Pie Town by Lynne Hinton Read Free Book Online

should just get back together. Then maybe he wouldn’t come around here so much and you’ll quit being so bossy.”
    Malene took the cloth and folded it, adding it to the supplies she had gathered. “Thank you, Christine. I’ll keep your advice in mind the next time I have a minute to think about Roger and me.” And she headed out of the nurses’ station and down the hall to finish her work.

Chapter Seven
    I t makes a little rattle when I rev up the engine.” Oris was talking to Frank, the town mechanic. Frank had his head under the hood, listening for the noise Oris had called about earlier that morning when he made an appointment for an oil change.
    “Hit the gas again,” Frank called out, and Oris bore down on the pedal.
    Frank waited a second and then finally pulled his head out and closed the hood. “I don’t hear it, Oris. It sounds fine.” He wiped his hands on the rag he had hanging from his back pocket, then held the rag and waited. He was tall, and he wore his black hair in a long ponytail that hung down his back.
    “Listen again. I swear there’s a rattle.” Oris was seated behind the wheel of his new Buick. He revved up the engine again and waited.
    Frank shook his head, confirming what he had just said—he couldn’t hear anything.
    “I thought you Indians could hear things the rest of us couldn’t.” Oris turned off the engine and swung his legs around, placing his feet on the ground. It was hot and he was sweating.
    Frank walked over to Oris. “That’s your wife’s people, Zuni, they’re the trackers, the ones with good ears. For us, it’s just another myth, Oris, just like the one that claims we aren’t good at business. You owe me twenty dollars for the oil change.” He stood next to the open door. Frank was Navajo, and his family had been in Catron County for generations.
    “I was told that my oil changes were free for the first year of ownership,” Oris responded. He stepped out of the car. “You see the size of the trunk?” he asked.
    Frank rolled his eyes. He had seen the trunk.
    “If you take it back to the dealership in Albuquerque. Do I look like I sell Buicks here?” Frank asked, glancing around at his garage.
    Oris reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. He fished out a twenty-dollar bill and handed it to the other man. “What happened to the good old days when we traded in tobacco and animal skins?” he asked, putting his wallet back. He yanked up his pants and stuck his thumbs in his belt loops.
    Frank took the money and stuffed it in the front pocket of his coveralls. He wiped his hands again and returned the rag to his back pocket. “We got screwed is what happened. Now it’s cash only, my friend.” He winked at Oris.
    “How’s your mother?” Oris asked. “I haven’t seen her since the graduation.” He recalled seeing all of Frank’s family when Frank’s son graduated from high school. Even though Oris didn’t have any young people in his family finishing school, he liked to attend the special ceremonies. He went every year just to see how the children had grown.
    “My mother and all my family are well, thank you,” Frank replied. “They don’t travel much in the summer. They stay up in the mountains where it’s cool.”
    “And your boy,” Oris hesitated, trying to recall the name. “Raymond,” he remembered. “He still heading off to the army later this month?”
    Frank nodded. “Getting ready to go to boot camp, and against my better wishes,” he answered. “But what’s a father to do?” He shrugged.
    Oris leaned against his car and then pulled away because of the heat. “He’ll get a good salary, learn a decent trade. It’s not all bad, the military I mean.”
    Frank didn’t respond.
    “Could be worse,” Oris noted. “Could be screwed up on drugs, locked up in jail, living with hippies in Taos.”
    Frank looked at Oris. They both knew he was talking about his granddaughter Angel.
    Frank had not asked about