The Last Days of October Read Free Page B

the world through empty glass eyes.
    “Do you think
Daddy’s okay?”   Amber asked.
    Heather took her
foot off the brake and the truck began rolling forward again.   “Let’s go home,” she said.  

 
    It had been a
stupid fight, in hindsight.   Not that
they argued like a pair of rocket scientists on the best of days—an element of
the ridiculous usually found its way into all their conflicts, ensuring that no
matter how it started or turned out, she could postgame herself into
embarrassment over at least some aspect of it.   In this case, she took something relatively minor and ensured that it
grew.   And while the Asshole Award
ultimately went to Mike in this one, she’d done her part.   Yes, she had.
    He’d found the
bank statement— a   bank statement, actually, because she’d split
the money into three different accounts for FDIC purposes pending a decision on
exactly what to do with the almost four hundred thousand dollars that the trust
had paid.   The statements were supposed
to go to her post office box.   Apparently, she’d had something on her mind at the time she funded the
third account, because the first statement for that one came straight to the
house.
    “A hundred and
fifty grand,” he remarked when she came home from the store on Wednesday, the
day before the camping trip.   She found
him sitting in the kitchen in his jeans and Navy sweatshirt, the envelope open
on the table before him beside a plate of peanut butter toast.   Although his hard and handsome features had
softened with the addition of post-retirement fat, he still wore his blond hair
militarily short.   He ran his hands over
the freshly-cut stubble.   “Wow.”
    She concealed a
flash of irritation behind the grocery bags in her arms.   She set them on the counter and began placing
the cold items in the refrigerator.   She
kept her back to him as she said, “That’s part of my grandma’s trust.   You’ve known about that.”
    “I know.   I’m just saying.”
    “You’re just
saying what?”
    “It’s a lot of
money.”
    “It is.”   Her back tensed, as if it ran off the same
wire as the rock-solid muscles in her jaw.   “And?”
    He didn’t reply
right away.   She felt him back there,
staring at her.   Thinking,
analyzing.   Wondering.
    Go ahead , she thought.   Bring it on. Because there’s an and in there somewhere, right?    Always is.
    “And nothing,” he
said at last.   “I was just thinking.”
    “Thinking what?”
    “I don’t
know.   I was just thinking maybe we could
take a little bit of this and put it down on a truck.   Trade the Ford in, put something down,
finance the rest.   Get something a little
newer.”
    “What’s wrong with
the Ford?”
    “It has two
hundred thousand miles on it.”
    Cold items in the
refrigerator.   Boxed items in the cabinet
above the coffee machine.   Canned goods
in the pantry.   Everything in its
place.   “The Durango isn’t far behind
it.”
    “Okay, let me say
it another way; my truck has two hundred thousand miles on it and I just spent
the last two decades risking my life for my country and this family.   That’s what’s wrong with it.   Twenty years, not one new vehicle.   I don’t think I’m asking for much.   I mean, Jesus, Heather, unclench.   I think if I stuck a lump of coal up your ass
right now, you’d make a damn diamond.”
    Her jaw tightened
so much her teeth hurt.   Red, angry pain
enveloped her cheeks and spread upwards into the rest of her skull.   Her temples throbbed.
    Careful.
    But she couldn’t
be careful.   Not today, not about
this.   Daylight still burned in the sky
over the houses beyond her window, but this was the middle of the night again
and this was just another instance of him waking her up and turning her
whichever way he wanted.   Doing whatever he wanted, like he always
did.   Not asking, oh no, because asking
implied some level of give-a-shit about her feelings in the matter and