Carolyn McSparren - Over His Head

Nancy heard Tim catch his breath, but all he said was, “Great, son.”

“Eddy looks like he’s set for a while,” Nancy said to him before calling out again. “Eddy, you want to ride home with me? You can feed your pup again before you leave.”

“Can I, Big?” Eddy looked up at the big man with the same trust Nancy had seen in the eyes of everything from wild deer to newborn kittens.

“Sure. How ’bout we put Daisy back in my house and go do that little thing?”

“Okay.” Eddy scooped up the ball, then did what Nancy was sure was a miraculous thing in Tim’s eyes. He grabbed Big’s huge hand and walked off toward the small bungalow at the back of the parking lot without a backward glance at his father.

IS THAT ALL it would have taken? Tim wondered. One puppy and Eddy was fixed?

Obviously not. But for the first time since Solange had been killed Eddy was showing signs of behaving like a normal boy. Once the novelty wore off the puppy, Eddy might well fall back into his silent misery. Tim prayed that wouldn’t happen. He doubted the puppy would work the same magic with Angie and Jason, although they both loved animals. They wouldn’t get to meet it until it came home anyway. If it survived.

Tim wasn’t surprised they hadn’t come downstairs earlier when they could have met the puppy. Like most teenagers, they could sleep through a riot. Even in their small Chicago apartment, nothing woke them on Saturdays before noon—not even police sirens.

Maybe Nancy Mayfield would find the key to unlock the normal parts of Jason and Angie. For the first time since he pulled away from his city apartment, he felt absolutely certain he’d done the right thing moving his family down to Williamston.

If he’d listened to Solange and gotten them out of Chicago earlier, she might still be alive.

His pigheadedness had destroyed their marriage and killed her. He’d live with his guilt for the rest of his life, not only for her death, but also for the life he’d forced on her, the choices she’d made.

No matter how much she’d demanded they all rely on her since Solange’s death, he knew he’d been right to get his children and himself away from his mother-in-law, too. He’d certainly used her, but then she’d used him as well. She’d tried to submerge them all in permanent mourning. Solange would have been furious.

Tim had never called her anything except Madame, nor had she asked him to. The French term for mother-in-law was Belle Mere—Beautiful Mother.

And Madame was still a beautiful woman, small, reed-slim, with that innate chic that French women seemed to possess as a birthright. Solange had been even more beautiful than her mother. She was also clever and funny—at least in the old days.

Madame didn’t hesitate to tell him she thought Solange could have done better for herself than a workaholic high school vice principal and adjunct professor. He might never even become a full principal or a full professor.

Solange had been three months pregnant with Jason when they’d married, so Madame considered her damaged goods. Madame had never forgiven Tim for that, either.

Actually Solange had seduced him, not that he needed much seducing. She saw him as an up-and-coming graduate assistant with a Ph.D. and a prestigious academic career ahead of him. He saw nothing except her beauty and charm.

“You never appreciated her,” Madame railed at him. “You have no passion. You work all the time for no money and no prestige. Why else do you think she went back to graduate school? Why else did she take a lover?”

He’d endured her tirades and her guilt trips. The children needed her, and she had lost a beloved daughter.

Had he lost a beloved wife? He’d been furious when he let Solange out of the car to go to her French class, where her professor lover waited for her. She’d been just as furious with him.

Yet when the police came to tell him she was dead, he’d felt as though his heart had been torn out of his body. He grieved for what they had been to each other, for the love they had shared. The love they might have found again had she lived. A marriage, even a marriage gone bad, must be grieved.

The children missed her, loved her, but they also hated her for abandoning them. Jason and Angie’s rebellions were a form of acting out the unhappiness they felt. Didn’t make them any easier to endure.

Nobody expected to be touched by sudden violence. No, not touched—struck, bashed, torn apart. His children had been secure in a stable environment. Then, suddenly, that security was ripped away.

Tim pulled into the parking lot of the Collierville supermarket, took a parking space, turned off his ignition and simply sat.

He’d been so certain his goals were Solange’s goals, too. Work long hours to gain a more prestigious position to make more money.

Looking back, he saw that she needed him then, and not at some future date when he could afford to relax a little.

But he’d never had the chance to tell her.

He climbed out of the SUV, went into the grocery, took a cart and wandered through the unfamiliar aisles trying to remember what he said he’d buy for the house. What was the only kind of shampoo Angie would use? What kind of cereal did Eddy want? He should have made a list.

Tim picked up two dozen eggs. The kids were getting pretty sick of pizza, and he could make a great omelet.

His basket overflowed with microwave meals.

He checked his watch at the checkout line. He’d been gone three hours. It was after eleven. But in an unfamiliar house, Angie and Jason might be up and causing God-knows-what havoc.

He had remembered the extra half-gallon of orange juice for Nancy to replace the one he and Eddy had downed.

The orange juice gave him an excuse to see Nancy again. Among other things, he wanted to speak to her about those Halliburton people, to find out what he could do to make amends for kicking them out.

Before yesterday, when he’d literally run into her, he would have sworn he didn’t have any libido left. He’d almost forgotten how soft a woman felt.

He turned into the driveway of his new house. From the outside, all seemed serene. The inside looked serene, too. Apparently Jason and Angie weren’t even aware that he and Eddy had been gone, that the Sheriff had visited. His note lay untouched on the kitchen counter. He made half a dozen trips to carry in the groceries and found a place for them. He tried to recreate Solange’s system, but this kitchen was gigantic compared to the galley kitchen in their Chicago apartment.

To get to the pantry, he had to edge between the boxes still to be unpacked. He’d tried to label each one, but after a while, he’d run out of steam, so at the moment he wasn’t certain where the coffeemaker was hidden. He definitely needed caffeine.

He settled for a glass of milk.

He’d forgotten to pick up a Saturday newspaper. He’d have to call the subscription desk to arrange service, assuming they delivered this far out in the country. He took his milk into the empty living room—well, empty of everything except the randomly arranged furniture—and sank into the love seat in front of the bow window overlooking the porch.

He believed in writing To-Do lists, but at the moment his day-planner was buried somewhere among the boxes. He’d have to rely on his memory. Never a good idea, but he didn’t even know where he could find a pen and a piece of scrap paper.

First, call his rental agent and find out about the Halliburtons. Then call them himself, and see if he could do anything to mend fences.

Next, check in at Maybree. With only a few weeks until school started, the office staff might be working on Saturday. His first staff meeting was scheduled for eight-thirty Monday morning, but it wouldn’t hurt to seem eager.