drabble - Sense
Saturday, Nov 7, 2009 10:50PM / Standard Entry
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Sense Sometimes, Lureen thought, she didn't have the sense God gave a goose. Here Jack was, after driving for days all told, back from hunting, not that she had much sympathy for a man being tired out from waiting for some animal to walk into his bullets, but Jack had gone from that part of his trip over to his folks' place, helped them for a week with the brunt of calving season, and she wasn't so far removed from ranch living not to know how wearing that was. But still she'd gone ahead and told her folks, sure, they'd join them for dinner, since Grandma Newsome was visiting over from Dalhart. So they were driving to the restaurant, the decision to go out to dinner each night of her visit another in a long string of slaps from Grandma Newsome at her mama's cooking, to spend a few hours that would seem like years with a woman who wore out Lureen at the best of times, and she had to love her, or at least she was supposed to. Jack was just fullfilling an obligation. I appreciate this, honey, she said, reaching across Bobby, giving Jack a quick squeeze on his arm, stretched out tense to the wheel. Jack shook himself like he was waking up, Lureen thinking he'd been concentrating on driving, sleepy as he was. He glanced at her, smiled, said, Sure enough, wouldn't think of leaving you on your own to sit through three courses of advice, with an extra helping of good ol' common sense for dessert. They both broke out laughing, Lureen relieved that maybe this evening wouldn't be so bad after all, knowing she could look across at Jack and know someone else was feeling the same as her, Jack amazed that he could still laugh, and pretend, when every sense was straining north, where Ennis was.
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