out already?”
Ruth wasn’t happy, Wrecker could tell from the red on her cheeks. But she pulled a crumpled bill from her pocket and handed it to the man. “This doesn’t work, I’m bringing it back.”
“I’m late,” he grumbled. “Past closing.” He gestured toward his truck or the setting sun, it wasn’t clear. “Go on, now. I’m letting out the dogs.”
Wrecker said loudly, “Where’s Deedee?”
They all turned to look at him.
Melody reclined with the Studebaker seat pushed all the way back and her legs stretched out in front of her, her ankles crossed and her arms folded across her chest. The sun was a lump of red in the rearview mirror. She had quit crying and was just listening to the breath whistle in and out through her nose. The sound was oddly comforting. She knew she should be getting back but felt that she had discovered a pristine, unrecycled pocket of calm that couldn’t last, and that it would be sinful to turn her back on it. She gave it six breaths. She gave it ten and then opened the car door and got out.
Ambling up the lane was a thin man with a shuffling walk, a dark apostrophe that resolved, as he got closer, into DF Al.
“You,” she said.
He stopped a few yards from her and shifted his weight from foot to foot. He reached a hand to scratch the back of his neck and then ran it over the beard growth on his chin. “I guess so.”
She laughed. It surprised her and she put her hand to her mouth. She had been exposed, as—as what?
He didn’t seem to care. He just stood there and let the evening air spill over him.
“You know what I’d like, Al?” Melody felt emotion swell again in her throat and had to talk just to keep it from spilling out. “For a little while? I’d like everything just to stop. Just for a bit. So I could stand here and smoke a joint with you.” Her voice wobbled, but she kept going. “We could talk about nothing. Bullshit. Whatever.” She took a deep breath and leaned back against the car door. “Then I’d like to smoke another one. And then—” She glanced at him and almost said it. Because it was true, he looked good, standing there like that. And the truth hurt.
It had been so goddamned long.
He didn’t look embarrassed. He just nodded, his head gently bobbing, his body moving slowly forward with each dip of his chin until he stood close enough for one more nod to bring the rough scratch of his beard gently onto the crown of her head. His arms had somehow taken up positions around hers to circle her rib cage. He kept his body close but tilted his chin back and to the side to gaze at her. “Aw,” he said. She watched him smile and then he leaned forward and let his breath ruffle the whorls of her ear. “I gave up weed a long time ago.”
Melody felt a sob disguised as a warble of laughter escape.
Al shuffled into the opening it made and reached beside her to unlatch the back door. He made a formal gesture with his hand, but his eyes, warm behind the black-framed glasses, held her steady as Melody let herself sink onto the horsehair bench. Her heart was bruised and her confidence torn to ribbons, but when Al squeezed in beside her, bumping a bony knee against her hip and releasing a cloud of dust from the seatback, she could feel it start to mend. As long as he kept doing that. And that. As long as he didn’t stop with any of that.
It was nearly dark when they made their way back to join the others. The Desk Man was agitated in a damped-down, church-whispering way. “Don’t come back,” he said, but not to anybody in particular. He led the dogs, two sleepy Dobermans who stretched and yawned and slobbered on Wrecker’s hand, out of the office. He released them into the yard and then herded everyone outside the gate. “Don’t you come back,” he muttered again, and got in his truck and revved the engine and drove away.
“Ruthie,” Melody said. She felt as though someone had scraped away the top layer of her skin and left everything internal—blood vessels, organs, emotions—horrendously exposed. “This is DF Al.”
Ruth looked from her face to his and down to take in Wrecker. The boy was watching Melody carefully. Ruthie reached for his