“Hey,” said Kell, looking up, dragging Galen from his ruminations over his coffee. “Bede doesn’t want to ask you about the books.”
“Kell,” said Bede, quite sternly, the sudden almost-threat in his voice drawing the attention of every man at the table.
“But you should ask him,” said Kell, raising his shoulders, palms out. He wasn’t at all afraid of Bede, that was plain to see. “That’s what you do when you need something. It isn’t like in prison.”
Bede looked at Galen, studying him, and Galen’s curiosity was raised beyond his ability to resist. None of his team had asked him for anything yet, but, then, it was only Tuesday.
“What do you need?” he asked, his curiosity making his voice come out a little sharp.
“Nothing,” said Bede, shoveling cornbread into his mouth.
“He needs books,” said Kell.
Galen looked over at the tiny library and office area that Kell was pointing at. There was a whole shelf of books.
“We have books,” he said.
“He’s read them all already,” said Kell brightly.
“All of them?” asked Galen. He wasn’t much of a reader, at least not for pleasure. “All? And when? You just got here.”
“In prison,” said Bede with a twitch of a shrug. “I’ve read all those books, except for the ones on birds, but I’m not much of a bird man.”
Galen wasn’t much of a bird man either, so he could sympathize. Royce, one of the other team leads, was a big,bigbird man, and had donated around twenty books to the collection. Threatened to donate more until Gabe had told him that maybe they had enough books about birds on hand.
“There’s paper and pen,” said Galen, jerking his chin in the direction of the shelf. “Make a list. I can order any book you want. Any number of books,” he added to make it clear that the sky was pretty much the limit. Then, because he couldn’t help himself, he asked, “What kind of books do you like to read?”
Bede’s response was a dark-eyed gaze, as though Bede was determining whether or not Galen was the enemy. The kind of smoldering gaze that Galen imagined he’d see if he’d ever encountered Bede in a dark alley mid-way through a drug deal.
Galen wasn’t Bede’s enemy, even if he was having recurring yet unproductive thoughts that the ex-cons in the valley were getting off easy. Except Bede had certainly worked hard that morning, as hard as Galen had.
In addition to that, he was impressed that Bede wanted something to read.
But looking at Bede, sitting very still and watchful, made it easy to imagine what five years behind bars must have been like. What being on guard all the time must have felt like. Looking every gift horse in the mouth. Not to mention all those TV shows and movies that made being in prison like staying in Motel Rape Central.
While in prison, Bede had looked after Kell. Maybe he’d done the same for others, too. He didn’t have to, but he had. And now he didn’t have anything to read.
Galen felt bad for him and if that wasn’t a laughable topsy-turvy idea, he didn’t know what it was.
Maybe he needed to shift his mind and keep up with what was really going on. Maybe those five years in prison had affected Bede to the point where he might, just might, turn out to be a decent guy.
“I’m not much of a reader,” said Galen to get the conversation going again. “My dad was. He had tons of books onfarming, but I donated most of those to the local library. So if there are books you need, really. Just make a list.”
“Even porn?” asked Toby from the next table.
“No, no porn,” said Galen, turning to look at Toby. “Be reasonable, okay?” He shifted his attention back to Bede. “So? What kind of books do you like?”
Bede must have made up his mind to answer in spite of himself, because he took a very deep breath.
“John Grisham,” he said, saying the author’s name as if he’d read Grisham’s entire catalog and knew each book by heart. “Alistair MacLean. Pat Conroy. Stephen King, if I’m in a mood. Barbara Kingsolver, though I’ve only read one or two of her books.”
Galen could only blink. Bede did not look like a reading kind of guy. But maybe being stuck behind bars had made him reach out for some kind of distraction, and books had been closest to hand. And maybe reading them had changed him.
“Make your list,” said Galen with a nod. “I’ll order those books as soon as you let me know what you want.”
Bede still seemed dubious, so Galen concentrated on finishing his lunch, and then bussing his place. Afterward, he got a paper and pen from the little office in the mess tent, and gave those to Bede. Then, as Bede bent over the small desk to write his list, Galen went to Gabe and told him about the book order, then got the password to their joint Amazon account.
“You did good, there,” said Gabe, pulling him out to the wooden platform in front of the mess tent.
