I got to town I went around the corner at the bank and went into the little entryway there, you know how it juts back? They weren’t open yet, so nobody was in there to ask me what I was doing, so I waited, and next thing I knew she was coming around the corner. She was wearing that same black trench coat, and she looked just like you, Mom. I stepped out in front of her. I thought she was going to take off, but she just stood there, staring at me.”
He swallowed, and looked past us all, out through the dining room door to the front room.
“What happened then?” Eric asked.
“I knew who it was. I mean, it had to be her, right? I’ve heard about her my whole life, not just from family, but from other people, too. Even at school, sometimes, our own town’s unsolved mystery, you know? Plus, I’ve seen that photo on the refrigerator. Who else looks that much like Mom? But before I could say anything, she goes, ‘You look just like him.’ I’m like, ‘Who?’, and she says, ‘My dad. Your Uncle Cyrus.’ I’m starting to say, ‘I don’t have an Uncle Cyrus,’ but then I stop, because I know who she’s talking about, and I say, ‘I do?’ She looks around, like she’s worried about somebody seeing us, you know? And she pulls me farther back, sort of behind one of the pillar things, and she looks at me like she can’t believe I’m standing there. I ask her why she’s here, and where she’s been, but she shakes her head and says it doesn’t matter and all that matters is that I’m safe and my mom is safe, and do I know who Wayne Greer is and if he’s happy.”
“Wayne?” Scott sounded surprised. “Why was she asking about him?”
Betsy gave him a sweet, sad smile and patted his cheek. “She was in love with him, honey.”
“But I thought…”
“She wasn’t sure yet, but Wayne had it bad for her—”
“Well, I knew that.”
“—and she was afraid.”
“Of Wayne?”
“Of losing their friendship.”
Scott rolled his eyes. “I hate it when girls say that.”
“Anyway,” Casey said. “What then?”
Billy blinked rapidly, like his brain was clicking back to that spot in the story. “I told her what I knew about Wayne. I’m friends with, I mean, I know Robbie, so I know who his parents are—and about Mom and Scott, and how they got married young because of me and how we have Junie, too.” He glanced at her in the doorway and gave her the sweetest smile that about broke Casey’s heart. “I asked her what she was doing back home, and why didn’t she come over, and said that in a few minutes Mom would be just across the street in the pharmacy and she could say hi. But she said she couldn’t, it wouldn’t be safe, that it wasn’t safe for her to be talking to me, and that I shouldn’t tell anybody, not Mom, not Wayne, not anybody, that it would have to be a secret, but she had to come home and see it for herself one more time. I asked her why it wasn’t safe, and she got all sad and said she was sorry, and that she loved me, and that I should be happy and be kind and…” He shrugged. “She got all choked up. I asked again where she’d been, and she just said, ‘Around.’ I asked her where she was living now and she said it was beautiful, and the sky was bluer than blue, and there were mountains that would take my breath away, and she wished she could take me skiing, but she couldn’t afford it, and it wouldn’t be safe, even if she could. Somewhere…somewhere in Colorado.” He stopped suddenly, like he’d run out of breath, or words, or both.
“She told you where she was?” Casey was surprised. So either she was planning to move on soon, so the information wouldn’t be relevant anymore, or she really was going to stay and make a life there. One way she had lied to Ricky, and the other way she was ready to give up the fear.
“What else did she say?” Betsy asked. “Did she give you a message for me?”
He looked at his mother. “She said I couldn’t tell you that she’d been here or where she was living. She said she never should have told me that. That if I told anybody it would