Page 69 of Roads Behind Us
He grumbled something under his breath, but then did as I’d asked. He tightened his arms over his chest, and his biceps stretched the sleeves of his gray T-shirt, his fingers digging into his skin as he clenched his jaw and fought the urge to say more. Miss Flirty behind the counter looked like she might melt into a puddle of drool. She licked her lips like a hungry coyote, but finally, she emerged and tried to help us.
She pulled five more dresses for Athena to try. Three were knee-length cocktail dresses, and two were long and flowy. Athena liked the shorter dresses best. She looked good in all of them, and they weren’t too short.
“What’s your favorite dress you ever wore, Bea?” she asked through the dressing-room door as she changed out of a salmon-colored dress into the last option.
“Me?” I checked over my shoulder, making sure Bax was still in compliance. His eyes met mine, then narrowed beneath his hat, but he shook his head and looked away. “Oh, I don’t remember. I’ve never been to a dance. I think the last dress I wore was in elementary school.”
“Really?”
Actually, now that I thought about it, the last dress I’d ever worn was to my mama’s funeral, but Athena didn’t need to know that. The last thing I wanted to do was remind her that her own mom couldn’t be here to help her, and instead she got stuck with me.
“Yeah. I like long skirts ’cause they’re comfy, as long as they have pockets, but I’ve never been super girly.”
“It doesn’t matter what you wear,” Athena said. “Can you zip me up?” The door creaked open, and she stood with her back toward me. “You could wear a garbage bag and you’d still be pretty.”
Stepping into the little closet-sized cubicle, I swept Athena’s braid over her shoulder, zipped her up, and met her eyes in the mirror. She smiled softly and fiddled nervously with the neck of the dress.
Normally, I would’ve ignored her compliment or dismissed it with a self-deprecating comment, but it seemed important to show her that accepting a compliment like the one she’d just given me was a good thing to do. When I pictured someone telling her she was pretty and her blowing it off because she didn’t believe it was true, like I normally did, it made me sad.
“Thank you, Athena.”
When she came out of her dressing room and spun slowly in front of a mirror, fluffing the skirt as she turned, I couldn’t help my smile, and said, “You’re a knockout.”
Athena beamed. “Thank you.”
The lavender dress she’d finally chosen fell to just above her knees, cinched at the waist with a ruffled band, and it had a matching high, lace neckline and lace-capped sleeves. The lace highlighted the freckles on her arms and added a simple, feminine edge to the dress, and I couldn’t put my finger on what it was, but something about the design said “western.”
Bax tipped up his gray hat with a finger. He’d been silently peeking and watching us the whole time, his body rigid. I’d bet my truck he wished he could snatch his daughter up and run out of the store, but at least he’d kept his mouth shut.
Now, as he looked at the stunning young woman she had become, he was just speechless.
He tossed me a quiet smile, a “thank you” that tried to stop my heart, and he told Athena, “She’s right, baby. You look just like your mama.”
Athena’s eyes lit up. Tears filled the corners, and she smiled so big. “Thank you, Daddy. Do you really mean it?”
“I do. You’re beautiful, and the color is perfect. I’m sorry I was grumpy before, but I still remember when you were little and I was the only guy you wanted to hang out with. It’s hard sometimes, seein’ you so grown up.” I saw something glisten at the edge of his eye, too, but before Athena noticed, he nodded down to the tennis shoes she’d worn to go dress shopping and cleared his throat. “You gonna wear your trainers to the dance?”
She giggled and looked at her shoes. “No.”
“Well then,” Bax said, pulling his wallet from his back pocket. He held it out to her and she grabbed it, and then he pushed himself up on his crutches. “Guess we better head over to the boot shop and get you some fancy purple cowgirl boots to match, and then we can grab some dinner.”
And just like that, the little pinch and burn was back, the one I’d felt in my chest when I’d first arrived in Wisper and realized that the rude, argumentative man I’d met back in Sheridan was nowhere to be found. The pinch had carved a tiny hole inside me that first night, and it had been silently and steadily growing. Now, it was a gaping chasm edged with girly flowers and hearts.
The void had been there a long time, I realized. I’d just never found anything to fill it that fit the shape.
This man and his daughter had filled the space inside me easily. I would never have thought it possible a month ago, but they’d packed me full of laughter and light and family, and they had me questioning my own resolve to leave when my job was done.
Thinking about driving away now made the pinch feel angry and raw, and I thought I’d do anything to stop it burning.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Bax
Sundays, according to Merv, were for prayer and rest.
She’d shown up like she did most Sundays, hoping to get Athena and me to accompany her to church, but as usual, trying to convince her there was no rest on a cattle farm and with new businesses to navigate proved to be an exercise in futility. But there really was no rest for the wicked, the weak, the strong, or the mired. Not for anybody around here, so Merv headed to Sunday services alone and disappointed, and I felt a pang of sadness for my mama. She’d spent her whole life trying to find God’s love, but didn’t she know she’d just driven away from it?
It was right here, in Athena and in me. In the land she’d raised us on, in the sky, and the wind. A lot of bad things happened, sure, but so many good things had happened to us here too.
