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“Well, it’s about Norma Jean.”
“Okay?” Sally forgot about looking for jumps as she looked at him across the board. Her heart clenched. Maybe he decided he liked her after all. Sally held her breath.
“Do you think she might have opened the gate on purpose?” He asked the question while he looked at the board, and then he lifted his head, meeting her eyes.
Oh boy. Sally didn’t know what to say. She wanted to tell the truth. Which was that she thought it was very likely that Norma Jean might have opened the gate.
“It makes me feel mean to think she might have done that. But I... I know she manipulated other things, just so that she could get me to spend time with her. I told you about her asking me a million questions, but I didn’t tell you that she unplugged the coffee maker and asked me to come fix it. She flushed a wad of toilet paper down the toilet and caused it to overflow.”
“I didn’t know about those things. But I guess I’ve been thinking about it.”
“Miles said he spoke with her, and she said that there wasn’t anyone else in the office that morning. She doesn’t know that we think that the gate was deliberately opened, since Miles had closed it.”
“Maybe he didn’t close it right?” Sally said, and she couldn’t help the fact that her voice sounded hopeful.
“Well, Miles has closed a lot of gates. I’d say he knows how to do it correctly. But more than that, he specifically told me that he remembered bringing Chester through and putting him down, which is a common practice with cattle dogs. He just made him lie down while he shut the gate. And he said he remembered shutting it and latching it.”
“Oh.”
“I know. She’s your friend, and you don’t want there to be any bad blood between you two. And that’s part of the reason I hesitated saying anything to you.”
“Well, you know I would say something if Norma Jean told me that she did it on purpose. I wouldn’t hesitate to tell you.”
“No. I know. I just wondered if you thought that that was something that she might do.”
Sally forgot all about the checkers and stared at the board without seeing anything. She couldn’t lie. But she didn’t want to throw her friend under the bus.
She also didn’t want to protect her friend at the expense of someone else.
It was a moral dilemma, and she wasn’t sure what was exactly right.
“I don’t want to admit it, but I can see her doing it. I’m...not saying she did, just saying it wouldn’t be out of character.”
“I thought as much,” Peter said, and he didn’t sound very happy.
“I guess I suspected, but when I think about it, I wonder if it matters.”
“Of course it matters. My leg will heal up, but I’ll probably always have issues with it. And a concussion, even one, can have permanent repercussions.”
“God could make those things not be an issue?”
“Of course. But if Norma Jean hadn’t opened the gate, they wouldn’t be an issue either.”
“Right,” Sally said slowly. “But it doesn’t matter whether Norma Jean opened the gate or not, God is in control either way, right?”
Peter stared at her, anger still on his features, but slowly the tension drained out of his shoulders.
“Why are you always right?” he asked, and he didn’t sound very happy about it.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. She hated this. She didn’t want to make anyone feel bad. Just like she didn’t necessarily want to beat him at Chinese checkers. But she wasn’t going to play anything less than her best game, just to keep Peter happy or to allow him to win. And she couldn’t not say things, if they were the correct things, even though they might not be what he wanted to hear.
“I didn’t mean that in a bad way,” he said, gazing across the board at her, concern on his features.
“It kinda sounded bad,” she said dryly.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“No. I shouldn’t let it bother me, just sometimes... I know I should just keep my mouth shut. But I sometimes say things that, while they might be accurate, they don’t always help.”
