My kitchen had a counter, a coffeemaker, and a stack of takeout menus in a drawer. The walls were bare. The only personal item in the entire house was Jolly’s bed in the living room, and even that was military-grade, designed to be rolled up and transported.
Kayla’s kitchen had herbs growing in small pots on the windowsill. A corkboard near the phone was pinned with school notices, a dentist appointment card, and a grocery list in her handwriting. Three of William’s drawings.
A home. Not just a house.
The microwave hummed. Kayla set two plates on the counter and divided the pasta between them. She dressed the salad with oil and vinegar, the quick, efficient movements of a woman who’d been feeding people on a timeline for years. She slid a plate in front of me and sat on the stool beside mine.
We ate. The pasta was good. Simple red sauce, not trying to be anything other than Tuesday night dinner, and after the gas-station burritos and the cold pizza and the parade of takeout that had defined my eating habits since I’d arrived in Summit Falls, it was outstanding.
“This is really good.”
“It’s pasta.”
“You keep saying that about your food. The chicken wasjust chicken and rice. This isjust pasta. You’re not great at taking compliments.”
She twirled her fork. “I’m fine at taking compliments. I’m just realistic about my cooking. It’s functional, not inspired.”
“Functional is underrated.”
“Spoken like a man who’s been eating out of Styrofoam containers for a month.”
“Longer than a month.” I took another bite. “Try years.”
She set down her fork and looked at me. “Years?”
“I move a lot.” I shrugged. “Contract work doesn’t come with a kitchen. Or it does, but you’re not there long enough to buy groceries.”
“Where were you before Summit Falls?”
“El Paso. Before that, a contract in Virginia. Before that, overseas.”
“How long have you been doing this? The Citadel work?”
“Six years. Since I left the Army.”
She pulled one foot up onto the rung of her stool, angling toward me. “What made you enlist?”
“Small town. Eastern Montana. Not much there.”
She waited. Didn’t fill the silence. She was good at that.
“My parents ran a feed supply store. Good people. Quiet.” I turned my fork on the plate. “I lived in the kind of house where nobody yelled, but nobody said I love you either. You just showed up and did your part, and that’s how everyone knew things were fine.”
“Do you see your parents regularly?”
“A couple times a year. We talk on the phone when there’s something to talk about, which isn’t often.” I shrugged. “It’s not bad. It’s just how we are.”
“Any siblings?”
“Nah. It was just the three of us.”
She didn’t push. Didn’t offer sympathy or fill the silence with something I didn’t need. She just listened, the way she listened to William when he was working up to saying something important.
“So you left,” she said.
“At eighteen. Didn’t have money for college, didn’t have a plan, and staying felt like the walls were closing in. Recruiter in Billings said the Army would fix all three.”
“Did it?”
