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There was nothing to do but smile and pretend like I didn’t care.
I even think she bought it.
When I’d kissed her cheek, whispered in her ear, the charge of desire that had overcome me had my hands balled into fists so they wouldn’t reach for her. I knew her, the memories dredged up by the way she smelled—like fields of flowers and sweet vanilla—carrying me back in time to the boy I’d tried so hard to leave here in Lindenbach.
Evangeline was still talking as I followed the GPS, scanning the road for signs of the turnoff. On seeing it, I pulled in, fighting a wash of emotions. I’d stepped off the plane as one man, and everything I’d come across since challenged his legitimacy.
On recognizing this, I put every thought in a mental box labeled For Never and sealed it shut.
The farmhouse I bought for my parents a few years ago was small enough to be modest but big enough that it might as well have been a mansion for all my parents were concerned. Before I’d even gotten all the way out of the Escalade, they burst out the front door and charged down the porch steps.
“Oh, you’re here!” Mama said, launching herself at me.
Laughing, I caught her. “Hey, Mama.”
She smelled like Dove soap and menthols and home. I squeezed her tight, hanging onto her for an extra-long moment before setting her down. Her eyes shined with tears when she stepped out of the way to make room for my father. I took his extended hand—more like a paw in size—and he pulled me into a hug, clapping me on the back with his bad hand, mangled in an oil rig accident when I was a kid.
“Good to see you, son.” His voice trembled a little, and he cleared his throat as he let me go, lowering his eyes to the front pocket of his pearl snap where his cigarettes were. “Angie, how are ya?” he said, a smoke already waggling between his lips as he spoke, his hands patting his pants pockets for his lighter.
“Oh, I’m fine,” Evangeline said, smiling and hugging them both. “Thank you for letting us stay with you.”
“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Mama said, taking her arm as they turned for the house. “Buck, get their bags, would you?”
“Already on’ it, Sher,” he answered as I popped the trunk.
I handed him a suitcase, and he set it down to extend the handle before taking a drag of his cigarette.
“You get all your papers turned in to Verna?”
“Sure did. Saw Poppy too. She’s running against me.”
A slight pause was his only reaction. “Can’t say I’m surprised.” He put his smoke back between his lips to take another suitcase. “Town loves her. Most of ‘em anyway.”
“She was too thunderstruck to say much.”
He shrugged. “Not surprised ‘bout that either. Been a long time since you’ve come home.”
Home. The word sometimes lost its meaning.
“Not much has changed,” I noted, taking the last suitcase out and closing the trunk. “She’s pretty as ever, mad as all hell,” I answered. “Her whole family was there.”
“What’d Jo say?”
“Called me an asshole first thing. Everybody ignored her. Everybody but Poppy, at least.”
He was quiet for a beat, stopping at the bottom of the stairs to lower the handle of the suitcase he’d taken and haul it up, handlessly smoking his cigarette while he spoke.
“I’m sure that couldn’a been easy.”
“No, it wasn’t easy for either of us, less for her. I had the advantage of knowing she still lives here, that the possibility of bumping into her exists. She had no clue she’d see me today, and even less of a clue that I’d be running against her for mayor. We’re going to try to get her out of the race. Easier for everyone.”
“Easier for you,” he noted.
“Come on, Dad. She’s a bee farmer, not a politician. And the half of the town that hates her loves Doug Windley. There’s no candidate in the middle, no one who wasn’t involved in the town’s drama but is still part of the town.”
“Which is where you come in.”
“Which is where I come in,” I echoed. “And this is just the beginning.”
“Always somethin’ next, isn’t there?”
“Always.”
He’d stopped again just outside the door and met me at eye-level, plucking his cigarette from his lips to say, “If you’re always lookin’ for what’s next, searchin’ for more, you ain’t never gonna be happy.”
The words were simple, without accusation or expectation of a response—in fact, his cigarette was already in his mouth and his hands busy with the suitcase as we headed inside—just the sage advice from a father to a son.
Too bad I wasn’t smart enough to take it.
3
CUT A BITCH
POPPY
Evan Banks had been talking for at least five minutes, but I hadn’t heard a single word he’d said.
