didn't know how to thank Shelby for hauling her all the way up here on a whim. Whatever was behind Shelby's shift in attitude, Luce was grateful--she wouldn't have been able to do this on her own.
The town of Shasta was wacky and artistic, with a good number of elderly people walking leisurely down the wide avenues. Shelby rolled down the windows and let in the brisk early-evening air. It helped settle Luce's stomach, which was knotting up at the prospect of actually having to talk to the people she'd seen in the Announcer.
"What am I supposed to say to them? Surprise, I'm your daughter back from the dead," Luce practiced aloud as they were sitting at a stoplight. "What am I supposed to say to them? Surprise, I'm your daughter back from the dead," Luce practiced aloud as they were sitting at a stoplight.
"Unless you want to totally freak out a sweet old couple, we're going to have to work on that," Shelby said. "Why don't you pretend you're a solicitor, just to get in the door and feel them out?"
Luce looked down at her jeans, beat-up tennis shoes, and purple backpack. She didn't look like a very impressive salesperson. "What would I sell?"
Shelby started to drive again. "Hawk car washes or something cheesy like that. You can say you've got vouchers in your bag. I did that one summer, door to door. Almost got shot." She shuddered, then looked at Luce's white face. "Come on, your own mom and dad are not going to shoot you. Oh, hey, look, here we are!"
"Shelby, can we just sit in silence for a little while? I think I need to breathe."
"Sorry." Shelby pulled into a large parking lot facing a compound of small, single-story connected bungalow-style buildings. "Breathing I can do."
Through her nerves, Luce had to admit it was a pretty nice place. A series of the bungalows stood in a semicircle around a pond. There was a main lobby building with a row of wheelchairs lined up outside the doors. A big banner read WELCOME TO SHASTA SHIRE RETIREMENT COMMUNITY.
Her throat felt so dry it hurt to swallow. She didn't know if she even had it in her to say two words to these people. Maybe it was one of those things you just couldn't think about too much. Maybe she needed to get up there and force her hand down on that knocker and then gure out how to act.
"Apartment thirty-four." Shelby squinted at a square stucco building with a red Spanish-tile roof. "That looks like it over there. If you want me to--"
"Wait in the car till I get back? That would be great, thanks so much. I won't be long!"
Before Luce could lose her nerve, she was out the car door and jogging up the winding sidewalk toward the building. The air was warm and
lled with a heady scent of roses. Cute old people were everywhere. Split into teams on the shu eboard court near the entrance, taking an evening stroll through a neatly pruned ower garden next to the pool. In the early-evening light, Luce's eyes strained as she tried to locate the couple somewhere in this crowd, but no one looked familiar. She would have to go straight to their house.
From the footpath leading up to their bungalow, Luce could see a light on through the window. She stepped closer until she had a clearer view.
It was uncanny: the same room she'd seen earlier in the Announcer. Even down to the fat white dog asleep on the rug. She could hear dishes being washed in the kitchen. She could see the thin, brown-socked ankles of the man who had been her father however many years ago.
He didn't feel like her father. He didn't look like her father, and the woman hadn't looked at all like her mother. It wasn't that there was anything wrong with them. They seemed perfectly nice. Like perfectly nice ... strangers. If she knocked on the door and made up some lie about car washes, would they become any less strange?
No, she decided. But that wasn't all. Even though she didn't recognize her parents, if they really were her parents, of course they would recognize her.
She felt stupid for not thinking about that before. They'd take one look at her and know she was their daughter. Her parents were much older than most of the other people she'd seen outside. The shock of it might be too much for them. It