The Cold Breakfast Bride novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: Paint and Rain

Abel read the inspector's list on Friday night at the tailgate, by flashlight.

"Grease trap," he said. "Floor tile. Mop sink."

"The mop sink's been there since 1952."

"Then it's had a good run."

On Saturday morning, eleven Wilder pickups pulled into the lot at six.

The packless brothers tore out the cracked tile.

The night cook and Abel cut the old mop sink off the wall and moved it six feet.

The waitress held the flashlight and complained about the smell.

The reefer trucker showed up with a grease trap still in its crate.

"Fell off a pallet," he said.

The hill wolves painted.

By noon on Sunday the gray, peeling walls were white again.

The trim was cherry red.

Ruthie painted the bottom two feet of the back wall by herself and got more on her raincoat than the wall.

On Monday the inspector came back.

He walked through my kitchen for an hour.

He looked at the new tile for so long I thought he was going to propose to it.

Then he took the padlock off the kitchen door and handed it to me.

"Keep it," he said. "Souvenir."

He paused at the door.

"For what it's worth, I didn't like the tip."

"Who called it in?"

"Anonymous," he said, and then, looking at the lake below the pass, "with a lodge's phone number."

He drove off.

The only thing left was the sign.

Now it wasn't flickering at all.

It was dead.

"Transformer," Abel said, looking up at it. "I'll get it tonight."

"I'll hold the ladder."

"You're pregnant."

"I'm pregnant, not made of glass. I'll hold the ladder."

He looked at me.

"You're going to climb the ladder."

"I'm going to climb the ladder."

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