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"I mean, it’s not his fault he’s such a complete and total ahole He just wouldn’t see it the e do You have to pro"
"Good" She nodded briskly, satisfied, and pointed her eyes out the windshield again, her shnuts Now, I don’t knohy I stopped here of all places You probably don’t want doughnuts, do you?"
Just the word made a blast of saliva wash down the insides of his ht," Carter said "The coffee’s good"
"But they’re not a real meal, are they?" Her voice was fir "A real meal is what you need"
That hen Carter realized what the feeling was He felt seen Like all along he’d been a ghost without knowing it It came to him all of a sudden that she meant to take him with her, take him home He’d heard about folks like her but never believed it
"You know, Mr Carter, I think God put you under that freeway today for a reason I think he was trying to tell oing to be friends I can just feel it"
And they were friends, just like she’d said That was the funny thing He and this white lady, Mrs Wood, with her husband-old enough to be her father, though Carter al house under the live oaks with its thick lawn and hedges, and her two little girls-not just the baby but the older one too, cute as a bug like her sister was, the two of theht down to the marrow, the deepest part of his for him that no one ever had; it was as if she’d opened the door to her car and inside was a whole big roo his name and food to eat and a bed to sleep on and all the rest She’d gotten him work, not just her yard but other houses, too; and wherever he went, people called hi a little extra today, because they were having folks over: blowing leaves off the patio or painting a set of chairs or pulling leaves froain Mr Carter, I know you must be busy, but if it’s not too much trouble, could you? And always he said yes, and in the envelope under the mat or the flowerpot they’d leave an extra ten or twenty, without his having to ask He liked these other folks, but the truth was they didn’t matter to him; he did it all for her Wednesdays, the best day of the week-her day-she’d wave to hie, and sometimes, lots of ti up-she didn’t leave the money under the mat like the others, but put it in his hand-and lasses of tea on the patio, telling hi hi in the shade Mr Carter, she’d tell hiodsend Mr Carter, I don’t kno I ever got one thing done without you You’re the piece of the puzzle that was
He loved her It was true That was the mystery, the sad and sorrowful mystery of it all As he lay now in the dark and cold, he felt the tears cout How could anybody ever say he’d done anything to Mrs Wood when he’d loved her like he did? Because he knew Knew that even though she s and playing her tennis and taking trips to the salon, inside of her was an empty place, he’d seen it that first day in the car, and his heart went out to this, like he could fill it for her just by wanting to The days when she didn’t come out to the yard, ht of her, so the baby just cry and cry because she et or hungry, but not one out of her Souessed she was deep in the house sos on those days, tri weeds out of the walk, hoping if he waited long enough she’d coht, that she’d gotten through another day of feeling awful like she did
And then that afternoon in the yard-that terrible afternoon-he found the older girl, Haley, alone It was December, the air raith dairl, as in kindergarten, earing her blue school shorts and a collared blouse but nothing else, not even shoes, and sitting on the patio She was holding a doll, a Barbie Didn’t she have school today? Carter asked, and she shook her head, not looking at hiirl stated, and shivered in the cold With his girlfriend Her et out of bed
He tried the door but it was locked, and rang the bell and then he called up to the s, but no one answered He didn’t knohat to irl, outside alone like that, but there was lots he didn’t know about people like the Woods, not everything they did ive the girl, but she took it, wrapping it around herself like a blanket He got to work on the lawn, thinking maybe the noise of the moould wake up Mrs Wood and she’d reirl was outside alone by the pool, that she’d accidentally locked the door somehow Mr Carter, I don’t kno it happened, I fell asleep soirl watching hie to clean the pool That hen he found it, along the edge of the path: a baby toad Weren’t no bigger than a penny He was lucky he’d hed nothing in his hand If he hadn’t been looking at it with his own eyes he’d have said his hand was eirl watching hi behind hiht then, like the toad could set things right sorass
-C’ to show you Just a little baby of a thing, Miss Haley A little baby thing like you
He turned then to find Mrs Wood, standing in the yard behind him, not ten feet away; she must have come out the front, because he hadn’t heard a sound She earing a big T-shirt, like a nightgown, her hair all whichaway around her face
-Mrs Wood, he said, why there you are, glad to see you’re up noas just about to show Haley here-
Get away from her!
But it wasn’t Mrs Wood, not the one he knew Her eyes were gone all wild and crazy She looked like she didn’t knoho he was
-Mrs Wood, I justnice-
Get away! Get away! Run, Haley, run!
And before he could say another word she’d shoved hith; he tuled on the skimmer where he’d left it on the pool deck He reached out, a reflex, his fingertips catching and holding the front of her shirt; he felt his weight taking her with hi he could do to stop it, and that hen they fell into the water
The water It hit hi with it, with its awful chemical taste, like demon’s breath She was under and over and all around his twisted around each other’s like a net; he tried to free hi him down and down He couldn’t swi if he had to but even that scared hith to stop her He craned his head to find the shining surface of the water where it met the air, but it could have been ahim down, into a world of silence, as if the pool were an inverted piece of sky, and that hen he figured it: that here she wanted to go That’s where she’d been headed, all along, since that day under the freehen she had stopped her car and said his name Whatever had kept her in that other world, the one above the water, had finally snapped, like the string of a kite, but the world was upside down, and now the kite was falling She pulled hiainst his shoulder, and for an instant he gli water and saw they were full of a terrible, final darkness Oh please, he thought, let me I’ll die if you want me to, I would die for you if you asked, let me be the one to die instead All he had to do was breathe He knew that as clear as he knew his own naht he couldn’t ive it up by will alone They hit the botto him, and he felt her shoulders twitch when she took the first breath She took another, and then a third, the bubbles of the last air in her lungs rising beside his ear like a whispered secret-God bless you, Mr Carter-and then she let hio