Chapter 16: Since Page Four

Tabitha's mouth was still open when I turned to her.

"Your phone is recording," I said. "Wave."

She looked down at it.

"You walked into a closed restaurant in a raincoat to win a man who had just said no to you."

"Post that if you like. I'd watch it."

She stood there for another second, with her chin shaking.

Then she grabbed her bag and walked out through the front door, and the bell rang twice behind her.

The room was very quiet.

Ewan hadn't moved.

He stood beside table two with the tablecloth at his feet, and his hands hung at his sides.

"Three weeks," he said.

"Three weeks and a day."

"You knew at the lawyer's."

"I saw the scar when you signed."

"You were looking at the page, not me."

"I was looking at your arm."

He laughed once, a bad sound.

"Ewan."

"The gas bill." He pressed the heel of his hand to his forehead.

"Eggs at five in the morning, and you told me what was wrong with them."

"It was wrong."

"You ate my lies with a spoon."

"I did."

"And you let me stand in front of your stepfather and lie about my own arm."

It came out raw, with something shaking underneath it.

"I watched you do it," I said. "You were very good."

"Rosie."

"I handed you five hundred and fifty dollars for half a gas bill that was paid in September."

"You put it in a jar!"

"I watched you put it in a jar."

His eyes were bright, and his jaw was tight.

I realized he was close to crying, and I realized I was too, and I hated that he'd got there first.

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