Heat pressed against the walls.It sat in the mattress, in the floorboards, in his skin.The whole bedroom felt as if the day had crawled inside and refused to leave.
Connor threw the sheet aside and sat up.
A dog barked somewhere down the road.Farther off, a truck moved along the highway, its engine fading through the open window.
He crossed to the window unit.
The air conditioner was old, square, and ugly, bought in a hurry five summers ago when his mother had complained that his house felt like a feed shed.Connor turned the dial.The unit grumbled to life, blew one thin breath of cooler air, then coughed twice and stopped.
Connor stared at it.
The machine made a faint ticking sound, as if offended by the request.
He hit the side with the heel of his hand.
Nothing.
“Machines are the bane of my life,” he muttered.
The bedroom returned to silence, broken only by the ceiling fan’s useless click.Connor rubbed a hand over his face and turned toward the hall cupboard.He had an electric fan somewhere, probably behind a box of winter gloves, fishing gear, and items his mother had insisted were too useful to throw away.
The cupboard door creaked when he opened it.
Inside, stacked shelves leaned under old towels, a toolkit, spare light bulbs, folded blankets, and a shoebox with a cracked lid.The fan sat on the top shelf, wedged near the back.Connor reached for the handle and pulled.
The fan came down.
So did the shoebox.
It struck his shoulder, flipped, and burst open across the hallway floor.
Papers slid over the boards.Photographs scattered under his feet.A key chain skidded against the wall.Two cinema ticket stubs floated down last and came to rest face up, their print faded almost unreadable.
Connor stood there holding the fan.
He should have gathered everything and shoved it back.No good came from opening certain parts of the past at four in the morning.
Instead, he crouched.
A photograph lay closest.Selena, at seventeen, was sitting on the hood of his first truck, one hand raised to block him from taking the picture.Another showed Jessie between them at Hank's, pulling a face while Connor stole fries from Selena's plate.
More items lay around the box.A pressed flower Selena had given him when they were 18.A cheap silver bracelet from a fair stall, another gift, but a returned one.A matchbook from the roadside inn where he and Selena had stayed after getting married because they had no money for a proper honeymoon.
Then the letter.
Folded once.Yellowed at the edges.His name was nowhere on it, but he knew the paper before his fingers touched it.
Connor sat back against the hallway wall.
The date at the top put him there at once.
The day before the divorce was finalized.
Selena,
I don’t know if you’ll read this.I don’t know if you’ll tear it up before the second line.Maybe I deserve that.Maybe I deserve a lot of things.But I need one last chance to tell you I didn’t betray you...
He stopped reading.
