Alex Bledsoe: Wisp of a Thing

“Oh, yeah. There’s some tough luck for you. Why is he here?”

“I don’t know. Remember how we all thought he looked like one of us? Well, he ain’t got a drop of Tufa in him, I can tell that for sure. But he does have the look.”

“That could be trouble. Not everyone can tell the difference.”

“Oh, he’s harmless. He probably just wants to get away from all the publicity, like Bronwyn. Can you blame him?”

“Reckon not. He picked the right place to do it.”

Marshall carried the box into the kitchen. Peggy tapped her finger on the desk. Marshall had reiterated something she’d thought earlier: Not every Tufa, even some of the true bloods, could tell if someone else was one of them. If a person had the look, like Rob, then he could stumble into things he was never meant to know.

She picked up the phone and dialed Bliss Overbay, then hung up before it rang. Bliss was fine for most things, but she was merely the regent, not the leader. For something like this, Peggy needed someone with a direct line to the night winds.

She dialed again. A moment later she said, “Leshell? May I please speak to Mandalay? Oh, that’s right, school did start last week. Well, could you tell her to call Peggy Goins when she gets home? Thanks.”

After lunchtime, Doyle went into the convenience store beside the garage. His father sat on a stool at the register, chin in his hand, elbow on the counter. He was snoring. Behind him, Gretchen Wilson reclined suggestively in a poster thumbtacked to the wall.

Doyle picked up the phone, dialed the bank, and asked Bella Mae for Berklee’s extension. “Thanks for calling the Bank of Needsville,” his wife said when she picked up, “where interest rates are—”

He interrupted the mandatory spiel. “It’s me.”

“Hi.” There was no feeling of any sort in the word.

“Met an interesting fella today. Guitar player from Kansas, staying down at Peggy Goins’s motel. Thought I might take him down to hear Rockhouse and the boys tonight.”

“Sure, go ahead.”

He had to lick his suddenly dry lips before speaking again. “Thought you might want to come along.”

There was a long pause. Doyle heard the noise of the pneumatic tubes at the bank’s drive-through window, and he knew exactly what his wife was thinking: He might be there. Finally Berklee said in a small voice, “Okay. That’d be nice.”

He felt a tingle in his chest, but wasn’t sure if it was relief or apprehension. “’Kay. See you at home, then.”

“’Kay. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

He hung up. Gretchen’s slightly stoned, slightly horny expression hadn’t changed. He turned so he wouldn’t have to look at her, and watched through the connecting door as a squirrel poked its head into the garage, sniffed the fume-laden air, and scampered away. It was a nice symbol for how he felt whenever he approached Berklee these days. Something inside her was dying, decaying, and she tried to cover the stench with alcohol and bluster. Unlike the squirrel, though, he couldn’t wrinkle his nose and just scurry away. He loved her.

Doyle parked his truck beside Rob’s car in front of the Catamount Corner. The sun had just crept behind the mountains, and darkness would, as always, fall like a thick shroud thrown over everything. Berklee sat beside him, her eyes scanning the street outside the way they always did in town. She looked fantastic: tight jeans, a blouse unbuttoned just enough to display her cleavage, her long hair loose and combed to shiny perfection. And, as some sort of concession to the evening, she’d consumed only three beers during the time she spent getting dressed. He knew if he mentioned it, she’d mock him and turn it into an argument, so he simply filed it away. These scraps of effort, meager as they were, made him recall the girl he loved, and kept the spark inside him alive.

Peggy Goins glanced up at them as they entered, then smiled. “Well, the happy Collinses. And how are the night winds treatin’ the two of you this evening?”

“Fine as always,” Doyle said. Berklee said nothing, her eyes continually drawn to the windows that looked out on Main Street. “We’re here to pick up one of your guests.”

“Must be Mr. Quillen, he’s the only one I’ve got right now,” Peggy said. “I’ll ring his room for you.” She picked up the phone, punched the numbers, and waited for an answer. “You have company, Mr. Quillen. Doyle and Berklee Collins. Okay, I’ll tell them.” She hung up. “He said he’ll be right down.”

Berklee took a seat in one of the padded high-backed chairs, elegantly crossed her legs, rested her hands in her lap, and resumed staring out the window.

Peggy took Doyle’s arm. “Come along, then, we’ll go hurry him up.” She pulled him toward the door that led to the stairs.

“But he said—”

“Come along,” she repeated, and cut her eyes at Berklee. Doyle wearily nodded and allowed her to lead him into the stairwell.

Once the door closed behind them and they were halfway between the two floors, Peggy stopped. “She’s getting worse, Doyle.”

“Everybody drinks a little,” he said with a weak shrug.

“I don’t mean the drinking, and you know it. She hasn’t taken her eyes off the street since you got here. I bet she hasn’t let the two of you have marital relations in months.”

“That’s kinda personal, Mrs. Goins,” he said, annoyed. He respected Peggy as both an elder and because of her status in the Needsville community. But some lines no one was allowed to cross.

“You need to cut bait, Doyle,” Peggy said seriously. “There’s nothing you or anyone can do. It’s got its hooks in her, and they won’t pull out. They just work their way in deeper.”

“She don’t drink that much.”

“Stop trying to make this about her drinking,” Peggy said. “I’d drink all the time, too, in her shoes. I can’t believe she’s lasted as long as this. But, son, you have to know where this’ll end up. No matter how much you love her, it’ll never be enough. You should start letting go of her now, before she pulls you down with her.”

“You give everyone such good advice?”

“Doyle Collins, don’t you take that tone with me. I knew you before you could wipe your own behind. Same with Berklee in there. You think it doesn’t break my heart to see her like that? I’m giving you the advantage of my… Oh, what do you call it when you look at something different from everyone else?”

“Perspective?”

“Yes. The advantage of my perspective. I wouldn’t be able to close my eyes at night if I knew I didn’t try.”

“Then you should sleep like a baby.”

He said it flatly, with no blatant malice, but his irritation was plain. Peggy scowled again, then decided to change the subject. “How did you meet that boy upstairs, anyway?”

“His car broke down. Dad and I helped him out.”

“Do you know who he is?”

“Said his name was Rob Quillen.”

“Yes, but do you know who he is ?”

Doyle shook his head.

Peggy opened her mouth, then remembered her promise. Her almost biological need to gossip warred with her sense of honor, until finally the latter won. “I reckon he’ll have to tell you. I promised I wouldn’t.”

“Is he famous or something?”

“Closer to ‘something.’”

Doyle shrugged. “Whatever. I can find my way from here.”

When the phone woke Rob, it was dark. He knees ached from dangling off the side of the bed. He lay half-curled around his guitar, the same way he used to spoon with Anna. After talking to Mrs. Goins, he stood, stretched, and felt his back and shoulders pop. Then he went to the still-open window.