“A year, I guess,” Nimble said, scooping up a spoonful of soup and shoving it into his mouth. Then, with rough manners and a lot of gusto, he ate the soup and three pieces of buttered toast besides. “Maybe more.”
While Nimble feasted, Morgan sipped his soup almost daintily from his spoon and nibbled at a single piece of toast, which was very buttery, the butter sliding onto his thumb and tasting nice.
“That’s a long time,” Morgan said involuntarily, as though he were a robot with his polite switch turned to On. “I feel as thoughI’ve been living out of my suitcase for that long, even though it’s only been a week or so.”
“You don’t got a lot of stuff,” Nimble said. Then he paused, his gaze flicking to Morgan, a worried crease between his dark brows, as if he felt he might have been rude. “I mean, that makes sense if you’ve only just moved in.”
“I did,” Morgan said. He crunched through the slice of toast and made himself eat at least half the bowl of chicken soup as he turned the idea over in his head. “My Aunt Oralee died, so here I am.”
“Aunt Oralee,” Nimble echoed as he picked up his soup bowl and tipped the remaining contents into his mouth. Then, with a sigh, he put the bowl back on the table and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “She the one who collected all the Jadeite?”
“The what now?” Morgan sat up and pushed his bowl away. He wasn’t all that hungry and just wanted to put his head back down. But Nimble had asked a question, so Morgan ought to at least try to be interested.
“Fire King Jadeite,” Nimble said. “My Nana had it, too. It’s from the fifties. It’s all green, like jade, you see.” There was a sparkle in his eyes as if the memory of eating at his Nana’s table was a fond one. “Super cheap back then, but now it’s kinda pricey. You could sell it.”
Morgan had better things to do than try to flog a set of lime green dinnerware, so he scowled as he stood up. “Look, I sleep better on the couch, so you take the bed,” he said. Nimble started to protest, but Morgan waved him off. “It’s easier to prop up my knee and stay in one position so I don’t fuck something up. You take the bed.”
“I’m not taking your bed,” Nimble said. “I’ll set up some pillows for your knee.”
Morgan's head was spinning, and the floor was tilting. He needed to lie down before he fell down. He vaguely heardNimble asking him a question with a teasing laugh, something about remembering to brush his teeth, but he couldn’t focus.
He let himself be led to his room, Nimble’s arm around his waist. Let Nimble help him off with the robe and into bed. Let Nimble bring him a glass of water to drink.
He should not be falling asleep with a stranger in the house. One half of his brain screamed this at him while the other half was entirely too grateful for the help Nimble had given him.
Nimble arranged the pillow beneath Morgan’s head and shoved another pillow under his left knee.I’ll leave the bathroom light on, Nimble seemed to be saying as Morgan’s eyes slid shut.
And when Nimble flicked off the overhead light, Morgan focused on the sound of the storm howling outside, imagining the curtain of whiteness burying him until he couldn’t move.
Which would be a vast improvement on everything else going on in his life. Better to be buried alive than to have to answer any more of Mabel’s questions:Did you get those humane mousetraps I told you about? Did you find a place to take that raccoon? Do you want to pet my dog?
She was relentless. So was Gus. So were the guys at the coffee shop, and the cashier at the grocery store.How are you today, sir? Do you need any help, sir?
Good grief, couldn’t any of them mind their own business?
CHAPTER 8
nimble
In the yellow kitchen, Nimble did the dishes. That was what you did when staying over at someone’s house and the owner of said house had just stumbled off to bed. He’d gone to sleep, trusting Nimble entirely or being too out of it to care. Either way, Nimble wasn’t about to break that trust, no matter what had been done to him by anybody else.
While the storm grew and the wind hurled bits of snow against the windowpanes, Nimble washed the green dishes with care, dried them, and put them away. Then he wiped the table and swept the floor, and he finished up by putting the three pill bottles on the kitchen counter, where Morgan could easily find them if he needed them.
For all the pills were so small, they’d done a number on Morgan. He didn’t seem like a guy to be stupid with pills, but maybe he’d gotten distracted.
Not that any of this was Nimble’s problem, right? In the morning, surely the snow would have stopped. Soon a train would come through and he’d be headed west all on his own, there to settle on a warm beach to watch sunsets, leaning back on his hands, his bare toes curling in the sand, waiting for his real life to begin.
In the meantime, it was nice to pad around barefoot doing small things. He left the light on over the stove but turned off the light on the landing before heading into the dark parlor.
The apartment was filled with heavy, dark furniture, which, if it had belonged to the recently deceased Aunt Oralee, was entirely fitting. Old furniture, Jadeite dishes, a stove that had seen better years, an avocado-green fridge that would last forever. A wooden floor with scratches, as though the area on the second floor that was now an apartment had once been a warehouse that stored heavy boxes and equipment.
Morgan was the only thing out of place. Nimble had seen a pair of city boots in the bedroom, and loafers with tassels.
Morgan limped, had a knee brace, and walked with a cane, so the slip-on sneakers he wore made sense. As did the stack of new sweatpants and T-shirts, a practical uniform to fit Morgan’s current way of life.
Morgan hadn’t spoken of his aunt with any real affection, so maybe he’d not known her well. At the very least, though, he’d come up to Montana for her funeral, so that said something about him. A loyal nephew, if nothing else.
He’d been nice enough to let Nimble stay the night, though Nimble doubted that the decision was sensible. It wasn’t anything he himself would have done, that was for sure. While riding the rails, if someone new showed up to occupy a vacant corner of a boxcar, Nimble slept with one eye open, always. And here Morgan was, trusting that Nimble wasn’t going to rob him blind.
