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But the best truthful adjective I could come up with was numb.
I didn’t sleep much that night, too busy overthinking things to find peaceful rest. I wished I could have said I felt vindicated or justified, but there was no rightness in my heart. He was gone, and I felt his absence not as an emptiness, not as a space, but as a weight so oppressive, it crushed me slowly, breath by breath, inch by inch.
This morning, I’d woken not with purpose but with some amount of determination to adhere to a schedule. So just as the sun rose, I pulled on my running shoes, tightened my ponytail, put on the most ass-kicking playlist I had, and I ran like the devil was chasing me.
In a lot of ways, I supposed he was.
The sun was well risen by the time I made it home to find Uber Stan pulling into my driveway. We didn’t actually have Uber in Lindenbach, just sweet old Stan, who everyone texted or called for a ride. He’d even made little signs for his windows that mimicked the Uber and Lyft logos.
Nobody had the heart to tell him that wasn’t quite how it worked.
I jogged behind him, surprised when Salma slowly eased out of the back of his SUV. I hurried to help her out.
“Salma, what are you doin’ here?” I asked, cupping her elbow.
She put all hundred pounds of her weight on me, her eyes on her feet so she didn’t misstep. “Well, hey, honey.”
“Hey. Come in for some tea?”
“Oh, that’s all right. Can we just sit on the porch for a while?”
“Of course.”
“Stan,” she called into the SUV, “not gonna be too long. You wanna wait?”
Before he could answer, I said, “I’ll take you back home.”
“Oh, I don’t want to trouble you.”
“It’s no trouble.”
She checked my expression with rheumy eyes, but nodded her assent.
“Thanks, Stan,” she said, and he flicked the brim of his feed store trucker hat.
“Anytime, Miss Salma. Y’all have a good day now. Don’t forget—Ima runnin’ a twofer special: get a ride from me, and I’ll pick you up free.”
“I’ll spread the word,” I said, securing Salma behind me before shutting the door with a thump.
Gravel crunched and popped under his tires as he backed up and drove away. And I offered Salma my arm and guided her toward the house.
“How are you, Salma?”
“Just glad I woke up this mornin’, honey.”
I chuckled. “How come the older people get, the more morbid the jokes?”
“Because when you get to be my age, no point in avoiding the truth. May as well make peace with it, and what better way than laughing? Anyway, it’s true. Every morning I wake up surprised.”
I led her to a rocking chair and sat in its twin by her side. “What can I do for you today, Miss Salma?”
“Well, first I wanna say I’m sorry for not coming by sooner. It’s just that I didn’t know Grant left until this morning. I figured he was just out here at the farm, but then Bettie told me he’d gone. Went by hoping she was wrong. And when I did, I found this.”
Salma reached into an ancient purse from what had to be the sixties—it went perfectly with the hot-pink polyester cigarette pants she had on—and when her hand reappeared, it held an envelope with strong, hard writing on the front.
She extended it in my direction. I took it, rested my hands in my lap, fingertips heavy and aware on the paper between them. I didn’t know what to do. Reading it would hurt. Not knowing what was inside would kill me.
I was holding a grenade with the pin out. And for a minute, all I could do was make sure it didn’t detonate until I was prepared.
As if I’d ever be prepared.
Salma watched me for a moment, then turned her attention to the horizon. “He wrote me one too.” A pause. “It’s not my place to speak out of turn or pry, but one of the perks of being this old is that you can say whatever the hell you want, and nobody will tell you to hush.” When I chuckled, she continued, smiling. “I know that Grant wasn’t honest with you, honey. I know you’re hurt at knowing his intentions were anything but pure. And that he kept his daddy’s intentions from you too. He made mistakes. But that doesn’t change the fact that the boy is in love with you.”
Shock stopped my heart for a beat. It started up again, sending an electric flush across my skin. “He … he what?”
She shook her head a little, smiling softer. “He loves you. You love him too, if you hadn’t figured it out.”
“I … Salma, I don’t …”
“Oh, yes you do. Whatever you were gonna say, you do.” She sat back, looked off, waved a hand at me. “Plenty of this is in your letter, I’m sure, and here I am spoiling it. Read it, if you would. Go on inside where you can have some privacy if you want—I’m happy here on your porch. I’ve always loved this view. Used to sit with your granny out here and talk about our men, when they were still with us.” Her thoughts drifted away with her words, and she sighed, rocking herself gently.
