The Searcher(94)

He hands her the saw and moves so she can take over at the table. “You had a snack after school?”

“Nah,” Trey says, squinting along the saw line.

Cal goes inside and comes out with a peanut butter sandwich, an apple and a glass of milk. “Say thank you,” he says automatically.

“Yeah. Thanks.” The kid drops cross-legged on the grass and aims herself at the sandwich like she hasn’t eaten all day.

Cal goes back to his paint streaks. He doesn’t want to say what he’s about to say. He would like to leave this afternoon undisturbed, let it unroll itself in its own slow time across the newly plowed fields, to the rhythms of their work and the west wind and the low autumn sun, right up until the moment when he has to wreck everything.

But, Mart’s theory notwithstanding, there are a couple of reasons Cal can think of why a girl might not want to look like a girl. If someone has been doing bad things to Trey, his plan will need to change.

“I got a bone to pick with you,” he says.

Trey chews and gives him a blank look. Cal can’t tell whether this relates to the subject at hand, or whether she just hasn’t heard the expression before.

He says, “You never told me you’re a girl.”

The kid lowers her sandwich and watches him, with fast things zipping behind her eyes. She’s trying to read in his face what this means. For the first time in a long time, she looks ready to run.

She says, “Never said I was a boy.”

“You knew I thought you were, though.”

“Never thought about it.”

Her muscles are still primed for flight. Cal says, “Are you scared I’m gonna hurt you?”

“Are you pissed off?”

“I’m not mad,” Cal says. “I’m just not crazy about surprises. Did someone do something bad to you ’cause you’re a girl?”

Her eyebrows twitch together. “Like what?”

“Like anything. Anything that might make you feel better going around like a boy.”

He’s alert for the slightest flinch of tension or withdrawal, but the kid just shakes her head. “Nah. My dad, he went easier on us girls.”

She has no idea what he’s aiming at. Cal feels a flood of relief, chased by something thornier and harder to identify. The kid doesn’t need his rescuing; there’s no reason to change his plan. “Well then,” he says. “Quit looking at me like I’m gonna throw this toothbrush at you.”

“How’d you know? Did someone say it to you?”

Cal says, “What’s with the hair?”

Trey swipes a hand over her head and checks it, like she’s expecting a leaf or something. “Huh?”

“The buzz cut. Makes you look like a boy.”

“I had lice. My mam hadta shave it.”

“Great. You still got ’em?”

“Nah. Last year.”

“Then how come it’s still short?”

“Less hassle.”

Cal is still trying to overlay a girl on top of the boy he’s accustomed to. “What was it like before?”

Trey holds up a hand somewhere around her collarbone. Cal can’t picture it. “When I was in school, kids would’ve given a girl shit for having her hair like that. No one does?”

The kid does a combination shrug, mouth-twist and eye-roll, which Cal takes to mean that this is the least of her problems. “They mostly leave me alone. ’Cause I bet up Brian Carney.”

“How come?”

Trey shrugs again. This one means it’s not worth going into. After a moment she says, with a quick glance at Cal under her eyebrows, “Do you care?”

“That you beat up Brian Whatsisname? Depends on why. Sometimes you got no choice but to set someone straight.”

“That I’m a girl.”

“At your age a kid’s a kid,” Cal says. “Doesn’t make much difference what kind.” He would love this to be true.

Trey nods and goes back to her food. Cal can’t tell whether the subject is closed in her mind. After a little bit she says, “You got any kids?”

“One.”

“Boy or girl?”

“Girl. She’s grown.”

“Where’s her mam? Were you not married?”

“We were. Not any more.”

Trey absorbs this, chewing. “How come? You a hoormaster like your dad?”

“Nope.”

“Didja beat her?”

“No. Never laid a finger on her.”

“Then how come?”

“Kid,” Cal says, “I have no idea.”

Trey’s eyebrows twitch together skeptically, but she says nothing. She bites a chunk off the apple, puts it inside her last piece of sandwich and tries out the combination, with mixed results, going by the look on her face. It makes Cal’s bones feel weak, how little she sometimes is.

She says, “Does your girl know you’re here?”

“Sure. I talk to her every week.”

“Is the desk gonna be for her?”

“Nah,” Cal says. “She’s got her own place, her own furniture. That’s staying right here.”

Trey nods. She finishes the apple and tosses the core, with a hard whip of her wrist, down the garden towards the rooks. Then she wipes her hands on her jeans and goes back to sawing.