Serial

73

Beth had used a brush to get around the edges of the porch floor with flat gray paint. That was the hard part, now that she was done with the scraping, and hammering in all the loose nails so they wouldn’t stick up from the floor.

The floor had become so weathered that bare wood was peeking through the paint leading up to the door, and beneath the glider where people rested their feet. All she had to do now was pour paint into a tray and roll the floor. It wouldn’t take very long, even though she’d be covering a large area.

She paused as she heard a car slow on the country road and turn into the driveway.

No, not a car-a truck. She could hear the rattling bass note of its big diesel engine.

As she watched, a gray, dusty truck cab parked near the short gravel jog to the house. It was one of the big rigs, with twin exhaust stacks protruding straight up on each side of the cab’s sleeper. On the tops of the exhaust-blackened stacks were loosely hinged caps that bounced and danced as the engine idled. Behind the cab were only the greasy fifthwheel connector plate, and air brake and electrical lines leading nowhere. No trailer, just the cab. There were numbers on the truck’s door, meaningless to Beth. She stood and watched, the paintbrush forgotten in her hand.

The truck’s door opened and Roy Brannigan swung down out of the cab.

Beth drew in her breath. Time seemed to collapse away beneath her, leaving her weightless and floating.

She and Roy hadn’t seen each other in years. Beth was surprised by how her ex-husband had broadened, though he wasn’t fat. More muscular, as if he worked out regularly in a gym. Or maybe driving, or loading and unloading trucks, had kept him in shape. She’d have known him at a glance, though, despite the buzz-cut hair and dark sunglasses.

He peeled off the tinted glasses and smiled at her, then took a few tentative steps toward the porch. He’d left the truck’s engine idling. It sounded like a great beast’s heartbeat, powerful, indestructible.

Beth walked to the top of the porch steps and stood looking at him. Somehow holding the brush gave her confidence, as if she might simply paint him out of her life again if he made trouble.

He moved a few steps closer so they could talk.

“Been a long while, Beth.”

She said nothing.

“I’m driving a truck now, doing long-distance hauling. My route on this run took me close to where I knew you lived, so I thought I’d drop by and see how you were doing.”

“I’m doing fine, Roy.”

“Me, too, I guess.”

“Eddie’s fine, too.”

At first he didn’t seem to recognize the name. Then he said, “Good. I was gonna ask.”

Sure you were.

“You look real good,” Roy said, as if at a loss for words. He moved his scuffed black leather boots around on the gravel. “Look, Beth, I just wanted to let you know I was sorry about everything. What I did… how it happened… I upped and left you because of my religion.”

“You still got religion, Roy?”

“I do, but you might say it’s less severe. I mean, what I’m trying to say is, I wised up, like everybody does when time passes. I apologize for overreacting. You know, back when… it happened.”

Beth chewed on her lower lip for a while, listening to the low, diesel beat of the truck. She didn’t like this, Roy showing up this way out of nowhere.

“I’ve got a husband, Roy,” she said.

He smiled. “I know you do. I checked on you. Fella in town mentioned Link’s away on a trip someplace. That his name, Link?”

Mentioned it because you asked about him. “You know his name.” Beth was beginning to feel the first cold touch of fear. “What is it you want, Roy?”

“It ain’t to dig up the past. Except I would like to know that you at least sort of forgive me-no, not even forgive. I guess I’d like you to understand that I was more rigid in my thinking back then. Now I can’t believe God would’ve approved of my actions. I’ve apologized to Him, and now I wanna apologize to you. I had no right to act like I did. I’m truly sorry.”

She studied him. He did seem sincere. “All right, Roy. I can’t forgive you, but I do understand.” She wondered if there might be some way she could get into the house if he tried anything, hold him off long enough to phone Wayne Westerley. But, hell, Wayne was all the way over in Hogart. It’d take him just inside an hour to get here.

“I heard about Vincent Salas being released,” Roy said. “Has that been making you uneasy in any way?”

“Not really,” Beth lied.

“I’d be glad to go talk to him if you want.”

“He wouldn’t like that.”

“You can’t know for sure. His soul might need succor if not salvation.”

“I’d prefer it if you’d just let all that drop, Roy. Let the past stay the past.”

Roy seemed to think that over. “Okay, Beth, if that’s what you want. But I got one question.” Roy moved a few steps closer. “Even though things worked out the way they did, is it possible we could be friends?”

Beth got a firmer grip on the paintbrush handle. “I don’t think I want that, Roy. I don’t go around thinking ill of you every day, and I can’t see where it does anybody any good to call up bad memories, or even good ones if they attach themselves to the bad. I’ve got a new life, and it looks like you do. Let’s leave it that way.”

Another step closer. “You sure that’s what you want?” He squared his new, overpowering body to hers and leaned toward her.

Gravel crunched out near where the truck cab was parked, and Eileen Millvany, who lived with her mother two houses up the road, slowed her SUV and glanced over at Beth, then drove on.

Roy and his truck had been seen, and Roy knew it. That made Beth feel better, safer.

“I’m sure and I’ll stay sure,” she said.

Roy stood and stared at her, a kind of quizzical expression on his face, and then he nodded, turned around, and walked slowly toward his truck. The confused expression was one she’d never seen before. She remembered him being certain of everything when they were together. The younger Roy thought he knew all the answers before he’d even heard the questions.

He climbed back up into the cab, shifted gears, and the truck rumbled away. Nothing was left of it but a thin haze of dust and a final dying growl from the direction of the county road.

Beth tried to make herself believe Roy’s appearance was something other than an illusion. It was so strange and unexpected, him suddenly turning up here like that.

She looked down at the brush in her hand and saw that the paint on it had become tacky and the bristles were stuck together. It needed to be placed in the jar of turpentine, and then she could continue with what she’d been doing and roll the porch’s paint-starved plank floor.

But not immediately.

She propped the brush in the turpentine jar and went inside the house.

She needed to make a phone call.