Page 161 of Roadrunner

A man who passed the remote and kept his hand on my ankle like a fact.

A house that did not require me to perform gratitude in order to be allowed inside it.

My parents were probably somewhere with a view.

They usually were.

The view in front of me was a paused frame of a gun that shouldn’t fire and two profiles I knew better than any coastline.

I set the can down.

Riley’s thumb moved once against my ankle bone.

Arthur said, “See? That’s not how guns work.”

“Noted,” Riley said.

I closed my eyes for a second.

The baby was still mostly an idea with a pulse.

The rest of it was already here.

I didn’t need a speech for that.

I needed Friday.

I needed the movie to keep being mediocre.

I needed not to miss it by explaining it.

CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

Alex

Now

Wednesday.

Della’s kitchen in the middle of the week is a different country than Sunday.

No roast.

No performance of plenty.

Just a pot of something that had been started because she thought I looked peaky in the grocery store parking lot and had said so, out loud, in front of a man unloading watermelons.

“Sit,” she said.

I sat.

The chair knew me.

I was hot.

I was always hot.

My back had filed a formal complaint that morning and then refused to drop it.