“Is that a good or bad sound?”
“I’m processing. You know what you’re doing.”
“I’m not so sure this time, but we went and just got back. I put my food away and he’s going to text me when he’s done. Then I’m going to walk to his condo and we are going to explore today while he shows me around. Tell me I shouldn’t do it. I’ll make up an excuse.”
“I won’t tell you that,” her mother said. “I’ll tell you to be careful, but you do what you want. You’ve been controlled enough by one parent and I told myself I’d never do it to you.”
“Maybe I want you to tell me in this instance.”
“Sorry, Nora. I know it’s hard, but you’ll figure it out.”
“I will. I’ll keep you posted.”
“You do that. I’m always here for you.”
The minute she hung up, her phone went off with a picture from Ethan of all of his junk food in a pantry and the address and number of his condo.
No question asking if she wanted to come over. Just leaving it like that.
She replied “OTW” and got a thumbs up in reply.
He was keeping it simple and she’d do the same.
14
THERE WAS HOPE
“Hi,” he said when he saw her walking toward him.
He’d come down to meet her outside, then bring her up himself. Otherwise he’d have to give her name to the front and he’d rather not.
At least not yet. She most likely wouldn’t want it either.
“How long have you been standing here? I hope not long.”
“I came down a minute ago.”
With his baseball hat on again. At this point he had hat head, but it was better than drawing attention to himself.
At times he just wanted to blend in.
He could do that more on the island.
Wrong, he really couldn’t, but since he didn’t work on the island, he was left alone more times than if he ran into people in Boston.
Acquaintances who wanted to gab his ear off, find out what was going on, or just gossip.
Women who wanted to flirt or hit him up for some time alone. He’d cut back on that in the past few years and was more selective.
Business associates who wanted to kiss his ass.
It was tiring.
And no one would play a violin right now for him either.
“What did you want to do today? I made sure I had comfy shoes on, just in case.”
He looked down at her sneakers. Not the ones she was running in, but still the athletic variety. The same as him.
