Chapter 13

Cody was right, of course. Though she wasn’t too fond of getting up at the crack of dawn, it felt great just to be out in the open air, smelling the dew that had fallen on everything the night before. She had told her mother and aunt where she was going on the way home the night before, causing both to raise eyebrows, but neither said anything other than telling her to have fun. She and Cody crept out of the house right after sunrise, carrying a small cooler bag filled with snacks and water.

“Don’t we need fishing poles if we are going fishing?” Susan asked him on the way to his old brown Dodge Ram parked to one side of the driveway.

“Already in the back. I packed up everything last night before I went to bed,” he told her.

“I guess we’re all set then.” She laughed, climbing into the passenger’s side of the truck that he held open for her.

“Yes, ma’am. We certainly are,” he told her.

She was surprised when he started up the truck and classical music began filtering through the cab. He might look like one of those sexy farm types you see in the movies, but she was beginning to get a feeling that there was nothing stereotypical about Cody.

After a quick stop at the bait shop and a bite to eat at Hannah’s Country Crock, they were on their way to what Cody described as the best fishing hole in the world. Susan felt like she had already had a full day just eating the heavy gravy and biscuit platter they served at Hannah’s. They hadn’t even made it to their destination yet, and she was already considering a nap on the banks or in the bed of the truck.

It was a bit bumpy as he turned onto a dirt road, and then the dirt road disappeared so that they were just driving through an open pasture across holes and rocks that sent the truck jarring back and forth. For support, Susan held on to the side of her seat and occasionally the dashboard when she launched forward unexpectedly.

“Sorry it’s so bumpy. Guess I’m just used to it. We’ll be there in just a minute,” he said.

“I don’t remember it being so bumpy in the wagon last night,” she commented.

“No, we came in a different way. They took the old Bedford road around the edge of the property. This is a shortcut.” He grinned.

“Men and shortcuts,” she said with a grimace.

Cody laughed a little as he brought the truck to a stop by a section of the stream that flowed into a much larger lake and then spilled off the other side to continue winding its way through the trees just beyond. She could see why anyone would like it here. He pulled a couple of fishing poles from the back of the truck, along with the bait and a small tackle box.

“Live bait works best in this area, but I like to toss out a couple of lures here and there just because Tank made them for me and I can honestly say I used them if he asks,” he told her.

“They don’t work?” she asked.

“Not worth a damn,” Cody laughed, causing her to chuckle along with him. “He is getting better, though. You don’t just decide to make lures and do it all perfectly right out of the gate. He mostly gives them away for people to try or sells them up in the little general store in town. A lot of tourists coming into the area buy them because they look cool. Most of them are never going to actually use them for fishing, anyway.”

“I guess it all works out in the end then, huh?” she marveled, accepting the fishing pole he handed to her, though she had no clue what to do with it.

“Have you ever baited a hook?” he asked.

“No. Ick!” she said with a disgusted face.

“Maybe I’ll let you fish with Tank’s lures then,” he said with a grin as he slid a worm onto the hook already waiting on the end of her line. She looked on, completed grossed out by the entire process.

They fished most of the morning. Well, mostly Cody fished and she laid her pole to one side and hauled out a book she had brought for the trip.

“I didn’t think you city girls owned any books. I thought you all read on tablets and e-readers these days,” he told her.

“I do sometimes, but it’s not good for my eyes to stare at the screen for too long, so I mostly stick with real books. Plus, I didn’t know if y’all had electricity in these parts,” she told him, countering his stereotype with her own.

“Sassy. I like that. I actually have a nice tablet that I bought to take with me overseas. It helped me keep in touch, and I love that I can have a whole library of books in one lightweight device. I had no idea they were so bad for the eyes, though,” he said.

“Well, for normal people, maybe not. My eyes are just more sensitive since the transplant,” she told him.

“Transplant?” he asked, reeling in his pole and looking at her curiously.

“I’m sorry. I just assumed Aunt Mary or Uncle Tank had mentioned it. I had transplant surgery to repair my vision. I lost it in an accident my senior year of high school,” she said, trying to keep the explanation as simple as possible.

“Wow, I had no idea. So, you were completely blind? For how long?” he asked

“Yes, completely blind for five years,” she said.

“I can’t imagine how hard that must have been for you. How does all that work? Tell me if I’m too personal. I’m just hopelessly curious about everything, and I’ve never met anyone that had eye transplants,” he said.

Susan ran through the general process with him, noting how he stopped everything and listened intently. She could also see him trying to get a closer look at the stitches she was talking about.

“You can’t see them. I have on contacts that cover the little dots they left behind. It was like a little zig zagged circle around the cornea with the stitches connecting the dots, but after the stitches were pulled out, I still have the dots. The doctor says they aren’t usually as noticeable, but because my eyes are so light colored, they stand out a bit more in mine. Anyway, the contacts cover them,” she told him.

“Hmmm, too bad. I’d like to see that,” he said, cinching up his pole and heading toward the truck. “You want something to drink or a snack?”

“No, I’m still stuffed from breakfast, but some water might be good,” she replied, following him to the truck.

“I think we’re about done here today, anyway. I’m out of regular bait, and the fish are making a mockery of me for saying I catch so many here. I can’t believe we haven’t gotten the first bite. If it weren’t for the great company, I’d have to write this off as the worst fishing trip ever,” he said, handing her a bottle of water from the cooler.

“I’ve had fun. You aren’t too bad to hang out with, even if you do lie about being a great fisherman,” she said with a smirk. He feigned a dagger to his heart and stumbled back against the truck. She watched as he reached into the back again and pulled out a large butterfly net.

“Perhaps you would like to show off your superior butterfly catching skills then,” he told her, tossing her the net. She caught it with one hand and threw her bottle of water to him with the other. He tossed it back in the cooler before following her back toward the lake. After chasing several butterflies and catching none, they finally decided that she was no better at butterfly capture than he was at fishing, at least not today.

“All right, well, I guess we better call it a day. I have to get over to the Richmond farm and help Ben out for a bit,” he told her.

“So, you work over there?” she asked as they headed back to the truck.

“No. Ben and I went to school together. It’s his parents’ place and they are getting older, so he’s been helping them out. I’ve just been pitching in here and there. They were out of town for a few days, and we stayed there and did some work around the house that needed to be tended to,” he told her. It was the first time he had not made eye contact while talking to her, and she wondered what it was about his activities at the Richmond farm he was hiding.

“You boys aren’t growing any special crops out on the back forty, are you?” she asked playfully.

“What? Man, no. Old man Richmond would tan our hides like he used to when we were little. He didn’t care if you were his kid or not. He figured he was doing your parents a favor by just taking care of the problem instead of putting it on their plate. That man has given me a whoopin’ many times when I was a boy.” He laughed.

“Wow. I can’t imagine any of my friends’ parents punishing me for something. They would have just sent me home,” she said.

“Good thing you didn’t hang out with the Richmond girls. Five girls and Ben. All of them have moved off and hardly ever visit. It just leaves Ben to take care of things around the place,” Cody said. It was obvious that he thought very highly of him.

“All right, well, let’s get out of here so that you can give Ben a hand,” she told him. On the way home, it occurred to her that he didn’t appear to be doing any work that paid. Though it was none of her business, she asked him what he was planning on doing once he left her aunt’s house.

“I’m looking for a place of my own, but I don’t really want a cramped little apartment somewhere. The closest thing they have to those here anyway are some tiny duplexes Rod Sanders built over by the highway. Damn things are so close to the road that they probably rattle when semi-trucks roll by. I had planned to move back in at my mother’s house and get the property around it ready for crops, maybe put some work into the barn and get a few chickens or goats to start with. That didn’t work out so well,” he told her.

“Right. I’m sorry.

“It’s okay. Things don’t stay a secret long in a small town. Since it happened, I’ve thought about moving, but I have ties to this place that keep me here.” He looked thoughtful as he said it, and Susan knew he had at least one secret that he wasn’t so open and honest about as he seemed to be about everything else, but he wasn’t going to reveal it. “There’s a little rundown place up off the highway that has gone into foreclosure. It’s going on the auction block in a couple of weeks, and I hope to buy it. I’ve got money saved up from my time in the military, and hopefully it will be enough to get it.”

“Sounds like a lot of demanding work,” she told him. “I can appreciate your putting your heart into something you really want, though.”

“Heart and soul. Ben will help me when he can, and I know some other folks that will pitch in. I just hope it works out. Otherwise, I’m going to have to just get a job and wait for something else to pop up, probably move into one of those rattling duplexes in the meantime. I just hate to throw my money away on rent when I could be using it to get my own farm, you know?”

Susan nodded, though, she really didn’t know. Renting was perfectly fine with her. If something went wrong, the landlord fixed it. If she didn’t like the place, she could give notice and move somewhere else without the hassle of trying to sell or rent to someone else. It worked for her, but she understood that there were a lot of people that preferred to own their place, and she could imagine that it was better to purchase a farm than rent one.