Chapter 9: He Knew

Stanley closed the ring box.

He did it slowly, with a small click, and he put it in his shirt pocket.

"Lena," he said. "Door."

"Stanley, I only wanted..."

"Door."

She picked up her tablet and left her slice of pie on the plate.

I heard her heels on the porch, and then her car.

Stanley looked at Mom, and Mom looked at him.

Neither of them said anything.

"Kitchen," Stanley said at last, and held out his arm.

She took it, and they went through the swinging door together.

It swung shut behind them, and Justin and I were left alone with five slices of pie.

"Outside," he said quietly.

The porch swing creaked in the dark.

He didn't sit.

He stood at the rail with his hands braced on the wood, and I stood by the door with a glass of wine I didn't remember picking up.

"You told your father yes," I said. "In front of everybody."

"He asked me directly."

"You could have lied."

"I don't lie to my father."

"You lied to him ten minutes ago, about me in the ladies' room."

"That was a different lie," he said. "That was about stairs."

I almost laughed.

I didn't.

"Did you do it before?" I said. "Lena says there was a woman last year."

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