Page 82 of Creeping Beautiful

She takes one out and turns to hold it up at me. “What’s all this?”

“I dunno.”

“Should I open it?”

“Why not? It’s your closet. Must belong to you.”

She furrows her brows and frowns, but doesn’t say anything as she takes the garment bag over to the bed and lays it down. You can tell the quality of a thing by the sound the zipper makes when you open it. And this one has a nice, deep, ripping sound that conjures up images of Italian leather purses and handmade luggage.

“Huh.”

“What is it?” I walk over to the bed and look down as she eases the hanger out of the top of the bag and takes the dress out.

“I never bought this.”

“I guess Adam did.”

She turns to look at me. “Why would he do that?”

I shrug again. “Maybe he was hoping you’d come home one day.”

She stares at me for a long moment. “Maybe.” Her gaze wanders over to the open closet door, and for a second I think she’s going to go unpack everything. Check it all out. But she drops the dress back on the bed and turns to the window.

This is when my heart skips two or three beats.

But before I can stop her, she’s walking over to it and looking out over the duck lake.

I wait in the middle of the room, holding my breath. Because the little brick house that used to be visible from her window isn’t there anymore.

She glances down at the windowsill and picks up an old rifle scope, then puts it up to her eye and once again looks across the lake.

“Indie?”

“What?”

“Are you hungry?”

And just as those words come out of my mouth, Donovan calls up the stairs. “Hey! There’s no fucking food here. Like… none, dude. I’m gonna go hit up the store. You guys want to come?”

I’m about to say yes when Indie answers for me. “No. We’ll stay here.”

“OK. You want anything special, Indie? Sweet tea? Or lemonade?”

“Beer?”

Donovan and I both laugh. And for a short moment I feel like maybe this is all gonna turn out OK. He’s gonna go to the store and come back with beer. And we’ll all go outside and sit under the pavilion and drink it like that day four years ago never happened.

“Beer it is.” And then I hear Donovan’s footsteps across the hardwood floors. A few seconds later comes the sound of the front door closing.

But Indie is still fucking peering through that scope across the lake.

She lowers the scope and turns to me, smiling.

“What?” I whisper it.

“I love this place. God, I love this place. Why did we ever move, McKay? Like… OK. I remember that the Company went under or whatever.” She waves a hand in the air, dismissing that thought. “But we had work after that. And it was pretty good, right?”

I nod at her, unable to say anything. Because it was good.