Chapter 14: Two Cups

I got to the cemetery at ten to six with two thermoses.

Lindy was already there, sitting cross-legged in the wet grass in front of the stone.

She had no flowers this time and no photographer.

"I didn't know if you'd come," she said.

"I said I would."

"You didn't say. I texted and you didn't answer."

"I drove here. That's an answer."

I sat down beside her and unscrewed the first thermos.

"What is that?" she asked.

"His coffee. Black, no sugar, and it's terrible."

She took the cup in both hands and sniffed it, and her whole face went soft.

"Oh my God," she said. "It smells exactly like the truck."

She drank some, coughed, and drank some more.

"He made me drink this when I was twelve," she said. "He said it would put hair on my chest."

I stared at her.

"He told me the same thing. Word for word."

"He did not."

"He said the hair was a guarantee. He said it with his right hand up."

Lindy put her cup down on the grass and laughed until she had to wipe her eyes.

"Casey, did he call you Little Captain?"

"Every Saturday of my life."

"He called me that, too. I thought I was the second one. I thought the Little meant I was behind you."

"I thought I was the only one."

"I think he used it on both of us so he'd never say the wrong name out loud."

That set us both off again, and the maple dropped a leaf on the stone.

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