Scarlett Rose's Arc

Chapter 29 of 57

By morning Scarlett could sit up without the room tilting. Rose brought her toast and left for a walk to give her the phone. Scarlett dialed Clayton from the guest bed. Aunt Lorraine was in the kitchen two thin walls away, humming while she washed a pan. The bedroom door didn't latch clean. Scarlett heard the humming stop when she said his name. "Morning," Clayton said. "Morning." She wanted to tell him she'd read the letter he was on tonight before he did. She wanted to say the things she'd only ever written down. She looked at the door and said, "Broth stayed down. I slept." Her voice went flat as a note read off a page. A pause. "You alone?" "Not really." "Call me back when you are." He hung up first. Scarlett set the phone on her knee. The humming in the kitchen started again. She had six more days of this. Six more mornings of weather-report calls while Aunt Lorraine listened through the wall. Clayton would stop reaching. She knew him. He'd go quiet to protect her, and quiet was the thing she couldn't afford. She got dressed. She found Aunt Lorraine at the sink. "I need to walk," Scarlett said. "Just the block. I'll take my phone." Aunt Lorraine looked her over. "Take a sweater. And the neighbor's dog if he's out. That beagle mix likes company." The front of the house was a small one-story with a low porch and white curtains. Scarlett went down the three steps and turned along the sidewalk. Two doors down, a black-and-white beagle mix stood at a gate, tail already going. His owner nodded from the porch and waved her on. Scarlett clipped a loaner leash to his collar and kept walking until the houses opened onto a small park with a bench under a maple. She sat. The dog leaned against her boot. She called Clayton. "I'm outside," she said. "By myself. There's a dog. That's it." "Good." His breath came out. "Tell me the real answer." "I threw up twice yesterday on the road. I cried in the bathroom last night because I couldn't hear you right through the wall. Aunt Lorraine's house has paper for walls, Clayton. I can't talk to you in there." "Then don't. Walk out. Every morning and every night. I'll be on the porch." "Every call?" "Every call." She pressed her hand flat on the bench. "Last night's letter. Did you open it?" "Yeah." "Tell me which one." He told her. She closed her eyes and remembered writing it, a year ago, at her kitchen table, not sure he'd ever read a word of her. They talked forty minutes. The beagle mix slept on her foot. When she stood up she had a plan for six more days: two walks, two calls, no walls between them.