Six
Bishop
Annie looks run down this morning. Exhausted. She should have help around here, and not Ronnie. Someone actually capable of helping her. He just causes more work. He doesn’t do her any good, but my sister’s not one to tell anyone ‘no.’ I don’t think anyone else in this town would want his help. As usual, Annie took him under her wing. I think it just makes more work for her, fixing what he screws up, but she’s always had a soft spot for people who need help. Hell, that’s how she ended up with that dickwad of an ex-husband.
“Go sit in your office for a second. Let me help out here.”
She eyes me and shakes her head. “Look around this place. You think you can handle it?”
“I helped two mares give birth this mornin’ before you even crawled outta bed. I can handle bringin’ out plates.”
“One of my cooks called in sick. Can you work a grill?”
Instead of answering her, I walk behind the counter, pour her a cup of coffee, and guide her to the closet she calls an office. “Don’t come out for at least ten minutes.”
She lingers in the doorway. “I’m glad you’re here. Thank God you made it home,” she adds on, whispering, knowing how I feel when anyone brings that shit up.
“Hungry?” I will never respond to any of my family’s comments like that. Avoid and deflect is what I do best.
“Nope. Thanks.”
Just as I turn around to head back to the counter, the bell chimes above the door, signaling the morning’s newest customer. Don’t know what I was thinking, telling Annie I’d help out. Chit-chatting and making small talk with the people of Bellemere isn’t something I’m remotely interested in.
“Fuck,” I mutter as I hear the heels clicking before I even look at the door. Only one person around here would come to Annie’s for breakfast wearing goddamn stilettos.
“Ollie,” she breathes out. “Just who I’m looking for this morning.”
“Don’t have time for this, Princess.” Can tell by the tone of her voice that she’s after something.
“When are you going to stop calling me that?” she asks as she sits down at the counter.
“When you stop actin’ like one.”
“Ollie, I need to borrow your truck today.”
“Excuse me?”
“Your truck,” she repeats. “I need to pick up a few things.”
“Bishop,” someone yells from a booth. “We’re ready to order.”
Vivienne grins. “You work here too? How cute.”
“Gimme a sec,” I holler back to the customer before turning my attention back to Viv. “Not a fuckin’ chance, Princess.”
“But Ollie, you’re supposed to be helping me.”
“This have anything to do with the house?”
She pulls in her bottom lip, so I know she’s about to lie. She’s been doing that since she was a kid.
“Yes.”
“When’s the last time you actually drove?” I ask before picking up a plate from the small window connecting the kitchen to the dining room and delivering it to a table. When I come back, she answers.
“It hasn’t been that long.”
“Bullshit. Mrs. Tallulah said you had a driver in New York. No way you’re gettin’ behind the wheel of my truck.”
“You taught me how to drive in that truck.”
“Not much drivin’ actually happened, Viv.” I attempted it, but we couldn’t keep our mouths and hands off each other. She remembers, too. The color rises in her cheeks and she looks down at the counter.
Not liking this dangerous trip down memory lane, I leave her at the counter and go see what everyone else needs. After about ten minutes of bringing food, refilling coffee, and making small talk, I don’t see how in God’s name my sister does this all damn day. When I see Annie talkin’ to Viv, I’m fuckin’ relieved. If I thought God existed, I’d drop to my knees and thank him. But, when you see the things I’ve seen and done the things I’ve done, it’s impossible to believe.
“Thank you,” she says, taking the coffee pot from my hands. “Know what else you can do to help?”
“Be happy to do anything, as long as I don’t have to deal with any more of these damn people.”
“Let Vivienne use your truck.”
Son of a bitch. My sister doesn’t even like Viv. Her and that damn bleeding heart. “She doesn’t drive.”
“Then take her where she needs to go,” Annie fires back without missing a beat.
Vivi is looking at me with her eyes full of hope. My sister is standing with her hand on her hip, daring me to deny her request. “Why are you pushin’ this, Annie?”
“She needs help.”
“She has parents.”
“They’re busy,” Viv says.
“Oh, and I’m not?”
“Then just let me borrow your truck.”
“You won’t drop this, will you, until you get your way?”
She smiles. “Nope.”
“I’ll pick you up after lunch. One hour and one store, Viv, that’s all you get.”
“Thanks, Ollie.”
“Bishop,” I growl, but she ignores it, as usual, and high tales it out of Annie’s on her mile-high shoes.
_____
“Must always get your way.”
“Why do you say that?” Viv asks like she doesn’t have the slightest idea what I’m talking about.
“You got the use of my truck, and the one hour, one stop gig turned into five hours and every goddamn office store in Baton Rouge.”
She shrugs, smug as all get out. “You could have said ‘no’.”
Fuck me, but she’s just as impossible to tell ‘no’ as she was when she lived here. Every stop we made, every infuriating minute we shopped, I could hear Mrs. Tallulah.
“I see your demons, Bishop. They show in your eyes. And if you’re not careful, they’ll consume you. Let yourself take time to do things that occupy your mind. You’ve got to learn to let the demons rest. I’m not certain, but I suspect if you start to enjoy life again, they’ll eventually leave.”
And damn if Mrs. Tallulah wasn’t right. Not that I was enjoying myself, but I was so preoccupied with bitching about bringing Viv all around that I didn’t think about my past.
Not one time.
I unload the back of my truck while she leans against a porch post, lost in thought. When I catch her like this, not trying, not doing anything but thinking, she looks like my old Vivi. I’ve seen it a few times this past week when I’m working around my property and she’s sitting out here. I suspect she’s thinking about her grandmother and the times she spent out here with her.
“You know,” she says when I shut my tailgate, “I found Lulu’s stash of whisky. The good stuff. Want a glass, Bishop?”
I immediately regret harping on her to call me by my last name. It doesn’t sound right coming outta her mouth. ‘Ollie’ comes out smooth, like Mrs. Tallulah’s aged whisky. ‘Bishop’ doesn’t have that same even sound. The same smoky texture.
“I’d love some,” I tell her, even though I wanna tack on a condition that I’ll only stay if she’ll call me ‘Ollie’ again.
The second she leaves to go inside, Cat comes creeping up on the porch. I’m surprised. Haven’t seen her leave the barn since Mrs. Tallulah’s been gone. She purrs a few times and rubs her face against my boot, waiting for a scratch behind the ear. I guess that’s what she would get on this porch when she’d come calling.
“Who’s this?” Vivi asks when she comes back out.
“Cat.”
“I know what it is. What’s its name?”
“Cat,” I repeat, taking my glass of whisky from her.
“It’s yours?”
“She is.”
“And that’s all you could come up with?” She sits on the swing, putting as much distance between us as the swing will allow and reaches her hand out for Cat.
“Don’t have much time, or desire, to sit around namin’ barn cats.”
“Come here, baby,” she calls. I feel it straight in my gut. She sits with her glass of whisky in one hand, sipping it, every so often giving all her attention to Cat.
I’m fine with the lack of attention. The quiet doesn’t bother me. The only thing that gets me is when she talks to Cat in that damn sugar sweet voice, or when the breeze blows across the porch and I get a whiff of her perfume. She doesn’t smell like she used to – sunshine on her skin – but she still smells good enough to eat. Devour.
Not able to take it anymore, I thank her again for the drink and head home in my truck, leaving her with my traitorous barn cat.