The Drought by Patricia Fulton, Extended Imagery Page A

radiance. Breathing deeply, he closed his eyes and tried to catch her scent. Cinnamon, she had always smelled like the spices she used when she baked. When Nathan’s granddaddy had been alive, he would sneak up behind her and nibble at her neck and whisper, “Ninon, you smell good enough to eat.”
    He breathed the endearment into the morning air, “Ninon.” A soft wind stirred the trees and a shape emerged from their depths. Agador bounded through the dew-covered grass, cutting a swath of darkness from the woods to Nathan’s porch.
     

Chapter Six
     
    Junction, Texas
     
    Beth Riley knew grief was an odd thing and it affected people in different ways. For two weeks she watched her son struggle with the tragedy at the drainage pipe. Instead of talking about his fears, Jared had become preoccupied with the weather reports being broadcast on TV He didn’t go outside. On more than one occasion she awoke from a tangle of sweaty dreams to the sound of running water. In the kitchen she could hear her son muttering under his breath, “Just in case. One more gallon just in case.”
    He was filling old milk jugs with water and stockpiling them out in the shed. Although she couldn’t see the link, somewhere in Jared’s mind he had connected the unrelenting heat with Luke Casteel’s disappearance. These actions alone wouldn’t have worried her. The dark circles under his eyes and his gaunt features made her realize he wasn’t sleeping. At the end of two weeks she’d had enough. She gathered every piece of dirty clothing she could find and loaded it into laundry bags.
    Jared was on the couch watching the morning news. She stood behind him for a moment, leaning on the couch for support. She’d already taken three aspirin to fight the headache squeezing the front lobe of her brain like a vice-grip but she was still in pain. Her eyes flicked toward the television where the baffled weatherman pointed to a red screen. She waited for a commercial break. When it came, she announced, “I need you to take the laundry into town.”
    Jared looked at her like she was insane. “Mom, it’s over a hundred degrees outside.”
    “I know, but we still need clean clothes. Use the baby buggy, you can pull it all out in one trip.” She didn’t wait to hear his argument. She walked into the kitchen, leaned against the counter and fought off the rising nausea. One of her favorite movies was Shawshank Redemption, and one of her favorite lines from the movie was, “Get busy living, or get busy dying.” She’d been living that motto since her husband disappeared ten years ago.
    The laundry was her way of saying to Jared, “Get busy living.” She knew he was going to be angry with her, but she wanted him to get off the couch and stop watching the weather. If he needed to focus his anger, he could concentrate on her, and maybe, just maybe, he wouldn’t be so preoccupied with Luke’s disappearance and Barry’s prolonged absence.
    She moved slowly and cleared the few dishes from the table. Normally she would have hollered at Jared to come put his cereal bowl in the sink, but today she did the task willingly. She was trying to keep her mind preoccupied until the Advil kicked in.
    She wiped the table thinking about Luke Casteel’s mother and her hands shook as she wrung the dishcloth in the sink. Just the thought something could have happened to Jared made her heart twist painfully in her chest. She whispered under her breath, “It could have been Jared.” She twisted the cloth again, and the last drops of water fell into the sink. She would have lost them both, father and son to the hands of a Tanner.
    And it could have been Jared. That’s what really shook her up. He worshiped Barry Tanner. There was no doubt in her mind Barry could have turned on the charm and convinced any one of those kids to go in there and fetch the ball. She closed her eyes against the steady pressure in her head. She didn’t understand how fate could be so