Cynthia Thomason - Firefly Nights

Campbell reminded himself to give the kid the benefit of the doubt for now. Maybe nobody had ever taught him basic manners. “No. I’m not expecting anyone in here for any reason. Got the message?”

Adam snorted through his nose. “Yeah, but it won’t work. Mom’s coming over to fix your lunch.” He bounced the bar of Dial in his palm. “She just wanted to wash her hands first. Our room is disgusting.”

“I’ll tell housekeeping.”

“Huh? We’ve actually got a maid?”

Campbell rolled his eyes.

“Oh. Funny.” When Campbell started reading again, Adam turned toward the door, but stopped when he spied the fifty-two-inch TV in the middle of an oak entertainment center. A baseball game was on the screen, the volume turned low. Adam squawked. Campbell looked up to see the kid’s jaw drop. He backed up a couple of steps and plopped onto the sofa. “You’ve got cable!”

“No, I don’t,” Campbell said, wincing at the pain the kid’s uninvited and inconsiderate movement had caused in his chest. “There’s no cable out here. I’ve got a satellite dish.”

“Even better!” His eyes lit up when he spotted the remote control on the table. “I want to be connected in our room!”

Campbell scowled at him. “They don’t let juvenile offenders have luxuries like three hundred TV channels.”

“Heck, if I was in prison I’d have a better TV in my cell than that crappy ol’—”

“Adam!” Kitty Watley burst into the room like an avenging angel and swooped over her son. “I just told you not ten minutes ago to stop complaining.”

He shrugged. “I forgot.”

“Apologize to Mr. Oakes.”

“For what?”

“For expressing your opinions in such a vulgar way.”

Campbell raised his eyebrows. “Actually I’ve been known to use worse language than that.” Like when I’m in a plane heading nose-down with fuel spraying in all directions.

A full thirty seconds passed before Adam responded to a nudge by his mother and mumbled, “Sorry.”

“While you’re being so humble,” Campbell said, “get the dustpan and a whisk broom out of the closet and sweep up those soap crumbs. Maybe the next time you want to make a point you won’t use visual effects.”

Adam shuffled to the closet, and his mother took his place on the sofa. At least when she sat, she didn’t send shock waves into Campbell’s cracked ribs. But she did wiggle, and for some reason, that bothered Campbell more than the kid’s unceremonious plopping. She placed her hand flat against her bare chest above the top of a tank-type shirt. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Oakes. Adam is high-spirited. He doesn’t mean any harm, but...”

“Do you always apologize for your son?” Campbell said. “If so, it must take up a lot of your time.”

“Well, there are days. Unfortunately Adam has had some bad influences on his life.”

Typical cop-out for lack of discipline . “So you’re using the wrong-crowd theory as a defense for the boy’s behavior?”

Kitty’s clear, disturbingly blue eyes locked on to his. “It’s more the wrong role model. But Adam won’t cause you any trouble, I promise.” She stood up and headed toward the kitchen. “I’ll get your lunch now.”

“You don’t have to. I’m not hungry after all.”

She stopped, turned and placed her hands on the waistband of her low-slung pants. “You’ve got to eat. Otherwise you won’t get your strength back.”

He turned a page in his book. “That, Miss Kitty, is up to a power much greater than the meager benefits of a bologna sandwich.”

Confusion veiled her eyes for an instant. But then her foot started tapping in its ridiculously impractical sandal. “I told your uncle I would take care of you, and I intend to keep my word.”

“Yeah, you’ve got to keep the hoodlum out of jail...”

Her eyes narrowed. She took in a sharp breath that seemed to raise her up a couple of inches. “However...” She drew the word out for several seconds. “I can only put food in front of you. I can’t give you the good sense to eat it.” She lifted her chin in a defiant gesture. “I guess either you were born with that or you weren’t.”

He stared at her, waiting for her to look away. She didn’t, so he hitched one shoulder in what he knew was childish insolence. “Suit yourself.”

As he watched her walk to the refrigerator, he pondered the information she’d given him. What role model had the kid had in his life? Was Kitty talking about the boy’s father? Was she married? If so, where was the man who should be taking care of this desperate pair? Was he going to show up at the Saddle Top Motel someday?

That was all he’d need. Campbell felt the first manifestation of unease coil like a spring in his gut. He didn’t want to be in the middle of a domestic dispute, forced to defend this duo, not in the condition he was in. Then he remembered Virgil had referred to Kitty as “ Miss Watley.” That eliminated the husband possibility, if Virgil was right. But it didn’t eliminate an ex-boyfriend one.

After she took a can from the cupboard and a package of lunch meat from the refrigerator, Kitty looked over her shoulder at him. It was the first time he realized he was still staring at her and that he probably shouldn’t be.

“Is something wrong, Mr. Oakes?” she asked.

Truly he was gawking at her as if he’d been trapped in a mine shaft for a week and she was the sun. “Nothing’s wrong,” he barked at her. She lifted her eyebrows, waiting for a logical explanation. He certainly couldn’t tell her that he’d been memorizing every curve under that shirt, so he improvised. “It’s those clothes you’re wearing. They’re, uh, interesting to say the least.”

That was a stupid thing to say. What did he know about women’s clothes? Only that the hip-hugging pants and top that Kitty wore had to be the most unforgiving garments he’d ever seen on a female. If she’d had a blemish anywhere on her torso, he’d have seen the outline through that fabric. But the more he looked, the more he concluded that she was awfully pretty.

She grinned bashfully and turned her attention to heating something on the stove. “Thanks, Mr. Oakes. These clothes certainly aren’t fashion statements, but they’re comfortable.”

Kitty Watley was strange. He’d expected her to blast him for what some women would have interpreted as a snide comment about her appearance. That’s exactly what Diana would have done if, heaven forbid, there had ever been a reason for him to question her impeccable taste. And yet Kitty had taken it like a compliment.

Once again he found himself searching for the right words. “I wish you’d stop calling me ‘Mr. Oakes,’” he finally said. “It makes me feel old, as well as lame.”

She slathered something on two pieces of bread. “Okay. You’re certainly not old, Campbell. And once your leg heals, you won’t be lame, either.”

If only the doctors were as confident, he thought. “When you’ve got that food ready, you can leave it on the end table. Then you and the kid can take yours and go.”

A few minutes later Kitty quietly set a tray on the table without disturbing his reading as her oblivious son had done. But this time it wouldn’t have mattered, since Campbell hadn’t done anything but stare at the pages as if they were blank. She brought him a glass of water and his pain pills and then took her own food and left with Adam, who had spent the past minutes zipping through the channels on his remote.

Almost as if he owed Kitty some consideration, Campbell forced himself to eat the cheese and bologna sandwich and, of all things, chicken soup.

When he finished eating, Campbell took his pills and watched a few minutes of the baseball game before shutting off the TV. He picked up his book, slammed it closed and set it down again. He glared at the useless leg, which prevented him from going outside in the cleansing mountain air and walking off the restlessness.