and in rapid speech I continued, “But what if he won’t listen to me? Won’t you call him, at least? He’s a good person, really he is. He’s just grieving, and his grief has gotten the better of him. He listens to all the stupid stuff Dodge says and it’s like he’s lost his perspective. If he could just be snapped back in line by somebody he respects—”
“I have no reason to think he respects me.”
“I know he will. He’s so angry, that’s all, and he won’t listen to reason from me. He’s only twenty-two, Randy. He needs a father figure to lay down the law for him. He’ll listen, if you speak to his conscience.”
“He’s a grown man old enough to have a child and old enough to make his own calls about things, for good or for evil. And as much as you may not like it, this may be his conscience. Maybe the truth is he’s not as different from Dodge as you’d hoped, and if that proves true, Lord knows there’s not a thing that can be done for him.” He set down his tools and came around the table to stand before me. “I have a guest room in the basement with its own bath. You’re welcome anytime you need it, and you might. You can take it right now if you like.”
Without warning, tears began trickling down my face. “I can’t do that. I’m not going to leave him just because he’s grieving. I’d never do that to him.”
“That’s fine. But if the day ever comes that you decide his son is paying too dear a price for his father’s grief, the offer stands.”
I nodded and scrubbed my cheek with my sleeve, and Randy laid his big hand on my shoulder.
* * *
Once I got home from Randy’s, I put TJ straight down for a nap and lay down on the bed in the dark room, watching him squirm in the laundry basket. The exhaustion I felt was bone deep; my mind, more than any other part of me, demanded rest. I needed time to think about all that Scooter and Randy had said, time to mull over how I would move forward from here, what I would say to Cade or demand of him. But in my current state, every thought popped like a bubble as soon as it rose to the surface of my mind.
I closed my eyes and let the peace of my weariness overtake me. Yet not more than a few minutes passed before I heard rapid footsteps on the attic stairs and then Leela’s voice, sharp and sure. “Outside, Jill,” she ordered. “Candy, Jill, outside!”
I bolted from the bed and hurried to follow her. She was hustling down the staircase ahead of me, her magnifying lens bouncing against her chest and her skirt bunched up in one hand. She shouted Candy’s name again, but her daughter wasn’t to be found. As we passed through the screened porch I heard a frantic rustling outside, a fluttery, broken noise accompanied by the noisy squawking of chickens. Leela rushed over to the side of the shed and turned on the garden hose. It had an old-style nozzle on its end, and water gushed out in uneven bursts as she ran with it toward the chicken coop. At first glance the swirl of wings was both green and white, but just before the water hit the birds the white ones wilted down. Ben Franklin’s powerful wings beat the air hard, and then he squawked indignantly, strutting backward from Mojo’s wet and docile corpse.
“You get back from there,” Leela barked at him. “You blasted bird.”
In the excitement Candy had emerged from the Powell house, her home-sewn dress protected by an apron spattered with paint. She peered around me and Leela to better see the chicken enclosure, then uttered a sharp laugh. “Old Ben finally did it,” she said. “I told you that other one still had his balls.”
I steeled Candy with a look. “I messed it up. That’s why he’s supposed to be in his own enclosure.”
“Chewed right through his own enclosure, looks like,” she observed, making sure to mimic my tone and accent. And I saw she was right—the wire had been picked apart at the base where it connected to the wood frame, allowing Mojo to squeeze through onto Ben Franklin’s side. I supposed he was after the hens.
“Well, let’s get him out and trash him,” Candy said. “He’s no good to