Page 72 of Torch Songs

“Larx.” Tad smiled just saying the name. “Yeah—I got an invitation to their wedding. Did everybody else?”

“Oh yeah. Me, Janine, Mary Lee—everybody who came to help with that situation got an invite. There’s already talk about who’s going in which vehicles, and people are making hotel reservations. The whole nine yards. You going?”

Tad tried to tamp down his smile and couldn’t. “Well, yeah. Guthrie’s playing at the wedding. George’s daughter asked him in particular.” Guthrie had refused the fee; Tad had caught that part of the conversation, and his heart twisted for the weight of Guthrie’s pride.

Chris nodded. “Yeah. Well, Aaron called to chase down how many of us were attending, and then… well, I know he’d done this foryoubefore you even got rescued, but this was the first time he’d done it for me.”

“Offered you a job?” Tad asked. He wasn’t particularly surprised. Aaron had joked about “poaching” Tad before they even fell down the damned canyon.

“Offeredusa job,” Chris said seriously. “As a package. Has already tapped a real estate agent to get us a break so the wife and I can move into a house, and there’s probably one up there for you. He’s got a project for you until you’re ready for the field, and he’s working on getting funding for it, and it’s right up your alley.” Chris smiled at Tad’s sister, his voice going gentle. “He’d like to hire you too, Miss April. No pressure. If you don’t feel up to it, you don’t have to.”

“What’s the job?” April asked.

“He wants to start an addiction treatment center in Colton. It would be small, because the place is small, and the model would be based on the CPS model, in which all branches of law enforcement and health care are tapped depending on therecipient’s needs. That kid that got stranded in the canyon with you?”

Tad nodded, remembering Curtis MacDonald with a hazy intensity. Poor kid—his life had been amess, and much of it hadn’t been his doing. And then someone he’d trusted had offered him a taste of “candy,” and Curtis had learned what a real mess was.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “How is that kid?”

“He’s in a sixty-day rehab program, and Aaron’s getting him funded for an extra thirty days because the kid doesn’t have a support system. He’s in Auburn, which is about an hour’s drive from Colton, and Colton’s the only place the kid knows. So Aaron wants a small halfway house, a rehab center, something to meet the needs of the population and to educate people on addiction. Tad, you’d be doing setup at the beginning. April, you’d be a consultant and then maybe a resident or a counselor—or even a dishwasher. Aaron wasn’t picky. He said sometimes helping people is the best therapy, and he wanted to offer you the chance to do that.”

“Oh,” April said, and she put her hand to her mouth. “Wow. Tad, did you hear that?”

Tad nodded, thinking about how nice it would be to live in a small town again, and how April seemed really excited about the prospect.

And the downside hit them at the same time.

“What about—” she started.

“Guthrie,” he finished, both of them looking guilty.

“Would he be willing to move up with you?” Chris asked, glancing from one to the other.

“Maybe,” Tad said, shaking his head. “But he needs time, Chris. He’s still doing gigs down in the Bay Area. How soon does George want us up there?”

“First week of September,” Chris said. “And to be honest, we need to give our notice before the end of July. I talked to the captain, and she understood. It’s a great opportunity. My wife would love it up there, the kids are all moved out of the house, and, you know….”

“It’s smaller,” Tad said. “Same problems, but….” He’d seen the way things worked there. Law enforcement, education, health care—there was a strong network of people wanting to do some good. It was why he’d wanted to work in Bodega Bay, but better, because the good ole boy network wouldn’t be working against him. He peered at April and saw both hope and unhappiness radiating from her eyes.

She loved Guthrie too.

“We’ll talk to him,” Tad said, clearing his throat. If he turned his face toward the sun and closed his eyes, he could see Guthrie as they’d last made love, tears leaking like they did, but a look of openness on his face, of acceptance, that Tadonlysaw there in the aftermath of touching together. Oddly enough, Guthrie had rolled into Tad when they were done, and as though they’d been in the middle of the conversation and had never stopped, asked if, when he got back this time, he and April could go pick out a cat for April. Tad had been excited. It was… was a promise of sorts, that Guthrie would be around to play with said cat. Tad wanted to be part of that. Unbidden, hope fluttered that his musician, who disappeared every so often and turned up at odd hours of the night unwashed or unfed, looking like something the cat draggedin, might actually be around for a while.

“Yeah?” April asked, and he smiled at her.

“Yeah,” he said. “Colton’s two hours away. It’s not the ends of the earth.”

They were rounding the corner for the end of the block, and Chris grunted. “Yeah. My wife started talking about getting a dog. A big dog. And a little bit of property. In twenty years Inever knew she had a giant crush on golden retrievers and pit bulls, but apparently they are thethingsthat have beenmissingfrom herlife.”

Tad and April laughed, and for a little bit, they talked about other things. Chris’s children—how his youngest was enjoying her summer in Santa Cruz, where she was working a part-time job before school started, and how Laura was excited about the wedding and wanted to talk to Janine and, yes, April, to see what they were wearing. Although April didn’t say much besides, “Shopping would be nice,” Tad could feel a longing in her for normalcy, for companionship in small doses. After all, Guthrie had turned out to be a good friend, right? Maybe she could find other friends outside the halfway house. Maybe she could remember what real life felt like without the drugs. Small doses of reality; he was all for it.

By the time the walk was done, Tad was more than ready for his time in the pool, and Chris had to get back to work. He was paired up with a veteran of the force since Tad was on leave, someone Chris said, sourly, “Actually retired years ago, but he’s been collecting a paycheck ever since.” They gave a bro hug before Chris climbed back into his SUV, and he said, “Talk to your guy, okay? I… this move, up into the mountains, this sounds like dream-job shit to me, and you and me saw all thebadshit about it when it almost killed you. I sure would like to check it out.”

Tad nodded. The place had put a bullet in his ass, but he’d also started to yearn for the scent of pine dust and the quiet in the black dark of the night.

“Will do,” he said. “I… hopefully any place I hang my hat’s home, right?”

Chris’s expression softened. “That’s how it works for me and Laura,” he said. “It should work that way for everyone else.”

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