavy. Other people wouldn’t like you living with me, since I’m not your family. Maybe you could go live with your aunt. They’re your family.”

It made a kinda sense, but that was about the last thing I wanted. Tulsa was a long drive, and the way her aunt looked at me, it wasn’t like I’d be able to visit Wavy there. But maybe things would be better for her without me. Maybe she could have a regular life with good people.

“Well, what if we…” I racked my brain trying figure out something. There was the spare bedroom. I could put the weight bench out in the garage. Get a bed in there. Except it didn’t fix the real problem. Her living with me.

“Get married,” she said. Had she heard what Liam said at the hospital? Man, I hoped she didn’t believe that crap about me messing around with Val.

“If who got married?” I said.

She pointed at me and, in that slow way she had, brought her finger back to her chest.

I couldn’t help it. I laughed. Not because I thought it was funny, but because I was shocked. She looked right through me, like I wasn’t there. She wasn’t joking, and I wished I could take it back.

“I’m not laughing at you, sweetheart. You surprised me is all. I didn’t expect you to say that.” She didn’t make a sound. She was gonna make me answer her. “You know we can’t get married.”

“Why?”

“I don’t think Liam would like that.”

She shrugged, ’cause it was a stupid reason. Liam had kicked her out.

“I’m a good wife,” she said.

“I know you’d be a good wife. I like your cooking and you clean the house and you know how to keep the books. I mean, if it was just about that, or about me wanting to be with you, sure, but you’re too young to get married.”

Staying out at the farmhouse with Wavy and Donal, it was something near to playing house, except Wavy didn’t play at things.

“Here’s the thing: in a couple weeks you start school, right? Leave the house by seven, when Val’s still asleep. After school, you can go to my house or down to the shop. Stay there ’til it’s time to close. Then we can have dinner, you can do your homework, watch TV, and I’ll take you up to the farmhouse before bed.”

Wavy didn’t answer. No nod, no shrug, nothing.

“Hey,” I said. “Hey.”

For the first time ever, I reached over and touched her hair without waiting for some kind of invitation. Even that didn’t get me a reaction. She didn’t lean into me and she didn’t push me away. There had to be something to make my offer stick and sitting there looking at the back door of my house, I thought of it. I started the truck and headed to the hardware store. Got there just before it closed. I came around to Wavy’s side and almost spilled her on the pavement because of the way she was leaning up against the door.

“Come on, we gotta get something,” I said.

She came after me, dragging the heels of her new boots. While I went looking for a clerk, she stood in the store’s main aisle, staring through a display of car wax.

When I came back, she was still doing that. I had the feeling again like I’d come up on a wild animal. Only instead of a fawn, she was like a fox kit I saw once, hit by the side of the road. On its feet, but dying.

The key in my palm was hot off the grinder, smelled like graphite.

“This is for you. So you can go to my place any time you want, whether I’m there or not. Only other person got a key to my house is Old Man Cutcheon, but that’s so, you know, if something ever happened to me. “

I held the key out to Wavy, but she just looked at it. If she wouldn’t take it, I figured that would mean she was done with me. I wasn’t ready to reach that point, so I kept talking.

“I bought that house three years ago. Mr. Cutcheon co-signed for me on the loan. If I can do a few more deals like with the Barracuda, and with the extra money coming from Liam, I figure it’ll be paid off in two years. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s my house. Where I don’t gotta put up with nobody’s bullshit. That’s why I’m giving you this. So it can be your house, too. So you can have a place to go. Even if you can’t live with me, that other bedroom’s for you. I’m gonna clean it out, so it’ll be your place.”

Finally she reached for the key, squeezed it tight in her fist, and then dropped it down in her boot.

Leaving the hardware store, I asked her where she wanted to go.

“Home,” she said. I wished that wasn’t the farmhouse, but it was.

When we got there, a strange car was parked in the drive. A ’72 Buick wagon. The nurse. I turned off the engine, but before I could open my door, Wavy pulled the keys out of my hand and stuck them back in the ignition.

“You don’t want me to come in?” I said.

She shook her head.

“I know you’re mad, but will you at least give me a kiss?” I said.

She opened the door, got out, and walked up the porch steps without looking back. Sitting there, trying to decide what to do, I saw her answer. She’d written LIAR in the dust on the Willys dashboard.

I felt like I’d been kicked in the stomach. Not like she’d kicked me, but like life had. Kicked her, too, while it was at it.