He Thought I'd Forget novel · Chapter 21 of 32

Chapter 21: Night

I finished the B in BLUEBERRY after he left.

My hand shook on the first try, so I wiped it off and did it again.

The owner didn't say anything.

He just put a slice of blueberry pie on the counter next to my ladder and pointed at it with his rag until I ate it.

At five Jeanine came to get Davey for the night.

"Sleepover with his cousins," she said. "They've built him a fort. It has a moat. Don't ask."

She looked at my face for a second too long.

"Lee. What happened?"

"Tomorrow," I said. "I'll tell you tomorrow. I want to tell Clark first."

Her eyebrows went up into her platinum bangs.

She didn't say a single word.

That was how I knew she was proud of me.

Clark came up the outside stairs at eight with a bag of Thai food.

He stopped in the doorway when he saw my face.

"Wrong food?"

"It's fine," I said. "It's actually fine. Sit down."

He'd sewn the buttons back on his flannel shirt from the workbench.

Badly. With white thread.

I sat on the floor across from him with my back to the couch, under the folk-art poster.

Then I told him everything.

Not pieces.

All of it, start to end.

The kitchen table and the poster and the score sheets.

The copy shop. The fond laugh. The suitcase.

Neenie, leave the porch light on.

The bridge, last. I said it flat, and he never looked away.

Then I told him what Byron had said in the café, across the counter, with peppermint on his breath.

"He's going to tell a judge I did it on purpose," I said. "That I was depressed. That I aimed for the rail. And someday he'll tell Davey."

Clark had been very still the whole time.

Now he put his food down.

"Can I tell you something?" he said. "You don't have to do anything with it."

"Okay."

"The first time you knocked on my door, it was two in the morning."

I didn't remember.

Of course I didn't.

"You were in the hall in your nightgown, with your keys in your hand. You couldn't remember which door was yours. He was on night rounds."

He looked down at his hands.

"I walked you to 4D. Your key worked. You stood there in the doorway and asked me to write down where you lived, so you'd know next time."

"Did you?"

"No." He shook his head. "I went back to my place and got a blue notebook I'd bought for shop measurements. I gave it to you and a pen. I said, 'Write it yourself.'"

My throat closed.

"I didn't want to be the guy who writes you down," he said. "I wanted it to be you."

I got up and went to the stroller by the door.

I lifted the seat.

I took out the blue book and opened it to the very first page.

My handwriting. Shaky, and small.

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