Lorraine Heath Read Free

too.”
    “I don’t want to spend the whole day in bed. If this frog-chokin’ rain stops, I aim to go fishin'.”
    “We’d just be sick till church was over.”
    “Nah, Clay’d make us stay in bed all day just to make sure we wasn’t sick tomorrow. Ain’t worth it, Joe.”
    “But I hate goin’ to church! I hate the way everybody looks at us.”
    “They ain’t lookin’ at us. They’re lookin’ at Clay. ‘Sides, if you do catch ‘em lookin’ at you, you just gotta cross your eyes at ‘em, and they’ll look away.”
    “Is that what you do?” Joe asked, disbelief resounding in his young voice.
    “Heck fire, yeah! Sometimes, it’s even fun. Did it once to old Pruneface, and she started wobblin’ her head like a rooster that was tryin’ to decide whether or not it wanted to crow.”
    “And did Widow Prudence crow?” Clay asked quietly.
    Startled, both boys jerked back in unison, toppling off their respective stools, their legs flying out, kicking the bucket over and spilling milk over the straw.
    “Oh, heck!” Josh cried as he picked up the bucket too late to save much of their effort.
    Clay grabbed the stool the boy had vacated, moved it to the corner, sat, and drew his legs up so he could cross his arms over his thighs. “Joe, Josh, come here and sit down.”
    With their brown eyes focused on him, the boys dropped before him. He resisted the urge to tussle their red hair. Living with his family often made him feel as though he lived with strangers. The boys accepted him because he was their brother. He’d mistakenly thought that was enough.
    He continued to see them as they were the day he left, clutching their mother’s apron and crying. They hadn’t asked any questions that day because they’d been too young to understand what questions needed to be asked. They were older now, but they’d kept their questions and their doubts to themselves. He wondered if they feared the answers. Before he’d left, they’d loved him. He wanted desperately for them to love him again.
    “I want you to tell me the truth because the truth never hurts as much as a lie.” He met each boy’s wide-eyed stare and waited until both boys nodded. “Does it embarrass you to be seen with me in church?”
    The boys slid their gazes toward each other, communicating silently what each felt in his heart. Josh returned his gaze to Clay. “It don’t embarrass us none to be seen with you. We just don’t like the way people stare at us.”
    “Do you know why they stare?”
    ‘"Cuz you’re a coward,” Joe said without hesitation.
    Clay felt as though all six rifles had just fired into his heart. He bowed his head, clasping his hands together until they ached and the knuckles turned white. “Is that what you think?” he asked solemnly. “That I’m a coward? Or is it just what you’ve heard?”
    “It’s what they say at school,” Josh told him.
    “And what Lucian says,” Joe added.
    “Is that what you say?” Clay asked.
    “I tell ‘em it ain’t so,” Josh said.
    Clay lifted his head, his gaze not reflecting the hope cautiously soaring within his heart. “Do you really say that?”
    Slowly shaking his head. Josh screwed his mouth. “I don’t tell ‘em nothin'. Just let ‘em think what they want.”
    A bullet slamming into his chest could not have hurt more. “Do you know what a coward is?” he asked.
    “Someone that runs away.”
    “Did I run?”
    The boys exchanged troubled glances. “Did you?” Josh asked. “Did you run?” “No.”
    “Then how come they think you’re a coward?” “Because I didn’t fight either.” “How come?”
    Clay heaved a sigh. Knowing they would one day ask this question didn’t make it any easier to answer now. “It’s hard to explain, but my conscience wouldn’t let me.”
    “What’s your conscience?”
    “It’s a meeting place for the things your heart feels and the things your head knows. Then they decide what you should believe and how you should