Dark Favors

“Is it about the money?”

“Yes.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“He talked about it last night, huh?”

“Yeah, he said he wanted it.”

“So why didn’t you just give it back to him? I know there’s no way you spent it all,” she said, looking at me carefully. Fawn knew me much too well, I thought, considering we just lived together. We didn’t talk about money a lot. There was never really a reason to. As long as we each paid what we were supposed to, we were happy.

“I got rid of it,” I told her.

“What the fuck? Like you threw it away?” She shook her head. “Are you serious right now?”

“I was walking by a church on my way home last night,” I told her. “I donated it.”

“To a church?”

“Yeah.”

“On a whim?”

“Yeah.”

“Honestly, not a horrible idea,” Fawn shrugged. “You’ve had worse ideas.”

“You’re not opposed to churches?”

“Not so much. They do a lot of good,” she said. “The one on 17th Avenue has free lunch every Wednesday.”

“I didn’t know that.”

More importantly, I didn’t know Fawn was the kind of person who took advantage of free lunch. Maybe I misjudged her. I always kind of thought of her as a girl who had unlimited resources. Maybe I was wrong. She seemed to read my mind, because she smiled a little bit.

“Surprised?”

“Honestly? Yeah.”

“I grew up poor,” she shrugged. “I still have a hard time with money. My parents have a lot of it now, but they don’t exactly give me much. Not that I expect them to, you know. That’s their cash. They’re paying for school. Everything else, I kind of figure out on my own.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“I thought they paid your rent.”

“Nah,” she shook her head. “I just...”

“What?”

“Look, I don’t want you to pity me,” she said, looking up at me sharply. “I have some money saved up from when I worked and now I’m trying to make the most of everything that I’ve been given. I’ve taken out some loans, and I’ve saved a little. I’ve actually been looking for a job,” she added. “But I don’t know how to tell my folks. The fre

e lunch thing? It’s not a lot, but it helps. When you’re struggling, every little bit helps.”

“That makes me feel a lot better about giving it to the church,” I told her.