True Colors

Aurora stood there, holding Noah, who pointed immediately at Dallas and said, “Dada.”

“Christ,” Dallas said softly.

Aurora brought Noah over and put him in Dallas’s arms. He clung to his son, pressing his lips to the silky black hair, breathing in deeply. “Tell him I loved him.”

“You tell him,” Vivi Ann said, dashing away tears with her sleeve. “We’ll visit you every Saturday until they let you out.”

Dallas kissed Noah’s pudgy cheek and then pulled Vivi Ann closer. For one heartbreakingly perfect moment, they were together, the three of them, like it was supposed to be, and then he drew back.

He placed Noah in Vivi Ann’s arms and said, “I won’t let him see me in prison. Never. If you bring him I won’t come out of my cell. I know what it’s like for a kid to have his old man behind bars.”

“But . . . how will he know you?”

“He won’t,” Dallas said, then he turned to Roy. “Tell them I’m ready to go now.”

Vivi Ann wanted to throw herself at him, to block his path and cling to his leg and beg him not to go, but she couldn’t make any part of her move. “Dallas,” she whispered, crying so hard now he was a blur of black and white, a sliver of movement against the wooden wall. She didn’t blink or breathe or wipe her eyes, afraid that at the smallest movement, he’d disappear. “I love you, Dallas,” she said.

“Love Dada,” Noah agreed, nodding and pointing.

At that, Dallas broke. She saw it as clearly as if an arm had simply been snapped off or his spine had cracked. “Get me out of here, Roy,” he said.

And then he was gone.

Every Saturday for the rest of the summer, Vivi Ann went to the prison to visit Dallas. The remainder of her time she spent working at the ranch. She went out of her way not to talk to her father; she left a list for him at the barn when she needed something done.

Now it was the final night of the county fair. For the past few days, she’d lost herself in the familiar routine. Her 4-H Club had brought twelve girls this year, ranging in age from eleven to fifteen. From the moment Vivi Ann pulled her truck and trailer into the shorn, grassy field behind the horse barns, she was in motion. It took a herculean effort to keep the girls—especially the younger ones—on schedule for their classes, so that each one was dressed, mounted, and on deck during the class before theirs. Vivi Ann was constantly running back and forth between the barn and the arena, with Noah in her arms or holding her hand, trying to keep up with her. There were mothers there, too, of course. Julie and Brooke and Trayna were just as busy, doing the girls’ hair, polishing their horses’ hooves, fixing gear that broke at the worst time. By Sunday night, everyone was dusty and exhausted and exhilarated.

Everyone except Vivi Ann. She was just dusty and exhausted.

Closing her eyes, she leaned back against the stall door behind her. All she had to look forward to now was going home, crawling into her empty bed. Every night for the whole summer, she’d rolled over in her sleep and reached for Dallas. She didn’t know which bothered her more—reaching for him or knowing that some night it would stop.

Sighing again, feeling older and more tired than should have been possible for a twenty-nine-year-old woman, she dragged her tack trunk over to the truck and put it in the bed.

She stood in the grassy field, empty of trucks now except for her own. She could see the sparkling lights of the midway from here, the giant glittering spool of the Ferris wheel against the black sky, and hear the distant, recognizable song of the calliope.

She used to love the fair. Now even the word fair mocked her. Everywhere she looked lately, she saw injustice. Nothing was fair; not really.

For all the years of her life, this had been a special weekend, a time of coming together for the Grey girls.

She and her sisters had always closed the fair together, turning this last night into a journey through their common past. They’d walked shoulder to shoulder down the midway, eating scones smothered in local marionberry jam and picking at pink clouds of cotton candy, and talking. They’d done that most of all.

. . . look, Aurora, that’s where you got your first kiss, remember?

. . . that quilt looks exactly like the one Mom made for the Bicentennial, doesn’t it?

. . . Speaking of the Bicentennial, whatever happened to my Bobby Sherman watch? I know one of you witches stole it . . .

She knew her sisters were down there, going their separate ways for the first time. For months, Winona had been trying to reconcile with Vivi Ann, but she ignored every pathetic attempt. Vivi Ann couldn’t look at Winona without wanting to smack her in the face.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out the Xanax Richard had prescribed for her. The little pills had become her best friend lately. Popping one into her mouth, she swallowed dryly and then went to the barn, where Noah lay sleeping in a portable crib. She scooped him up, held him a little too tightly, and carried him over to the truck.

At home, she put him to bed and took a long, hot bath. As was usual lately, she let herself cry in the bathtub, and when it was done, and she’d dried off, she was okay again, able to keep walking, breathing, living. Believing. That was the hardest part of all, the believing that his appeal would be granted and all this would be over. Every time the phone rang, she caught her breath, thinking: It’s happened. And every day, when the call didn’t come, she popped another pill and kept moving. Slowly, perhaps, but she moved, and in this cabin, where memories of Dallas were everywhere, each forward step was a triumph.

She crawled into their bed, took two sleeping pills, and waited for the sweet relief of sleep.

It seemed that she’d just closed her eyes when the phone rang.

She clawed out from the oozy comfort of sleep and reached sideways, feeling for the phone. By the time she found it, she was sitting up. “Hello?” she answered.