"Bunny—"
"Take it. Please."
He looked at the money. Looked at me. Looked back at the money.
"This is too much."
"It's not enough. It will never be enough. But it's what I have."
He took the bundle.
"I'll put it in the safe. Behind the bar. It'll be there if you need it."
"The rest?"
"The rest can go in the safe too. Or you can keep it here. It's your money."
"I don't want it here."
"Then it goes in the safe."
He stood up and began putting the bundles back in the duffel.
"Matt."
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For not asking questions. For not looking at me like I'm crazy. For... being here."
"You're not crazy, Bunny."
"How do you know?"
"Because crazy people don't worry about whether they're crazy. They just... are."
He zipped the duffel and slung it over his shoulder.
"Come on. Let's get this money somewhere safe. Then we'll go back to the bar and figure out what you need for the basement."
The safe was behind the bar.
Matt opened it with a combination I didn't watch him enter, and he placed the duffel inside among the other things—a ledger, some papers, a gun I pretended not to see.
"There. Safe and sound."
"Thank you, Matt."
"You've said that a lot today."
"Because I mean it."
He closed the safe and spun the lock.
"Come on. Let's go downstairs. You can show me what you need."
The basement looked different in the afternoon light.
The fluorescents were off, but light filtered through the small windows near the ceiling, casting the room in shades ofgold and grey. The drain was still there. The pipes were still there. The locked door was still at the far end.
