“Is he doing alright?” I asked. “He sounded a bit worn out when we spoke last week.”
Arthur adjusted his cap, pulling the brim even lower. “There are some things a neighbor sees but keeps to himself, Jenna. You just be careful.”
He turned back to his hydrangeas without another word, leaving me standing in the driveway with the heavy book in my hand.
I walked up the front steps, the wood creaking slightly under my weight. The gray paint on the railing was peeling in long, brittle strips that showed the dark cedar underneath.
The smell of sugar and lemon zest drifted up from the metal container in my hands. I reached for the brass handle of the front door, planning to slip inside and set the table before Gary woke up.
A sound from the kitchen stopped me.
It was Gary’s voice, but it did not have the low, gravelly drone I had grown up listening to. He was laughing, a loud, sharp sound that carried clearly through the glass of the entry window.
The front door was already unlatched. I stepped into the cool darkness of the hallway, my sneakers making no sound on the worn linoleum.
The kitchen door at the end of the hall was slightly ajar. A single stripe of yellow light cut across the floorboards, and I could hear the squeak of the cabinet hinge as someone moved inside.
“She actually bought the whole thing,” Gary was saying into his phone. His voice was bright, clear, and completely different from the quiet, grieving tone he always used with me.
I stood perfectly still in the shadows, my thumb pressing hard against the glass face of my mother’s watch.
“The girl thinks her mother left her nothing but debt,” Gary said, his tone dry and dismissive. “She has no idea about the actual paperwork. Let her keep paying the taxes while I stay here rent-free.”
