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“The storm knocked out the telephone, sweetheart.”
“Pow,” said Jody.
A
“You are a smart little girl,” she told her.
It gave her an idea: maybe she could “knock out” Laurie’s bad idea of going to Colorado by herself-supposedly by herself-by getting Belle to go, too. After all, Belle might be jealous and resent the expensive treat for her sister-in-law, and Laurie had already talked about inviting a friend. She and Belle weren’t all that close, but they were friends in the way that people who had gone all through school together in low population counties were.
Yes, Belle definitely deserved a short trip to Colorado.
Glad of a solution, A
She occupied Jody with sorting whites from colors.
A
Surprised to find such a sentimental thing in his pocket, A
“Look, Jody.”
The little girl hopped up and came over to see.
“Is that baby me?”
“It sure is. That’s you and your mommy.”
“Where’d you get it?”
“From your uncle Bobby’s pants pocket.”
“What was it doing in there?”
“He wants to keep you close to him.”
“Really?”
“Yes. He’s proud of you. You’re his only niece.”
A
“I love Uncle Bobby.”
“Well, he loves you, too.”
“Mommy’s pretty.”
“Yes, she is.”
Bobby was better with children than he was with grown-ups, A
A
The only thing you should soften by pounding is steak, A
There was a ferocious crash of lightning, and the basement laundry room went dark.
“Grandma, what happened?”
“We’ve lost power, honey. Here, take my hand. We’ll find candles.”
“I’m hungry.”
“Then we’ll find a flashlight, candles, and something good to eat.”
Feeling grateful for her gas stove, A
Outside, the storm battered the house.
Inside, they were cozier than any pioneer women could have been.
As she turned a page and Jody snuggled against her, A
AT THE ROSE MOTEL, Hugh Senior peeled down to his skivvies and crawled between the thin white sheets of the lumpy motel bed, for lack of anything else to do. There wasn’t any light to read by, except a flashlight, and the television was out, and it was raining too hard to go anywhere, even over to Bailey’s Bar & Grill for supper. He would have loved a couple of big fat pork chops with a baked potato and some green beans, but his stomach was just going to have to grumble because it wasn’t getting fed anytime soon. Unlike the motel, Bailey’s place would have electric generators going, so they’d still be serving, but that didn’t do him any good if he couldn’t get there. He wasn’t hungry enough to pay the price of getting soaked to the skin when he didn’t have a change of clothes, and he’d stupidly left his rain slicker in his truck. He thought about forcing his way through the downpour anyway, and driving over to the grill, but decided that he’d had about enough of his own kids for one day. He knew they were at Bailey’s because when he’d driven past he saw Bobby’s truck and Meryl’s. A phone call to Bailey himself had filled in the blanks: his two younger sons, his daughter, and his daughter-in-law; they’d take care of themselves and each other.
Truth to tell, they’d probably had enough of him, too.
He ran his hands over the sheets-so cheap and rough compared to the soft, good-smelling ones that A
“At these prices, you’d think they could afford decent sheets,” she’d say.
In truth, at the prices the local motels charged, they probably couldn’t afford anything but old towels and sheets, but his wife was careful about money, which was one of the things he loved about her-as opposed to some other wives he could think of, including one in his own family.
He liked staying in hotels and motels with A
Hugh Senior crossed his arms behind his head on the pillow and smiled at the ceiling. His kids drove him crazy half the time, the ranches were heavy responsibility and hard work almost all of the time, there were various problems that he’d just as soon he didn’t have to deal with, but overall, life was pretty good…
Especially now that the Billy Crosby problem was solved.
Any second thoughts he’d had were gone.
We’ll be fine, if we don’t lose any cattle in this storm, he thought.
He felt a bubble of laughter in his chest, knowing what A
In his imagination, he kissed her back.
He wasn’t through thinking, though.
He was convinced-again-that he’d done the right thing about Billy: get him arrested, put him in jail. A lot of things got tolerated or overlooked in small towns because people had to live together, but this wasn’t going to be one of them.
Satisfied with his own intentions, Hugh Senior closed his eyes.
Outside, lightning crashed as if the end of the world had come.
Exhausted from the day of stress and hard work, Hugh Senior slept through most of it.
TWO DOORS DOWN from his father, Bobby ran in from the rain.