Chapter 5

On July seventh the board read 29.

That morning Kit had crossed off July sixth on the refrigerator calendar, pressing the marker so hard it squeaked.

The boxes were on the back porch now.

The counters were clear except for the pile of papers over the shallow drawer and the folded program beside it.

The window above the sink was still shut, the way she'd left it after the draft, and the kitchen had gone close and warm.

A fan turned on the counter and moved nothing.

I thought she was going to pack the papers.

Instead she took the stack in both hands and carried it to the table.

She came back for the program and set it down beside the stack, squared to the edge.

Then she opened the shallow drawer.

She didn't pause.

She pulled it out until it stopped.

Inside were rubber bands, my address book, a flashlight with no batteries, and the letter, right where I had put it in May, her name across the envelope in black ink.

I watched her hand close around it.

She turned it over.

The flap was still pressed down twice, the way I'd left it.

She looked at the writing on the front for a long time, the way you look at a face you're almost sure you know.

Then she took a butter knife from the dish rack and slit the envelope along the top.

She read standing up.

I knew every line.

It wasn't long. I'd left out how it felt to stand at that stop with my pockets empty. I'd only written what I did.

The first lines I had copied three times, because I couldn't get them right:

Kit, I paid a woman's bus fare on May 20, 1997, because she was trying to get to her son.

I came up short for my own ride and missed your solo.

I told you I was at work. I wasn't.

When she got to the third line she said one word out loud.

"Work."

She said it the way you'd say the name of a town you left.

She read the rest once, then went back and read the first lines again.

Her face didn't soften.

It didn't harden either.

It got very still, like she was reading a repair manual for something that couldn't be fixed.

She turned the page over to check the back, in case I'd left anything else.

I hadn't.

I hadn't asked her to forgive me, either. I'd checked that three times too, the way you check a stove.

Then she pulled out a chair and sat down hard.

She laid the page flat under one hand and held the other over her mouth.

I'd had twenty-nine years to say it to her face.

I wrote it down instead, because a page can't watch your face do what hers was doing.

That was cowardice, and I knew it when I sealed the flap.

After a minute she got up, ran the tap, filled a glass, and didn't drink it.

She came back and set the letter beside the program.

May twentieth on one page, May twentieth on the other.

Two pieces of paper that agreed with each other, and neither one said what she needed it to say.

At the bottom I had written Bernice Toller's name and a phone number.

Under it: Please call her if you want to know the part I never asked.

Kit's finger stopped on the number.

She picked up her phone from the counter.

She dialed, and I heard the ringing through the window.

Someone answered.

"Hello?"

It was Bernice, exactly as she sounded at the bus stop, warm and a little rough.

Kit opened her mouth.

I listened for anything. A hello, a name, a swear word.

Nothing came out.

She stood there with the phone pressed to her ear while Bernice said hello again, and then, "Is someone there?"

I pressed my palm flat to the glass, as if that could carry anything.

Then Kit ended the call.

She laid the phone faceup on the counter and looked around the emptied kitchen.

I had practiced a dozen things she might say. I had never practiced the silence.

"You let me think I wasn't worth the trip," she said.