TWENTY-FOUR
The news from Durango sucks, man! They are like total downers with their tests and bullshit like “you’ll probably need a feeding tube in twelve to eighteen months,” and crap like that. I don’t listen to them. They’re just a bunch of talking heads to me. It’s like I told Dad, “If they say I have to get a feeding tube, they can kiss my ass. It’s bad enough I have to sit in this chair all the time, but if I can’t have Aunt Patti’s brownies, what’s the point?”
Seriously, what’s the point?
But it upset the old man, and I advised him not to dwell on that, because we are having a par-tay! Luke cooked it up as part of his campaign to Save Homecoming Ranch. He told us the same day Jackson came over and told me there were some guys from Denver sniffing around the ranch, and they were asking him lots of questions about the deal Grant and Dad made. Jackson thinks one of the heirs lawyered-up. Dad said he didn’t have the money for a lawyer, and Luke said he did, he had like a ton of equity in his Denver house. They had this huge fight about it, and it totally reminded me of Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier fights. Remember how they just went round and round? You can catch those fights sometimes on HBO.
Anyway, Luke is way more stubborn than Dad and he said, “We’re not letting go without a fight. I’ve already seen a lawyer.” And then he said to me, “And we’re having a goddamn party, Leo.”
He said it like that because it was my idea to begin with. Luke rejected it when I first presented it, but he always comes around to my brilliant ideas. Think about it—it’s going to be hard for the lovelies to totally cut us out of the ranch when they actually put names to faces and meet us. You probably think I’m going to use my chair for sympathy. Hell, yeah! It’s got to be good for something, right?
But that’s not why Luke invited them. He’s always been the Dudley Do-Right between us. Still, I like that he’s beginning to think like the apprentice of a certified genius.
I said, “You only want a party because you’re totally into this Blue Eyes chick.” I was just kidding around, but he acted all annoyed. Judge and jury, allow me to present the facts: First, he doesn’t want a party. Then he comes back from Denver and he suddenly wants one. And he wants to invite Blue Eyes and Libby and Jackson to this party, which, you will not be surprised to hear, flipped Dad out.
Dad said, “We don’t have the space and besides, we eat stuff like Chef Boyardee. How the hell are we going to have a dinner party?” So I e-mailed Aunt Patti, and she said she would make lasagna, and I said to Dad, “Next time, don’t wig out, come to your Problem-Solver.” That’s me.
Fact number two: Luke is spending all this time in Pine River, it’s like over a week now, and he’s got to be sick of sleeping on the couch. But everyday he gets up and goes to the ranch, and every night he comes back—sometimes super late—and talks about what they did. So one day, I asked him, “What’s there to do out there when the sun goes down?”
He said, “What?” Like I was speaking Greek.
And I said, “You’re up there super late all the time. Are you building latrines in the dark?” I thought it was kind of funny but Luke said something about me being an ass.
So later, Dad told me to lay off, that we needed to work together to get Luke back to Denver because houses don’t build themselves, and that Luke was letting this woman get under his skin. Only it was hysterical because it was clear that Dad thinks the woman under Luke’s skin is Julie.
I know it’s not Julie because Dani told me about “the lunch” Julie and Luke had. Dani heard half of it, heard Julie begging for him to take her back and Luke saying that wasn’t going to happen. She said you could have driven a Mack truck through the gulf at that table and Luke would have been happy. She said he looked like he wanted to fold himself up into a little ball and bounce away. (Side note: It would be awesome if Luke could make like Rubber Man and turn himself into a ball and bounce away.)
To be fair to Dad, he has this misperception because Julie keeps coming around. She was here Wednesday night with that evil-eye baby of hers, and it so happened it was the same night Marisol got mad at me for suggesting she’d put on a few pounds (well she has, but it’s not like I’m complaining. I like the way her butt looks). Anyway, Marisol let Julie in. So we sat in the living room watching Castle with that baby staring at me, and Julie was trying to ask me questions, like “has Luke said anything about when he’ll get back to Denver?”
To which I responded with a succinct, “Nope.”
I wasn’t going to tell her that the guy he’s working with has called him a bunch of times asking him this question that the other day, he told Luke that he had one more week, and then he was going to have to do something, because this guy couldn’t handle all his work. I heard Luke tell him he’d be back by the end of next week, no problem.
I was about to tell Julie that, but then the baby started crying and she had to go, and I didn’t try and stop her—the woman talks while my show is on. She was walking out of the house just as Luke drove up. I thought for sure he’d walk right around her and come inside, but no, they sat down on the porch steps and talked for like an hour. When he came in, he was sort of smiling, but not in a happy way, sort of in a “I can’t believe it’s butter” kind of way.
He took one look at me, pointed his finger, and said, “Not one word about her, Leo. Not one, or I will knock your block off.”
Well, they don’t call me Big Mouth at the hospital for nothing, and I said, “Agreed. Not one word about Julie. So what’s up with you and Blue Eyes?”
Luke looked startled and said, “What the hell, Leo? Why are you always trying to create drama where there is none?”
I said, “Hold up there, Cowboy, I’m not creating anything. You haven’t gone back to Denver, you spend every day at the ranch, and the only person you talk about is Madeline Pruett, and for the first time in like a hundred years, you are not hot to trot after Julie Daugherty. It doesn’t take a genius to see what’s going on here, but I am a genius, and I get it.”
Luke folded his arms across his chest. He had the same expression on his face that he had when we were teens and he found out I’d been smoking weed at lunch. He decked me and told me that was the best way to get kicked out of football and lose the scholarship I needed to go to college. Turns out the best way is to get MND. But that night, Luke looked like he was going to deck me again. He said, “No, Leo, you’re wrong. I’m just trying to save the ranch so you and Dad have a place to live, okay? And in case you’ve forgotten, I’ll remind you that Dad and Grant Tyler thought it would be a great idea to have a damn reunion there that we have to put together. So while I’m trying to figure out how to get the ranch back, I’ve been building showers and extra latrines. That’s what I am doing out there. If you don’t believe me, I’ll put your lame ass in the van right now and drive you out there and shove your head down one. Now shut your damn mouth or I will.” And he stalked off.
I shouted, “You and what army!” And stuff along those lines, and some choice words I will not repeat here. But for the record, Luke did not answer the fundamental question: How do you build latrines and showers in the dark? Because you can’t. That’s why he is not a genius. He does not think these things through. That’s what I told Marisol, and she told me to lay off Luke. She said, “He does all that he can for you and your dad. He’s always there for you. If he likes the girl’s company, it’s nothing to you.”
Yeah, okay, she’s right. But it’s like I told her: “I kind of wish he wouldn’t do so much for me, you know? I mean, I want him to get the ranch back, because Dad is going to need it. But I kind of like being in town. People come to see me. My good looks and winning personality have attracted half of Pine River to this door, and I even talked the Methodists into building the ramps Luke said he was going to build and didn’t, because he’s been out at the ranch all week making moon eyes at the Florida chick.”
Marisol said, “You don’t know that, Leo. You should really learn to keep your mouth shut.”
Yeah, well that’s not going to happen because that’s all I’ve got left, you know? It’s part of my magnetism.