JR pulls the curtain back on his balcony door, watching John Ross pack another load of Elena's belongings into his truck. He can see all the way from here that John Ross is miles away. The way his son keeps a distance from that poor girl when she comes close looks so familiar to JR. He knows John Ross is counting the minutes before he can install Elena somewhere, excuse himself with an aching back or whatever else and go off to meet whomever he really wants to be with tonight. As if on cue, John Ross checks his cell phone out by the truck when Elena walks back inside. JR can't help but chuckle.
He closes the curtain on the charade below and sits down at the mahogany desk in the corner of his room. The desk is so small he can touch both ends by extending his arms. No. This won't do. How long should he wait to take over Bobby's office downstairs? Maybe he'll announce that at Sunday dinner. JR smiles at the thought.
His eyes drift to a framed photo of Miss Ellie sitting between him and Bobby on the patio, her arms around both, fingers clutching the sides of their necks as if trying to keep them with her forever. A wave of guilt passes over him.
"Oh come on now, Mama. Don't look at me like that," JR says to the picture. "I'm only claiming my rightful place in the family. Well, reclaiming it," he says and turns the photo away from him on the desk. "Bobby doesn't care about such things, never has," JR continues, trying to convince his mother's picture and himself that his intentions are good.
A loud knock on his bedroom door startles him.
"Yeah?" JR says.
John Ross opens the door and looks around the room. "Who you talkin' to, Daddy?"
"Myself," JR says. "I'm nuts, remember?"
"Right. Crazy like a fox," John Ross says.
He tosses a set of keys on JR's desk. "Here. Elena's keys to the cottage," he says and turns to go.
"Wait a minute, John Ross," JR says. "Sit down for a minute. Have a drink with me."
John Ross sighs and shakes his head. "Dad, not now. I'm moving Elena and she'd rather go sooner than later. Can't say I blame her."
John Ross walks to the bedroom door. JR puts the bourbon bottle down.
"Son, turn that girl loose today. Don't let her go on thinking you love her when we both know you don't."
John Ross stops in his tracks. He turns to face JR, expressionless.
"What?" he says.
JR tilts his head. "You heard me, son."
"What I heard was you giving me relationship advice. Do you hear how ridiculous that is?" John Ross says.
JR smiles. "John Ross, what's ridiculous is how long it's taken me to learn that chasing tail is a waste of time. You should set yourself to looking for the one that hangs the moon for you. Until you find her, remember that above all, women want to know the truth, no matter how much it hurts at that moment. They want to know the truth. And they deserve to know it, son, a lot more than we do. We are liars, cheats and scoundrels."
John Ross laughs, JR does not.
"And women?" John Ross asks.
JR smiles softly. "Women are God's finest creation. They're lovers and mothers, unless we push them into a blind fury with our bad deeds. Then they become bent and twisted versions of what they were really meant to be."
John Ross stares at his dad, a puzzled look on his face. He sits on the corner of JR's bed.
"Dad, did you have a small stroke or something?"
"A stroke of genius, maybe. Too bad it's 30 years too late. I told your mother hundreds of lies and every one of them chipped away at her love for me until it was all gone. And there comes a day, John Ross, when you can't get it back."
This time it's JR who turns his back on John Ross.
"Well….," John Ross says, fumbling for words. "You should tell her. You're preachin' about truth telling, so tell it. Tell her you still love her."
"She doesn't want to hear that from me, John Ross."
"How do you know that?"
"Because I just do, that's how. Besides, it's not that simple. You can't just level a field after you've plowed it season after season," JR says.
"What does that even mean, Dad? If you love her, tell her. What more to it is there?"
For once, JR has no answer. A horn blasts several times outside. John Ross looks out the window to see Elena standing next to his truck, her arm inside the cab. She honks the horn several more times when she spots him looking out JR's window.
"I gotta go, Daddy. Grow a pair and tell Mama whatever you need to. You're a Ewing, aren't you?" he says and slaps his Dad on the back on his way out.
The bedroom feels empty after John Ross leaves. His words hang in the air and JR sits alone with them in a bright ray of light from the mid-morning sun. He picks up his cell and scrolls to Sue Ellen's name in the contact list, trying to think of a clever line to invite her to lunch. After a few moments, he puts the phone away.
"Come on, you old fool. What's the matter with you?" he says to himself in the mirror. "You're JR Ewing and you go after what you want. So saddle up."
He changes into a creme linen suit, beige button down shirt, dons a chocolate brushed suede Stetson with a spotted feather braid and heads to Sue Ellen's office.
Elena's face is flushed with heat by the time she and John Ross finish unloading his truck of her belongings. The lake front condo he leased for her is more spacious than the Southfork cottage and the view so beautiful that it eases Elena's disappointment at not being asked to move in with him a little. She sighs deeply and grabs two cold bottles of beer from the refrigerator.
"Come on babe, let's relax with these on the deck now," she says, holding one beer out to John Ross who stands in the middle of boxes stacked halfway up the living room wall.
John Ross glances at his watch.
"What? You got somewhere to be?" Elena says, teasing him.
"No, no just a habit, that's all. Damn. I'm worn out," he says and slowly follows her out to the teak deck overlooking White Rock Lake.
They sit in reclining deck chairs in silence as the sun begins to hide behind the tall, fragrant pine trees, casting shadows of branches across them like long crooked fingers. John Ross thinks the shadows look like twisted jail cell bars.
"You okay, John Ross?" Elena asks after a few moments.
"Huh? Yeah. Yeah I'm fine. Just wiped out is all."
"You seem a million miles away," she says. "What are you thinking about?"
John Ross sighs. "Nothing."
Elena rolls her eyes.
"Well…..just some bullshit my Daddy said. Some more Ewing code bullshit. Same as usual, just dramatics," he says.
Elena knows better than to press for more. "Well, I'm just glad the drama skipped a generation," she says with an unsure smile.
John Ross continues staring at the lake.
"Elena, you're a good girl. You know I want you to be happy, right?"
Elena looks at him in alarm, "Yes?" she says.
John Ross stays quiet.
"John Ross?…Is that it? That's all you're gonna say?"
"Yeah, that's it," he says flatly. "Look, my back's killing me. I'm gonna go on home," he says while standing up.
"Well….wait….let me help you. Rest here. I'll give you a massage," Elena says, her voice high pitched with desperation.
"No. I…..left my muscle relaxers at home. I need to go take one of those and just knock out for the night," John Ross says. He kisses her on the cheek and walks down the deck stairs to his truck, never looking back.
Elena watches him go. He is not walking stiffly. She touches the cheek he quickly kissed and her eyes begin to water. Why does it feel like she'll never see him again?
John Ross sits in his shiny black truck parked on Clover Street in the middle of the artists' district just outside downtown Dallas. He watches the apartment on the corner of the yellow building's third floor for any sign of Maxine, just as he has for the past two days since Bum got her address from reverse phone number research. John Ross changes stations from country to acid jazz on his satellite radio, something that's become part of his 'surveillance' routine but he's unsure why. He's never listened to that kind of music before.
He closes his eyes for just a minute and lets the hypnotic rhythm take him into orbit. When he opens them, Maxine is walking down her building's porch steps wheeling a laundry basket behind her. John Ross sits straight up in his seat and removes his dark designer sunglasses. Today Maxine wears pink flip flops, cut off jeans and a white cotton tunic. Her hair is covered by a bright pink and orange head scarf tied into intricate knots high up on her head. She has earbuds in her ears and looks to be singing along to the music. Across the street, John Ross' heartbeat quickens and he's sure it's not just from watching that wondrous, tight ass move up and down with each step she takes.
He follows her, driving slowly behind traffic all the way down her block. He laughs nervously, like a teenage boy awkward around girls. Maxine walks so gracefully, like music in motion. She waits for a second at the traffic light for the cross signal as John Ross waits for the green light too, one car between them. He likes that she does not jaywalk. Seconds later they both move forward. She enters a laundromat halfway down the next block and John Ross pulls over to the opposite curb, rolling under the shade of a giant oak tree. He catches a glimpse of himself in his rearview mirror, smiling from ear to ear.
He watches other people going about their daily errands in the neighborhood while regularly checking the laundromat entrance for Maxine. Everyone is dressed casually here, wearing flip flops, tennis shoes or no shoes at all. A lot of cyclists pass by John Ross' truck with fabric shopping bags or long loaves of bread in their bike baskets. A man with long dreadlocks plays drums under the awning of a coffee shop across the street. John Ross opens his tinted window to listen. While bobbing his head to the beats, he notices the other cars passing by on the block, none of which are similar to his professionally waxed, extended cab truck with Italian chrome rims. A lot of older sedans drive past, along with several classic VW buses chugging with age. Several guys that look older than John Ross ride by on skateboards while gripping blank canvasses.
Two thuds on his truck bed cover make John Ross jump. His driver's side view mirror shows Maxine quickly walking up from behind.
"What you doin' here, Ewing?" she shouts in his face.
John Ross leans back from her and puts his sunglasses on. "Who are you?" he says.
"Please," Maxine says. "That's just sad. I'm the girl whose place you been parked outside of for the last two days. Now, you better tell me what in hell you doin' before I call the police on your stalking ass," she says and produces a switchblade.
"Whoa, shit! Calm down ninja! Alright, alright. I…..I just want to talk to you, that's all," he says. "No need to slit my throat over it."
Maxine flicks the blade open and closed over and over without saying anything. John Ross doesn't even look at it. Behind his dark glasses his eyes are taking in every inch of her beautiful face. This is the closest he's been to her. Her skin is like velvet mocha, her big hazel eyes pop with colors of the sea and her thick, pouty lips are so dewy and perfect he wants to bite them on the spot.
"Well I don't want to talk to you," she finally says.
"Why? Why not?" John Ross says. "We can just be friends, you know, hang out. You just seem…..cool, different - "
"Yeah? Well you seem rude and an asshole. Not interested," she says and starts walking away.
"Wait! Come on, Maxine. You don't even know me," he says.
She stops and turns around. "I know what I saw at your Mama's house. How you barged on in and spoke to her like she was the hired help, there to serve you. That's your mother you're talking to. She gave you life and if I were her, I'd be second guessing that decision. You're a rude and spoiled man. What would I want with you?"
John Ross is speechless. This is not how things of this nature usually proceed and he has no experience with this kind of talk, or this kind of woman.
"I'm…..I'm sorry," he simply says.
"Watchoo tellin' me for? I ain't your Mama," Maxine says and shakes her head.
"I know. But….I'm just sorry anyway. And I still want to be friends with you," he says.
"It ain't always about what you want, Ewing 7," she calls out to him as she looks at his license plate while walking back to the laundromat.
At that moment, John Ross wants nothing more than to sit beside Maxine waiting for her clothes to dry. He decides to take the first step toward getting there, starts his truck and drives to Sue Ellen's office.
"Who was that?" Maxine's friend asks in the laundromat while folding her clothes.
"Just some rich white boy looking for chocolate candy, is all that was," Maxine says.
"Oh hammercy. He must not know who he dealin' with!" the friend says. Both girls laugh long and hard.