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Flora looks away, and her shoulders slump. “Fine. Okay. Just stay out of my way, Ev.”
She called me Ev. I hide the smile my face wants to collapse into, at hearing my old nickname.
“Maybe you’d like to step out now, Everett,” Bobby says quietly. “While I finish going over a few things with Miss Flora here.”
I nod. “Absolutely. I’ll see you later, Flora.”
She nods in return, not looking at me, but I think I hear her mutter, “Not if I see you first,” under her breath.
I had no idea Miss Zinnia would set things up this way. But she loved Flora, and she wanted Flora to be happy.
I have to think that Miss Zinnia’s given me the chance of a lifetime—the chance to save our marriage. The chance for us to keep each other.
I decide that the best course of action is to be engaged in a blamelessly helpful renovation activity when Flora gets to the house, and to that end, I’m filling some old nail holes in the gorgeous eight-inch-thick crown moulding in Miss Zinnia’s parlor when I hear rattling at the front door. Muffled curses accompany the clash of keys. “It’s open,” I call, and the noises at the door fall silent for a moment.
They’re followed by Flora’s footsteps, which sound unsteady. “Of course it’s open,” she says in a sarcastic voice that’s probably meant to be under her breath, but isn’t. I wonder if she’s tipsy.
Then she steps into the parlor and looks up at me on the stepladder, and now I’m certain she’s had a few drinks too many. She squints in my direction. “What’re you doin’ up there?”
“Filling nail holes.”
“That’s a tiny little fix-it project, for a house that’s going to take six months of work.”
She’s still mad at me.
Well, Flora’s nothing if not stubborn. I already knew that a woman who has stayed away from her husband for six years is a woman with a stubborn heart. I just have to be as persistent as she is.
“I know it’s a small project,” I say in my calmest voice. “There are small projects and big ones, and I had time for a small one tonight.”
Flora blinks sleepily at me. “Did you know there’s a dishtill—dis—oh hell. A whisky place in town?”
“Dogwood Distillery, yeah. I like their Irish-style. How many did you have?”
She glares up at me. “One too many, I guess.”
“Oh?” I smear some more wood filler into a new set of holes.
“Yeah. ‘Cause you look good, Ev. Stay up there, okay?”
I look good? Like I’m gonna stay away from her now. “Come on. Let’s get you some water, and maybe some acetaminophen.”
She stands in a corner of the kitchen, wrapping her arms around herself and not looking at me until I hand her a glass of water and two tablets. Her black dress is wrinkled and her hair tousled. When she closes her eyes to tip back the water glass, I see how her mascara is smudged under her eyes.
“Rough day,” I say with sympathy. “You loved her.”
She nods.
“It’s hard to lose someone you love,” I say, feeling a pang in my chest. I lost you, Flora.
She looks up at me, startled, then spins around and leaves the kitchen without another word, caroming into the door. I hear her crashing around with her suitcase upstairs.
If she won’t talk to me or be around me, this is going to absolutely suck.
