Antler Crown, Silent Departure novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Third Step

Bridget's POV

On Wednesday morning I found Malcolm on my grandmother's front porch with a toolbox.

I had not given him a time, and I had not given him an address, which meant Dot had.

She sat in the porch swing in her housecoat, drinking coffee and enjoying herself.

"Don't look at me," Dot said. "He asked."

"I asked if the step was a problem," Malcolm said, from his knees. "She said it's been a problem since the Reagan administration."

The third step from the top had a board that tipped when you stepped on the edge.

Dot had been stepping around it for thirty years.

"I haven't asked you for anything," he said, without looking up. "I'm asking Dot's permission to fix a step. If you'd rather I stopped, I'll put the board back and go."

"You pulled the board off already."

"I did."

"So you can't put it back."

"I can put it back broken."

I stood on the porch in my scrubs with a travel mug in my hand, trying not to smile, and failing.

"You have forty minutes," I said. "I have a nine o'clock patient with a molar situation."

"That's more than I need."

"It's a step."

"It's an old step," Dot said. "Give him his due."

He worked.

I stood by the rail and drank my coffee and watched his forearms.

I told myself I was supervising.

He measured the board twice and wrote the number on his wrist with a carpenter's pencil.

His sleeves were pushed up, and the tendons moved under the skin when he tightened the screw.

I looked at the street instead, and the street had nothing to say.

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