What We Choose novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: Five Weeks

Mr. Penhallow straightened up off my car when he saw me.

Kenna stepped in front of me without thinking.

"It's okay," I said.

"Is it?"

"He's the one who walked the check down the table."

She stepped aside, but not far.

Mr. Penhallow took his hands out of his windbreaker pockets. One of them held a long white envelope.

"I won't keep you," he said. "You're tired. I can see it."

"Radiation."

"I know. I asked the pie lady." He almost smiled. "This town tells you everything eventually. It just takes its time."

I waited.

He turned the envelope over in his hands.

"I was harbormaster here thirty-one years. I knew every boat by its engine. I could tell you who was coming in before I saw the bow." He looked at the ground. "I didn't know my own son."

"You weren't the only one."

"You weren't his father." He held out the envelope. "Here."

I didn't take it yet.

"What is it?"

"The club deposit. Twelve thousand." He said it flatly, like a tide table. "It was nonrefundable. I've been a member forty years. I sat in front of the board on Tuesday and told them why the June date would never be used, and whose money it was."

Kenna said, "Holy crap."

"They voted to refund it," he said. "One abstained. I won't say who."

I took the envelope.

It was a cashier's check, made out to me. Dessa Quinlan. Spelled right.

"Your mother's money," he said. "All of it back now, I think. Correct me if I'm wrong."

I did the math in my head, the way she taught me.

Twenty-four thousand into the account. Nine thousand one hundred I'd saved. Fourteen thousand nine hundred at Thanksgiving. Twelve thousand here.

"You're not wrong," I said.

"Good."

He nodded, once.

"Where's Nash?" Kenna asked. She couldn't help it.

"In his old bedroom, under his football trophies." Mr. Penhallow zipped his windbreaker. "I got him a job pumping fuel at the harbor. Minimum wage. He shows up. That's something."

"And Mrs. Penhallow?"

"At her sister's in New Hampshire, for now." He didn't say anything else about that, and I didn't ask.

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