I Left to Make Him Follow, and He Let Me Go for Three Years novel · Chapter 17 of 24
Chapter 17: The Roof
The glassworks roof was flat tar and gravel, with a low brick parapet and the whole Strip District spread out below.
It was the first properly cold night of the year.
The sky was clear, and the chimney of the old kiln house stood black against it, breathing a thread of heat.
Ansel had brought a camp heater and the blue quilt from the bed, and he had spread them both in the lee of the stair housing.
He did not say why.
He had said only, at ten, "Come up with me," and I had put on my coat.
"Your mother sent the letters," I said.
"This morning."
"Does the parish know?"
"By noon." He stood with his hands in his pockets, looking at the lights of the bridges. "My uncle called to say half of them have already phoned the Monsignor. Not to complain about me."
"About her?"
"About her. A woman from the altar guild told him she had known Marta since the cradle, and she was ashamed she had said nothing for eleven years."
I leaned on the parapet beside him.
The brick was cold through my coat.
"I thought it would feel like winning," I said.
"It does not?"
"It feels like I took a stone out of a river and the water ran." I turned my face into the wind. "Come here."
He turned.
I took the front of his coat in both hands and drew him in until his chest touched mine.
"I want you to do something for me," I said.
"Anything."
"I've been the one deciding. In the bedroom, in the hotel, in the car. I've told you where to put your hands." I looked up at him. "Tonight, I want you to take it."
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of I Left to Make Him Follow, and He Let Me Go for Three Years are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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