mother says that, what’s your dad say?”
Stefan gestured to indicate grand wisdom. “He said that to deal with a Polish man, American women need only two sayings in Polish.”
“What’s that?” Tad looked interested.
“Idz do piekla and jacie kocham.“
“What’s that mean?”
“‘Go to hell’ and ‘I love you.’ Those two sayings will cover any situation. In conversation, a woman needs only to listen.”
Tad laughed.
Stefan again started for his Jeep. “Watch.”
“Hell, man, we just went through all that.”
“Yeah.” And Stefan finally left.
As he drove along, he studied his restlessness. Why? Well, it seemed to him that a whole lot of nothings got in the way of his life.
Look at Kirt fooling with the innards of a new car because he had three marriageable daughters. Or his own mother’s anxiety over his single life. There was that stupid, old man, Mac, claiming Stefan was responsible for an antique government-issue Jeep finally groaning with age. And then there was the damned woman with the blond-red hair who was so cool and collected...but not by him.
Now why had he thought of Carrie as a problem of his? He’d discarded her three months ago. She was a holdout and pigheaded and impossible.
Impossible was sure true. Any woman who’d kiss like that, and then say no, was mean! Think what a woman like that would do with little kids! She’d rule with an iron hand. “Eat that spinach!” “It’s bedtime. You get yourself right upstairs. This is the last time I’m telling you!” “You play hookey and I’ll blister you!” She’d be relentless.
She’d probably want more Polish words than just “go to hell.” She’d tongue-lash a good man.
But then he began a dreamy vision of her tongue-lashing him, here and there, and he lost all his hostility. He’d be putty in her seeking hands. She’d turn him into a slave. He’d starve, waiting for her attentions.
It was just a good thing he’d wiped her from his mind and excluded her from his life.
* * *
On the other side of Blink, out where Stefan lived, there were no sidewalks. There were wire fences along the road. And the county didn’t mow the sides of the road, so the weeds were high outside the fence. His “yard” was somewhat mowed, but there was no trimming done. It was all pretty weedy and loose. Casual? It suited Stefan.
However, the house was plumb and painted, and so was the garage and shed in back of it. There was also a neat outhouse, just in case. Across the back of the house was a great, open screened porch, a lot like the ones other people had.
Inside, the furnishings were family castoffs. He did have a new bed, a good refrigerator, stove and a dishwasher. He did not wash dishes by hand.
He looked over the place and it was his.
When he got out of his car, the phone rang. That surprised him. It was almost ten, and people went to bed early in Blink. He went into the unlocked house and picked up the receiver with some curiosity.
Her tongue said, “You got home okay?”
He took a satisfied breath and began to sit down to talk as he said, “Yeah.”
But the witch hung up.
Why the hell had she called? She was paying him back for him making sure she’d gone into the house safely?
Tit for tat.
That only set his mind off again.
He went through his sparsely furnished house and up the stairs into his bedroom. Upstairs, his bedroom was the only furnished room. Stefan went to the shower and used the liquid soap to get rid of the remainder of the grease. Then he put on clean pajama pants and faced the fact that there wasn’t much else to do but go to bed.
So he did.
And the next thing he knew, he awoke to the alarm. His bed was a torn-up mess, and he was not rested.
So what was the problem? He sure as hell didn’t need more exercise.
He lay in his silent room in the silent house and went over his potential conversation with Mac, who was eighty-two, a childless widower and lonely. Stefan’s dad’s solution was to just go ahead and give Mac a new Jeep.
At that time, Stefan had replied, “Hell, Dad, if I did that, every yahoo in the county would come a-running, declaring their Jeep was one of mine, defective and needed to be replaced.”
So his dad had said, “For Mac’s Jeep, make it seem like a competition. It might cost you a Jeep or two, but it would salve that old man’s heart. He’s lonely. Why don’t you hire him as a salesman?”
“I thought I was supposed to hire Carrie.”
His dad had agreed. “Her, too. She’d draw men in like they’re flies after honey.”
“I can’t submit her to that sort of harassment.”
His dad had slid his eyes over to his youngest son and inquired, “Jealous?”
“I gave up on her over three months ago.”
“When was that?”
“Dad, you’re pushing it.”
His dad had shrugged. “We like her.”
“Which ‘we’? Are you implying Momma likes her?”
“You and me.”
Stefan had reminded his gene contributor, “Momma called her a tart.”
His dad had soberly nodded agreement. “It was the dress. It was like a second skin.”
“So you did notice. I thought you told Momma you hadn’t seen it.”
His dad had gestured openly. “There are just times when a man’s better off temporarily blind.”
“Now you tell me.”
“Hell, Stef, I’ve told you that ‘til I’m blue in the face! Just look!”
Stefan looked his dad over quite critically, because he was feeling critical. He said, “Your face’s pretty pink. There’s a blood vessel there that looks busted.”
“That was from the night you first took out the car, alone, with that youngest Sorrus girl.”
Stefan had sighed and shaken his head in empathy for a lousy time. “I remember that.”
“I should hope you would!”
Stefan had to remind his father, “It’s stuck in my head because I had to go and get her daddy to get his mules to haul us out of the sand.”
“That did take guts.”
“It was the car,” Stefan again vowed. “I couldn’t allow my first car to sink in quicksand.”
“But you left her inside the car,” his father had retorted in a censorious manner. “I’ve never understood that.”
“I told you. She had on high heels, and I didn’t want to wait around for her to make the trek. She was fifteen. She wobbled in high heels on a smooth surface. What if somebody else had come along, pulled the car out and took it off. I figured if she stayed in it, the car was still mine.”
“And if it sunk?”
“Dad.” Stefan had been very adult. “All this happened fourteen years ago.”
“You asked about my burst blood vessel.”
“No.” Stefan had then managed to be excruciatingly patient. “I just barely mentioned