Summer of Fire - Linda Jacobs [36]
Getting unsteadily to his feet, he pulled on a pair of shorts and a dirty T-shirt from the floor. The clock beside his picture of Susan said eleven-thirty. Ancient venetian blinds leaked light around the edges.
Jesus, he’d missed half the day.
He tried to think. Determined to take on Clare Chance’s challenge to get sober, his resolve had remained in place until Saturday when he’d driven to Old Faithful. He had intended to present himself, sober, and thank her for saving him, no matter how worthless he felt. Returning without finding Clare, the four walls stared him down. He paced and wondered why he’d gone.
Alone on another Saturday night, while the park housing around him rang with familial laughter; rage surged like a specter through the drafty floorboards, seizing his throat.
How had he thought to live with Susan in her grave?
Going to the kitchen, he had reached beneath the sink and drawn forth a half-gallon of Old Crow.
As Steve entered the small living room dominated by Susan’s black-lacquered grand piano, the hammering at his door grew louder. Half-full glasses and filthy dishes littered the tabletops. An empty half-gallon of Crow lay on the floor, fallen companion to one beside his bed. At some point, he’d shed his jeans and socks in a heap on the floor.
He did not remember doing that.
His caller was using his fist. “Steve? Are you there?” The male voice had a tinge of Oxford. The small square window in the front door revealed Moru Mzima’s dark face, his high forehead edged in close-cropped black hair. The bars over the glass were the last vestiges of when the small building had been Fort Yellowstone’s stockade.
With trembling hands, Steve turned the dead bolt and opened the door. Bright light stabbed and the old parade ground across the street blurred.
“Moru.”
“I was about to break in.”
Steve ran a hand through his hair and found it a greasy mess. “Ya know me,” he tried at being casual. “I may be late on a Monday, but don’t I always get there?”
Moru flinched. He glanced into the darkened depths of the living room. “May I come in?”
After standing in the fresh air, Steve noticed the musty, sick smell inside. Nevertheless, he waved his fellow ranger in.
Moru looked doubtful, but he came in and folded his long legs to sit on Steve’s brown leather couch trimmed in pine. He removed his ranger’s hat, the summer straw model. After looking at the dirty dishes and a half-empty bottle of Seagram’s gin that Steve had opened when the Crow ran out, Moru settled for placing the hat on his knee.
Steve shifted his weight from one foot to another, like he always did when he was uncomfortable. Susan had called it his elephant dance.
Moru met his eyes. “Shad Dugan sent me.”
Oh, boy. Dugan, who worked directly for the Chief Ranger, was reputed to be a fair man. He demanded exacting work and Steve tried to deliver, through his hangovers and the occasional late morning.
“Dugan said to tell you this can’t go on,” Moru said levelly. “He’s considering referring you to a treatment center to dry out.”
Steve gasped as though Dugan were here and had punched him. “Oh, yeah? I suppose he was too busy to come over here and tell me this to my fucking face. He lives three goddamn doors away.” Maybe it was a good thing Dugan had sent Moru with this little bomb, because it effectively prevented Steve from jumping one of his bosses and ending his career.
Moru worried his hat, turning it.
Steve felt like hitting something, but there was nothing near except the mirror-like surface of Susan’s piano. He put a fist on it, holding himself up.
At the sight of Moru’s stricken face, the rage went out of Steve. Moru was Ndebele, from rural Zimbabwe. His good fortune in getting educated in England and making it to the United States tended to make him unfailingly cheerful. Today, he looked sick.
“Ah, Jesus,” Steve moaned. His head felt too heavy to hold up, so he slumped until it rested on the piano. Light reflections in the deep shining surface and the sudden realization that he stank