Lee Martin - Late One Night

“You letting Missy keep the girls?”

“For now,” he said. “Just for now.”

Wayne wouldn’t let Ronnie come inside. He stepped onto the porch of the box house set back a lane off County Road 550, and he said to Ronnie, “I guess I didn’t kill you.”

“I hear you’ve been sickly.”

“Got the head spins from time to time.”

Ronnie nodded. “I’m not going to press charges. That’s what I came to say.”

Wayne nodded. Then he said, “Lois and I have to be somewhere in a few minutes, so I don’t have time to talk. At some point, though, we’re going to have to come to a decision about the girls.”

“What’s there to talk about? They’re mine to see to.”

“Can you make a home for them, Ronnie? Can you make sure they get enough to eat, clothes to wear?”

“I get work here and there, just about like you, I expect.” Ronnie narrowed his eyes. “And there’s Brandi. She makes decent money at the Savings and Loan. I’ll ask Pat for steady work once things pick up in the spring.”

“I don’t want to hear that woman’s name. I mean it, Ronnie. Not ever. And I don’t want to see her at the visitation or the funeral. You understand?”

“Is it the funeral home?” Ronnie said. It came to him with a force that made him feel weak in his legs that Wayne and Lois and maybe even Missy would make decisions about the funeral without asking his help. “Is that where you’re going in town?”

“I don’t have to report to you, Ronnie. It’s not your concern.”

So not even Ronnie knew until the night of the visitation that there would be only one casket. That was the first thing that everyone noticed when they walked into the Phillipsport High School gymnasium, that single casket, closed, at the far end near the free throw line. Missy and Lois and Wayne had decided the gym would be the best place to accommodate all the people who were sure to come, and now the rows of folding chairs on the floor were filling up, and people were scooting closer together to make room on the bleachers rising on both sides. All these people coming out on a cold night to pay their respects. People from all over Phillips County. Many of them hadn’t known Della or Ronnie or any of their families, but they felt that they should be in attendance because there were those poor girls — the four of them standing near the casket with Wayne and Lois Best — and it was going to take a passel of folks to shepherd them now.

Some people, though they wouldn’t admit it, were there because they’d heard the stories about Ronnie and Brandi, and they couldn’t squelch their curiosity. Would she be there? Would they arrive together? The story of Wayne taking that tire iron to Ronnie had made the rounds, and as people chatted in low tones that night in the gymnasium, more than one person admitted that they had an inclination to do the same. A man like Ronnie Black. Of course, he’d be there for the sake of his children, but, mercy, it’s a wonder he can even show his face.

He’d been there all along. He’d come before Wayne and Lois, before Missy and his girls, before Laverne Ott and Shooter Rowe and Captain, and all the people who’d followed, filling the gym with their footsteps, the scents of their perfumes and aftershaves, the smell of the cold outside that they carried in on their clothes. He’d come alone, and the only person there was Dean Henry, the funeral director.

“I guess Wayne and Lois made all the arrangements,” Ronnie said.

Dean was a short man who was all-over bald. He’d just finished arranging the casket spray of yellow lilies, white carnations, and red roses. He stepped back a moment and took in the casket and the standing floral sprays on their tripods and the baskets and vases sitting on the floor. The air was sweet with rose attar, the perfume of lilies, the spicy scent of snapdragons, and the aroma of gladioli.

“That’s right.” Dean took off his metal-rimmed glasses, and Ronnie noticed the creases the stems had pressed into skin above his ears. “And Missy Wade. She made sure the casket was taken care of.”

“Out of her pocket?”

“I really can’t say.”

Ronnie knew there was a fund at the First National to help with the girls. He’d read about it in the Weekly Press , but no one had said anything to him about it. No one had told him how to access the money because, so he assumed, no one thought he was capable of managing it. No one trusted him to make the right decisions. He’d lost three of his babies, and up to this point no one had given him a chance to do anything a father would have done.

“One casket,” he said to Dean.

Dean put his glasses back on. “No need for others,” he said in his gentle funeral director’s voice. He patted Ronnie on the shoulder as he turned to give him a moment alone at the casket. “You take your time.”

Ronnie stood there trying to recall what it was like when Della meant the world to him. He couldn’t say that he’d stopped loving her, only that he’d reached a point where it was easier to be away from her than it was to be with her, disappointing her too much of the time. Then there’d been Brandi, and one thing had led to another until he was in too deep and there was no getting back to the man he’d been and the life he’d had. A life that was achingly real to him now and yet beyond his reach.

He recalled the smallest things. The way he taught Emily to swallow air and make herself burp; the months when Gracie had an imaginary dog she called Pitty-Pat Popsicle Pooch; the way they’d all sing “Walking on Sunshine”—even Della — and Junior would bob his head and pound his sippy cup on his highchair tray like a drummer caught in the rapture.

Just things like that. Just the stuff of being a family.

Finally, he slipped out through a rear door that opened onto the alley. It was dark, and snow had started to fall. A few feet up the alley two men leaned against the wall of the school, one of them smoking a cigarette, the cherry bright when he puffed. Ronnie noted something familiar in the set of his narrow shoulders and the way he stood with his chin thrust out in front of him. He knew it was Milt Timlin, the fire chief from Goldengate.

“Something odd about that fire,” Milt said. “I was out there all night and most of the next morning. I can’t put my finger on what it is, but something doesn’t set right with me.”

And the other one said, “It went up in a hurry. I can tell you that. Missy said, ‘Della’s trailer’s on fire,’ and by the time I got there—”

Ronnie knew then that the other man was Pat Wade.

“And Shooter Rowe was already there?”

“Him and his boy.”

“No one else?”

“Just them.”

For a while neither man said anything, and Ronnie could hear the sound of traffic on the street that ran along the school. He could hear car doors slamming shut and the hushed tones of people talking as they made their way inside.

Then Pat said, “You don’t think someone set it?”

“I guess the State Fire Marshal will determine that,” Milt said, “but I can tell you that blaze sure burned hot in a certain place.”

That’s when Ronnie coughed so the men would spy him there and stop their talking. “Pat, is that you?” he called down the alley.

“It’s me,” Pat said. “Sure is snowing, isn’t it?”

Ronnie took a few steps and then stopped when he realized the snow was coming up over his loafers and the cuffs of his dress pants.

“You think I set that fire?” he asked.

Milt said something to Pat in a low voice, and then Ronnie thought he heard Pat say his name.

Then Pat’s voice came louder. “Ah, Ronnie, we were just talking. We didn’t say anything like that. Why in the world would anyone think you’d—”