Page 8 of Cannon
“How’d you know I was hungry?” she asked around a mouthful of food.
Her dad looked at her and just chuckled.
“Because every time your mom was pregnant, she was always hungry once she was past the nausea. I remember making her a snack at three in the morning because she woke up and was hungry.”
Jesse continued chewing, finishing her sandwich in a couple bites. She motioned to the drink.
“For me?”
He nodded. She picked it up and opened the lid, sniffing what was inside. She couldn’t smell anything, so she took a tentative sip. Ice cold ginger ale hit her tastebuds. Perfect. She sipped as her dad drove silently across the compound. They used to call this their farm, but once they bought the land between the Bluff Creek compound and their land, it had all become the compound. Her dad crested the little hill to the tree with the small fence around it. Within a week of burying her mom, her dad had made a wooden bench wide enough for six people to sit on. He’d wanted a space where all the girls could come tovisittheir mom. The first year, they all visited a lot. Over the years, at different times, Jesse had come here.
But she hadn’t come here since she found out she was pregnant. She wasn’t sure why, or maybe she didn’t want to examine it too closely.
Her dad parked the side-by-side and then got out and walked around it to Jesse’s side. He held his hand out and she placed hers in his rough hand. Her dad had run the bail bonds for years and taught his girls everything he knew. Even when he’d been grieving for her mom, he’d still worked to make sure their life was the same. He opened the gate and led her through to the bench. He placed the flowers in the vase he’d installed on her headstone. Then he sat beside her and slid his arm around her.
“I come here to talk to your mom a lot. After so many years of marriage, I couldn’t just not tell her what was going on. You can just sit here and listen, or you can talk too if you want.”
Jesse nodded and looked into her dad’s eyes. She wasn’t sure what he wanted, but she’d listen and be here for him.
“Kathryn, it’s been a week. In fact, I honestly didn’t think anything could rival what went on when War and Remi got together, but then everything happened with Bear and Winnie. Then Scoop and Sarah had their adventure. Well, this last week has been wild.
Let me start with Sunday lunch. It seems our next to youngest has been keeping a secret and Cannon didn’t take kindly to it when he found out. I don’t think I’ve ever been as mad at a man as I was at him. The only thing holding me back from beating him within an inch of his life is that he’s the father of our grandchild. I mean, Jesse must have liked him at least a little for him to be the father. Once I got over the anger at Cannon, I have to admit I cried. I sat in what used to beourbedroom. Yep, we’re getting another grandchild. Each grandchild I’m blessed with, I ache for you to be here with me.” Her dad’s voice trailed off fora minute while he fished a handkerchief out of his pocket. He wiped his eyes and then his nose.
Jesse was fighting the tears too.
“That night, a truck deliberately hit Cannon while he was riding his motorcycle. He’s come through surgery but will have some time he’ll need to recover. So you’re up to where we are today and the reason we’re here is because I feel completely unprepared. Pumpkin is going to have her own little pumpkin. Can you believe it? It seems like yesterday they were placing her in my arms. Even though she was our fourth and you’d think I’d be an old hand at it, I remember being so scared I couldn’t be the dad she needed. But it was always easy having you with me. I want to support her. I’m so proud of her for all she’s done on her own with this pregnancy. I’d give anything to have you here. You always knew what to say to the girls to get them through hard times. I’ve watched Jesse grow over the years and I know she’ll be a great mom to a boy or girl. She’ll teach them to stand strong in the face of adversity just like she has. But how do I help her?”
Her dad paused and Jesse leaned over on his shoulder. “You’re already helping me, Dad. I was worried you’d be mad at me for getting pregnant.”
Her dad chuckled. “Why would I be mad? We need another generation for the bail bonds, and I want to get to do all the fun things this time around without the discipline.”
Jesse closed her eyes and breathed in the unique smell of her dad. His soap and the cologne he used, along with the smell of the outdoors. She didn’t know why she’d worried about her dad being mad at her. He’d always had her back, even when she might do something stupid. Like the time she and Beth crawled up to the roof of the diner and threw rotten tomatoes down at the snotty girl that was mean to her and Beth in high school. She still remembered him walking into the sheriff’s station because she and Beth might have miscalculated how mad the girl’s dad,who was the sheriff, would be. When he’d asked the girls why they’d done it, the truth had come out about the girl pinching Beth when she walked down the hallways and also spreading rumors about her. The sheriff had been appalled when her dad asked what the sheriff was going to do about his own daughter. When the sheriff’s reply had been nothing, her dad had worked to have someone else run for sheriff the next year. The girl and the former sheriff had moved at the end of the school term since he didn’t have a job.
“Mom, I’m pregnant and I wish more than anything you could be here. I know you’d have the best advice on how to deal with the baby’s father. But I’ve got Dad and I’ve got my sisters. You raised us to meet every obstacle head on and I’m finally ready to do that. I’m going to hope I can be half as good a mom as you were because we had the best childhood. I will always be grateful for you supporting every dream I had.”
She sat and watched the tree limbs sway in the breeze, listening to the silence. Her mom would tell her to fight for what she wanted. What if she wasn’t sure what she wanted?
“I better get you back so you can show those young women how fierce they can be.”
Her dad stood and held out his hand to help her up. If there was one thing she was going to enjoy about everyone knowing about the baby, she wouldn’t have to hide how hard it was to do certain things. She could get a couple people helping in the garage because there were certain things that were physically impossible now.
Chapter Six
Cannon scratched his nose. Everything was itchy. His skin itched inside the casts. His head itched and even though they’d used dry shampoo on his hair, he freaking smelled. A nasty mixture of stale man, antiseptic and sweat.
He was completely rethinking making everything work with Jesse. He knew what he’d thought on the road, but heck, he’d thought it was the end. Now, after being relatively clear-headed again, he was reconsidering what he was supposed to do.
He didn’t want to be a dead-beat dad, but he should never have had the option of being a dad. He should have gone through with that vasectomy he’d considered in his thirties. War and Bear had talked him out of it with the what if you met the perfect person argument. Plus, having a doctor snipping down there skeeved him out. What if they missed and he never made wood again?
It didn’t really matter now because Jesse was pregnant and not just a little pregnant but a lot pregnant. He’d calculated andshe was around six months. Clara had tried to explain this whole nine months versus forty weeks, but it just made his head hurt. He’d nodded and acted like he understood but he didn’t.
He was a little stronger, and the doctor had indicated Cannon might get to go home this week sometime. It probably helped that he had Stella and Flick offering to be on call for him. Thinking through how he could possibly shower in his room at the clubhouse worried him. What he wouldn’t give to submerge in a tub! He wasn’t a bath man but the thought of actually getting clean and having the hot water against his sore muscles was very attractive.
He really liked Clara. She was younger than his grandma had been, but Clara had a lot of the same characteristics of caring for people and the way she wanted to talk stuff out.
He was a little concerned that she was getting ready to have a chat with him. She asked him before she left for lunch what his plans were when they got back to Bluff Creek. Saying he wanted to kick back with a beer in a recliner hadn’t been the answer she was looking for. She didn’t understand, though, that he didn’t grow up talking about his feelings. His dad wouldn’t have stood for it, and Cannon wouldn’t have been able to sit for a week if he’d shared. When he was with his grandma, he was just so happy to have food and a clean, bug-free place to stay; he didn’t want to rock the boat by talking about sad stuff.
Clara walked back in with a grocery bag and a container of food. Cannon caught a whiff of Chinese food and fought not to drool. He was so tired of hospital food. He’d been spoiled by being at Bluff Creek and eating Regina’s food.