Just Joe (22 page)

Joe literally camped on
Mattie's doorstep for three days. He didn't eat. He didn't sleep. He could only
remember that last night with her, and the memory was like barbwire tearing
into his skin. He played with that memory constantly, because for two months it
would be all he had of Mattie.

He somehow dragged himself
into uniform for the game that week—a play-off game, at that—only to be
replaced in the second quarter by the team's second-string quarterback.

On the sidelines Coach
Rusky roared at him. "Ryan, what the hell is wrong with you? You're
playing like you're at Scout camp. Why did you throw the damn ball?"

Joe just walked away. In
truth, he didn't even hear the coach's tirade. He was wondering what Mattie was
doing right now.

Coach Rusky stared after
him blankly. "What the hell...?"

It was Freight Dumbronkowski
who provided the answer. "I haven't seen his lady around in a while,
Coach. I think she left him."

Rusky turned his steely
eyes on Dumbronkowski. "You can just keep your opinions to yourself,
Freight. You're still not out of trouble for that last stunt you pulled."

"Jen was in labor,
Coach—" Marion began defensively.

"And you walked out
in the middle of the game," Coach Rusky reminded him incredulously.
"I looked up to see ten men on the field instead of the eleven I sent in.
I see you running out of the stadium—in uniform. And I see the other team score
a touchdown."

Marion tried to look
ashamed and failed miserably.

"How is your new
daughter, anyway?" Rusky demanded reluctantly.

Marion smiled joyfully and
pulled out a picture.

Farther down on the bench,
Joe relived that last night with Mattie again.

Mattie stepped from the
car and took a deep, satisfied breath. She was home, she thought with a shining
contentment. Home to Joe. Her eyes studied the ranch house quietly as Rags bound
out of the car behind her. Mattie started up the front steps and Rags followed
friskily.

When her knock produced no
answer, Mattie turned to sweep her gaze over the land surrounding the house.
Joe would be out on the ranch somewhere. She knew that the door wasn't
locked—it never was. But she decided to wait for him on the porch, absorbing the
crisp beauty of the February day. She would wait now for what she had waited
for her whole life.

Mattie pulled herself up
on the porch rail, drawing her legs up to rest her arms on her knees. Her eyes
remained steady on the horizon as if she could see Joe just beyond. Rags danced
around the front yard, clearly delighted with

the space and clean air
surrounding him. Mattie watched indulgently for a while, then allowed her
attention to drift.

She returned to Joe a
whole person. She had known that even before Jim Wright's confirmation two days
ago.

After two months of
searching through the past for that part of herself that Frank Bowers had
taken, Mattie was almost ready to return to Joe. There was only one thing she
needed to do first. With a firm grip on her newfound serenity, she made an
appointment to see Dr. James Wright.

The appointment was
scheduled for early afternoon, and the bright winter sun bathed Mattie in its
glow as she faced Jim Wright. He regarded her with a well-subdued wonder,
taking in the radiant calm she exuded.

"You're not what I
expected," he told her frankly.

Mattie smiled wryly.
"Me, either," she told him with stark honesty. "I've changed
since Joe came to see you, grown."

Jim studied her
cautiously. "He told you about that?"

Mattie nodded, her eyes
loving as she thought of Joe. "He told me."

"You know," Jim
began solemnly, "in my work, I've managed to help a lot of people come to
terms with themselves, to find a semblance of peace. Sometimes, I can't do
that. Sometimes, a patient can't find that peace even with my help. And
sometimes," he finished deliberately, "very rare ones will find it
all by themselves... as you have."

Mattie shook her head.
"Not by myself, doctor. Joe Ryan gets the credit for this. I would have
been too afraid to try without him. Too frightened of what I would have
found."

"Have you told Joe
this?"

"I'm on my way to him
now."

Jim met her eyes bluntly.
"Why are you here now?"

For the first time
Mattie's eyes avoid his. "I... I guess I just wanted to be sure that what I've
found is real."

Jim nodded with calm
understanding. "Tell me what you've found," he invited easily.

Mattie needed no further
encouragement. She was almost bursting with the hard-won knowledge she had
acquired.

"I learned that all
those ghosts I went back to Port Arthur to wrestle with weren't there. I
learned that they were inside of me, that I had carried them with me all these
years like a millstone around my soul. Once I accepted that..." Her voice
drifted off, her eyes briefly unfocused.

Jim leaned forward, his
eyes intent. "Once you accepted that... ?" he prompted.

Mattie met his eyes
squarely. "Once I let them go, I was free. Free of the past, free for the
future. What happened to me will always be a part of me, but not the biggest
part. I have a whole life to live, and I intend to live it to the fullest,
without fear, without the past coloring the future."

Jim nodded with deep
satisfaction. "Yes."

Mattie regarded him
quietly. "It's really that simple?"

"It always was,
Mattie," Jim promised her calmly. "But that wasn't the hardest thing
for you to accept, was it?"

Mattie was a little
nonplussed by his perception. "No," she conceded. "I figured
that part out the first week I was gone. It was... something else that held me
back."

"And have you figured
out... something else?"

"It's love," she
told him flatly. "I've been so terrified of that word. All my life I've
associated it with loss and pain and... degradation. My parents ioved' me, but
they left me. My foster father 'loved' me, but he hurt me. When Joe came into
my life, when he showed me that other kind of love, a good kind of love, I was
so—confused. I didn't understand. .."

''Didn't understand what,
Mattie?''

"I didn't understand
that there is only one kind of love," she told him slowly. "The good
kind. All the rest is make-believe, unreal. Love isn't the word people use.
It's the emotion behind it. It's what I feel for Joe."

And Mattie, lost in the
memory of that discovery, didn't notice that Rags had wandered off.

Joe gave the wrench one
more tight turn, then cursed a blue streak when it slipped and crushed his
thumb against the engine he was working on.

In the two months since
Mattie had gone, he had lost more weight than he could afford to and it showed.
He looked haggard, tired, and all the joy had gone from his eyes. He felt
emptier than he had ever felt in his entire life, as if the happiness Mattie
brought to him had simply made more room for the despair when she had gone. She
had taken the biggest part of him with her. He wondered if she knew that and if
he would ever get it back.

Two months since he had
held her, touched her, loved her, he thought achingly. Two months of fear and
pain and sadness. Two months of searching and hoping and dying a little inside
each day. Two months without Mattie—

Joe was so lost in his
despairing thoughts that he didn't even hear the barking at first. When it
finally did register, he thought nothing of it. There were several working dogs
on the ranch. Only when Rags danced joyously into sight, scampering up to him
to tug on the leg of his jeans, Joe allowed himself to hope.

"Rags?" Joe's
voice was thick and disbelieving.

The dog stared up at him
with the comically endearing expression that had so captured Mattie's heart.

Mattie....

Joe bent slowly, reaching
out to touch Rags awkwardly.

"Did Mattie bring you
here?" he asked, stunned. "Is Mattie... home?"

Rags barked once in answer
as he recognized Mattie's name.

Joe threw the wrench
aside. "Take me to Mattie, Rags," he urged intently. "Take me home
to Mattie."

Rags turned and trotted
off happily, heading toward the house. Joe could almost believe the puppy
understood the urgent yearning in his tone. His heart pounded louder in his
ears with every step he took. Pounded for Mattie.

Joe froze as the house
came into sight, his form hidden in the shadow of a towering evergreen. Mattie
was there. Curled up on the porch railing, with her back propped against the
corner column.

Rags ran on ahead, unaware
of the fierce tide of emotion that seemed to cripple Joe who remained just out
of sight. Mattie hopped off the railing and went down the steps to meet her
errant companion, and Joe could hear her sweet, scolding voice as she playfully
berated the puppy.

"Where have you been,
young man? Leaving me alone like that! Why, what if a six-foot squirrel had
come along and attacked me? They grow 'em big here in Texas, you know. Who
would have protected me then?"

"I ran off the last
of the six-foot squirrels. You're in no danger here."

Joe's husky voice brought
Mattie's head up sharply. She had not heard him crossing the yard while she was
playing with Rags.

Her lips formed Joe's
name, but no sound emerged. Their eyes held for long seconds, a wary joy in
each, before the contact was broken to allow a wider perusal.

Mattie noted Joe's weight
loss, her eyes taking in the thrust of his hip bones through his jeans. He
looked like he had been driving himself for weeks without rest. New lines

scored beside an
unfamiliar grim mouth, and his eyes looked weary.

Joe saw the new confidence
Mattie carried with her, the resolution and strength in her suddenly serene
gaze. If Joe had lost part of himself, it seemed that Mattie had found a part.
He felt a physical pain at the thought that she had done so without him.

"You look
beautiful."

Mattie smiled slightly at
the husky words and rose from her knees awkwardly. "So do you."

Joe gave a disbelieving
snort. "I look like hell."

Mattie's smile trembled at
the edges. "Besides from that," she amended.

Neither seemed to know
what to say after that, and they stood there in a strained silence. Mattie
thought of all that lay ahead of her, of everything she had to tell him, but
the words wouldn't seem to come.

A bitter wind blew up and
Mattie shivered slightly, galvanizing Joe into action.

"You're cold,"
he said protectively. "You should have gone on inside the house. The door
isn't locked." He gestured for her to climb the steps, careful not to get
too close to her.

"I wanted to wait out
here," Mattie told him quietly. "I wanted to see you coming
home."

Joe said nothing as he
held the door for her to enter the house.

Mattie stopped dead in her
tracks when she reached the doorway in the living room. Joe almost ran into her
from behind, but Mattie barely noticed, her eyes riveted to the tree they had
decorated for Christmas over two months ago.

She looked at him in
silent demand, and Joe shifted restlessly before moving into the room.

"The tree's still
up," Mattie pointed out needlessly, her mind churning with questions.

Joe was silent for a long
time before he answered, his eyes on the tree. "In memory of a beautiful
Christmas Eve."

They were both silent
then, remembering that night and what had followed. For Mattie it was the
memory of triumph over her dark past. For Joe it was a stinging condemnation of
a bitter present.

"So," she tried
a little desperately, "you're a full-time rancher now, huh? You really
retired from football?"

"Yeah," Joe
confirmed quietly, his eyes fixed intently on her from across the room.
"We kept it quiet until after the Superbowl. I announced it after they
gave us our rings."