Chương 6
“Good. I’m not one.”
“What are you?”
Nicole considered the question.
“Your daughter.”
“You haven’t been that in this diner for a long time.”
The plate slipped in Evelyn’s hand and struck the sink but did not break.
Nicole stared at the faded university name across her sweatshirt. It belonged to a school she had attended for three semesters before leaving for officer training. Evelyn had mailed it to her overseas after Nicole complained that every Army sweatshirt she owned looked like recruitment material. Nicole wore it only when traveling alone.
“I called,” she said.
“You reported.”
“I asked how you were.”
“You asked whether the roof was fixed, whether I had renewed the insurance, whether I was taking my blood pressure medicine.”
“Those things matter.”
“They do. They just aren’t the same as knowing me.”
Nicole folded her hands on the counter. “You told me you were fine.”
“I lied.”
“That makes two of us.”
Evelyn turned off the faucet.
Nicole had not planned to say it. The words had come from somewhere beneath anger.
Evelyn waited.
Nicole looked at the white cup beside her phone. “I didn’t come home after Dad died because I couldn’t stand being here. Then I kept pretending it was because you asked me not to.”
“I did ask.”
“Once.”
“You were nineteen. You had a scholarship.”
“I lost it.”
“You joined the Army.”
“I ran.”
“Yes.”
Nicole looked up.
Evelyn dried the plate with the corner of a towel. “Both can be true.”
They slept badly.
Nicole took the office couch and woke twice to the sound of cars slowing outside. At three thirteen, the motion light over the rear door came on. She crossed the diner in bare feet and found a raccoon sitting beside the trash cans with half a hamburger bun in its paws.
It stared at her as if she were the intruder.
She stood in the back doorway until the light went dark again.
In the morning, Evelyn opened at six because closing would look like fear. Nicole repaired the rear latch using screws from a coffee can beneath the sink. The first customer arrived at six twelve, saw Nicole behind the counter with a drill, and left without ordering.
By seven, every booth was empty.
Evelyn filled sugar jars that were already full.
“They’re punishing me,” she said.
“They’re afraid.”
“That’s a polite word for it.”
“You were afraid.”
“I still am. I’m just not eating somewhere else.”
At seven thirty, Mack Dillard entered alone. He removed his cap, stood beside the door, and looked at the empty room.
“Coffee?” Evelyn asked.
He sat in his usual booth. “I suppose.”
His hands shook when he lifted the mug.
Nicole brought him eggs without being asked. He stared at the plate.
“I ordered oatmeal yesterday,” he said.
“You always order eggs on Thursdays,” Evelyn replied.
“It’s Wednesday.”
“No, it isn’t.”
Mack checked his phone. “Well. That explains why my crew didn’t show up.”
Evelyn snorted.
For a few minutes, the diner sounded almost normal. Fork against plate. Coffee poured into ceramic. A delivery truck changing gears on Route 14.
Then Mack said, “Travis called me last night.”
Evelyn stopped wiping the counter.
“What did he want?” Nicole asked.
“He asked what I saw.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That you were all standing too close.”
Nicole leaned against the booth. “That isn’t what you told him before you left.”
“I said maybe.”
“What did you see?”
Mack stared at his eggs. “I saw his shoulder hit yours.”
“Did I touch him?”
“No.”
“Did I threaten him?”
“No.”
“Did the sheriff threaten me?”
Mack’s mouth tightened.
Evelyn said, “She asked what you heard.”
“I heard enough.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
He set down his fork. “My boy works for Cain Concrete.”
Nicole waited.
“They’ve got three bids coming up. Travis makes one call, my boy’s laid off. He’s got twins and a wife who thinks a budget is what happens to other people.”
“What do you want me to do with that?” Nicole asked.
Mack looked at her then, anger replacing shame. “Understand that bravery is cheaper when the government sends your check.”
The words landed cleanly.
Nicole could have told him about officers whose careers disappeared after protected complaints, about deployments that ended marriages, about the years she spent earning authority from people who saw her skin before her rank. None of it would change the fact that her salary arrived twice a month and Mack’s son worked at the pleasure of Travis Cain.
“You’re right,” she said.
Mack looked almost disappointed.
“But I still need the truth.”
“I know.”
“Will you give a statement?”
He looked toward Evelyn.
She folded her arms, then winced when the sling pulled at her shoulder.
Mack rubbed his jaw. “Let me talk to my boy.”
It was not courage. It was not refusal. It was the maybe again.
Nicole accepted it because she had begun to understand how much of real life occurred between yes and no.
Calvin Price arrived at eight ten.
He was seventy-one, broad through the chest despite a stoop, with a white mustache stained faintly by tobacco. He paused when he saw Nicole.
“My booth taken?”
“No,” Evelyn said. “Your conscience might be.”
Calvin sat anyway.
Nicole placed no menu in front of him.
“You told Travis about the tape,” she said.
Calvin removed his glasses and polished them with a napkin. “I told Deputy Miller you were looking for an old recorder.”
“Deputy Miller works for Harper.”
“He eats lunch with Travis.”
“In a town this size, everybody eats with everybody.”
Evelyn poured coffee into Calvin’s cup until it overflowed into the saucer.
He lifted both hands. “Evie.”
“You asked for coffee.”
“I didn’t ask for the Gulf of Mexico.”
Nicole put a towel beside him. “Why did my father hide a cassette labeled with Harper’s initials?”
Calvin replaced his glasses. “I don’t know.”
“You were at the crash.”
May you like
“I was one of several people.”
“You signed the vehicle inventory.”
