"Good,” she says.
"You did not?” I respond, almost knowing the answer.
"No."
"Are you all right?” She is different. She is afraid. I can feel it. She doesn’t want to let me go.
"I do not know,” she pauses then, “Evangeline."
"Yes."
"I am not going to the city this morning."
I nod.
"I am not going to the city Tuesday either."
"I figured.”
She is quiet a count.
I put my hand on her chest, low, where the flat line of muscle is at the bottom of her sternum. I feel her heart. The heart is going at the rate she keeps it at, which is slower than mine, which is the rate of a woman who has chosen her breath for many years. Underneath it I can feel fear.
"Tell me what she said," I say.
She does not answer.
"Max."
"Yes."
"You do not have to tell me what she said. I am asking. You can tell me a small piece. You can tell me no piece. You can tell me at the end of the day or in three days or never. I am only asking because the silence is the loudest thing in this room right now and the silence is going to be louder by lunchtime."
She is quiet a count.
"She told me to put you on a bus to Boise this morning."
"All right."
"She told me you were the worst thing I have done."
"All right."
"She told me if it comes out, I am in a federal courtroom in a chair next to her."
"All right."
"She told me Tuesday at ten Elise Warren is going to ask me questions I cannot answer if I have been lying to her about you for six days."
"All right."
"She told me to drive you to the bus station and not write to you and not look for you and to ask her in a year if you have not been found by anyone else."
"All right."
"And I told her I cannot do that.”
"All right."
