Page 62 of Boy Blue
“Too late, you idiot,” Jack said, letting me go. “Your guy is already coming out here and I’m going to get detention.”
“Who?”
“Wolfe,” Jack said. “He probably thinks I hit you.”
Wolfe was coming up to us across the parking lot, his hands in his pockets as if he meant to be seen as a casual observer. Rather than what he was, narrow-eyed and on alert.
“Everything all right here, guys?” he asked. Looming. Watchful.
“Yes,” I said. I tugged on the lapel of Jack’s parka, pulling him closer. Not letting him go. “It’s just a lot.”
“Morgan thinks we need to go visit Mabel,” Wolfe said. I watched his shoulders loosen, his stance relax. “To get it over with, he says.”
“That man,” Jack said, exasperation and fondness mixing together. “It’s her bridge day. If we go now, we’ll be out of her hair by the time the ladies arrive.”
“We should go then.” Wolfe tipped his head in the direction of the feed and grain, where Morgan was coming out the door, coat on, cane in hand. “I’ll drive us, and Jack can drive you.”
“Sounds good,” Jack said.
I got into the truck. Jack turned it on, and the engine sprang to life with a growl.
Mabel had come up in a lot of the conversations between Wolfe and me. Morgan seemed put off by her, but as Jack drove us along the streets to where she lived, he was almost bouncing in his seat with joy. The truck crawled along, in comparison to the speed it’d had when Jack had pressed on the gas, sending the truck screaming down the two-lane blacktop.
In short order he’d parked in front of a little gray house that Wolfe had taken me to before; I’d waited in the warm truck for him. The walkway had been shoveled; the rest of the front lawn still had a layer of slushy snow. The front door opened, and a brown and white dog came rushing out, barking.
“Mister Rocket, you get back here!”
I looked up as I got out to see an older woman with white hair in a bun come out. She was wearing a kind of house dress with a white apron tied around her middle. As she gestured to the dog, the dog ignored her, but instead came straight to Jack, jumping across piles of melting snow on the lawn.
Jack scooped up the dog and kissed its muzzle over and over while the dog struggled in his arms. Or, rather, pretended to struggle and protest the kisses, all the while panting happily.
I’d never much liked dogs, nor had a desire to pet them, but this doglovedJack. Of course it did. Everyone and everything on the planet loved Jack.
As if to prove a point, Mabel hurried down the walk as Jack came up it, still holding the dog.
“Oh, Mister Rocket,” she scolded, petting the dog with her thin hands. “How naughty you are.”
“Where’s your coat, Mabel?” Jack scolded in turn. “Just because the sun is shining doesn’t mean it’s warm.”
“Let’s go inside, then,” she said, scowling as if she meant to be gruff, but the light in her eyes as she looked at Jack, looping her arm through his, made the scowl a lie. “All of you boys, come in. And don’t forget to wipe your feet.”
She glanced at me, an intense gaze, as she went up the steps, trotted would be a better word, Jack close behind.
“Who’s your friend, Jack?” she asked over her shoulder.
“Another boxcar boy, Mabel,” he said, and then I couldn’t hear any more as they moved into the house, their voices muffled, their attention on each other.
I went up those steps. Wolfe and Morgan were close behind, and we each dutifully wiped our feet on the welcome mat before stepping into the warmth of Mabel’s house. The wooden floor in the small living room gleamed, and everything smelled of fresh lemons. On the Formica table in the small kitchen were two pecan pies. The scent of sugar rose in the air, and I knew why Jack’s voice had been so warm when he’d spoken of her.
She was a nana. Jack had anana.
That’s what Jack would have called her. A grandmother, we would have called her in my old neighborhood. Star would have referred to her as a memaw. We none of us had one, but all of us had imagined. The kisses. Baked goods. Quick hugs. Love shining out of her eyes all day and all night.
Jack even had a story about his real nana back home, something about a can of striped paint and five bucks. Star and I agreed he’d made it all up. But maybe, looking at the kiss on the cheek Mabel gave him when he’d put the dog on the floor and she pulled off his parka to hug him, he hadn’t been.
She gestured for us to sit, and when we had, she wiped her hands on her apron and looked at us one at a time, quickly assessing, it felt like.
“Now,” she said. “If I sacrifice one of my bridge club pecan pies, would you be so kind as to tell me why you’re all here in my living room when you know perfectly well it’s bridge day and I’m expecting company?” To me, she asked, “Which boxcar boy are you?”
