Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Meyer
T he house smelled of lavender and beeswax, as usual. I inhaled deeply, feeling, as I always did, that I was home. The entry was shabby, needing a lick of paint. Probably, the whole house needed renovation. I knew Mom didn’t have the money to do that, and she’d never have asked if I could help her. I followed Mom into the breakfast cum diner nook at the back of the house, dumping my bag by the door. I hadn’t actually asked if she wanted me to stay, so I didn’t run up the stairs to my old bedroom quite yet.
Mom made a pot of coffee, the rich aroma adding to the familiar smells, and brought out the cookie jar decorated with faded Christmas trees and reindeer with red noses. I’d bought the jar for her from a yard sale when I was eleven. The fact she still used it brought a lump to my throat. I swallowed hard and looked out of the window to the yard before I did something stupid, like cry.
We sat down at the table. She poured me a mug of strong black coffee and pushed over the cookie jar.
Mom eyed me steadily. “Now tell me why I had to find out from Dex that you’ve taken a job back in your hometown rather than the promotion in Chicago you told me about?”
Quicksand! Quicksand!
I took a deep breath. I’d anticipated this was going to be an awkward conversation, and I’d always been lousy at lying to my mom. She’d had a sixth sense when I was trying to bullshit her. There was a reason I didn’t play poker. My face showed everything.
“I heard there was an opening here, and I thought it would give me a chance to spend more time with you.”
Mom sighed and took a sip of her coffee. “You mean Mark told you about my angina.”
And tumbling into the quicksand I went.
“Uncle Mark called me,” I admitted and went on the offensive. “More to the point, why didn’t you call me?”
“Because it’s just mild angina. It’s not important.”
I held back an eye roll. My mom was as bad as me at lying. I covered her hand with my larger one. “Mom, I’m a big boy now. I can cope with hearing you had angina attacks and went to the ER.”
“Mark’s got a big mouth,” she muttered.
I chuckled ruefully. “He has. You should have heard him go on at me for not visiting you until he realized I had no clue what he was talking about.”
My uncle had called me selfish and thoughtless and a waste of space, interspersed with curse words I only heard at the firehouse until he’d paused for breath. Then I’d demanded to know what he was talking about.
“Why didn’t you simply call me when you found out?” Mom asked.
“Because you’d have lied to me,” I said, fixing her with the ‘don’t mess with me’ stare she’d used on me my entire life. “You’d tell me everything was all right when it’s clearly not. You should have told me you were ill.”
“It’s not serious,” she protested. “I’m getting older. These things happen.”
“It is serious, and you’re only fifty-four, Mom. Still young.”
And I’d lost my dad to a sudden heart attack while on a call. I couldn’t face losing my mom, too. I remembered my panic when my uncle calmed down enough to tell me she’d been ill. I was never going to admit to her how scared I was when I heard heart and attack in the same sentence. It had taken me five minutes after putting the phone down from my uncle to call the fire chief of the firehouse in Charming Butte to see if there was a job. I was prepared to volunteer if necessary if it gave me a chance to come home.
I’d known Chief Brannigan all my life. I grew up in the firehouse, and helped my dad cleaning the trucks. Brannigan had been understanding when I called—he knew my mom, of course—and to my surprise, offered me the assistant fire chief’s job immediately. The current assistant chief was due to retire, and nobody among the firefighters was ready for the position.
“They’re good men,” Brannigan said, “but still rookies. I need someone with experience under his belt.”
I was relieved. I didn’t want to walk into the firehouse only to find out another guy had been expecting my job. I didn’t need to face hostility on my first day at work or wonder on every callout whether the men with me would have my back.
We talked for a while, catching up on the gossip, then I put down my phone and expelled a long breath. Turning down the promotion I’d been offered in Chicago was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I’d worked my butt off for that job, but I knew I’d never forgive myself for leaving Mom to face a life-threatening illness alone.
So now I was here. I smiled at Mom, held her hand, and asked if I could stay for a while.
Mom narrowed her eyes, then she smiled and relaxed. “’Course you can. If you don’t mind dealing with my belly dancing class on Monday, pole dancing on Thursday, and the poker game on Friday.”
My mouth dropped open. “Belly dancing?” I said faintly. “Pole dancing? Poker?”
What the hell had happened to my knitting-addicted, watercolor-artist mother?
She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t think I can dance?”
“Of course you can,” I said promptly. My mom could do anything. I knew better than to say different. “But…belly dancing?”
Mom burst out laughing. “You deserved that.”
I stared at her again, then chuckled ruefully. “I guess I did.”
“I do go dancing every week, but it’s not quite as lively.”
I shook my head. “You had me, Mom.”
She leaned back in her seat. “Are you really moving back here, Meyer?”
“I am, but I’ll need to find a place to live.”
“Then I’ll help you find somewhere.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I said, grateful she was willing to help and not expecting me to stay with her.
She chuckled. “You flew the nest a long time ago, son. I think we’ll kill each other if you stay here for too long.”
My mom rocked. I leaned over the table and hugged her. “I love you, Mom.”
She squeezed me hard. “I love you too. Now, I’m going to make sandwiches for lunch, and you can tell me all about your new job. Then you can tell me how you managed to get Gary to keep his mouth shut. That man has a looser tongue than my old mom had.”
It took me a moment to remember who Gary was. Then I realized. Chief Gary Brannigan. Of course. Mom knew everyone.
After lunch, I called Smith’s Auto shop and made arrangements to pick up my Impala.
“Meyer Jones,” the woman cooed. “I couldn’t believe it when I heard you were back in town. And riding on the back of Dex’s sweet horse too.”
I held back a sigh. It wasn’t that I’d forgotten what it was like to live in a small town and have everyone know everyone else and their business. I’d lived in Charming long enough. But after the anonymity of the big city, I knew it would get wearing. I remembered the first couple of years in Chicago when I’d been so lonely I’d almost given up and come home. I just needed to adjust again.
“Hi, Mrs. Smith. It sure wasn’t how I planned to arrive.”
Mrs. Smith was at school with my mom. I’d known her forever. She always had small, white fluffy dogs at her feet.
“He’s such a good boy,” she gushed. “You were lucky he turned up.”
Unseen, I rolled my eyes. It was a five-mile walk, not fifty miles. But I agreed with her because Dex had been kind, even though he was a snarky snitch.
She sent her son, who was a few years older than me, and married to Sally. I knew her better. We’d been in the same chem class together.
The ride back to where I’d left Daisy was much quicker than my journey with Dex on the back of a horse, if not as interesting. Alex Smith kept an undemanding patter for the ten minutes it took to get to my vehicle.
“There.” I pointed to the Impala.
“Nice ride,” he said.
“She’s usually so reliable.” Daisy was my pride and joy, one of the final Impalas.
Alex pulled the tow truck in front of it. “I’ll take a look and see if there’s anything I can fix now; otherwise, I’ll take it—her—back to the shop.”
I handed over the keys. “I looked under the hood myself, but I’m no mechanic.”
“No worries, man.” Alex grinned at me. “That’s what we’re here for.”
To my relief and pride—I’m a guy, it happens—Alex couldn’t see the problem either, so Daisy got hitched up to the tow truck, and we rode back to town, Alex dropping me off at the end of my street.
That was one problem off my list. If my old bike was still in the garage, I could cycle to work on Monday. It wasn’t a long journey to the firehouse, and I could walk, but it’d be a lot quicker with some kind of wheels.
I poked my head in the garage and groaned. The space that used to house my mom’s car was full of old furniture I remembered from when I was a kid. I’d have to ask Mom if she still had my bike and had any idea where it was.
Mom smiled at me when I came in. She was stirring something on the stovetop. “Gary called. He heard you were in town.”
“I should go over there.” I should have called him as soon as I arrived.
“He said he doesn’t want to see you until Monday morning. Get your breath back and get settled in before you start.”
I expelled a breath. “That’s kind of him.”
“He’s a good man,” she agreed, and there was a softness in her voice I didn’t expect.
But Chief Brannigan had been a friend of my dad’s, and he’d kept an eye on us after my dad had died. He was her friend now. And now he was going to be my boss. I hoped that wasn’t going to make life complicated.
I went over to hug her. “Don’t shut me out again, okay? You have all these people taking care of you when it should have been me.”
She squeezed me, and I felt her shake a little. “You’re my boy. I wanted you to follow your dreams.”
“My dreams can wait a while. You know you’re the most important person in my life.”
Mom leaned back to look up at me. “We’re gonna talk about that, young man. What about Tom?”
“Tom? What Tom?” I said it in a teasing tone, but I really didn’t want to talk about my ex.
To my relief, Mom dropped the subject. “Your dad would be so proud of you right now.”
I snorted. “He would have kicked my butt for being away for so long.”
“He was the one who told you you’d have to leave home to follow your dreams. He knew Charming was too small for you.”
She was right. Dad had told me that, even when I didn’t want to hear it.
I gave her a stern look—one she said was exactly like my dad. “But he never expected you to be alone, Mom. He thought he’d be there to take care of you.”
“You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
“No, I’m not. But I’m back now, and I have a job. I just need to find a home.” I wandered over to the sink to fill a glass with water and took a long swallow.
“You should talk to Dex. He’d got an empty house on the ranch.”
I choked on the water, spraying it everywhere. Mom rushed over to me with a towel. “Meyer, are you all right?”
I nodded, clutching onto the sink, as I coughed and choked and heaved while Mom patted my back anxiously. It took me long moments to recover my breath.
Live with Dex? Oh heck no. That would be my worst nightmare. All those muscles wrapped in a hot but grumpy exterior. That would never work, and I was sure he’d hate the idea as much as I did. I coughed a few more times, then sipped at the water until I could breathe again.
Mom huffed at me as she mopped up where I’d sprayed water. “I taught you to drink from a cup when you were little.”
“Sorry. Just breathed at the wrong time.”
Because you suggested I live with Dex . Okay, not with Dex, but near him, and that was bad enough. I’d be dreaming about him every night.
“I could fix up the house for you now I’m back,” I suggested, hoping the deflection would work.
It did. She started to scold me again about having too much to do than worry about wielding a paint brush.
“I’ll be working shifts,” I pointed out. “I can do some touch-ups on the house. Call it a project to make up for all the Mother’s Days I missed.”
Like all of them. Somehow, I’d never gotten home for Mother’s Day, on shift as the single guy. I always sent flowers and a card, but it wasn’t the same as me being here.
Mom bumped a hip with mine. “Done. But only once you’ve moved in, and I pick the colors. I know you. You’ll choose gray for every room.”
“That’s not true,” I protested.
“What color is your room?”
“It’s blue.”
“It’s gray,” she snapped.
“Blue-gray,” I countered. “It’s a nice color.”
It was, and I still liked it. But maybe I could paint the room green now. Then I thought about Dex’s eyes. They’d look perfect as the color in my room. Yummy. I could make him stand next to the paint cans so I could match the color. I grinned, imagining his sour reaction.
“I pick the color, and you can paint,” Mom insisted. “Maybe Dex could give you a hand.”
I was so glad I’d finished my glass of water.