“Pink,” she called. She went down the hall to the bathroom, but it was empty. She could see his bedroom door was closed. “Pink, are you awake?” she waited a moment, then rapped lightly on the door. “Pink, are you awake? I need some help with something.”
Knowing how stubborn Pink could be and actually having to deal with it were two different things. Lulu had never had children of her own, and she didn’t know how Mattie had managed with Pink all those years. She twisted the doorknob and pushed it open. “Pink, are you awake?” She walked to the bed, to the roll of blankets. He wasn’t there.
Burrito followed as Lulu walked to the back porch and surveyed the yard, the trees at the edge of her property, the mountains painting a bluish-gray backdrop to her view. She checked with a couple of her neighbors, but no one knew anything.
Standing in the front yard, Lulu let her eyes rove the gravel driveway leading up to her place, the field just beyond her front gate, the flashing lights turning off the county road heading her way. It was then she heard the sirens. Two cars. She watched as they came closer.
She picked up Burrito. The dog licked her cheek, her neck, wriggling in her arms.
“Pink, where have you gone?”
Chapter 45
“Well ain’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Pink said, getting into Claire’s car. “I thought you’d never come get me. Hell, Lulu told me she didn’t know where you were. I told her I just saw you a few days ago, but that old woman’s crazier than a woodpecker with a neck brace.
Pink looked over at Claire, placing his hand on her shoulder. Claire’s sour expression gave him a start. Claire turned onto the county road, heading for the highway.
“Pink, I ain’t seen you in almost five years,” she said. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
“What?” Pink said. “We just watched that crazy damn video last week, the one where those fishermen all drown in a hurricane.”
“The Perfect Storm?” Claire said. “Is that the movie you’re talking about? I can’t even remember when I watched that. Hell, Pink, what did they do to you in that damn hospital? I heard you’d gone bonkers, but shit . . . I’m worried for you.”
“You telling me we didn’t see that damn movie last week?” Pink said. “Well, which one was it then?”
Claire pulled the car into a deserted gravel parking lot off the highway.
“Pink, baby,” she said. “We didn’t watch any movie last week, or last month, or last year! I haven’t seen you since . . . you know . . . Isabelle.”
Pink searched his pockets for the pills the hospital had given him until he realized he’d left them in the bathroom at Lulu’s. He needed them now. The tingling had come back, like he was hooked up to some low voltage car battery. He hated the disorientation, the vertigo.
“Pink, you okay?” Claire said. “You don’t look so good, baby.”
Pink threw open the door and stepped out into the fresh air. He took his eyes to the mountains beyond, to the leaves on the trees, the sky, things familiar and able to bring him back to the world. He filled his lungs with fresh air. Even so, he still felt like he might get sick.
A hawk flew above him, its shrill call echoing through the valley below. Pink felt a hand on his back. “I’ve never seen you like this, Pink,“ Claire said. “Come on, I know where we can go. It’s not safe here.”
In twenty minutes they were sitting near an old gravel boat ramp, the lake calm and beautiful beyond the windshield. Pink had dozed off. Sleep had always been a hobby for him, but since he’d been in the hospital it had become a full-time job. A drip of water woke him.
Claire was crying, holding Pink to her chest, staring out at the water. Pink sat up, but she never turned to look at him. He reached across the seat and took her hand in his. “What’s this?” he asked, referring to her wedding ring. “I thought you pawned this after you left Kenny.”
Claire shot him a confused look and started crying harder, her head slumped toward the steering wheel. “Pink, don’t do this to me.”
He didn’t know what she was talking about. “Claire, remember that night at Burtran Lake after your crazy husband, Kenny, made us jump off that damn bridge. Remember how we stayed warm that night, how we made love in the front—”
Claire pushed his hand away. “How could you even suggest such a thing, Pink. You’re my damn brother. What we did was a sin against nature, against all things holy. We’re gonna burn in hell for what we did.”
Pink had no way to relate to this newfound narrative. Why did everyone, even Claire, think they were siblings? It made no sense. Pink started to get out of the car when Claire snagged his wrist.
“Pink, we’ve got a problem,” she said, her eyes marshaled by fear.
“What the hell, Claire?” Pink drew back from her, but she dug her nails into his skin.
“Look, Pink, you need to listen closely. I hope for both our sakes you can do that.”
Claire’s makeup ran from her left eye like a muddy creek. Pink pulled the door closed. He wasn’t sure how much of this he could take. Something in his head had gone off-plumb and was spinning haphazardly, making him dizzy.
Claire spun the wedding ring on her finger. “I married Elmer a couple of years ago,” she started.
“Bogan?” Pink said. “You . . . married Bogan? How could you . . . when . . . ?”
“Pink, this will go a lot easier if you just let me talk.”
Pink wasn’t sure he could do that.
“Anyway, after you left . . .” she said, putting her hand to his lips to thwart his interruption. “After you left, I went back to Kenny. I was so messed up and I had no one to talk to about what had happened. Then when Kenny drove himself off that mountain all drunk and coked up, I nearly fell apart. I was so alone. Elmer came to the house to give me the news about Kenny. He came day after day, bringing me food, cooking dinner for me. I fell in love with him, Pink. He was the only thing in my life that made sense.”
“Well then you’re about the luckiest damn person in the world,” Pink said. “Cause nothing makes a bit of damn sense in my life. But Bogan, Claire? Don’t you remember how we always made jokes about him?”
“He’s a good man, Pink. Good and kind . . . and he loves me so much. I’m pregnant with our first child.”
Pink looked at her stomach and saw no signs of life there.
“It’s only two months, Pink. But that’s not what we’re talking about here,” she said. “Anyway, several months after Kenny’s accident, I thought I might like to try getting a job. Elmer said there was an opening at the sheriff’s office, and we weren’t sure how that would work out, him being a deputy and me a . . . well . . . assistant, I guess. But I took it. Eventually we told Louden about our relationship, and he didn’t seem to care that we were seeing each other and all.”