Chapter 2
Chapter
Two
Malcolm stood at the window of Howie’s ICU room and stared at the view of the attached wing and its slightly tinted windows.
Beyond it, he could make out the distant shape of the mountains.
Behind him, Howie slept restlessly. Malcolm had never been in an ICU room before, but it resembled regular rooms, except for a lot more machines, tubes, wires, and a lot less privacy.
Which made sense, since these patients needed near-constant care and monitoring.
It was still kind of creepy that anyone walking past could look in and see them.
Didn’t matter, not if being here got Howie better.
Malcolm cared about Howie and was still worried for his recovery, but much deeper than those things, Malcolm was hurt.
And not surface hurt that could be fixed with some putty, sanding and time.
No, this was deep down, a foundational fracture that could ruin the whole structure if he didn’t address it soon.
This wasn’t the time, with Howie struggling, but soon.
Iggy hadn’t known Malcolm was back in Chance.
Correction: he knew Malcolm had come back but not that he’d decided to stay.
To try and create a foundation for a new life on previously unstable ground.
He hadn’t intended to, but that’s what happened.
He loved his sister and her kids more than he hated his memories.
Even the memories that speaking to Iggy had stirred back up, like a snake down a clogged pipe.
Old shit rising to the surface in a way that walking down Old Main or grabbing a bite at Laughing Fork Diner didn’t reach.
Or hell, even doing jobs for Howie every few weeks, chatting him up while ordering drinks at the saloon—none of that stirred the shit like hearing Iggy’s voice again after seventeen years.
The first time he’d heard the high, lyrical voice of an angry angel, Malcolm had been rushing through the high school hallway after the warning bell, trying to make first period on time, first day back after Christmas break.
He’d overslept because he’d been up all night listening to his parents fighting over credit card bills, thanks to Mom’s Christmas spending.
And Dad said if Malcolm got another detention for tardies… well…
…Malcolm can’t be late. He dodges a stray pack of freshmen and turns a hard left down the west corridor toward Mrs. Rose’s classroom, and he nearly collides with a tall, slender, solitary figure.
Malcolm dodges hard and slams his shoulder into a locker.
The echoing clang makes his roadblock yelp, then say, “Dude, watch out! I don’t want to be roadkill my first day! ”
“Don’t stand in the middle of the hallway then,” Malcolm retorts, shoulder stinging from the impact. Pride bruised more than anything else.
“I’m hardly in the middle, dude.” The sarcastic emphasis on ‘dude’ brings the guy’s pretty face and sharp cheekbones into focus. White-blond hair with dark roots is pulled back in a ponytail, and silver glints in both ears. “Look, is Mr. Sanchez’s room down this hall? I’m going to be late.”
“You and me both, and yeah.” Malcolm points two doors down the nearly empty corridor. “Right there.”
“My hero.” An eye-roll and more sarcasm. Blondie flounces away without introducing himself or saying thank you.
Malcolm stares at the closing door to Mr. Sanchez’s room, dumbfounded and enthralled and kind of annoyed. Then the late bell rings.
“Fuck my life.”
He’s late to class, but Mrs. Rose has mercy when he explains he helped a transfer student find his classroom. Malcolm doesn’t know that’s the gods-honest truth until later, when he stumbles over his mysterious blond roadblock again after lunch…
…Malcolm’s stomach gave an angry gurgle.
It was midafternoon, and the dry bagel he’d scarfed down for breakfast had been a lifetime ago, according to his moaning belly.
Even though Howie had told Malcolm he didn’t need to hang around when surely there was work to be done, Malcolm still felt shitty about leaving the man.
He had no idea if Howie had other living family members besides Iggy, and it had taken a full day just to get Iggy to answer Malcolm’s call.
And while Howie had a lot of friends in and around Chance, some of whom had already sent cards and flowers via the hospital’s gift shop, everyone also had lives and jobs.
While Howie loved to complain about the ugly fancy houses being built across Snow Creek from the saloon, most of the folks in Chance were working class and blue collar. Every paycheck counted.
“Why didn’t you tell him I live here now?
” Malcolm whispered to the sleeping man who couldn’t hear him.
It wasn’t as if knowing would have kept Iggy away from Chance; Iggy hadn’t known and he still stayed away.
But Iggy’s heart had been broken, his trust shattered, and both things were Malcolm’s fault.
An emergency sink leak at the urgent care clinic stole Malcolm away for the rest of the afternoon, and when he called the hospital, they told him that Mr. Donohue had two signed-in visitors. Good, he wasn’t alone.
Malcolm went home and helped Amy get dinner on the table for everyone by five-thirty.
Amy was fourteen going on thirty, the older half-sister of her three younger siblings.
Her own useless sperm donor had sent a condolence card when Amy’s stepfather Tomás died, and Amy had made a point of lighting it on fire in the backyard.
Malcolm had initially been worried, but he’d rather her burn greeting cards on an old barbecue grill than do some of the rebellious, angry teenage stuff her own mother had done.
Melissa and Malcolm’s parents’ final two years of marriage and eventual divorce had been ugly.
Later that evening, he was in his camper tinkering with a vintage pot metal clock he was trying to fix, when a series of texts came through. All from Iggy.
Got a red-eye, lands in FNL 5:45 am.
No hotels check in that early.
Do you have a key to Uncle Howie’s house?
Sorry to bother you.
The stream-of-consciousness texts made Malcolm smile. Iggy used to blow up his phone with line-by-line texts, instead of focusing and sending one long coherent thought. It was like personal Iggy poetry, and he’d loved it, like he’d loved so many quirky things about teenage Iggy.
Focus, ding-dong.
He read each text again. Yes, he currently had a key to Howie’s place, because early this morning he’d gone over to fix the door he’d broken, which had meant replacing the busted lock.
New key. Easy. Airplane arriving before dawn and no hotel check-in meant Iggy would need someplace to chill until hospital visiting hours—oh. Duh.
Duh.
Malcolm voiced the text and hit send before he could think twice.
I’ll pick you up and drive you back to Howie’s house. I’ve got a key. See you at 5:45.
Almost an hour passed before Iggy replied:
Acceptable. See you then.
“Acceptable,” Malcolm repeated, rolling his eyes at nothing in particular.
Sometimes he wished he had a pet to talk to, but he was allergic to cats, too busy for a dog (Melissa had banned four-legged animals that required walks anyway), and he wasn’t fond of rabbits or rodents.
Fish tanks were expensive and difficult to maintain, and the only time in his life Malcolm had owned a beta fish, his father had flushed the thing down the toilet as punishment for ten-year-old Malcolm getting a D on a history quiz.
No fish, no pets, he’d just talk to the walls like usual.
Sometimes, he’d pick up his phone and yack into his best friend Jake Colter’s ear about stuff and nonsense, but he’d never told Jake about Iggy.
Broad strokes, sure, about the boy he’d loved and lost in high school, but not the particulars.
Not the betrayals. Not being forced to leave his broken heart behind when he moved away with his mother the summer after senior year.
Nope, he wasn’t ready to tell his closest friend about this. Not yet.
He called Melissa to let her know he wouldn’t be around for the breakfast frenzy tomorrow, because he had a super early errand to run.
Bless her, she didn’t press. She had her life and he had his, and “As long as you aren’t out there committing crimes,” she’d told him when he decided to stick around on a permanent basis, “you don’t have to check in with me about everything you do.
Just try to be home for a meal once a day, if you can. ”
He’d done his best. Mealtimes with those kids, while hectic and messy, were his favorite times of day.
Naturally, he slept for shit that night, tossing and turning on the camper’s thin mattress.
Constantly tempted to search Iggy’s name on his phone, to find all his social media accounts and see what he’d been up to these last seventeen years.
It would be so easy. Too freaking easy. And creepy.
He was a terrible actor, and he wanted to be genuinely surprised when Iggy told him stuff tomorrow—if Iggy told him stuff—and not pretend he didn’t already know.
He would not cyber stalk his ex.
He might be lonely and bad at relationships, but Malcolm wasn’t completely pathetic.
A million stars in the sky kept him company on the drive south to the airport.
The quiet beauty around the highway gave way to billboards and the light pollution of Fort Collins.
One of the things that always drew him back to places like Chance was the stars and heavens above.
Sometimes, he was jealous of the cowboys who worked the surrounding ranches, especially the boys up at Snow Creek Ranch, because they lived with this beauty every single day.
Camped out beneath it, traveled over her lovely terrain. So jealous.
But whenever he contemplated changing careers, Malcolm remembered why he couldn’t fathom spending his days in a saddle, moving cattle. He needed to work with his hands, to build things, to see progress being made. To work out a puzzle in his head, sometimes sketched on paper.