The Passage - By Justin Cronin Page 0,84

was upset, and it felt wrong to leave her like that. He wondered if she wanted him to feel sorry for her. Rachel Wood: he guessed that was her name, that she was talking about herself. But he couldn’t say for sure. Maybe Rachel Wood was a friend of hers, or somebody who was looking after the baby. He knew he’d have to go sooner or later. Whatever mood had taken her would pass, and she’d figure out she’d just about gotten herself shot for this smelly nigger who was sitting in her car. But for the moment, the feel of cool air on his face from the dashboard vents and the woman’s strange, sad silence were enough to keep him where he was.

“What’s your last name, Anthony?”

The question wasn’t one he could remember anybody asking him. “Carter,” he said.

What she did next surprised him more than anything that had happened so far. She turned in her seat and, looking right at him with a clear gaze, offered him her hand to shake.

“Well,” she said, her voice still etched with sadness, “how do you do, Mr. Carter. I’m Rachel Wood.”

Mr. Carter: he liked that. Her hand was small but she shook like a man, her grip strong. He felt—but he couldn’t think of the words for it. He watched to see if she’d wipe her hand off, but she made no move to do this.

“Oh my God!” Her eyes widened with amazement. “My husband’s going to have a heart attack. You can’t tell him about what happened back there. I mean it. You absolutely can’t.”

Carter shook his head.

“I mean, it’s not his fault he’s such a complete and total asshole. He just wouldn’t see it the way we do. You have to promise, Mr. Carter.”

“I won’t say nothing.”

“Good.” She nodded briskly, satisfied, and pointed her eyes out the windshield again, her smooth brow furrowing thoughtfully. “Doughnuts. Now, I don’t know why I stopped here of all places. You probably don’t want doughnuts, do you?”

Just the word made a blast of saliva wash down the insides of his mouth. He felt his stomach growl. “Doughnuts is all right,” Carter said. “The coffee’s good.”

“But they’re not a real meal, are they?” Her voice was firm; she’d decided something. “A real meal is what you need.”

That was when Carter realized what the feeling was. He felt seen. Like all along he’d been a ghost without knowing it. It came to him all of a sudden that she meant to take him with her, take him home. He’d heard about folks like her but never believed it.

“You know, Mr. Carter, I think God put you under that freeway today for a reason. I think he was trying to tell me something.” She put the Denali in gear. “You and I are going to be friends. I can just feel it.”

And they were friends, just like she’d said. That was the funny thing. He and this white lady, Mrs. Wood, with her husband—old enough to be her father, though Carter almost never saw him—and her big house under the live oaks with its thick lawn and hedges, and her two little girls—not just the baby but the older one too, cute as a bug like her sister was, the two of them like something in a picture. He felt it right down to the marrow, the deepest part of him. They were friends. She’d done things for him that no one ever had; it was as if she’d opened the door to her car and inside was a whole big room, and in that room were people, and voices saying his name and food to eat and a bed to sleep on and all the rest. She’d gotten him work, not just her yard but other houses, too; and wherever he went, people called him Mr. Carter, asking him if maybe he could do something a little extra today, because they were having folks over: blowing leaves off the patio or painting a set of chairs or pulling leaves from the gutters, or even walking a dog every now and again. Mr. Carter, I know you must be busy, but if it’s not too much trouble, could you … ? And always he said yes, and in the envelope under the mat or the flowerpot they’d leave an extra ten or twenty, without his having to ask. He liked these other folks, but the truth was they didn’t matter to him; he did it all