Wishmakers (24 page)

“Are you all right?”

“Noooo—I'll ne-ver be all ri-ght again.” Was the clicking sound she heard her teeth chattering? It was no wonder she couldn't talk.

“If you'd have dressed decently you wouldn't be so cold,” he said unfeelingly. “How about you, hotshot? Are you cold too?” He lifted the helmet off Peter's head and placed it on the seat of the cycle.

“Naw…that was
fun!
I'm goin' to get me a motorcycle when I grow up.”

“Heaven forbid,” Gloria muttered.

“Gloria! Is that you?” A short, plump woman in a royal-blue jogging suit flung open the screen door. The metal sign, OFFICE, clanged when it slammed shut.

“What's left of me, Aunt Ethel.”

“Land-a-Goshen'! What happened? What are you doin' with Jack? Oh, never mind, you're here, that's what matters. I thought you'd be bigger, but you ain't no bigger than when I saw you last. I figured you was about thirteen then.” She talked in a steady stream as she wrapped her arms around Gloria. Her twinkling eyes looked down. “This is Peter?
Eeekkk
…,” she squealed. “I thought you were a baby, but you're almost as big as your ma. Come give Aunt Ethel a kiss.”

“I got a puppy,” he announced as soon as he had kissed the smooth cheek. “See!” He pulled the squirming ball of brown fur out of the front of his jacket. “I think he's got to pee-pee. Do you like dogs? Can I put him down?”

“Oh, Peter,” Gloria groaned.

“Course I like dogs. Land sakes! Put him down. You can't expect such a little fellow to hold it forever.” She took the puppy and sat him down on a grassy patch beside the drive. “Watch that he don't go to the woods,” she cautioned. Then, “Hi, Jack.”

“Hello, Ethel. Is this the new help you were expecting?”

“Aunt Ethel, I'm freezing.”

“Well, I should think so. What in the world were you doin' on that cycle? Where's your clothes? Where's your car? C'mon in. I'll swear, I wasn't lookin' for you to come ridin' in with Jack.”

“Her car's down at the rest area, Ethel. Give me the keys to your pickup and I'll go pull it in.”

“Way down there? Heavens! What's it doin' there? No wonder you're cold, if n you rode that cycle all the way up here.”

“I…had car trouble. It's got a U-Haul hooked on behind it. Aunt Ethel, I don't think he can—”

“Is there anyone here who can go with me?” Jack asked, ignoring Gloria's protest and looking at Ethel.

“Gary's out back working on his rig; he'll go with you. C'mon in, Gloria. Ain't no sense you standing out here freezing. Jack'll take care of your car.” Ethel opened the door and motioned her inside. Jack followed Ethel, looming over her five-foot figure;
He looks more than ever like a caveman,
Gloria thought.

“The keys are on the desk, Jack. When you and Gary get back, c'mon in for supper.”

Gloria stood hugging herself, trying not to shiver. Her eyes went from her aunt to the black-bearded man and back again; her little gray-haired aunt seemed to be perfectly at ease with him. He walked across the room and then went outside without a word or a glance at her. She heard him say something to Peter, and she started for the door just as her son came in holding the puppy.

“We'll have to find a box and make him a bed, and teach him what he can do and what he can't,” Ethel said. “We'll lay out some papers too. We don't want him to get in the habit of piddlin' on the floor.”

“Oh, Aunt Ethel! I didn't realize how much trouble the dog would be,” Gloria said apologetically.

“Ain't no trouble.” Ethel's eyes sparkled vividly. “All boys ought'a have a dog to take care of. Why, Peter an' that pup'll liven this ol' place up considerably.”

“No doubt,” Gloria said with a worried frown. She and Peter followed her into the living quarters behind the office. Ethel went through a door and was back almost instantly.

“Here. Put on this old bathrobe. Land sakes, didn't you know that just as soon as the sun goes down it gets colder than the bottom of a well out here?”

“I didn't, but I certainly do now.” Gloria slipped into the worn flannel robe that was too short for her, and belted it tightly around her waist.

The room was small, but warm and cozy. An oval braided rug covered most of the floor. A couch with a freshly washed slipcover and pillows stood on one side of a cobblestone fireplace, and a rocking chair on the other. The walls were lined with paintings of Western scenes. Gloria moved over to peer at the one over the fireplace.

“Don't look too close,” Ethel said with a merry laugh. “I'm one of those paint-by-number artists. I love doin' it, and it passes the time during the winter when things slow up around here.”

“You're kidding,” Gloria exclaimed. “They're beautiful.”

“My, my.” Ethel shook her head. “I just can't get over that you're here. And of all the times we've talked on the phone I pictured you as bigger than what you are; why, a good wind from the north would blow you clear to Mexico.” She turned on a lamp beside the rocker. “Here, sit down and tell me about the trip. I swear, it was a shock to see you come ridin' in on that cycle with Jack. It's a good thing he come along, though. Traffic slows to almost nothin' in the late evenin'.”

Gloria sat down and Peter came to lean against her knee. “We had a good time driving out, didn't we, Peter? Our only problem was when we stopped at the rest area down the road. The car had started to heat up; I guess it was from pulling the trailer.” She told her aunt about the two hoodlums, downplaying the seriousness of the encounter because Peter was listening with rapt attention.

“They stomped on our car, but Jack come and beat 'em up. He hit 'em.” Peter put the dog in Gloria's lap and demonstrated as he talked. “He hit 'em to the ground and he said, ‘Get the hell out—’”

“Peter! Watch what you're saying. Little boys don't use words like that.”

“That's what Jack said. He said—”

“Never mind.” The dog began to whine. Gloria lifted her eyes to the ceiling in a gesture of silent suffering.

Ethel laughed and pointed toward the swinging doors. “Honey, there's a clothes basket in that room behind the kitchen and a stack of old towels on the washer. Fix that pup a bed. He's tired and wants to sleep.”

After Peter left, Ethel sank down on the couch. “He took to Jack, seems like.”

“He's had so little male companionship that he takes to anyone who gives him a little attention. As I told you on the phone, Marvin's name is on his adoption papers, but he's never been a father figure. Peter doesn't even think of him as his father. He seldom speaks of him, and when he does he refers to him as ‘he.’”

Ethel clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and shook her head sadly. “If that ain't the limit! What's the world comin' to? Oh, well…you and Peter are here now. I never had a chick of my own. George and I just rammed around in the Oklahoma oil fields most all our married life. He loved workin' on the oil rigs; he did it until his hands were so crippled up with arthritis that he couldn't do it anymore. Then we sunk our nest egg in this here motel and campground. Two, three years after we come here he had his heart attack and was gone.” She paused. “My, my, I miss him. Sometimes I get so low my tail's draggin' in the mud. Then I think of what George said a few days before he died: ‘Ethel,’ he said, ‘if anythin’ happens to me, you take the bit in yore teeth and stay right here. This here's a good place for you. The folks like you, and them truckers think yore a jim-dandy.' You know, George was right. Oh, I don't mean about the truckers likin' me, I mean that this is a good place for me. I've got a lot of friends that come and go and keep tabs on me, and I like doin' for 'em.” Ethel's bright-blue eyes glinted and her round face broke into a smile. “Now, after all these years, I got me a family too.”

“How come you and Dad never kept in touch with each other, Aunt Ethel?”

“George and I used to go back East once in a while. The last time we was back, you was just a young sprout. I think your mother kind of resented the affection me and Ernest had for each other, so…” Her voice trailed away. “How is Ernest?”

“He's fine. He retired from the bakery two years ago. Now he's working part time at a self-service gas station. He had so much time on his hands that he didn't know what to do with himself.”

“I can understand it. If you got any gumption a-tall you'll keep on a doin' somethin', anythin', till you drop dead, else you'll wither on the vine. Well…did you burn your bridges behind you when you pulled up to come out here?”

“Yes, I did, Aunt Ethel. Maybe it was foolish. I should have come out and stayed awhile before we moved in on you lock, stock, and barrel. Peter and I may be too much for you.”

“You and Peter won't be too much for me,” Ethel said staunchly. “My worry is that being a city girl, you'll get tired of being stuck out here in the boonies. We're more than twenty miles from town. Sometimes, after a heavy snowfall, it's days before the highway gets plowed out.”

“I won't mind that. I like to read and to sew, but I've told you that before.” Gloria smiled warmly at her aunt. “During the last few years our talks on the phone helped me to keep my sanity. You always said things that made perfectly good sense. Aunt Ethel, I feel closer to you than I do to my mother, father, or any of my brothers and sisters.” She frowned. “I never told them about any of my problems with Marvin. They thought I had made a good ‘catch’ and that I was crazy when I left him.”

“Dear child, you only get one time around in this life, and it ain't all downhill in the shade. Just because you've made a mistake, God doesn't expect you to live with it and be miserable for the rest of your life. George always said, ‘Do what you want to do as long as it don't hurt anybody else. It won't make any difference a hundred years from now, anyway.’” She bounded off the couch. “I'd better look at the casserole. And I might ought to add more lettuce to the salad. I hadn't planned on feeding Jack. He's a lot of man to fill up.”

Gloria followed her to the kitchen. “Who is he, Aunt Ethel? I didn't want to tell you in front of Peter, but he flew into those two hoodlums like a whirlwind and sent one of them off with a broken arm.”

Ethel chuckled. “He's Jack Evans. He lives up north of us four or five miles in an old ghost town. He's fixed himself up a little place up there. It takes a lot to get Jack riled, but when he is—watch out. He's all right, and he's no dummy.”

“Maybe not,” Gloria said dryly. “But he sure looks like one. I was just as scared of him as I was of the other two. Why would a man want to look like that?”

“Oh, you mean the beard?” she asked with a twinkle in her eye. “Maybe it keeps him warm in the winter.”

“This isn't winter. And I didn't mean only the beard. I mean the long hair, the sleeveless shirt, the tattoo on his arm, and that stupid motorcycle. Right away I thought he was a member of the Hell's Angels gang.”

Ethel shot her niece a look of amusement. “Jack's all right.” She put on two oven mitts and lifted the large pan out of the oven. “While we were working the oil fields, I learned not to judge a man by what was on the outside. Some of those greasy, shaggy-headed ol' boys were just as sweet as could be, honest as the day is long, and would give you the shirt off their backs. Then, sometimes we'd run into a dressed-up dandy who was all pretty and smelled nice, and find out that he was so crooked he'd have to be screwed into the ground when he died.” She lifted the foil off the pan and put it back in the oven. “I hope you like lasagna.”

“Peter and I love it. Aunt Ethel—how many people do you usually cook dinner for?”

“All the way from four to eight. I got started giving them supper when George and I discovered that's why people didn't stop here. People's got to stop where they can eat. The truckers will give me a call on the CB and let me know that they'll be here. I have regulars that stop on their way out and on their way back. I get a few salesmen, and some tourists in the summer. A few backpackers and tenters come in once in a while.”

“I'm so glad you asked us to come out. This is the perfect time, before we have to move on to find a place for Peter to go to school.”

“There's a good community school only ten miles up the road. Ain't no reason to cut your stay short for that. The school bus will pick him up.”

“
Only
ten miles! Oh, Aunt Ethel, he'll be five years old! I couldn't possibly put him on a bus to travel ten miles to school every day.”

“Don't worry about it now.” Ethel took a stack of plates from the cabinet and carried them to the long table at the end of the kitchen. “You've got a whole year before your chick has to go out to meet the world.”

“Come look, Mom. Come look at the bed I made for Cisco.” Peter came into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand.

Gloria went to him. “You're tired, honey. I bet Aunt Ethel could find you a little something to eat so you can go to bed.”

“I wanna wait till Jack comes back. I'm not tired, Mom. Honest.”

“I want to show you your room before Jack gets back with your things.” Ethel came and took his hand. “C'mon. We'll go back to the front office. I had a connecting door put in. You and your mom will be in unit one.”

“Aunt Ethel! Are we taking up one of your paying units? I thought you had two bedrooms in your living quarters. We'll be using a unit you can rent out.”

“Land sakes! Quit your frettin'. You need a place where you can spread your things out and make yourself at home. I've nine other units, and they're hardly ever full. If one of my regulars comes and we're full up, he can sleep on the couch.”

She opened the door into a spacious room. There was a large double bed at one end with a rose-colored satin spread, and a twin bed at the other with a spread splashed with bright comic-book characters. Along one wall was a double chest, and in the corner a single. A warm beige carpet covered the floor. Ethel pranced in, turned on the light, and opened the door to the dressing room that also served as closet. Off this room was the bathroom.

Peter began to open the empty drawers and to play with the three-way lamp beside his bed.

“It isn't fancy,” Ethel said lamely, as if she were seeing it through Gloria's eyes.