"Yes sir."
"Check in when it's done."
The line goes dead. Grace's light turns off. Eleven thirty-nine. Seven minutes later than usual.
I open the knife and work the blade under my thumbnail.The mop handle between us. Her knuckles, red from hot water. My name in her mouth. I'm going to kill two people this week and then everything in her life comes apart, and I'm standing in the wreckage whether I'm ready or not.
I'm not.
I'm going to do it anyway.
Chapter Eight: Grace
HisnameisCarmelo.He's Italian. He walked me home last night, and I stood at my door and said his name just to say it. Then I went inside, locked the door, and stood in my kitchen with my back against the counter for four minutes without moving.
I counted.Fourminutes.
Staring at the wall above the stove, spine pressed into the counter edge, finger tapping the laminate beside my hip, replaying the walk. Three blocks. The cold. His arm next to mine. The third block, where my knuckle hit the back of his hand and my heart raced.
Like a teenager with a crush.
Pathetic.
Four minutes of standing in my kitchen thinking about the back of a man's hand.
I need to get a grip.
The pill goes down with cold water from the tap in the glass I finally washed this morning, which is the most productive thing I've done since waking up. I eat half a banana and throw the other half away because it's brown on one end. Then my routine begins… get dressed, tie my hair back, and walk to the bodega. Rosa tells me I look tired, asks if I'm eating, tells me my hair looks like I slept in a wind tunnel. I drink the coffee, leave the two dollars, and walk to work.
Carmelo doesn't come in.
The door opens at five thirty-eight. A couple I don't recognize walks in chattering animatedly. Five forty-five, a regular, the lawyer who comes alone on Thursdays. Five fifty-one, a family of four. Six oh-two, the door opens again and my eyes go to it before my brain tells them to.
A man picking up a takeout order. My stomach drops an inch, and I'm furious that I give a shit if he comes in.
Javi is behind the bar tonight. He's watching me watch the door without saying anything about it, which is infinitely worse than if he called me out.
"Stop looking at me," I say, passing the bar with a bread basket.
"I'm not looking at you."
"You're looking at me by specifically not looking at me. It's worse."
"I have no idea what you're talking about. I'm making a Manhattan."
"You're making a Manhattan and judging me."
"I would never judge you, Grace. I'm simply observing that you've checked the door eleven times in twenty minutes and it's not even six fifteen."
"Counting is judging."
"Counting is math."
I deliver the bread basket. I don't check the door again.
Ugh, fuck. Idocheck it again. Twice. Three times.
He doesn't come. By seven o'clock I've stopped because the dinner rush is full and I'm running the floor and there's no room in my brain for anything except the job.