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Gene stood staring at the door for a full minute, regretting what had just transpired. Could he have handled that better? He wasn’t sure. He presented her with what might have happened. How could this girl have just vanished? Unless she’d never been there in the first place. It was a sound theory.
The porch light clicked off, leaving him standing in the dark. He sighed and turned to leave when he saw a curtain abruptly fell back into place at Miss Lydia’s unit.
Fuck.
Gene quickly got into his car and drove off.
Maybe coming back to this small, nosy town wasn’t a good idea after all.
twelve
“Are you just gonna keep buttering that biscuit or eat it?”
Gene looked up to his dad, then back to his hands where he was, indeed, buttering a half of a biscuit. Well, smothering was more like it. He put the knife down and took a bite of the warm, pillowy hunk of biscuit. It reminded him of Amanda’s hankering for biscuits and gravy.
I haven’t taken her out for the proper breakfast I promised.
“What’s wrong, hon?” Martha asked. “You’re awfully quiet this morning. Your date didn’t go well last night?”
“It wasn’t a date,” Gene bit out shortly, regretting it right away.
“Whatever it is, did something happen?” Mom probed.
“Amanda’s not happy with me,” he replied.
“You’ve just saved her and taken care of her after an accident. What reason does that young woman have to be unhappy with you?”
His father—loyal to his son—looked offended.
“I suggested she might have confabulation, that her brain might create the girl to fill in blanks in her memory,” Gene said.
“You did not.” Mom looked aghast.
“It’s a perfectly sound explanation of what could’ve happened,” Gene said. “I told her to get a CT to make sure there isn’t something we missed.”
“Something you missed, you mean?” Mom clarified.
“She refused treatment, Mom. Neither I nor the paramedics could force her to do anything. But I thought she would trust me enough now to listen.”
“I don’t understand. Why would she be mad at you for suggesting she gets a CT. She could just refuse again,” Dad said.
“Amanda’s not mad about that, is she?” Martha clicked her tongue. “She’s mad because you basically said she was making the whole girl thing up.”
“That’s not what I said at all!”
“That’s what she heard.” Mom shrugged with a sounds-obvious-to-me expression on her face.
Gene knew what his mom was getting at.
“Am I supposed to let her believe she crashed her car avoiding a non-existent girl when there might be something serious causing this?”
“Your concern is valid,” Mom said. “But until your theory is proven, who’s to say she didn’t see what she said she saw?”
Dad frowned at Mom. “What if she did see this girl? What can she do about it?”
“You don’t know Amanda, Dad,” Gene said.
“And you do?” Dad retorted as he got up from the table, having finished his breakfast and coffee. “You’ve only known her since Sunday night.”
