But he asks questions, and I end up telling him the whole story from the beginning, or at least the highlights. I skip some parts.
When I finish, he’s quiet a long moment.
“I knew it,” he finally says, and tosses the peas onto the counter next to him. “You remember that time at the Mountain Grind when you two were talking about a wireless router?”
“She was annoyed that my house didn’t have Wi-Fi,” I explain.
“I’ve never seen you look at anyone like that,” he says. “I should have known then. God, it was obvious.”
“Probably,” I agree. “Everyone knows wireless routers are definitely a couples thing.”
He’s silent another moment.
Then: “What have you told her?”
I take the hash browns off my face before I get frostbite.
“About you?”
“Yeah.”
“Nothing.”
“She can’t know,” Silas says, crossing his arms over himself, his robe still open and slightly bloodstained, his voice low and urgent. “Not about the dreams, not about the episodes, not about what we had to do or what we saw or — or any of that, Levi, I swear. She can’t.”
“I haven’t told her anything,” I say softly.
“She’s my baby sister,” he says, and now there’s a desperate edge to his voice.
“I have no intention of discussing your business with June,” I say. “That’s yours. It’s got nothing to do with me. Nor, for the record, do I have any intention of discussing June’s business with you.”
Silas frowns.
“What business does June have?” he asks.
I just raise one eyebrow and say nothing. He narrows his eyes.
“Point taken,” he finally mutters.
We’re both silent for a long time, standing in his dark kitchen, nursing the wounds we gave each other.
“You could tell her,” I say. “I know you don’t think you could, but you could. It might help.”
“I don’t know,” he says.
“She’s not a kid.”
Silas just gives me a dangerous look.
“You know what I mean,” I tell him.
“I do,” he says, and then, “She took the job.”
I just nod. I knew June would take the job. Everything I know about June told me she’d take the job.
“Good,” I say, and toss the hash browns on the counter. “It sounds like a good job. I know she wanted it.”
Silas pokes at his lip, then gives me a funny look.
“Yeah, she did,” he says, half to himself.
“I gotta go.”
“I haven’t given you permission yet,” Silas says.
“Don’t need your permission to leave,” I point out.
“To date my sister,” he says. “Levi, you do not have my permission to date June.”
“I didn’t come here to get your permission,” I tell him. “I came here because I thought you should finally know.”
With that, I walk out of his kitchen and for his front door uncertain how I’ve left things between us. My nose hurts, and I cut my hand on his teeth when I punched him back, but I can’t say I think that makes things bad.
“That was a test,” he calls after me. “You passed.”
“Of course I did,” I call back, and I leave Silas’s house and walk back into the dark gray of early morning.Airport security doesn’t love it when you’ve got an obviously-recent black eye and a swollen nose, but I manage to smile and tell the security officer that I’ve got a new puppy who just got a little too excited when I told her goodbye this morning, and after being wanded and patted down, they let me through.
I sit in the Roanoke airport and stare out the window. I wonder if June stared out this window, two days ago. I wonder whether she’ll even take me back after what I said to her. Deep down, I wonder if it’s possible that I’ve been reading this whole thing wrong all along, that I’ve been falling in love while she was just having a good time.
I wonder if I’m flying to South Dakota — three flights, two connections, a rental car — just to have my heart broken again.
I could have called first. It probably would have been the prudent thing to do, the rational thing. Call her and talk to her instead of showing up halfway across the country, apologize and discuss and tell her that I’m willing to move there, I just want to be with her.
It really lacks something, though. I don’t consider myself someone with a flair for the dramatic, but even I know that going to her is the right move and if she turns me down, she turns me down and it’s really over. Anyone can say they’ll move to a new state.
I’m pretty sure you only make the offer in person if you’re truly and psychotically in love.Chapter Thirty-NineJuneBLUFF CITY, S.D. — At the end of yet another lengthy harangue disguised as a campaign speech, City Council hopeful Patty Gold finally sat with a faraway look on her face, as if she might begin to cry at any moment. Her hands sat limply in her lap, and her face wore the lines of bad politics, shattered promises, and lies told so often that even she had begun to think they were true.