“You asked me—you told me—you were moving toAtlanta. I needed some time to think.”
“Can you lower your voice, please?” His glance went beyond me. He shook his head, very slightly, at someone over my shoulder.
Story of our relationship, right there. The whole time I was picturing our future, he was always looking past me at something I couldn’t see.
“Right.” I took another fortifying gulp of my drink. “Not about me.”
“What did you expect?” He ran a hand through his hair, and something unguarded in the gesture raked my heart. “Why did you even come?”
“To wish you luck, I guess. And…” I hiccupped. “To say goodbye.”
18
Joe
Anne was standing under thelit overhang of the hotel, flowery dress, red hair, suitcase at her feet. Easy to spot.
Joe’s jaw relaxed for the first time since he got her text twenty minutes ago. He pulled up to the entrance. Before he could get out of the truck, a valet had opened the passenger door and was escorting Anne tenderly inside.
“Thank you, Ray,” she said with a wobbly smile. Charming him, the way she had the cherry farmer.
“No problem, miss.” He lifted her suitcase in behind her.
“Oh.” She fumbled in her purse.
Joe passed a folded bill over the seat. Ray pocketed it smoothly.
“Take care of yourself,” she said. “And tell Mr.Garcia I’m so sorry.”
“I will, miss. You have a good evening.”
Her face crumpled before she got control of it again. “You, too!”
Her eyes were pink-rimmed and swollen. She’d been crying, then. He thought of the way she’d marched into the hotel a couple of hours ago, all smiles and resolution, and wanted to comfort her. Or punch somebody. He put the truck in drive.
She was clutching something in her lap. A handkerchief. “Thanks so much for coming.”
“No problem.” He didn’t ask the obvious question—why wasn’t she staying with her boyfriend?—in case it triggered more tears. Her text had not been clear.Can you come get me?He’d responded instinctively, the way he would if Hailey had messaged him out of the blue.
“What’s with the apology? Who’s Mr.Garcia?” he asked instead.
“He’s the…manager, I guess? I had kind of a…moment in the lobby when I couldn’t find anyplace to stay, and he gave me his handkerchief.” She waved it around like a flag of surrender. Blew her nose in it, hard. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to impose on you. Or your friend.”
“They won’t mind.”
She blotted her eyes. “I don’t want to make things weird.”
“It’s fine. You’re fine.”
But she was not fine. She stared silently out the window at the orange glow of the sodium-vapor lights, her fingers fretting the handkerchief in her lap, her knee bouncing up and down.
It felt wrong. Anne wasn’t the silent type.
He parked the truck on the street and wrestled her bag away from her.
“I live near here,” she said as they walked along the cracked sidewalk. “I sublet the apartment for the summer to this really nice graduate student. Otherwise, I could have—”
“It’s okay,” he said, relieved that she was talking. “Kelsey doesn’t mind. She turned in an hour ago.”
