The Best Husband In Texas

“Do you know the play?”

“Very well.”

With her voice’s rough shattering, Iris asked, “How can I find any reason to enjoy this life?”

It took a while for her mother to reply. “You can look at the day and the people who live in it. You can look forward instead of backward.”

Her voice trembling with tears, Iris guessed, “I discard each one and forget them all?”

“No. You...release them...and let them go.”

Her voice husky and bitter, Iris asked, “I tell them to just run along and get lost?”

And her mother replied gently, “You must let them go.”

“They’re in my mind!”

“You’ve trapped them there.”

“No!” Iris got up and left the room with her breakfast almost untouched.

Not eating was one of Iris’s problems. Not eating, and not caring what happened. She was afraid to be close to anyone, so she was gruff and distancing to all those around her. It was selfprotection. She didn’t want to love and lose anyone else.

Edwina wondered when the time would come that Iris would reach out? To whom? For what reason? What would it take for this fragile, wounded child of hers to see the world...and to be a part of it again?

Two

Iris came down the stairs in a soft, long, rumpled dress and her hair hadn’t been brushed very well. She’d probably just clawed her fingers through her hair.

Without any greeting, Austin told her of his cow as Iris came down the last steps. “You remember Fanny? She has a new calf. Come see it.” He didn’t smile or coax. He gave her the unadorned option.

Iris questioned, “New?”

Austin agreed. “Joe just called in on the CB. The momma was licking the sack from her baby just before I got here. I really thought I’d get you back there in time for the birth.”

Austin watched Ires. She just moved on past him slowly but she went on out the door. With a quiet glance at the riveted Edwina, the silent Austin followed the silent Iris.

Since Iris moved slowly, Austin got to the truck ahead of her and opened the door for her.

She just got up into the pickup and sat there with her hands clasped on her lap.

Austin hurried around the truck and got in real quick and started the motor. He was very aware that if Iris could get in that easily, she could get out just as quick.

He noted that her seat belt wasn’t on her. But he couldn’t stay there to correct it because she could change her mind, get out of the truck—and leave. So he drove carefully to the edge of Fuquay before he said, “Hey, our seat belts aren’t on.”

And he helped with hers... Ah, for his own arms to be given the job of protecting her body! His eyes squinched and his mouth opened a little bit so that he could breathe.

She made no move to help with the belt and didn’t even watch him fix it. She just moved her arm and allowed herself to be safeguarded.

Only after she was secure did he buckle his own belt. She made no comment.

While his mind noted the weather, his neighbor’s livestock and other vehicles on the road, he also noted every breath and move Iris made as she sat silently in the cab of his pickup.

Finally he said, “Violet and Bud had another date.”

Iris made a sound in reply that meant only that she’d heard him.

He said, “Marla’s twins have the croup.”

He’d spent time that morning talking to Iris’s friend Maria and getting the gossip so that he’d have something to say to such a silent woman. Even if she didn’t reply or discuss each item, she would know the current gossip.

Thoughtfully. Austin looked over at Iris. And he wondered, would she?

She just turned her head to look out the car window and said nothing. Was her mind gone? Would her eyes ever see him? Why had she gone into the decline? Since she came home, it seemed to Austin that she just got worse.

If she didn’t have all the money from her dead husbands, she’d have to get out and work. She’d have to have some contact with other people. Edwina said Iris prowled the dark house at night.

So Austin asked Iris, “Do you sleep during the day?”

“No.”

Then why did she...prowl...at night?

The day was balmy and the fresh air came over .the land from the Gulf and into the pickup.

Austin told his passenger, “Breathe that TEXAS air. It’s good for your vitals.”

Very softly, she replied, “I can breathe.” None of her dead husbands could.

Austin blinked. He knew she could breathe. What did she mean? He frowned at the road, wondering if he should ask. But he bit his lip and commented, “Look at the sky. How wide and blue it is.”

At her silence he looked over and saw she was still peering out the car window. She was responding by looking? Or was she already aware the sky was blue, and it was obvious, so she felt no need to confirm his observation?

They drove the rest of the way in silence. He rode over the grid between the gateposts. The grid discouraged cattle from going over onto the roadway. And it eliminated the need to get out of the truck, open the gate, get back into the truck, drive through, then get out and close the damned gate before getting back inside the waiting truck.

Of course, driving in thataway on the grid, a man always has to peel off any woman who might be stuck to his chest. And she ought to be reasonably dressed.

There were cameras, which were triggered by any weight on the grid. A man, a horse, a beeve or a vehicle could trigger a picture. If anything went over the grid, it was filmed.

The film was evidence. The tape would show the truck, the driver and the license number. The cameras were cleverly hidden, but often stolen from their places. They were worth replacing even if it was a hell of a nuisance.

The cameras were for rustlers who could drive over the grid just like anybody else. And they could take out a cow or two and carry them off.

Austin looked over at his silent passenger as they exited the grid. He looked down her body. It was skinny. But there was potential. She was so nicely female. He lusted for her. He always had.

She’d gone away to college. He’d been twenty-four and thought he had plenty of time. Since she was then eighteen, if she wanted to be that educated, he could wait. Who could believe she’d be married—to another man—in just six months?

That was the first time.