Tanner delivered the last parcel of the day. After he dropped the van off at Courier Express, he needed to pick up some groceries. Milk, for one thing. Tori wouldn’t eat breakfast without it. And if he didn’t get bread, he’d have no fixings for his lunch tomorrow.

His cell phone, which rode atop a sticky mat on the dash, chimed with a message notification. Tanner grabbed the device and glanced at the screen to make sure the text wasn’t from his mother. She never contacted him during work hours unless it was urgent. When he read the name of the sender, his hand froze on the steering wheel. Tuck Malloy? He almost went off the road into a ditch. How could that be? The old coot was dead. Wasn’t he?

Tanner pulled over onto a wide spot, shifted into park, and stared at his phone. The message was definitely from Tuck. They had exchanged cell numbers months ago, and Tuck had occasionally texted to ask Tanner to pick up items he needed from the store. It hadn’t been a bother for Tanner. There was a mom-and-pop grocery not that far away, and Tuck’s house was on the road he always took back to town.

He swiped the screen. A smile curved his lips as he read the message. “I fell off the damned porch. Busted my arm, some ribs, and had to get a hip replacement. Now I’m doing time in assisted living, and the bitch that runs the place won’t let me have my beer or chew. Can you buy me some of both and sneak it in to me? I’ll pay you back.”

Tanner had been picturing the old fart in heaven, sitting on an Adirondack chair with a six-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon and a spittoon within easy reach. It was unsettling to think someone was dead and then receive a text from him.

He tapped out a response. “I don’t mind bringing you things. My kids have activities this afternoon, so I’m not pressed for time. But I don’t want to get in trouble for delivering forbidden substances. My job could be on the line.”

Tuck replied, “No trouble. Just put it inside a box and pretend it’s something I ordered. If I get caught, I’ll never tell who brought me the stuff. Sorry I can’t just call, but these nurses have sharp ears and I got no privacy.”

Tanner grinned. He trusted the old man not to reveal his name if it came down to that. And he truly did sympathize with Tuck’s feelings of deprivation. Just because a man was eighty shouldn’t mean he no longer had a right to indulge his habits. Staying at an assisted living facility was costly, and in Tanner’s estimation, the residents should be able to do whatever they liked in their apartments as long as their physicians didn’t object.

He texted, “Do you have your doctor’s permission to drink and chew?”

Tuck replied, “Well, he ain’t said I shouldn’t. I been drinking and chewing my whole life. I’m eighty. What can he say, that my pleasures might kill me?”