Wild Man Creek

Sixteen




It was very rare for Jack to have any kind of issue and not seek the counsel of Melinda, but on this occasion he was going to forge ahead on his own. He made plans to go fishing with Denny on Saturday. “Not so much biting out there yet,” he told the young man, “but the weather’s been perfect and you never know, one of the big ones might be lurking, waiting for some die-hard like me.”

Between the Fourth of July picnic and the following Saturday Jack did a lot of thinking, a lot of remembering. He thought he might’ve been a little preoccupied, a little on the quiet side, but no one seemed to notice. He thought he’d make good use of the week trying to mentally put all the pieces together, but in point of fact the pieces fell into place immediately when Phil Prentiss had said, Give the kid a foundation he can be proud of….

Susan Cutler had said almost the same thing. She’d said, I wish it had been you, Jack, because you’re a man a little girl or little boy could be proud of….

There were some major reasons he hadn’t been able to place her. First of all she’d been about thirty in the picture Denny gave him, the one of them together when Denny was a little tyke about six or eight years old, and she’d been brunette. The Susan he’d known had been blond. Another reason—he’d been concentrating so hard on a woman he’d been sexually involved with and he really, arrogantly, thought he remembered them all. At least any that had become serious on the woman’s part. It wouldn’t have completely shocked him to learn there was one he was so briefly involved with that she’d slipped his mind, but he thought that any woman who felt that strongly toward him would have left an imprint on his mind. And yet another reason—he hadn’t really known Susan’s last name. He might’ve heard it once, twice at the most. And did he like her? Oh, he thought she was great! But he had never dated her. She had a guy in her life. A guy who was making her life miserable.

Jack and Denny staked out a little piece of river on Saturday and began casting. Fly-fishing was a quiet sport for the most part and Jack waited a long time to begin talking.

“This place has a reputation for father-son talks,” he said. “Rick wasn’t really my son, but I thought of him like you would a son. He counted on me like a kid would a father, that’s for sure. This was the place I brought him when he was sixteen to tell him not to mess with his fourteen-year-old girlfriend. He promised me he wouldn’t, but I gave him some condoms anyway.”

“How’d that work out for him?” Denny asked.

“He got her pregnant.” Denny just whistled. “Then I brought him here to counsel him about not giving in to panic. I told him to come to me with his issues, that I could probably help him somehow, but that he shouldn’t be crazy enough to try to marry some young girl just because she was pregnant, only making one problem into several problems. By that time they were fifteen and seventeen, so…” Jack paused. “So, they ran away to get married.”

“I know Rick’s married, but I guess I didn’t realize he’d been married as a teenager.”

“He wasn’t. I caught up with them, stopped them. He married Liz, the same girl, last fall. That baby from their teenage years, that baby was stillborn. It was horrible for them. They stayed together—all through his Marine career, all through his war injuries and disabilities. They’ve had a rough road, but they love each other a lot. Needless to say, I don’t have a real good track record with the advice I give out on this river….”

“You oughta give yourself an A for effort, Jack. Sounds like you tried to do all the right things.”

“You know, probably the only reason I really thought of Rick like a son was because of his young age when I found him. Just a kid, not even close to grown-up. With you, it’s different—you’re a man. Even without that letter your mom left, even if that hadn’t become a consideration, we were bound to be friends. We think a lot alike. And it goes without saying—I’m proud of you, Denny. Proud of your actions, your behavior. Proud of your ethics. We were gonna be friends who just keep getting to be better friends. You’ve been there for me and my family in an outstanding way. Not only am I attached to you by now, Mel and the kids are, too.”

Denny performed a beautiful cast and said, “I told you, Jack—if you can’t think of me as your son, I get that. I mean, you don’t remember my mom, which isn’t your fault. And even without that, I like you and the family.”

“Denny, I remember your mother. It came to me all of a sudden at the picnic this week and I remember her very, very well. And… Denny, I’m not your biological father.”

When Denny turned to look at Jack, Jack met his eyes. Clearly Denny was shocked speechless.

“Here’s how it was, son. Your mom cut my hair every single week—she worked in the barbershop at the PX. I was a dedicated young Marine and I never let much hair cover my head. It wasn’t a quick friendship, but I liked her right away—she was awesome. She looked a little different back when I knew her—different than the picture you showed me. Her hair wasn’t brunette like in the picture. But now I know exactly why you turned out so great— Susan was the best. She was positive, friendly, happy all the time. I never let anyone touch my head but her. Not only did she do a real good job, I liked talking to her. We talked about our families, our ambitions. I was determined to make a name for myself in the Corps. She wanted to settle down, have a family. Then one day she wasn’t so happy and I took her out for some coffee, let her talk and found out she was in a bad relationship.

“We got to be real good friends, Denny. I was willing to do just about anything to help her get out of that bad situation—anything but marry her. I knew you were on the way and she was definitely worthy of a good solution, but I had my family—my parents and sisters—to consider. I couldn’t marry her just to help her out. My family would have higher expectations of me. They’d expect me to be a dedicated husband and father and I wasn’t ready. I didn’t love her that way. I would have ended up disappointing her, you and my whole family. But I laid it all on the line—I offered to help her financially, to help her get that guy out of her life for her, anything that would work. And then I got my orders. She slapped on a cheerful face, told me everything was going to be fine, her parents were on her side and she had all the help she needed. She also said she wished she’d have met me first—that I was the kind of man her child would be proud to have as a father.” Jack took a breath. “I had no idea what that might mean in the end. And now I understand why she did what she did. And I understand why you turned out to be a fine young man.”

Denny was quiet for a long time. Finally he let out a breath with the word, “God.”

Jack gave him some time to absorb all that. He fished awhile, grateful nothing bit; he didn’t want to be distracted. When Denny didn’t speak, Jack said, “I don’t see that it changes anything.”

“It changes everything,” Denny said at once.

“No, Denny, it just alters a few biological facts, but the important things are the same.”

“My mother lied to me,” he said. “My mother never lied. And she implicated you when you had nothing to do with me.”

“She reinvented your past. I know she had a reason. Probably a good one. And from what you told me, she didn’t expect you to hunt me down. She just wanted to give you some comfort. I’m good with that.”

“Because you don’t know the guy, Jack. If he’s my true father, I have issues to worry about.”

“Why? Because he wasn’t a good guy? What’s that have to do with you? You’re a good guy. And I have witnesses.”

“She made you a part of her drama and—”

“Stop right there. The Susan I knew didn’t have drama, she had survival instincts.”

“For all the good that did her,” Denny said with a bitter tone.

“I don’t think there’s a lot we can do about serious illness, son.”

“You don’t have to call me that,” he said, anger at the edges of his voice.

“Okay, listen up, kid. Last year Mel had it in her head we had to adopt a child. She just wasn’t done having children, but she’d had a hysterectomy so her body was done. When you came along she reminded me that we were ready to take on a child with different biological parents and she never doubted for a second that we’d accept that child as our own. She thought we—you and me—should do the blood work, if for no other reason than to know who was a potential candidate if anyone in the family ever needed help, like a bone marrow transplant. But she reminded me that the outcome of the blood work didn’t really matter in relationships. Relationships are connections you make. What that means, Denny, is you don’t have a connection with the man you always knew as your father because he was indifferent and cruel. You don’t owe him anything, either—let him go. You’re free to create your own family. Think about that.”

“Let me tell you what’s different, Jack. I came here to find you, thinking you were my father, thinking that meant I belonged here. I don’t belong here.”

“You do if you want to. I came here not knowing a soul and I dare you to argue I don’t belong here.”

“It’s different and you know it. I’m sorry. It was all a lie and I’m sorry.”

“Okay, I understand that you’re disappointed. Suck it up—we’re still good friends. You’re still important to the family, to the town, to a lot of people.”

“Yeah. Maybe, until they find out the truth.”

“I haven’t said anything to anyone about this.”

“You have to tell Mel,” Denny said.

“Of course I’ll tell Mel,” Jack replied. “But I don’t see why anything has to change between us. I don’t see why we have to alert the town. Give your mom a break here, kid. She had a dying wish. I don’t know if it was as much for you as for herself. She regretted that relationship. The only thing about it she didn’t regret was you. She wanted you. She loved you. She raised you right.”

“Yeah? Maybe so. But even considering that, I don’t feel like living a lie.”

“I know you’re offended. It wasn’t what you expected,” Jack said. “How about you just remember, it doesn’t have that much to do with us. We were friends for months before you laid this on me.”

Denny reeled in his fly. “Yeah. I understand. Listen, if it’s all right with you, I think I might be done fishing for today.”



Jill and Colin attended a great salmon dinner at Erin’s cabin; Jill brought a nice assortment of salad vegetables to contribute. Of course she already knew that she got along very well with Colin’s family, so no surprise there. And she not only offered a tour of the Victorian, she threw together a light dinner and invited them all to stay, including Denny.

But the real excitement in the weeks following the Fourth of July picnic came in the form of harvesting some of her most precious fruits and vegetables. The Russian Rose was in. Not quite as large as her nana used to get, but big, dark, delicious and beautiful. There were teardrop-shaped yellow tomatoes—a bush in the garden, a hanging basket on the porch. She had baby melons, miniature eggplants, a variety of colorful peppers, red lettuce, red brussels sprouts, tiny beets smaller than cherry tomatoes. Jillian and Denny boxed up some of her best samples of most rare and beautiful fruits and vegetables and shipped them off to Kelly via overnight express; she would know if they were just the sort of thing that high-end restaurants could use. Since they were free, Jill didn’t have to worry about licensing her farm and crop.

The rare heirlooms aside, she had a delicious assortment of organic fruits and vegetables—her zucchini, yellow hook squash, cucumbers, carrots, leeks and scallions were out of this world and she made baskets of them daily to be taken to Preacher. She even shared some of her rare lot with him; she couldn’t save it or eat it all. She did photograph everything, however.

Jillian and Denny were at the outside edge of the fenced garden gathering their crop in a wheelbarrow, separating what she wanted to eat and what she wanted to send to town.

“Don’t you want to take it to him, Jillian?” Denny asked her.

She shook her head. “No, go ahead. You were as much a part of growing it as I was, and don’t you usually stop there after work anyway?”

“Sometimes,” he said with a shrug.

The way he glanced away and shrugged wasn’t the first time she noticed that he might be a little quieter than usual. In fact, he’d been less excited than she had expected. “Hey, is something wrong? I thought you were all keyed up for the harvest! And this is just the beginning.”

He just ducked his head shyly. She grabbed the sleeve of his shirt and pulled him back to face her. She tilted her head and gave a sharp nod, urging him to answer.

“Yeah,” he said. “It’s better than I expected. You’ve got something, Jillian. I don’t know what it is, but if you stick a seedling or starter in the ground and nurse it along, it returns the favor and gets big, beautiful and strong. I never thought I could get so jazzed about that.”

“Unless we want it small, precious and rare,” she said with a smile. “What’s up with you?”

“Aw, I don’t know…”

“Spit it out,” she demanded.

“It’s too soon to say, really.”

“Say it anyway!”

“You know I like this, right? And you know it’s been working, right? At least I think so. But Jillian, I don’t know if it’s going to work for me in the long term. I’d never run out on you during your harvest, especially your first harvest, but I think I’m going to have to get serious about finding something more permanent. And no offense, something that has more security and benefits and pays a little… Sorry, but a little better. I’ve been kicking around going home.”

“Home?”

“San Diego,” he said. “I grew up there.”

“I thought you’d decided to relocate?”

He shrugged and looked away again. “I don’t know if that’ll work.”

“But Jack’s here,” she said, because everyone knew the story about how this young man had come here to find his father.

“Nothing stopping me from visiting sometimes,” he said.

Jillian shook her head. “Something else is going on here. Something—” She stopped talking as she was distracted by the sound of a vehicle. She automatically assumed it was Colin in his Jeep, then remembered the Jeep was already here as Colin was in the sunroom painting. She squinted toward the drive that ran along the side of the house and recognized the BMW convertible. “Aw, shit,” she said. “Christ on a crutch. Son of a bitch.”

“Um, I take it you’re not happy to see this guy?” Denny said.

“You armed? If you’re armed, just shoot him right now!”

“Jillian, maybe you should just take a few deep—”

But Denny watched as she stormed away, toward the BMW. A man got out and stormed toward her. He was about five-ten, blond, tan, slender, dressed like a city boy. But he had a sneer on his face. It was nothing to the grimace Jillian had on hers.

There was a part of Denny that thought it would be best to give her a little space to deal with whatever this was. Clearly it was private. It might be an old love affair gone sour. Hell, it could be an ex! But he just wasn’t comfortable letting the kind of blind rage he saw on Jillian’s face, matched by Mr. BMW, go without some backup. So he moved toward what was certainly going to be a conflict, but he tried to go slow to let her have her privacy and fast enough to intervene if necessary.

“Kurt! What the hell are you doing here?” Jillian stormed. “This is my property and I want you out of here!”

“Get off your high horse, Jillian! I’m here to tell you I’m going to sue your ass for everything you think you’ve got!”

“I believe you missed that opportunity, you jackass! We settled. Now get the hell out of here before I find a pitchfork and—”

“We had a confidentiality agreement, Matlock, and you violated it! And for that you’re going to pay! And pay large!”

She couldn’t quite stop the stunned expression that floated across her features. “Huh? I didn’t do any such thing.”

“Oh, yeah, you did. They told me at Intel that word leaked about my… Now, what did they call it? Transgressions! That’s right, transgressions. I didn’t have a real big fan club, they said. And since they weren’t very attached to me, they invited me to leave. No package, by the way. No one else would have done that! Only you!”

For a second she was shocked. But then she started to laugh. She laughed so hard she doubled over. So, the women Harry wasn’t supposed to mention? They went after him! She straightened and wiped at her teary eyes. “Why, Kurt,” she said, humor in her voice, “is it possible you lied to more people than just me? Possible you used more women than just moi? Because I haven’t talked to anyone, Kurt!” She laughed some more. “I’ve been gardening!”

He stepped toward her, his posture and expression threatening. “You lying bitch! You’re nothing but a lying bitch.” And then he shoved her and she stumbled backward a couple of steps. But she recovered and was right back in his face.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Denny said, inserting an arm between the two of them.

Kurt suddenly smiled meanly. “What’s this?” he asked. “You doing the pool boy, Jillian? Just your speed. A liar and a slut!”

She pulled back an arm and slapped him across the face with all her might. He actually moved back from the blow. It left a red patch on his face.

His hand went to his cheek and he wobbled a little bit. “That’s assault and battery! I’m going to file charges and you’re going—”

The back door to the house crashed open and slammed shut, but by the time the noise reached the side yard where they all stood, Colin was upon them. He moved Jillian out of the way, pushed past Denny, grabbed Kurt by the front of his shirt and landed a blow to his face that knocked him three feet back and right on his ass. “No, that’s assault and battery,” Colin said, towering over him. “Want to go a few rounds? You look kind of little, but I could promise to go easy.”

“Seriously,” he said, holding his face and struggling to his feet. He moved backward, out of Colin’s reach. “You’re going to jail.”

“Seriously,” Colin mocked. “You might have a little trouble with that. But, hey, go for it. We’ll hash it out with the sheriff, if you can find him, if he has time to deal with a little bitch slap. Things work a little different out here in the mountains, sweetheart.” He grinned at the slight, blond man. He winked. “They have work to do. They don’t have a lot of time to screw around with little boys and their whining. Out here when men get into it, they just fight.” He raised a hand. “Best of luck, a*shole. Now get the f*ck out of here before I get mad!”

Kurt took several steps toward his BMW, still holding his cheek and jaw. He turned back toward Jillian and at that moment Colin draped an arm over her shoulders. He was at a safe distance, so he lobbed a few nasty insults. “This guy know you’re just a low-class, blue-collar whore who slept her way up? Just a poor girl who came from nothing and brought it with her?”

Jillian just smiled. She shook her head.

“You’ll regret this, Jillian,” Kurt said. “I’m going to sue you.”

She shrugged. “Knock yourself out.”

“You’ll be sorry.”

“I highly doubt it.”



Once Kurt was gone, Jillian brought Denny into the kitchen. Of course Colin followed, listening.

“You deserve an explanation about that,” she said. “Would you give me a pass on that? It was both personal and professional and… Well, and embarrassing. I misjudged him and it cost me.”

“Sure,” Denny said. “Total pass.”

“Thanks. Here’s what I want to say about your situation. I wouldn’t think of getting in the way of you taking a better position. It would be selfish of me because I have no guarantees for you. I have ideas, of course. Ideas that I might not be able to bring to fruition. When you’re starting a company, or a farm, as the case may be, you always have to fly high and loose. I have to plan to succeed while keeping my alternative options in my vision. And by that I mean—I’m not going to be a fool. The minute this doesn’t seem to be working and I can’t see a solution, I’m not throwing good money after bad. You with me so far?”

“I think so.”

“Okay, I have ideas. I’m buying this property and I’d like to farm ten acres of organic fruits and vegetables, much of it dedicated to specialty items. It’ll take me some more time. It’ll take buyers. But it’s looking like it’s going in the right direction and I’ll continue to develop my line. I don’t want a lot of employees—I’ll want to supervise my own gardens, watch my plants. But I will want a farm manager. If I reached that point tomorrow, that person would be you and the position would come with higher pay, benefits and about as much security as you’d get anywhere. That is to say, job security is always at some risk. After all, I lost a job with a company I helped to build, and I never saw that coming.” She smiled. “You probably had more security with the Marines.”

He smiled back. “You’re not planning to send me to war, are you, Jillian? I’m not going back that way.”

“I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t talk about my plans. I’ll keep you informed, show you my business plan as it evolves, as I make changes. But it’s sensitive information. Can I count on you to keep it to yourself, Denny?”

“Sure, but—”

She held up a hand. “I only tell you this so you have a few options to weigh. Pretty iffy options, I know. Still, there’s no reason for me to keep that from you—we’ve worked together since March, almost five months. I trust you. If I manage to grow this little farm, you will be my first choice for a manager. But, if you have to follow other opportunities?” She shrugged. “That’s the chance I’m taking.” She leaned toward him. “I have one piece of advice—choose work you love over everything else. Especially over money.”

“Yeah,” he said. He stood up. “I’ll take those veggies into town for you.”

“Want a sandwich before you go?” she asked. “I’ll make you one.”

“No, thanks, Jillian. If I give Preacher food, he’ll give me food.” He smiled at her. “I’ll think about everything.”

“If you get the right phone call, Denny, I understand. That was our agreement from the start.”

Denny gave her a brief salute, then left the house. She watched him from the window as he transferred the vegetables from the wheelbarrow to a couple of boxes and put them in the back of his truck. She still stood in front of the kitchen windows until he’d pulled away. Then she turned toward Colin. “I worked like a mule all day and was holding up pretty well, but the last fifteen minutes did me in. I feel like an eighty-year-old woman.”

He stepped toward her with a smile, wrapping his arms around her waist. “You were great. You didn’t take any of Kurt’s shit.”

“What were my choices? I think I need to get a shower.”

“Sure, but tell me first—when he called you a blue collar whore, you smiled at him. Why in the world would you smile at him?”

“I was never a whore. That would’ve been easy—I was a slave! I worked so hard for Harry, even he couldn’t believe it. But blue-collar? A poor girl who came from nothing?” She chuckled. “Oh, he has no idea! Blue-collar would’ve been a promotion! My nana took in ironing. Me and Kelly—we got free breakfast at school. We were a couple of the poorest kids there and qualified. Nana had food stamps but also did odd chores like wash, sold her vegetables, then later sold some of her canned stuff, always keeping back enough to feed us. She bought our clothes at secondhand shops. Poor? We were so poor, we envied the church mice. On top of that, she was our great-grandmother. She was elderly when she got us all. And she was a full-time nurse to our invalid mother.” She shook her head and just laughed. “Honestly, I don’t know where Kurt came from, but he never came from anything as tough as that. Now, I really need a shower.”

“Want someone to wash your back? I mean, since the farm manager has gone to town?”

“Who’s going to wash my back when you’re photographing the Serengeti?”

“I won’t leave without making sure you have a good brush with a long handle.”