Redwood Bend

matter,” he said. “This is my sister. ”
“Noted,” Dylan said. “And now that I know the situation, I’ll take care of it. And you better back off or you’re going to screw it up for all of us.”
“How do you plan to take care of it?” he demanded.
“That’s going to be between me and Katie. We’ll work it out.”
“Don’t you even think about making her do anything she doesn’t want to do!”
Dylan couldn’t help it, a huff of laughter escaped. In his mind he saw her struggling with the lug nuts, standing up to an angry bear, telling him, Don’t even go there—it is what it is. “Are we talking about the same woman?”
“She was hurt,” he said. “No matter what you said, the way you just dumped her, hurt her. Don’t you do anything to her that makes her cry again. Do you get me?”
“I’m going to do the best I can” was all he promised.
“Your best better be some improvement.”
Dylan was quiet for a long moment. He gathered himself internally. “I know you love her,” he said with as much understanding as he could muster, “but you can’t fix this for her. She has to deal with me because we made this situation together, Katie and I. If you don’t back off, if we don’t make our peace for her sake, it’s going to get more complicated than it needs to be.”
Conner was stubbornly silent, frowning.
At long last Dylan said, “So. How about those Red Sox?”
About an hour after Dylan and Conner shook hands and Dylan walked away down the street, Katie picked him up at Jack’s. When he was sitting beside her in the car she said, “You couldn’t sit on the porch with my brother and have a beer? A friendly conversation?”
“Not today, Katie,” he said. “Soon,” he added.
He wasn’t real happy with the idea that Conner punched him before talking to him. Before they made their peace, Dylan had many things to come to terms with. That was only one of them.
When they were back at the cabin, he made his special pizzas, which were basically a simple bread dough covered with tomato sauce, lots of cheese, some pepperoni and on one, some mushrooms and black olives. He asked the boys to help cover them with stuff. The pizzas couldn’t lose because the boys were involved.
After dinner, he took the boys outside and kicked the soccer ball around with them, though he was wearing boots to their tennis shoes. Then he sat on the porch and watched as they climbed all over the jungle gym. When Katie came outside and sat in the chair next to his he said, “I’m wearing them down for you.” And he smiled.
“What are your plans, Dylan?”
“If you don’t mind, I’d like your couch for a while. I need some time to figure out how to handle our…situation. I want to do the right thing. For many reasons.”
“You do understand that it’s not entirely up to you, right? I have no husband and three children to think about so whatever you come up with, I’ll definitely listen. But you’re not going to decide our lives for us.”
“Can I have the couch?” he asked. “Or not?”
“You can have the couch and the kitchen. You’re a good cook, as it turns out.”
Right now Dylan didn’t want to be distracted—he wanted to figure out how he felt and what he should ultimately do with his life. The day after his forced handshake with Conner, he drove down the mountain and checked in with Lang. All was status quo in Payne, Lang assured him. So he texted his grandmother, the agent working on his movie contract, Jay Romney, Lang, Sue Ann and Stu— I’m staying in the mountains for a few days and cell reception isn’t great. I’ll check in when I can, but might be out of touch. No problems, just out of touch. I’ll be in touch when I’m back in service. Thanks.
And then he turned off the phone.
Over the next several days Dylan hung pretty tight to Katie and the boys, stayed close to the cabin except for errands. When he wanted to go off on his own he made Katie promise not to have a standoff with any wildlife, especially the bear. He went to the larger towns for groceries, more than happy to be responsible for dinner.
The one thing that kept him on the couch and from sneaking into Katie’s room at night or from begging her to make love while the boys were at school was the fact that he felt he had their entire lives to figure out before he could think about things like that. He also thought there was a good possibility she might clobber him.
But Dylan had plenty of confidence in other