Chapter 21: Two Men on the Porch

I was not eavesdropping, and I want that on the record.

I was washing a pot at the kitchen sink.

The window over it happened to be open an inch, and the porch happened to be right there.

It was the last Saturday of March, bright and cold, with a wind that smelled of mud and the first thin green.

Gene sat in the porch chair with a blanket over his knees and the tablet on his lap.

Neil sat on the top step, below him, because Gene had pointed at it.

"Sit," the voice had said. "I have questions."

"Yes, sir."

"Do not call me sir. I am not a sir. I am an old man with a clipboard."

He did not have a clipboard, but he held the tablet like one.

"Question one," said the voice. "Salary."

Neil didn't blink.

"I made forty-eight thousand at the agency. At the clinic I'll make nothing for about eight months, and then maybe thirty. I have a loan."

"Savings."

"Enough for the loan and my rent. Not enough for a mistake."

"Do you snore."

"I don't know." Neil considered it honestly. "I've never had a witness."

I put my forehead against the window frame and shook.

"Your mother."

"In Florida. She'd like you. She'd also feed you until you died."

"Cooking?"

"Two things. Soup and eggs."

"That is three," said the voice.

"Eggs count as two, depending on the day."

Gene's eyebrow rose. There was a long pause, with the wind in the tree and a pigeon walking along the rail.

"Question seven," said the voice. "What do you intend."

I stopped moving.

The water ran over my hands and I let it.

Neil looked out at the street for a while, at a kid on a bike who had no idea he was part of anything.