The Man and The Outlaw

Chapter Five

They rode out of sight of the station and towards the outer edge of Spencer where houses lay in clusters. The sky above them was a constant drum in their ears and the rain had started to fall harder, soaking through their clothes and hats with merciless ease. It would make for miserable riding. Clara knew they needed to find a place to stay for the night, but she doubted the motel back towards Main Street would put up much of a fight for them if the sheriff she'd left still loopy came around looking for them.
And he will, she told herself with cruel certainty. She thought she had a good idea of what that particular man was made of, and she knew the type, knew that they took to shame or embarrassment like a dog took to the vet, not very well. Without a doubt, he would be more embarrassed than angered by what she'd done (though the two were closely intertwined) and would do his reasonable best to track her down if they stayed in town. They needed some place safe, some place dry.
"Loren," she started, her throat catching at the thought of what she must ask him. They'd slowed to a steady walking pace once they felt safe enough and Loren turned his head to look at her. She seemed to detect in his eyes a glimmer of something like betrayal or pain. He too knew that the rain wasn't going to stop anytime soon, that the sheriff would be after them, that Walker, who had started coughing more consistently as the air grew cooler and wetter, would not do well in these conditions, that none of them really would. He was not an idiot, though he didn't speak often enough around other folks to inspire confidence of that fact in them. He knew exactly what she was going to ask him and, for the briefest of moments, he hated her for it.
"We need a place to bed down for the night," she started again, trying to urge more confidence in her tone as she went, "someplace friendly, someplace where we'll be safe, where we can be sure no one will leak word about a silvertongue posse to anybody else around."
"Guess you must know such a place, huh?" Walker scoffed in between coughs and Loren shot him a stiffening glare that went unnoticed as the former smothered his face in his hands to try and silence himself.
"Couldn't we just try and..."
"No, Clara, we can't. I won't," Loren growled at her, his face darkening beneath his hat so much that he could've resembled the man on the poster in Clara's pocket if his skin tone had been a shade or two darker.
"It's the best option we've got," she shot back quickly, "unless of course you'd rather sleep with your head in the mud."
"That don't sound too fun, Lore," Walker chimed in with a quiet chuckle. On the second attempt, he caught the full force of Loren's glare and needed no help to fall immediately silent.
"It's one night, Lore. What happened that was so bad between you two that you can't stand one night of each other?" She studied her old friend carefully, assessing the holes in her knowledge of his recent past that would rectify the confusion she was feeling. Loren brooded, looking more and more like an animal caught in a hunter's trap.
"I won't set foot there again, Clara. I mean it," he told her, but she could hear in his voice that reason, along with the fact that they were all drenched to the bone already, was whittling away his willpower.
"It's only one night," she repeated and, as if God himself was on her side, the rain came down harder, pelting their backs furiously. Walker shivered beside her, but Clara would not look away from Loren.
Finally, he scowled and rubbed his face with both hands, working his jaw back and forth before jerking the reigns on his horse and heading off towards the nearest cluster of houses to their right.
"When she slams the door in our faces, don't say I didn't warn you," he called to Clara as she and Walker followed after him at a good distance.
Loren led them to a small, gray house huddled in the middle of what appeared to be a dying neighborhood. The houses around them were boarded up and falling apart, paint peeling and wood rotting from years of neglect and abandonment. One of them even looked to have been partially burned down, the flames guttering out halfway through the job, whether by divine or human intervention Clara did not know. She saw no sign of any other living creature, no horses, squirrels, dogs, or people for that matter.
Amongst all this, the little gray house shone like the moon in a dark night sky scene. The paint appeared to have been redone not even a year ago, there were blooming flowers and rose bushes in the flower beds along the front of the house, and a cute set of rocking chairs teetered in the wind on the front porch. The driveway that branched off the house had been fenced in, equipped with a locked gate, and a good bedding of straw had been scattered over the top of the concrete pad. There was a water trough at the end closest to the garage of the house and feed buckets attached midway up the fence at three different points around it. With cars falling out of use, the home's owner had seen to it that any visitors might have a place to safely leave their animals while they stayed.
Catching sight of this, Clara couldn't help but smile. She should've expected nothing less from the sharp, considerate woman she knew to abide within the home. Peering back up at the house, Clara could make out a shadowed figure lit on the blinds by the inside light, bustling around inside.
Loren unlocked the gate of the makeshift paddock, as Clara imagined he'd done a million times before, and the three of them ushered their horses inside, peeling off their saddles, sodden and heavy with the rain, and shouldering them to traipse back towards the house. Loren looked a little surprised that she hadn't changed the gate code since the last time he'd been there. He'd warned her to change it often enough that no one keeping watch on it would have much opportunity to break in and steal a horse that might be inside. She hadn't listened to him, of course and he appeared to turn a light shade of grin as he turned towards the house and the window where the woman's shadow remained, unaware she had three uninvited guests outside.
They slung their saddles over the front porch railing, and, from the edge of the lawn, Loren gestured for Clara to go on up to the door ahead of him, his free hand shoved deep in his pocket and a flush on his cheeks. He was no longer allowing himself to look at the window or the house and Clara felt a surge of guilt wash over her. If they'd had any other choice, she wouldn't have pressed it, but they didn't. Walker cleared his throat nervously beside her, trying to avoid another coughing fit, and looking very unsure of what he was to expect next when that door opened. Clara rapped on it lightly and followed the progression of the shadow as it stopped suddenly and crossed three other windows on its way to answer her knock.
Loren made a small, guttural noise in his throat from behind them as the door swung open and Clara met a familiar face in Mae Reynolds.
She was a very short woman, maybe 5'2" with her shoes on, and her long dark hair flowed freely down past her hips. She wore a gray sweatshirt with a faded thunderbird symbol on the front and blue jeans over tan house slippers. Her brown eyes flashed brightly at the sight of Clara on her porch, and she threw her arms open wide. They had not seen each other in over two years.
"Clara! What are you doing here?" Mae exclaimed as the two women hugged one another. Suddenly, she held Clara at arm's length and her eyes softened. Clara, sensing what was coming, braced herself.
"I'm so sorry about your dad," Mae told her, and Clara nodded acceptingly, trying to keep a knot from forming in her throat. Mae, realizing her friend's emotions, rushed on quickly.
"What brought you this way? Who's your friend?"
Clara stepped aside as Walker held out his hand to Mae.
"This is Walker Merrill, the man from Brandle who was in the paper a little while back," Clara told her as they shook hands in greeting. Upon hearing who he was and realizing what he'd done, Mae pulled Walker into a hug just as big as the one she'd given Clara. He was caught off-guard by this and powerless to stop it but hugged her back as the squeeze overtook him.
"It's very nice to meet you Walker," Mae said, finally relinquishing him from her grasp.
"My other friend, I think you know," Clara said uncertainly, turning her body to reveal to Mae a straight shot down the porch steps where Loren lingered anxiously in the rain.
It was as if someone had flipped a switch somewhere in Mae's head at the sight of Loren Winchester. Her face clouded, matching that of the sky above them, and she glowered at him with such intensity that Clara could almost feel the heat of it. Loren shrunk further into himself and offered a feeble wave without looking at her.
"Hiya Mae," he mumbled.
She was off the porch before anybody knew what was happening. They both stood there in the pouring rain, Mae poking Loren in the chest and shouting at him and Loren, all 6'4" of him, towering over her with that guilt sick look on his face, flinching each time her fingertip made contact with him. Mae was soaked in seconds but still she went on and on at him.
"How dare you come back here Loren Winchester! What were you thinking showing up like this after what you did to me? You won't set one foot in that house, I swear it! Just try and I'll show you how good with a gun I've become!"
There were tears on Mae's face, mixing with the rain, and Clara could tell it nearly caused Loren physical pain to see them there. Her own guilt overtook her then, it had been her idea to come in the first place, and she stepped off the porch and grabbed Mae around the arm, pulling her away.
"I'm the one who said we should come here; he wanted no part of it. It wasn't his fault. Let's just go inside Mae," Clara suggested calmly.
"He's not coming in, Clara. I can't stand to have him in there," she bawled, anger and frustration mingling with a sudden sorrow that caused her to tremble. Her soaked clothes did not help, and Clara put an arm around her and began leading her back to the house where it was dry and warm.
Looking back over her shoulder at Loren, she called to him, "You just hang out here on the porch for a bit, alright? I'll talk to her."
Loren looked resigned to stand in the yard for the rest of eternity, slumped like an old statue in the rain. Walker hesitated between the two parties as Clara led Mae into the house. He looked a question at Loren who merely shrugged and nodded for him to go on. With heavy reluctance, Walker followed the women inside and closed the door behind him.
It took a while to get Mae calmed down and dried off. They left Walker in the living room to loiter around, awkwardly trying not to drip on anything, and Clara helped Mae into some dry clothes while she sobbed.
Clara couldn't figure what it was that Loren had done to cause all this. A year ago, they had been happy as far as she knew. Even when he'd come to see her after her father's passing, Loren had made no mention of any rift between them. Clara rubbed Mae's arms gently as her sobs became sniffles and hiccups.
"Mae..." she began tentatively, "what happened? I...well, I thought you two were happy together not too far back."
Mae looked at her with red-rimmed eyes that swelled with tears again. Clara's stomach clenched. She hadn't meant to get her all upset once more. She continued to pat her arm and hug her, not knowing if she would ever get the answer, or even if she really wanted to know. Whatever it was Loren had done, it could not be good.
Finally, Mae took a shaky breath.
"He l-left me," she whimpered, her voice threatening to break with each syllable she uttered. "He j-just...just disappeared one n-night, not long after y-your...your dad. I n-never heard from h-h-him again."
Clara's mind raced. Not long after her dad? He'd just disappeared, ran out on her? And showed up back at her place with a story about how they'd broken up and how he didn't want to talk about it. She hadn't pressed him. She'd been too caught up in her new idea. How could she have been so stupid? How could he?
"I thought...I t-thought he loved me," Mae moaned and dissolved into sobs again.
"I'll fix this," Clara whispered and squeezed her tightly.