Round Rock - Michelle Huneven [131]
“No,” said the boy. “You look more like a rock star.”
They saw each other every day after that, up in the hills, in many of the same spots where David and Billie had once met.
“I showed up every day, rain or shine,” he told Libby and Lewis. “I showed up until he knew I was there for him. When I was offered a job in New Mexico, Bill helped me decide to take it. We’ve been in close contact ever since.”
“And Billie never knew?” Libby was incredulous.
“It’s the only secret this town ever kept,” David said. “Berthe Kipness once saw us in a restaurant in Los Angeles, and Rogelio spotted us at that campground on the Dennison Grade. Either Billie didn’t believe them, or they never told her.”
The three of them sat quietly in Red Ray’s former bedroom. The late-afternoon breeze, bearing a cool tone of ocean, flapped the cover of a magazine, shifted hairs on their heads. Lewis had taken a chair by the bassinet, in which the calico cat lay curled and sleeping.
“Billie had told him his father was some kid,” David told them, “who’d died in a car wreck before he was born. When Bill was ten, he asked about his other grandparents and aunts and uncles on his father’s side. Why didn’t they want to meet him? That night Billie took fifty Valium, and he never asked about his dad again.”
“She really wants things her own way, doesn’t she?” Libby said.
“Don’t we all?” said David. “This spring, I was given an herb that kills you in twenty-one days unless you make enormous changes in your life. Warriors and sorcerers used to take it as part of their initiations; in more recent times, it’s been classified as a poison. As my uncle says, it makes you grow up or die. I finally had to forgive myself for my childhood crimes. I had to stop capitulating to Billie, and stop running. I really had to come home.”
“I know,” Libby said. “This damn valley. You yearn for it even when you’re here.”
“I knew this job might be problematic,” David said. “Red and I talked about it.”
“You told Red?” said Libby.
“Only in the most general way.”
Libby’s eyes filmed with tears. “Okay,” she said. “Thank you.” She handed a water glass to Lewis. “You guys go back to work. I need some time to think.”
SHE PHONED Lewis at the office the next morning and invited him to stop by for a bowl of Gloria’s albóndiga soup. “That’s meatballs to you, Lewis,” she said.
He walked across the roadway to Libby’s house. Gloria, a tiny woman with a thick gray braid, had the darkest eyes he’d ever seen. She was on her way out the door, but put down her purse and ladled out a bowl of soup for him. “Contenta hoy.” Gloria nodded to the bedroom.
Libby sat propped up in bed, eating her soup. She looked happy. The back door was open. The calico cat sat on the stoop, having a stare-down with Gustave, who was tied to the oak tree. Every now and then, Gustave let rip an excruciating, bloodcurdling whine.
“Don’t you love soup on a hot day?” Libby pursed her lips to suck in the skinny vermicelli. The air in the room seemed light as helium.
“I gotta get this recipe,” Lewis said.
“Lard—that’s the secret,” said Libby. “When Gloria was browning the meatballs, I asked what smelled so good in there. ‘Manteca,’ she said. Pig fat. Nectar of the gods.”
“I read that lard’s actually better for you than butter. Less cholesterol, more amino acids, something like that.”
“Hey, you’re preaching to the converted.”
They slurped up their noodles.
“So, I called Billie,” said Libby.
“You talked to her?”
“No way. She didn’t pick up. I left a message.” Libby regarded the meatball balanced on her spoon. “I said, ‘I just have one question. What gives you the right to deprive your son of his father? That’s the most selfish thing I’ve ever heard. Every child has that right!’ Oh, I was really on my high horse.” She raised the meatball to her lips. “And I also said, ‘Come to think of it, you haven’t been very nice to me, either. Until you deal with some of this stuff and start treating people with some compassion and honesty, I don’t think I can be your friend.” Libby