“I didn’t see you this morning, Miss Donovan,” he whispered.

“I needed my beauty rest, can’t you tell?” She held out her hands and turned from side to side. “Beatrice saw me doing dishes this morning. She whacked Sid on the arm and told him he didn’t have a single hair of hiring sense, even on his ass.” She whispered the last part, then laughed so loud Leo wondered why she’d whispered at all.

Sidney peeked through the window. Leo stepped back and put in his order: two blueberry muffins, two corn, three regular coffees, and a Coke for himself. He watched her bag the muffins, pour the coffees, and put the full cardboard cups in a carrier. Allie bit her lower lip as she slid his Coke into place. If he had ever seen a finer looking girl in his life, he didn’t know where.

“Do you need a hand to your truck, sir?”

They had to walk around the back of the flatbed to get out of Sidney’s view, but still anybody driving by on Paper Boulevard could see the two of them French kissing, the blonde girl reaching into the tall boy’s back pockets, pulling him in as close to her as she could. Leo took a breath. “Meet me here at six?”

Allie nodded and smiled, licking her tongue along his front teeth. When she got back behind the counter, Sidney was at the register ringing up a man’s check. He stopped to look at Allie, then out the window at Leo. Allie waved and blew Leo a kiss.

Just before lunch Leo and Floyd hoisted up the last bucket of ash and climbed out of the hole to help Chick and Tom unload from the truck a generator and a load of new two-by-fours and two-by-sixes. Noontime the three men and Leo sat on a grass slope in the shade of a willow a few yards behind the barn. Floyd finished his lunch pretty quick, two chocolate Devil Dogs that he washed down with a warm Fresca. He leaned back on one elbow and smoked an L&M, looking off in the distance between where Tom and Chick ate, and he was either smiling at something or squinting, maybe both, Leo couldn’t tell. Floyd spat and asked Chick if they were going to hack off the old joists and start from scratch. Chick nodded yes while he chewed, not looking at him. Floyd asked if the foundation was still level, and if it wasn’t, were they going to use things called shims under things called base plates. Chick nodded twice again, but when Floyd started up with a third question Chick looked into his face and that made Floyd look away and wink at Leo, who glanced down at his half-eaten blackberry jelly sandwich. Tom held up a cold chicken drumstick and asked if anybody wanted it.

“Your dad in the union over to Heywood Paper?” Chick said.

“Yes, he is.”

“An official?”