“The Circle’s schedule has gaps.”
“What do you do over there?”
“We play cards.” Margo put the towel down and picked it up again. “And he’s trying to get me to watch basketball.”
Meg set her coffee down. “You’re watching basketball?”
“I didn’t say I was watching it. I said he’s trying. There’s a difference.”
“What kind of basketball?”
“College. His roommate from Michigan sends him hot fudge you can’t get out here and apparently it’s connected to the season somehow. I don’t fully understand the system.”
Anna had stopped stacking filters. Meg was looking at Margo with an expression Margo recognized from years of raising this particular granddaughter—the look Meg got when a spreadsheet suddenly made sense.
“So you play cards,” Meg said, “and watch basketball, and eat hot fudge. Three times a week.”
“The hot fudge was once.”
Meg wiggled her eyebrows. “So far.”
“It’s nice to have company,” Margo said, which was true and also not the whole of it, and Meg knew that, and Margo knew Meg knew that, and neither of them said anything else about it.
Joey, who had been at the pass the entire time and had apparently heard everything, said nothing. He made a note onhis clipboard and walked to the back office. Margo saw him go. She did not want to know what he’d written.
At two o’clock the rush was done and the Shack settled into its afternoon quiet. Margo wiped down the grill and hung her apron.
Meg was at the counter finishing her coffee.
Margo looked at her granddaughter. Meg’s face was perfectly pleasant, which was the most dangerous version of Meg’s face.
“Fine. Yes, we play cards,” Margo said, not exactly sure where it had come from. “With flamingo cards his brother sends from Florida. He doesn’t like pickles. I didn’t know that. Fifty years of pickles and he’s been moving them to the side of his plate.”
She hadn’t meant to say any of that.
“Flamingo cards,” Meg said.
“His brother’s lonely. He sends novelty decks.”
“That’s actually kind of sweet.”
“It’s cards, Meg.”
Meg was pressing her lips together in exactly the same way Anna had earlier, and Margo realized this was genetic and there was nothing she could do about it.
Margo stopped at the booth on her way out. The Reserved sign. The salt shaker, precisely placed. The window light falling across the seat.
She straightened the sign half a degree.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Michael took her to the place on Coast Highway with the good fish and the patio that faced the wrong direction, which meant the sunset crowd skipped it, which meant you could actually get a table.
Bea had been in Sedona for four days. Michael had called at four and said “dinner,” and Anna had said yes before she’d thought about it, which was how most of her best decisions with Michael had happened.
She wore the blue shirt she liked. He wore the shirt he wore to the place on Coast Highway, which was a slightly nicer version of the shirt he wore everywhere. They sat at a table near the window. The bar behind them was dim and quiet, a few low conversations and the clink of glasses. The waiter brought water and menus and Michael ordered wine without consulting her, which would have annoyed her from anyone else and from Michael meant he’d been paying attention to what she liked since the day they met.
Michael opened his menu. Closed it. “You look tired,” he said.
