Chapter 3 - The Parking Lot Check
The front walk was longer than I remembered. My heels clicked against the pavers and I didn't look back at the double doors, even though I could feel them all still sitting at that dark wood table under the chandelier.
My car was parked crooked along the side of the driveway where I'd pulled in that morning, thinking I'd only stay for lunch. I unlocked it with a shaky thumb and slid into the driver's seat and locked the doors again out of habit. The heat had built up inside. It smelled like old coffee and the lemon wipe I'd used on the dash last week.
I set my little cream handbag on the passenger seat, clasp up. My right hand throbbed where the skin was still red, and I laid both hands flat on the steering wheel to make them stop shaking. I didn't start the engine right away. I just breathed. In through my nose, out through my mouth. I watched a sheer curtain move in one of those tall arched windows and told myself I wasn't going to cry in their driveway.
My phone buzzed in my skirt pocket.
I thought it was Daniel. It wasn't. It was my banking app, the sharp little chime I had set for anything over two hundred dollars. Shared checking — alert: new request awaiting approval.
I stared at the screen. The brightness hurt my eyes after the dining room daylight.
It was a transfer request. From our joint savings to an account I didn't recognize, with Rosa's first name in the memo line. The amount was almost all of what Daniel and I had put aside for the car insurance and my fall classes. It was still pending. Needs one approval, the app said. Requested ten minutes ago.
Ten minutes ago I had been sitting at that table with a plate of molded rice in front of me, listening to Vanessa tell me who I was supposed to be now.
My thumb hovered over the buttons. Approve. Decline. The phone felt slick in my left hand. My diamond ring clicked against the case, and my wedding band was warm from my skin. I could hear Vanessa's voice in my head again, bright and sure, about mother managing all that money. This was what that looked like. Not a conversation later. Not a family meeting. A button pushed while I was still holding my water glass.
I hit the side button to dim the screen and pressed my forehead for a second against the top of the steering wheel. The horn didn't go off. I was careful. I breathed again and smelled the prawns still on my clothes, garlic and butter I hadn't even tasted.
I didn't approve it. I didn't decline it either. I wasn't ready to start a paper war from their driveway. I left it sitting there in pending, locked my phone, and started the car. The air conditioner blew hot first, then cooler. I backed out slowly, checking the mirrors twice because my eyes were blurry. No one came out of the house. That was good. I didn't think I could have been polite to Daniel right then, even if he was just trying to keep the peace.
County Road 9 was empty that time of day. I drove with both hands at ten and two like my dad taught me, past the church parking lot and the elementary school where the pick-up line would form in a few hours. My blouse stuck to my back. At the light by the highway I realized I had nowhere I wanted to be. Not home, where Rosa had a key. Not work, where I'd have to explain why I smelled like lunch and looked like this.
I turned into the Starlight Diner lot because it was public and open and I knew the coffee was weak enough to drink three cups of. I parked at the far end under a skinny tree, away from the truckers and the lunch crowd, nose out so I could leave if I needed to. I cut the engine. The sudden quiet rang in my ears.
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I picked up my phone again. The pending transfer was still there, waiting. I slipped the phone face-down onto my handbag so I wouldn't keep staring at it. I needed a minute to think about tonight — motel, my friend Carla's apartment, the gas money to get there — before I made any move that couldn't be undone.
That's when it started ringing. Daniel's name lit up the screen through the gap between the bag and the seat. Once, then again. I watched it ring and didn't answer yet.
