I softly chuckle. “Okay. Okay. Grilled then. What can I do to help?”
“You can sit your handsome, overgrown butt on that stool and entertain me while I grill you a sandwich.”
“May I return the toolbox to the garage first?” I ask.
“Don’t get smart with me, Greyson. I still know how to spit in someone’s food and hide the fact.”
I hold my hands up in a gesture of innocence and grab the toolbox.
When I come back, the sandwich is sizzling in the pan, the smell of garlic filling the air.
“Did you use garlic butter?” I ask.
“Does a bear fart in the woods? Of course I used garlic butter. And I buttered both sides of the bread. Now, grab the chips from the pantry and slap some of that coleslaw on each of our plates.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say.
Once I’ve loaded our plates with sides, including some pickled vegetables she jarred last fall, I take my seat at the island.
“So?” Mrs. Kinkaid asks. “Tell me about life.”
I fill her in on practice and work, general stories, nothing too specific.
She brings our sandwiches to the plates and takes a seat across from me. “How’s the new firefighter?”
“She’s good,” I say. “Fitting right in.”
She stares at me and I take a big bite of my sandwich.
“What’s she like?”
I chew, considering the fallout of sharing.
“Funny story,” I finally say.
Mrs. Kinkaid perks up.
“And one you can’t repeat.”
“I won’t.”
“The night before Zach and I deployed, he was asleep in our hotel.”
She smiles softly. It dawns on me that I don’t tell her stories about Zach often enough. She should own as many memories of him as she can, and I’m keeping so many to myself.
“I was restless, so I went out for a walk.”
She nods. Her food sits untouched on her plate, her hands folded softly in her lap.
“I wandered around and ended up in front of this cathedral.”
She just stares at me, a certain yearning in her eyes, as if my story can bring back something we both lost.
“And she was there.”
Mrs. Kinkaid’s brows draw in and she asks, “She? The firefighter?”
“Yeah.”
