After Randall left, the dinner fell into an uncomfortable silence. Lureen paid without even a glance at Ennis. He was grateful, didn't have the money, but felt mighty awkward about it. He hadn't come to Texas for money. Bobby already feared that, and Ennis didn't want to make it so even unintentionally. His mind started a tally, and he would have to find a way to pay back Lureen.

The car ride back to the house was even quieter. Lureen broke the silence at last. Ennis had learned she was not one to skirt emotional issues. "Sorry again 'bout that. Didn't have any intention of you meetin' him."

"Ma'am." It was all Ennis could think to say, the only words his mouth would produce amid a whirlwind of thoughts he'd rather not be having, and wondering whether Randall would make good on his promise and come back sometime when Lureen wasn't around. Probably—seemed a man of action. He couldn't go using Lureen's presence to protect himself, though. Randall was a big fellow, but nothing Ennis couldn't handle. Physically, anyway.

The car pulled up and Ennis pulled his over-stuffed frame out of the passenger seat, hoping every meal was not going to be as overdone as that one. Bobby moved with a purpose towards the door, mumbling something about homework, Lureen and Ennis following. Bobby disappeared down the clean white hallway where his bedroom was. Ennis watched the boy walk, his stride fluid and strong like his daddy's, but different somehow, more erect.

His thoughts were penetrated by Lureen's smooth voice behind him. "Guest room's right over here." She led him through a door. "There're towels in the linen closet." She pointed to a hallway door. "You know where the bathroom is."

"Yes, ma'am." Ennis floundered in the guest bedroom, which was done in peaches and florals, expensive paintings of the desert on the wall, expensive desk lamp, expensive carved wooden furniture, and an alarm clock complete with a tape player. He felt like a coyote at a dog show.

"I gotta go ta work in the mornin'. Help yourself ta whatever. Just relax tomorrow I guess. 'Less you got business in town?"

"No, ma'am, no business."

"Suit yourself. Can stay as long as ya like, but I gotta be at work." She turned to leave, her hair leaving a chemical breeze behind her.

"Ma'am?" Ennis interrupted her stride and she turned back towards him. "Can I… I mean, are Jack's remains far from here?" He didn't mean for his voice to crack as he said it, but there were a lot of things Ennis thought of as Jack's remains, and none of them were ashes. Spit, semen, littered cigarette butts, whiskey bottles, the way he would just throw his underwear in any old direction in the tent, the way he didn't eat the fatty bits of meat like he was too good for them, the bits of Jack that were left after Ennis was done tearing his man to pieces. Now, the ashes too.

"Couple miles. Can go over ta the mausoleum tomorrow night if ya want."

Ennis nodded, though he had no intention of taking her up on that. If he was going to visit Jack, he was going to do it alone, the way he'd been doing for twenty years. Two miles wasn't too far to go after twelve hundred.

Before settling to bed, Ennis took a beer out of the fridge and stepped back onto the deck. Before long he found his feet tracing their way down the deck stairs. The yard wasn't too big by Wyoming standards, but it had a three-car garage, maybe a couple acres of land, a woodpile, a grill shinier than anything Ennis had seen but looking completely unused, and a large half-built shed. Ennis wandered over to the shed. He figured Jack had to be in the process of building it, since the work looked like it'd been stopped mid-stride and not continued, long enough for a hammer lying outside by a sawhorse to get rusty where it joined the wood. The edges where Jack joined the world were rusting over too soon.

The inside was in the process of being toe-nailed. The sun had long ago set, but the roof was unfinished, and a clear shaft of full moonlight illuminated the room. A little makeshift table of ply wood and cinder blocks held a couple books on building outdoor structures. That was Jack-- needing a book to do something he'd probably done ten times as a kid but had lost the knack of in his life as a salesman. The top book was simply on shed-building. It had some notes in the margins as well: lists of supplies, timelines, phone numbers of lumber yards, swear words. Ennis ran a cool finger across the familiar scrawl, hard to see by the dim light, and lifted the top book to see the one underneath it.

It was similar, a guide to building, though the title read Building Your Own Cabin. This weren't no cabin. It was large for a shed, but just a shed. Ennis started at the back, flipping through its pages too. There were a couple notes, not many, places where soil types were underlined or drawings in the book had been drawn over, designs changed. Ennis shrugged, thinking nothing of it, until he got to a page that was blank, right before a new chapter, and the notes there were copious, written in every direction like the names at the back of the yearbooks of the kids as had been able to afford them in high school. "Bet he doesn't like ceiling fans," one said. "Be nice to have the woodpile accessible from the inside and outside." "He won't wanna spring for a dishwasher."

Ennis felt red heat moving up to his face. That's what this was. Jack had been planning a cabin with this Randall. Ennis's stomach clenched, his hands gripped the edges of the book tightly, and he managed to heft it, light as it was, and hurl it against one unfinished wall. A thick paper fluttered on its own breeze from inside the front cover and fell to the floor.

Kicking himself for wanting to know, screwing up his mouth to keep from yelling at Jack within earshot of his wife and child, Ennis crossed the shed in a couple steps and picked up the paper. Tears were already in his eyes, red hot tears of rage, his mouth set firmly against them, when he unfolded the paper, but the moonlit shed wasn't bright enough to read it. Telling himself he'd better take it outside anyway in case the clenching in his stomach turned to something more, Ennis swept back out into the cool Texas air. Holding it up to the moon, he could just make it out. They were blueprints alright, and in Jack's handwriting too. One room was labeled "our room" and the feeling in Ennis's gut twisted to become more painful.

Like watching a train wreck, the last consequences of the killing he'd done to Jack himself, he examined those Jack-and-Randall house plans as well as he could, holding them at arm's length in the paleness. One room had the fireplace on one side and a kitchen and front door on the other, with a table in the middle. Meager compared to Jack's current—former—current but former—living conditions. The one side of the room led to a hallway with a bathroom and the "our room." All of that was done in dark blue pen and clear to read.

On the other side of the big room, though, and only in pencil, was another hallway, harder to see in the moonlight. Squinting through angry tears, Ennis could make out two rooms off that hallway. One said "Bobby's room." Yeah, right, Jack stupid shithead Twist thinks him and his burly-man lover are going to get custody of Bobby. The other room was labeled too, in that scrawl of Jack's, and the words there underlined. They took a minute to sink in all the way, all the way to the pit of his stomach and further. "The girls," they said. Ennis lost his expensive steak dinner right there by the shed.


The sun screamed through his East-facing window, alerting Ennis that he'd overslept. The house was empty. A note on the kitchen table let him know that Lureen had left for work and Bobby for school, and that Lureen wasn't likely to be home until after dinner, but Bobby'd be home by four o'clock. Ennis wondered whether Lureen had even meant what she'd said about the mausoleum if she was going to be working so late. Maybe she'd forgot. It didn't matter. What was clear to Ennis was that the four-mile-round-trip had no better time to start itself than right now.

He dressed in the shirt he'd worn the day before, planning on a shower after he finished this. He wasn't even sure why he was doing it. He didn't really want to see some fancy room where Jack's name was inscribed next to that asshole father-in-law of his, some sort of venerable "John C. Twist" for people to spit on. He didn't want to see it because he knew Jack wouldn't have wanted it.

But that's why he had to go. He didn't know what he believed concerning death and God's judgment, but in case any kind of spirit of Jack was left in this space, he deserved to know he wasn't alone, wasn't relegated to an eternity next to L.D. Newsome without someone thinking on what a towering shame it was. Ennis had to apologize to Jack for the world, 'cause there wasn't no way the world would be apologizing for itself anytime soon.

The walk went quickly and warmed Ennis through. Somehow it felt right to be moving his feet towards Jack, but it was like Bobby had said and too late. Still, he felt so sure that no one else had done this. No one else had visited Jack since he'd been put here, just like Lureen had lied about tonight. There was no one else.

The mausoleum loomed across the graveyard, an ornate building with marble and columns and not at all anything like the Jack he'd fell in love with—cat piss and uneven strokes with the ax. The word, love, fell off his mind's tongue without a hitch, and Ennis fished through a pocket for a cigarette. There was no need to lie anymore, since there was no one left to lie about.

He started and finished the cigarette outside the mausoleum steps. Finally he bridged that last gap. The inside was cool, but much larger than he'd expected.

He underwent probably an hour of wandering up and down aisles of little drawers of ashes before he saw the first familiar name: Irene Claudette Newsome. As he kept walking, he saw Newsome after Newsome. Charles Robert Newsome. Sandra Newsome Baker & Lawrence Baker. Marianne & David Newsome. Loren David Newsome. John Charles Twist, Jr.

Ennis staggered, feeling like he'd been punched from somewhere inside. He clamped his jaw against rising bile and wished with all his might he hadn't come. Wished he hadn't even come to Texas. He could not see this.

Surprising even himself, his voice croaked "Jack" before he clamped his jaw again, something moving uncomfortably inside of him. He'd had to come because no one else would.

Except someone had. There was a little shelf above the row of names, mostly empty, but one card stood out. It was a simple white card, folded so it would stand. The front said, in no uncertain terms, "Jack."

Ennis knew he shouldn't look. Jack probably would have been annoyed, but it was never Jack he was afraid of, and it would have been that kind of annoyed where maybe a smile broke behind his eyes, and he would have said something like, "del Mar, why you takin' a sudden interest in my business?" Ennis would have chuckled and said something like, "Twist, I been interested in your business longer than's good for me."

Ennis leaned his head back, straining his neck and ears in all directions before reaching for the note. He'd come to Texas to share some of Jack's life, he told himself. Truth was he was just being a nosey son of a bitch, and he knew it, but no one was around watching, so. He snatched the card quickly and plucked it open.

Jack—Boy, I miss you right hard, but I gotta get out of town. Nothing left here for me anyway. You hold tight for me, ya know I love you. – Randall

Ennis felt his vision redden reading those words he'd never shared with Jack right there on a queer card in the public mausoleum. He guessed Randall didn't have anything left to hide in Childress, but Ennis thought maybe Randall didn't have a right to leave anything. You hold tight for me. Like hell. Ennis slammed the card back down on the shelf, balled his fists and walked right back to the mausoleum door. His hand was on the handle, fisted and white-knuckled, when he spotted the little table.

He'd seen it when he came in—a little table with a stack of white cards and a fancy pen. That's what they were for, he knew. This is what people did. He couldn't let Randall have the last word, he knew that much, though he didn't have a clue what to say. It didn't matter, though, 'cause he was through with walking away from Jack, wasn't he? He put pen to card and scrawled out:

You asshole. – Ennis

He balled that one up and threw it in a little trash can, set there also for that purpose. Ennis imagined countless, nameless people writing countless little white cards at this table. He imagined widows trying to fight out some words, and wondered how many of them has started with "you asshole." He doubted he was the first. He picked up another card and gave it a second shot.

Bud look at this I'm in Texas. Your boy he talks like a freight train sometimes. Saw them plans. You know I am... Just wait on me, Jack. – Ennis

Nope. It was too queer. He couldn't have that sentence hanging around the mausoleum for everyone to read. He didn't throw this one away, though, but tucked it into a pocket, and started a third:

Jack I'm here. Miss you bud. Jack if you was here I got some things to say to you. Miss you. – Ennis

Well, Ennis was not about to give it a fourth try. He wondered if he should have just stuck with the first. Jack probably would have laughed at it. Jack wouldn't laugh at this last one, it was too serious. Ennis frowned at it. It didn't say anything, but just like the toothpaste, if Jack could have read it, he would know what it meant. Ennis decided not to worry about it any more, walking back to the Newsome section and tucking his card in behind Randall's where he didn't think it had any chance of being seen. It wasn't for anyone but Jack.

He pressed his worn fingertips against the cool marble of "John Charles Twist, Jr.", then shoved off from it and turned to head back to Lureen's without hesitation. He knew somehow that no one, especially not Jack, was around here to read his card. He wondered if that meant there was no such thing as hell.


He arrived back in the late morning and decided to make himself useful. The garage was open, and he started by firing up the lawn tractor. The grass looked long and the tractor started easy. He mowed for a couple hours until he'd exhausted its tank and an extra tank of gas he'd found in the garage. By then his stomach was complaining so he went in for a late lunch.

He found some ham, cheese, and mustard in the fridge. Pairing it with the bread he found in the pantry and another cold beer, Ennis took his lunch on the back porch. He must have fallen asleep there, though, because next he knew the glass door was opening, and Bobby Twist was smiling down at him again.

"What you lookin' so perky about?" Ennis was surprised that he'd asked that, but he was starting to think of Bobby as something akin to family, and he spared no words on his own daughters, since he had no other means of spoiling them.

Bobby's grin widened. "I got a B on my reading exam."

"No kidding?" Ennis remembered Jack had said something about Bobby having trouble reading.

"Yup! That's the highest grade I got in reading. You want another beer?"

"No'm fine."

"K. I think I got a higher grade 'cause it was an interesting story."

"That so?"

"Yeah. It was about these kids on a desert island. There were some gross parts and stuff. It was pretty neat."

Ennis eyed Bobby groggily. He seemed years younger than he'd seemed yesterday. This Bobby was better, Ennis thought, considering his own experience of growing up too soon from his own parents' deaths.

"You know I'm gonna have my driver's license soon?"

How did that boy switch topics so fast? "Yeah?"

"Yup! Say, what do you want for dinner?"

"You cook?"

"Some. I only know how to make a couple things, but I think I make them pretty well."

"Well, what's your favorite?"

Bobby frowned. "Oodles of noodles, I guess."

"Oodleswhat?"

"Oodles of noodles. It's a kind of soup that comes in a block and only takes a couple minutes."

It sounded crazy to Ennis. Who heard of soup coming in a block? Maybe he meant a box, like back on Brokeback. Ennis just nodded. "That sounds fine."

Bobby was smiling at Ennis when his face suddenly fell and those eight years came piling back on. Ennis turned to look where Bobby was looking over his shoulder, and there was Randall Malone, sauntering across the yard towards the back of the house.

"Bobby, maybe you should go on inside." Bobby wasn't his son, true, but Ennis felt a responsibility to keep Jack's boy from all manner unpleasantness, and this was likely to turn out to be that, but Bobby didn't move, only standing straighter.

Ennis stood, feeling achy in all his bones. Today had been enough for him. He was tired and this was the last thing he wanted to do, still haunted by that card in the mausoleum and feeling like he had no right to hit someone who loved Jack, though feeling the desire to with every bone in his hand.

"Can I help you?" Ennis squeezed out around clenched lips, descending the stairs to meet Randall head-on in the yard, in full sight of Bobby and the shed and God above.

To his surprise, Randall didn't start with fists flying, or any such thing, just a simple "del Mar," with a head nod. After a pause, Randall added, "think we need to talk."

Ennis surprised himself as he scolded Bobby over his shoulder, a fierce growl of "Bobby, I told you ta go inside." He was pleased when he got a sudden, harried "yessir" and heard the glass door open and close. If one thing was worse than having Bobby watch him fight Randall, it would be having Bobby watch him talk with Randall. They only had one subject to talk about, but Bobby shouldn't be hearing it.

Ennis's voice was still growling and clenched when he hissed "What the fuck you want?"

Despite the growling, though, Randall seemed to uncoil a bit, looking plenty tired himself, like Ennis felt. "Just wanted ta tell you—I'm leaving town right after this. I went to the cemetery today. Saw your card."

That did not make Ennis any too happy, but in the silence that followed that sentence, Ennis moaned, "Yeah, and?"

"I just… I guess I think it was a pretty nice thing, del Mar. I… look I'm sorry 'bout the restaurant last night, but I been puttin' up with, well, with more'n I can handle. Meetin' you… look, I'll just speak plain. Jack never said anything about you, but I knew about you alright. I know you must not have wanted Jack, 'cause he sure as hell wanted you. Makes me mad to know he couldn't be mine. You had the best fuckin' thing in the world del Mar, and that is the love of Jack Twist. I wanted that more'n anything, and you had it, but you didn't want it."

You didn't want it. The words were too familiar, and both stung deeply and seeped in slowly, like a cold, blowing rain. Ennis couldn't say anything to defend himself, and he didn't feel a need to defend himself to Randall regardless. Still, Randall's words rang mostly of comfort. They told Ennis what that piece of paper, "the girls" still glowing in his mind like the hot embers of a fire, had told him. Finally, Ennis nodded.

He didn't think Randall took it in the way he meant it, though, 'cause Randall continued. "del Mar, can you imagine how it is ta be in love with someone that won't love you back?" Ennis had to shake his head 'no' to that question. He'd been loved back alright; His chief problem in life was that everyone kept on loving him long after they should have given up.

"You imagine how it is," Ennis noticed Randall's eyes flashing to the porch, and seeing something that satisfied him, he lowered his voice and continued, "every time he comes, he announces it to another man?" Ennis's cheeks hardened and flushed. Jack always announced it. OhGod, Ennis, and he added some euphemism 'bout weapons or alcohol or the Fourth of July. Apparently, this little manta of Jack's that had become second nature for Ennis to hear during sex, so much so that more than once he'd softened to the sounds of Alma or Cassie coming with nothing but sighs and whimpers, apparently this was not a punch Jack pulled with Randall. Ennis couldn't figure out how he felt about that, but he did turn back to the porch and make sure Bobby was nowhere in sight. It seemed Randall'd had that foresight. Ennis had to wonder if Jack called his name out of habit, or maybe it was spite. Maybe Jack imagined Ennis could hear him.

Randall sighed, smiled a tight smile that didn't get anywhere near his eyes. "Just thought you comin' to Texas and all is somethin' Jack would want. Thought maybe you need to hear it. I can't say I don't want to slug you for just existing, but I can't blame you for falling in love with him. That, my friend, is called hypocrisy. Your card was really nice, I think. I'm movin' on, finding myself somewhere and someone new I reckon, but I get the feeling you ain't doin' the same. I'll leave Jack to you, then. That's what he'd want, anyway."

Randall turned to leave, but spun around once more. "Can I ask you a question, del Mar?"

Ennis wondered if Randall called everyone by the last name, or was it simply that Randall couldn't summon Jack's coital mantra to his lips? He nodded, looking at the grass.

"How long you two together? I know you met before I knew Jack, but how much a head start you got on me?"

"Met in '63."

"No shit. You together since then?"

Ennis shook his head, but not to say 'no' so much as to shake unpleasant memories out of his skull. He added simply "tried ta be, only way I knew how."

Randall seemed puzzled but satisfied. He nodded, adding a sad, "well I guess I never did have much of a chance then," before he turned his long strides and disappeared back to the front yard from whence he came.

Ennis stood where he was a long time, not knowing what to think or do, not sure he could go in to Bobby and try to explain or not explain what had happened outside with Randall. He thought about Jack's cabin plans and the stuff Randall had said. Without hardly thinking about it, his feet led him to the unfinished shed. He picked up the rusty hammer to finish what Jack started.