Divorce or not, I don’t know if Frankie will be all right.”
“Then help him. Encourage him to come out of his shell. Get him in the 4-H. That’s a good group of kids.”
I shoved the tongs I was holding right up to Grady’s face. “Stay out of it. Just stay the hell out of it.”
I knew then he had no idea, though just that week I’d laid out the truth to Holly, and she’d sworn to keep quiet until I was ready. I had loved her—still did—and I’d certainly been attracted to her. When we married she was pregnant, so I nudged doubt to my toes and took my place at her side. I’d hoped husband was who I was. But I was wearing a pair of boots made for other feet and the longer I wore them, the more they hurt. Holly didn’t know what was wrong. It was more than just the bedroom stuff, though that grew dismal enough. I lost interest in us. I went to work every day and came home to something I didn’t want. Here is the most cliched thing in the world, but it fits: I came home to a lie. There was no one thing that tipped us over in the end. I didn’t hunker down in a duck blind with some guy who was more than a friend, or slink off to the bar in Shreveport that caters to the same-sex crowd. There were attractions, sure, but I never acted.
Holly was grateful to have a place to pin our troubles, relieved to know it wasn’t her, that she was innocent.
That she was hoodwinked.
“It wasn’t my fault,” she’d said.
“No,” I said. “Not that.”
I picked up the bucket rig and drove down Route 7 toward my father-in-law’s place, where Grady would be waiting. I hadn’t been out since Friday night, before the shuttle fell. At first, what I saw along the highway was normal landscape: lush fields, swampy spots and the branchless lower trunks of our towering pines, stark as charred asparagus. But a half-mile down the road, a pasture was littered. I could make out chunks of black and bits of white that looked like foam. A rod-like thing stuck out of the grass. For another mile I saw nothing odd, but just over the rise at Avitt Tindale’s ranch, seven horse vans were parked in Avitt’s front range. The riders were spread in a line, heads down, aiming for the thicket that bordered his place. I should have been searching, too. My own mother had lifted hot metal from the highway, before she knew she wasn’t supposed to. Now, my son had done more.
I turned off the highway at 104, where two feet of blue tarp covered something that lay beside a wire fence. Next to it was a rustic cross, made from twigs. Acid rose from my gut like a vicious cloud; the orange juice dump had been a mistake.
A sheriff’s deputy blocked the dirt road that led to Cloyd’s place. When he signaled me past, I spotted Grady’s car and a black SUV with government plates that I figured to be FBI. Frankie was across the grassy meadow holding the reins of his horse, letting Rosco graze with the bit in his mouth, which I’d taught him not to do. Signs of my absence hurt. Frankie spent Wednesday nights with me, and two weekends a month. Other people were filling the space I once took up in his world.
When Frankie waved, I rolled down the window and pointed to my mouth. He looped the reins over Rosco’s neck and took off the bridle. When he looked back at me for approval, I gave him the okay. Frankie favored my mother—same gray eyes and the dark wavy hair of Lila MacFarland’s youth. Funny how it would skip a generation like that. He gestured like her, too, and when he was talking about something he’d thought hard about, he would rub the side of his finger across the tip of his nose, a feminine gesture that made me nervous for him. Turns out it was nothing to worry about, and wasn’t that typical. The things about Frankie that came into focus for me were so often the wrong ones.
Now Frankie was talking to Parris Parker, whose parents owned the place next to Cloyd’s. I’d known Parris since high school but had never been around him much. He was only about a head taller than Frankie, with blond, short-cropped hair and, I could just see from here, a bald spot starting. I sat watching for a moment. Frankie was pointing into the Parkers’ woods, probably in the direction of his find. My son was beautiful. What was going on in his head back then, I’ll never know.
When I climbed out of the rig, Holly’s father shook my hand, though I doubt he wanted to. “Ain’t we got us a mess?” Cloyd said.
I nodded in Frankie’s direction. “Should he be here?”
“He’s already seen it. Can’t go back now. It’s that other one, Parker. Should he be here? Makes my butt itch, have a queer around.”
It was useless to get on a soapbox. I was pretty sure Parris wasn’t gay. “Parris is okay,” I said. He’d left Frankie and was coming our way.
Cloyd shot me a stern look. “You got a boy to watch out for.”
I let that one go, too, and I should not have. Frankie’s head is on straight about things like that now, no thanks to his grandfather. But back then I worried about slippage, the low notions Frankie would pick up when I wasn’t around. “Frankie is fine,” I said.
“That boy is always alone,” Cloyd said. He was keeping tabs on Parris as he talked. “Boy gets in the woods and just sits on some damn log he likes. If he’s not smoking, what’s he up to?” Holly had told me about the woods. It worried her that he was sitting out there more now than when we first split.
“It’s been hard on Frankie,” I said. “We have to let him deal with it best he can.”
Parris was within earshot now. “Something ain’t quite right,” Cloyd said loudly. “Lot of things ain’t right.” He stalked off, passing Parris without so much as a nod.
With a patient smile, Parris watched him go. What his life was like in that town, for a man so different, I could only imagine. “Nice boy you have there,” he said, and when he shook my hand it was plenty firm. Parris was fit, you might even say buff, but he didn’t check me out the way gay men did. The mutt he had with him showed more interest in my ass. The dog was a birder of some kind, and it had found an irresistible odor on my shoe.
“Kids,” I said. “Got to get out and look around. I think he was up at daylight, looking for stuff. Anything to get out of church.”
“He was telling me about it,” Parris said. “But he doesn’t look at you when he talks, does he? Kind of looks past you.”
“Frankie looks at me, no problem,” I said. “It’s just that he doesn’t know you.” The dog had followed his nose to a spot in the grass, but now he was back, snuffling around the heel of my boot.
“Maybe that’s it.” Parris cast a glance in Frankie’s direction. “I bet the teachers like him.”
“He’s mighty good with numbers. And he likes to read.” In high school, Parris had been a smart kid, too—artistic, and a loner. He’d been best friends with Eddie Briesbecker, who died in a hunting accident over in Yellowpine just before we graduated. Parris never seemed to have anyone to hang around with after that.
“That tree where he found it,” I said. “It’s on your dad’s property? I might have to take down a couple of trees to get the rig in there.”
“Whatever you need. Technically the place is mine, too.” Parris snapped his fingers and the dog bee-lined for the spot where he pointed. Nobody around Kiser trained their dogs like that. People think that small Southern towns treasure their eccentrics, but Kiser wasn’t one of those storybook places. Parris owned a tile business and did pretty well, but when he refurbished his house in town, he painted a scene around his front door so bizarre that the neighbors complained. It was just animals, but they were bright and anatomically odd, like in a Picasso. “He’ll tile your new house real good,” Junior Pierce told me once. “But you wouldn’t invite him to the housewarming.”
“Good luck,” Parris said. “Holler if you need help.”
I hiked over to where Frankie stood with his arm draped over the pony’s rump. Frankie got on well with animals. He wasn’t anti-social; he had friends. I put my hand on my son’s shoulder. “You okay?” I wanted to take him in my arms,