Chapter 6: Rain

It rained on Monday, and I walked to work at five forty in the dark.

A truck slowed beside me on the lake road with its wipers going.

The window came down.

"Get in," Lennart said.

"I'm fine."

"You're soaked."

I got in.

The cab was warm and smelled like him, pine smoke and cold water, and the heater roared.

He didn't turn toward town.

He drove down to the boat launch at the end of the road, killed the engine, and let the rain fill the silence.

"Moth wrote back," he said.

I looked at the windshield.

"She said, 'Don't stop on my account.'"

He gave a small, baffled laugh.

"'Be kind to her. Someone is allowed to be good for you.'"

I wished the truck would sink into the lake.

I had typed those lines at midnight, with my hands shaking, and had not slept after.

"She sounds generous," I said.

"She's the most generous person I've ever met. And I've never met her."

"That's an odd thing to be in love with."

"I know."

"Does it bother you that I write to her?" he said.

"It would bother me," I said. "If I were her."

"Good thing you're not."

"Good thing."

He turned in his seat to face me.

The rain drummed on the roof, and the windows were already fogging at the edges.

"I'm not hiding what I want from you either," he said.

"I want you. In daylight. In my bed. I don't want to do it in a stockroom."

"I like the stockroom."

"I noticed."

I unbuckled my seat belt, climbed over the gearshift, and settled into his lap.

His hands came up to my waist, startled, and then tightened.

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