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“Don’t blame yourself. You were just a boy.”
“A boy, yes. And small for my age. But my pa was huge. As tall as I am now and broader even. I knew he didn’t love me, but I thought he loved my mother. So I thought to myself, ‘don’t worry, he’ll save her. He’ll fight for her.’”
“Did he?”
Bobby sighed, his pulse pounding. “No. He begged for his own life like a lily-livered pantywaist. Said they could have her if they’d spare his life. Said he’d throw in his little girl too.”
“Little girl? You had a sister?”
“No.” Bobby stiffened, remembering the tears that had formed at his father’s words. The last tears he ever shed over the bastard. The last tears he’d ever shed, period. “He meant me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“My father hated me, Naomi. He thought I was a sissy. A mama’s boy.”
“You?”
He chuckled. “I take it you don’t agree?”
“Not at all. You’re the most...well, I don’t know how else to say it. You’re the most manly man I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
Bobby kissed the top of her head. “I saw his eyes through the window when he died. He had light brown eyes, lighter than mine, almost yellow, and they met mine with his last breath. I never felt remorse.
“The Indian who killed him handed him over to the other so he could have a turn with my mother. The other one scalped him.”
“A-And your ma?”
“She stopped screaming during the second rape. I figure she died then. After he was finished, the Indians ransacked the house and took everything of value. My father’s guns, his tobacco, the money my ma kept in a tin can on the high shelf of our pantry. She didn’t have much jewelry, but they took the wedding ring off her finger, and they took her pride and joy.”
“That would be you, Bobby. Did they take...you?”
“No.” He fidgeted with her hair splayed on his chest. Naomi had such beautiful sable hair, like silk. “Her pride and joy was an amethyst brooch from her grandmother. The first time I saw you, your eyes reminded me of that brooch.” He gulped. “I hadn’t thought of it in years.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to remind you of something so painful.”
“No, no, angel. God, no.” He kissed her head again. “They went to the barn then, took our horses and milch cow. They left our old steer and set fire to the barn.”
The steer’s bawling had made his ears ache, but after listening to the screams of his mother as those savages violated her, the wretched cries of an animal hadn’t touched his emotions.
He couldn’t tell Naomi that he waited the rest of the day and then the night, outside. Scared to go in his house. Twenty-four long hours passed. Finally mustered the courage to sneak into his home and look upon his ma’s lifeless body. He’d been a damn coward. But that was the last time.
He cleared his throat. “When I went into the house, there was nothing left. Nothing but the smell of my father’s birthday cake that had burned in the stove before the fire went out. I scrounged what crumbs of food I could find, put as many clothes on my back as I could, and left.
“I left, angel, without even burying my ma’s body.”
“Oh, Bobby. How did you live?”
“The occasional odd job. Stealing mostly. I couldn’t stay in one place too long or I risked being sent to an orphanage. I sure as hell wasn’t going there.”
“Would that have been so bad?”
“Yes.”
She didn’t ask why, and he was glad. He’d taken her innocence in so many ways already. He didn’t want to tell her the truth about orphanages.
“Thank you for telling me,” she said softly. “You really did understand about violation.”
“I’ve never told another living soul that story, Naomi.”
