Chasing Shade Part 13

'If I don't get it out ' she said. She shook her head and looked very much like a woman trying to rein in her emotions. 'Other things like yesterday will happen and that will scare me, Archie.'

'It scared me too,' he admitted. Seeing her so broken up like that had terrified him. Betsey was like a force of nature. A good one. As bright as a stripe of sunlight on a grey day. Seeing her spiral down into darkness had hurt him.

'I'm sorry.'

'Don't be. We go through the s.h.i.+t we need to go through.' He remembered his very dark days after Jessica and he had split up. Remembered trying to figure out why he was so different from other men. Why he couldn't find and hold on to what he was seeking. And that issue seemed minuscule in comparison to Betsey's journey.

'I have a ton of s.h.i.+t,' she said and laughed. A look of exhaustion crossed her face and she sighed. 'I would not blame you in the least if you ran away from me,' she said. 'Ran far, far away and stayed away. I don't mean leave the trailer park,' she said, hurriedly. 'It was more a metaphor. What I mean is, if you want me to stay away from you, I will understand. And I will honour your wishes.'

Archie's heart felt like it was caving in. He took her face in his hands and said fiercely, 'Is there anything I've done that would imply I want that?'

'No,' she said. Her eyes had finally spilled over. Tears tracked down her smooth cheeks. 'But I would understand. I really would, Archie. I'm not the goofy party girl you'd meet at a party. I'm not bubbly or a partier. I've got a history a sticky one. I've got issues and problems and '

'The biggest heart I've ever known,' he continued for her. 'You have empathy and grace, finding a wandering man a home and a job in the matter of an hour. You have hospitality and kindness, feeding and helping him put his brand-new hovel together so it felt like a home.'

He kissed her. Wis.h.i.+ng he could kiss her for a century. Let time slip past them as he kept his lips on hers and showed her how very amazing he found her.

'You're a G.o.dd.a.m.n wonder to me, Betsey. And don't ever talk yourself down in front of me again.'

When he looked down at her, her cheeks were red, her eyes were wet and she looked stunned. 'I'm so broken, Archie,' she whispered.

'Get in line, Betsey. We all are. The only thing that differs is what's broken and how hard are you working to fix it? You are working very hard to fix it. You amaze me.'

She shook her head and looked away and he let her. Instead of more talking, he pushed the truck door shut with his boot, took her hand and led her along towards the place where Tania Drummond should be buried.

When they got there, he was unprepared for Betsey's emotion, but not surprised either. He watched her set the bouquet of flowers on the headstone. He kissed her knuckles. 'I'm going to go stand over there, Bets. I think you need to do this with just the two of you.'

She nodded and said nothing and he retreated, hoping this helped her. He watched a murder of crows making noise and mischief out by a reflecting pool. The wind and cold temperature didn't seem to be bothering them any.

He was still staring at them when she came up to him and took his hand. He wrapped an arm around her and squeezed her tight. 'Feel any better?'

'I guess.' She laughed. 'I feel like I lost four pounds in tears.'

He smiled down at her. Thumbed away the wetness beneath her eyes.

'Where to?' he asked her. One more glance at the crows and they walked back to the truck.

'I think...where I used to live,' she said.

Once back on the highway, they headed in that direction. She knew exactly where to go.

'This is it,' she said and laughed.

The house was a cracker box made of brick and s.h.i.+ngles. It was a semi-detached and had a swing set in the backyard, though Archie thought it didn't look as if anyone had been on that thing for years and years.

'Are your parents...?'

'My mom,' she corrected.

He nodded. 'Is she still here?'

Betsey shrugged. 'I don't think so. But I'm not sure. We were beyond estranged once my trauma became a meal ticket.'

That hurt him, to think of someone using Betsey's pain for gain.

'So why here?' he asked. 'If no one's here.'

'Roots, baby,' she said with a bitter laugh. 'We all need to see where we came from. Though I must say, this all looked so much bigger when I was younger.'

'Perspective,' he said and followed her.

She walked to a birch tree in the front yard and patted it like it was an old friend. She pointed to something carved in the soft bark. He saw it was BIG.

'Big?'

'Hysterical, ain't it?'

'What is it?'

'My initials! Betsey Ilene Green. BIG! My mother...what the h.e.l.l was she thinking?'

He laughed. 'Ilene with an I?'

'Yeah, apparently that's one way to spell it.'

They made a quick tour of the side and the back. She toed the swing and watched it move back and forth in the wind. 'That was mine,' she said. 'So it's been here for ever.'

'Because you're ancient,' he teased.

'You know what I mean.'

'Betsey Green, is that you?'

They both turned towards the back porch of the small home. An old woman stood in the open screen door with an afghan wrapped around her shoulders and a tiny s.h.i.+vering dog in her arms.

'Yes, who '

'It's me. Ducky Child.'

'Ducky?' he asked out of the corner of his mouth.

'It's really Dorothy. Ducky is a nickname. Her sister lives...lived, maybe, down the street.'

'Yes, Mrs Child. It is.'

'Well, come up here, girl. You're freezing Jean Harlow right out of her fur.'

With that, the small old woman turned and the screen door banged behind her. Archie felt like he was in some kind of movie. A strange one that was part comedy, part drama, all surreal.

Betsey sighed. 'Let's go. We'll just say hi and then be gone. I'd love to see the inside anyway.'

He followed her up the steps. At the top he took her hand again, wanting to give her that contact. But, truth be told, he wanted it himself as well.

The house was a clutter of collectable plates, dolls, doilies and what appeared to be baking tins. Archie went from feeling fine to slightly claustrophobic.

'How are you, Ducky?' Betsey asked, glancing around. He saw her flinch subtly. Apparently, the older woman's home was decorated very differently from when Betsey lived here.

'I'm fine, child. How are you? It's been years since anyone's seen you,' Ducky said. Jean Harlow wagged her tail so vigorously the elderly woman had to put her down.

'I know. That's been on purpose.' Betsey squatted and petted the dog. 'How long have you lived here, Ducky?'

'Oh...two years, I want to say. Maybe a bit more. I bought it so I could be close to Hazel. She was doing poorly.'

'How's she doing now?' The dog had managed to half jump into Betsey's lap. Archie watched as she gathered it into her arms and stood.

'She died earlier this year,' Ducky said and sighed.

'Oh, gosh. I'm sorry.'

Archie also mumbled his sympathies.

The woman waved a tiny, gnarled hand. 'She was doing very poorly, Betsey. I think it's all for the best. But now it's just me and Jean on a street full of young kids with Priuses and baby buggies!' This seemed to strike her as funny. 'But you didn't come to hear my woes. I'm making some tea. You show your man guest around and I'll make two extra cups.'

Betsey led him through the house, still cradling Jean Harlow in her arms. 'Man guest?' Archie asked.

'Don't ask me,' she laughed. 'I'm just glad it was someone I knew in here. At least I can peek around.'

She showed him the tiny bedroom at the top of the steps that had been hers when they first moved into the house. Then her mother's room. The final one was a baby-blue room at the front of the house. 'This was mine when I hit about ten on. So it was my room when...it was my room until I moved out.'

When she stepped inside what now appeared to be a storage room, Archie saw a flicker of the girl she had been. Jean Harlow wriggled crazily in Betsey's arms until she stooped and let her down. Betsey touched the closet door, drew it open slowly. Inside were a series of marker lines. Betsey at five, seven, twelve, fifteen...

'I grew up here,' she said softly, as if reminding herself.

'You grew strong here,' he said.

Her brown eyes widened. 'You think?'

'I know,' he said. 'Look at you.'

'But yesterday '

'Everyone cracks sometimes, Betsey. It's the nature of being human. It's how big you let that crack grow that's important. You didn't. You stopped and you found your way again and you ceased the damage. It's all anyone can ask. No one's perfect. Show me a perfect person,' he said, 'and I'll show you a liar.'

'How'd I find you?' she asked, c.o.c.king her head.

'I found you,' he said. 'And I think it was because of a great and terrible hunger and a lonely hairpiece in the middle of the road.'

She laughed and Jean Harlow did a happy doggy spin. 'Let's go drink some tea and get out of here.'

'Do you have any idea what you're going to do?'

'None. But I feel different somehow.'

He took her hand. 'Understood,' he said.

They drank tea and ate stale b.u.t.ter cookies and seemed to make an old woman's afternoon. They escaped a half hour later with a bag of the cookies. Betsey looked at the sky. 'We only have a few hours of daylight left.' All day the radio had been forecasting possible sleet, snow and freezing rain.

'It'll take us a few hours to get home,' he said. 'What do you want to do?'

'Go to Miller's house. I've heard it referred to more than once as his lair. As if he's some superhero movie villain.'

'Let's go,' he said. 'We have to eat soon, though.'

She laughed. 'I'm sure there's a diner around here somewhere.'

Chapter 18.

For a lair it was rather boring, she thought. They sat in the truck and stared at it. A two-storey brick house with white siding and black shutters. The front yard was overgrown, with a 'For Sale' sign that looked ages old. It was faded, the realtor information barely legible.

'Wow,' she said.

'You never ended up here, though?' he asked. His fingers kept sliding along the front of his jeans like he was nervous. Archie caught her watching him and smiled. 'It has a vibe,' he said, looking uncertain. 'You know?'

'I do,' she said. 'Probably why it's been for sale for ever. And no,' Betsey said, 'to answer your question, I was never here. But Christ, if I had a dollar for every single time they put a picture of this place up next to my picture, I could live in a very nice house with a very nice car parked in the drive and never have to worry about food again. It seemed to be on a constant loop for ever. But that was me, maybe. My perception.'

'No,' Archie said. 'I remember it too. It's not just you.'

'I never thought about that.' Betsey slid along the bench seat and put her hand on his shoulder. It made the clamour inside her quiet down.

'About what?'

'About you seeing it. Remembering it. I guess it was something that happened to me and that's all. It never really hits me that people would remember it. Or me.'

Archie put his arm around her. He said nothing. He just waited.

'Can we go up?'

'We can do whatever you want, Betsey.'

Together they circled the house. And it truly felt like circling, she thought. As if they were approaching a live thing that could react poorly. The backyard was a more tangled mess than the front and they had to pick their way through the undergrowth. Betsey watched Archie's broad back as he moved ahead of her, helping to clear a path.