Page 2 of Gray’s Surrender

“What did you file me under?” Her eyes meet mine as she says it.

The answer rises too quickly in me. She’s definitely in the dangerous category. I look at her hand resting beneath mine. “Still deciding,” I say instead.

Her eyes warm. “That sounds very inconvenient.”

“It is,” I say, looking at her and giving nothing else away.

The screen door bangs at the front of the house before I do something that would be harder to explain. Ruby comes in carrying a glass jar with holes punched through the lid. Her blond hair has escaped its braid, and one sock has slid halfway into her shoe.

“Mrs. Lawson says it’s a Japanese beetle,” she announces.

I release Meg and crouch to look at the jar. The beetle climbs one smooth wall and slides back onto the leaf at the bottom.

“She’s right.”

“Can I keep it?”

“Yes, but outside.”

Ruby thinks about arguing, then holds the jar toward Meg. “You said we could take it back to the roses.”

“We will.” Meg accepts the jar as seriously as Ruby offers it. “I keep my promises.”

Ruby’s shoulders settle in a way most people would miss. I don’t. My ex, Ruby’s mother, promised she would call. Then she promised she would visit. Then she promised she would come back when she had herself sorted. She never did any of those things. For five years, promises have been things Ruby studies for weak seams before she puts any weight on them. She has started trusting Meg and that scares me more than it should.

I straighten and point toward Ruby’s foot. “Fix your sock before it rubs, by the way.” She drops onto a chair, and I listen as she explains that Mrs. Lawson’s roses sometimes have beetles on them while Meg carries the jar to the back step.

Ruby looks between us. “Meg said she can still get me Friday if you’re late.” I look at Meg.

“The club stuff sounded serious,” she says.

“Okay, I’ll be back,” I tell Ruby. “But if that changes, Meg gets you.”

“Okay.”

She accepts it because neither of us has let her down this week. Ruby finishes her water and heads outside with Meg. At the back door, Meg taps the frame twice.

“Cedar,” she says.

Ruby repeats the emergency word, then points across the narrow yard toward the loose panel in the rear fence. “Through there, then Mrs. Lawson.”

“Good.” Meg holds the door. “Only if your daddy or I say it, though.”

I showed her the route Monday morning. The code word means Ruby doesn’t wait, argue or look for me. She goes through the fence, crosses the grass and locks Mrs. Lawson’s back door behind her. Meg never told me it was excessive. She practiced it once, made Ruby laugh about our serious faces, then moved on. They cross the yard together. Ruby talks. Meg listens. It would be easy to watch them and build the wrong picture. Meg in my kitchen. Meg beside Ruby. Meg’s keys next to mine.

That’s the trap. I want Meg, but I don’t want a woman because she fits into the empty spaces in my house. I’ve raised Ruby since her mother left. I know the medicine cabinet, the school calendar and which dinners she’ll eat when she’s worried. I’m not shopping for somebody to carry what’s already mine. But wanting Meg for myself is far worse.

She comes back alone five minutes later. The jar is gone. Ruby has gone over to Mrs. Lawson to help her water the roses. Meg wipes her feet on the mat and catches me watching.

“What?”

“You’ve got ink on your hand, by the way.”

She looks at the blue mark. “I spent the morning unpacking classroom books.”

“Thought you weren’t starting until fall.”

“The room doesn’t know that.”