If Wishes Were Horses (23 page)

“No . . . I want to go to Oklahoma City,” Etta said. She didn’t want to go to a nearby pawnshop and risk running into someone she knew. Her reputation was not so hot anyway; she didn’t need to be seen going into a pawnshop. Besides, she felt she would do better in a bigger city.

Keeping her gaze from looking down at the side of the road (she did not want to feel again like throwing herself out of the truck) Etta looked out at the greening fields and pastures and here and there oil wells pumping beneath the bright sunshine. The sweet-smelling air blew in the window, and she began to relax.

She thought that she really liked to ride with Johnny because he did not mess around; he drove fast. Roy had always done that, too, and Etta herself loved to drive speedily. She put her hand out and felt the wind in her fingers. Johnny looked over at her, and they sort of grinned at each other.

Etta told herself to look away, yet his silvery eyes held hers and made her feel things deep inside.

Then she turned straight ahead and laid her hand on her belly, reminding herself.

They reached Oklahoma City in a little over an hour, after two stops, one for gas and another for Etta to go to the bathroom. The pawnshop that Johnny knew was in cowtown, the area surrounding the cattle market. One look at the plate glass window in which was displayed saddles and bridles and shiny belt buckles and colorful boots, and Etta knew this was not a place to sell an elegant silver service or crystal platter. She had Johnny ask several people, and they were directed to another part of town with several pawnshops and used and antique furniture stores.

“Stop here," she said, pointing at a pawnshop with a cluttered window. “This looks like a good place.”

Johnny cut the wheel. “I sure wish you would give me more warnin’, Miz Etta, and not just holler stop when we get right on a place.”

“I didn’t holler.”

He looked from her to the shop, then got out and came around to help her and the box out of the truck. When she saw he was prepared to go along with her, she told him that she would rather go in alone.

At his hurt expression, Etta said, “I think being pregnant, I might do better alone."

He nodded. “Yeah, you might.”

Also, Etta intended to sell her wedding rings, and she certainly couldn’t do that with Johnny looking on.

He walked with her to the door, saying, “Watch the clerk’s eyes and make certain his offer matches the interest you see in his eyes.”

She started inside the shop, and then a sudden uncertainty threatened to overwhelm her. She felt as if she was about to lose her grip on life. She was on the edge of turning and calling for Johnny after all, when she saw her reflection in the window glass. Looking at her swollen belly, she thought:
I have a child depending on me.

Etta visited two pawnshops and a place that billed itself as having fine used furniture and antiques. Johnny escorted her to each one, each time waiting outside. Just knowing he was there gave her courage. She knew that if she needed to fall back on him, she could, and she followed his advice and watched the eyes of the shop proprietors. Johnny was right about that.

At the first pawnshop, she sold the ornate glass paperweight and two gold-tipped onyx fountain pens from the desk in the den, and the earrings that went with her string of pearls. (She intended to hold on to the string of pearls if possible.) When the spark in the shop owner’s eyes—a woman with thick eyeliner and blue lids—was much more than the offer she made on an item, Etta declined to sell. The money the fountain pens brought astounded her. Although the shop owner was a woman and very cool acting, Etta noticed she took note of Etta’s condition. She said, “Guy up and leave you, honey?”

“He died,” Etta said. She saw pity flash across the woman’s face, although it was quickly gone, and the woman said she was sorry, but she was after all a businesswoman.

At the second pawnshop, Etta succeeded in selling Roy’s watch, the gold cuff links she had bought him on their second anniversary—getting more than she had originally paid—and her wedding rings.

“Are you sure you want to sell these?” the proprietor asked her, when she struggled to get them off her finger, which had picked that inopportune time to swell.

“Yes,” she said, and handed the rings over. He peered at them with his eyeglass, made an offer she found generous, and she accepted.

As he swept the rings from her sight, she experienced a sadness so deep as to be frightening. Watching him count out the money before her, all crisp bills, helped considerably.

When she went back outside, she waved the money at Johnny, who had been waiting right beside the door, and who gave the appearance of being a little anxious. His concern warmed her heart.

“Well now, you’re doin’ right well, Miss Etta,” he said, giving a slow grin.

“Yes, I am,” she said proudly. Some instinct caused her to take care to keep her ring hand out of plain sight.

Johnny suggested the shop of antiques and fine used furniture, pointing out the silver tea and coffee service in the window was very much like Etta’s. Here she sold the silver tea service, the silver platter, and the crystal serving dish. As the man handed her a check, she mentioned that she had a number of pieces of furniture which she might be willing to sell. He passed her a card which read: Robert Lamb, Appraisals and Estate Liquidation.

Johnny worried that the check Mr. Lamb gave her might not be good and drove her directly to the bank upon which the check was drawn. The streets were busy and parking limited, forcing Johnny to let Etta out in front of the bank, while he circled the block.

Etta watched the wooden stock rails of his truck lean as he pulled out into traffic, then she looked at the building rising up into the sky and went inside. Never in her life had she seen such a bank, with ceilings rising two stories and ornate lamps and frescos and marble everywhere. She was looking so hard that she ran into a pillar.

Considering that Roy had taken her to Tulsa and Dallas and Houston, and that she had stayed in the best hotels, it seemed strange that she never once had been inside such a bank. After marrying Roy, she rarely had even gone into the bank back home. In time he had quit taking her with him to the cities, too, and her world had become the stately house and waiting for Roy to come home. She had not even realized it.

Etta counted the money the cashier gave her, then went back outside and down the wide sidewalk to where Johnny had pulled into a no-parking zone. He saw her coming, jumped out, and helped her up into the seat. When he got back inside, she looked at him for a breathless minute.

“Here’s what I owe you for the groceries,” she said, quite proudly bringing forth the money from her purse.

Johnny’s silvery eyes went wide. He looked at the money and then at her. An angry expression crept over his face.

“I don’t want your damn money.”

She had never heard Johnny swear, not once, not even when he dealt with the most stubborn horse. He turned straight ahead, with his jaw hard as frozen meat.

Somewhat confused, Etta dropped her hand into her lap and stared at the money, while silence thick as heavy fog filled the truck.

“You sold your rings,” he said.

Etta looked down at her hand, at the finger where she had worn her rings. There was a white place there, and the finger was thinner than the rest.

“Yes,” she said, then added, “I think I got a good price.”

Feelings were trying to rush in, and she pushed them out. She thought she would be crushed if she allowed them in.

“Look,” Johnny said, turning to her. “You should have told me that you and Latrice needed money for groceries. I’ve been eatin’ them for weeks now. It’s only right I help pay. I could spare the money—and I wanted to do it.” With each word, his voice got angrier.

She lifted her eyes to him. “Why?”

She watched his scowling face. Shifting his seat, he looked out the windshield, squinting.

“Well, you and Miss Latrice have been real generous with me,” he said at last. “You let me use your barn and corrals and are feedin’ me and doin’ my laundry. I figure it’s only right for me to chip in. I should have offered a long time ago.” His eyes came around to her, and he added, “You saved my life the other night, too.”

Disappointment washed over Etta. She didn’t know why . . . what he said was very sincere.

She said, “I don’t know if we saved your life. You probably would have rolled over or somethin’ when you couldn’t breathe. People do that naturally.”

He shook his head, “I was drunk as a skunk and dead to the world.”

“Well . . . you’ve done so much for us. Our deal was for you to use the barn and corrals as payment for my husband’s IOU. Use of those barns for a couple of months won’t add up to eight hundred dollars, not to mention you fixing the fences and everything else. I’ve felt that by feeding you, we come closer to coming out even.”

His jaw got tight again. “Ma’am, I was raised up to look out for ladies, if I was in a position to do so. It hasn’t cost me nothin’ to do a little work, and I could afford to pay the dang grocery bill, so I did. It’s no big deal.”

He reached out and turned the key, starting the truck.

Etta said, “That’s very fine, but I cannot let you pay my bills. It will make me indebted to you”—she tried to steady her lips and her voice—“and I do not intend to be relying on a man to pay my bills ever again.”

With his hand on the gearshift, he gazed at her for a long moment while he seemed to be thinking very hard.

“Friends help friends,” he said at last. “I figured we’re friends. You saved my life, like I was a friend.”

Etta nodded. “Yes . . . we’re friends.”

“Okay then,” he said flatly. “You just keep your money and go on feedin’ me for a few more weeks. I guess we can call it even after that.”

He shifted into gear and pulled out into the street.

Etta gazed at Johnny's strong tanned hands on the steering wheel, and then her gaze dropped to the money she still held in her hand. She had been gripping it so hard that her palm had grown moist.

If Johnny insisted on being foolish, there was nothing she could do about it—she couldn’t very well dash him in the head and stuff the money into his pocket. And she could use it, she thought, as she opened her handbag, slipped the bills deep inside, and closed it with a snap.

Her gaze lit on the pale skin of her finger where the rings used to be. She saw herself and Roy in the small office at the courthouse that had smelled like oiled wood, and the judge who’d kept blowing his nose in a handkerchief, and how when Roy had put the wedding ring on her finger she had known a terribly frightening feeling, like knowing she was about to get hit by a car but that she could not do anything about it because she was already in the middle of the road. There was no going back, only going forward and hoping for the best.

That’s exactly how things were now, she thought.

Lifting her gaze from her empty finger and empty memories, she looked out the window at the city buildings and lots reflecting brightly in the sunlight and the people walking along, each with his or her own troubles and pain that could not be seen from the outside, each going onward.

On the outskirts of the city, Etta spied the familiar sign with the flying red horse. “Would you pull into that station? I need to use the restroom.”

Johnny turned into the gas station, saying, “Geez, Etta, you can sure startle me with those requests to turn. Would you start givin’ me a little warnin?”

“I’m sorry, but I just now saw it.”

He had called her Etta again.

She slipped from the truck before Johnny could come around and open the door for her, and hurried away to the ladies’ room. When she came out, she found Johnny sitting at one of the picnic tables at the edge of the parking lot. He had them each a hot dog and drink—an Orange Crush for her, root beer for himself.

“Oh, gosh, we never did have lunch, did we? Thank you—I’m starving!”

Johnny looked highly pleased.

She adored hot dogs with only mustard, and when she remarked on this, he said, “I remembered once that you said that.”

He had remembered that.

She gazed at him. It was nice to sit in the shade beneath the minuscule awning above the picnic table, nice to feel the cooling breeze and look across into Johnny’s bright silvery eyes.

As she bit into the warm hot dog, it struck her that no matter the blows one took, life—appetites and distractions and annoyances—went on. There was a certain comfort in this.

Stretching out beyond a barbed wire fence was a pasture in which several horses grazed. Gazing at the sight, Etta asked, “How many acres do you suppose I’d need just to operate a stable? Maybe raise and train good riding horses?”

She was a little shy about bringing up the subject, since she had initially thwarted the idea when Johnny had suggested it.

He didn’t seem bothered. “Depends,” he drawled. “If you kept grazing pasture, you’d save some money. If you weren’t using your grazing pasture, you could always rent it out. I’d say you could manage easily with twenty acres, but you’d probably want forty, so you could keep that alfalfa field.”

“I’d need enough property for people to ride on, if I rented boarding space.”

“That’d be nice, but what would bring renters is an arena for training.”

“I don’t think I’ll make enough money to go sinkin’ it into building an arena.”

“Well, not at first, but later,” Johnny said, warming to the subject.

He then went on describing the various setups of stock ranches he had seen and worked for, in the manner as only Johnny could, talking endlessly yet interestingly. Etta listened and ate her hot dog and watched Johnny’s eyes and voice grow intense with his subject. He had a way of really drawing out his words when he got intense; she liked to listen to his tone.

She ended up eating two hot dogs. She might have had another Orange Crush, but she didn’t want to keep having to stop to go to the bathroom. The public restrooms between Oklahoma City and Chickasha were not of the quality she preferred.