The white cotton sheets from the downstairs linen closet always smelled of the damp pine needles pressing against the basement window. I stood by the edge of my bed, smoothing the hem of a pillowcase, when Harper appeared in the frame of the door. Her running shoes were still laced, though she had been home from school for two hours.
“Mom, can I borrow $40?”
She did not step into the room. Her fingers went immediately to the silver heart necklace her father had given her the summer before he died. She began to twist the small metal shape around her index finger, pulling the thin chain taut against her throat.
“Forty dollars is a specific amount for a Friday night,” I said, keeping my voice even. “Is there an event at the high school?”
“Just a pizza party at Mia’s house,” Harper said, her chin lifting slightly. “Some of the seniors are getting together before the autumn break.”
The silver heart spun twice around her finger, then clicked against her collarbone. In the three years since we lost David, I had watched that tiny movement accompany every broken promise, every late arrival, and every hidden grade. It was her tell, a silent indicator of deceit that she did not know she possessed.
I looked at my wristwatch, noting the hands stood exactly at seven o’clock. My chest tightened, but I kept my hands flat against the folded pillowcase on the bed.
“The local delivery place charges fifteen dollars for a large pie,” I said. “Why does Mia need forty dollars from you?”
“We are ordering from the place over in Oak Creek,” Harper said, her voice dropping into a flat, defensive tone. “They have a delivery fee.”
She did not look at me while she spoke. Her eyes remained fixed on the corner of the dresser where David’s old leather watch repair kit sat.
“I see,” I said.
I walked past her into the hallway, where the old wooden floorboards always groaned under the runner rug. The air in the corridor was cooler than in the bedroom, carrying the faint draft from the front door down the street.
