Chapter 8: Mahoning River

Fletcher came to the bay the next afternoon with the water, like he'd said, hours before the line.

Noel handed him the manifest before he'd set the crate down.

Fletcher read it under the work light.

"Forty drums," he said. "That's a year of Hush for the whole city."

"I'm going to Youngstown."

"Alone?"

"Fenella's on shift. Maddie has an exam."

"I have a truck."

"You have a black car with a company tracker in it."

"I have a truck," Fletcher said again. "It was my grandfather's. Clay doesn't know it runs."

It was a green Ford pickup older than Maddie, with a bench seat and a radio that only got one station.

The station played power ballads.

Fletcher knew all the words.

He didn't sing them. He mouthed them, very seriously, with one wrist on the wheel.

"I can see you doing that," Noel said, somewhere past Beaver Falls.

"Doing what?"

"Lip-syncing to a man in leather pants."

"He's suffering. Somebody has to keep him company."

Noel turned it off.

Fletcher turned it back on, one notch quieter, without taking his eyes off the road.

They stopped at a diner off Route 18.

Noel ordered eggs.

Fletcher ordered a fried bologna sandwich with peanut butter on it, a side of pierogies, and a chocolate milk.

Noel stared at him.

"You run a pharmaceutical company."

"I ran one. I'm on leave."

"That is a crime against food."

"My grandfather ate it every Sunday. He lived to ninety-one."

"He lived to ninety-one in spite of it."

Fletcher cut the sandwich in half and pushed one half across the table.

Noel ate it.

It was disgusting and perfect, and he didn't tell Fletcher that.

Back on the road, Fletcher asked about Noel's mother.

Nobody had asked about her in eight years.

"She was a nurse," Noel said. "A beta. Night shifts at Shadyside."

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