11. Blue
blue
As Wolfe drove us through the snow-packed streets, I sensed that Billings was a small town.
It was bigger than Hysham, but it was still small.
I saw memory frames of other places I had been, bigger places, with rushed activity, lots of traffic, and tall buildings.
A collection of large houses set back on smooth green lawns.
The glitter of bodies of water between the trees. None of which I could put a name to.
The only things that seemed real were those places I had been to since I woke up.
It felt like that. That I’d woken up to find Wolfe and his house and Hysham.
The front walk of a gray house and the older woman and her dog.
Wolfe had told me to stay in the truck while he went in, and I was fine with that.
He’d left the truck running and the heater on, and I just wasn’t up to meeting anyone.
But he’d made me meet Dr. Tanaka. He asked please when I told him I didn’t want to go in.
As if a single word was worth enough to strip away all my fears, unnamed, tenuous, but blocking the light.
Both Wolfe and the doctor had gotten concerned about scars.
I sensed I had them, could just about see them when I looked over my shoulder at the small mirror above the sink in Wolfe’s bathroom.
They were a part of me. They might have happened in Room or Cellar or House, but I couldn’t be sure they’d not happened elsewhere.
Maybe Nimble knew, or Star knew, though I couldn’t find them to ask. Wouldn’t know where to start. But the most important thing had been Wolfe, standing there, seeing them.
Not as though he’d been witness when they’d been formed, but like he stood in that exam room ready to set fire to someone or something for making them. Hands in the pockets of his dark blue parka, a sentinel at the gates. A guard watching for signs of distress.
His eyes had been so dark, and he’d watched the doctor like he’d be ready to jump in and stop the whole process if I so much as flinched because those hands examining me had hurt me.
It was a good feeling to be protected by him, I could not deny. To feel his energy on the lookout for me. I wanted to feel things more like that moment.
The doctor had been precise and professional, finding nothing worth keeping me for, and Wolfe and I were soon in his truck making our way to the army surplus store to buy boots he insisted I needed.
The man didn’t have enough money to pay a doctor, and here he was insisting on buying me boots.
And sneakers, because I’d been a brat about my old ones.
In my old life, being a brat got results, or at least I sensed it had.
Now, though, Wolfe didn’t seem like the kind of man who would take no for an answer, even if I said I’d changed my mind and didn’t want them.
“Here we are,” Wolfe said as he parked the truck in a half-empty, snow-covered parking lot. “We’ll get you some boots, and some sneakers, maybe some other things.”
He turned off the truck and got out, and I scrambled out in those oversized rubber boots that were only staying on my feet because I was wearing two pairs of Wolfe’s socks.
I waited for him by the passenger door, and when he came up to me, puffs of steam floating around his head, I said, “You don’t have any money. Are you going to pay everyone in hatbands?”
He went still, as though I had slapped him, which was a horrible way to repay him for all his kindnesses.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just don’t know why you’re being so nice to me. So generous.”
“Because that’s what a man does,” he said. “At least the kind of man I want to be does.”
I wondered what other men he’d known to make him take such a stance. And whether I understood how lucky I was that he found me, and not some other man, a more selfish one.
“Okay,” I said, swallowing over my dry throat. “But will you teach me to make those hatbands?”
“Once you’ve got your lanyard technique perfected,” he said, and as he came close to me, I could look up and see the smile lurking deep in his eyes. Leading me to believe that the way I made lanyards was less important than my willingness to help.
We went inside the low building, and after nodding to the clerk who came up to us, offering assistance, Wolfe led me straight to the back of the store, where the boots and shoes were.
I will admit, as my feet shifted in those rubber boots, that my mouth watered when Wolfe picked up one of the sample boots sitting on top of a stack of boot boxes.
“These’ll take you as far as you want to go.” He held out a pair of oiled leather boots. They were brown and sturdy, with white soles and yellow laces.
I touched the soft leather, admiring it, and then I saw the price tag and drew my hand back. “I don’t need these,” I said. “Maybe just the sneakers. They’re only thirty bucks.”
“More like sixty,” said the clerk, coming up behind us.
We both turned to look at him. “You have that credit with us, Mr. Bramwell,” he said.
“From those keychains you made us. We’re almost out.
Maybe you could make more, especially coming up to the holiday season.
I’m sure my boss would want me to make an arrangement with you. ”
Credit. Wolfe was willing to use his credit to buy footwear for a stranger. Credit he’d earned in his workshop, all alone, head down as he focused on what his hands were doing. Head down, ignoring the blue sky right outside his window.
I drew in a hard breath because we’d reached a stopping point for me.
Somehow I knew that in my past life, in the beforetime, I wouldn’t have even raised so much as an eyebrow, let alone an objection.
Money had flowed in that life, and nobody I knew even had to pause when making a purchase.
This was not true for Wolfe, and it wasn’t going to be me draining his credit at this place, even if it was only a dinky army surplus store in the middle of nowhere.
Wolfe turned the boot in his hands, tracing the leather with his fingers, following where my fingers had been.
Maybe he was thinking of all the places the boots could take him, if he wasn’t already tied to his land and his cabin and the view of those purple humped mountains off in the distance that had made his eyes light up when he looked at them.
Then, slowly, he looked at me, dipped his head in a way that felt like he was drawing me into a private conversation. Something for just the two of us.
“Do you reckon you’d care to learn how to make keychains out of leather?”
He was offering me an opportunity, and I realized this was the way to him. Maybe a hundred years ago, I would have said, let me help you with your harvest, and he would have accepted and helped me with mine.
But now, as I knew he appreciated my offer to make hatbands with him, he was giving me a way to avoid having those boots be pure charity.
He was giving me a way to contribute. To him, that kind of interweaving of effort mattered, and maybe to him that was how you built a life.
I had nothing. No life, no memory, no past. And here he was, reaching out to give me something to hold on to. Something real.
“Yes,” I said. “Of course.”
“Good,” he said, and then turned to the clerk. “I can get the bits and bobs, but do you have any more of those leather remnants?”
“You cleaned us out, sir,” said the clerk with a smile. “But you can go online and order.”
“I checked some sites when I first came,” Wolfe said. “Pricey for me.”
“I know a guy in Minnesota,” the clerk said. “I’ll reach out. Because a portion of keychain sales goes to local vets, he’ll cut you a deal.”
“Cowhide,” said Wolfe with a shake of his head as though surprised to find the same generosity in others that he’d given me. “It’s got to be cowhide.”
“I’ll let him know,” the clerk said. “I’ll have his number for you when you ring out.”
As the clerk went off, humming beneath his breath, Wolfe tugged on the sleeve of my coat and began to select things for me.
Those boots. The blue canvas high-tops. A pack of underwear, a pack of t-shirts.
A pack of thick white socks. A pair of jeans.
Two Henleys in my size. A red scarf. Wool gloves in dark gray.
A toothbrush from the discount aisle up front.
As we walked to the clerk waiting by the cash register, our arms laden with things for me, and none for him, Wolfe said, “I’ll get you a better coat next time.”
As I stood there, watching the clerk ring up the items, half-listening to their continued discussion about the key rings, I saw that no money changed hands when the clerk handed the receipt over.
Which meant that I’d surely wiped out Wolfe’s credit at the army surplus.
Which meant that it was important that I learned what Wolfe knew: how to make things that people wanted.
Handcrafted items for sale at Christmas.
“Sit down,” Wolfe said, taking the handles of the plastic bags the clerk had packed for us. “Put these on, and I’ll put the rubber boots in the box.”
I sat down, pulled off the rubber boots, and one pair of woolen socks. As I laced up those new boots, I sensed a kind of stability. I stood up, testing the feel, which was balanced as though, for once, I was standing on solid ground.
“I feel like a new man in these,” I said. “Thank you.” I’d make a million lanyards or key rings, whatever he needed, just to pay him back.
We went out to the truck. The temperature seemed to have dropped, so it was like walking inside a freezer, only a freezer would have been warmer.
Wolf put the bags in the truck bed, packing snow on top so they wouldn’t fly away.
We started out of the parking lot, and I would have thought we’d head back, but instead we drove deeper into Billings, to a strip mall.
Wolfe parked in front of a place that said Village Inn Pizza.
“Thought we’d get a bite,” he said without looking at me, as though he wanted us to do something I’d object to.
Which I wouldn’t. I followed him in, my feet heavy in my new boots, sniffing the garlic-laced air as the glass door shut behind us, bells on the handle jingling our presence to the owner.
It was early for lunch, so the place was empty as we took our seats near the front, where the bright blue sky painted a swath across the front windows.
Wolfe looked at the plastic menu and turned it so I could see it, pointing at the Hawaiian pizza as if to ask, did I like that kind of pizza? I had no idea, but Wolfe wanted it, so I nodded.
When the young lady in the sauce-stained apron came to take our order, he ordered an iced tea, so I did as well.
It was as if, outside the familiar confines of the cabin, I wanted to stay small so as not to rock any boats or make any sudden moves.
I wanted to stay invisible to everyone but Wolfe, so I did everything he did.
The pizza came quickly, and I watched Wolfe eat.
Slowly and with care, using a paper napkin after just about every bite.
I remembered the way I’d eaten that first meal at Wolfe’s cabin.
Shoving everything in as though I’d been starving, which might have been true, but I didn’t know.
Only that the food had been hot and good, and Wolfe had watched me then, as I watched him now.
“This is good,” I said after a few bites. The sweetness of the pineapple went well with the tomato, and I vowed I would have it again.
“Some people hate it, some love it,” he said, just about winking at me. “I’m glad you’re one of the good ones.”
I ducked my chin to hide my smile at the joke and the off-handed compliment. “How many key rings will we have to make?” I asked him.
“Millions,” he said, the laughter draining out of his eyes. “Just about millions.”
“I’ll help you,” I said.
“Thank you,” he said, his eyes soft in a way that went beyond mere gratitude.
In a way that made it feel like Wolfe liked having me there, sitting across from me.
Doing something as simple as eating pizza.
That maybe he didn’t mind having me in his cabin, eating all his food.
Needing boots. Taking up space. No, he didn’t seem to mind at all.
“This is really good,” I said, swallowing a huge bite, gasping around the swallow. He smiled and looked around at the people coming in the door, as though he didn’t want to be caught smiling. But I’d caught him, and I wouldn’t forget that I had.