Chapter 25
SLOANE
Thank God it's Friday.
Twenty more minutes and then it's the weekend. Even if my weekend consists of the Dusty Rose Motel and the library in Cawley, I'll take what I can get.
I've somehow managed to get through two weeks in Duster. Six weeks to go, give or take, plus a two-day surcharge for being late on day one.
Thelma and Louise are calm and settled, and the other animals are used to them now. Louise keeps staring at me though and I've been giving both emus a wide berth all week.
The other animals, by contrast, have grown on me.
Hank came up to say hello when I arrived this morning and Dolly, the old blind pig, leans her side against my leg now when I'm filling the water trough and waits for me to scratch behind her ear.
I've stopped flinching when they touch me.
I already smell of the pig pen and a bit of friendly contact isn't going to make me smell any worse.
I'm in the henhouse with Maggie. It's a low wooden building, with two long rows of nesting boxes along one wall and perches running across the back.
The floor is covered in soiled straw that needs to come out.
I'm using a rake and Maggie has a stiff brush and a bucket of soapy water.
She's on her knees scrubbing, working at a stubborn patch with both hands.
Her hair is pulled back and her T-shirt is darker between her shoulder blades from sweat.
The light from the small window above her catches the side of her face and her arm and I notice that she is — there's no other word for it, and I would prefer one — attractive.
She's a person with a body that works and a face that means what it says.
I'm thinking about this while raking chicken output into a wheelbarrow.
I don't normally find women attractive. Beautiful, sure, in a way that I'm envious of them. But that's not the case with Maggie. Since when did I start taking pleasure in looking at her?
I shake my head and rake harder.
The thing is, I was self-conscious around her this morning. I have been since yesterday in the diner. She hasn't said anything about last night, but I keep waiting for her to bring it up. She's been completely normal, which is worse, because it leaves me to do all the work in my own head.
I rake another section of straw into the wheelbarrow. Maggie has moved to a fresh patch on the perch and is humming to herself, something I don't recognize.
I take a breath. "Maggie."
"Mm."
"About yesterday."
She doesn't stop scrubbing. "You don't have to explain yourself."
"I know. I just want to say something."
"Sure."
She still doesn't look at me and I appreciate this more than I can express. I lean on the rake.
"So I went to the library in Cawley and borrowed a few books.
And I — I wasn't — I didn't go in there looking for anything in particular.
I was just looking around. I read like one book a year, normally, and I've actually never been in a public library, so I was just sort of wandering.
And I ended up at this shelf in the back.
" I pause. "And I don't know why I picked up this book exactly.
I think when I saw it, I thought of you for some reason.
I knew you were gay, and I just thought, oh. Okay. And I had a flick through it."
Maggie stops scrubbing and looks up at me.
"I read the first chapter standing up at the shelf," I continue.
"And then I sat down and read a whole lot more in the chair before I realized what I was doing.
And I kind of liked the writing and the characters.
And I liked the sort of slow build of it.
And so I took it back along with a few others.
Because it was interesting, and that was that. "
"Okay. You're allowed to like a book, Sloane. You don't have to justify that." She stands and drops the brush into the bucket. "So what did you like about it?"
"I don't know," I say. "The chemistry was good."
"Mm." Maggie rolls her shoulders and locks her eyes with mine. Her T-shirt rides up a little, exposing mahogany skin, and it causes a quick, sudden flutter behind my ribs.
"That's all. I've never read a romance but I thought this one was good." I hesitate. "And I don't want this to be a thing."
"You've never read a straight romance?"
"I've never finished one." I shrug. "I don't think it's a sexuality thing. I think my life out there was so loud and full of constant action that I never had the patience to sit down with a book for long enough. I couldn't even get through Fifty Shades when the whole world was reading it."
"Well." Maggie picks up the bucket. "It's good that you've found a genre you enjoy. It'll get you through another weekend. Are you going back to the library tomorrow?"
"Yes. And to the supermarket and the coffee place. Decent coffee, good food, books — the holy trinity. I have a slight problem on Sunday though. Ruthie wants me to come to church."
Maggie's jaw drops and her eyes widen. "Are you serious?"
"Yeah. She thinks I'm a devout Christian now that she's seen me reading the Bible. She wants to pick me up from the motel. She brought it up again when I went to get coffee this morning and I have no idea how to get out of it."
Maggie laughs so hard the water sloshes over the bucket she's holding.
"It's not funny."
"It's so funny." She sets the bucket down before it goes everywhere, leans against the henhouse doorway, and presses the heel of her hand against her eye. "Oh god. I needed that."
"Maggie, I need to come up with an excuse."
Maggie shakes her head with a humorous grin. "Sorry. There's nothing I can do for you. You booked yourself a pew the minute you slipped the Holy Bible's dust jacket over your naughty little novel."