“He has been doing a lot of scrambling lately,” Aaron said.
His thumb spun the gold band around his finger, twice, before he let his hand drop to his side. He looked back toward the window, where the low clouds of late September clung to the glass.
“He wanted to make sure they had their sweaters,” I said, closing my eyes for a moment. “The mornings have been cold.”
“He knew about the sweaters because he was at our house on Tuesday,” Aaron said.
“He was dropping off the lawnmower part,” I said.
“He was there for forty minutes, Elena,” Aaron said.
“I was folding laundry,” I said. “He sat on the porch and drank a glass of water. That was all.”
Aaron checked his watch again, the metal ticking invisible but present in the silence.
“I will go down to the cafeteria,” he said. “The doctor said they would check you again at noon.”
He left the door open an inch, and the low murmur of the hallway drifted in, carrying the smell of boiled cabbage and floor wax.
