She ordered him a second cheeseburger, and when that was ready she brought it to the table, passing him an extra straw so he could help with the milkshake, which she said she and Rain couldn’t finish without help.

After they got back to the house, she moved Shawn’s clothes into the dryer. Later the two of them folded his clean clothes and made a neat pile of them. Then he and Rain read stories and worked on her printing skills. For supper they had a huge bowl of popcorn, corn being a vegetable, as Deborah pointed out. She made sure they bypassed the television set, and played board games until Rain’s bedtime at 8:00.

Deborah asked Shawn if he wanted to sleep on the couch. She had a knitting project she was working on and said she’d work in the next room.

The idea made him anxious. “I better not. Mom and Creed might come back and wonder where I am.”

“We can leave them a note,” she said. “That way they won’t wake you up when they get in. With Patrick gone, I could use the company. I don’t know about you, but I sometimes get scared on my own.”

“Okay.”

She let Shawn write two notes and he went off to brush his teeth while she taped one to the back window of the bus and slipped the second into the front bifold door. She settled him on the couch under a big puffy quilt and a spare pillow she told him he could keep. Then she sat in the den with her knitting, leaving the door open between the two rooms so the light would slant in.

At 9:00 he called, “Deborah?”

“I’m here.”

“Do you think my mom will get mad about what I ate?”

“I don’t see why she would. You had lettuce and tomato on a bun with a glass of ice water on the side. We won’t mention anything else, okay?”

“Okay.”

And after a few minutes, “Deborah?”

“Yes?”

“You know what?”

“What, Shawn?”

“This has been the best day of my life.”

“Mine, too, sweetheart,” she said. Her eyes filled and the knitting blurred in her lap. She had to put a finger on her lips to maintain silence while she blinked back tears.

Chapter 22 - Thursday night, April 14, 1988

22

Thursday night, April 14, 1988