Chapter 15
WILLOW
Isteel my nerves, which are jangling even more than they were that first time I walked into the bar. I hold my head high and my shoulders back, making it appear that everything’s fine. Just fine.
It’s so not.
I know that as soon as I walk in the door. Unc is behind the bar, wiping down the already shining surface. His blue eyes, cold and hard as ice, cut to me with the creak of the door.
I crumble instantly. Bellying up to the bar opposite him, my apologies gush off my tongue in one big rush of words.
“Unc, I am so sorry if I overstepped yesterday. I was trying to help, thought it’d be nice for you to drive up and see everything spic and span and safe.
But I should’ve asked. I’m sorry. How’s your hand? ”
Without a word, he holds his hand up. He’s wearing fingerless leather gloves, like something you’d use to work out, that block me from seeing a darned thing.
“How many stitches? What did the doctor say? Do you have an antibiotic prescription? I can pick that up for you.”
Unc’s eyes narrow, but he answers aloud this time.
“Ten stitches. Doc said to keep it covered in ointment and bandaged.” He wiggles his fingers around, and I can tell they’re restricted, hopefully by the bandage beneath the glove.
“Figured I’d keep the bandage covered so nothing got in it and people didn’t come around asking nosy questions.
” One of his bushy eyebrows lifts pointedly at the questions I’ve been asking.
“Sure, good idea,” I agree. My head bounces up and down as though I’m a bobblehead, reassuring him that everything’s fine. Just fine.
Maybe if I say it enough, to myself and to him, it’ll be true.
He sighs and goes to run his fingers through his hair but stops short as he remembers the injury. “Come in here a minute so we can talk. I don’t need the whole town knowing my business.”
There’s literally no one but us in the bar right now. No customers yet, and Olivia is nowhere to be seen. But I hear clanging in the kitchen, so Ilene must be here getting prepped for the day.
Unc opens the door to his office and steps inside, indicating that I should sit on the bench.
I do, watching closely as he goes around the desk and sits down.
He lays his hands over one another, bad one on bottom.
He’s not a man who willingly shows a weakness, and an injury is definitely something he’d consider a weakness.
This feels ominous.
I think I’m about to get fired by my own uncle. I’ve never been fired from a job in my life, but that it’s Unc doing it makes it sting that much more. Especially when I was only trying to help.
“I’m so sorry, Unc.” Hopefully, another apology will soften his heart into giving me another chance?
“Willow.” He pauses dramatically, and my heart climbs another inch up my throat. “I asked you this before and didn’t push when you lied straight to my face, but I think it’s high time you tell me the truth. What brings you to Great Falls?”
Huh? He knows I lied?
Oh, shit, he knows I lied.
I’m in deeper trouble than I thought.
He pins me in place with a glare, and I can’t help but fidget, my knee bouncing rapidly. “A change. I told you.” I swallow down the bile threatening to come up. It’s not a lie, it’s just not the whole truth.
“Tell me more. After all these years, why now?” A thread of anger weaves through the question, and while I’d like to tell myself it’s a leftover emotion from Grandpa or Mom, I know it’s because he can read me like a book. And he knows I’m still lying to him right now.
If the only way out of this is with the truth, then so be it.
Sorry, Mom.
“I remember you from when I was younger. You know I always thought you were my cool uncle. You’d take me for rides in your truck, letting me bounce around in the front seat when Mom made me sit in the back, and you’d tell stories and cuss with zero care that Oakley and I were in the room, and you .
. .” I fall back into the past, into memories around the dinner table with Mom, Dad, Oakley, Unc, and me.
“You talked to me like I had thoughts and opinions worth hearing. Other than Mom and Dad, you were the only adult who did that. It made me feel . . . not invisible at a time when all I felt was invisible.”
He starts to say something, but I need to get this out while I have a chance. If he sends me out of here today and I go home to the city with my tail between my legs, I need him to know how much he means to me.
“But when you and Grandpa . . .” Unc flinches, and I graze around that wound.
“Fought, you left. You left me like I was nothing, like maybe I wasn’t so worthwhile and important, after all.
And I was hurt. I was furious for a long time.
But time keeps passing, and when I got older, I realized we don’t always have ‘later’ to sort things out, so I came.
For a change with you, before it’s too late. Before we’re out of time.”
The last words are my real fear. His time is short, shorter than it was all those years ago for sure, and there’s more at stake now.
He starts to speak but coughs, covering a catch in his throat. “How long have you known?”
“Since I came. It’s why I came,” I confess.
“I figured as much,” he says dryly, leaning back in his chair.
He props his feet up on the desk, crossing his hands over his belly, the bandaged one still covered by the good one.
He’s somehow the utter picture of relaxation, as though yesterday didn’t happen and we’re not discussing a cancer diagnosis.
The word alone hits me hard, which is why I’ve tried to avoid it, even in my own thoughts. Unc has cancer. It’s bad. He’s alone and needs help. He needs me.
Cancer. Death. Fear. Time.
Powerful words that seem to not hit Unc in the slightest. I want this memory—of Unc strong and resolute, dismissive of the seriousness of his reality. Click. Not with my camera, but with my mind this time. I know I won’t forget this image.
“Okay, your turn. If we’re getting this out in the open, what’s the prognosis?
What does the doctor say your odds are and how can I help?
” I’m a woman on a mission, charging full steam ahead to handle whatever needs attention.
This is what I’m here for, and there’s no need to refute it any more or hide it in subtle, secretive moves so I don’t poke at his pride.
Unc snorts derisively. “Like he knows a damn thing. He says this is what’s gonna kill me, but he ain’t got a crystal ball. I might get hit by a bus tomorrow, so no sense worrying about what he thinks he knows.”
What a bright, uplifting outlook, I think wryly.
“There are no buses in Great Falls,” I challenge.
“You know what I mean. I ain’t worrying about things I can’t change. And school buses,” he counters, plenty of sass in his own voice.
I don’t bother reminding him that it’s summer and school buses aren’t running. “But you’re doing what the doctor says, right? Following orders?” I already know the answer, but I want to make him say it so he sees that he’s doing too much.
And he is—working six days a week for lunch and dinner shifts the way he always has, with just those rare two days he took off, still carrying boxes around like he’s a muscled up man of twenty, drinking his craft beer and eating from Ilene’s kitchen every night where even the vegetables are cooked in butter and salt.
I’m not sure how to fight cancer, but my gut tells me it involves a lifestyle based on less stress, healthy eating, and eight hours of sleep every night.
All things Unc is not doing. Hell, things he’s probably never done!
“I’m doing what I want, same as always. No reason to fix something that ain’t broke. And to be clear, I ain’t broke.” This time, I lift one brow, mimicking the move he’s perfected. “I’m not,” he asserts. “I’m old, not done.”
I’m glad to hear that he hasn’t given up. His fight is strong, going so far as to fight the doctor and whatever weakness his body has succumbed to with the iron will he’s always had.
Relief grows inside my heart, even though nothing has really changed.
Unc still has cancer. But now we’re talking about it at least, and that is a change for good.
He’s still a stubborn old coot. But now I can call him out on being pig-headed and ornery.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t honest with you from the get-go, but I wanted to stay, wanted time with you.
I still do,” I plead. “I’m sorry if I overstepped with the yardwork and office organizing.
” I look around the room, gesturing to the file cabinet with drawers that actually close cleanly instead of getting stuck on stacks of crooked papers.
“I really was trying to help without stepping on your toes.”
His boots wiggle on the desk. “These old boots protect my toes just fine, girl. Don’t you worry about dancing on them. If anything, I should be the one apologizing to you.”
I shake my head, and he does the eyebrow thing, freezing my tongue before I can argue.
He sits up straight, his feet on the floor once again as he leans forward over the desk.
“You said your piece, now I’m gonna say mine.
You’d best listen up, too, because I’m not doing this whole thing again.
” He points from himself to me, like this conversation is the very definition of hell to him.
Not because it’s me, but because words have power and he’s speaking out loud about something beyond his control, a scary prospect for anyone, but certainly for a man like Hank Davis.
I nod, zipping my lip and listening.
“One, nobody knows shit and I intend to keep it that way. The gossipy Guses of this town have enough ammunition to keep them busy six days a week and twice on Sunday, and I don’t need them gossiping about me, coming in to check on me, and sending over casseroles like I can’t cook my own damn dinner. ”
He says the word ‘casserole’ with disgust, and a smile tries to bloom, but I press my lips together.