“Don’t try to point out to him that it is just a minivan,” Heather said, climbing into the backseat and pushing a ball onto the floor. “We’ve tried.”
“It’s the modern man’s love machine,” Ellis replied, walking around to the driver’s-side door as Riley got in beside Heather, and Dave took a seat in the next row. I glanced at Deb, who was standing there clutching her purse, then slid in next to him, giving her the front seat. “How many vehicles do you know of that have an AC adapter plug-in, three feet of washable cargo space, and fully reclining fold-down seats?”
“It’s still a minivan,” Heather said. “Before you were macking around in it, it was strictly for car seats and crumbled Goldfish.”
“But I am macking around in it,” Ellis replied, cranking the engine as Deb shut her door. “And we’ll be macking all the way to Austin in it, too. That’s all that matters.”
We pulled out of the lot beside Luna Blu, turning into traffic. I turned around, so I was facing Riley, who was looking out the window while Heather checked ion ever.phone beside her. “You sure this is okay? Inviting two extra people at the last minute?”
“Oh, yeah,” she said. “My mom always makes too much anyway.”
“You can never have too much fried chicken,” Dave told her.
“She made fried chicken last time,” Heather said, still studying her screen. “I remember, because Dave ate two breasts, two legs, and two wings. Which was actually . . .”
“. . . an entire chicken,” Dave finished for her, sighing. “A personal best for me.”
“The gluttony on display is unbelievable,” Riley told me. “It’s almost embarrassing.”
“Almost,” Ellis said. Then he shot her a smile in the rearview, and she smiled back briefly, before looking out the window again.
We drove through town, past neighborhoods and subdivisions, until the road turned into a two-lane highway. The landscape began to change, with rolling hills on either side, the occasional farmhouse, and broad pastures dotted with cows. I realized suddenly that Deb hadn’t said a word, so I leaned forward, around her headrest.
“You okay?” I asked, my voice low.
“Yeah.” She was looking straight ahead, taking it all in. “I’ve just . . . never done this before.”
“Been out in the country?”
She shook her head. Beside her, Ellis was messing with the radio, snatches of music and voices popping up here and there. “Been invited to dinner like this.”
“What do you mean, ‘like this’?”
“By, you know, a bunch of people from school. As friends.” She pulled her purse a little closer to her chest. “It’s really nice.”
We aren’t even there yet, I wanted to say, but I kept quiet as, yet again, I was reminded that as much as she’d told me about her past, there was a lot I didn’t know.
“Everything cool?” Dave asked me as I sat back.
I nodded, looking at Deb again. She was sitting so still, like at any moment someone might realize their mistake and tell her to go. It made me sad, not for now but for whatever she’d been through to make this so new. “Yeah. Everything’s fine.”
After driving for what seemed like a long time, Ellis slowed down, turning onto a gravel road. POSTED: NO TRESPASSING! a sign read, just past a row of mailboxes, and then we were bumping along, Dave’s knee knocking into mine every now and then. I didn’t move out of the way, though, and neither did he. As we came over a small hill, we saw a woman coming toward us in sweatpants, a long jacket, and sneakers, walking two big dogs. She had a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other, and still managed a broad wave as we passed.
“That’s Glenda,” Dave explained. “Out for her evening power walk.”
“One beer down, one beer back, cigarettes as needed,” Riley added. To me she said, “My neighbor.”
“Right,” I said.
“And that,” Heather said as we passed a short driveway, a little te house at the end of it, “is where I live. Try not to be too stunned by the size and majesty.”
“I love your house,” Ellis said. Over his shoulder, he added, “Her dad buys MoonPies at Park Mart in bulk. Has an entire glass jar of them on the TV. It’s the best.”
Heather looked pleased, and I realized I’d rarely seen her smile until now. “He has a bad sweet tooth. I try to make him eat healthy, but it is a thankless job.”
“Let the man have his MoonPies,” Dave said. “What are you, the food police or something?”
“He needs to watch his weight!” she told him. “Diabetes runs in our family. And it’s not like he can keep a woman around long enough to take care of him.”
I turned slightly as we passed the house. “You live alone with your dad?” She nodded. “Me, too.”
“He’s a mess,” she said affectionately. “But he’s my mess.”
Ellis turned into the last driveway before the road ended, pulling up in front of a large, brown house with a bunch of cars parked in front of it. It had a silver metal roof, a wide front porch, and what looked like a barn just behind it. A thick chimney on top spouted smoke, puffing up into the sky.