He Stood Me Up, so I Married His Brother novel · Chapter 12 of 24

Chapter 12: The Red Tag

He didn't say a word on the drive to Jones Street.

He carried the pickle jar in from the truck and set it on his kitchen counter, very carefully, next to the hard hat.

Then he sat down on the bottom step of the loft stairs.

I sat down beside him. Our knees touched.

"It was a Tuesday," he said. "In May."

I waited.

"I'd red-tagged that deck the Tuesday before. Lot nine. The spec was plywood and ring-shank nails, and somebody had put down thin board and smooth nails. I could push a screwdriver through it."

He looked at his hands.

"I wrote it up. I put the red tag on the front door. I put a copy in the file. I kept the yellow carbon for myself, because I always do."

"You still have it?"

"In a shoebox. Under the bed."

"Under this bed?"

"Under this bed."

He almost smiled. It didn't last.

"Lorene had a buyer for that house. A closing date. She told Dad I was being dramatic and costing them money."

"Your dad believed her?"

"He believed me. He just wanted to see it himself. He was sixty-one and he'd been walking roofs since he was nineteen. He didn't trust anything he hadn't stood on."

His voice was very even. I put my hand on his knee.

"I got there at a quarter to nine. Dad's truck was already there. Lorene was there in a cream suit, by the ladder."

"And Ivey."

"In the car. That's what she said. I saw her trunk open. There was a ring light in it."

He breathed in.

"The red tag wasn't on the door anymore. I asked Lorene where it was. She said she didn't know what I was talking about."

He shut his eyes.

"Dad was standing at the bottom of the ladder. I said, 'Dad, don't. I'm telling you, don't.' And Lorene put her hand on his arm."

He said the next part slowly, word by word.

"She said, 'The deck is fine, honey. The supplier certified it. Go on up and see for yourself.'"

The kitchen was silent.

"He went up."

I held on to his knee.

"He walked out onto the eave. I was on the ladder behind him, yelling. I heard it before I saw it. A crack like a gunshot."

"Thatcher."

"The board broke between the trusses and he went straight through. Into the garage. Onto the slab."

His hands had started to shake. He looked down at them.

"I got to him first. I held his head off the concrete. He was still awake."

"What did he say?"

Thatcher's face folded.

"He said, 'You were right, son.'" His voice broke on it. "And then he said, 'Don't fight her. Look after your brother.'"

He bent over his knees.

"He died that night at Memorial. Before Crosby could get there from Atlanta."

I wrapped both arms around him.

"At the hospital, Lorene told everyone I'd signed off on that deck. That I'd told Dad it was fixed. She said it to Crosby first, while he was still crying in the hallway."

"And you didn't say anything."

"Dad told me not to fight her. Crosby had just lost his father. The tag was gone out of the file. All I had was a yellow carbon and my word, against a widow's." He wiped his face hard with the heel of his hand. "So I gave her his hard hat to keep, and I quit, and I got a job at a counter where nobody needed me to build anything."

"Where you called my number nineteen times."

"Where I called your number nineteen times."

He turned his face into my shoulder.

He didn't make a sound. His whole body shook.

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