The Crazy Horse Electric Game (21 page)

Inside, Willie's heart is broken, but he doesn't show—takes himself away like Sammy taught him—because he doesn't want to make things worse. “I understand that,” he says. “Is there anything I can do? Anything you need from me?”

Big Will shakes his head.

Willie reaches into his pocket and pulls out a sealed, crumpled envelope that Lacey gave him just before he got on the bus. “Don' you go readin' this,” Lacey had said. “Jus' give it to you daddy.”

“Guy I stayed with in Oakland wanted me to deliver this to you,” Willie said. “I haven't read it.”

Big Will opens the envelope, reads the short note with no visible reaction and lays it in front of Willie. “Black guy, huh?”

Willie nods. “Yeah.” He reads the note:

Willie smiles at the thought of Lacey composing the letter exactly the way he talks, leaving out all the emotion, writing tough and to the point.

They talk awhile longer; Willie tells how he got himself back together physically and his dad seems interested, even mildly impressed. He tells Willie he did a hell of a job. After they eat, Willie walks his dad back to the motel and says he'll see him again.

He calls Johnny's house to let them know where he is and that he's already had dinner, so not to hold anything for him. Then he rides the bike over to Jenny's. Might as well get it all out of the way today.

Jenny's mom welcomes him with a big hug and tells him how the whole town is so glad he's okay and that he looks good, much better than anyone would have expected, and offers him three kinds of dessert. Willie respectfully declines and asks Jenny if she'll go for a walk with him.

On the street, he apologizes again for not contacting anyone, but holds his ground: he just couldn't.

“Do you know what I've been through this last year and a half?” Jenny asks. “Thinking I drove you out; that I killed you?”

“It must've been bad.”

“Yeah,” she says sarcastically. “It must've been. Willie, why couldn't you have just called? Sent a card? Anything.”

He starts to explain his one feeble attempt in the Portland terminal, but stops. “Look, Jen, I didn't, okay? There's nothing I can do about that now. I'm not going to spend our time together answering questions that don't have answers. You guys act like you're the only ones that got hurt in all this; like I've been holed up in some California country club laughing at the great joke I played. Everybody's hurt, okay? Now we can either find a way to bury it and go from here or we can leave it like it is. Either way, at least you know I'm not dead, so you couldn't have killed me.”

He tries to force the anger down, but it's like an anvil on his chest. He closes his eyes, like Sammy taught him, and forces the anvil up; he softens. “Look, you should be happy. There's no more guilt. I'm okay, maybe better than ever. You did what you had to do and
so did I. Hell, I knew you'd have to start seeing someone else; I was a
troll
. I just needed you to be honest about it and there was no way you could. If it had been reversed, I'd have done the same thing you did.”

Jenny stops in the middle of the sidewalk. The evening sun shines off her face and lights her hair and Willie remembers how much he loved her once. “Willie, I can't talk about this now. I'm too hurt and too angry and too confused. I don't even know how I feel. If I talked now, it would just be gibberish and I wouldn't mean what I say.”

 

Early Sunday morning Willie straps all his belongings to the back of the Shadow and says goodbye to Johnny Rivers. It isn't time. He loves Montana. He loves the freedom, the wilderness; but he feels crippled here; like he did before he left. They all know where to find him, he left the address of OMLC. He and Johnny hug, promise to meet. He's let everyone know he'll be back.

He rides the bike slowly to his old house, walks up to the door and knocks. A woman, who must be Mrs. Miller, answers the door in her robe. She has been cooking breakfast for her family.

“Excuse me,” he says, “I'm really sorry to bother
you, but my name's Willie Weaver and my sister died in this house a long time ago. I wonder if you could just let me see her room. I'm leaving.”

The woman doesn't question him, only stands aside, saying, “Of course,” looking to her husband reading the morning paper in his easy chair, lifting a finger to her lips at him.

Willie walks through the living room and stands in the doorway to what was Missy's room when he was twelve. There's a crib there, and a baby; a beautiful, round baby with most of its fist crammed into its mouth, breathing easily, like Missy wasn't the day she died. He walks over and puts his hand softly on the baby's head, then down on its open hand. The baby instinctively squeezes his finger and Willie cries.

“Her name's Melinda.” Mrs. Miller's soft voice comes from behind him, and Willie says, “Melinda,” without turning around. He takes a deep breath, fighting to hold the tears until he can get outside. “She's beautiful,” he says. “Thank you.”

Outside, he gets on the Shadow and without looking back heads south for Oakland.