Oh, they explained it in different ways, of course. They claimed it was financial, that they had to choose between private sessions and group. That was Carol.
Bob said he couldn’t make either the private session or the group, using his job as an excuse. Jane said she had shift change at the hospital and couldn’t make the group sessions. He wondered if she hadn’t made the shift change herself, if there even was a shift change.
Maynell called and said she would rather not come to group anymore but would if he wanted her to. Terry said he would never come back. He said he wouldn’t talk about it and didn’t want him to bring it up again.
He reached for the phone.
Of course, she could have forgotten about yesterday’s appointment. Sometimes, as the great man pointed out, a cigar is only a cigar. He crumpled the empty cigarette pack.
45
If only there was someone to talk to, someone who could tell her she was all right, that everything would be be fine, that she wasn’t crazy. She could never go back to the station, never. They talked about her, laughed about her. Yes, they did. She was just one of their stories. Even Ellen, she thought, even Ellen.
And the group? The thought made her stomach turn. If she went back to them and that horrible room she would have to stay there forever. They didn’t want her. There was no one to call and no place left to go.
She went into the kitchen and began to clean. She could not call her father. What could he say, come home? She couldn’t do that again. She couldn’t start over again.
She ran a dust cloth across her grandmother’s hutch. She licked her finger and wiped at a spot on the dining room table. She looked in the bathroom. The towels hung straight on the rack. In the bedroom, she dusted the top of the dresser and moved her father’s picture slightly forward. She picked up her mother’s picture and rubbed her finger across the glass.
“Oh, Mommy,” she whispered. “Oh, Mommy.”
In front of the dresser mirror, she brushed her hair. It was long now, blond and full to her shoulders. She pulled it back into a small ponytail. She found a pink ribbon in the top drawer and tied a bow around the curl of hair.
She stopped in the kitchen and took an apple from the basket on the counter. She rubbed the apple hard on her jeaned thigh. Today she was going to do something she had never done before. She was going to climb a mountain.
46
Juan Moya waved as Ellen came up the long driveway. Joan McBain watched from her kitchen desk.
“So,” she said to Ellen after the mugs had been filled, “you thinking about coming back here?”
“I have thought about it,” Ellen said with a nod.
“I thought you liked it over there.”
“No, not really. As a matter of fact, I don’t know if I ever liked it. I have to get out of there and soon.”
“Well, it’s your life and you better enjoy it while you can,” Joan McBain commented. “Although, I don’t know if coming back here is the answer. It wouldn’t have to do with Ronnie, would it?”
Ellen shook her head.
“I haven’t talked to Ronnie in two years. This doesn’t have anything to do with him.”
“Just as well,” Joan McBain said with a sigh. She looked to the wide window. “I don’t think that would be a good reason for coming back here. There’s a lot going on in his life.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, he’s doing real well. He’s talking about buying a second feed store over in Bernalillo and he’s looking to buy a house.”
Ellen sipped at her coffee.
“He’s also been seeing this girl Linda for a couple of months now. She’s got a good job with the city. Comes from a local family. She’s a nice girl and I’ve got a feeling they might get married.” The words were delivered as though of little importance.
Ellen sat frozen in shock.
“I believe marriage would be good for him,” Joan McBain continued as she poured more coffee. “You two ever talk about it?”
“I’m sorry,” Ellen said faintly. “I didn’t hear you.”
“Did you two ever talk about getting married?”
“Not really,” Ellen said. “I would have liked it.”
“No,” came the emphatic response. “No, I don’t think so. You two were too different. You know that, Ellen, when you think about it.”
“Sometimes different works.”
“Not often, honey. You gotta have something in common, something big.”
But they did, Ellen thought. They had this place, this kitchen and the mornings drinking coffee and the window to the fields and the horses. They had this woman in common and Sarah and Bob Junior and young Phillip. They had the ranch, the big sky, rolling ranchland up north.
She wanted to see the ranch again, to see the cabin as she first saw it from the road, small and waiting. She wanted to see the red ridge of the mountains and to see him, tall and lean, walking the land.
“How’s the ranch?” she asked.
“Up north?”
“Uh huh.”
“I think we’ve finally got somebody interested and it’s about time.”
“Interested how?” Ellen asked.
“In buying it, honey. We’ve been trying to sell the dang thing for years,” Joan McBain said, lighting a cigarette
Ellen stared in surprise. “You’re selling it? What does Ronnie think about that?”
“He’s the one who wants to sell it the most. We’ll both be sorry to see it go, sure, but land needs to be worked. You can’t let it sit idle for too long. And Ronnie sure as hell ain’t going to work it. The other boys don’t care one way or the other.”
“But I thought Ronnie loved the ranch.”
“He likes to get up there every so often but Ronnie ain’t no rancher. You know that.” She laughed.
“But all the work he did up there,” Ellen insisted. “The fences, the cabin.”
“He didn’t do all that, Ellen. It was Bobby that built the place
