Boy Who Shoots Crows (9781101552797) (20 page)

She shut off the Jeep, lifted the Ovenware dish with its hot pad off the seat, and held it atop her lap. The trailer looked unoccupied, even abandoned. All the curtains were drawn. No gleam of light behind them. No whisper of music or drone of television in the air. Charlotte sat there in the Jeep with the dish of braciola in her lap, felt her stomach turn over at the scent of baked sauce, and hoped that Livvie was not at home.

Two minutes later, Charlotte changed her mind, decided to go home, toss the braciola in the trash. She started the Jeep again and lifted a hand to the gearshift. Just then the front door came open by a few inches, and Jesse's mother peeked out at her. Charlotte lifted her hand off the gearshift, held it up behind the windshield in a motionless wave. Livvie cocked her head a little, opened the door only wide enough that she could step through and put one leg over the threshold, one stockinged foot on the first concrete step.

Charlotte pushed open the car door, leaned out. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you.”

Livvie opened the door a little wider, brought her other foot down onto the gray concrete. Her face was pale, no makeup, hair hanging straight. She was wearing blue jeans, a pale orange sweatshirt, and gray cotton socks. Something about the sight of her unshod feet caused a pinch in Charlotte's chest.

Livvie said, “Is this about Dylan?”

Charlotte did not understand the question. She slid her legs around, held on to the baking dish, and stood just outside the Jeep. “I brought a dish of braciola. So you don't have to, you know . . . I'm sure you don't feel much like cooking.”

Livvie said nothing, and for a few moments the women stood looking at each other, both confused, both attempting to process the words they had heard and to find some sense in them.

Livvie was the first to respond. She came down off the three concrete steps and started toward the Jeep. Only when she was halfway there did Charlotte react. “Wait,” she said, “let me come to you. You don't have any shoes on.”

Livvie stopped and looked down at her feet. Then offered Charlotte a little smile. To Charlotte's eyes, she had never seen a sight so pathetic, so swollen with heartache. She crossed to Livvie as quickly as possible, but felt, even as she moved toward her, hands flat under the hot pad on which the baking dish rested, that the manner in which she carried the heavy amber dish must have looked, as it felt, artificially ceremonial.

“People have been bringing me food all day,” Livvie said. “There's no way I can eat it all. I wouldn't want it to go to waste.”

“It's braciola,” Charlotte said, and again felt a disconnect, as if they were trying to communicate through a strong wind that blew every other word away.

“Will it freeze?” Livvie said.

Charlotte stood there in front of her, holding the dish, looking down at the foil cover. Then understanding clicked into place. “You want to freeze it? Sure, that's fine. I'd seal it up in a freezer bag first though. Otherwise you'll get freezer burn.”

Livvie nodded but did not reach out for the dish. She kept her arms wrapped around herself. There was a plaintiveness in her eyes, some plea Charlotte could not decipher.

Charlotte asked, “Did you say something about Dylan?”

“I hope they catch him. I really do.”

“Dylan ran away?”

“Denny. My husband.”

The conversation felt strangely dreamlike to Charlotte; dizzying.

She asked, “Dylan and your husband ran away?”

“Denny did. After what he did to Dylan.”

Again the pinch in Charlotte's chest, but sharper this time, prolonged and deep. “What did he do?”

“He nearly beat him to death.”

“Your husband beat up Dylan?”

Livvie nodded. “The sheriff came by around five this morning looking for him. But he never came home last night. He went out drinking after the thing at the football field.”

The palms of Charlotte's hands stung from the heat of the braciola, but the pain gave her something to focus on, something to help choke down the churning sickness.

She understood that Denny had beaten up Dylan, that Denny was gone now, yet the pieces of information seemed broken. Nothing fit together. “I'm your neighbor from down the road,” Charlotte said. “The old Simmons place.”

“Somebody told me last night. Thank you for the money.”

“Oh, that. I . . .” She had forgotten about the money borrowed from Mike Verner. “I'm Charlotte. Charlotte Dunleavy.”

Livvie said, “Maybe you could take it to Dylan's family instead.”

“Take . . . the money?”

“The dish. The . . . what did you call it?”

“Braciola. It's a meat dish.”

“I wouldn't want it to go to waste,” Livvie said.

“Is he going to be all right? Dylan? Your husband beat him badly? With his fists, with . . . ?”

“He's in the hospital, is all I know. All broken up. Denny's not a big man but he's a mean drunk. Sober too, I guess.”

Charlotte felt a semblance of understanding then, a fitting together. The two women stood facing each other, neither speaking for half a minute. Livvie offered a thin, sad smile. Charlotte offered one of her own.

Finally Charlotte turned back to the open door of her Jeep, set the Ovenware dish on the middle of the seat, and climbed in. She turned the key in the ignition but realized only when she heard the grinding noise that the Jeep was already running. She thought then that she should say good-bye before driving away, turned to look out the door, and was startled to see Livvie standing there beside her.

“What was it you called it?” Livvie said. “The dish you made?”

“Braciola?”

“I don't think I know what that is.”

“Oh, it's a flank steak. Beaten thin and then rolled and stuffed. And baked in a marinara sauce.”

“It sounds good,” Livvie said.

“Are you sure you won't take it?”

“People have brought so much,” she said. “People I've never even talked to before.”

Like me,
Charlotte thought. “I haven't made it in a long time. My ex-husband used to love it.”

“I'm sorry about not being able to take it. I wouldn't know where to put it. The refrigerator's full already.”

“It's my fault, I should have realized. I just wanted . . .”

Livvie reached inside then and laid a hand on Charlotte's arm. “I know,” she said. “It's all right.”

In an instant Charlotte's head seemed filled with tears, throat constricted, sinuses congested. She looked away, stared through the windshield.

Livvie said, “Maybe you could make it again sometime for Jesse and me. He's a big meat-eater. It's about all I can get him to eat.”

Charlotte turned to look at her, felt Livvie's hand still on her arm. She said, her voice far stiffer than she intended, “You're going to ruin your socks standing out here without any shoes on.”

Livvie drew her hand away. “I hope I didn't offend you or anything.”

“God, no, no it's just . . . no, not in the least.”

“It was kind of you to bring it over. I really appreciate it.”

“Listen, I understand, I really do. It's my fault, really. I should have called first.”

“You don't have to call,” Livvie said. “We're neighbors.”

“We are,” Charlotte said.

“It's nice to meet you finally.”

“I wish we had spoken before. Before any of this.”

Livvie smiled again. “Anyway, you know Jesse.”

The statement jolted Charlotte and made her flinch.

“He said you asked him about school. Why he wasn't at school one day.”

“I did,” Charlotte said. She felt herself choking, unable to swallow.

“Sometimes he plays hooky, I know. I probably shouldn't let him, but . . . it's not an easy place for him. He's small for his age. He gets teased a lot.”

Charlotte looked away again, stared at the watery windshield.

“Well,” Livvie said, and took a step backward. “Anyway. Thank you for not reporting us or anything. I'm not going to let him play hooky like that anymore. We might move, I don't know. I mean, if Denny comes back . . . I don't know,” she said.

Charlotte wanted to drive away. She wanted to pull the door shut and slam the gearshift into place and just drive. Just drive and keep driving.

But Livvie had not moved. Charlotte turned to look at her. Tear pools shimmered in Livvie's eyes. She was hugging herself again, squeezing tightly.

Charlotte said, “He likes to draw.”

Livvie nodded and smiled. “He's good at it too.”

“I saw the drawings last night. He's very good.”

“I have a hundred more I could show you.”

“I'd really like to see them.”

“We'll come over sometime and say hello. We always pick berries over across the road from you.”

“Do you?”

“Blueberries. They ripen around July, usually. We'll bring you some next time.”

Charlotte could make no reply, could think of nothing to say that sounded sincere.

“There's a patch of them in the field over the road from you,” Livvie said. “But it's around behind some trees. You probably can't even see it from your place. We'll show it to you some time.”

“Thank you,” Charlotte said.

Livvie nodded and smiled.

Charlotte nodded and smiled.

Then, abruptly, Livvie turned and made her way over the gravel, up the cold concrete steps, into her ruined home. Charlotte pulled the door shut and backed out of her driveway, backed onto the road and drove home. Her chest ached. She saw the road as if it were underwater, as if she were driving through thick water. She heard somebody moaning with every exhalation.

T
HE Jeep slowed to a stop at the mouth of Charlotte's driveway. She held her foot on the brake, leaned forward over the steering wheel, and wept. For the next several minutes she was unable to move.

When she sat upright again, she stared down the driveway at her farmhouse and yard.
My home,
she told herself, though she no longer felt any warmth there, had no desire to go back inside.

I made you,
she thought, and remembered the joy she had taken in the remodeling, the joy of moving in, the joy of signing the mortgage papers. She had made a home for herself out of the passion of her work. The passion of painting.
But where is the joy now?
she wondered.

She remembered what June had told her once, that the word
passion
, from the Greek, also means
grief
. “These days we think of passion as a source of joy,” June had said, “a driving ambition, a compelling lust for somebody or something. But those wise old Greeks. They realized that yes, of course, passion is all that, but it's also grief, because how can a person long for something—for love or sex, fame or beauty, money or success—without fearing its inevitable loss? And what is that kind of fear but the future tense of grief? And what is grief but a recognition of what we can never have again?”

“All we can do,” June had said, “is what the Buddhists advise. Try to find the joy in sorrow.”

Charlotte gazed at her farmhouse, the yard, the outlying fields and buildings, the barn.
All I can see,
she told herself,
is the sorrow in joy.

G
ATESMAN cruised the bar parking lots from the west side of town to the east. After the last one he asked himself,
Where else?
Then he decided to check the truck stops along the interstate. He knew that he should have had his deputies doing this, and he had alerted them to be on the lookout for the pickup truck, but he also knew that he was in no frame of mind to be sitting at his desk now, had no patience for the trivial complaints and selfish requests that flowed across his blotter. Besides, he felt responsible.
Whether I am or not is another matter,
he told himself.
Anyway, it's how I feel.