“It has always been forty-five here,” he said.
He kept his eyes straight ahead, his jaw locked.
At the Maple Street Diner, the soup was lukewarm and the coffee cost two dollars.
Marian checked her phone, her thumb flicking across the glass screen three times in ten seconds.
“He shouldn’t be on the county road after five,” she said.
She spoke so fast she nearly ran her words together.
“Your father has driven these roads for forty years,” I said.
I stirred my chicken noodle soup, watching the small circles of grease gather in the center of the bowl.
“The highway department changed the markers last month, mother,” she said.
She did not look at me when she spoke, her eyes remaining on the screen.
“He knows the turns,” I said.
“He almost missed the turn for the pharmacy yesterday,” she said.
She set her phone down with a small click against the wood.
“He is sixty-eight, mother, not thirty,” she said.
“I know how old my husband is, Marian.”
“Gary told me he saw the Buick riding the shoulder near the curve,” she said.
I set my spoon down, the metal clinking against the ceramic.
“Gary is a retired deputy with too much time on his hands,” I said.
Marian leaned in, her voice dropping.
“He needs to let you drive, mother.”
I looked out the diner window at our clean blue sedan parked by the curb.
It had cost us eighty-five dollars to fix the radiator leak last week, and the paint still shone.
“We manage just fine,” I said.
When we got home, the sun was sinking behind the pine trees, throwing long shadows across the yard.
Richard sat on the low wooden stool on the back porch.
He was scraping dried mud from his work boots with an old putty knife.
The metal scraped against the leather with a dull, rhythmic sound.
