“Uncle Cletus!” I yell across the house. He has this rule where we use absolutely no etiquette because when his wife was alive he was “made to follow etiquette to a damned T” and he “ain’t gonna do it anymore.” Plus, he says I have soft feet and scare the bejesus out of him when I sneak up on him while he’s sleeping. “I forget sometimes that I’ve got a guest in the house,” he said.
I set the table in the kitchen for two, and pour Cletus a big glass of sweet iced tea. I’ve learned how to make decorative lemon slices at the café, so I do one up for Cletus’s glass. He’ll pretend like it’s too girly for him, but secretly I think he likes to be bothered over. “Uncle Cletus!” I yell again when I hear no shuffling down the hallway. “Dinner’s ready!”
I sit in my seat and fold my napkin across my lap. If I were eating alone, I wouldn’t do this, but out of respect for the etiquette Cletus claims to no longer respect, I do it. After another five minutes have passed, and the steaming pile of spaghetti on my plate has become a congealed pile of spaghetti, I decide to go check on him. I don my flip-flops and stride down the hall to the ballroom. The door is slightly ajar, which means he’d been expecting a call for dinner from me. I can’t help but smile.
We’ve fallen into a routine, he and I.
I push the door open the rest of the way. I’d just polished the floors in here yesterday and the lavender scent of the cleanser still hovers in the air. From across the room I see Cletus’s feet hanging over the end of the couch; it’s his usual napping position.
When I reach what I call his man-corner, I lean over the couch to determine how soundly he’s sleeping. He’s become somewhat of an insomniac himself lately, like Arden is, and I worry that these daily naps won’t get him the true rest he needs. If he’s in a deep sleep, I won’t wake him; I can always reheat his dinner for him before I leave for my shift at the Breeze. If he’s awake and just got a case of naptime lethargy, then I’ll wake him all the way up and we’ll have a proper meal together.
“Uncle Cletus,” I whisper, giving him a little shake.
And that’s when I realize he’s not breathing.
Twenty-Eight
Arden takes a huge swig from the water jug on the wooden bench. It’s been a three hour practice—on a Sunday, no less. Coach Nelson wants him in top form for the next game. Arden has to admit, playing ball again is not as bad as he thought it would be. The physical exhaustion alone helps him sleep, even though dreams of Carly haunt him well into the early morning hours. And it gives him something to do with his hands, even though they ache to hold her, touch her instead of the glistening pigskin of a game ball.
This thing with Carly isn’t over. It will never be over, not for him. He might have to put on this gut-twisting performance at school, this sickening act to keep up appearances. To force his eyeballs to focus straight ahead in the hallways instead of watching her smooth silhouette melt into the crowd of kids. To ignore the tantalizing curves of her figure as it takes up the doorway on her way out of social studies. To look the other way when she wears a new outfit, or styles her hair to cascade around her face. To pretend not to notice when a guy is talking to her, trying to coax her out of her stubborn shell—to pretend not to want to break his nose.
He might have to convince the world that he is no longer interested in Carly Vega, that their story has ended. But his heart knows better. His heart knows there are endless unwritten pages left between them.
He can’t, he won’t lose her for good.
Which is why he’s been scheming with Cletus. The old man has made good on his promise to keep him informed of all things Carly. And if the old man is right, she’s suffering as much as he is. Oh, she keeps her head high. She knows how to play this quiet game too, to the point that it almost drives him mad. She doesn’t look at him, doesn’t speak to him, doesn’t grace him with a secret smile when nobody could possibly be looking. One time she ran into him in the hallway and while he was tempted to let the contact linger, she pulled away as if she’d been struck by lightning.
But Cletus says she listens in when she thinks he’s on the phone with Arden. That any mention of his name sends her into a disturbed, fidgeting silence, one that she doesn’t recover from for sometimes hours later. That she turns on the radio to the local station that covers the football game every Friday night before she goes to her shift at the Breeze.
So together, Cletus and Arden have hatched a plain and simple strategy. When Carly’s parents arrive, they’ll just have to become legal. Period. Take all the steps, classes, swears and oaths and what have you. Cletus will help them file all the paperwork to become US citizens—he was the county sheriff back in the day, after all, with his own connections. That way, the mighty Sheriff Moss will have no sway with them. Nothing to hang over Carly’s head. Her family will be legal, and Carly and Arden can finally be together again.
Cletus gets regular updates from Carly on their progress to the States. Just last night, Carly told him her family had started on their journey the day before. They are already on their way.
The plan is already in motion.
The revered Sheriff Moss is already undermined.
Right? How hard could it be to get them legal?
It’s such a transparent, naïve little plan, the least conniving and most uncomplicated of all his schemes, but Arden has to believe this will work. He has to believe that the universe is not so unfair as to keep them apart indefinitely. Not when staying away from her tortures him like this.