Wild Orchids Part 23

But what would happen if-?

"Who were you talking to?"

I turned to see Tessa standing in the doorway. She was a funny little kid who talked little. Except to Ford. The two of them seemed to be on the same circuit board so they agreed on everything. Allie said she'd never seen anything like it. She'd always bemoaned the fact that her daughter was antisocial and wouldn't talk to adults or her peers. But Ford and Tessa were often together, doing things like looking inside some hole in the ground and speculating as to what was inside it.

"A man," I said to Tessa.

She didn't ask any more questions, but during the day I saw her looking at me oddly a couple of times. I ignored her. I knew from experience that to ask Tessa anything would only get me silence and a blank stare.

One time Allie was watching Ford's feet disappear as he slithered on his belly into some dungeon of greenery he and Tessa had made, and she gave a huge sigh. "My daughter is hungry for male companionship."

I leaped on the chance to find out about her former marriage. After all, I'd told Allie about Kirk. Truthfully, Allie was the only woman I'd revealed more to than I'd learned from. "Does Tessa see her father often?" I asked.

"Rarely," Allie said quickly, then turned and walked away. And that was all the info I could get out of her.

So I ignored Tessa's funny looks at me on Tuesday and got her to pose.

At least I got her to pose after Ford told her she should do it.

I wish I could describe how good my photos of Tessa came out. It was one of those cosmic things that happens now and then. I think that if I'd been myself that day the pictures wouldn't have been half as good. Usually, I tend to be a bit a.n.a.l about depth-of-field and light meter readings, but that day I was so distracted that I didn't think about adjusting every k.n.o.b on my camera. My camera had a depth-of-field preview b.u.t.ton, so I just pushed that, and when Tessa and the background looked okay, I pushed the remote cord and took the shot.

Maybe Tessa caught my mood that day. Usually, she was impatient to be off and doing her own thing, so I'd thought of what I could use to bribe her to get her to sit in front of a camera. A gift certificate to that garden store where she and Ford had bought the truckload of ugly little statues?

But I didn't have to bribe her that afternoon because Tessa seemed to be as much in a dreamlike state as I was. My attention wandered as I thought about Russell Dunne. I imagined wearing a ball gown-not that I owned one or had ever worn one-and waltzing in the moonlight with him.

I sat Tessa in an old chair by the window, gave her a book to read, then snapped pictures. Not too many pictures and not too quickly because my mind wasn't moving that fast. Instead of scurrying around and adjusting hair and reflectors as I usually did, I just let things be.

Tessa and I hardly said a word in the three hours that I took pictures of her. Usually, I'd take an hour and six times the photos I took that day, but I was so dreamy that I moved in slow motion, and the result was more time but fewer photos.

After a while, Tessa and I moved outside. She stretched out on the gra.s.s in the dappled shade of a tree and looked up at the overhead leaves. Had I been myself that day I would have straddled her and given her a thousand directions about how to look, where to look, and even what to think. But since I wasn't my usual bossy self, I just let Tessa do whatever she wanted and trusted my camera to perform.

That night Ford stayed in his office late, so I went to my studio and started developing my black-and-whites of Tessa. When that first photo came into focus I knew I had something. With a capital S: Something.

I was still moving at half speed, but I was awake enough to see that I'd finally done what I'd always dreamed of doing: I'd captured a mood. I'd put a personality on paper. Not just a face, but a whole person.

As I stood there looking at those wet pictures, I learned a lot in an instant.

Whenever I'd photographed kids previously, I'd done it fast because they move a lot and get bored quickly. "Look at me! Look at me!" I was always saying, then snapping rolls of film as fast as I could push the b.u.t.ton.

Maybe a photographer had to do that with some kids, but there were also children like Tessa. She was an introverted, moody child, and today, purely by accident, I'd been in the same state, so I'd caught it on film.

The photos were good. Very, very good. Maybe even, win-a-prize good. I had some close-ups of Tessa that were so beautiful they brought tears to my eyes. And as I looked at those pictures, I saw why Allie and I got silence from Tessa, while Ford got invited into the secret house.

Allie and I were alike. We were doers and movers. Ford could sit in the same chair for twelve hours, but I couldn't sit in one place for more than thirty minutes. For me, reading was easiest when I was on a treadmill.

There was a world going on inside Tessa's head and Ford saw it. Today, I had captured Tessa's inner world on film.

I left the photos hanging in the studio, wandered into the house, and up to bed, smiling all the way. Obviously, Russell was good for me. Being around him had put me in this state where I could be quiet long enough to listen to Tessa with my camera.

It wasn't until I was getting ready for bed that I remembered what Russell had said about Amarisa having visions. I remembered my fright when he'd told me about her seeing evil in a person's mind. Again, I wondered what I'd do if that happened to me.

As I slipped on my nightgown, I thought that if I had another vision maybe I'd tell Russell about it. Maybe I'd break my ironclad rule and call him and tell him what I'd seen. Maybe he'd understand. Maybe that would be a way Russell and I could form a bond. A forever bond.

Smiling, I climbed into bed and went to sleep.

On Wednesday, I was still wandering about in a daze. I'm not sure what I did all day, but everything seemed to take twice as long as usual. Ford said, "What the h.e.l.l is wrong with you?" and I had enough presence of mind to say, "PMS." I guessed correctly that that statement would make him back off. He didn't comment on my mood again.

I didn't show Ford the pictures I'd taken of Tessa. When they were dry, I slipped them inside a big portfolio because I wanted to show them to Russell first. After all, he and I shared a love of photography, didn't we?

In the afternoon, I used the little digital to snap some photos of Nate in the garden. He was sweaty, had flecks of gra.s.s on his face, and he was squinting at the sun, so I was sure the pictures would be awful. While I cooked dinner, Ford ran the photos off on Russell's little printer.

I was removing a dish of sweet potatoes from the oven (coated in brown sugar, swimming in marshmallows, the only way Ford would eat them) when he held a photo in front of my face. It was impossible to believe, but Nate was better looking on film than he was in person. He was only seventeen, but on film he looked about thirty, and he was handsome in a way that made your breath catch.

I put the potatoes on top of the stove and looked at the photo while Ford ran off more. When he had a stack of them-and each one was gorgeous- he said he'd send them to the art director at his publishing house.

But the next morning when Ford showed the photos to Nate and said he might have a modeling career ahead of him, Nate said he couldn't leave Cole Creek. He said it as though it were an unchangeable fact, then he turned on the lawn mower and began to cut.

Standing to one side, I watched Ford turn the mower off and start talking to Nate in a fatherly way. I was too far away to hear all of it, but I caught phrases like "deciding your future" and "this is your chance" and "don't throw this away." Nate looked at Ford with an unreadable face, listened politely, and said, "Sorry, I can't," then turned on the mower again.

Ford looked at me as though to ask if I knew what was going on, but I just shrugged. I figured Nate was really saying that he couldn't leave his grandmother. She'd raised him and she'd be alone if Nate left town. But my impression of his grandmother was that the last thing she'd want was a grandson who'd sacrificed his future for her.

I decided to let Ford handle it. He was pretty good at talking to people, so I figured he'd eventually get Nate to come around. Besides, I didn't have time to get involved. I needed to go to the grocery to buy food for Ford- and for the picnic with Russell. He hadn't called yet, but when he did, I wanted to be ready. I planned to take enough food that Russell and I could stay out all day long. Just the two of us. Alone in the woods.

So I left Ford to talk to Nate while I went to the grocery. When I returned hours later, the house was empty. There was an open FedEx envelope on the hall table and I figured it was "maintenance," as Ford called it. His publishing house often sent him paperwork that he had to approve or disapprove about his books, which were all still selling after all these years.

As usual, I lugged all the groceries in by myself. After a glare at my cell phone because it still hadn't given me a call from Russell, I put away all the groceries, then went to the sink to get myself a gla.s.s of delicious well water.

When I turned the handle, it came off in my hand, and water came shooting up, hitting me in the face. I threw open the doors below the sink and tried to turn the water off, but I couldn't budge the rusty old k.n.o.bs.

I ran out of the house shouting for Ford, but when I reached the garden, I was drawn up short by the most extraordinary sight. Ford and Tessa were standing side by side, looking at two men I'd never seen before.

One man was standing behind the old bench Nate had repaired. He was tall and ruggedly handsome in that country-and-western way that made some women swoon.

Sitting on the bench in front of him was a little man who looked like Ford -if you saw him in a fun house mirror, that is. Every one of Ford's features was exaggerated. On this little man, Ford's thick eyelashes were like one of those sleepy-eyed dolls. And Ford's rather nice lips were like a nursing baby's. And his nose! Yes, Ford's nose was a bit unusual, but it was small enough that no one noticed it. But this man's nose looked as though a miniature hot dog had been placed crosswise on the end of it, then smoothed out.

When I first saw the man sitting there, my face and hair wet, water dripping into my eyes, I thought he wasn't real. I wanted to say crossly to Ford and Tessa that they had to take that huge statue back to the store and get a full refund.

But as I wiped water out of my eyes, the stout little creature turned his head and blinked at me.

It was then that I knew who the men were. The handsome one, the one with the face that looked as if he could write songs about his "honky-tonk life," was called "King" in Ford's books. As in "King Cobra." Ford had described him well enough that I recognized him-and I remembered that he hadn't been portrayed as a good guy.

As for the little man, he was Ford's father. In his books, Ford called him "81462"-which was the number on his shirt in the prison where he'd been since before the hero's birth.

The man in back, the country-and-western singer, said to me, "Is something wrong?" He had a voice that was filled with every cigarette he'd ever smoked and every smoky bar he'd ever been in. And he had an accent so thick I could hardly understand him.

"Sink," I said, suddenly remembering that the kitchen of my beautiful house was being flooded. "The sink!" Days of lethargy left me; I was myself again. I sprinted back toward the kitchen, four people close behind me.

"You got a monkey wrench?" the younger man said to Ford as soon as all of us were in the kitchen. There was contempt in his voice: a blue-collar worker's contempt for a white-collar worker. The water was shooting up to the ceiling and these two men were about to get into a socialist war.

The little man, 81462, grabbed a cookie sheet off the countertop and directed the spray of water out the open window over the sink. Smart, I thought. Why hadn't I thought of that?

"Course he's got tools. He's a Newcombe," Number 81462 said.

At least I think that's what he said. I could have understood Gullah more easily than his tw.a.n.g.

Ford disappeared into the pantry for a moment and returned with a heavy, rusty wrench that was probably new when the house was built. I'd never seen it before and wondered where he'd found it.

Two minutes later, the water was stopped and the five of us stood there on the flooded floor, staring at each other and having no idea of what to say.

Tessa spoke first. She seemed to be fascinated with 81462, couldn't take her eyes off him. "Praying mantis?" she asked, and I wondered what she was talking about.

81462's eyes started twinkling in a way that made him as cute as a...

Well, as cute as a garden gnome. Or a bug's ear. Or a- Turning slightly, he said, "Halfway down."

I was trying to understand his dialect-it was too strong to be called an accent-when I noticed his vest for the first time. It was covered with hundreds of little enameled pins of insects. They were all about the same size and as far as I could see, there were no two alike.

"Centipede," Tessa said, and 81462 lifted his left arm to show a centipede.

I couldn't believe it, but out of my mouth came "j.a.panese beetle"-the bane of my gardening life.

When Number 81462 looked at me, smiling, I couldn't help smiling back.

He was just so cute!

"Right here." He lifted up the tip of his vest. "Where I can see that he don't eat nothin' good."

I don't know why, but I kind of melted. Maybe it was because of all the drippy-movie hormones that Russell had released in me. "Are you two hungry?" I asked. "I just went to the grocery and-"

"They're not staying," Ford said. Or, actually, grunted.

When I looked at him, his face was as hard as the steel in his truck, and his eyes were flashing angrily. But you know what I'd learned about Ford Newcombe? He had a heart made out of marshmallow cream. He complained and he bellyached about a lot of things, but his actions never fit his words. I'd seen him risk his life to save a bunch of teenagers who were strangers. And I well knew he wasn't researching his devil story because he feared I was involved.

"Nonsense," I said. "Of course they're staying. They're family." I wanted a family more than life, and I was d.a.m.ned if I was going to stand aside and watch Ford throw his out because of some silly childhood arguments.

"Lightning bug," Tessa said, ignoring the adult drama playing around her.

81462 crooked one of his short fingers at her and Tessa waded through the water on the floor to stand before the man. Bending so the upper part of his vest was right before her eyes, he reached inside, pushed something, and the tail of a lightning bug lit up.

Tessa looked at it in awe for a moment, then turned to Ford. I didn't have a mirror in the kitchen, but my guess was that she and I were wearing identical expressions. Of course they'd stay.

When he saw Tessa's face, Ford's marshmallow cream heart turned to liquid. Throwing up his hands in defeat, he left the kitchen.

For a moment the four of us stood there in silence, then Country-and-western said, "Ma'am, do you have a mop?"

"Sure," I said, blinking at being called "ma'am."

Tessa took 81462's hand and pulled him outside, leaving Country-and-western and me alone. He took one of the two mops I got out of the closet, and from the efficient way he used it, I could tell he'd done it before. We worked in silence, with him doing most of the work.

"n.o.ble," he said as he wrung out the mop into the bucket.

"I beg your pardon?"

"My name is n.o.ble."

"Ah," I said, thinking that that's why Ford had named his character "King."

"When my mother was carryin' me she heard somethin' that was in a book. 'The n.o.bles of the land were new come to G.o.d.' Since my daddy's name was Newcombe, she called me n.o.ble."

I stopped mopping. "I like that. It's sort of a prayer."

"I never thought of it that way, but I guess it is." He stopped mopping for a moment to look at me. "And I take it you're Ford's new wife?"

I smiled at that. "No. His a.s.sistant."

"a.s.sistant?" n.o.ble asked, his voice full of disbelief.

Isn't marriage strange? I thought. In front of this man I'd snapped at Ford and ordered him around. Therefore, it was a.s.sumed we were married. So where was "love and honor" in that formula?

"Yes. His a.s.sistant," I said firmly. "Jackie Maxwell."

"Nice to meet you, Miss Maxwell," he said, wiping off his hand on his jeans before he held it out for me to shake.

I did the same thing and shook his hand. Now that Ford was no longer in the room, the arrogance and hostility were gone from his eyes and he seemed nice.

"So... ?" I began. "You and Mr. Newcombe are... ?"

"Toodles just got released from-" He looked up at me to see how my pure, easily-shocked, middle-cla.s.s morals were going to take the coming revelation.

"Prison," I said. "I know." Truthfully, the name "Toodles" shocked me more than the idea of prison.

"Yeah, prison," n.o.ble said. "And the truth is, he ain't got no home."

Oh, dear, I thought. Ford wasn't going to like this. His father to live with him? "And you?" I asked.

n.o.ble shrugged in a self-deprecating way. "I take care of myself. Tumble about the country. Do odd jobs."

"I see," I said, wringing out my mop. "You're dead broke so you volunteered to take, uh... Toodles to his rich son in hopes you'd get a...

what? A loan? Or do you want a place to stay?"

When n.o.ble looked up at me, I could see the "King" Ford had written about, a man who "could charm the pants off any female."

But I was in no danger. Between liking Ford so much and living in a daydream over a handsome stranger, my psyche didn't have room for another man.

"You sure you ain't married to my cousin?" n.o.ble asked.

"Double sure. So tell me what you're after and if I like it I might help you." I didn't say so, but it was my opinion that Ford needed family as much as I did. To hear him talk, he despised his family. On the other hand, Ford was so deeply involved with his relatives that he'd written books about them.