Later that evening she stood in the living room of Cam's house holding a jelly glass of cold sweet tea and examining a photo of Cam and his sister as children that hung next to the fireplace. How absurd, she thought, to have a fireplace in such a place, but they were de rigeur across the continental U.S. it seemed; even her own tired bungalow had a fake one, outlined in brick, home to a single imitation log wrapped in paper and covered in the dust of decades. She wondered if her father's childhood home in Korea had had a fireplace—it did actually get cold there, after all—and she made a mental note to ask him the next time she spoke to him before remembering that was not an option, never would be an option.

Before the flood of loss and sadness could engulf her, bringing in its wake the latest developments of the day and her phone call from her sister, she refocused on the photo, taken perhaps when Cam had been 6 or 7, his sister several years older. They stood in a vegetable garden, the sister holding a handful of weeds and sticking her tongue out at the photographer while her little brother smiled happily. She counted back years in her head and decided she would have probably been in tenth or eleventh grade at that point, definitely old enough to have been their babysitter or camp counselor. Though somehow she doubted kids from this part of Texas attended "summer camp." They probably worked all summer, first for their parents, and then for minimum wage as soon as they were old enough.

She heard the sound of Cam's father—Kyle—taking plates down from a cupboard in the kitchen and jumped in guilty alarm, though of what she wasn't sure. Perhaps for musing over a childhood photo of her former student who she couldn't stop thinking about in very inappropriate ways while waiting for the start of a dinner date with his father. She took a big gulp of her sweet tea and walked back to the kitchen.

"Can I help somehow? Set the table?" she offered while standing shyly in the kitchen doorway. She felt foolish offering any help at all, Cam's father looked so confident, so at ease, in his kitchen. He was using one hand to move around a pair of sizzling pork chops with a spatula while he took a swig of beer with the other. He was dressed in a black, button down shirt that brought out the brown flush of his tan; the shirt was tucked into a pair of blue jeans and a wide leather belt worked with an intricate design that, like Cam's belt buckle, she had a hard time keeping her eyes off of. His sleeves were long, but he had rolled them up in the heat of the kitchen, and they revealed the bulge of his forearms.

The word DILF suddenly popped into her head.

"Already done," he replied without glancing away from the stove top. "You sure I can't get you a beer? Those Coronas are probably cold enough by now."

"No, I'm good, thanks," she said, still leaning uncertainly against the frame of the entranceway. "I think I need a bit of a detox after last night."

"Yeah well," he said, glancing up at her with a very amused look on his face, "That probably makes sense."

She smiled ruefully and went to sit down at the kitchen table, which was set with simple stone plates and a bunch of wildflowers in a glass pitcher. It was true she was still nursing the last pangs of her epic tequila hangover, but she also couldn't face what a beer or two might do to her fragile sense of composure. She still wasn't sure why she hadn't canceled dinner after the phone conversation with her sister that afternoon. Perhaps she had been in too much shock to do anything but automatically follow the rest of her plans for the day, returning home, showering, pulling on the same light sundress she had worn the first time she ran into Cam at the shop. Perhaps the thought of having to call Kyle to cancel and explain her reasons would make the whole thing too real.

Or perhaps she had been hoping, longing even, to see Cam, as ridiculous as that felt to admit to herself. When she pulled up to the red brick, ranch-style house she had noted the absence of his truck, and felt both a sense of relief and one of disappointment. Relief because of the obvious awkwardness it would cause her to have him there during what she thought was probably a date with his father, and disappointment because—well, because she couldn't stop remembering the feel of his hand around her throat, his lips against her ear, his hard cock pressing through his jeans against her cheek as she kneeled before him.

She ducked her head in shame and embarrassment when recalling this last image, as though Kyle could see the images inside her head. Suddenly a delicious smelling pork chop appeared on the plate before her, still sizzling from the heat of its fat and marinated juices.

"Dinner is served Ma'am," he said, placing the other pork chop carefully onto his plate and returning the pan to the stovetop. Then he easily grabbed two large bowls of side dishes with his own large, strong hands and transferred them to the table. He sat down then, his unexpected grace throughout the evening thus far making it hard for her to look away. He caught her staring at him and winked at her for a second time that day. She blinked in flustered surprise and hurriedly picked up a fork and knife to start sawing at her pork chop.

"I take it you don't say grace?" he said, his own utensils still untouched.

Now she was even more rattled, realizing her faux pas.

"Oh no, I'm sorry, I'm so rude!" she said, a piece of pork chop frozen in mid air at the end of her fork.

He just laughed though, and shook his head.

"Heck no, I don't say no grace, not in this house," he said, picking up the wooden serving spoon from a bowl of greenbeans. "I'm just giving you a hard time. It's fun because you blush so easily."

He dropped a serving of string beans onto her plate, as though she was a child, she thought at first, and then corrected herself. As though he was a gracious host and an old-fashioned gentleman. Gentleman. That was the word. Definitely different from his son in that way.

Then she paused, recalling how Cam had sent her off to bed the night before when she had been too drunk to think straight, and had crooned her to sleep with a strange old lullaby.

"Have you ever heard of a country song about a 'Honky Tonk Moon'?" she suddenly blurted out, and them immediately regretted it when he appeared to flinch. She really could have just looked it up on You Tube or something, what was she thinking.

"It's an old Randy Travis song," he said, and began sawing at the pork chop on his plate. "My ex-wife used to sing it to the kids when they were little."

"Oh," she said. He didn't ask her where she had heard it, but she felt the unasked question hang between them in the air. Maybe he already knew the answer.

"It was really kind of you and Cam to look after me last night," she said, desperate to put an end to the silence. "I mean, it's embarrassing I needed looking after of course, but I appreciate it."

He only shook his head at her again and chewed his food slowly, thoughtfully almost.

Then he slapped the table.

"I almost forgot to put some music on," he said. He pushed his chair back, stood up, and walked into the living roon.

"Anything you want to hear in particular?" he called out. She couldn't even begin to guess at the contents of his music collection.

"Whatever you like listening to works for me," she replied. She stopped eating and turned to look out the glass sliding doors that opened up from the kitchen dining area onto a large wooden deck at the back of the house. A single flood light illuminated the deck but the miles of empty land she had caught a glimpse of in the last glow of twilight had been swallowed completely by the night. She couldn't even guess at the extent of the ranch; the fence that ran along the road she had driven to get there had gone on for several miles before she reached an open metal gate and a long driveway leading to the house.

She heard the hiss and crackle of an old record, and the haunting sounds of a man crooning his heartbreak spilled into the kitchen and surrounded her. Why didn't country music singers ever sing about the good times? The people she had met in Texas didn't seem particularly gloomy, but maybe they suppressed their feelings and channelled it all through their depressing music or something. It was probably better than what she did, which was just supress them period, and then freak out and run away across the country and entertain lustful advances from former students.

"Is that Randy Travis?" she asked him when he had sat back down at the table again.

"Oh Randy Travis isn't that old," he said, refilling her glass with more iced tea from a blue earthenware pitcher. "No this is Merle Haggard, one of my daddy's favorites."

"It's nice," she said. "But it's so sad."

He smiled at this and shrugged. Then he pointed at her pile of untasted greenbeans with his fork.

"Try those," he said. "I picked them from the garden today."

***

The rest of dinner had passed by uneventfully, the music filling in the empty spaces enough that she never felt too awkward about her fits of sudden shyness, nor his own apparent comfort with long silences. They talked some about the ranch, and he told her about its history and its size, and how more and more ranching families in the area were turning their land into big game hunting grounds for rich folk from all over, China even. How it didn't make as much money, the ranch, as it used to, but that along with the heating and cooling repair business he was doing alright.

Later, as she sat on the living room couch and watched him put on a new record, she wondered if maybe he had put on the music because he could read that about her, her uneasiness with conversational lulls. He and his son, each in their own way, seemed so ... aware of her thoughts and feelings. It was uncanny really.

"Now Courtney," he said, sitting down on the easy chair catty-corner from the couch and leaning forward with a hand on each thigh, as though ready to get down to business with her. "What's got you so down tonight? I hope Melvin hasn't been bothering you again."

"No sir, I mean Kyle, no Melvin hasn't been by since, well since Cam chased him off with his rifle yesterday," she said sheepishly. She wasn't sure how much he knew about everything that had happened before she passed out and Cam had called him for help.

He nodded in satisfaction. If he didn't know about the rifle and his son, he certainly approved of it. She decided to google the murder rate of Texas when she got home later. She needed to go online anyway to buy her plane ticket back to New Jersey.

"What is it then?" he said. "I know you didn't ask for our help, but that boy and I, well we can't help but feel somewhat protective of you, you understand? You're a single woman living far away from your home, and while it's none of my business what in God's name could have brought you to this corner of Texas of all places, well here you are."

She smiled ruefully at this and looked down at her feet.

"You must think me the biggest fool," she said.

"No ma'am, I do not," he said, his voice becoming soft and deep. She glanced up at him then, and felt her heart flip at the look in his eyes. Concern mixed with appreciation.

"Well I am," she muttered, returning her eyes to her feet and the glossy warmth of the wooden floor. Someone else, a woman, was singing plaintively now, and she hid behind a rising swell of chorus and emotion.

"Lay your head upon my pillow
Hold your warm and tender body close to mine
Hear the whisper of the raindrops blowing soft across the window
And make believe you love me one more time
For the good times."

She saw his hand outstreched before her, and she looked up in confusion. He returned her gaze with one that was searching and fearless.

"Will you dance with me Courtney Park?"

She put her hand in his, and stood up, feeling the warm strength of his touch spreading up her arm and into the rest of her body.

"Sure," she said. "I'll dance with you Kyle."

https://youtu.be/tmgTjGnUcKE