“So, you’re having Thanksgiving dinner with Stu?” she asked.
“Kind of,” he replied, offering no further explanation. He gestured to her left hand. “You sure you’re okay?”
“You’re pretty obsessed with how I feel.”
“Wellll,” he drawled in his slow, cowboy way. “This morning, you told people you didn’t know where you were or how you got here. Then, you went runnin’ around in thirty-degree weather without a coat?—”
“I didn’t run,” she interrupted. “I was—curiously exploring.”
“Now you’ve got gauze wrapped around your hand.”
“Not my best day,” she admitted.
“You also told Clara that, yesterday, you felt like you were dying.”
She recalled what she had said to the lady in the gift shop while he continued: “And on your first day here, you apparently weren’t even here. Nobody saw you.”
“God, you’re nosy,” she observed.
“Occupational hazard,” he explained.
The waitress came over to verify Goldie wanted the meatloaf. She did, and she also ordered a Coke. The sheriff ordered pumpkin pie. After the waitress had gone, she responded to the lawman.
“I went to the library in Denver to do some research on Sparkledove,” she offered. “At the bus station, I cut my hand on a broken soda bottle. Okay? Happy, Officer?”
“We’ve got a historical society right here in town,” he replied. “It’s like a museum.”
“Run by the guy who is both its president and the city’s mayor. I wanted unbiased research. Regarding my confusion this morning, I occasionally suffer from short-term memory loss. It’s usually triggered by a traumatic event.”
“Interesting,” he said. “Did you recently suffer a traumatic event?”
She hesitated before answering, then decided she had nothing to lose by telling the truth.
“My boyfriend of seven years dumped me for someone new,” she admitted. “Some young college girl. Wears clothes that look like they came from a locker room hamper. He’d been cheatin’ on me for months, but I just found out about it yesterday.”
“Ouch,” he empathized. “Yeah, I guess that would do it. Seven years,” he mused. “Must’ve met him when you were quite young.”
“I did.”
“I’m sorry… I understand heartbreak. Guess these are heartbreaking times for people all over the world,” he said.
“Yeah. That’s true,” she agreed, realizing he was referring to the war.
The waitress delivered Goldie her Coke and Eli his pie. After she returned to the kitchen, he changed the subject. “Let’s talk about something different. Something good. Wait ‘til you see Sparkledove decked out for Christmas.”
“Nice, huh?” she asked.
“Very. My folks used to bring me and my sister to some of the holiday events in town when we were kids.”
“So, you weren’t born here?”
“No, but I was raised not far away. And the covered bridge at the end of town, have you seen it yet?”
“No.”
“Mayor Banyan claims it’s the only authentic New England-style covered bridge west of the Mississippi. Don’t know if that’s true, but it sure is pretty to walk through on a snowy night. It has viewing windows on either side.”
Goldie smiled politely and knew what a covered bridge was, but she’d actually never seen one in person. She’d done some traveling, but not as much as other people. Markie had taken her to Mexico a couple of times to meet with drug suppliers, but the month in Vegas for her aunt was by far her longest and greatest distance as a solo traveler.
