Webster Daily's Arc

Chapter 2 of 6

Webster sat in his car two blocks from the shopping center, engine off, watching the street in his rearview mirror. He'd been parked for twenty minutes, trying to decide if he was leaving or just waiting for permission to stay. He spotted Sherrie standing near the old town square sign, the ornate metalwork catching the afternoon light. She was watching him, had probably been watching him the whole time. Webster opened the car door and stepped out, but before he could decide what to say, she crossed the street and stopped three feet from his hood. She pulled a folded paper from her jacket pocket and held it up so he could see the list written in neat columns. Names, dates, arrival times. His name was at the bottom, underlined twice. She'd known he was coming before he'd even decided to stay. Webster looked at the list, then at her face. "What do you want me to do?" he asked. Sherrie refolded the paper and slipped it back into her pocket. "Write about anything else," she said. "The contamination. The company. The people who left. But not the power." She turned and walked back toward the square without waiting for an answer. Webster stood beside his car, keys still in his hand. The story he came for was gone. The story he found was the one he couldn't tell. He got back in the car and started the engine, but this time he knew he wasn't coming back to ask more questions. He was coming back because writing the truth meant deciding which truth mattered more.