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“Hell, Stef, I’ve told you that ‘til I’m blue in the face! Just look!”
Stefan looked his dad over quite critically, because he was feeling critical. He said, “Your face’s pretty pink. There’s a blood vessel there that looks busted.”
“That was from the night you first took out the car, alone, with that youngest Sorrus girl.”
Stefan had sighed and shaken his head in empathy for a lousy time. “I remember that.”
“I should hope you would!”
Stefan had to remind his father, “It’s stuck in my head because I had to go and get her daddy to get his mules to haul us out of the sand.”
“That did take guts.”
“It was the car,” Stefan again vowed. “I couldn’t allow my first car to sink in quicksand.”
“But you left her inside the car,” his father had retorted in a censorious manner. “I’ve never understood that.”
“I told you. She had on high heels, and I didn’t want to wait around for her to make the trek. She was fifteen. She wobbled in high heels on a smooth surface. What if somebody else had come along, pulled the car out and took it off. I figured if she stayed in it, the car was still mine.”
“And if it sunk?”
“Dad.” Stefan had been very adult. “All this happened fourteen years ago.”
“You asked about my burst blood vessel.”
“No.” Stefan had then managed to be excruciatingly patient. “I just barely mentioned it. You asked if your face was blue from giving me sage advice.”
“Sage? You a horticulturist?”
That had done it. In order to avoid a burst blood vessel of his own then, Stefan had said, “Tell Momma I was here.”
“Probably.”
That one word had caused Stefan to hesitate on his way to the door. “Why...probably?”
“I’ll have to test how she’s feeling about you, before I admit you was here.”
“Do you realize there are people that have real, normal parents? How’d I end up with you two?” Then, hopefully, he’d asked rapidly, “Was I adopted?”
“No. You’re ours.”
“That’s scary.” And Stefan had left.
* * *
Stefan had four brothers. They were a year apart in age. Stefan was youngest. His mother had told Stefan that when he was born, and she was exhausted and groggy, his father had told her—at that time, mind you—that he’d finally figured out how to have daughters. Even Stefan’s father admitted that he could have chosen a better time for his pronouncement. His wife didn’t speak kindly to him for two years.
So why did Stefan think Carrie would be any different? She was also a touchy female, just like his mother. Well. Why was he interested in Carrie who was a rejected woman? It was that hair. And disgruntled, he thought about the fact that everybody has hair. Well, someplace on them. There aren’t very many people who are bald all over. But Carrie had all that mop of shimmery blond-strawberry hair. It was alluring. A man wanted to be wrapped in it.
He decided he’d casually mention to her that some of the men at his place had talked about the fact that she’d look better with her hair cut short. If she cut it, he figured, it ought to solve his lured-attention problem.
Then, more than likely, she’d mention something he should cut. Like his own throat.
* * *
When he came back into his house the next time, the phone was ringing, and it was that woman, Carrie, who said, “You get home okay?”
He didn’t sit down that time, he just said, “Yeah.”
“Who all did you accost?”
So he eased down and heard himself saying, “Some guys out at the lot were talking about you.”
“Naturally.”
She was snippy and just asking for some man to take charge of her and straighten her out. He went on, “And they think you’d look cute with your hair real short. I told them they were crazy.”
She hung up.
* * *
Several days passed and just about everyone in Blink heard of the scam Stefan’s dad had contrived. Stefan was going to give away a new Jeep in exchange for one from the time of World War II. Ownership had to’ve been continuous.
The idea was attention-getting. Stefan would actually trade a new Jeep for an antique. But it was worth doing because of the publicity.
Mac did win. The two runners-up each got a hundred dollars.
Kirt said thoughtfully, “Mac’s old Jeep up on a pole out front of the car lot would be a plus. Up in the air, thataway, it would be seen from the highway.”
It is odd what happenstance does. While Stefan was just trying to get Mac off his neck, the newspapers from around the area clear to San Antonio, up to Austin and over to Fredricksburg came for interviews with Stefan...and pictures!
Those combatants left from World War II were getting precious. World War II had been a “good” war. It wasn’t like the newer wars, so nasty and appalling.
Memory is selective.
Stefan had never had such publicity. It was good for business. He gave a second Jeep to his father.
Was his father delighted? No. He said furiously, “What the hell you trying to do? You want me to look like a moocher?” And he refused the Jeep.
Stefan begged God to prove he was switched at birth. Or at least adopted!
As he drove around the area for television interviews, he dreamed his real parents would recognize him and claim him. He hadn’t dreamed that since he was fourteen, just over half his life ago.
Then he heard by chance that Carrie had all his TV interviews taped! The very thought of her watching him on tape wobbled him. Why would she tape the interviews?
But he overheard his father say, “Our VCR went crazy and chewed up tapes, but Carrie volunteered to tape the TV bits on Stefan for us. She has a double VCR that can hold twelve hours of—”
The sound of his daddy’s voice went away, and Stefan’s head was filled with the popping air waves of a vacuum. It was fascinating. Eventually, he was aware that the stunning reason for his mental vapidness was the fact that Carrie would volunteer to tape his interviews for his parents!
Did that mean... Did she have copies?
His father’s voice came back to Stefan. “We don’t even have to watch or fool with the recorder. They give Carrie the day, channel and hour, and she just sets the time and so on. She really doesn’t mind, it’s so simple.”
Stefan was deflated. She didn’t have to watch the tapes. She just programmed the VCR. That sobered him.
Why had he been...un-sobered? Why had his libido gotten so excited when he heard she was... But she wasn’t. She was simply being kind to his parents.
Yeah. And just why was she being kind to his parents? Hmm?
His head waggled a little, his body moved a bit and he touched his tie. Carrie Pierce was interested in Stefan Szyszko?
He could understand it. After he dumped her, she hadn’t been able to get over him. She was courting his parents to get through to him. She was trying to get them on her side and trap him. Yeah.
* * *
At church the next Sunday, Stefan watched in some shock as Carrie came inside with Pepper Hodges. What the hell was she doing with Pepper, of all men? And why was she with him...in church!
And Stefan knew. Just that fast, it came to him. Pepper was the fall guy. She wanted to see Stefan. And she wanted him to see her with another man and get territorial. Yep.
Knowing all that, he wasn’t surprised when she didn’t look around to find him. He sat there with his parents, three of his brothers and their families, in a Szyszko fortress of relations, and he knew that she knew right where he was.
When had she gotten that big, floppy hat? It looked really good on that skinny, shapeless woman. She had good taste. And she was there, in church, with Pepper Hodges. She was lucky she was in church with a guy like that. She’d better be careful.
How come she had paired off with Pepper? Well, she didn’t belong to that church. Coming with Pepper was the only way she could seem normal when she came inside. But she still didn’t look around. How did she know he would know she would be with Pepper?
And Stefan figured it out. She’d come in during the week and checked the pews for names. Yeah. She had. She knew where he was. He relaxed and studied the statue of Jesus showing his cross-impaled heart wrapped in thorns, and Stefan felt great compassion.
* * *
When the service was over, and they were moving out of the church, Stefan saw that Carrie and Pepper were ahead of him. It seemed odd that she would allow that. She should have waited until he exited the church and was standing around outside as he talked, then she could have come out and been surprised to see him.
She wasn’t handling a confrontation at all well. But she was a novice. She’d learn.
However, she had taped his interviews. He would be kind to mention his mother’s gratitude. He’d be casual about it. He squeezed through impossible barriers of talking people, knocked a lady’s hat askew and walked through empty pews and got outside just in time to see her being put into Pepper’s car!
What was the rush?
And a thought stopped him cold. What if...what if she was allowing Pepper to...court her!
Yeah. What if?
And he found he was stunned by the idea. His mind rejected it. How could he be so upset over a woman whom he’d discarded three months and seventeen days ago?
How come he knew exactly how long ago it had been?
Was he sulking? Had he been waiting for her to call him and make up with him, saying he was right and she’d been rude? Yeah.
So what was he supposed to do?
* * *
Knowing her family was still away, Stefan called her the rest of the day, and fortunately she didn’t have the pushy answering machine connected. Each time, he could let the phone ring twenty times. If she deliberately was not answering, it would be annoying for her to have to listen to the long rings, but he knew she wasn’t there. No single woman would resist a ringing phone.
When he couldn’t contact her the next day, he began to get a breathing disorder. Where was she? How could he find out without seeming interested? A man’s life and times were a heavy burden.
He drove by her house, using different cars from the lot so he could be anonymous. Sure. But he went by the next night and her driveway was filled with cars. She was having a party, and he hadn’t been invited?
He was crushed. It was several days before he found out her visitors had been sorority sisters. Finding that out kept him from going into a decline. But...why would he care?
* * *
Then Pat Vernon called. He was one of the people from the TV station in San Antonio who had interviewed Stefan. Pat had called because Mac’s earpiece didn’t accept the telephone. Pat had found a World War II veteran who was only sixty-eight and he could still qualify to fly a single-engine plane.
His name was Jerold Kraut. It would be good copy if Mac would go on a flight with Jerold. Pat asked Stefan, “Would you find out if Mac would be interested? We can land the plane right behind your car lot. It’d give you some free publicity.”
Stefan said, “Great. Why don’t you come out and talk to the old man with me.”
“Is there a motel around there? I don’t recall one in Blink.”
“You can stay with me? I have the room. Mac’ll come into town, and it’ll probably be fun. My mother will fix the meals and you can’t get any better than that.”
“You talked us into it. What day?”
So they got that figured out.
Stefan’s father and a couple of his brothers helped him move an extra bed out of the family storage in the barn. The struggle to put it into one of the vacant rooms at Stefan’s house was so difficult that it was hilarious, and they became weak from laughing. Then they decided they might just as well put a bed in the other room. So Stefan bought a case of beer.
His mother told Stefan to buy some mattress covers so the stains wouldn’t show. She loaned him sheets and towels. And pillows. And dishes. And she donated two braided rugs. She told him that if he put one end under the bed no one would notice the indelible stains on one of the rugs. And she added a rocking chair to set on the stubborn stain on the other rug.
Stefan said, “That’s the rocker you used for feeding us kids.”
His mother looked at it critically. “It’ll last.”
Slipping it in slyly, Stefan offhandedly asked his mother, “Can we come to your house at mealtime? Just supper.” He gestured as if that was no big deal, and “just supper” was letting her off the hook.
She was agreeable, but she gave Stefan a look, and he knew she was collecting brownie points. She’d hit him with some god-awful job for him to solve, and he would be committed to it. The weight of that reality came down and landed heavily on his shoulders.
Carrying the burden of probable obligation, Stefan checked with the area weatherman. He said the weather ought to be okay for the next several weeks, and to check back.
In an afterthought, Stefan finally had to go see Mac because he couldn’t talk to him on the phone. Mac was willing to be involved in the filming. By then, Stefan wouldn’t have been at all surprised if the old geezer had flatly refused. Stefan’s confidence in himself wasn’t high.
But then Mac hesitated. “You say the pilot’s not even seventy? A whippersnapper. You suppose he’ll know what the hell he’s doing? What’d you say? Don’t mumble, boy.”
Therefore, it was a real fluke that Stefan had a valid excuse to call Carrie. She wasn’t at the TV station, but she was home.
Before she could reject his call, he said, “I wonder if you’d be kind enough to set your VCRs to tape another string of great promo coverage.” He just went ahead and told her what and when and why.
She said a calm, “Sure. No problem. I’ll contact your mother for the times.”
