Post by Cannonball on Sept 16, 2006 18:12:21 GMT -5
((JP by Ravery/Sarah))
Sam Guthrie was twenty three years old. For the past three years he had been working for a fairly high-profile Kentucky mining company on projects that often saw him away from home for lengthy periods of time. He was also breaking Momma Guthrie gently into the idea that one day, her Sammy would have to move out to his own place - especially now he was engaged to be married.
He was back from a two-week long trip that had seen him heading out to West Virginia for some preliminary surveys, and the gossip he had heard within minutes of arriving home had very definitely knocked the pleasure of returning home out of his rather tired sails.
"Where you goin', Sam?" His mother called from the kitchen where she had been baking. "I'm doin' you your favourite steak pie for dinner, honey...don't you be stoppin' out all night at that no-good bar..."
"I'm just goin' out to meet Paige from school, Momma. She left me a note sayin' she had a free period this afternoon, so I figured I'd surprise her."
It wasn't a complete lie. More a ... fabrication of the facts. If the gossip was to be believed, Paige had been playing hooky from school anyway.
He had no idea where to start looking for his sister, but headed into town where he often saw the teenagers hanging out.
Sam's oldest sister was eight years his junior... so 'oldest' rarely fit into the idea; and still Paige resented being called Sammy's kid sister, or little sister, or, that pretty Guthrie girl. All her life she'd idolized her older brother and had never wanted for a second to be anything like the prissy girls in her class. She was a tomboy; which is how she'd eventually fallen in with the 'wrong crowd'...
She'd only been in high school for a week when she met Trace Cunningham. It wasn't a surprise to anyone in town that they ended up going steady... Trace was on his second year as a senior(having been held back on account of an short stay in juvenile hall for stealing his grandfather's chevy) and had a penchant for younger girls. Of the younger girls at Tremont High, Paige had been the prettiest. In spite of her stubborn refusal to wear dresses(or maybe because of it), her wild blonde hair and sky-blue eyes attracted more than the good for nothing Trace; and yet, Trace was the only boy to be seen with her. Couldn't have anything to do with the size of the boy, could it?
On this particular day Paige and Trace lingered outside the Circle K near the highway- just enough outside town that only the state troopers passed by, leaving them free of the prying eyes of County cops who knew their mother's names and thus would call them in for truancy. Trace had his arm around Paige's neck, a cigarette dangling from his fingers as they laughed with some of their friends. The plan was to hang out a few hours more, then take off to Rocky Point with beer their friend Jackie had pilfered from his father's stash in the shed out back. The afternoon had a lazy early-summer heat that made beer and loud music sound just about right.
There was one thing you could say for Sam Guthrie’s car. No, that was wrong. There were several things you could say about his car. The first was that it couldn’t be mistaken for a feat of modern engineering. There were those who said (unkindly, but not inaccurately) that it was mostly powered by a combination of rubber bands and good intentions.
The second thing you could say about the car was that it was orange. Oh yes, there was no doubt about its colour. It made the General Lee look insipid.
The third thing was that as a general rule, people heard Sam arriving long before he actually drove onto the scene. A two-inch bore through exhaust with no silencers would do that. He’d gone through a rebellious phase when he’d been eighteen and got the old jalopy in the first place when he’d liked to slow down alongside folks on the sidewalk, turn the ignition off and then switch it straight back on, causing a back-blow through the exhaust that sounded not unlike his mutation.
Little things, little minds.
Thus it was that the sound of his car came drifting on the air approximately two minutes before the nose of the vehicle rounded the bend.
Paige sighed, rolling her eyes a little more than she likely needed to.
"Gawdammit. Wouldn't ya know Momma's got Sammy after me?" All the kids lifted their heads after the sound of the car on its way towards them.
Trace smirked, making Paige feel like the least cool girlfriend to ever have existed. Fixing a nonchalant look on her flawless features, she shrugged.
"No mattah. I'm gonna go inside and use the can. Y'all just pretend ya don't know him, right?" Sauntering off into the little convenience store, she sweet talked the kid behind the counter into giving her the key, and disappeared into the bathroom.
The orange Guthrie Wagon pulled up outside the Circle K and Sam sort of unfolded out of it. The community was small enough that everyone well knew that the eldest Guthrie boy was a mutant, and whilst they didn’t take kindly to it, he’d never been totally cut out. This was mostly due to the fact that he’d used that same power to save a life.
“I’m lookin’ for my sister, Paige,” he called to the group of kids leaning against the wall. “Any of ya seen her around? I was told she was last seen here.” His eyes turned to look over Trace and his blond brow feathered in suspicion. “Hey, pal, ya seen my little sister?”
The other kids shook their heads no quickly, a short round girl adding in a thick drawling 'nah..' before spitting on the ground.
Trace however, smirked at Sam and took a long drag of his cigarette. He wasn't the sort to lie to avoid a fight; in fact, Trace Cunningham liked himself a fight now and then. He didn't say anything, letting that orange heap of junk make a mess of noise and dust in the parking lot.
“Hey,” said Sam, moving closer to Trace. “I asked ya a question, man, the least ya could do is give me the courtesy of a reply.” His eyes narrowed still further. “Ya that Cunningham boy ain’t ya?” He thrust his hands in his pockets. “I done heard ya been seein’ my sister, so could ya give me an idea where she is?”
Oh yeah. Sam had definitely heard.
Most good southern boys would level with another man, particularly where it concerned a female related to one or both of them. Trace Cunningham was southern; but he wasn't good.
He put his hands in his pockets, too, and shot a look back at Sam. "I been seein'er, but I don't now. Best you be lookin’ at home maybe."
The other kids looked nervous. One of them dodged into the store, not so subtly making her way back to the bathroom.
Sam, on the other hand, was both southern AND good. And he could spot a dirty liar from a hundred paces. All part of the training he’d undergone at Xavier’s Institute, all the psychology stuff. Stay focused, the advice would have been. Stay focused and don’t let them know you’re onto them.
The eldest Guthrie had always performed well in practise sessions, but then none of them had ever focused on his sister’s well-being.
There was the slightest muscle tic, barely perceptible, under his right eye. In his peripheral vision, he spotted the girl sneaking to the bathroom. “I been home,” he said, struggling to keep his voice nonchalant and calm. “She ain’t there. But ya know what? I’m just gonna go buy me a soda in the store there – an’ hey, look! It’s Henry Bell behind the counter! I ain’t seen Henry for weeks! We sure do have a lot to catch up on, looks like I’ll be standin’ around here for a while.”
Trace set his jaw, frowning hard at the older man. "Sure," he said sarcastically, and tossed his cigarette at their feet, walking away towards his pickup. The other teens looked like they hardly knew what to do next.
Henry Bell wasn't an idiot and he liked his job. As much as he'd like to help Paige out in playing truant from school- he'd had days like that himself when he was younger- he wasn't going to lie to a girl's family about where she was. Particularly when she was hanging out with guys like Cunningham.
So when Sam walked into the little convenience store, Henry tossed his head towards the bathroom.
“Thanks, Hank,” said Sam, his face like thunder.
He crossed the distance to the bathroom door, where the girl who had approached to forewarn Paige scurried away as Sam raised his fist and pounded on the wood. “Paige Guthrie, ya get ya bony ass outta that lavatory right now ‘fore I gotta break this door down an’ DRAG ya out.”
To say that he was angry was an understatement. He was incandescent.
"Don't you talk like that ta me Sammy Guthrie, you gonna raise a fuss in public now? Momma'd like that about as much as a kick in the head!" She yelled from inside the bathroom.
Opening the door a few inches, she looked up at him with a flushed face, frowning. "'Heavens sake Sam. I'ma justa havin a day away from school s'all. Don't hafta get your undies up your butt about it."
“But it ain’t just a day away, is it, Paige? Heck, no. Y’all been missin’ far too often from what I do hear tell. An’ ya know what? I’m draggin’ ya straight back for the rest of this afternoon’s classes whether ya wanna go or not.”
Having so said, he caught his sister’s wrist firmly and began hauling her towards the main entrance, much the embarrassed amusement of her peers.
Paige wasn't about to get into a brawl with her brother amongst the aisle at the Circle K, but as they got out onto the sidewalk she threw back her shoulder, doing her best to get free of his grip. All she really did was give herself a nice red indian burn.
"God dammit Sammy, I'm not a little kid anymore!" She hollered, kicking at him. "You lemme go this instant!" Yelling in impotent rage through her teeth, she pushed at him with her free hand. "You meanta tell me you never played a day away from school when you was my age! Lemme GO dammit!"
“No, I never did play a day away from school, ya done forget I went down the mine at fifteen, ya stupid girl. It was only ‘cos of Professor Xavier that I got any kind of proper schoolin’ at all!”
He glared at her furiously. “Ya think I wanna see ya throwin’ good after bad in ya life? No, Paige, I won’t have it. Finish ya schoolin’. Make somethin’ of yaself, ‘cos otherwise where will it end? When ya gonna drop the first of Momma’s grandkids, because that’s where this is all gonna end!”
He got her outside and opened the back door of the orange wreck of a car. “Get in,” he said, in a low, angry tone. “Now.”
"Who you ta tell me, Sammy, look what you done made of YOUR fool self." She shot back, instantly regretting what she'd said. It was just cause to get in though, she looked briefly at Trace, and sat down with a heavy sigh.
Gritting her teeth, she crossed her arms stiffly and kept her eyes out the window as he got in.
"I ain't goin back ta class, Sam. Not a thing they can teach me worth knowin."
Her snipe cut him sharply and he bit back the angry retort. “So don’t end up like me,” was all he said in reply to her words. Finally, however, she sat down and shut up.
For a second or two anyway. Then she said she knew it all.
“Ya gonna graduate, Paige. Ya gotta. If you don’t do it for me, ya gotta do it for Momma. An’ for Daddy. Ya know how he said he hoped the rest of his chilluns would finish school proper an’ not hafta work the mines.”
He craned his head to look over his shoulder at her. “Ya go ahead an’ hate me an’ be angry at me, but don’t let down Momma. She’s so proud of ya.”
She resented having Momma and Daddy thrown in her face as a reason not to go partying with her boy, but that was the trick about using parents dead and alive in an argument; wasn't much you could say against it.
"I hate you Sammy Z Guthrie..." she murmured, looking out the window with tears in her eyes. "I hate you rotten."
“Ya won’t hafta put up with me for much longer,” he told her. “I’m gonna be gettin’ my own place in the next couple months. Wasn’t gonna tell none of ya ‘til dinner, but I’m lookin’ to buy my own apartment. So humour me while I’m still around. If ya wanna wreck ya life, Paige, wait ‘til I ain’t here to be hurt by it, OK?”
He didn’t tell her the reason for moving out. He wasn’t sure how she’d react in this mood.
"S'my life ta wreck," she said weakly, teenage fury lingering on even though she knew he was right.
A few minutes passed and she calmed slowly, mumbling almost too low for him to hear.
"Think you'd know what its like ta have the whole family hopin and prayin ya make somethin of y'self..." she chewed on the inside of her lip for a second. "I'm not lucky enough ta have some fancy power ta make my way in th'world."
“Watch what ya wish for, girl,” said Sam, almost viciously. “’cos ya might just get it. Ya think this is some sorta blessin’? Ya think again, an’ ya think right carefully, too. What damn good did those powers do me when I needed ‘em most, eh? None at all. An’ what has it got me since? Nothin’ but distrust and even hate from people round here.”
He fell into silence.
“Paige, believe me. I reckon y’all are better than that. Make somethin’ of ya life. Y’all are a smart girl, honey. Use them brains now. Take a step back an’ damn well look at this path ya walkin’.”
Almost as an afterthought, he added, “Please.”
Paige just didn't understand what her brother was getting at. What was she but another country girl, destined to become a hairdresser and have a million babies? What else did their Momma become that was so great? Was she proud of herself, or did all those hours of daytime soap operas tell a tale of disappointment and a longing for more than a double wide trailer and a dead husband?
She sighed, wishing there were some other outcome for her. "Ya gonna marry that Brenda, aren't ya." Maybe that's why he was on her about school. He had always liked Brenda's up town accent and her fancy dresses and shoes. Bet that woman'd never worn a pair of blue jeans in her whole life. Mighta broken a nail gettin her tennis shoes tied.
“Yeah, I am marryin’ her,” he said, looking at Paige’s face in the rear-view mirror. “I love her, Paige. I asked her a couple days back. I’d be glad if ya can find it somewhere in that heart of yours to be glad for me, too.”
They headed for the corner to the road that would take them down to the high school. Sam felt far older than his twenty three years as he pulled the car to a halt outside the gates.
“I want more for ya, Paige,” he said, in a sad sort of voice. “I know ya could be one of the ‘Tucky girls who does good for themselves. Look at ya. Pretty as a picture, bright as a button – an’ wastin’ your life on one of those good fer nothin’ Cunningham boys. I can’t control what ya do, I know that.”
He took a deep breath.
“Let me tell ya this, an’ ya pass it on to that beau. He hurts ya, in any way, an’ his ass is mine. I’ll rip him in half, hollow out his head an’ use his skull as an ashtray. I’ll even take up smokin’ to prove the point.”
Paige smiled faintly. "Trace ain't nothing ta be angry bout Sammy." She looked up at the school.
"If you want someone ta take care'a the family cause you're leavin town, then just say so." She looked back at his reflection in the mirror. A blonde eyebrow lifted and she almost sneered.
"I'm gonna take care'a myself too. Don't you worry bout that." She sighed. "You gonna let me out?"
“I’m still gonna take care of y’all. All of ya. Momma too.” He met her eyes in the mirror. “What else do I know how to do?”
With that, he got out of the car and opened the back door. “Ya got two choices,” he said. “I hold ya hand and walk ya back to class, or ya give ya big brother a hug an’ walk into that school with ya head held high.”
Paige got out and looked up at him skeptically. "Ya wouldn't do that...." but she wasn't so sure.
With a smirk that said she wasn't half as mad as she wanted to let on, she put her arms around him and gave him a hug, holding her face to his chest as she used to when she was small.
"I love ya, Sam. Even if y'ar a bit of an ass." She smiled a little.
“Good girl. Love ya too.” He planted a kiss on the top of her blonde head. “Now go. Git.” He gave her his most endearing Sammy-smile. “Go show this town that not all the Guthries are gonna wind up spendin’ the rest of their lives covered in crap. An’ tonight I’m gonna take all of ya out to dinner.” It’d cost him the best part of a month’s salary – he wasn’t that well paid.
She smiled a bit more, making an effort just for him. "Sure, Sammy." Flipping her blonde hair over her shoulder, she ran up the steps and through the door.
Sam Guthrie was twenty three years old. For the past three years he had been working for a fairly high-profile Kentucky mining company on projects that often saw him away from home for lengthy periods of time. He was also breaking Momma Guthrie gently into the idea that one day, her Sammy would have to move out to his own place - especially now he was engaged to be married.
He was back from a two-week long trip that had seen him heading out to West Virginia for some preliminary surveys, and the gossip he had heard within minutes of arriving home had very definitely knocked the pleasure of returning home out of his rather tired sails.
"Where you goin', Sam?" His mother called from the kitchen where she had been baking. "I'm doin' you your favourite steak pie for dinner, honey...don't you be stoppin' out all night at that no-good bar..."
"I'm just goin' out to meet Paige from school, Momma. She left me a note sayin' she had a free period this afternoon, so I figured I'd surprise her."
It wasn't a complete lie. More a ... fabrication of the facts. If the gossip was to be believed, Paige had been playing hooky from school anyway.
He had no idea where to start looking for his sister, but headed into town where he often saw the teenagers hanging out.
Sam's oldest sister was eight years his junior... so 'oldest' rarely fit into the idea; and still Paige resented being called Sammy's kid sister, or little sister, or, that pretty Guthrie girl. All her life she'd idolized her older brother and had never wanted for a second to be anything like the prissy girls in her class. She was a tomboy; which is how she'd eventually fallen in with the 'wrong crowd'...
She'd only been in high school for a week when she met Trace Cunningham. It wasn't a surprise to anyone in town that they ended up going steady... Trace was on his second year as a senior(having been held back on account of an short stay in juvenile hall for stealing his grandfather's chevy) and had a penchant for younger girls. Of the younger girls at Tremont High, Paige had been the prettiest. In spite of her stubborn refusal to wear dresses(or maybe because of it), her wild blonde hair and sky-blue eyes attracted more than the good for nothing Trace; and yet, Trace was the only boy to be seen with her. Couldn't have anything to do with the size of the boy, could it?
On this particular day Paige and Trace lingered outside the Circle K near the highway- just enough outside town that only the state troopers passed by, leaving them free of the prying eyes of County cops who knew their mother's names and thus would call them in for truancy. Trace had his arm around Paige's neck, a cigarette dangling from his fingers as they laughed with some of their friends. The plan was to hang out a few hours more, then take off to Rocky Point with beer their friend Jackie had pilfered from his father's stash in the shed out back. The afternoon had a lazy early-summer heat that made beer and loud music sound just about right.
There was one thing you could say for Sam Guthrie’s car. No, that was wrong. There were several things you could say about his car. The first was that it couldn’t be mistaken for a feat of modern engineering. There were those who said (unkindly, but not inaccurately) that it was mostly powered by a combination of rubber bands and good intentions.
The second thing you could say about the car was that it was orange. Oh yes, there was no doubt about its colour. It made the General Lee look insipid.
The third thing was that as a general rule, people heard Sam arriving long before he actually drove onto the scene. A two-inch bore through exhaust with no silencers would do that. He’d gone through a rebellious phase when he’d been eighteen and got the old jalopy in the first place when he’d liked to slow down alongside folks on the sidewalk, turn the ignition off and then switch it straight back on, causing a back-blow through the exhaust that sounded not unlike his mutation.
Little things, little minds.
Thus it was that the sound of his car came drifting on the air approximately two minutes before the nose of the vehicle rounded the bend.
Paige sighed, rolling her eyes a little more than she likely needed to.
"Gawdammit. Wouldn't ya know Momma's got Sammy after me?" All the kids lifted their heads after the sound of the car on its way towards them.
Trace smirked, making Paige feel like the least cool girlfriend to ever have existed. Fixing a nonchalant look on her flawless features, she shrugged.
"No mattah. I'm gonna go inside and use the can. Y'all just pretend ya don't know him, right?" Sauntering off into the little convenience store, she sweet talked the kid behind the counter into giving her the key, and disappeared into the bathroom.
The orange Guthrie Wagon pulled up outside the Circle K and Sam sort of unfolded out of it. The community was small enough that everyone well knew that the eldest Guthrie boy was a mutant, and whilst they didn’t take kindly to it, he’d never been totally cut out. This was mostly due to the fact that he’d used that same power to save a life.
“I’m lookin’ for my sister, Paige,” he called to the group of kids leaning against the wall. “Any of ya seen her around? I was told she was last seen here.” His eyes turned to look over Trace and his blond brow feathered in suspicion. “Hey, pal, ya seen my little sister?”
The other kids shook their heads no quickly, a short round girl adding in a thick drawling 'nah..' before spitting on the ground.
Trace however, smirked at Sam and took a long drag of his cigarette. He wasn't the sort to lie to avoid a fight; in fact, Trace Cunningham liked himself a fight now and then. He didn't say anything, letting that orange heap of junk make a mess of noise and dust in the parking lot.
“Hey,” said Sam, moving closer to Trace. “I asked ya a question, man, the least ya could do is give me the courtesy of a reply.” His eyes narrowed still further. “Ya that Cunningham boy ain’t ya?” He thrust his hands in his pockets. “I done heard ya been seein’ my sister, so could ya give me an idea where she is?”
Oh yeah. Sam had definitely heard.
Most good southern boys would level with another man, particularly where it concerned a female related to one or both of them. Trace Cunningham was southern; but he wasn't good.
He put his hands in his pockets, too, and shot a look back at Sam. "I been seein'er, but I don't now. Best you be lookin’ at home maybe."
The other kids looked nervous. One of them dodged into the store, not so subtly making her way back to the bathroom.
Sam, on the other hand, was both southern AND good. And he could spot a dirty liar from a hundred paces. All part of the training he’d undergone at Xavier’s Institute, all the psychology stuff. Stay focused, the advice would have been. Stay focused and don’t let them know you’re onto them.
The eldest Guthrie had always performed well in practise sessions, but then none of them had ever focused on his sister’s well-being.
There was the slightest muscle tic, barely perceptible, under his right eye. In his peripheral vision, he spotted the girl sneaking to the bathroom. “I been home,” he said, struggling to keep his voice nonchalant and calm. “She ain’t there. But ya know what? I’m just gonna go buy me a soda in the store there – an’ hey, look! It’s Henry Bell behind the counter! I ain’t seen Henry for weeks! We sure do have a lot to catch up on, looks like I’ll be standin’ around here for a while.”
Trace set his jaw, frowning hard at the older man. "Sure," he said sarcastically, and tossed his cigarette at their feet, walking away towards his pickup. The other teens looked like they hardly knew what to do next.
Henry Bell wasn't an idiot and he liked his job. As much as he'd like to help Paige out in playing truant from school- he'd had days like that himself when he was younger- he wasn't going to lie to a girl's family about where she was. Particularly when she was hanging out with guys like Cunningham.
So when Sam walked into the little convenience store, Henry tossed his head towards the bathroom.
“Thanks, Hank,” said Sam, his face like thunder.
He crossed the distance to the bathroom door, where the girl who had approached to forewarn Paige scurried away as Sam raised his fist and pounded on the wood. “Paige Guthrie, ya get ya bony ass outta that lavatory right now ‘fore I gotta break this door down an’ DRAG ya out.”
To say that he was angry was an understatement. He was incandescent.
"Don't you talk like that ta me Sammy Guthrie, you gonna raise a fuss in public now? Momma'd like that about as much as a kick in the head!" She yelled from inside the bathroom.
Opening the door a few inches, she looked up at him with a flushed face, frowning. "'Heavens sake Sam. I'ma justa havin a day away from school s'all. Don't hafta get your undies up your butt about it."
“But it ain’t just a day away, is it, Paige? Heck, no. Y’all been missin’ far too often from what I do hear tell. An’ ya know what? I’m draggin’ ya straight back for the rest of this afternoon’s classes whether ya wanna go or not.”
Having so said, he caught his sister’s wrist firmly and began hauling her towards the main entrance, much the embarrassed amusement of her peers.
Paige wasn't about to get into a brawl with her brother amongst the aisle at the Circle K, but as they got out onto the sidewalk she threw back her shoulder, doing her best to get free of his grip. All she really did was give herself a nice red indian burn.
"God dammit Sammy, I'm not a little kid anymore!" She hollered, kicking at him. "You lemme go this instant!" Yelling in impotent rage through her teeth, she pushed at him with her free hand. "You meanta tell me you never played a day away from school when you was my age! Lemme GO dammit!"
“No, I never did play a day away from school, ya done forget I went down the mine at fifteen, ya stupid girl. It was only ‘cos of Professor Xavier that I got any kind of proper schoolin’ at all!”
He glared at her furiously. “Ya think I wanna see ya throwin’ good after bad in ya life? No, Paige, I won’t have it. Finish ya schoolin’. Make somethin’ of yaself, ‘cos otherwise where will it end? When ya gonna drop the first of Momma’s grandkids, because that’s where this is all gonna end!”
He got her outside and opened the back door of the orange wreck of a car. “Get in,” he said, in a low, angry tone. “Now.”
"Who you ta tell me, Sammy, look what you done made of YOUR fool self." She shot back, instantly regretting what she'd said. It was just cause to get in though, she looked briefly at Trace, and sat down with a heavy sigh.
Gritting her teeth, she crossed her arms stiffly and kept her eyes out the window as he got in.
"I ain't goin back ta class, Sam. Not a thing they can teach me worth knowin."
Her snipe cut him sharply and he bit back the angry retort. “So don’t end up like me,” was all he said in reply to her words. Finally, however, she sat down and shut up.
For a second or two anyway. Then she said she knew it all.
“Ya gonna graduate, Paige. Ya gotta. If you don’t do it for me, ya gotta do it for Momma. An’ for Daddy. Ya know how he said he hoped the rest of his chilluns would finish school proper an’ not hafta work the mines.”
He craned his head to look over his shoulder at her. “Ya go ahead an’ hate me an’ be angry at me, but don’t let down Momma. She’s so proud of ya.”
She resented having Momma and Daddy thrown in her face as a reason not to go partying with her boy, but that was the trick about using parents dead and alive in an argument; wasn't much you could say against it.
"I hate you Sammy Z Guthrie..." she murmured, looking out the window with tears in her eyes. "I hate you rotten."
“Ya won’t hafta put up with me for much longer,” he told her. “I’m gonna be gettin’ my own place in the next couple months. Wasn’t gonna tell none of ya ‘til dinner, but I’m lookin’ to buy my own apartment. So humour me while I’m still around. If ya wanna wreck ya life, Paige, wait ‘til I ain’t here to be hurt by it, OK?”
He didn’t tell her the reason for moving out. He wasn’t sure how she’d react in this mood.
"S'my life ta wreck," she said weakly, teenage fury lingering on even though she knew he was right.
A few minutes passed and she calmed slowly, mumbling almost too low for him to hear.
"Think you'd know what its like ta have the whole family hopin and prayin ya make somethin of y'self..." she chewed on the inside of her lip for a second. "I'm not lucky enough ta have some fancy power ta make my way in th'world."
“Watch what ya wish for, girl,” said Sam, almost viciously. “’cos ya might just get it. Ya think this is some sorta blessin’? Ya think again, an’ ya think right carefully, too. What damn good did those powers do me when I needed ‘em most, eh? None at all. An’ what has it got me since? Nothin’ but distrust and even hate from people round here.”
He fell into silence.
“Paige, believe me. I reckon y’all are better than that. Make somethin’ of ya life. Y’all are a smart girl, honey. Use them brains now. Take a step back an’ damn well look at this path ya walkin’.”
Almost as an afterthought, he added, “Please.”
Paige just didn't understand what her brother was getting at. What was she but another country girl, destined to become a hairdresser and have a million babies? What else did their Momma become that was so great? Was she proud of herself, or did all those hours of daytime soap operas tell a tale of disappointment and a longing for more than a double wide trailer and a dead husband?
She sighed, wishing there were some other outcome for her. "Ya gonna marry that Brenda, aren't ya." Maybe that's why he was on her about school. He had always liked Brenda's up town accent and her fancy dresses and shoes. Bet that woman'd never worn a pair of blue jeans in her whole life. Mighta broken a nail gettin her tennis shoes tied.
“Yeah, I am marryin’ her,” he said, looking at Paige’s face in the rear-view mirror. “I love her, Paige. I asked her a couple days back. I’d be glad if ya can find it somewhere in that heart of yours to be glad for me, too.”
They headed for the corner to the road that would take them down to the high school. Sam felt far older than his twenty three years as he pulled the car to a halt outside the gates.
“I want more for ya, Paige,” he said, in a sad sort of voice. “I know ya could be one of the ‘Tucky girls who does good for themselves. Look at ya. Pretty as a picture, bright as a button – an’ wastin’ your life on one of those good fer nothin’ Cunningham boys. I can’t control what ya do, I know that.”
He took a deep breath.
“Let me tell ya this, an’ ya pass it on to that beau. He hurts ya, in any way, an’ his ass is mine. I’ll rip him in half, hollow out his head an’ use his skull as an ashtray. I’ll even take up smokin’ to prove the point.”
Paige smiled faintly. "Trace ain't nothing ta be angry bout Sammy." She looked up at the school.
"If you want someone ta take care'a the family cause you're leavin town, then just say so." She looked back at his reflection in the mirror. A blonde eyebrow lifted and she almost sneered.
"I'm gonna take care'a myself too. Don't you worry bout that." She sighed. "You gonna let me out?"
“I’m still gonna take care of y’all. All of ya. Momma too.” He met her eyes in the mirror. “What else do I know how to do?”
With that, he got out of the car and opened the back door. “Ya got two choices,” he said. “I hold ya hand and walk ya back to class, or ya give ya big brother a hug an’ walk into that school with ya head held high.”
Paige got out and looked up at him skeptically. "Ya wouldn't do that...." but she wasn't so sure.
With a smirk that said she wasn't half as mad as she wanted to let on, she put her arms around him and gave him a hug, holding her face to his chest as she used to when she was small.
"I love ya, Sam. Even if y'ar a bit of an ass." She smiled a little.
“Good girl. Love ya too.” He planted a kiss on the top of her blonde head. “Now go. Git.” He gave her his most endearing Sammy-smile. “Go show this town that not all the Guthries are gonna wind up spendin’ the rest of their lives covered in crap. An’ tonight I’m gonna take all of ya out to dinner.” It’d cost him the best part of a month’s salary – he wasn’t that well paid.
She smiled a bit more, making an effort just for him. "Sure, Sammy." Flipping her blonde hair over her shoulder, she ran up the steps and through the door.
