• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 256 0

the years. About how he’d dropped out of school when he was twelve and found a job in his uncle’s garage; how he’d first met Clara at church when he was fourteen years old and knew in that instant that he was going to marry her; how Tuck’s entire family, including his uncle, had moved north in search of work a few years into the Great Depression and never came back. She told Dawson about his early years with Clara, including the first miscarriage, and his backbreaking work for Clara’s father on the family farm while he worked on building this house at night. She said that Clara had two more miscarriages after the war and talked about Tuck building the garage before gradually beginning to restore cars in the early 1950s, including a Cadillac owned by an up-and-coming singer named Elvis Presley. By the time she finished telling him about Clara’s death and how Tuck talked to Clara’s ghost, Dawson had emptied his tea and was staring into the glass, no doubt trying to reconcile her stories with the man he’d known.

“I can’t believe he didn’t tell you any of that,” Amanda marveled.

“He had his reasons, I guess. Maybe he liked you better.”

“I doubt that,” she said. “It’s just that I knew him later in life. You knew him when he was still hurting.”

“Maybe,” he said, sounding unconvinced.

Amanda went on. “You were important to him. He let you live here, after all. Not once, but twice.” When Dawson finally nodded, she set her glass aside. “Can I ask a question, though?”

“Anything.”

“What did the two of you talk about?”

“Cars. Engines. Transmissions. Sometimes we talked about the weather.”

“Must have been scintillating,” she cracked.

“You can’t imagine. But back then, I wasn’t much of a talker, either.”

She leaned toward him, suddenly purposeful. “All right. So now we both know about Tuck and you know about me. But I still don’t know about you.”

“Sure you do. I told you about me yesterday. I work on an oil rig? Live in a trailer out in the country? Still drive the same car? No dates?”

In a languid motion, Amanda draped her ponytail over one shoulder, the movement almost sensual. “Tell me something I don’t know,” she coaxed. “Something about you that no one knows. Something that would surprise me.”

“There’s not much to tell,” he said.

She scrutinized him. “Why don’t I believe you?”

Because, he thought, I could never hide anything from you. “I’m not sure,” he said instead.

She grew quiet at his answer, working through something else in her mind. “You said something yesterday that I’m curious about.” When he fixed her with a quizzical expression, she went on. “How did you know that Marilyn Bonner never remarried?”

“I just do.”

“Did Tuck tell you?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know?”

He laced his fingers together and leaned back in his rocker, knowing that if he didn’t answer, she’d simply ask again. In that, she hadn’t changed, either. “It’s probably better if I start from the beginning,” he said, sighing. He told her then about the Bonners—about his visit to Marilyn’s crumbling farmhouse so long ago, about the family’s years of struggle, that he’d begun sending them money anonymously when he got out of prison. And finally, that over the years he’d had private detectives report on the family’s welfare. When he finished, Amanda was quiet, visibly struggling with a response.

“I don’t know what to say,” she finally burst out.

“I knew you were going to say that.”

“I’m serious, Dawson,” she said, her anger evident. “I mean, I know that there’s something noble about what you’re doing, and I’m sure it made a difference in their lives. But… there’s something sad about it, too, because you can’t forgive yourself for what so clearly was an accident. Everyone makes mistakes, even if some are worse than others. Accidents happen. But having someone follow them? To know exactly what’s happening in their lives? That’s just wrong.”

“You don’t understand—,” he started.

“No, you don’t understand,” she interrupted. “Don’t you think they deserve their privacy? Taking photos, digging through their personal lives—”

“It’s not like that,