The Rescue

Chapter 12

The day after Denise had run into Taylor at Merchants, she spent the morning working with Kyle. The accident seemed to have had neither a negative nor a positive impact on his learning, though now that summer had arrived, he seemed to work best if they were able to finish before noon. After that it was too warm in the house for either of them to concentrate.

Earlier, right after breakfast, she’d called Ray and asked him for a couple of extra shifts for the time being. Fortunately he’d consented. Starting tomorrow night she’d work every evening except Sunday, as opposed to her usual four shifts. As always, she’d head in around seven and work until midnight. Though coming in a little later meant less in tips because she’d miss a good portion of the dinner rush, she couldn’t in good conscience leave Kyle in the back room for an extra hour all by himself while he was still awake. By arriving later, she could put him down in the cot and he’d fall asleep within minutes.

She’d found herself thinking about Taylor McAden ever since she’d run into him at the store the day before. Just as he’d promised, the groceries had been placed on the front porch, in the shade provided by the overhang. Because it hadn’t taken more than ten or fifteen minutes for her to make it back home, the milk and eggs were still cold and she’d put them in the refrigerator before they spoiled.

While Taylor had carried the bags to his truck, he’d also offered to put their bikes in the back and give them both a ride, too, but to that Denise had said no. It had less to do with Taylor than Kyle-he was already getting on his bike, and she knew he was looking forward to another ride with his mother. She didn’t want to ruin that for him, especially since this would probably be a regular routine and the last thing she wanted was for him to expect a truck ride back every time they came to town.

Still, part of her had wanted to accept Taylor’s offer. She’d been around long enough to know that he’d found her attractive-the way he looked at her made that plain-yet it didn’t make her uncomfortable the way the scrutiny of other men sometimes did. There wasn’t the usual hungry gleam in his eye while he’d stared at her-the one that implied a roll in the sack would solve everything. Nor had his eyes wandered downward while she spoke-another common problem. It was impossible to take a man seriously when he was staring at her breasts.

No, there was something different about the way he’d looked at her. It was more appreciative somehow, less threatening, and as much as she resisted the idea, she’d found herself not only flattered by it, but pleased as well.

Of course, she knew it could have been part of Taylor’s shtick, his way of coming on to women, a pattern honed over time. Some men were good at that. She’d meet them and talk to them, and every nuance of their being seemed to imply that they were different, more trustworthy, than other men. She’d been around long enough to meet plenty of those types as well, and usually she’d hear little alarm bells going off. But Taylor was either the finest actor she’d ever come across or he really was different, because this time the bells were silent.

So which was it?

Of the many things she’d learned from her mother, there was one that always stood out, one that came to mind when evaluating others. “You’re going to come across people in your life who say all the right words at all the right times. But in the end, it’s always their actions you should judge them by. It’s actions, not words, that matter.”

Maybe, she thought to herself, that was the reason she’d responded to Taylor. He’d already proven that he could do heroic things, but it wasn’t simply his dramatic rescue of Kyle that inspired her . . . interest in him, if that’s what it was. Even cads could do the right thing some of the time. No-it was the little things he’d done while they were at the store. The way he’d offered to help without expecting something in return . . . the way he seemed to care about how Kyle and she were doing . . . the way he’d treated Kyle. . . .

Especially that.

Even though she didn’t want to admit it, over the last few years she’d come to judge people by the way they treated her son. She remembered compiling lists in her mind of the friends who tried with Kyle and the ones that hadn’t. “She sat on the floor and played blocks with him”-she was good. “She barely even noticed he was there”-she was bad. The list of “bad” people was far longer than the “good.”

But here was a guy who had for whatever reason formed a bond with her son, and she couldn’t stop thinking about it. Nor could she forget Kyle’s reaction to him. Hewwo, Tayer….

Even though Taylor didn’t understand everything Kyle had said-Kyle’s pronunciations took a while to get used to-Taylor kept talking to him as if he did. He winked, he grabbed his helmet in a playful way, he hugged him, he looked Kyle in the eye when he spoke. He’d made sure to say good-bye.

Little things, but they were incredibly important to her.

Actions.

Taylor had treated Kyle like a normal little boy.

Ironically, Denise was still thinking about Taylor even as Judy pulled up the long gravel driveway and parked in the shade of a looming magnolia tree. Denise, who was just finishing up the dishes, spotted Judy and waved before making a quick scan of the kitchen. Not perfect, but clean enough, she decided as she moved to meet Judy at the front door.

After the traditional preliminaries-how each was doing and all that-Denise and Judy seated themselves on the front porch so they could keep an eye on Kyle. He was playing with his trucks near the fence, rolling them along make-believe roads. Right before Judy had arrived, Denise had liberally coated him with sunscreen and bug spray, and the lotions acted like glue when he played in the dirt. His shorts and tank top were streaked a dusty brown, and his face looked as if it hadn’t been washed in a week, reminding Denise of the dust bowl children Steinbeck had described in The Grapes of Wrath.

On the small wooden table (picked up at a garage sale for three dollars-another excellent buy for bargain-shopping ace Denise Holton!) sat two glasses of sweet tea. Denise had made it that morning in a typically southern fashion-brewed Luzianne with lots of sugar added while still hot so it could dissolve completely, then chilled in the refrigerator with ice. Judy took a drink from her glass, her eyes never leaving Kyle.

“Your mother used to love getting dirty, too,” Judy said.

“My mother?”

Judy glanced at her, amused. “Don’t look so surprised. Your mother was quite a tomboy when she was young.”

Denise reached for her glass. “Are you sure we’re talking about the same lady?” she asked. “My mother wouldn’t even collect the morning paper without putting makeup on.”

“Oh, that happened right around the time she discovered boys. That was when your mom changed her ways. She turned into the quintessential southern lady, complete with white gloves and perfect table manners, practically overnight. But don’t let that fool you. Before that, your mother was a regular Huckleberry Finn.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No-really. Your mother caught frogs, she cussed like a shrimper who’d lost his net, she even got in a few fights with boys to show how tough she was. And she was a good fighter, let me tell you. While a boy was trying to figure out whether it was okay to hit a girl, she’d sock ’em right in the nose. One time, the other kid’s parents actually called the sheriff. That poor boy was so ashamed, he didn’t go back to school for a week, but he never teased your mother again. She was one tough young lady.”

Judy blinked, her mind clearly wandering between the present and the past. Denise stayed silent, waiting for her to go on.

“I remember we used to hike down by the river to collect blackberries. Your mother wouldn’t even wear shoes in those prickly things. She had the toughest feet I’d ever seen. She’d go the whole summer without wearing shoes, except when she had to go to church. Her feet would be so dirty by September that her mother couldn’t get the stains out unless she used a Brillo pad and Ajax. When school started up again, your mother would limp for the first couple of days. I never figured out whether it was because of the Brillo pad or simply the fact that she wasn’t used to wearing shoes.”

Denise laughed in disbelief. This was a side of her mother she’d never even heard about. Judy continued.

“I used to live right down the road from here. Do you know the Boyle place? That white house with the green shutters-big red barn out back?”

Denise nodded. She passed by it on the way into town.

“Well, that was where I lived when I was little. Your mom and I were the only two girls who lived out this way, so we ended up doing practically everything together. We were the same age, too, so we studied the same things at school. This was in the forties, and back then everyone sat in the same classroom until the eighth grade, but they still tried to group us together with people the same age. Your mother and I sat next to each other in school the whole way through. She was probably the best friend I ever had.”

Staring toward the distant trees, Judy seemed lost in the throes of nostalgia.

“Why didn’t she keep in touch after she moved?” Denise began. “I mean . . .”

She paused, wondering how to ask what she really meant, and Judy cast her a sidelong glance.

“You mean why, if we were such good friends, didn’t she tell you about it?”

Denise nodded, and Judy collected her thoughts.

“I guess it mainly had to do with her moving away. It took me a long time to understand that distance can ruin even the best of intentions.”

“That’s sad. . . .”

“Not really. I suppose it depends on how you look at it. For me . . . well, it just adds a richness you wouldn’t otherwise get. People come, people go-they’ll drift in and out of your life, almost like characters in a favorite book. When you finally close the cover, the characters have told their story and you start up again with another book, complete with new characters and adventures. Then you find yourself focusing on the new ones, not the ones from the past.”

It took a moment for Denise to respond as she remembered the friends she’d left in Atlanta.

“That’s pretty philosophical,” she finally said.

“I’m old. What did you expect?”

Denise set her glass of tea on the table and absently wiped the moisture from the sweating glass on her shorts. “So you never talked to her again? After she left?”

“Oh no-we kept in touch for a few years, but back then your mother was in love, and when women fall in love, it’s all they can think about. That was why she left Edenton in the first place. A boy-Michael Cunningham. Did she ever tell you about him?”

Denise shook her head, fascinated.

“I’m not surprised. Michael was kind of a bad boy, not exactly the kind of guy you want to remember way longer than you have to. He didn’t have the greatest reputation, if you know what I mean, but a lot of girls found him attractive. I guess they thought him exciting and dangerous. Same old story, even today. Well, your mother followed him to Atlanta right after she graduated.”

“But she told me she moved to Atlanta to go to college.”

“Oh, that may have been somewhere in the back of her mind, but the real reason was Michael. He had some kind of hold on her, that’s for sure. He was also the reason she didn’t come back here to visit.”

“How so?”

“Well, her mom and dad-your grandparents-they just couldn’t forgive her for running off that way. They saw Michael for what he was and said that if she didn’t come home right away, she wasn’t welcome here anymore. They were from the old school, as stubborn as can be, and your mom was just the same. It was like a couple of bulls staring at each other, waiting for the other one to give in. But neither of them ever did, even after Michael went by the wayside for someone else.”

“My father?”

Judy shook her head. “No . . . someone else-your father came along after I lost contact with her.”

“So you didn’t know him at all?”

“No. But I do remember your grandparents heading off to the wedding and being a little hurt that your mother hadn’t sent me an invitation. Not that I could have gone, of course. I was married by then, and like a lot of young couples, my husband and I were struggling financially, and with the new baby-well, it just would have been impossible to make it.”

“I’m sorry about that.”

Judy set her glass of tea on the table. “Nothing to be sorry for. It wasn’t you, and in some way, it wasn’t even your mom anymore-or at least the one I used to know. Your father came from a very respectable family in Atlanta, and by that point in her life, I think your mom was a little embarrassed about where she’d come from. Not that your father minded, obviously, since he married her. But I remember that your grandparents didn’t say much after they returned from the wedding. I think they were a little embarrassed, too, even though they shouldn’t have been. They were great people, but I think they knew they didn’t fit into their daughter’s world anymore, even after your father passed away.”

“That’s terrible.”

“It’s sad, but like I said, it went both ways. They were stubborn, your mom was stubborn. And little by little, they sort of drifted apart.”

“I knew Mom wasn’t close to her parents, but she never told me any of this.”

“No, I wouldn’t expect that she did. But please don’t think poorly of your mother. I certainly don’t. She was always so full of life, so passionate-she was exciting to be around. And she had the heart of an angel, she really did. She was as sweet a person as I ever knew.”

Judy turned to face her. “I see a lot of her in you.”

Denise tried to digest this new information about her mother as Judy took another sip of her tea. Then, as if knowing she’d said too much, Judy added, “But listen to me, droning on like some senile old woman. You must think I’m two steps from an old folks’ home. Let’s talk about you for a while.”

“Me? There’s not much to tell.”

“Then why not start with the obvious? Why did you move to Edenton?”

Denise watched Kyle playing with his trucks, wondering what he was thinking.

“There’s a couple of reasons.”

Judy leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “Man trouble? Some psycho stalker like you see on America’s Most Wanted?”

Denise giggled. “No, nothing that dramatic.” She stopped, her brow furrowing slightly.

“If it’s too personal, you don’t have to tell me. It’s none of my business anyway.”

Denise shook her head. “I don’t mind talking about it-it’s just tough to know where to start.” Judy stayed silent, and Denise sighed, collecting her thoughts. “I guess mainly it has to do with Kyle. I think I told you he has trouble speaking, right?”

Judy nodded.

“Did I tell you why?”

“No.”

Denise looked in Kyle’s direction. “Well, right now they say he has an auditory processing problem, specifically expressive and receptive language delay. Basically, it means that for some reason-no one knows why-understanding language and learning to speak is hard for him. I guess the best analogy is that it’s like dyslexia, only instead of processing visual signals, it has to do with processing sounds. For some reason, the sounds seem to get all mixed up-it’s like he’s hearing Chinese one second, German the next, nonsense chatter after that. Whether the problem’s in the connection between the ear and the brain or within the brain itself no one knows. But in the beginning, they weren’t sure how to diagnose him, and, well . . .”

Denise ran her hand through her hair and faced Judy again. “Are you sure you want to hear all of this? It’s kind of a long story.”

Judy reached over and patted Denise on the knee. “Only if you feel like telling me.”

Judy’s earnest expression suddenly reminded Denise of her mother. Strangely, it felt good to tell her about it, and she hesitated only briefly before going on.

“Well, at first the doctors thought he was deaf. I spent weeks taking Kyle to appointments with audiologists and ENTs-you know, ear, nose, and throat specialists-before they found out that he could hear. Then, they thought he was autistic. That diagnosis lasted for about a year-probably the most stressful year of my life. After that came PDD, or pervasive development disorder, which is sort of like autism, only less severe. That too lasted a few months until they’d run more tests on him. Then, they said he was retarded, with ADD-attention deficit disorder-thrown in for good measure. It wasn’t until maybe nine months ago that they finally settled on this diagnosis.”

“It must have been so hard on you. . . .”

“You can’t imagine how hard it was. They tell you something awful about your child, and you go through all these stages-disbelief, anger, grief, and finally acceptance. You learn everything you can about it-you research and read and talk to whoever you can-and just when you’re ready to confront it head-on, they change their minds and the whole thing starts all over again.”

“Where was the father during all of this?”

Denise shrugged, an almost guilty expression on her face. “The father wasn’t around. Suffice it to say, I hadn’t expected to get pregnant. Kyle was an ‘oops,’ if you know what I mean.”

She paused again, and the two of them watched Kyle in silence. Judy seemed neither surprised nor shocked by the revelation, nor did her expression register any judgment. Denise cleared her throat.

“After Kyle was born, I took a leave of absence from the school where I was teaching. My mom had died, and I wanted to spend the first year or so with the baby. But after all this started happening, I couldn’t go back to work. I was shuttling him all day long to doctors and evaluation centers and therapists until I finally came up with a therapy program that we could do at home. None of that left me with enough time for a full-time job. Working with Kyle is full-time. I’d inherited this house, but I couldn’t sell it, and eventually the money just ran out.”

She glanced at Judy, a rueful expression on her face.

“So I guess the short answer to your question is that I had to move here out of necessity, so that I could keep working with Kyle.”

When she finished, Judy stared at her before finally patting her on the knee again. “Pardon the expression, but you’re a helluva mother. Not many people would make those kinds of sacrifices.”

Denise watched her son play in the dirt. “I just want him to get better.”

“From what you’ve told me, he sounds like he already has.” She let that sink in before leaning back in her chair and continuing. “You know, I remember watching Kyle when you were using the computer in the library, but never once did the thought occur to me that he was having any problems at all. He seemed like every other little boy there, except that he was probably better behaved.”

“But he still has trouble speaking.”

“So did Einstein and Teller, but they turned out to be the greatest physicists in history.”

“How would you know about their speech problems?” Though Denise knew (she’d read nearly everything on the subject), she was surprised-and impressed-that Judy knew it as well.

“Oh, you’d be amazed at the amount of trivia I’ve picked up over the years. I’m like a vacuum cleaner with that stuff, don’t ask me why.”

“You should go on Jeopardy!”

“I would, but that Alex Trebek is so cute, I’d probably forget everything I know as soon as he said hello. I’d just stare at him the whole time, trying to figure out a way to get him to kiss me, like that Richard Dawson did on Family Feud.”

“What would your husband think if he knew you’d said that?”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.” Her voice sobered slightly. “He passed away a long time ago.”

“I’m sorry,” Denise began, “I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay.”

In the sudden quiet, Denise fidgeted with her hands. “So . . . you never remarried?”

Judy shook her head. “No. I just didn’t seem to have time to meet someone. Taylor was a handful-it was all I could do to keep up with him.”

“Boy, does that sound familiar. It seems like all I do is work with Kyle and work at the diner.”

“You work at Eights? With Ray Toler?”

“Uh-huh. I got the job when I moved here.”

“Has he told you about his kids?”

“Only a dozen times or so,” Denise answered.

From there, the conversation drifted easily to Denise’s job and the endless projects that seemed to occupy Judy’s time. The rhythm of conversation was something Denise hadn’t experienced in a while, and she found it unexpectedly soothing. A half hour later Kyle tired of playing with his trucks, and he put them under the porch (without being asked, Judy couldn’t help but notice) before wandering up to his mother. His face was red from the heat, his bangs plastered against his forehead. “Can I have some macaroni and cheese?” (Ca-ah haf son concor cheese?)

“Macaroni and cheese?”

“Yes.”

“Sure, sweetie. Let me go make some.”

Denise and Judy stood and went into the kitchen, Kyle leaving dusty footprints on the floor. He went to the table and sat while Denise opened up the cupboard.

“Would you like to stay for lunch? I can throw together a couple of sandwiches.”

Judy checked her watch. “I’d love to, but I can’t. I have a meeting downtown about the festival this weekend. We still have some last-minute details we’ve got to iron out.”

Denise was filling the saucepan with hot water and looked over her shoulder. “Festival?”

“Yeah, this weekend. It’s an annual event and sort of gets everyone in the mood for summer. I hope you’re going.”

Denise set the pan on the burner, and the gas range clicked to life. “I hadn’t planned on it.”

“Why not?”

“Well, for one thing, I hadn’t even heard about it.”

“You really are out of the loop.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“You should go, then-Kyle would love it. They have food and crafts, contests, a carnival is in town-there’s something for everyone.”

Denise’s mind immediately leapt to the costs involved.

“I don’t know if we can,” she finally said, thinking of an excuse. “I have to work Saturday night.”

“Oh, you don’t have to stay long-just come by during the day if you’d like. But it is a lot of fun, and if you want, I could introduce you to some people your own age.”

Denise didn’t respond right away, and Judy sensed her hesitation.

“Just think about it, okay?”

Judy picked up her purse from the counter, and Denise checked the water-not boiling yet-before they walked toward the front door and stepped out on the porch again.

Denise ran her hand through her hair, adjusting a few loose strands that had fallen in her face.

“Thanks for coming by. It was nice to have an adult conversation for a change.”

“I enjoyed it,” Judy said, leaning in to give her an impulsive hug. “Thanks for inviting me.”

As Judy turned to leave, Denise realized what she’d forgotten to mention.

“Oh, by the way, I didn’t tell you that I ran into Taylor yesterday at the store.”

“I know. I talked to him last night.”

After a beat of awkward silence, Judy adjusted her purse strap. “Let’s do this again sometime, okay?”

“I’d like that.”

Denise watched as Judy made her way down the steps and onto the gravel walkway. When Judy reached her car she turned to face Denise again.

“You know, Taylor’s gonna be at the festival this weekend with the rest of the fire department,” Judy called out conversationally. “Their softball team plays at three.”

“Oh?” was all Denise could think to say.

“Well, just in case you do come by, that’s where I’ll be.”

A moment later Judy opened her car door. Denise stood in the doorway and waved as Judy slipped behind the seat and cranked the engine to life, the faint outlines of a smile playing softly on her lips.