Gibbes carefully placed the man and his seat on the bedspread next to the plane. Owen got down on his knees to be at eye level, his elbows on the bed and his chin resting on his hands. His dark brows were angled over his forehead as he studied the man very carefully. “Why would the dopp kit be on his lap?” he asked.
“I was just asking myself the same thing, Rocky,” Gibbes said. He gently pinched the dopp kit between his thumb and index finger and tugged. “It’s glued down. Must have been a pretty heavy-duty glue for it to still be stuck.” His eyes narrowed slightly as he studied the man in the business suit, the vivid stripes on his navy blue tie, and the white handkerchief in the breast pocket. “When I travel, my toiletry bag goes inside my suitcase. I certainly wouldn’t carry it on my lap.”
They all stared at the plane model for a long moment, the silence finally interrupted by Owen.
“Mama?”
Loralee looked down at her son and resisted the impulse to lick her fingers and smooth back his hair. “Yes, sweetheart?”
“This doesn’t have to stay in my room, does it?”
“No, sir. And I don’t blame you, Rocky,” Gibbes said as he replaced the man and seat and then lifted the plane and wings from the bedspread. “I’m going to go stick it back where we found it.”
Owen let out a breath of relief as Loralee gave in and put her fingers to her mouth before plastering down that stubborn cowlick that would never lie flat no matter how hard she tried to coax it.
“I’ll call in the pizza order just as soon as I put this back, okay?”
“Pizza!” shouted Owen, and Loralee and Merritt laughed.
Merritt carried the two firefly jars to the door. “I’ll go put these in the kitchen by the back door so they’re handy when you’re ready to use them. Although it looks like they’re old enough for a museum.”
“Speaking of which,” Gibbes said, “when is your appointment to go see Deborah Fuller at the Heritage Society?”
“Tomorrow morning.” She eyed him suspiciously. “Why?”
“She was a good friend of my grandmother’s and I haven’t seen her for a while. I wouldn’t mind tagging along, if that’s all right with you.”
Merritt took a moment to respond, but Loralee noticed that her face didn’t get that closed-off look that she’d grown used to seeing, the face that made it clear that Merritt was making sure you were kept a stranger. “Sure. I’m meeting her at ten o’clock.”
“Great. I’ll pick you up at nine forty-five.” He smiled, and it didn’t even look like he was getting ready to shoot his favorite dog.
Loralee put her arms around Owen’s shoulders, noticing again that his head was now as high as her shoulders and not remembering when that had happened. She sighed, feeling more tired than she’d ever been, but happy, too. She considered the day and all that had happened, her thoughts resting on Cal’s shoe box that held the old bullet and an airplane bolt, and remembered something else she needed to write in her journal. To really know a person, find out what they choose to take with them, and what they leave behind.
She listened to Merritt’s footsteps fading down the stairs and thought of Cal and wondered what kind of person he must have been to have saved only those two things. And whether Merritt had ever known him well enough to understand.
chapter 15
MERRITT
I reluctantly turned around to see myself in the mirror over the dresser in Loralee’s bedroom. Before I could protest, she yanked the rubber band out of my ponytail hard enough that it broke. She picked up a brush and pulled it through my hair, arranging it around my shoulders.
“See? Doesn’t that look better?”
“It looks heavier and hotter, and like it’s going to get in my face and annoy me. Where did you put my headband?” I searched the top of her dresser where I thought she’d tossed it.
“It must have slipped behind the dresser. Sorry.”
She didn’t look sorry at all, and I was about to suggest we pull the dresser out from the wall when the doorbell rang.
“That must be Gibbes,” she said, eyeing me critically. “Let me just put a little dab of lipstick . . .”
“What for? I’m just going to the Heritage Society, and Gibbes is coming with me.”
“You’re widowed, Merritt. Not dead. Why not put your best foot forward? My mama used to say . . .”
She caught my gaze in the mirror and closed her mouth. Although I don’t think I would have stopped her if she had continued. I’d begun to almost anticipate the little pearls of wisdom she felt obliged to drop at random intervals throughout the day. I’d somehow moved beyond being annoyed to being amused, to now actually listening to the grains of truth she and her mother had managed to learn from their lives in a trailer park in Alabama. It made the world seem smaller, made me feel connected by these universal truths. Maybe even made me feel a little less lonely.
I pushed the hair behind my ears. “You don’t need to be my friend, okay?”