The Cedar Tree (Love Is Not Enough) (2 page)

For a while, he hoped something the preacher said would make sense of the weird sensation he'd had for the past several days this whole thing had happened to someone else. Someone he didn't know. The words remained meaningless.

He turned his gaze back to the casket, studying the ornate brass fittings on the side-rails. At least Darlene wouldn't be heavy for him and the other guys to carry. Now, if it had been
him
stretched out in a box he would've made them all grunt. He grinned a little, but his grin slowly faded. His gaze fixed.

Why hadn't it been him?

Shifting uneasily, he looked up at the preacher again, his soft hands clasping and unclasping as he talked. The man's image disappeared in a sudden vivid recollection of his grandfather's lanky frame behind a wooden pulpit, his work hardened hands gripping the edges of it while his booming voice filled a crowded room.

He hadn't seen his grandfather since his childhood, but Gene Howard wouldn't have preached a funeral like that. If it had been him speaking of Jesus and heaven, his words would have rolled through the room with the certainty of thunder…and he would have known the deceased's name.

At the cemetery, the sun in the deep blue of spring sky made the pallbearers sweat, but he had been right—Darlene didn't make any of them grunt when they lifted her casket to the stand over her grave. And her father did take it hard. The tough little man stood alone and bawled like a baby.

Standing on the spongy, emerald turf in the line of pallbearers, hats in hands, Gil shifted his boots and turned his eyes away from Darlene's father. When the minister said 'amen,' he turned and walked away.

He drove to Don's trailer to change clothes. In the bathroom, Darlene's beer bottle had cracked the mirror all the way across, but none of the glass had fallen from the frame. The crack distorted his reflection so one of his eyes looked higher than the other as he carefully probed the cut on the side of his face. He ripped open the snaps of his white shirt and shrugged out of it. Then he turned on the tap to splash water over his face and head. He braced his hands on the counter and stood with his hair dripping in his eyes and into the sink.

Finally, he reached for a towel and dried his hair, raising his gaze to his reflection. Sun-browned, lean-jawed face and dark lashed gaze reminded him of his father, but the anguish in his eyes as he really looked into them for the first time…completely unfamiliar.

Ain't one drunk in the family enough, Gil?

He stared at himself as the sheriff's words rolled through his thoughts. He hadn't felt the need since he'd been a kid, but…maybe he needed to talk to somebody.

He tossed away the towel and gathered his shaving gear from the counter beside the sink. Finding his duffel bag under the couch that had been doubling as his bed, he stuffed the rest of his belongings into it. He slung it over his shoulder then hesitated at the door. Probably he should leave a note for Don. He shrugged.

Hoisting his saddle with one hand and his guitar case with the other, he left without a backward glance.

***

Heat reflected from the sun-lit bricks of the convenience store on the highway where a wiry-haired yellow mongrel trotted in a businesslike way along the sidewalk. The dog stopped suddenly to lift its leg on the phonebook dangling from a chain beneath the payphone then flopped down, panting, in the small patch of shade to the north of the phone.

Gil approached, digging in his pocket for a quarter. "Beat it, mutt."

He dialed his sister, Dee. The phone rang twenty times while the dog sat up, ears cocked with every appearance of interest.

"I don't think she's home, Pooch." He leaned over and scratched the mongrel behind the ear.

"Hey, Gilberto! Is that you, man?"

He turned at the shout then grinned widely, hung up the receiver, and stepped off the curb. "Armando! Hey,
como estás
, dude?"

Armando's brown face stretched with a wide, white grin. "I am always doing good."

He approached Armando's car. Eyeing the glossy shine of metallic flaked gold paint, polished tires and a small Mexican flag fluttering from the radio antennae, he whistled. "How'd you score this nice ride, dude?"

Armando's grin widened and his black eyes danced with laughter. "I am the Mexican National boss of all those illegals out at the farm of potatoes."

He laughed. "How's that goin'?"

"They love me, man." Armando threw back his head, roaring with laughter. "What you doing now? Still riding those bucking horses?"

He shook his head, sobering a little. "Naw. Came off one last summer and blew out my knee." He shrugged. "Just been doin' this and that. Playin' my guitar at the bar mostly."

"Aw, man. You ain' even going to be able to play ball at the college no more, neither?"

"Naw," he said with a wry grin. "They pulled the plug on me before that ever happened."

"Aw, man. You was a good hitter, too. Going to the playoffs and everything, you know? So you going to work for your ol' man out at the ranch for the res' of your life, now?"

He swore and gave a derisive snort. "Hardly."

Armando studied him for a moment. "Uncle Antonio heading back to Mexico pretty soon since he los' his job with you ol' man."

"I wondered what he'd do. Poor ol' dude. He's been with Dad since we came to Idaho. Seventeen years, I guess."

Armando nodded. "He tell me once only reason he stay after your ol' man start drinking so much is because of you an' Dee. An' your mama." His gaze sharpened. "He tol' me the bank selling your ol' man out."

He stared at Armando. "Sellin' him out?"

"You didn' know?"

He stood silent for a moment. "Haven't been home in a while." He changed the subject. "How's Maria?"

Armando's good-natured eyes became wary. "She doing good." He paused. "Why you want to know?"

He shrugged. "I might come see her sometime if she won't shoot me."

Armando smiled. "She migh' not shoot you, but I don' know if I really wan' you seeing her, man, you know? We grow up together and everything, an' I like you, but…you a little crazy when you drinking, you know?" He paused. "Like that one time, remember? Taking that sign down like that? That guy could have drown when he wen' in the river, you know?" He grinned. "Besides, she married, now, man."

He stared at Armando. "Married? She ain't even eighteen yet, is she?"

Armando shrugged. "Mexican girls grow up fas'."

"Who'd she marry?"

Armando flexed his stocky shoulders. "Big guy. Mean. Jealous." He grinned. "Very jealous, this man."

He tried to grin. "Got it, Armando. I won't try to see Maria."

***

The bass from Armando's car speakers boomed, still audible for a block after he pulled away from the convenience store. Gil stood on the curb looking thoughtfully after him until the sound faded away then he headed for his pickup. The sun gleamed on its shining, midnight blue paint, striking sparks of light from the chrome grill guard and wheels. He slid in and stomped down on the accelerator, pulling onto the highway toward the ranch with a gratifying roar of exhaust pipes.

He took a dip from the tobacco can on the seat beside him and groped for an empty beer can on the floorboard to spit in. An hour later, he had left the dry hills as the road climbed toward the foothills where the ranch his folks had built from nothing spread across a thousand acres.

He should have thought about marrying Maria like she wanted. Armando's younger sister had grown into one of the most beautiful girls he had ever known, but beneath her quick temper she had a tender, sympathetic heart—one of the few girls he had ever known who thought about something besides her hair and shoes. She really knew him, too, and he had always been able to talk to her. Heaving a sigh, he spit in his can. He should have treated her better the last time he'd seen her.

It had been hot that day almost a year ago. Dust had billowed from behind her old car on the graveled road until she slammed on the brakes.

She had glared across the seat at him, her black eyes flashing. "I ain' no trashy wetback girl looking for no green card. I though' you care abou' me, but you don' care about nothing. Get out."

He had looked out at the dry grey hills shimmering in a heat haze in dismay. "Right here?"

"Righ' here." The more agitated she got, the thicker her accent got. "Jhew drink too much and jhew don' got no feelings. Jhew ain' never gon' have no feelings. Only feelings jhew got is in jhore pants."

"C'mon, Maria, settle down. It's five miles to town—"

"Maybe you see if you got feelings in your feet. Get out."

He hadn't been mad when he slowly got out of her car and slammed the door, but the last thing she yelled out the window made him mad and he hadn't gone back to make up with her like he should have.

"This too bad for you, Gilberto." It sounded like Hilberto when she said it. "We coulda made a lotta babies, had a happy life, but maybe you gon' end up jus' like your papa…"

The big sign at the turn onto the gravel road to the ranch interrupted his thoughts. He stopped his truck in the road, staring disbelievingly at the sign reading, Ranch Auction Saturday, with an arrow pointing north. The auction notice almost obscured the faded sign reading, H Bar Ranch—Registered Roping Horses and Angus Bulls.

His stomach twisted. Armando had been right—his father really had managed to lose the place. Swearing, he jerked off his hat and drove his fist down on the steering wheel. He sat staring, and then he gunned the motor, leaving the pavement for the gravel road with a squeal of tires.

At the ranch, the evening breeze blew through the wide doors at either end of the log barn his father, Roy Howard, had built. Gil pulled his pickup into the breezeway and to the end stall. He shut off the motor and stepped out. Visible through the big double doors, his father worked a big buckskin gelding in the breaking pen outside the barn.

Jaw tight, he worked his wad of chewing tobacco, narrowing his gaze on his father and the horse. The whites of the gelding's eyes stared and the muscles beneath his glossy hide bunched with effort as he struggled to keep his balance against the deep sand of the pen and the conflicting cues of the man on his back. His father moved easily with the horse, as much an extension of the big animal beneath him as always, but his hands pulled heavily at the horse's foaming mouth as he jerked him in meaningless circles.

He spit contemptuously on the ground. If he tried to intervene with his father this drunk, it'd just be worse for the horse.

Turning away, he yanked open the half door of the stall, entering the dim space smelling of dust, horse sweat, leather, and saddle oil. Nails full of bridles, halters, ropes and saddle straps covered the length of one wall and he passed along it separating his gear from his father's, flinging each piece into a pile on the floor as he went. When he had it all gathered, he carried it to his pickup and heaved it all into the back. He headed back for his saddles and the metal box with his horseshoeing tools then he stood looking around the familiar space for the last time before he turned away.

He drove around to the ranch house where his mother, Irene, sat on the top porch step, her unruly black curls loose on her shoulders. Her white blouse looked too big for her, and her sandaled feet peeked from under one of what his father always called her 'hippy' skirts. The skirt swirled around her in a riot of design, and the whole thing created the impression of a forlorn little girl dressed in her mother's clothes.

He parked then removed his hat and flung it onto the seat beside him, ran his hand over his hair, and stepped out to spit his wad of chew onto the ground.

He stopped at the foot of the steps. His mother raised her dark blue eyes with their heavy fringe of lashes without any of her usual attempt at cheerfulness. The hopeless look in her gaze hurt him.

"I'm sorry, Mama."

She reached for his hand, pulling him down beside her on the step.

He slid his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to rest her head on his shoulder. "What're you gonna do now?"

She sniffed and wiped at tears dripping silently onto their hands. "I'm still working at the travel agency in town, so I guess we'll move into the apartment."

His mother, desperate for money his father couldn't drink, had taken the job at the travel agency in town a few years before. Too far distant for her to drive every night, she and Dee had lived in a small apartment during the week until Dee moved away to work at a veterinarian clinic in northern Idaho.

He stared out across the lawn. Once the color of an emerald and mowed smooth, it now sported a straggly growth of drooping dandelions and parched bluegrass in spite of the rush of irrigation water in the ditch at the edge of the yard. The flowerbeds next to the porch, once a profusion of color, grew only weeds now.

His mother cleared her throat. "Gil, the sheriff was out here a while ago." She paused. "He said you were in a wreck with Darlene Carpenter and she was killed."

He sat motionless. "That why he came out?"

She sighed. "No. He came to tell your dad not to give any trouble at the auction Saturday, but he's…concerned about you." She paused. "Is it true about Darlene?"

He shrugged and turned loose of her hand to lean his elbows on his knees. "Yeah."

"He said her blood alcohol level was way over the limit and that you'd had too much, too. He seemed to think you could have prevented the whole thing."

He didn't look at her.

"Could you have prevented it, Gil?"

"Probably."

Roy's Australian shepherd, Spud, bounded around the corner of the house. The dog spotted him and launched himself. While he held the dog's enthusiastic onslaught at arm's distance, he scratched Spud's grey ears and rolled him around at his feet, but he didn't smile.

"Did you…care about her at all?" his mother asked.

He picked up a stick from the flowerbed and flung it across the yard, his gaze on the dog racing after it. "No."

She burst into tears. He turned to her.