C. E. Murphy - No Dominion - A Garrison Report

Annie Macready gave me a sideways look that turned into a laugh. “I don’t think I believe you, Private Muldoon.”

I grinned down the street. “Believe what you want, sweetheart. Not much I can do about it.”

“You’re a very confident man, aren’t you, Private Muldoon?”

“Yeah, but I think I found a girl to give me a run for my money, Miss Macready.”

Her nose wrinkled. “I like ‘Annie’ better.”

“Then you gotta stop callin’ me Private Muldoon. It makes me feel like I oughta be standin’ up and saluting.”

“Oh, all right. I was just teasing you anyway.”

“Me too. I got a rise outta you faster, is all.” I offered my arm and she wrinkled her nose again an’ tucked her big fuzzy sleeve into the crook of my elbow. “How far we going?”

“In a hurry to get back?”

“Figuring how to make it last.”

A giggle burst outta her. I raised an eyebrow an’ she stared straight ahead, trying like the devil not to blush or laugh again. I got a grin that spread slow but wouldn’t quit. “Why, Miss Macready, I think maybe you got a little bit of a dirty mind there. And you seem like such a straight-laced girl!”

Her cheeks turned bright pink and her grin was so tight I thought it might explode right off of her face if she let it go at all. “I have two older brothers and a father who are all soldiers, Mr. Muldoon,” she said, prim as she could through fighting that smile. “Sometimes they say things a lady shouldn’t hear.”

“And then she’ll keep askin’ around until she finds out what they meant? Aw, c’mon, darlin’, don’t tell me girls don’t whisper ‘bout the same kindsa stuff we do,” I said when she gave me a cautious look. “I got a sister too, you know.”

“I didn’t.” She latched onto that, and I guessed I couldn’t blame her. “Older or younger?”

“Older, ‘bout four years older. Name’s Irene. She used to give me advice about girls. Guess she still would, if I needed it.”

“But you’re a football hero,” Annie said, which made me laugh.

“A couple seasons of college ball don’t make me a hero, doll.”

Her smile lit right up. “Don’t spoil my fun. Football hero is how I’m telling the story, and surely a football hero doesn’t need help with girls.”

I grinned down the street. “You tell me.”

“You’re doing all right.”

“Hmph. ‘All right’. I’ll take it, but next time I’m gonna do better.”

“Next time?” Annie stopped at a driveway beneath a big ol’ leafless tree. “You expect there to be a next time? This is me.”

“I sure hope so.” I looked up the drive at a plain little cozy-looking house and shook my head. “Nah, sweetheart. It might be your ma, but it ain’t you. Your house will be painted something bright, to match your soul.”

Annie Macready said, “Oh my,” and left me standing on the sidewalk and feeling like a fool.

I spent the whole next two days of leave trying not to fret. Me and Andy went out to see Monterey Bay, which was about the prettiest place I’d ever seen, with the calm blue water an’ all sorts of little personality-filled towns around it. It was nothing like Seattle, but I guessed nowhere was ever like home. Andy seemed okay with that. I didn’t know what he’d left behind in Alabama, just that he’d come out West before joining up, and I wondered just what all he’d left behind. It wasn’t the kinda question a fella could ask. At any rate, we didn’t have lots of time for talk anyway, ‘cause I’d thought girls liked a football player, but that wasn’t anything compared to being in uniform. But I kept thinking about Annie and forgetting to flirt, until Andy threw his hands up an’ told me to go find the girl. I said I couldn’t do that, and I thought he was gonna blow a gasket.

“I already know you’re too damned dumb to have gotten her number, but you know where she lives, don’t you?”

“Sure, but what kinda big puppy shows up on the doorstep without an invitation?”

“One who might get shipped out any day.”

That shut me up and sent me heading across town without him, back to the street where Annie lived. A nice older lady who looked a lot like her was in the front yard, tending to a flower bed, when I walked up the street. She gave me a look up and down, then brushed her hands clean on her skirt an’ got to her feet with a smile. “I guess you’re Private Muldoon.”

“I guess I am, ma’am. Are you Mrs. Macready?” I leaned across a low white fence an’ offered my hand.

She took it with a soft grip. “I am. I’m afraid Anne’s not home, though. It’s Sunday afternoon. She had to head back to Oakland for school. She stays there during the week and comes home to visit on weekends.”

I put my hands in my pockets an’ rolled back on my heels to cast a look at Heaven, wishing Andy had kicked me into motion earlier. “That’s just about the worst news I’ve had all week.”

Mrs. Macready had dimples just like her daughter’s, ‘cept thirty years older. “Maybe hearing she spent all day Saturday talking about you will take the sting out. You made an impression, Private Muldoon. I might not have believed her when she said you were very handsome, but I’ll have to apologize for that.”

“Aw, nobody who’s played as much ball as me can be all that good-looking, ma’am. Got my nose broke a couple times.”

“It lends you character. Though from what Anne said you might have plenty of that already.”

“Well, thanks.” I caught up to what she was saying and my eyebrows went together. “’bout being handsome, I mean. I ain’t sure about having so much character. Would you have a number I could call her at, Mrs. Macready? I shoulda asked her myself, but she kinda…got the upper hand somewhere along the way an’ I never got it back.”

Mrs. Macready took a slip of paper out of her pocket, handed it to me, and said, “You might as well get used to that, Private Muldoon. That’s her number. She asked me to give it to you if you came by.”

I opened the paper an’ memorized the number there in a heartbeat, all the while trying not to look like a kid at Christmas. “Thank you, ma’am. And if you don’t mind me sayin’ so, I hope to see you again soon.”

“I hope so too, Private Muldoon. My oldest boy is living in Europe now, and the younger one got married to a girl from New Jersey.” She shook her head like she didn’t know how that had happened. “It would be nice to see another man around the house.”

“If it ain’t intruding…there’s no Mr. Macready?”

“Oh, there is.” She said it kinda airy and light with a steel belt running below, an’ I thought maybe Annie’s apple didn’t fall far from the tree. I also thought I knew when to not ask any more questions, nodded like I understood, an’ kept my damned mouth shut, even when a cold touch ran up the back of my neck. Something seemed wrong about her answer, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Anyway, Mrs. Macready got a crinkly-eyed look like I’d done good, and brushed her hands on her skirt again. “Care to come in for a glass of lemonade, Private Muldoon?”

I was done being a fool. “I’d love to, ma’am.”

The inside of the Macready house wasn’t as plain as the outside. Tidy rooms and regular furniture, but the pictures on the walls were something else. I stopped to look at one, a painted waterfall with gold mist risin’ up in the shape of some kinda bird, and smiled. “Looks like magic. Somewhere you’ve been?”

“I’m not certain I’d want to visit somewhere that birds were made of mist and born out of waterfalls. My husband did that painting, and all the others. He’s very artistic. The children inherited my pragmatic streak.” She guided me into the kitchen without giving me much chance to see the other paintings, except the one that was on the wall in there. Like the waterfall, it was misty, but this one was all silvers an’ greys muting far-off greenery. There were horse riders heading away from the viewer, deeper into the painting. I got no sense of urgency from ‘em. They seemed content somehow, even though I couldn’t see any of their faces. The fella leading ‘em was on a big grey stallion, and a slender kid rode a yellow mare beside him. Most of the others were indistinct, but I could just about see the dents their horses’ hooves left in the shining soft misty path.