My House Or Yours?. Lass Small

the farmers from the north wintering in TEXAS were called Snow Birds. The snow birds fly south, and so do the idle farmers. Well, actually they don’t all fly, they mostly just drive motor homes down. Now the Yankee farmers are called Winter TEXANS and they are included as citizens. Contributing citizens. They help the economy.

      Without comment, the two idlers viewed the havoc wrought by intruding entrepreneurs on Padre Island. It was filled with high rise condos and hotels on either side of the sand island. And there were paved double highways down the middle of the sandbar. In all of that south TEXAS land, the buildings were a surprise. The rest of the area wasn’t so intruded upon.

      The visiting pair drove over into Mexico and went through the shops. They bought wooden toys beautifully colored-tops, flutes and cups to catch an attached ball and yo-yos. They bought rawhide vests that were lined with sheep wool.

      Chad bought Jo a designer watch, and a toad purse with a zipper on its stomach.

      She was unsure about the zippered toad.

      He explained in his class lecturing voice, “It’s a prince frog. When you kiss it, it will become a prince. For this metamorphosis, you have to take it to bed with you.”

      She gave him a careful look.

      Chad frowned with false impatience. “Don’t you remember the fairy tale?”

      She said sober faced, “Yeah. Sure.”

      “I’ll explain when we get home.”

      He did keep mentioning they would be going “home” to Indiana.

      But she knew better. They would part long before that could ever happen.

      In Mexico, she bought a dress that was swirly and colorful, and she bought him a white, loose, cotton, beautifully embroidered pullover shirt. With it were slim black trousers.

      They bought huaraches, the leather strip woven, flat shoes that are so squeaky and interesting. And comfortable.

      She found a blue felt jacket that was embroidered with yarn. It was just right. There were two pockets for her hands. The edges of the sleeves and the jacket were cross-stitched with the yarn of the decorations. It was different.

      They returned the short distance to the Rio Grande, crossed back over the river into their own country and drove back to their hotel on Padre Island.

      They dressed for supper. They were so companionable and intimate that Jo thought of their marriage. Had they ever had this easy closeness? This comfortable silence?

      In all that time, she’d wanted the companionship that was then between them. When had they ever had the time to be silent friends? They’d had just beensilent. Either that or talking about some student who worried Chad. Then the conversation had been his verbal thinking on how to help or alter directions for the troubled one.

      At that time, why hadn’t she said to Chad, “I’m not oriented. I’m unsure. I need help.” She never had. She’d listened. She hadn’t even been old enough to have opinions to help. She hadn’t had the ideas to contribute. Nor had she known how to discuss her isolation.

      He had felt he was sharing.

      She had felt left out, left behind, lacking in experience.

      So did she now have the experience to help out? To listen? To observe?

      Jo looked at her ex-husband. He was miles away. He was thinking about something else altogether. She could not hold his attention, even now.

      He caught her observation. He said, “What would you think about coming back to Indiana with me? You are so self-confident now, that I believe you could handle being a prof’s wife. Let’s see, shall we? I want you back. I’ve missed you like bloody hell.”

      “How could anyone miss anything ‘like bloody hell’ and actually want it? That sounds quite awful.”

      “That’s how it’s been for me since you left.”

      “You’ve hidden it well.”

      “I married you too soon. You needed some adult shine—that’s like city shine for a country boy.”

      “You’ve been researching living with a student?”

      “In all this time, I’ve talked to your dad. He’s told me where you are, what you’re doing and if you’re going with anyone very much. He’s kept me in touch.”

      “You’ve actually, really been talking to Dad?”

      “I like him.”

      “What all has he said?”

      “To be patient. You need to mature.”

      She gasped in indignation, “He would never have told you that!”

      Chad nodded and replied, “Actually, he said you’re immature. That you take after your mother who took years to become adult.”

       “He did not say that!”

      Chad laughed. “No, he didn’t. He’s hard-nosed and it took me forever to just get him to recognize that I love you, and I’d wait through anything to get you back.”

      “Hah!”

      “That ‘hah’ is proof you haven’t made it yet, but it’s better than ‘baloney’ or—”

      She shrieked!

      He frowned and complained, “Now what am I going to say when all the TEXANS come arunning to defend your honor?”

      “You’ll think of something smooth. You’ll probably say I’m backing out on an agreement to, uh, cooperate.”

      He smiled and said, “Great! I knew you’d come up with the perfect defense. Thank—”

      “I’ll tell the truth.”

      He was disgusted. “You’ve always been a stickler.”

      “What did my mother say in all these conversations?”

      “She won’t speak to me. She thinks I’m a rat.”

      Jo laughed. “Really? I misjudged her! I thought she’d be on your side.”

      “What does she say to you?”

      “That I’m a fool to let you get away.”

      He nodded again. “With parents as logical as yours, how did you get the way you are?”

      “Dad says I’m not his, and mother claims I’m a throwback.”

      “Thrown away?”

      She enunciated clearly as she finished the sentence, “—of another time.”

       Three

      It was very interesting how Chad could manuever Jo. She was trusting. She was used to computer hacks who were open, honest and sharing. It never really entered her head that Chad was sly.

      On their way back north, they did not drive through one single place that had a commercial airport. It was incredible, especially in TEXAS where the distances are far.

      Once she said, “I’d no idea the land in TEXAS was so isolated.”

      And he’d had the gall to reply, “Yeah.”

      They were going up the west side of the state so that, he said, he could see the “real West” for comparison as to the progress in the rest of the country. That was exactly what Chad told Jo.

      Chad would go into a filling station miles from nowhere and come back to say to Jo, “Darn, we passed the turnoff too far back.”

      Jo would look at the map and hunt. Then she’d look up and ask, “Where is this place on