Jack expects a lot of trouble, when his smuggling empire collapses overnight and the care packages stop; but people go surprisingly easy on him. Maybe because of his cellmate's confirmation that Mac's stopped coming. Maybe because, for the first time in his life, he goes so dull that he can't even think up any jokes.
He spends most of his time daydreaming about Texas instead. Soft lapping waters, and wide open spaces. All a bit blurry, after decades of revisiting the same memories. He needs to go make some new ones.
"Hope I won't be seeing you again. No offense...you know, I still don't know your name," he says the last morning.
"That's fine, I don't remember yours."
Figures. "Got two candy bars left. Want 'em?"
"I'll take one."
They eat the chocolate together. Sweet, with a slightly sticky aftertaste. It'd go well with a good harsh whiskey, like the one he's going to treat himself to if Mac doesn't come.
"The guy'll show up," his cellmate says. "He promised you, didn't he?"
"Maybe he'll have forgotten about that."
"He didn't strike me as the type. Gotta hand it to him, that man was persistent."
"There's a niece for him to look after now," Jack says gloomily. "His whole life's gonna be wrapped up in her. There won't be any room for me."
"So get the niece to like you. Buy her another pack of candy bars, it should work just as well on little kids."
Jack sighs. "Doubt it'll be that easy..."
XXXXXXXXXXX
Mac shows up, though. Waves him into the jeep with a tired gesture.
"You look worse than I do." Not the first sentence he'd planned to say as a free man.
"Yeah. Well, stuff happens...mostly screwing up my life again, so no change there."
"Hey. Can't have been as bad as me, right? Or we'd just have been switching places, you in and me out."
That, at least, raises a chuckle; he'd been starting to wonder whether Mac remembered how. A certain cherished irritation (alas for his dreams of Texas) has immediately melted away at the sight of his friend, worn and wan and thinner than he should be.
"It's getting better now. Allison's estate is finally settled, the money's going into my bank account Monday. But- oh god, Jack, the things I've put Becky through since she got here. I'm still scared I'm not up to this."
"You love her. She loves you. It'll work out."
"Yeah, I'd like to think that, but- she's worrying me. Still won't cry for her parents, just putting on this brave little trooper act, and I don't know how to get through to her. I'm not...I mean, I wouldn't trust me either, in her shoes. Just about been keeping her fed and sheltered, but that's not the same as taking care of a kid- will you talk to her for me? I need to know if she wants to leave."
"Seriously?" Becky's doted on her uncle since she was old enough to toddle across a floor towards him, and Mac's always felt the same way.
"I don't think she'd be able to say it to my face. But she might tell you- she's always trusted you, all those dumb party tricks you amused her with when she was little."
"I went to a lot of trouble practicing those party tricks," Jack says loftily. "But- square with me, Mac, has it really been that bad while I was inside?"
"Well. I've got my fourteen-year old niece minding the store because I can't afford to lose any custom, the only vacation I've had in months is the day I took off to go poaching, and the only reason you're not walking the ten miles home is because Chuck was nice enough to let me borrow the jeep that I sold him three weeks ago. So yeah. Exactly that bad."
Jack looks around the lovingly maintained car, apple of Mac's eye. "Oh, hell."
"You said it, not me."
XXXXXXXXXXX
Becky's waiting on an elderly couple when they come in. Cooing over her precociousness, and comparing her to their own granddaughter. Mac makes an instinctive move for the counter; her glare and Jack's elbow in the ribs dissuade him, but he's visibly chafing.
"Sorry about that," he says, as soon as the customers have left. "I won't ask you to do that again, I promise."
"I did really well," she says, peeking in the tip jar. "And it was pretty fun, talking to people who aren't all my own age."
"Well, you can go do something actually fun now, enjoy yourself- huh. That is more than I'd expected."
"Girls always do better than boys," Becky says, very matter of fact. "Because Chris-" she stops for a thoughtful moment, then resumes as though she'd never stopped - "because Chris and I would always compare notes whenever we were selling school chocolates, or pens or anything, and I always sold more than he did. That's just how it is. C'mon, Unc? What if I just did Saturday mornings, when all the moms are out with their kids? I bet I'd make a lot."
"Becky, it's nice of you to offer," Mac says, looking very harassed, "but I'll take care of it. You don't have to do any of this stuff, I keep telling you that."
The look she gives her uncle makes Jack wonder if she's going to burst out crying, or run upstairs, or something dramatic- but she just sighs and glances imploringly at him.
"Will you please talk him into it? Please?"
"As though that'll work," Mac snorts, already deep into the receipt accounts. "Think I'm pretty wise to all your tricks by now, Jack."
Jack catches Becky's eye, and winks. "Since you're free, want to go outside for a walk?"
"No. Too cold. Though- I guess we could go egg hunting. At least that's one thing I get to do."
"Great. And maybe you can catch me up on the small town gossip. We'll leave your uncle here to get on with being busy all by himself."
Mac looks slightly hurt.
XXXXXXXXXXX
"He won't let me help," Becky says, listlessly fluffing up Posy's feathers (the hen accepts this with great philosophy). "There's all kinds of things I could do with the shop, and everything, but he just wants me to study and go play and whatever."
"Studying's pretty important," Jack says noncommittally, as he sets up against a comfortable fence post. That sounds like the kind of thing that gets said in these situations, doesn't it? Sure it is.
"I know it is, but- whenever I come up with something clever, he just ignores me. Last week I sold a quilt I made for fifty dollars, and he wouldn't let me do anything with it except put it in savings. I could be helping Saturdays in the shop, or even just a couple of hours after school, but it's just no this, and no that, and- does he even want me anymore?" Becky chokes. She scoops up the hen, cuddles it in her arms protectively.
"Of course he wants you to stay," Jack says, very gently. "Don't ever be in any doubt about that." (If Mac really is having second thoughts, that'll be his problem to explain.) "But he's a grown man, and you're still a kid, Mac thinks it's only fair for him to take care of you."
"None of this is fair! Mom and Dad and Chris, that wasn't fair! He's all I've got left, and I have to watch him having nightmares and skipping meals, and being so tired all the time, and if I lose him I don't know what I'll do!"
There's a look in her eyes that's appallingly familiar. Himself, even younger than Becky is now, displaced and homesick and needing one still point of happiness in a violently unfamiliar world-
"And you know you'll get through the rest of it," Jack murmurs, "as long as he's okay. If you can make him smile every morning, and chase off whatever's worrying him for a while, it's like chasing off your own demons too."
"Yeah," Becky says, catching her breath. "Exactly like that. How'd you know?"
"I'm not from Mission City either, you know. Texas first, then a stint in Wisconsin and finally I ended up here. Funny how Mac...huh." He trails off, not sure how to end it.
"You're an out of towner too?" Becky asks, hiccuping her way through a giggle. "And I thought I was the only one. Like a Tigger."
"We'll just have to be Tiggers together then, won't we?"
"Uncle Mac's right. You really are silly sometimes."
"Always was my speciality." Jack leans in, touches Posy's beak. "And how are we today, Mrs. Hen?"
The hen, predictably, clucks at him.
XXXXXXXXXXX
"Grief isn't all crying your eyes out, you know," he tells Mac later on. "Sometimes it's just throwing yourself so hard into something that you don't have time to be upset or scared anymore. Sorta like flying in that respect."
Mac looks unconvinced. "Everything is like flying to you. And the school psychologist told me-"
"Stuff the psychologist, I've been where she is now. All Becky wants is a chance to get to grips with life again. Let her stick her oar in every so often, look after you a bit, you'll have her smiling again in no time."
"That's tantamount to admitting I can't take care of her," Mac says. "And- oh, this shop isn't a good atmosphere for anyone. I don't want her to get used to it."
"You say that, because you hate it so much yourself. Might look different to a curious kid."
"Did it look different to you, Jack? Does it now?"
Jack musters up an hitherto unexpected reserve of patience. "Okay. No. But for one thing, I'm not your niece."
"Amazing deduction," Mac says, before going serious. "Jack, I saw what happened to my mother, after dad died. Working herself to death in this stupid shop- I'm not letting Becky do that."
"No," Jack says, eying his friend's exhausted pallor. "No, you're just going to do it yourself, aren't you? And then she'll really be alone. For the love of god, why'd you have to be so stubborn about accepting anybody's help?"
"You want something done right, do it yourself," Mac says firmly; but he'd flinched a little first, as if someone had hit him.
"Look," Jack says, enticingly. "You need a break, I need to do something that isn't prison routine. The ice rink's open now, right? Let Becky try her hand for another couple of hours, you can work off some of your frustrations by beating me to a jelly."
"That's hitting below the belt. You know me way too well," Mac says. "I was going to start dinner for Becky."
"I'll give you five minutes."
"I guess I can be out of here in two."
XXXXXXXXXXX
He always knows he loves it: but Mac never remembers just how good it is on the ice, until he's out and skating again. The swish of gliding metal, sharp awake air and breeze of passage, are the stuff of pure physical sensation rather than thought. Like what he's read about meditation- everything blotted out except the one ongoing moment.
They've been going at it for hours now, until they're the only skaters left, and Jack's still puffing away somehow. Poor pitiful Jack, not much of a goalie but even worse at scoring. He really shouldn't find it so damned satisfying, to demolish an opponent this terrible- but it never gets old. It just doesn't.
"Had enough yet?" he can't help taunting. "Or are you just gonna be a glutton for punishment?"
"Guess so," Jack says, panting his weary way across the ice. "See if I can't do better, if I'm not the one to cry uncle this time."
"You'll be out here all night," Mac says, skating a circle around him just for the hell of it. Easy enough to do tricks like this, when he's feeling light as air, light as wind, pleasantly warm with exertion. Heart thumping away unevenly, that's happened a few times now. He ignores it, wondering what it'll take to make Jack back down. Usually the man's more than happy to accede, after a few goes; where's all this determination coming from, the no-nonsense expression?
A flick of the puck, out of his control and into Jack's, for just so long as will justify a legal body checking (he has already done this four times tonight, but if the dupe keeps falling for it)- Mac slams into the smaller man, maybe with a touch too much aggression. Jack staggers, almost falls, but somehow recovers his balance, staggering off to lick his wounds.
So good, so flowing, so much light-
he's feeling practically weightless, now-
and Jack slides along the ice, slamming him back so hard as to send him flying, and it isn't the impact, he could handle the impact- it's just that he's run out of energy, and suddenly can't breathe anymore. He crumples downwards, just avoiding a spinout, every ounce of weight in his body pulling him downwards now. Still trying to grab a breath, but it's too heavy, everything's too heavy-
XXXXXXXXXXX
"Becky, is that you?"
"Who else would it be?" Becky says, much amused. "I know that you two like hockey, but three hours of it? Sheesh."
"I need help!" Jack wails into the phone. "I knocked into him on the ice, and he fell down and he won't let me call an ambulance-"
"We can't afford one," Becky says flatly. "Did he break anything?"
"I don't think so. But he's too woozy to skate or probably even walk, how do I even get him home? I can't carry him, I'm exhausted!"
Becky spends ten seconds being absolutely still. This isn't fair, this isn't fair at all, but it's on her. It's all on her now, and her sense of confidence surprises her.
"Did you at least get him off the rink yet?"
"No. I could probably skate him along, if I could figure out how to get him upright. But I don't want to get him halfway up and drop him."
"Lever him up with a hockey stick, duh," Becky says absently. "Uh- give me half an hour to get there, I'll figure something out."
Twenty minutes to the rink, ten to figure out a plan. What they really need is the jeep, or a wheelbarrow, or failing that even a bicycle to decouple; but they don't, so she'll have to think of something else. Lots of blankets, to keep Mac warm. What have they got that's wheeled, and strong enough to take a man's weight?
XXXXXXXXXXX
Up to this point, Mission City's opinion of Becky Grahme has been defined strictly in terms of things she happens to be: the girl whose family died in that tragic accident, the niece of that slightly dotty coffee shop owner, the weirdly-accented out of towner.
Tonight, as she charges down the street with a kitchen chair fastened to a push mower (duck tape, knotted cord, more duck tape), the gossip shifts towards what she's capable of: the girl who's always doing those wacky improvisational thingamabobs. Just like her uncle.
Not a distinction that Becky has any time to notice, that evening; but it's one that cheers her up rather a lot in years to come.
XXXXXXXXXXX
Mac whimpers. He can't help himself; vertigo isn't a nice sensation for an acrophobic. A tight and dizzy spiral, bodiless and weightless.
But he can sense there's someone holding him steady, as much as his brain is insisting otherwise. He tentatively opens his eyes to find Becky cuddling him on the kitchen sofa.
"I passed out, didn't I? Guess I overdid it."
"Jack and I figure that's what happened," Becky says, throwing a dirty look at the former (who has elected to forego chairs, in favour of slumping in a heap against the wall). "Three hours! Unc, that's way too much of a good thing."
"And don't I know it," Jack says, with histrionic zeal. "I am dead. DOA on arrival, deceased, you can roll poor old Jack Dalton out and bury him in his grave."
"Jack, the OA part already stands for on arrival," Mac says pedantically.
"Does it?"
"Drink this," Becky says, passing him a straw. "Ginger water with plenty of sugar."
"From a professional point of view, way too much," Mac observes, but drinks it down. The world starts to settle back into familiar patterns.
So it's just back home again, which he hates so much- well. Not quite the familiar patterns. He's warmly tucked beneath a black diamond quilt he's never seen before; this must be from Becky's collection. And there's other traces of her, now he's looking for them. Bright little ribbons tied to the cupboard handles, that eternal rent in the window seat cushion now neatly patched up. Maybe he's given up on the place long since, but she seems determined to make it cheerful.
Jack gets up with a groan and stirs something on the stove, looking surprisingly domestic as he flourishes a wooden spoon.
"You sure this isn't too much cheese sauce? Heckuva lotta it here."
"No such thing," Becky says. "White and red cheddar, I went all out."
"When did we get that?"
"When I went and bought it with my own money. And you're going to eat it as soon as it's ready. So there."
"Hear here," Jack comments.
"You know, when I was about four I thought it was just the funniest food ever? Because whenever anybody was talking to him and they'd say 'Mac', I'd just say 'and cheese!' The whole month he was visiting, nobody could get me to stop."
"How come you never told me that your niece was such a paragon of comedy? That's hilarious!"
Mac's blush is answer enough.
"So, Jack and I were talking while you were asleep. And he's going to start taking a day at the shop, to help you out."
"Under protest," Jack adds. "But it's not as if anyone ever wants a taxi on Wednesday. Or any other day, really...guess I might as well be serving drinks, I spend enough time here as is."
"And I'll take Saturday mornings, and that way you'll have some time to start building stuff again, instead of being tied to the cash register all week. Cos I miss my crazy inventor uncle," Becky says. "I want to see you again, not just the guy who makes people coffee."
"You really are so much like your mother," Mac tells her quietly. "Her side got all the practicality in the family...she'd be so proud of you, Becky."
She grins, but doesn't say anything. Just starts setting the table for dinner.
While I'm going ahead and letting a teenager and a convict plan my whole future for me.
But they're right enough, he has to admit; he's worried himself to a frazzle trying to keep things under control. Just too tired to keep going solo. Thank goodness he won't have to now, or at least not quite so much.
And he does need to look after himself, or else who's going to keep an eye on these two?
XXXXXXXXXXX
Out of an abundance of caution, Jack locks his door, draws the bolt, and shuts the curtains before allowing himself a furtive sigh of relief.
His body hurts in more different ways that he would have figured possible. If anybody had asked at the start of the day whether he thought he could survive a gruelling three-hour exercise bout, he'd have laughed, said no way...but needs must. Mac'll be a bit less hard on himself in future; Becky will get back some of the control she needs.
And if either uncle or niece ever work out that he did it on purpose, hanging grimly on all night until he could push Mac over the edge, they will kill him. Or ban him from the coffee shop for life, which would be way worse.
"Best con I'll ever do, though," Jack says, yawning at his reflection in the mirror. "Let's see. Liniment, ice, and a whole lotta whiskey, for starters...