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Us. We. “We will?” Agnes said faintly.
The tank moved up to the edge of the cut, making more racket than Cerise and Hot Pink multiplied by twelve. Black smoke puffed out into the darkening evening sky as Rhett howled and the flamingos honked, and Agnes cringed at the way the tracks tore up the gravel roadway but it wasn’t the time to point that out. She was getting a bridge. She squinted, trying to understand how she was getting a bridge as the folded-over sections on top of the tank body slowly began to extend upward into the air.
Carpenter and Lisa Livia came out onto the porch.
“I was going to complain about the noise,” Lisa Livia said, still looking fragile but much better than she had before, “but now I’m just impressed. Leave it to the army to mechanize an erection.”
“Laugh now, funny girl,” Shane said. “That’s gonna be a bridge in about a minute.”
“And that bridge can hold over sixty tons,” Carpenter said.
“So it’s a strong erection,” Lisa Livia said, looking at Carpenter.
“Oh, yes,” Carpenter said, standing more erect himself.
“Do you mind?” Agnes said, watching the miracle of her bridge literally unfold. “I’m having a moment here.”
The road sections reached their apex and began to go down, the hydraulic arm in the center scissoring them apart. Within a couple of minutes, the near end touched down and the far end was in place; then the tank driver disconnected the bridge from the body of the tank and drove back onto the transporter, and the transporter drove off into the gathering darkness.
Rhett settled down, secure in the knowledge that he’d driven off the invaders.
“Wow,” Agnes said, looking at her bridge.
“Was it good for you?” Lisa Livia said. “It was good for me.”
“That bridge was built for tanks,” Shane told Agnes proudly. “It’ll take your wedding traffic and then some. It’s even better than what you had.”
“Thank you,” Agnes said to him, trying not to sound hero-worship-y.
“But it’s temporary,” Lisa Livia said, warning in her voice. “It’s a bridge,” Agnes said. “It’s right here. And it’s even better than what I had.”
“Good point,” Lisa Livia said, leaning on Carpenter a little. Carpenter put his arm around her.
“And I’m thinking the price is right,” Agnes said, and sipped her coffee as Shane settled his arm around her.
“And my mother is going to have a stroke,” Lisa Livia said.
“It’s a beautiful bridge,” Agnes said, and tried to forget all the hell swirling around her and the need to be practical and not get hurt.
She could be smart tomorrow. Tonight she had a bridge and she was holding on to him.
Three hours later, Agnes heard laughter from Lisa Livia’s room next door, rolled over, put her chin on Shane’s chest, and said, “It really is a beautiful bridge.”
“Uh-huh,” he said, in postcoital stupor.
“It’s nice about Lisa Livia and Carpenter, too. I mean, it’s a little bit Bobbsey Twins—you and me, her and Carpenter—but then neither one of you is sticking around after the wedding anyway, so it’s not as tidy as it seems, right?”
“Mmmhm.”
“I mean, basically, Lisa Livia and I are just extended one-night stands, it’s not like we’re anything special. I’ve known that from the beginning, that’s why I kept making those pathetic attempts to end this before you ended it and left me. Which I’m giving up, by the way. You got me a bridge, you got me. My God.”
Shane lifted his head, waking up more, and frowned at her. “What?”
Agnes gave up. “Thank you for my bridge.”
“Yeah. Before that.”
She sighed. “Nothing.”
