Wrapped in Rain(82)

Katie was quiet and looked like she'd lost her appetite, so I held Jase's plate while he pointed at everything he could see, starting with the dessert. We sat down, and Jase stuffed his face while Katie played with her food and didn't look at me.

Our waitress single-handedly saw to all fifteen tables. Every table was full; everybody needed refills now, another fork yesterday; and four huge men at a corner table kept tapping their feet and asking about the next tray of chicken. Behind all the jewelry sticking through her face and black ink that had tattooed her body, I saw a girl. She couldn't have been more than eighteen. Almost too skinny, baggy clothes, dark eye makeup, and black fingernails, she had doormat written all over her face and walked with a perpetual broken wing.

In the absence of conversation, we finished dinner in short order and I paid the bill.

You forgot to leave a tip.

But she didn't do anything.

I don't care. You leave that girl a tip.

Katie pointed at the grocery half of the building and said, "I need a few things. It'll just take a minute." She and Jase walked down the toothpaste aisle while I returned to the table and placed a dollar beneath my uncleared plate.

That's not the bill I was thinking of.

I knew what she was talking about, but I wasn't about to leave that on the table. The chain-faced girl walked behind me, carrying an entire tray of empty dishes, and disappeared into the kitchen, where I heard a bloodcurdling scream, a crash, and several people hollering in anger.



About seven years ago, I had begun hiding a single onehundred-dollar bill in the recesses of my wallet-for emergencies. Experience had taught me the need for it, and on more than one occasion I had needed it. This didn't strike me as one of those times.

I reached behind my license, slipped the hundred out, and left it beneath the plate. Katie paid for her items, and the three of us walked across the parking lot, where I held the door and loaded them into the truck. While I waited for the glow plugs to warm up, our waitress came running and screaming out the front door. She ran across the lot and flagged me down, waving that single bill in front of her face. I rolled down my window, and the girl leapt through, wrapping her arms around my neck and snotting my shirt.

"Mister," she managed, "thank you!" She hugged me again, this time wetting my other shoulder, and said, "Thank you!" Katie pulled a tissue from her purse and handed it to me while suspicion spread across her face. I gave it to the girl, and she wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and handed it back. "Mister, I was about five minutes from walking out of here and slitting my own wrists." She waved the money in my face again. "Then I found this." She shook her head and pressed the money hard against her chest. "I got a little girl at home, and ... I need money to buy the pink stuff, and ... he left me ... and. . ." She hung on the car door and cried, hiding her face in her arms. "Well ... at least I know I'm not invisible." She wiped her eyes, smearing black mascara across her cheeks, said, "Thank you," and disappeared through the front door.



I rolled up the window and pulled out of the parking lot. Katie never took her eyes off me. She put her hand on my arm and whispered, "Tucker Rain, you are a good man."

Jase hopped onto the center console and held out a small grocery bag with both hands. "Uncle Tuck, Mama let me buy this for you. I got it with my 'lowance." I turned on the overhead light and opened the bag. It was a box of Buzz Lightyear Band-Aids.





Chapter 36


KATIE WALKED IN THE BACK SCREEN DOOR OF WAVERLY Hall and found me quite comfortable in front of a roaring fire in the kitchen. Jase was in bed, tucked in snugly. Katie had something on her mind.

"I'd like a tour," she announced.

"A tour?"

She pointed up. "We've been here almost two weeks and all I've seen is the kitchen. I want to see what you've done with the house." She looked around. "It's been a while."

"Oh, well ... there's really not much ..."

She waved me off. "I am a woman, and this house was once in Southern Living. Now, are you going to turn tour guide, or will this be a self-guided tour?"

I stood up and clasped my hands in front of me. "Welcome to Waverly Hall."

We started at the front door, where she immediately took off her shoes and began prancing around the house barefooted, carrying her tennis shoes. She was far more interested in floors, wallpapers, trim, and crown moldings than I had ever been in my life. She had always liked the kitchen; the dining room she loved, especially the chandelier made from elk horns; and she shook her head when she remembered finding me asleep in the den fireplace. She thought the library looked contrived. Like somebody wanted to create the idea that they actually read all those old books.

We climbed the stairs, and that's when I started getting a little nervous. Seven years ago, I had shoved all of Rex's expensive artwork in the closets, baring the oak and mahogany walls, and started using stick pins and Scotch tape to paper them with my work. Because nobody but dust mites ever came up here, I figured I'd create my own private museum.



Katie pranced to the top step, expecting to see my childhood bedroom, but was met by a collage of old newspaper articles and glossy magazine covers, all curling at the edges and stuck with multicolored pins. "Tucker?"