Leo felt “yes” coming so he turned and pulled on his work shorts, then sat down on the mattress and switched on the bedside lamp.

“Well?” Allie had her hands on her hips. She was barefoot, wearing shorts and one of Chick’s T-shirts. Her legs looked brown but very skinny. Leo hadn’t realized how long and skinny her legs were.

“Are you mad?”

“Whisper. My dad wouldn’t like this.”

Allie crossed her arms and looked down at him. A strand of hair came loose from behind her ear and hung in front of her face. She left it there, and kept looking at him. “Why are you mad at me?”

Leo kept quiet. He liked the way this was going. He sat back against the wall and crossed his ankles. She was actually a plain girl if you really studied her. Long arms and legs, a mouth too wide for the cheeks on each side of it, and her hair wasn’t exactly Jayne Mansfield thick and blonde either.

“So you are mad.”

Leo almost said yes, but held off. He looked off in the direction of the doorway. Where this was headed he didn’t know, but he liked that she had come here and he was only going to push a little bit more.

“Oh screw you then.” Allie stuck one leg out the window and bent forward to squeeze through.

Leo grabbed her around the waist. “Who do you think you are even coming down here? You weren’t asleep when your mother told me to get lost, I snuck around to your window to say good-bye and I saw, so screw you, Allie, you’re the one who should be screwed.”

Leo held on a second longer, then let go. Allie looked like somebody had just slapped her with a wet sponge, not really hurting, just shook up, not sure if she was going to hit back laughing, or hit back crying, or else sit down and wait for it all to go away. Leo watched her do all three. She smiled up at him like she’d just had the last word. She walked by him, sat on the bed, looked at the floor between her bare feet, and began to cry. Softly at first, then pretty much out loud.

He didn’t feel a thing watching her, not at first. He was wondering how she got here; he hadn’t heard a car engine. Did she walk? He imagined her hobbling barefoot under the moon over gravel down Spoon Hill, then along the river road and through the covered bridge that was close to washing away. All of that to see him. Now here she was. Crying. Shit.