Blind Your Ponies Read online

  ANDREW WAINWRIGHT HAD reserved a small banquet room at the Colonial Inn and filled the place with Willow Creekians. They feasted on a main course of prime rib and several varieties of pasta, at Diana’s request.

  After they were stuffed and had enjoyed reliving the game for more than an hour, Andrew loaded the team, coaches, and cheerleaders into a Hertz van, and they returned to the sports center to watch the other four teams in the evening games. They arrived in time to see the second half of the first game, in which Alberton took out White Sulphur Springs by eight points. They ducked out of the second game at halftime where Twin Bridges, looking unbeatable, was pummeling Charlo. When he pulled up in front of the Colonial lobby, Andrew left the van running and turned around in his seat.

  “All grownups out,” he said. “Anyone over twenty be gone.”

  Sam and Diana hesitated. Then Sam opened the door and the two of them stepped out of the van, somewhat baffled.

  “I know a place in town where they have the biggest sundaes, banana splits, and malted milks in Montana and a million video games.”

  The kids cheered and Sam slid shut the van door. He and Diana stepped up onto the sidewalk at the entrance of the motel. Andrew hopped out of the van and hurried around to catch them.

  “What time do you want them in bed?” he asked Sam.

  “Oh, I think by midnight.”

  “They’ll be there,” Andrew said. “I figured you needed a little time off, a little time to yourself.” He smiled and hustled into the waiting van.

  “Who is that guy?” Diana asked, watching him go.

  “Just a happy fan,” Sam said. “Do you feel like a little time off?”

  “Sounds wonderful. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  They headed through the lobby for their rooms.

  THEY TOOK A hot shower in Sam’s room.

  “Wainwright is a baffling guy,” Diana said, all wet and soapy.

  “Not so baffling,” Sam replied, standing under the spray behind her and rubbing the soap over her hips and belly.

  “I get the feeling you know a lot more about him than I do.”

  He wrapped his arms around her from behind and held her tightly, the hot water caressing them. He didn’t want to think about the sadness of Andrew Wainwright. He didn’t want to look in the elephant’s eye. And most of all, he didn’t want to ever let her go.

  She turned off the water and they dried each other with fluffy white towels. In the king-size bed they made love leisurely, gently, savoring the aroma and sight and feel of each other, a sense-inundating expedition into a succulent, undiscovered continent. He knew if he lived two lifetimes he’d never get enough of her, discover all of her, uncover the last of her secrets. He noticed the outline of the bikini on her belly had all but faded. When she had flown off in convulsing, shuddering starbursts and he had joined her with his own, Sam fell into a sound sleep.

  SAM BOLTED UP in bed. “No-o-o!”

  He realized he was dreaming; Diana sprung up beside him. “What’s the matter?”

  He flopped back into the pillows with grateful relief. “I was dreaming.”

  “You seemed terrified. What was it?”

  “Oh... nothing.” He caught his breath. “I was falling.”

  “I’ve had dreams like that,” she said and she curled an arm over him, her warm breasts pressing against his chest. “I always wake up before I die.”

  “What time is it?” he asked.

  She glanced at the clock on the nightstand. “Eleven-twenty.”

  “We better get dressed, they’ll be coming back.”

  He pulled her to him and kissed her, praying that he’d always wake before she died.

  WHEN THE GANG came rolling down the corridor and through the open door of the cluttered girls’ room, they found Mr. Pickett and Miss Murphy going over the scorebook.

  “What’cha been doin’?” Carter said, as the ten of them flooded into the room.

  “Oh, working hard while you bums were out feeding your faces,” Diana said. “Where’s Mr. Wainwright?”

  “He said good night in the lobby,” Rob said.

  “Did you have fun?” Sam asked.

  “Yeah. Mr. Wainwright’s a cool guy,” Pete said. “He even took Dean to McDonald’s.”

  “Not again,” Diana said. “Dean, you’ll turn into a McMuffin or something.”

  Dean chuckled, basking in the limelight.

  “Listen up,” Sam said. “Tomorrow, after breakfast, we’ll go over some videos and talk about Seely-Swan. I know you realize that the game tomorrow is a huge leap on our journey. If we win it, we will be on the inside track to the State Tournament.”

  They shouted and chattered encouragements to each other.

  Sam hesitated. He had dared to say it out loud for the first time to the team, unveiling the canvas he had painted with the oils of his deepest longings, hoping he hadn’t irrevocably jinxed them. At first, he was surprised that no one raised their eyebrows at such a ludicrous statement, then he realized it was more of a normal thought now, here, in the semifinals of the Divisionals. It wasn’t August. It was the twenty-second of February and they were no longer playing in Willow Creek but in Helena, the state capital, poised to take the next step on their implausible quest.

  “You were all terrific today,” Sam said. “Get to bed now. Dream that tomorrow you’re going to be better.”

  “Yeah, and it wouldn’t hurt to do a little stretching before you hit the sack,” Diana chimed in. “Keep those bodies flexible.”

  Sam and the boys headed for their rooms after a round of good nights. After hours of celebrating, they were finally winding down. The team would have to be rested and strong for tomorrow. He only hoped that he would be able to sleep. He sensed something like vertigo of the soul, and heard a beer truck backing.

  “HAZEL BROWN?”

  A short, balding man in green hospital garb startled her.

  She woke in an uncomfortable, undermanned chair for an hour or so in the second-story waiting room. She’d have preferred to wait out in the car and have someone come out and get her. Hospitals gave her the creeps. Though every effort was made to hide it, she could smell death right through the stainless steel, the antiseptic tiles, and the color-coordinated lobbies.

  “I’m Doctor Gene Mack,” the man said. “You got her here just in time.”

  “What’s wrong with her?” Hazel asked.

  “She’s kept it a guarded secret. It was a good thing, asking you to bring her here. I convinced her that you’d have to know the truth. She needs someone to support her. She’s a tough lady but she’s human.”

  Hazel sensed a warmth in him, a genuine kindness in his voice and manner. “What’s wrong with her?”

  “She has leukemia.”

  “Oh God.” Hazel caught her breath and covered her open mouth with one hand.

  “I found it last summer. She comes in for treatment regularly. She put it off this time. I’m guessing it was because of her grandson’s tournaments.”

  “What will happen to her?”

  “Now? She’ll be able to go home in a day or two, but, I’m sorry to say, she’s right on schedule with my first prognosis. These things aren’t precise, but she most likely won’t live through the summer.”

  “O Jesus, Blessed Jesus.” She looked into the doctor’s benevolent face for some verification of the truth. “Are you sure? That woman has more energy and spunk than anyone in Willow Creek and you’re tellin’ me she’s dying?”

  “I’m sorry. She’s a remarkable lady. She’s learned how to take what life gives her and make the most of it.”

  “Do you know she’s been playing basketball?”

  “I wouldn’t doubt it.”

  “Does she know about... this summer?”

  “Yes, and that’s her one burning hope, that her grandson doesn’t find out. I hear she’s been telling him that she’s been visiting her dear friend, Gene Mack, in Billings. She says she’s the only one her grandson
’s got and she couldn’t bear it for him to know he was going to lose her, too.”

  “What can I do?” Hazel stood.

  “You can be there for her. You can be someone who keeps her secret, someone she can talk to about it. She’s carried this alone for too long.”

  “I’ll be there, Doc. There’s a lot of me to be there.”

  “Good,” the gentle man in green said, and then he squeezed her arm.

  “Can I see her now?”

  “The nurse will come and get you. Elizabeth is sleeping. Would you like a cot?”

  “Yes. That would help.”

  “I’ll have someone bring one.”

  The doctor walked away and Hazel dropped onto the overmatched chrome chair. Her mind turned like a kaleidoscope, back over the past year, trying to sift through hidden meanings in Grandma’s words or any hint of behavior that would indicate that her closest friend was dying. She could find none.

  CHAPTER 66

  Sam couldn’t sleep. He pulled on his sweats, jacket, and running shoes and ran out of the motel. Dawn glowed faintly over the eastern mountains. The streets were deserted. He could identify a high cloudiness. A slight breeze brought a mild caress from the southwest. Old crescent-shaped snow banks shrunk back on lawns and boulevards. The sidewalks were dry.

  Sam pushed himself. Uphill. Panting. Time, which had been hurtling through his life of late, had suddenly screeched to a stop, as though breathless, exhausted, and now refusing to move a muscle. It seemed to Sam that they had beaten Noxon a month ago.

  He sweated and racked his brain for strategies against Seely-Swan. He’d admitted to no one how good he thought the Blackhawks were. But they had to have a flaw, a vincibility, if he could only recognize it in time. And on top of that, the cache of Federal Reserve notes under his bed troubled him. He’d wanted to ask Amos about it yesterday—not indicating he had any idea of the stunning amount—but no opportunity had presented itself.

  The day came on strong, invigorating him. The temperature was somewhere in the fifties. A patch of saucerlike clouds caught his attention. Diana had called them lenticular altocumulus. He smiled. She had become so much of his life. He would always remember the look on her face as she gazed skyward and first explained them to him while lying in the brown winter grass along the Jefferson. Regretfully he hadn’t followed his impulse and pulled her into his arms, kissing her while the giant clouds sailed above. He would never forget their name in the same way he’d never forget the sea turtle hatchlings, the medial collateral ligament, or the Lightning Commander shock collar.

  The streets were coming alive with pedestrians and traffic as Helena’s citizens woke and hurried into the day. He circled back toward the motel, downhill, gliding. His body had hardened during his four months of running, his pot belly left behind in cellular increments somewhere along the cattail ditches outside Willow Creek. When he came in view of the Colonial Inn, he slowed to a walk. Someone was sprinting across the parking lot and the silhouette seemed extremely familiar. Sam approached stealthily, crouching behind parked cars until he could figure out what was going on.

  With the visor of his cap pulled down over one ear, Dean came tearing across the asphalt to the near side. He stopped, took several deep breaths, and then dashed back the half block. Sam stepped into view and jogged toward his only substitute.

  “Dean! Dean! Wait a minute!”

  Dean turned, with surprise on his sweating face, and he stood with the manner of a boy who’d been caught shoplifting.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Practicin’.” He wore jeans and a worn-thin navy sweatshirt that was partially soaked in perspiration.

  “Dean, Dean.” Sam half laughed, choked on his own amazement. “I appreciate your spirit, but it’s not good to run on the day of a game. You need to rest, save your energy.”

  “I’m only doin’ twenty-five or thirty.”

  “Thirty!” Sam shook his head. “C’mon.” He put his arm around the dripping freshman and started toward the lobby door. “On game days I just want you to rest. No running, okay?”

  “Okay,” Dean said.

  Rivulets of sweat trickled from under his enduring cap.

  “Dean, where’d you ever get that cap?”

  “My sister.”

  “Denise?”

  “Yep, for Christmas. Nobody knew how she did it. She rode along with my mom in the summer to get a part for the baler. We was puttin’ up hay. The guy at Kamp’s saw her sittin’ out in the pickup when my mom was in gettin’ the part and he gave her a cap. None of us could figure how she kept it hidden so long. On Christmas she had it in a brown paper bag and everything.”

  “She’s quite a girl,” Sam said. “Is that why you always wear it?”

  “Yep. It’s the only present she ever give me. She told me it would make me run faster.”

  “I think she’s right,” Sam said, completely converted to Cutter philosophy.

  They reached the lobby door, and Sam held it open for his freshman phenomenon.

  “Have you had breakfast?”

  “No.”

  “Why don’t you get Scott and Curtis and have breakfast.”

  “They’s still sleepin’.” Dean chuckled.

  “Well, they’ll be up soon. Is Denise coming to the game tonight?”

  “I don’t know.”

  In the lobby Sam stopped to get what papers were available. With pure astonishment he watched the ragtag boy sprint down the carpeted corridor, never doubting that his imprisoned sister’s gift truly made him run faster.

  HAZEL WALKED UNEASILY into the double room. She was sure she could smell formaldehyde. A bedraggled younger woman nodded from the other bed. Hazel stepped behind the curtain separating the patients and sidled up to Grandma’s bed. There were two plastic bags hanging beside her, one with clear fluid trickling, and the other with plasma dripping into a tube and following a serpentine course to the needle in her arm. Elizabeth Chapman appeared tiny and vulnerable in the high stainless-steel bed.

  “How are you doin’?” Hazel said.

  “I’m a little tired.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “What was there to tell?”

  “That you were sick, that you—”

  “Sweetheart, we’re all dying, so what’s the big deal. I don’t want anyone crying in my beer while I’m still drinking it.”

  “You’re some hard-assed lady, Elizabeth Chapman.”

  “I know how you like to gossip, Hazel, but I pray that you’ll keep this secret with me until the day I die. I couldn’t bear it if Peter knew. I just couldn’t bear the pain that boy would have.”

  “But maybe he’d want to know, so he could—”

  “So he could win for his dying grandmother. I want this to be the happiest time in his life, not a funeral. I want him to win for himself! This has been the best year in my life with that boy. If I die tomorrow, I’ll die a lucky woman, but as long as she swims, I will cook.”

  Hazel shifted her weight to the other leg, wanting to lift her frail friend into her arms.

  “How long have you known?” Hazel said.

  “Since July.” Grandma paused. “After he told me I went out and bought that felt hat to celebrate how glorious and insane life is.”

  “I’ll stay here with you.”

  “No … thank you, but no. Go back to the game, otherwise Peter will know something serious is wrong. If you’re at the game, you can tell him I have the flu. Please, go to the game, and stop by my place and get Tripod.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay with you?” Hazel itched to get the hell out of there.

  “Yes, I’ll be fine in a day or two. I’ll catch the bus and be home before the team on Sunday. Pete will find me at home as usual.”

  “You worry too much about that boy. He’s tougher than you think.”

  “I know he is, but I want my days with him to be happy. It’s the same for everyone. We take life for granted like the ai
r in our tires. What we share today, we have forever and what we put off, we’ve lost.”

  “I’ll call you tonight.”

  “Okay, get going. You have a long drive.”

  “I’ll see you later,” Hazel said, ready to haul her body out of there.

  She stepped back, about to turn.

  “And Hazel.”

  “Yeah?”

  “See that we knock the pickle juice out of Seely-Swan.”

  PETER AND ROB demolished a breakfast in the partially occupied motel restaurant where they could eat all they wanted. Tom and Olaf remained in their king-size beds.

  “I thought Miss Murphy would have us eatin’ ravioli or something for breakfast,” Pete said as he wolfed waffles and pork sausage.

  “She really believes in that stuff,” Rob said.

  “I hope they use a zone against us tonight.”

  “Yeah, but if they go man-for-man we can still get it high to Oaf.”

  “Man, I love seeing him jam that baby down their throats,” Pete said.

  A few tables over, Rob’s parents ate like honeymooners, obviously enjoying their stay in a motel. Pete watched from the corner of his eye as Rob’s father reached under the table and squeezed his wife’s thigh. She leaned toward him and they rubbed foreheads over breakfast.

  “What’s that like?” Pete asked, nodding at Rob’s parents.

  “What’s what like?”

  “Having two parents who like each other?”

  “Them? I dunno. It’s just normal.”

  “It’s not normal where I come from.”

  “Are your parents coming out if we go to State?”

  “No. They’re busy with some real important stuff.”

  “Will Kathy?”

  “I don’t think so. She’s got a lotta school work and everything.” Pete felt lousy for lying as his fellow guard cleaned up an onion omelette and a side order of bacon. A motherly waitress scooted to their table.

  “Would you boys like anything else?”

  “More orange juice, please,” Rob said.

  “I’d like another waffle and some more milk, if I could,” Pete said.