Amanda watched a few
minutes of TV while Maricruz changed out of her snow gear into a pair of jeans
and then filled the bath tub with piping hot water and an overabundance of bubbles. She placed a fresh towel on the lid of the
closed toilet along with a pair of new underwear out of a package she hadn’t
opened yet, as well as a white t-shirt, a forest green pullover sweater, and a pair of
jeans she couldn’t fit into but hoped to be able to eventually after Umberto
finally followed through and showed her the exercises she should be doing. That’s the excuse she kept giving herself
anyway. Maricruz called for Amanda to come. “You can stay in here as long as you want,
sweetie,” Maricruz said, touching Amanda softly on the shoulder. Amanda’s smile was so wide it could barely
fit in the apartment.
After Maricruz walked
out of the bathroom, leaving Amanda alone, she heard Amanda lock the door and
twist and pull the knob a few times to make sure it really was locked. Then she heard something, probably the
hamper, being pushed in front of the door and then the knob jiggled again to
make sure one last time that the door was indeed locked. Maricruz gathered everything she needed for
the French toast: a skillet, bread, milk, eggs, powdered sugar, and
cinnamon. Amanda had to be starving and
when Lyle arrived from her parents’ house with Benny he would be eager to bite
into a syrup drenched stack. But right
as she was about to turn on the burner to heat up the skillet the phone rang.
The call was her mother
filling her in on the fact that Lyle was stranded at their place for a bit and
that he was using that time to get cleaned up.
At first Maricruz was a bit perturbed at the delay in seeing Lyle and
actually getting to sit down across the table from him and share a meal for the
first time in three months. It seemed
all she’d been doing for as long as she could remember is waiting. “There’s not really much we can do about it
right now,” her mom explained. “If the
plow doesn’t swing through before he and his clothes are all cleaned up, then
I’ll bribe two of your brothers to take him and Benny over to your place. Plus, you’ll be glad that he’s showered when
he gets over there. That man smelled as
bad as Umby’s gym bag. They’ll be there
in a little over an hour, okay? Just be
patient and get some rest while you’re waiting.” Maricruz decided to put all the ingredients
back up and then to spend that time putting all the candles back in the box and
storing it again in the hall closet. After
she was finished with the candles, Maricruz flipped on the television and
absent-mindedly watched The Karate Kid
for the millionth time until she dozed off.
When Maricruz woke up
about an hour later, Amanda had finished up in the bathroom and was curled up
in a ball in the easy chair sleeping wet-haired and breathing deeply. Maricruz placed Benny’s black and yellow
fleece blanket over her and then went into the bedroom and called her mom, finding
out that Lyle and Benny would be there any minute on the back of the
snowmobiles, driven by Miguel and Umberto who Veronica had paid twenty dollars
each and who had also been conscripted by Fernando via phone to come down to Los Tres Hermanos in order to help him
make it the only restaurant open in town.
“You really don’t have to go down there to help today if you don’t want
to,” Veronica told her, but Maricruz fully intended on doing her part for the family. After she hung up, knowing that Lyle and
Benny would be there soon, she pulled out all the ingredients again and started
cooking French toast, along with bacon and eggs.
About ten minutes later
the door opened and in walked Lyle and Benny.
Lyle inhaled deeply and moaned in an ecstasy that could have only from a
combination of the heavenly smell of frying bacon and the sight of
Maricruz. At least she hoped that she
ranked somewhere near the smell of bacon.
As she looked him over, Maricruz couldn’t believe how handsome Lyle
was with his beard gone and his hair combed, like one of the cowboys from
the Stetson cologne commercials that always came on around Christmas. After she hugged Benny, Maricruz embraced
Lyle and rested her cheek on his worn flannel shirt, thanking her mother in her
mind for cleaning him up before sending him home. Although she was, of course, delighted to see
her little boy and more than willing to help out Amanda, she couldn’t help but
wish that it was just she and Lyle for a while so they could reconnect. It had been so long. They had too much catching up to do to have
anyone else around.
As Lyle kissed Maricruz
softly and held her close to him, she felt the ridges carved into the
wooden handle of the pistol stuffed into the back of Lyle’s pants. She stepped back from Lyle and was about to
ask him what in the world he was doing with a gun when Benny interrupted her by
tugging on his her arm.
“Who’s that?”
Benny asked, pointing at Amanda, speaking a little too loudly and in a tone bordering
on rudeness.
“That’s our new friend,
Amanda,” she answered him, whispering.
“She might be staying
here for a while,” Lyle said.
Maricruz gave Lyle a
surprised look. “What do you mean ‘a
while?’” she asked him.
“Just until we get all
this figured out for her,” he assured her, the look on his face revealing that
he realized that he had some explaining to do.
“You need to tell me
what’s going on with this girl and why the hell you’re carrying a gun,”
Maricruz demanded as she set out plates for Lyle, Amanda, and herself. Since Benny wasn’t hungry he went to his room
to play, and Maricruz decided not to wake up Amanda, but just to warm it up for
her whenever she woke up. Lyle pulled
the pistol out and placed it on top of the refrigerator where Benny wouldn’t
find it before he could turn it over to the police later. Then the two of them sat down and over the
next twenty minutes, Lyle told her everything Amanda had told him back in the abandoned farmhouse. After just a few
minutes of the story, Maricruz pushed her plate away, having lost her
appetite. “There really is evil in this
world isn’t there, Lyle? It’s not just
something our grandparents made up to scare us, is it?”
“I used to think there was evil,” he answered, “Now
I know it. So you can see that we’ve got
to help her out. I made a promise to her
that I wouldn’t let anything happen to her.
I’ve got to keep that promise, Mari.
No more letting people down. I need to call the police but I'm not sure if they should be my first call or my last. Your
mom thinks Father Carl might be able to help out.”
Maricruz’s mind raced
as she got up and piled Lyle’s plate with seconds of French toast, eggs, and
bacon, and then poured him another glass of orange juice. “Maybe Mr. Stockett or Rick would know
someone too,” she suggested.
“Oh yeah,” Lyle
interrupted her. “Speaking of Rick, I
called him from your parents’ place and invited him over this afternoon for a
late lunch since the highway should be totally clear by then. I figured we could celebrate my 90 days with
some fajitas or enchiladas and maybe some tres leches cake if you can talk Miguel
or your dad into making one. It’s a day
worth celebrating, babe. I’m alive! I’m sober! And I’m back with the woman I love! What could be better than that?”
“That sounds good,”
Maricruz forced herself to say, trying to hide her nervous tone, as she rose from her chair to take her plate to the sink. “What time did you say he’d be here
again?” Could she work up the nerve to
make today the day that Lyle, and even more importantly Benny, would finally
find out the truth about Rick? How would
they react?
“Well, I told him two
o’clock but he said he’d try to be here by one-thirty. He said he had something really important he
wanted to talk to me about. At first I
figured it was probably just something to do with AA, but he sounded kind of
weird when he said that, kind of like he was scared to death of something.” Lyle took a bite of French toast. “Any idea what he’d want to talk about?” he
asked with his mouth full.
Maricruz tried to catch
herself before it happened, but when she heard him ask that question the plate
she was taking to the sink dropped onto the kitchen floor, shattering it and
splattering her uneaten eggs, bacon, and syrupy French toast all over the tiles. “Um… uh” she said shakily, trying to stall
while she figured out how to answer the question without lying or telling the
truth. She hadn’t even talked to Rick
about her decision that it was time to tell Lyle and Benny. He must finally need to clear his
conscience. But today? Couldn’t it wait until she was ready? Did she
really need to keep that bargain she made with God that if Lyle made it back
safely she’d tell him and Benny the truth?
Maricruz looked over at Lyle and saw that one of his eyebrows was raised
in what seemed like anticipation of her answer and suspicion at why it was
taking her so long to give it. Did he know? Was he just setting her up, trying to catch her in a lie? Why was she being so paranoid? Of course he didn't know. Or did he? Not knowing how to answer, she decided to just walk out of the kitchen without cleaning up the mess on the floor.
"Where you going, babe?" Lyle asked her, again with his mouth full and a confused look on his face.
"I need to... I need to..." She stopped and steadied herself by placing her hand on the end table, noticing that Amanda had slept through the crashing plate. But would she be able to sleep through what was about to happen? "Lyle," she said. "You love me right?"
"Well, I did walk through a blizzard for you, so, yeah, I guess you could say I'm kind of fond of you," he joked, having walked over to check on her.
"Well, that's a good thing, Baby." She took a deep breath. "We should probably go back over to the table and sit down." She looked him in the eyes. "I think I know what Rick wants to talk to you about, but I'd rather you hear it from me."
