One hour and four cups of strong coffee later, Kid still sat at the kitchen table. Now both elbows rested on the table and his pain ridden head rested in the palms of both hands. He kept his eyes closed to block even the dim light of the oil lamp. His tongue felt thick and harry. He wanted desperately to sleep, but Clem wanted answers and was oblivious to his multiple ailments.
"You sober now?" Clem asked, the snarl gone, but the authority still very much present in her voice.
"Yeah," Kid croaked but kept his head stead in his hands..
"What do you mean they broke him?"
"I mean they beat or stole the spirit right outta him. You saw him," Kid said, his words finding clarity in his anger. "Complacent is what he was. 'Oh, Kid, it'll all be over soon,' and 'what kind of planning.' He can't see beyond the moment, Clem. He don't even know there is a tomorrow," Kid added, his voice and speech still thick, but his words coherent and void of any self pity
This time it was Clem's chin that began to quiver, but she took in a deep breath and forced a stoic and practical, no nonsense attitude.
Kid didn't see her expression. He didn't raise his head from his hands. But he heard the conviction in her voice and when he spoke again, his words were cold and void of emotion.
"Prison does one of three things to a man...It either turns him to a cold, hard stone, it makes him complacent...or kills him trying to accomplish one of the other two...Anyway you look at it, you ain't the same man coming out as you were going in."
Clem stared at Kid for a long time. With his head still in his hands, all she could see were the curls on his head, but she suddenly realized just how much Kid too, was struggling and why he had turned to the bottle of whiskey. Kid had been broken, perhaps in ways different from Heyes but still broken. And that made saving Heyes all the more difficult, the challenge all the more insurmountable. She reached out and very gently stroked her fingers through those dirty blonde curls.
"Kid, as long as Heyes is in prison, we can't undo whatever they have done to him. But we can work at putting him back together once he's here. Now I can't do that alone, and you can't do it at all if you're just gonna sit there and drown your sorrows in whiskey every night. We got to get you mended too. You understand?"
Kid didn't reply, but he did listen to her words. Slowly, Kid lifted his head from his hands and equally slowly his pain-filled eyes raised to meet the compassionate, yet determined eyes of woman sitting next to him. In an instant she was up, standing next to him, his face buried in her breast, his head cradled in his arms as he sobbed.
Clem held him close for as long as he was in need. Then slowly she pushed him back away from her and rested her hands on his shoulders as tear stained blue eyes stayed fixed and focused on her face.
"Now I don't know what happened to you or Heyes in that prison for five years, and maybe I shouldn't ever know. But I do know Heyes, and I do know you, and I know that the two of you together can accomplish the insurmountable... Don't wallow in what's happened, Kid...Figure out a way to fix it."
Kid nodded and wiped his nose with the back of his hand as he sat even further back in the chair and Clem's arms dropped to her sides.
"So what do you suggest?" Kid asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Clem sat back down and rested her hands on her knees.
"Right now I suggest we both go to bed and sleep. In the morning, we start making our own plans. And when we visit Heyes next week, we start getting him involved. We make him start thinking and planning. We show him that there is a future. Maybe, if we're lucky, by the time he gets out, we'll have helped you both build a foundation, and from there the two of you can start putting all the pieces back together."
Kid was sober enough to hear every word she said and slowly his head began to nod and a conviction began to take seed.
"Now I have never in my life known you to back down from anyone or anything, and you're not gonna start backing down now. Heyes needs you, Kid and God knows you need him."
"I need you too, Clem," Kid said with honest sincerity.
Clem smiled. "Kid, that's what the world is all about. We're all just traveling this earth, searching for the people we need...You and me, Kid...We can do this."
"You're right. We can. We can help him, we can help the both of us."
"Maybe help all three of us in the end...Now get your ass off to bed. We got work to do tomorrow."
Kid did exactly as she said and lumbered off to his room while Clem went out to the porch and brought the whiskey bottle inside. With Kid tucked safely away in his room, Clem held the bottle to her mouth and took a generous swig before pushing the cork into the bottle and putting the bottle back on the shelf.
"God, don't leave us now," she muttered aloud to herself.
0-0-0-0-0-
The next morning Kid again slept late and when he did awaken, he was greeted with a horrific hangover. Having not had any alcohol in five years, and failing to consider that when he drank last night, this was the hangover of all hangovers and even the creaking of the bed springs was a harsh an annoying irritant.
Kid changed his shirt and made his way into the main room where Clem had a fresh pot of hot coffee on the stove.
"You alright?" Clem asked as she watched Kid pour himself a cup of coffee before sitting down at the table beside her.
Kid nodded. "I'm sorry, Clem. I shouldn't have done that last night. I shouldn't have put you through all that."
Clem wasn't going to absolve Kid from what he had done, but neither was she going to dwell on it.
"Do you remember what all we talked about last night?"
Kid took a sip of the coffee. "I think so. The gist of it anyway. We gotta throw Heyes a rope so he can pull himself out of that hole."
"Kid, what you were saying last night about Heyes being so complacent..."
"You know Heyes, Clem and that's not him. That brain of his is always working, always planning, always figuring everything out. He's always searching for a way to get the upper hand. But that wasn't the Heyes I saw yesterday."
Clem nodded. As Kid explained it now, she came to understand what Kid saw and how he came to those conclusions. Kid saw things in Heyes that she hadn't noticed until she looked at things in retrospect now.
"He's very lucky to have you, Kid. Someone who cares that much about him."
Kid tried to make light of Clem's words and he chuckled. "Someone who cares so much he'd drink himself into a stupor?"
Clem met Kid's eyes. "Yeah, that much."
Kid took a sip of his coffee and leaned back against the sink as he looked at Clem with an admiration he was beginning to better understand.
"I'm lucky to have you, Clem. Not mincing any words to get me back on the straight and narrow. I can't say last night was the best night I ever spent with you, but it was likely the most important one."
"Did I ever tell you how much I love you, Kid?"
Even with the hangover, Kid grinned. "You're certainly showing me now."
They were both quiet for a moment. Then Clem cleared her throat and straightened herself in her chair, thus bringing an end to their moment of insight.
"Well, we might as well start planning this out. Heyes has what, ten more weeks in prison?"
Kid nodded and moved to the table and sat down across from her.
"Then we should start out slow, give him something to be thinking about, to be planning that has to do with once he gets out, like... maybe a job?"
"That might be kind of hard. I doubt he gets a weekly newspaper so it would be hard for him to find some kind of job."
Clem bit her bottom lip as she thought of possibilities. "Kid, you said some wealthy friend of yours is covering your expenses right now, right?"
"Uh-uh."
Maybe Heyes could plan a trip for the two of you to go see that friend, you know, to thank him for all he's doing."
"Except we have to stay in Wyoming and he lives outside of Wyoming."
"Does Heyes know you have to stay in Wyoming?"
Kid nodded. "The probation was part of the plea bargain."
"Oh," Clem said with a bit of disappointment.
But a moment later her eyes brightened and a sly smile spread across her face.
"Wait a minute, planning a trip to see your beneficiary and knowing about the probation requirement would make Heyes have to think a bit...outside the law, you know, thinking a way around the probation rule. You said he's always been good at that, and it might trigger a little, I don't know, deceptive attitude...a little secretiveness toward the prison guards."
Kid nodded and smiled. "Exactly the thing to make Heyes feel like he's holding the winning hand!"
"And every week we'll expect him to have come up with a solution to the problem we gave him the week before, and then we'll present him with a new problem to figure out for the next week."
"Start getting the gears working in his head again."
"Yes, thinking for himself again."
"So by the time he walks out of that prison, we might have the old Heyes back."
Clem smiled. "We just might."
"Clem," Kid said with confident smile. "I'm beginning to think Heyes ain't the only one with a brilliant mind."