Chapter 5: The Folder on Her Phone

My mother woke me by throwing a pillow at my head.

"You snore," Joan said. "And somebody keeps leaving flowers at my door."

I sat up in the chair.

A bouquet of white tulips stood on her tray table, and the card was propped against the vase.

"Who?"

"Read it."

The card said: From a friend of Miles's. No name.

"Hazel," I said.

"Is that the pale girl with the knot in her hair? She was here yesterday."

"She was here?"

"While you were at the lawyer's. She sat there for an hour and asked me what my first apartment was like."

"What did you say?"

"I said it had a mouse named Gerald." My mother narrowed her eyes. "She laughed so hard she had to put her tea down. I like her."

"She's Connor's wife, Mom."

"I know who she is. I've met her four times. She never talked at Christmas, and now I know why. Nobody ever asked her a question."

I rubbed my face.

"She paid your deposit."

My mother was silent for a long moment.

"I figured somebody did," she said. "The billing woman kept calling it a blessing. Is she in trouble with that man?"

"I think so."

"Then you be careful what you owe a woman who's in trouble." She pointed at my chest. "And don't you make her pay for it twice."

I did not know what that meant, so I kissed her forehead.

At ten, Hazel came down the hall with a paper bag and her coat over one arm.

She stopped when she saw me standing in my mother's doorway.

"I can come back."

"No."

I stepped out and pulled the door nearly shut.

"Why are you leaving flowers with no name?"

"Because she'd have to say thank you."

"You're giving her tulips and making her guess."

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