Chapter Thirty-Nine

Hank

Now

It was nothing against Idaho in particular; he guessed it was as good a state as any, the scenery nice enough and the meal he’d just ingested decent and satisfying—but he just wanted to get to Oregon. If he’d been on a trip of leisure, he might’ve visited Yellowstone because folks always had the park on their bucket list. But Hank only wanted one thing before he—hopefully, not anytime soon—kicked the bucket. He wanted to get to Florence. He wanted to get to Finn. Now that he’d made up his mind, he couldn’t get there fast enough, his old yellow Ford F-150 pushing the speed limit more than once.

Did he have any grand master plan worked out for when he arrived in Florence? Nope, not really. The only thing guiding him along those endless stretches of road was the echo of Finn’s words in that letter. ‘ Please, Hank. When you’re ready. Come take my breath away.’ And he was r eady. Still stupefied that he , Hank, had the ability to take anyone’s breath away, let alone Finn’s, but ready, nonetheless.

“You ready for a refill, mister? One more for the road?” The nice waitress, whose name tag read Loreen, smiled at him. She’d kept her distance aside from taking his order and bringing him his food, her long-acquired people skills probably telling her that Hank was not amongst the most talkative of her clientele.

“Sure, sweetheart,” he offered, holding out his cup, rewarding her kindness with a half-hearted smile in return. Her face immediately lit up, the generic endearment earning him some extra points, her near-black eyes spilling over with warmth. Loreen must’ve taken it as a small invitation, because she tilted her head, nibbling on her bottom lip.

“You’re welcome, handsome.” She winked, no undertones of anything remotely flirtatious, just well-rehearsed service-mindedness that was sure to have secured her a fair amount of tips over the years. “So, where’re you headin’, mister? Business or pleasure?”

Necessity , Hank wanted to say. I need to get to Oregon. Seems my heart went there, and now I just wanna get it back. But of course, he didn’t say that because that wasn’t what Loreen was asking. She wasn’t interested in his tale of woe. Her salary was hardly that great. This wasn’t some rural, gay version of Pretty Woman where he would tell the diner staff about Finn, and they would offer to bake an I LOVE YOU. PLEASE TAKE ME BACK cake , the jukebox version of Bryan Adams’ Please Forgive Me blasting in the background. The good folk of small-town Idaho were hardly going to roll out the rainbow-colored carpet to send Hank off on his get-my-boy-back mission.

“Oregon,” he settled on instead. “Just always wanted to see the ocean.” He shrugged because that was at least some version of the truth.

“Oh, honey, it’s nice,” Loreen smiled dreamily. “You’re gonna love it.” She pulled a cloth from her apron pocket and wiped a few coffee stains from the laminate table. “You got any family there?”

“No, not exactly,” Hank mumbled, tracing his index finger around the polished rim of the coffee cup.

“Oh, I see,” Loreen cooed, a shadow of sympathy coasting across her face, and Hank suddenly realized that she was probably a bit older than the mid-forties he’d initially taken her for. “You’ve got some sweetheart there?”

“Yeah, somethin’ like that,” Hank chuckled, his gaze flickering between the steam curling from his cup and Loreen’s face.

“Don’t worry, hon.” She patted his shoulder. “She’ll take you back in a heartbeat. Handsome fella like yourself. Nice too. She’d be a damn fool not to.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he shrugged, not even raising a brow at Loreen’s assumption that Finn was a she . Why wouldn’t she? And then he just thought, what the heck? There was something near-hypnotic about the subdued voices and clatter of cutlery in the rundown diner. Loreen’s trust-evoking face the final straw that made him want to share this small truth about himself. Hell, the locals were hardly going to run him out of town, pitchforks raised and all. And it wasn’t like he was ever going to visit Hill City again. “Actually, they're a he ,” he murmured carefully, searching Loreen’s face for any trace of disgust or disapproval. “Finn.”

“Oh.” Loreen raised a carefully groomed black eyebrow. “Ohhh,” she drew out. “Finn, you say?” she smiled knowingly at Hank. “As in Huckleberry?”

“Yes,” Hank sighed a breath of relief.

“Such a pretty name,” she purred, fluttering her eyelashes. Then she grew all solemn and Hank thought she might be appalled after all. Holding up a cherry-red tipped finger, Loreen nibbled on her bottom lip. “Don’t say anythin’. Let me guess. Pretty brown eyes,” she said, tapping her bottom lip with her finger. “Not the deep chocolate kind, but more like the brown of the bottom of the river. You know what I’m talkin’ about? When the sun shines through the water and hits the bottom,” she squinted at Hank like the sun was, in fact, blinding her. And Hank could only nod because, yes, he knew exactly what she was talking about and the small hairs at the back of his neck rose. “And he’s a blond, your guy.” His guy. “But not a golden blond, more like a straw blond, like a field lit up by the harvest moon, you know?” Loreen hummed, and for a second, Hank questioned if he was even awake or if he was still in that key lime-colored motel room Colton had booked for him, fast asleep, deeply engulfed in some ’70s mystery movie-like dream where people spoke in tongues.

“Yeah, I know,” Hank whispered, a chill moving down his spine, his eyes burning. Heck, his throat was burning, too, as if he’d gotten an acute case of laryngitis.

“Now, I might be wrong, but I get a feelin’ your man’s younger than you. Like, a lot younger. No offense,” she added quickly. “There’s just somethin’ about his voice, all… lofty and such. Youthful.”

“None taken,” Hank replied. “And he is. By a lot.”

“Well, mister, ain’t you a lucky son of a gun?” she squeezed Hank’s shoulder. Then she leaned in, adding conspiratorially like she and Hank belonged to the same international fellowship. “Got a young one myself at home. Chet. Boy, you should see my sisters, all green with envy, the first time I brought his perky tight end around for Sunday lunch. The look on those bitches’ faces, I tell ya. I don’t know what was greener, the collard greens or their ugly mugs,” she howled, throwing her head back.

Hank failed to stop a loud laugh from bursting from his lips, causing a local farmer to look up from his newspaper before apparently deciding he couldn't care less about the mid-morning ruckus.

“It’s true,” Loreen laughed too, her eyes crinkling adorably, her black hair flopping into her forehead before she brushed it away with the back of her hand. “Snatched him right outta college, that one. Got a good head on his shoulders, my Chet baby. Works for a good law firm up in Boise. Never knew what he saw in an ol’ gal like me, but I guess you ain’t gotta be Susan Sarandon to have your cake and eat it.”

“Susan Sarandon?” Hank asked, curious where this was going.

“Yessir. You never saw that movie? It’s my favorite. That young James Spader. Mmh hmm, don’t mind if I do. And I did!” she laughed, slamming her hand against her left thigh. “Not that my Chet looks anythin’ like James Spader, more like a young Sidney Poitier, but you get my drift. White Palace. ”

“White Palace?”

“Yes, that’s the title. You ain’t ever seen that movie, mister?”

“Nope, can’t say I have.”

“Well, you sure are missin’ out on somethin’. You watch it with that young man of yours.” She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

“Yeah, we’ll see,” Hank mumbled.

“Hey now, what’s with the face? You know what the best thing that I ever did was? Changed my life, that’s for sure.” Loreen spoke without waiting for Hank’s reply. “I stopped questioning my good fortune, for one. And I keep walkin’ past all the open windows. Now there’s another movie for ya,” she drifted off briefly, wistfulness washing over her face. Then her eyes darkened. “Before Chet, I had a man who’d beat me black and blue every chance he got. Never needed an excuse to rearrange my face. Always thought I’d done somethin’ to deserve it, just like my momma and her momma before her. Never did question it, just took it. Then one day, my Chet walked in here with his college friends. Took one look at my beat-up face, and then he pulled me aside. Just over there,” she nodded at the small hallway leading to the restrooms. “You know what he said, mister?” Hank shook his head because how could he know? Although, the expression on Loreen’s face told him it must’ve been life-altering.

“He said,” she started, pausing to wipe her eyes, “‘ I don’t know you, ma’am, but I know you don’t deserve that. No one does. ’ Just like that, mister. Without knowing me, he told me somethin’ that no one had ever told me before, least of all myself.”

‘ How is it that you think there’s no room for your ugly broken parts when you accept mine so easily and unconditionally ?’ Finn’s words slammed into him, blending with Loreen’s, the truth of them finally settling in his bones.

“So yes, eleven years, come May. That’s how long I’ve been married to my Chet.”

Eleven years. Hank couldn’t help but wonder where he and Finn would be in eleven years. If they would even be together by then. Deciding to meet Loreen’s openness with vulnerability in return, Hank said, “I don’t even know if he’ll want me back.”

“Now, why you say that, mister? Of course he will. It’s not like you did anythin’ wrong, did ya now?”

“More like somethin’ I didn’t do.”

“What, honey?” she coaxed, placing her hand on her broad hip.

“I never told him how I felt about him. Feel about him. I let him leave without lettin’ him know.”

“Oh, he knows. I’m sure he does.”

“Yeah, I ain’t so sure about that.”

“It’s like my Ghanaian nana used to say. ‘ The best way to cut an elephant in your path is to cut him up into little pieces. ’”

“What now?” Hank shook his head, the words of wisdom coming from Loreen’s mouth getting increasingly incredulous.

“It means the best way to solve a problem is to take it bit by bit. First, you get there. Then, when you stand in front of him— your Finn—you’ll know what to say to win him back. If you do, in fact, need to win him back.” She rubbed at her left cheek, talking more to herself than to Hank. “Somethin’ tells me he’s already yours.”

“So, what you’re sayin’ is that I should cut up an elephant?” Hank laughed as he rose from the booth, pulling a few bills from his pants pocket. Loreen laughed too, as she reached to put his coffee cup on top of his empty plate. Counting out the bills, he added a generous tip and placed the stack of bills in the middle of the table. He guessed advice like the one he’d just gotten handed to him was worth an extra-large tip.

Maneuvering himself out of the booth, he came to stand in front of Loreen. Tipping his well-loved cap, he smiled, suddenly feeling emotional as if he were bidding an old friend goodbye. Then he cleared his throat.

“Mighty nice meetin’ ya, Ms. Loreen. An honor, in fact,” he added. “Thank you for… you know…” he murmured.

“Nice meetin’ you too, honey,” she cooed. Then he turned, heading for the door. He’d just stepped his right foot outside on the sidewalk, feeling the sun on his face, when Loreen called out after him. “And don’t forget now! Keep walkin’ past the open windows, Hank!” Without turning, he nodded, as he took another step out into the bright mid-morning light, closing the door softly behind him.