Chapter 10: The Treasurer

Dee came in through the kitchen door at three in the morning.

She had her car keys in one hand and a bag of gas-station donuts in the other.

She stopped and looked at me, and then at Rowan, and then at the way we were standing.

"Hi," she said. "Is this a bad time? I can wait in the car."

"Dee," I said.

"I'm just saying, you've got wax on your face and he's got wax on his collar."

Rowan put his hand to his collar and took it down again.

"This is Rowan," I said. "Rowan, this is Dee."

"So you're the lumberjack," Dee said, and held out a donut to him.

He took it.

Behind her in the doorway, Beckett stood with his hood up and both hands in the front pocket of his sweatshirt.

He looked about twelve.

"Hi, Tegan," he said.

I didn't say anything.

I looked at him for a long time, and he made himself look back.

"He found me in the parking lot after the vigil," Dee said. "He was sitting on the curb being sick.

"I figured he'd earned a ride."

"I want to say something," Beckett said. "Before you decide."

"Go ahead."

"The pancakes line was mine."

I blinked.

"In the chat. 'She makes the best pancakes though.' I wrote that.

"Then I laughed when someone said pancakes don't make you fun."

He swallowed.

"You made me pancakes every Sunday for two years. You made them when I failed the econ final.

"I never said thank you, not once, and I sat there laughing."

Nobody moved.

"That's not an apology," Beckett said. "I know.

"I'm not asking you to forgive me. I just want you to know I knew what I was doing."

Dee set the donuts on Gran's table.

"That's more than the others will say," she said.

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