Chris Whitaker - We Begin at the End

They met with two couples.

The first, Mr. and Mrs. Kolene. Duchess knew right off that Shelly had worked hard to get them to the table, the table being a play area in the park on Twin Elms Avenue. Duchess pushed Robin on the swing while the Kolenes and Shelly sat on a park bench, drank a thermos of coffee and stared at them like they were attractions in a petting zoo.

“What the fuck are they looking at? They want us to do tricks or something?”

“Quiet, they might hear.”

Duchess took a tissue from her coat and wiped his nose, then went back to pushing the swing while Shelly smiled at her.

“The dude looks like a librarian.”

“Why?”

“Those glasses. He’s got a sweater with no sleeves. I think they’re too old to have kids naturally and now they want a second shot. Could be problems with his sperm, or maybe she’s barren as the Mojave.”

Robin stared over. “What’s barren?”

“Her parts have died off.”

“She looks alright.”

“I can feel the bitter seeping from her pores. Should’ve frozen her eggs. She won’t love us right.”

“But no one else has come.”

“They will. Shelly said we have to be patient, right.”

He looked down.

“Right?”

“Yeah. I guess.”

“These people, they get tested. Vetted. They take classes so they know how to parent right.”

She pushed him higher, till the chain began to flex and he screamed and laughed. She marveled at his ability to adapt, the way he smiled at Mr. and Mrs. Price so much, just the chance they might return it enough for him.

She worked hard to keep her temper in check now, didn’t say anything when Mary Lou smirked or Henry wouldn’t share his games with Robin. She buried the part of her that thought about Hal and the way he had died, and her mother and the way she had died. She watched old Westerns, read her books, knew that lives could be colored so bold by revenge they ate away all the good a person might have once had.

It was Walk who kept her from doing something foolish, he anchored her to the good, he kept her aimed toward the future instead of the now. Walk reminded her men could be all good. He kept her from marching over to Shelly and the Kolenes and telling them to get the fuck away, that she’d cared for Robin his whole life and didn’t plan on quitting anytime soon.

Mrs. Kolene raised a hand and Robin grinned and waved as hard as he could, like he couldn’t read what was going on. They’d barely spoken to them, a couple of questions in broad Midwest accents, no way of placing them, just another couple looking for a way to make themselves whole but knowing right off the Radley children fell short.

“Not the right fit,” Shelly said, on the drive back to the Price house.

Mrs. Price had been pissed at them that evening, like they’d played it wrong, like she was tiring of them and wanted younger, fresher faces to drag to church each Sunday and show off.

The next meet was bad. Mr. and Mrs. Sandford. He was a retired army colonel and she was a homemaker with an empty home.

They sat on the same bench with Shelly, made small talk while they sized up the kids. The colonel kept laughing and slapping his wife’s knee, hard enough to leave a print.

“He’ll beat us,” Duchess said, from her spot by the swing.

Robin stared at him.

“Probably want you to shave your head and enlist.”

“Could be she’ll teach you to bake,” Robin said.

“Motherfucker.”

“You said that too loud.”

They looked up at the colonel watching them. Duchess snapped off a salute. Shelly smiled nervously.

Early March, the thaw began.

Duchess sat at the window each night and watched the steady drip from windows as the color slowly began its return to Montana. Morning broke to cold sun, but sun just the same. Sidewalks melted, yards emerged from burial, shadblow shed browns to white blossom that reached skyward. She watched the change but could see no beauty at all.

Duchess moved through her small life without feeling, each motion so automatic she sometimes forgot which day of the week it was. She cared for Robin, walked him to school and ignored Mary Lou and her sidekick Kelly when they cut her down, her shoes, her top, the brand of her jeans. Shelly came each week, sometimes she took them out for ice-cream and once even to the movies. Robin talked about a new family, how the father would be like Hal, teach him to fish and play ball. He held the belief in his small hands, tighter with each passing day.

One Saturday Shelly took them to see the farm. Probate would take months so it was still Radley land for a little longer. They swung by to collect Thomas Noble.

High spring morning. Robin took Shelly to see the coop and told her of the jobs he used to carry out. Duchess and Thomas Noble walked the wheat fields, no crops planted, just rows of weed and mounded earth. She felt a sadness so profound she could not speak for a long time. Hal in every step she took, cigar smell as they walked up to the porch and took a seat on the swing. She pushed back, the chains pulled and creaked and she wanted to cry but did not. She visited the field where the gray once ran, she missed her almost as much as she did her grandfather.

After, they left the farm in heavy silence and Robin did cry. She held his hand in her own. When they got back to the Price house they sat idling on the street, watching the neighbor kids ride their bikes. It was warming up, summer a while off but making its intent known.

“I’ve got someone,” Shelly said.

Duchess could hear something in her voice, trace but it was there. Something different.

“Who?” Robin said.

“Their names are Peter and Lucy. They’re from Wyoming, where I used to work. Till now they’ve been searching just for one child, but I told them how special you two are—”

“So you lied,” Duchess said.

Shelly smiled and held up a hand. “Hear me out. They’re small town, he’s a doctor and she teaches third grade.”

“What kind of doctor?”

“A real doctor.”

“A shrink? Because I don’t want some guy messing with my—”

“A regular doctor. In a practice. Making sick people well again.”

“I like them,” Robin said.

Duchess sighed.

“You can meet them next weekend if you want to.”

Robin looked pleadingly at Duchess, till she nodded.

* * *

They rode Route 5 in her Prius, Medford to Springfield.

A hundred miles from Salem they left bright lights and smooth asphalt for bumping down dark tracks that slivered through Marion and the kind of townships that existed on old maps and nowhere else.

Martha slept. When the roads smoothed and held straight Walk allowed himself to glance over, and when he did he felt the sharp pain that had stabbed at him since the day he walked back into her life. She looked calm, at peace, so beautiful he sometimes fought the overwhelming urge to kiss her.

Dawn broke over the Calasade Highway, Walk was so tired he veered over the double-yellows till Martha reached over and gently tugged the wheel.

“You should’ve pulled over.”

“I’m straight.”

On the Silver Falls Highway they watched the sun creep from the hills and color farmland a dozen greens. At a diner they ate eggs and bacon and drank coffee so strong Walk felt it sharpen him right up again.

“It’s not far,” Martha said, looking at the map spread out across the table.

They were headed to Unity, a private healthcare facility in Silver Falls. The same place Dickie Darke had been making payments to as far back as they could go in his bank records. Dee had come through, knocked on Walk’s door the night before and given him a slip of paper with the recipient’s name.