***Hey guys! Just wanted to thank you for being cool about the writer's block. I finally got my muse off her smoking break and this chapter happened. I really hope you have fun reading it and I would love to hear from you, if you want. [smiling] See if you can figure out what I hid in those three names. [wink wink] Oh and thank you Linda and Snowbird. You guys rock! ***
Jake's expression soured faster than buttermilk under the molten waves of the blistering sun. He felt Teresa stiffen then slump against the wall of his chest, deep in thought as she cradled her bandaged hand in her lap. Randall could only watch the concentrated wonder that laced over every face in the room, after Michaela read the names on the back of the picture frame.
She had run her slender thumb along the hard black felt backing, feeling the difference between the smooth cool silver ink, over the rough shaved velvet-like feel of the felt board. "J.B. Harris Hemlock, Alexandra M. Hemlock, and Amie Hemlock 187..." Michaela scratched at the void were the last number of the date should be. "The last of the year has faded off."
Hank leaned back in Michaela's elbow-chair with a huff. Although the faces hadn't rung any bells other than resemblance, they had all hoped the names of these people might shed some light on the cracked psyche of Celina Marrow.
"Oh, I confess I was hoping for more," Teresa gently took the picture back from Michaela. Her voice still quivered with spurned hurt and disappointment, prompting Jake to caress her shoulders with devoted empathy. After reading the scripted names herself, she flipped back to the faces and studied them.
"Well ah…this is better than we could hope for," Randall piped up straightening slightly as every eye but Teresa's focused on him. "We can wire the names, back wherever she came from…You all know where she came from don't you?"
"Denver, I believe," Michaela busied herself by removing the shallow bowl from the examination table and mechanically cleansing her instruments, deep in thought.
"Welp, there yah have it!" Hank shot up circling the desk and reclaiming the framed photograph from Teresa. "Might wanna get this puppy back 'fore she notices." He turned on his heel about to exit the clinic when Randall stepped into his path. It wasn't meant as a menacing stall; however, Hank raised a perked brow over his hooded wintry blue eye at the man. There was something in the man Hank recognized in himself.
Randall shifted uncertainly, his gaze surpassing Hank to get to Teresa. "I'mah need those names, before you take it back."
Eyes' never leaving Randall's amused face, Hank pressed the frame into his open hands, "Here, write the names down yerself."
"That's alright, Hank," the unexpected sound of Teresa's voice sliced through him. She held her hurt hand up to her breast as she quickly scooted off the table, with Jake ambling to support her. Shooing him off, she retrieved the popular object, and sat it on Michaela's desk. Within moments, she had scribbled down all three names and the remaining numbers of the date on a piece of note scrap. Turning Teresa calmly handed Hank back his pilfered intelligence, and then gently handed Randall the note scrap. Her eye's glistened like the deep dark hue of wine through an amber glass bottle, as they connected with Randall's fluid cerulean orbs. "Now all you need do is hand Mr. Bing these names."
Randall nodded avoiding Hank's penetrating observations. His mouth curved into a sealed crescent as he folded the scrap into his black and silver scale patterned waistcoat. Not another word was spoken, as he and Hank strode out in much the same unceremonious manner they had entered, only this time on dispersed quests.
Apprehensively, Teresa turned back to Jake and Michaela. She knew they had thought her sudden jolt to assist Randall had looked odd in their eyes. But so much had been asked of her patience, of her steadfastness, of her faith and of her heart that Teresa didn't feel she could explain to them just yet. Besides, it was not her place to reveal her reasons. She could see the plumes of jealousy feathering in the expression of Jake's face. His mouth twitched as he struggled to conceal it from her; however, not only could Teresa see the viridian creature beginning to stir, she could feel it. The stress of the entire situation was forming cracks in Jake's foundation. Teresa couldn't let this happen. Not to Jake…her heart. For if, she had his heart and soul, surely he had hers locked deep inside him. "Jake-"
"Teresa," Michaela interceded. She had been observing the entire exchange, before she realized that Teresa had been alleviating Randall of some secret shame. "I think it would be best if Jake took you home for some much needed rest…You both could use it."
This alone snapped Jake from his dread, as he nodded in agreement. Let the Denver wire do its job, for now. As he looked at his wife's tired form, he cringed slightly seeing how she fought to hide the sadness in her eyes. Teresa seemed on the verge of breaking down; only, some small semblance of a tangent was holding her together. True he hadn't liked how bonded she and Randall had become; nor, did he enjoy the fact that they had some kind of shared secret between them. But there was that look staining her face that quelled the rhythm of his heartbeat. It was a look he'd seen far back in the recesses of his memories. All that long ago when she had asked him to simply trust her. He'd failed miserably, making a fool of not only himself, but also laying out Hank's private affairs for the entire town to witness. Now that same expression was pleading with him to trust her. Jake paused softening his face as he gazed at his loving wife. After the agony that had pierced through her earlier, he knew he would be a fool yet again, not to trust her now.
"Right," Jake twitched one side of his mouth up into a grin. "Thank you Dr. Mike," he added placing her charge on her desk.
Teresa and Michaela exchanged glances of understanding, before Jake affectionately lead his wife out the door.
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The mid-afternoon sun pierced through the oak saplings which canopied the uneven path to the house. The spindling trunks sprung up haphazardly along the road, like round poles, tangled in savage ashen vines which boasted fat heart shaped leaves. Running rampant on the wild wood floor, the thickets nestled in large bales of dried hawthorn brambles. Climbing up between the deep crevices of the thicker white oaks, mold, and moss pushed unchecked up the trees bare roots, like green veins threading their way up the wide gnarled trunks. The dried tawny leaves which mixed sporadically in patches, among the lush verdure of the fresh vegetation, rattled in the pleasantly chilled breeze. A breeze that seemed heaven sent to Lucy after such a hot day.
She observed this passing wild of the woods and wondered how it was, that such unbridled foliage, stopped just short of the tall grass that disproportionately lined the rustic dirt path. Lucy peered between the golden ears of what had once been her father's treasured palomino, as Cloud Dancing strolled in front of the animal holding Izzy in her cradle sling. The horses coat glistened like gold under the bright sunlight, setting off the striking corona of its silken mane. The well traveled story of Sunny, as she had known it, was that Mr. Lawson had loosely acquired him from a customer who couldn't pay his boarding fee. An event her father had personally witnessed from his perch beneath the saloon's porch. And after feeding Sunny roasted peanuts from his hand, as Mr. Lawson had put it, "That traitor of ah horse followed that ratfink to the damn barbershop, tah damn Grace's Café, and down the damn road outta mah life for good!" As the tale had passed from Mr. Lawson's begrudging lips to her father's smirking complacent mouth, it was revealed that Sunny was given as a gift to her Grandfather a year after she was born.
"In commemoration of your surprisin' delivery," Jake had smiled warmly at the memory. "He changed his name tah…WHAT Is it?" Jake had looked questioningly to Cloud Dancing who was at that time sitting in his usual stead on the white stairs of the terrace.
"Sun that Walk's on Earth," Cloud Dancing replied without looking up from his flute carving.
"An' the rest is history," her father nodded leaning back in his chair to watch that same creature mulling about in the wide pasture on the side of the house.
Like the ever fluctuating weather, Lucy's mind traveled from the past to the present. She had thought the moment her mother stepped across the threshold of their home everything would right itself. Ms. Marrow would move on to other things, and leave her parents to the marital bliss they had once been in. However, the slap as seen by some lucky passersby through the window had spread faster than it had taken Katie to deliver her mother's request to Cloud Dancing at the café. Things were not settling down, and as the wind eddies about lifting dirt to the sky, every unmentionable was being mentioned.
"Grandpaw?" her voice was timid, causing Cloud Dancing to turn his raven winged head back in her direction. "Would you tell me about Snowbird again?" She was hopeful the subject would derail her aching thoughts. Besides, she reveled in hearing stories from before she had been born. Yet, none was so precious as when he told her about Snowbird. Beauty bloomed from his mouth when he spoke of her. Light seemed to emanate within his brightly growing eyes. Although, Cloud Dancing's heart was firmly mended to Dorothy's, it was evident that he was still vastly enamored of Snowbird.
"And what shall I tell you, young one, that you do not already know of her?" he teased.
"What did she look like?" Lucy leaned forward holding tight to Sun that Walks on Earth's round flat saddle horn.
"You know what she looked like," he baited her as he shifted Izzy's sleeping body closer to his ribs. Just beyond the roofs of the wooded thickets, he could just make out the peak of the house, still far enough in the distance.
"Please!" Lucy begged combing her fingers through the smooth straight strands of Sun that Walks on Earth's mane. The horse swayed his mighty head clearly enjoying the gentle attentions.
"Her hair was as black as the wings of a raven and shone with the blue light of the stars in the night sky," Cloud Dancing pictured her in his minds eye. "Her skin was honeyed like walnut shells and when she laughed her eyes crested like two bows stretching towards the skies."
"What did her laugh sound like?" Lucy pressed already knowing the answer but wanting to hear it from his mouth.
Cloud Dancing chuckled digging into the folds of his heart where these venerable memories were kept. "I remember how she smiled so wide her cheeks dimpled here and here," he pressed his finger into the crescents beside the corners of his smiling mouth. "It was then that she laughed like water trickling down from the stream, like the bubbling plunge of a waterfall." Cloud Dancing turned to look back at Lucy, as she sat dreaming up the woman that might have been the only grandmother she'd ever know. He recalled how Teresa often referred to Jake as her heart. "She was my heart," he pressed his hand to his chest to show Lucy. "Now she is in my heart."
Lucy sat up straight and pressed her own little hand to her chest as Cloud Dancing had, "You are my heart Grandpaw."
He paused on the path causing the sunbeam of a horse to halt. His warm dark chocolate eyes looked from the child looking down at him as if he were the most precious thing in the world, to the sleeping babe cradled in her sling. They were not of his blood, but they were of his spirit, like Sully, like Michaela and Katie. A bond of spirit forged by love. "You are my heart as well."
These last few steps brought them onto the short path which lead to the cobbled walk up to the house. Cloud Dancing dug into the leather satchel which clung by his hip, until he found the iron skeleton key Jake had given him all those years ago. He had brought his granddaughters home.
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Together they jostled about on the high bench as the wagon drove along the rough dirt road. As they entered the alcove of trees which lined the rustic path, the uncharacteristic silence between them grew thick. The early evening sun had dispatched itself behind the roofs of the trees, causing the sky to erupt in a flurry of orange cloud scuttles. Oncoming hazes of purple and cobalt swirls, wafted closer and closer overhead, before the twilight of night could take over. Jake gulped down hard biting back the emotions he was feeling. Just the thought of her sitting so far from him, hurting the way he knew she was, was near to destroying him. Jake would give anything to simply go back and leave the damnable wagon in the meadow. Anything to have followed his family to Grace's. Anything to have saved Teresa of those tears and that bandaged hand.
Jake cleared his throat as he raked his gloved hand through the thick tufts of corn silk hair on his bare head. Surreptitiously, he cast glances her way, unable to read the dull expression on her lovely face. Teresa's bandaged hand was cupped within the other, resting in the pillow of her skirts. The thick curtain of her lashes hooded the dark jasper colored amber of her eyes, cloaking her thoughts from him. Short loose strands of sable had freed themselves in the breeze casting unmolested across her face. If only she would speak to him. Just one word, even if it was in anger, he didn't care. He just wanted to hear the sound of her voice.
It was then that her head tilted upward as though she had heard him. Teresa's head turned seeming to examine him from head to toe. Jake could feel her scrutinizing him, weighing him against some unforeseen counterbalance in her head. He shifted his sight between her and the road, finding that she continued to observe him unflinchingly. Then suddenly without preamble, without warning or sound, she pressed close to him. Her arm slid up between his side and his arm, nestling close to his body. Whatever battle that had waged in her had won out in his favor he supposed. Perhaps this was a moment to be had without words. He took up her hand and brushed his lips against the delicate skin on the back. There was still something wrong and she was desperately trying to bridge the gap in order to cast it from her mind. Reaching the path before the house, Jake sighed seeing how the light was dimming around the property. However, a warm yellow glow seeped from the windows showing life within the house. The sounds of muffled laughter permeated the walls and stroked at their ears as the two smiled wearily.
Teresa didn't wait for Jake to help her down. In a daze, she hopped from the wagon wheel to the cobbled path, and headed straight for the garden. Jake called after her asking if she needed any help.
"If I may manage on my own!" she snapped at him as she paced away.
In one fluid motion, Jake brought himself down beside the wagon's wheel. Beginning the arduous task of unhitching the horse from the wagon's stall, he suddenly found he had help.
"Is it true, you have been caught being unfaithful?" Cloud Dancing asked unlashing the horses flank from his side. Together they lifted the stall, freeing the horse.
"No!" Jake walked the horse into the neighboring meadow where Sun that Walk's on Earth was already grazing behind the fence. Agonizing word after agonizing word he explained the entire fiasco to Cloud Dancing. "I know she's hurt but…" he found he couldn't bring himself to finish.
"It is not you she is angry with," Cloud Dancing watched her walking back and forth along the row where the calendula flowers should be. Testily, she bent over the beds, searching among the dried leaves finding only the shriveled parchment husked heads of what once were thriving golden yellow marigolds. The sudden heat wave had destroyed the calendula; she needed to brew her tea. The beds had died, leaving yellowing patches of brittle stems and falling sallow leaves.
Knees buckling, she let herself fall into the row, hiding her face in her hands. The events of the day cascaded over her, beating her down into the soil. It was all too much to bear for the moment and she allowed her tears to flow freely down her face. Teresa's whole body racked with anguished sobs, ringing her out of the pain. Her sorrow quickly morphed into abject anger as she thrashed at the dead brambles, ignoring the throbbing in her hand. Fingers clawing with handfuls of the brittle twigs and thin spindling roots, she tore the beds from the powdered earth, ripping and shredding what appeared to her as crimson hair. The crimson hair of a certain seamstress. Teresa was tired. Tired of being so prim, tired of turning the other cheek and having to weather the storm. She'd been tossed around, insulted, and belittled by that unscrupulous woman. Her children had been wronged, her husband…her husband…
Strong arms wrapped around her shoulders preventing her fit from further harming her. Teresa's hands stung and the skin of her palms and fingers felt wet as she stayed them before her lap. Briefly, she fought against him, not wanting his comfort, and not wanting to comfort him. She was angry. Why couldn't they just let her be angry? But Jake wasn't asking her to comfort him. He had simply knelt down in the dirt at her side, and wrapped his arms around her.
"Just cry," was all he said as he gathered her against the steady wall of his chest. Finally, she turned tucking herself into him, and erupting all the hurt and anguish inside her. Everything she had been holding in, flowed up to the surface, and fell into Jake's waiting arms. The cruelty of her family, her aunt's death, Celina's unbridled attempts to usurp her place with Jake, the dreadful manipulation of her children, and the shameful way she had retaliated with physical assault, all spilled out, as Jake rocked her back and forth in his embrace. The safest place, Teresa had ever known, was in his embrace.