“What? Get out of . . . the room? The house?”
“The town,” Godiva said fiercely as she opened a drawer and pulled out a fistful of undies that were the very opposite of granny panties. She’d spent far too many years grimly rewashing the same three pairs of cheap cotton undies until she’d finally had enough success to climb out of poverty. Usually it made her smile to be wearing silky, lacey nothings in lurid colors beneath her clothes. Stuff no one knew was there but her.
Now, the sight of them, the sight of everything, torched her to the toenails.
“This whole week . . . I just knew I had to get away. I must be like those animals that can sniff an earthquake coming,” she muttered as she hurled the panties into the suitcase. “After all these years, how dare he show up here. In my town. Tools right up in that gangstermobile, as if nothing happened, as if it wasn’t sixty mother-loving years . . .”
“He?” Bird asked in a cautious voice. “Rigo? The man who came to the bakery?”
Godiva’s lips parted, but her throat had tightened. She froze, furious with herself. Nope nope nope. Not a single tear for slimy sidewinders.
She shook her head, mentally surveying her stuff. Her library, the garden outside, that she had worked on for over twenty years.
It was time to go. Rip the band-aid and just do it.
“Please let us help,” Bird said softly. “You did that for every one of us.”
“As well as half the women in this town,” Doris added.
“There’s nothing to help.” Godiva crossed her arms tightly. “It’s time I moved o
n.”
“It seems . . .” Bird said tentatively, “ . . . you don’t trust us?”
Godiva propped a fist on her hip. “Wait a minute. How did my moving on become about trust?”
Doris leaned against the door. “Godiva, you chucked that tray at that man like a champ.”
Bird added, “And the Shakespeare. The only time I’ve ever heard you hurling Shakespearean insults has been at total nogoodniks.”
Doris then chimed in, “Gangstermobile? As in, Rigo is a gangster?”
Godiva took a deep breath. “I don’t know. That car made me think of gangsters. How could I know either way? I haven’t laid eyes on that sniveling lewdster of beastliness since the day I told him I was pregnant, over sixty years ago, and he up and vamoosed.”
Bird’s jaw dropped. “He walked out on you when you were pregnant?”
“He was outa there so fast he probably left a vapor trail. I haven’t seen him since, until he snaked into the bakery this morning, like a snaky snake thing.”
Doris’s eyes narrowed. “Jen had to go with Nikos . . . somewhere. But when she hears this she’ll want to knock him into next Tuesday. What a scumbag!”
Godiva pinched her brows. “I better call Linette, and tell her I’ll pay for damages,” she muttered.
Doris said, “Do that. Though when we left, she’d just put her kids and their buddies to work, as 99% of the mess was theirs.”
“Yeah, but I started it,” Godiva said. Then couldn’t help but grin. “And I nearly got him, too.”
Bird said gently, “What can we do for you? Call the police?”
“For what?” Godiva said, dropping her hands—her gnarled, eighty-year-old hands, so unlike the slim brown hands that had once caressed Rigo’s smooth, warm skin, all fine muscle over strong bones. “There’s nothing to call the police for. They’d laugh me off the planet for reporting an abandonment more than sixty years ago.”
Bird’s chin lifted. “Was he abusive?”
“Naw. I never would’ve put up with that.” Godiva looked at two of her longest-term friends. Yes, it did seem to be time to fess up. Rip the band-aid.
“If you want to hear this sadsack story of mine, better grab a chair. Though I’ll try not to whine too long. Stop me if I do.”
Doris sat on Godiva’s reading chair, and Bird perched on the footstool, saying, “In all the years I’ve known you, you’ve never whined, but you’ve listened to us whine. You’re owed.”