Jeff Abbott - Promises of Home

She pulled back and touched my cheek. “He was always so fond of you. You made him laugh, you know.”

“He made us all laugh, Miz Shivers.” God, I didn’t know what to say. I’d spent most of my childhood around Clevey, but a wall had gone up between us when I’d gone off to Rice and he’d stayed in Mirabeau, working at the paper. A college degree not only opens doors; it closes them. But that had been Clevey’s choice, not mine. I didn’t spend the time with him I had as a child, but as grown men, we were too busy to sit, cuss, and smoke in tree houses.

Truda Shivers leaned against me and whispered, “Walk with me for a moment, Jordan.” She murmured a pardon to the other ladies; one woman took the cobbler pan from my hands, and I put my arm around Truda’s shoulders. She guided me to a wall of photographs, not terribly unlike the one my mother had created in our house: a gallery of her family’s lives. Various versions of Clevey smiled at me from the wall.

She pointed at a photo of several of us boys from our senior year in high school. The good old gang, arms looped over each others’ shoulders, posing in the back of Clevey’s battered pickup. I sat between Trey and Clevey, smiling broadly with my hometown brotherhood, someone else’s Stetson perched on my head. Trey had one hand affectionately on the top of the hat; Clevey held a beer in one hand and crossed his eyes for the camera. Davis, Junebug, and Ed stood behind us, brandishing beers and laughing. I remembered the picture; it was at a graduation party Davis hosted, when the drinking age was eighteen and we were all legal. The hat on my head was Trey’s and I recalled he’d joked I never cared to wear a cowboy hat and damned if we wouldn’t get a picture of me in one. He’d pulled off his hat and put it on me. We all looked full of joy, if not promise. My breath felt heavy in my lungs and I looked away.

“Clevey”-she sighed-“sure did love high school. I think it was the high point of his life.”

“Yes, ma’am.” I didn’t know what to say. Holding Mirabeau High as the pinnacle of one’s time on earth saddened me.

Truda saw my thought in my face. “It was, Jordan, it was. But that’s okay. My Clevey was never what you’d call a complicated boy.” She pointed at another photo: Clevey and I uncomfortable in suits, with the bishop standing imperially behind us, our hair combed smooth, his holy hands on our shoulders, guiding our little souls among the straight and narrow. A picture from our confirmation Eucharist. I remembered the bishop smelled of peppermint and his palms were not callused like my daddy’s. Truda’s hand tightened on mine.

“Those two pictures are the biggest helps to me right now,” she said, finally crying. “Knowing that he had true friends that loved him and that he’s gone home to God.” She took a ragged breath and her broad shoulders heaved.

“Why? Why would someone kill my boy?” She sobbed hard into my jacket, and I stood there, awkwardly, wishing to God I could just give her an answer that would help heal her heart. But there wasn’t one. Instead I just hugged her for a long while, feeling the surge of her grieving breaths subside as she wept herself out.

After several minutes, one of the other ladies-I thought she was Mrs. Shivers’s sister from La Grange-gently pried her off my shoulder and guided her into the kitchen. I was left in front of all those images of Clevey, with a few of his other relatives sitting and not looking at me. Wanda Dickensheets, divested of her Elvis accoutrements, sat whispering with her mother, Ivalou Purcell. They were both big-boned ladies, with egos and personalities to match. Wanda’s a few years older than Ed and it’s starting to show, with widening thick gray streaks in her hair. Ivalou has a pennanent pinch on her face, like she’s got gas and she’s riding in a crowded elevator. They quit whispering and favored me with what I considered wholly inappropriate toothy grins that portended conversation. I quickly excused myself and retreated back to the porch.

Davis had arrived, with Bradley in tow. Ed resumed his crying as I came back out on the porch and Davis gave him an awkward hug. Cayla Foradory, Davis’s wife, nodded curtly at me and went inside, balancing a casserole dish. She’s a quiet, rather unfriendly woman with fine blonde hair and a perpetual frown. What Davis sees in her I’ve never known.

“Hey, Jordy!” Bradley called, and waved, running toward the house in a ragged gait. “Is Mark here?”

“Bradley!” Davis snapped. “Lower your voice, please, sir. Remember what I said about minding your manners.” Bradley jerked like he was on a leash that’d just been yanked.

“Minding my manners,” Bradley repeated in a far softer tone. I went over to Bradley and gave him a hug. He hugged back. “Sorry, buddy, Mark stayed at home. But I bet he’d be glad to see you if you want to come by tomorrow.” Bradley and Mark, only two weeks apart in birth, had grown up together. Mark, despite his sauciness toward his mother and me, had always been gentle with Bradley. Maybe he found Bradley impossible to stay mad at for long.

Davis was accompanied by his cousin, who I was delighted to see. Eula Mae Quiff was not usually the first person you’d invite to a wake, but she was sure to liven it up. Eula Mae was our local celebrity, a prolific and successful romance writer, although she’d been agonizing over her latest torrid magnum opus. I hoped she wouldn’t start bitching about writer’s block; this wasn’t the place. Of course, Eula Mae considered the world her stage and Clevey’s death might just be a minor scene.

Eula Mae made her rounds, embracing each of us. She was about twelve years older than we were and viewed us like errant little siblings. She saved my hug for last; considering how much free advice she dispenses my way, I suppose she considers me a special case.

“Jordy. What a day you’ve had. First that no-good Trey Slocum back in town, and now poor Clevey dead.” She patted her mountain of reddish curls with a ring-heavy hand. Eula Mae should not be allowed near open bodies of water while wearing that much jewelry.

“How’d you hear about Trey being back?” I asked.

“That dreadful Gretchen creature called me. As though she and I were ever friends, especially after the hateful way she’s treated you. Anyhow”-she sniffed-“she said something about you needing your friends now, and she thought I’d like to know about what happened at the library with Trey.”

Gretchen? Concerned about me? The world was getting weirder by the hour.

“How are Mark and Arlene holding up? Have they seen him?” Eula Mae asked, taking a casserole dish from Davis, who was now having to comfort a once-again weepy Ed.

“No, they haven’t, and I told him to mind his distance.”

“Well, sweetie, I’m sure it’ll all work out. I really must get inside and see how poor Truda is. How’s she holding up?”

“As well as can be expected, considering her son’s been murdered. Actually, I think Truda is an amazingly strong-”

“Excuse me.” A distinguished-looking gentleman, tall and lanky with silvering brown hair, eased past the front door and came out onto the porch. I moved aside to let him pass and found myself slamming into Eula Mae’s casserole dish. Her jaw was about to dent the Saran Wrap cover of her broccoli-cheese-rice medley. I watched her watch the gentleman walk to an unoccupied corner of the porch, produce a pipe from the innards of his brown-and-tan houndstooth jacket, and fill it with tobacco.

“What marvelous hands,” Eula Mae breathed. “I wonder who that man is. I don’t believe I’ve seen him about.”

I cleared my throat. “Don’t you have to go get that food to Miz Shivers?”