Chapter 7

On Friday the board read 12.

Halene had two blank signal slips on the counter and kept her finger on them.

"You've used one," she said. "The next one has to be a request, not a wish."

"I have a request."

"Then say it."

"Make Kit keep the table."

Halene pulled the slips back.

"That isn't a request. That's a preference for how the living should choose."

I confessed it badly.

"I want her to keep one thing of me that isn't that letter."

"Then choose a small effect," Halene said. "A draft. A smell. A dream. It cannot carry wants."

I didn't have a request yet, only a want.

Halene put the slips in her cardigan pocket and called the next number.

Below, through the window, Kit had the phone wedged against her ear.

The scuffed folding table stood open by the back door, one cracked leg resting on a folded towel.

I could see the wood glue I had used on the hinge in 2011.

Kit folded the table flat and leaned it against the donation pile.

"Bernice, I hear you," she said.

I couldn't make out Bernice's words on the other end, just the high scrape of her voice.

"I'm not taking over her volunteer habits just because she died." Kit used the edge of her sleeve to wipe dust off the table. "That isn't a job. That's a shrine."

"She'd have wanted me to." Kit's voice went flat. "She wanted all of it. That was the whole problem."

"Do not tell me she didn't ask for that. The letter does nothing but ask."

She said goodbye and set the phone down.

The kitchen went quiet.

Later, after the window-hours light had gone out, I was still at the viewing room window.

The board still read 12.

Halene came in, snapped off the console light, and folded her arms.

"You've had your window time."

"I know."

"Then why are you still standing here?"

I didn't answer. Down in the kitchen, Kit was staring at the donation pile like it had said something.

Halene tapped the glass once.

"Five minutes," she said. "I'll cover it with a debt-service shift."

I tried to thank her.

"Don't make me a character in this," she said. Then she left.

Kit stayed at the pile.

She counted the boxes, looked at the table, and took it by the legs.

She slid the table out of the donation pile and carried it back inside.