Becca nudged his toe with hers, and when he looked up said softly, “Wave at Bill Platter and his wife. To your left.”
Dan looked that way and lifted an arm in greeting before turning back to Becca. “Thanks. He coming over?”
“Nope. Heading for the car. They always go to her mother’s in Waurika on Sunday.”
Dan nodded, keeping his gaze glued to her face. “Graduated high school with Bill.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “He looks older than you.”
“He is. Held back, dropped out for a while.”
“Is that so? Then you’ll be surprised to hear that he’s a big man around here now. Pretty well-heeled. Owns an insurance agency in Duncan.”
His mouth quirked at the word hear, but she didn’t apologize, sensing that would compound the mistake. “Surprised he’s living in Rain Dance, then.”
“How come? You’re living in Rain Dance now.”
He looked away, mumbling, “Inherited my house.”
She stood silently until he glanced her way again. “Is that the only reason you came home, because you inherited your grandmother’s house?”
He turned away as if he hadn’t understood her, but then he turned back again and looked her in the eye. “Not sure. It is home.”
She smiled. “Yeah. I feel the same way. I couldn’t think of living anywhere else after Cody died.”
He asked gently, “Not long ago?”
“Twenty-one months,” she told him. “Just after I found out I was pregnant with CJ.”
His eyes widened. “Must’ve been tough.”
She nodded. “But we’re managing. I’m even finally going to get my house fixed up.”
He chuckled and tossed his keys lightly, signaling his intention to take his leave. “We’ll see. Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow,” she echoed, adding, “Look left again and acknowledge Effie Bishop.”
Dan turned his head and smiled at the elderly woman, calling out in that same careful, measured way, “Good to see you again, Miss Effie.” He looked back at Becca as he moved into the parking area and mouthed the words “Thanks. Again.”
She smiled, waved and went in search of her family, marveling at how he handled himself. No one who didn’t know him well would realize his predicament, at least not with her acting as his ears. She found a strange satisfaction in that, one she didn’t much want to ponder.
Dan brought his white pickup truck to a halt behind Becca’s old car and studied the sight before him. He shook his head and killed the engine, automatically pulling the keys. The truck was spanking new, with fewer than two hundred miles on it. He’d ordered it specially equipped as soon as he’d made the decision to move back to Rain Dance, but it had never seemed so plush or shiny as it did now, sitting in front of Becca Kinder’s shabby little house.
The house didn’t need repairs, he realized with dismay—it needed demolishing. The roof line was uneven, the shingles a patchwork of colors and type. Over the low porch it sagged dangerously, and he saw that one of the support poles had sunk through the rotted wood and past the untreated joist to the ground. The house itself was built atop a foundation of cement blocks placed about two feet apart, so the floor probably rolled like an ocean inside. Besides that, every inch of wood siding needed scraping and painting. Windowsills were buckled. The damage was such that he could tell she’d been living like this for a long time, and that knowledge pricked him, though he supposed that he should’ve expected it.
Despite running the only grocery store in town, the Kinders had always been poor as church mice. None of them, Cody included, had ever seemed to mind. Dan remembered his grandfather saying that John Odem was a good man who had no head for business, that he gave credit to everyone who asked and probably collected only a fraction of what was owed him. That apparently still held true, and while Dan admired the generosity and pleasantness of the Kinders, he couldn’t help feeling a little irritated on behalf of Becca and the kids. No wonder she’d pressed him for help.
He got out of the truck and walked across the dirt yard to the porch, noting as he stepped up onto it that the floorboards were warped and broken. The whole thing would have to be replaced. The patched screen door opened and Becca stepped out, looking freshly scrubbed and smiling a happy welcome.
“It’s nearly ten. I was getting worried you wouldn’t show till after lunch.”
“Your morning off,” he pointed out. “Thought you might sleep in.”
She waved that away. “I’m a morning person, always up with the dawn.” She hugged herself. “I love it when the world’s still and quiet, like I’m the only person awake anywhere.”
He smiled, not because he identified—for him the world was always still and quiet, and he missed the bustle and racket of it keenly—but because she never bothered to police her speech with him. Becca was just Becca. Period. He liked that, admired it. In a funny way he was even grateful for it. She made him feel…normal. Whole. He reminded himself that he was neither.
“Come on in,” she said before leading the way inside.
He followed with some trepidation and found himself standing in a living room that couldn’t have been more than ten feet square. Poorly furnished with an old sofa, a small bookcase, a battered coffee table, a cheap floor lamp and a small television set on a wire stand so rickety that it leaned to one side, the place was shabby but spotless and cheerful.
Becca had obviously made a valiant effort. A colorful quilt covered the ratty sofa. Bright yellow ruffled curtains fluttered in the morning breeze. An oval, braided rag rug covered a significant portion of the torn linoleum floor, and sparkling beads had been glued around the edge of the yellowed lamp shade. The bookcase bulged with neatly stacked rows of paperback novels, children’s storybooks and Bible study materials. Best of all were the framed photos hung artistically on the wall, so many that they almost obscured the faded, old-fashioned wallpaper, along with a homemade shadow box of dried flowers and a variety of in-expert coloring-book pages pinned up at Jemmy-height. Jemmy sat on the floor industriously working on another while watching cartoons.
Becca waved him into another room. He glimpsed a sunny bedroom as he walked past an open doorway, then came to stand in the disaster that was her kitchen.
It looked like something straight out of the thirties, with a tired old propane stove, a tiny ancient refrigerator, peeling wallpaper that exposed its rough backing, a shallow tin sink and virtually no cabinets. The only work surface was an old table that obviously functioned as eating space and stood over the slanted entry of an old root cellar. A pair of unfinished shelves comprised the only storage, and a single naked lightbulb provided the only illumination, since the window and possibly a door had been boarded over. To top it all off, the baby sat in a rusty high chair in the very middle of the floor, naked except for a diaper, his hair, face and chest smeared and sticky. With one hand he clutched the remains of a banana while rhythmically banging a spoon on the metal tray with the other. When Dan caught his eye, the filthy little cherub offered him the piece of mushy banana. Dan pretended not to notice and quickly diverted his attention.
Becca reached
