Saving Rain(82)

I chuckled. Harry and I talked a lot.

“I’m good. How are you?”

“Can’t complain. Vacation has been nice. Relaxing.”

“Good for you, man. What have you been doing?”

“Ah, just some stuff around the house. Painting the deck, fixing the steps … you know.”

I snorted. “I gotta be honest with you, Harry … that sounds like a really shitty vacation.”

He laughed with me. “Hey, at least I’m getting Sarah off my back about this stuff. Happy wife, happy life. Remember that.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the implication that I might actually have a wife one day.

Shit … would Ray say yes right now if I asked her to marry me?

We hadn’t even exchanged I love yous yet, but … something in my gut told me she actually might accept my proposal … if I asked, I mean. Which I wouldn’t. Not yet. But …

Shit.

I had to give my head a little shake to remind myself that wasn’t what I was calling about. Then, I said, “Hey, so, Harry, I, uh … I was wondering if you could maybe give me a ride somewhere.”

“Yeah, sure. Where did you have in mind?”

He had agreed before even knowing the destination.

Harry was, as I’d said before, a good friend.

“My mom’s place.”

It was then that he hesitated before saying, “Soldier … son … do I have to remind you how things went last time? I understand she’s your mother, and I get that it’s hard, letting go, but—”

“No, it’s not that. I don’t want to try and fix shit with her.”

“Then, what is it?”

I’d purposely kept the private investigation I’d been conducting to myself to avoid his scrutiny. He knew nothing, and in order for him to agree, he needed the truth. So, in as few words as possible, I told him about the things I’d recently discovered about my mother—the car accident and the boyfriend who had died. I mentioned that I’d met with Billy’s mom to talk about it, and that she’d implied the man could’ve been my dad, and that I wasn’t sure I’d be able to rest again until I knew my mom’s side of the story.

“I don’t know, Soldier …” Harry sounded uncomfortable and unsure. “You realize you don’t know that she’ll actually give you the answers you’re looking for, right?”

“I know. But if I don’t at least try, I’m gonna go crazy. I can’t stop thinking about this shit.”

Harry, to my relief, understood, and the next day, he played hooky from his household chores—I mean, vacation—to pick me up from my house while Ray was at work and Noah was at school.

I didn’t like hiding the excursion from them. But I knew Ray would’ve had something to say about it. I knew she would’ve tried to stop me—or worse, she’d have insisted on coming. It was best to tell her after the fact, and I told Harry just that when he asked why I hadn’t asked my girlfriend to give me a ride instead.

He eyed me with wary skepticism from across the car. “So … are you trying to piss her off by keeping secrets or …”

“I’m trying to protect her,” I countered. “She doesn’t need to get wrapped up in this shit any more than she already is.”

That was half of the truth.

The other half had everything to do with Seth and my insistence that he never see Ray and me together. But not even Ray’s mother knew about the ongoing situation with Seth, and I didn’t feel it was my place to tell Harry.

“You can’t protect everyone, you know,” Harry replied, eyeing me like there was something more on his mind, but wouldn’t say it.

“No,” I agreed. “But I can protect her … and Noah.”

“You must really like her, huh?”

He spoke to me the way I imagined Grampa would’ve had we made it to the point of girlfriends and relationships. And I couldn’t help but wonder if David Stratton would’ve spoken to me that way, too, had he been given the chance to be my father. Had he been allowed to live.

“Something like that,” I muttered, looking out the window and wondering if Ray maybe felt the same way about me—something like like, but … more.

***

“You want me to come up with you?”

Harry pulled into a spot in the parking lot adjacent to the building. It had only been months since I'd been there last, but, man … the grass was longer, the weeds were bowing against the sidewalk, and the paint had chipped more off the windowpanes and front door.

Where the hell was the landlord? At what point had he stopped giving a shit about keeping the place maintained? And why? I knew the guy had been old when I was a kid, and that would only make him older now—if he was even still alive. It was possible that he just couldn't handle the responsibility anymore. But how had nobody in this place stepped up to the plate? How did nobody have any sense of pride in the place they lived in—even if it was a shitty hole-in-the-wall?

Anger and disappointment tugged at the corners of my mouth as my eyes drifted toward my mother's dirty, dingy window. “Nah,” I muttered, answering Harry's question. “I got this.”

“You sure? Because, Soldier, if you need me—”