Saving Rain(32)

I was getting tired of saying, “You didn’t have to do that,” but I meant it.

All of this—the room, the food, the company, and now, the clothes, apparently—she didn’t have to do any of it. And to insist that I didn’t need to repay her in any way at all, even by helping in any way I could, was absurd. Especially after I’d spent my entire life working and doing things for other people—I didn’t know how to turn that off.

But I did go back to the guest room to find a brand-new pair of black dress pants and a navy-blue button-down on the bed, both in my size—and at six foot seven, that wasn’t always an easy thing to just stumble upon. I was touched and grateful to have a new set of clothes to wear on the first Christmas of the rest of my life, and I got dressed to find that Sarah had a good eye for what would make a guy like me look nice.

After tying my hair back in a low tail at the nape of my neck, I left the room and heard the voices of people I didn’t know coming from the kitchen.

“Daddy, you let a criminal stay in your house?”

“Mom, how could you let him do that?!”

The first voice scoffed. “Oh my God, what if he kills you in your sleep and takes everything you own?”

The second said, “Wait. Has he killed anybody? Why was he in prison in the first place?”

Harry sighed. “Okay, first of all, he’s not going to kill anybody. He was in prison for manslaughter and—”

“So, wait. He has killed someone,” the second voice interrupted. “Oh my God, Pamela. Daddy invited a murderer to Christmas. Isn’t that awesome?”

I pulled in a deep breath and decided it was time to stop eavesdropping and get the introductions with Harry’s daughters over with and out of the way. I couldn’t force anyone to feel comfortable in my presence, but the least I could do was be polite and hopefully prove to them I wasn’t a threat. So, I cleared my throat and entered the kitchen to find two blonde women. They looked nearly identical to their mother, and they turned at the sound of my footsteps.

“Girls, I’d like you to meet Soldier. Soldier, these are my daughters—”

“Wait,” one of the two cut in, holding her hands out. “Soldier. I knew a kid named Soldier. He was one of my students, and he …” Her voice trailed off as something dawned on her, and she laid a palm over her chest. “Oh my God, are you Soldier Mason?”

“Um …” I swallowed as it dawned on me that she had heard of my case. “Yeah, I—”

“Soldier, oh my God.” She walked toward me, her eyes instantly misting with nostalgic recollection and sympathy. “Do you remember me? Mrs. Henderson?”

My jaw dropped at the name as I nodded. A tidal wave of memories flooded back, filled with school-day moments and after-class meetings. “Oh, wow, yeah. You …” I actually laughed, bewildered and completely blown away. “You were my only favorite teacher. You—” I didn’t think it was appropriate to mention that she’d been my first real crush on a person I knew outside of TV. So, I smiled and chose to tell her a different, less embarrassing truth. “You made school decent.”

That hand remained on her chest as she shook her head. “I had asked if you were okay. And you weren’t.”

I smiled apologetically, like it had been my fault. “No, I wasn’t okay.”

“I’m so sorry. When I heard what happened, I felt like I’d failed in some way, which”—she laughed, her cheeks pinking a bit beneath the kitchen light—“I knew was ridiculous. There was nothing I could’ve done, I don’t think, but …” She sighed and reached her hand out to touch my wrist. “I’m just really sorry.”

Harry, his wife, and their other daughter had remained silent as they watched this unlikely reunion take place.

I mean, come on. What were the chances that Harry’s daughter would just so happen to be the only teacher who had ever truly given a shit about me when I was a kid?

But then, when I really thought about it, I guessed it made sense.

It was fitting for her to be the child of the only man since my grandfather to care about what happened to me. And now, standing within both of their presence, I realized something for certain in a way I’d never known it before.

I was going to be okay.

One way or another, that was how it was going to be.

Finally.

***

Harry’s brother Howard owned a grocery store—The Fisch Market, it was called—in a town nearby, River Canyon, and on Christmas Day, Harry asked him if there were any positions to be filled.

“Actually,” Howard said, eyeing me with a hint of scrutiny, “our janitor just left us, and I’ve been having to do all the cleaning myself. If you don’t mind pushing a broom, mopping the floor, and scrubbing bathrooms, you’ve got yourself a job.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “It just so happens I’m overqualified for the job, and I’ll take it.”

Howard’s wife, Connie, was the mayor of River Canyon as well as the local real estate agent, and while she was a little hesitant to allow a convict to live within her apparently prestigious little hamlet, she agreed to set me up in a place just within the town limits.

“We have a reputation to uphold, you see,” she said in a voice that was unintentionally snooty, waving around a wineglass that was just a little too full. “And to clarify, it isn’t that I mind you being there or think you’re a threat to our little town. But it’s the others, you understand?”