Eduardo's Arc

Chapter 38 of 60

Saturday morning Eduardo walked to the feed store to start his shift. The old man was already at the counter, sorting receipts. He looked up when Eduardo came in and set the papers down. "Sit a minute," the old man said. "Before you start." Eduardo sat on the barrel by the register. His hands still ached from Gwen's pots. He waited. "A woman came through yesterday afternoon," the old man said. "Late. After you'd gone home. She asked about you." Eduardo's chest tightened. He kept his hands flat on his knees. "Short. Brown hair. Tattoos on her arms." The old man watched him. "She said she'd heard your name from a friend. Wanted to know if it was true. About the work." "What did you tell her?" "The truth. That you show up. That you pay what you owe. That you scrub a pot till it's clean and don't argue when I point at another one." The old man tapped the ledger on the counter. "I showed her the book. Your name and mine, week after week. She read every line." Eduardo swallowed. "Did she say anything?" "She said, 'He's really doing it.' Then she said thank you and left." Eduardo looked at the floor. He felt the pull start in his chest, the old want to get in the truck and drive to the school gate. He put his palms harder on his knees. "She didn't ask you to send word," he said. "No." "She didn't leave anything." "No." Eduardo nodded. He stood up. "What do you need hauled first?" The old man studied him a moment longer. Then he pointed at the back room. "Grain sacks. Twenty of them. Wall by the door." Eduardo worked through the morning. He counted the sacks as he stacked them. He did not think about her face. He thought about the weight in his hands and the count on his lips. When he finished he was wet through his shirt and the pull in his chest had gone quiet. He walked home the long way, past the house with the lanterns and the moons carved on the eaves where the dream reader kept her door. He did not stop. He had gone in there once, looking for a sign about Kiersten. He did not need a sign now. He had heard what he needed to hear, and it had not been meant for him. At the house he pulled the ledger down. He wrote the date. He wrote what the old man had told him. He wrote one line under it: She knows. That is enough. Then he closed the book and put it on the shelf. He picked up his hammer and went out to the side of the house where the siding still needed nails. There were twenty-eight days left. He had work to do.