Carefree Cove Ch. 06

"Oh yes she can, if she thinks there's something in it for her. But she didn't want to keep the fish; she made me turn them loose and she blew them goodbye kisses."

He laughed out loud at that. "Do you have enough money for the additional day?"

"Oh yes, Tom. You gave us way too much anyway."

"All right. Well, keep me posted."

"Sure. Don't have too much fun today, Gracie."

"Don't worry about it." The faint echo of his daughter's goodbye came through before the connection was terminated.

The morning was dawning clear with the promise of midday heat once again. After a simple breakfast, Tom went downstairs where he worked on Michelle's Mother Nature painting again. A strange peace settled over him, and he wanted to be alone all day with no one else around. He referred to the digital images he took days before: her eyes sparkled as she looked at him through the lens. Gently he stroked the canvas with his brush, as his hand stroked her soft skin the week before. Every flower was his fingertip circling her nipple, every long stroke his hand traveled her thigh to quicken her breathing.

By noontime, the painting was almost done, and a large damp spot pushed out from his sweat pants. His balls were tight and full, aching for release, and he took a long shower to relieve his tension, painting the walls sticky white with his frustration's release. The painting was done in the midafternoon, and he fixed a cooler of Sam Adams to join him on the deck for the rest of the day and long into the evening. He smoked two cigars, blowing billows into the night air once again, the image of his Michelle with Mutt Hayes still burning in his mind's eye.

******* He awoke with a start in fully daylight, with another hangover and ashtray taste in his mouth. Gravity worked very well that morning, and it took him an hour after awakening before he could shower and stagger downstairs. Only iced tea satisfied his needs, and he sipped it slowly as three aspirin dulled the ache in his head.

For the first time in days, he looked across the way and saw signs of life. A glance at the cove: she was reclining nude once again, her bronze skin reveling in the new day. Why was she gone? Who did she see? What was going on with Mutt? There was a somber look on her face that made him think twice about approaching her. He snapped a few digital shots of her as she sunbathed at the lakeshore below him.

She stirred and seemed to look his direction; he darted inside and pounded the counter in irritation. "Shit," he said to no one, "I'm no better than those boys in the parking lot. Acting like a damn teenager, sneaking peeks. Hell, I've fucked the shit out of that woman, why am I afraid of her?" Stomping around, he thought of going down the lakeside to see her, but every time he started out the door he stopped with a jolt.

Finally, he stomped upstairs and sat down at his computer, fiddling with unnecessary office work nervously until noon. When the grandfather clock in the hall struck the hour, he ran out the front door and drove into town and the Q and A Bar and Grill.

Tom found the Q and A Bar and Grill fairly empty. Taking a table around the corner from the front door, he sat with his back to the door. He ordered a grilled tenderloin and salad, and after he got his food, the DOM gang came in together and took a table by the front window. Mutt Hayes was with them, so he stayed quiet. After placing their orders, the old men sipped their coffee as they discussed the world's troubles.

Hoot shook his head sadly. "It's hell getting older. My drug costs just went up again."

"What?" Freddy said. "I thought the Church took care of its own?"

"The Church's got to since Jesus ain't walkin' around healin' people any more," Chigger Thompson sneered. A native of New York retired three years ago, he was the resident agnostic in Baptist Seville Hills.

"Shut up, Chigger," Hoot carped. "All you guys are feelin' it too, I know. We're all on at least 12 pills a day, except Mutt, who only takes his 10 Viagara."

"One to break every Commandment. Jealous, boys?" A chorus of sneers answered his boast. "I'm serious, guys, this is just another way this country's getting screwed," Hoot began. "All this talk of freedom: it's freedom to get sodomized by the rich and the strong, by whoever really makes the rules. Give your life to a company who promises you a pension and benefits for life? Gone, just because somebody isn't making enough money. A flicker of worry in an oil producing area? Boom, gas is twenty cents a gallon higher just cause somebody's worried that their profits might be endangered. And the kids get upset cause we didn't save our money, cause we're a drain on them. They don't care we had an agreement when we were younger that we'd be taken care of , and corporations have no problem walking away from that. Wait till their masters screw them for no good reason."

"C'mon, Hoot, when did you become a Democrat?" Mutt jibed, "Everybody in this country who's willing to work hard has a chance to get ahead."

"Just like Sysiphus. If you work hard enough, you'll get the stone up the hill, but something always trips you and you're at the bottom again. Look at old Gracie in the trailer park. Most of her income goes for her medication and her rent. Where does she find cash for food, phone and utilities? There's no way she has a credit rating worth anything? Not after spending all her free cash on booze more of her life. God help her if she gets sick. How's she supposed to work harder and get the gravy?"

Mutt spread his hands wide. "Look, this country is still the greatest in the world. Everyone has the opportunity to get ahead. Chigger, Petey and Freddy worked hard all their life for a fine retirement; you don't hear them complaining"

"I'm gonna lose the farm in two years if I'm still alive," Freddy murmured.

"My drug plan gets cut next week," Chigger sighed.

"I have to eat home-made peanut butter five nights a week," Petey groused.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, heard that song before Petey," Mutt continued, undeterred. "Capitalism is the greatest system the world has ever known, and the most equitable way to distribute the wealth."

"You and your buddies run this county," Hoot fired back.. "If you like somebody, they prosper, and if you don't, they fail. You preach opportunity enough to bullshit stupid people into thinking they have it, and count on enough indifference and discouragement to keep from being challenged at the polls. Whenever a big developer shows up, you pull out pants down and work in the butt grease to help them sodomize us, and whenever business needs a handout, you're the first to pull out our wallets and empty them. This isn't the land of the Free, Mutt, this is feudalism reborn."

The air was still in the Q and A, and Eric Clapton's Tears in Heaven wasn't making much of an impression. The other diners had stopped eating; the bartender was giving them his full attention. Tom leaned closer to hear what came next.

"You're one to talk, Mr. High and Mighty. When you started there was some moral force in the Methodist Church, some sense of right and wrong. But it got lost in the free love--hippy--peace now '60s and never came to its senses again. Have you preached fire and brimstone lately, Rev. Pidgeon? Everybody in the world joining hands and skipping through Heaven's Gate? Seems like Satan's in still in business."

"So you're the moral backbone of the town, Mr. Hayes? The great robber baron is the model of us all?"

"We could do worse. I've worked hard, and God has rewarded me, because as you know, the Lord helps those who help themselves. We've gotten the right men elected to local government, and in the state. In a few years, we'll have washed out all the liberal shit that's corrupted our system of government since FDR and get this country back on the right track again, by God."

"I don't think it's by God, and you're part of the problem, not the solution, Mutt."

"That's all I need to hear, Rev. Pidgeon. From now on, I'll go to Zion Grove Baptist. At least Brother Sam knows how God and Country work together." With that, he stomped out of the bar, started his Lincoln Town Car, and moved off into the shimmering afternoon.

"He's gonna have a hard time at Zion Grove," Freddy Klienschmidt observed from under his John Deere hat. "Brother Sam don't cotton to drinking, and Mutt ain't drawn a sober breath since he was 12."

Muffled laughter chorused agreement.

*********

The drive home was uneventful. He walked into the house and looked at Amanda's picture over the fireplace. She was sitting on the sofa, wearing her favorite yellow dress with a blue ribbon in her blonde hair. A broad, toothy smile lit up her face; her bare, tan legs hung off the couch and her toes seemed to wiggle impatiently as the subject longed to bound from her seat to a new adventure.

A chocolate cake Tom didn't bake rested on the counter, with an unsigned card. It read: "Back from the trip and I'm here to stay. MISSED YOU." The afternoon heat hung over the cove, and a glance at the shoreline was unproductive. Tom opened a Sam Adams and worked up the courage to look at the house.

Her car was gone. He shook his head in disbelief; what she was doing completely missed him. Downstairs, her portrait hung, the Earth Goddess ripe with fertility and irresistible sexuality. Her smell hung in his nostrils, her touch tingled on his skin, the memories were so vivid. These feelings had been absent for almost five years since Renee abandoned him.

Mounting a canvas on the wall, he filled several sandwich bags with paint. Fetching several more beers, he threw the improvised paint bags at the canvas with his full force, then decorated and connected them with rugged black lines. After cleaning up, he took his digital camera on a whim to snap a few shots, sending them to Alastair Livingston Quigely in New York just to see what kind of response he'd get. Quigley had been pestering him for years to try his hand at abstracts; Tom wanted to show him how stupid the idea was.

Going to his bedroom, he threw himself on the bed, falling into a deep sleep as his passion suddenly ran out of gas. It was dusk before he awakened, and a return to town to get the news seemed like a great idea.

*****

Tom entered the Q and A Bar and Grill around 6:30PM, and found his buddies Freddy Kleinschmidt and Petey Harms sitting at a table toward the back. "You guys been here all day?" he asked.

"Not quite," Freddy said. "We had a little excitement after we left earlier."

"Oh?" Tom asked.

"Hoot had a heart attack," Petey said flatly.

"When?"

"Around 2:00. After we left, Petey and I had some errands to run, and Hoot went home to mow his yard. He was pretty worked up: Mutt started an argument with him over lunch and he was still steaming about it when he left. Evidently, the fool didn't drink enough water before he went out, and the heat got to him."

"Is he gonna be okay?"

"They took him up to Fairhaven Regional Hospital," Freddy said quietly. "Just got off the phone with his wife Jan. They got him stable, and did a test. Tomorra' they're gonna see if he needs replumbing "

"That's what happened to me a coupla years ago, remember?" Petey added. "Got short of breath while I was on the tractor in the garden, went in and they had to come out and jump start me, bring me back. Ended up with four bypasses."

"The fact that he made it to the hospital should make all the difference," Tom concluded. 'Are you going to see him tomorrow?"

"Naw," Petey drawled. "His kids are coming in and there'll be a crowd. He'll be back pretty soon, probably late next week, and we can run by the house once he gets settled back in."

"Oh. Well, I guess I'll wait, too. Unless Amanda wants to see him."

The older men chuckled to themselves. "Little girls are a force of nature more powerful than tornadoes," Petey observed.

"When does she get back?" Freddy asked.

"Tomorrow morning."

At that moment, Tom's cell phone went off, and a familiar voice said: "Hi Daddy!"

"Hi, sweetheart. How's it goin'?"

"Swell. Grammie and I want to stay another day."

"What? How come?"

"There's a rodeo tomorrow night at Springfield and I wanna see it. Can I, please, can I?"

Hopes for the next day helped him with his answer. "All right, sugar, I guess so."

"Yipee!"

"But only if you don't wear your Grammie out."

"Oh, I"ll be good to her. I've been a very good girl the whole week, just ask!"

"How was the art fair?"

"It was bee-you-tee-full. Some really pretty pictures, almost as good as yours, Daddy."

A tear crept from the corner of Tom's eye, and his friends looked away. "I'm glad you had a good time. What else did you do?"

"We went out for pizza. It was really fun, lots of games to play. Grammie and I spent three hours there."

"That all?"

"No, we went fishing for a while. Didn't catch a darned thing."

"I'm glad you're having a good time. Does Grammie want to talk to me?"

"Yes, Daddy, let me get her." She managed to get away from the phone enough that her scream for her great-grandmother didn't deafen her father. "Hi, Tom. How's it going?" Gracie said when she took the line.

"All right for the most part. Rev. Hoot had a heart attack."

"Oh, no. Is he all right?"

"So far, so good. They've got him up in Fairhaven."

"That's all right I guess."

"Yeah. Don't tell Amanda yet, I'll tell her when she gets home. You can go to church down there, that'll be easier."

"Sure, I guess the walls won't fall in if I show up for a church where nobody knows me."

"Doesn't hurt to curry favor at this time of life. You'll get back around lunchtime Sunday?"

"I think so. I know I can't take more than that; you may have to send an ambulance after me if we're out longer than that."

"Okay, Gracie. Pace yourself. . ."

"That's easy for you to say."

"And have a good time. Does Amanda want to talk again?"

"Yes, hold on." There was a pause as Gracie passed the phone.

"Hi, Daddy."

"Now you be a good girl and promise me you'll come home no later than lunchtime Sunday."

"I promise. Cross my heart and hope to die. I need to ask you one more thing, Daddy. . ."

"Yes?"

"Sing the song, Daddy! Sing the song!"

"That's my daughter in the water. . . "

Freddy and Petey murmured along as Tom sang as loud as he dared in a public place. The bar other patrons paid them no notice, the blues tracks playing in the background covered the long distance serenade. The bar began to fill: four men wearing sleeveless t-shirts began playing pool; three women over 60 perched on barstools looking around and chatting with each other; an impossibly thin man, a scarecrow in his late 40's with shoulder length hair, moustache and sideburns put his two piece pool cue together and chatted with the bartender as he looked around.

"Thanks, Daddy," she gushed when they finished. "Are you in a bar?"

"Yes, Amanda, I am at the Q and A. I'm here with your uncle Petey and uncle Freddy."

"Is uncle Hoot or uncle Mutt there?"

"No, baby, they're busy." The older men snorted in derision.

"Well, I guess it's okay since they'll make you behave. Good night, Daddy."

"Good night, sweetheart." He flipped the phone closed.

"That's really pathetic when your little girl won't let you go out with your buddies on Friday night," Petey snorted.

"Did she give you permission to stay out late?" Freddy chimed in.

"Go to hell. Both of you know if your wives called you here, you'd be in deeper shit than that." They both laughed loud, amplified by a touch of nerves. Tom smiled to himself, while wondering where Michelle was, and whether Mutt was with her.

To be continued...