Page 5 of Ocotillo Kisses
He was fortunate in his friends, though the past few years he hadn’t made the effort he should have to keep those friends. Lacey, his dad’s home health nurse, and Austin, the town doctor, had made arrangements to remove all the medical equipment quickly, as if its absence would keep Con and his mom from remembering where and how his dad spent his last months.
Ginny, Poppy and Hailey were at the house now, setting up everything for the wake. As before, when Claudia had died, the townspeople had delivered so much food. The three women had skipped the funeral to make sure everything was warmed up and ready to feed the crowd.
They hadn’t had a wake after Claudia’s funeral. They just hadn’t had the strength to deal with all those people. He thought, maybe, something had been held at the church hall, but no one from the family had gone, only the friends who grieved her loss as well.
Now they were stronger, and honestly, neither of them wanted to deal with a quiet house, with just the two of them.
He held his mom’s hand on the way back to the car after the graveside service, and felt her stumble a bit. He stopped, looking at the ground to see what might have tripped her up, but saw nothing near her feet. Her shoes, maybe, he thought, but she squeezed his hand at the same time she drew in a long breath. Was she in pain? But when he looked at her face, he realized the source of her pain.
Then Austin was on her other side, holding her hand, but she didn’t need a doctor. Con watched helplessly as she collapsed in on herself, and the most horrible keening cry emerged from her. Not from her mouth or her throat or her lungs, but from her very soul.
Con tried, really hard, not to panic. But what did he know about love, enough to understand the loss she was feeling deep within? She and his father had been high school sweethearts. She’d been a debutante, he a proud rancher’s son. They’d gone to college together, married and moved back to Broken Wheel together. They hadn’t been apart since.
And now she was going back to the home they’d built, without him. The anguish on her face squeezed Con’s heart. She wasn’t old, only fifty-five, and she was going to have to figure out the rest of her life without the love of her life.
“Mom.” He moved closer and put his hand on her elbow. “Come on, Mom.”
He thought, for a moment, that she was going to collapse in the path to the family car. Austin must have thought the same, because he slipped his fingers to the inside of her wrist, and looked up at Con.
“Come on, Mrs. McKay, let’s get you into the air conditioning, get you some water,” Austin said, drawing her gently down the path.
“I can’t leave him, Austin,” she pleaded, clearly thinking that he was a softer target. “I can’t leave him here.”
“He’s not here,” Austin said quietly, bending his head to her as the rest of the mourners stood back, unsure of what t do. “He’s in your home. He’s in your heart. He’s in your memories of him.”
Austin had lost his mother in the bus accident when they were in high school. She had been the driver, and in his anguish, Con’s dad had lashed out, blaming her for his daughter’s death.
Then Austin had taken care of Con’s dad when he got sick, though he had to hold some resentment for the man, and now he was comforting Con’s mom, when she hadn’t been a comfort to him when he’d lost his mom and been completely alone.
But somehow Austin seemed to know her grief the best, and he was able to encourage her to get in the car. Before Con got in, Austin pulled him aside.
“Maybe the wake will be too much for her. You think she’ll want to go to her room, maybe nap? And we can cut the wake short.”
But by the time they arrived at the ranch, Con’s mother had drawn on her inner strength, and walked into their house with a serene smile. Con was able to convince her to take a seat in the living room, since the girls had everything set up, and could play hostess. He was really concerned about his mom becoming overheated, and her joints ached if she was on her feet too long. He was sure people would come to her to offer their condolences.
He knew it was early in the day, but if a guy couldn’t have a beer the day he buried his dad, he didn’t know when would be more appropriate. He walked through the dining room laden with offerings from the town, surrounded by people loading servings onto the heavy duty paper plates, and into the kitchen.
Ginny, Poppy and Lacey were still working, Ginny pulling food from the oven, Lacey rinsing off serving utensils at the sink, Poppy rearranging items on the shelf in the refrigerator to make room for even more covered dishes that were lined up on the counter.
“Here, let me help you make some room,” he said, and reached past her for a bottle of beer.
She narrowed his eyes at him, and he just cast her a quick grin while he twisted it open and tossed the cap on the table.
“Everything looks great, ladies. I don’t know how to thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank us, Con,” Lacey said quietly. “Did everything go okay?”
He decided not to tell them about his mom’s minor meltdown. If someone else wanted to tell them, he was fine with that. He just didn’t want to bring it up.
“Everything okay here?”
The women exchanged a look that he didn’t understand before Beck, Lacey’s husband, came into the kitchen. When he greeted his wife with a kiss, Con slipped out.
More than anything, he wanted to head down to the barn, maybe saddle a horse for a ride, put as much distance between himself and his grief as he could, but he also needed to be here for his mom. He was going to continue to stick close to the house the next few days—the next few weeks—to make sure there was nothing she needed.
He was surprised to return to the living room to see her smiling at a woman with long blonde hair, who sat on the footstool before her. Her mother held the other woman’s hands in hers, and when she looked up at Con, her eyes were bright with delight.
Before she could say, “Con, look who came to see us,” the young woman turned, smiling, too, and Con used every ounce of self control not to take a step back in shock.
