Catch up on the previous chapters here
Worry meant Nell tried to stay awake until Kent came to bed, but she didn’t make it. And she was so exhausted the alarm had to wake her, which was rare—usually she was up before it, so it didn’t even ring. The library opened much later than Pending, so she didn’t want to disturb Kent.
He just kept snoring, so at least that was good. He probably needed the sleep.
Nell only went to the bathroom first because she really needed to pee, but she ignored the rest of it—the shower, her clothes laid out so she wouldn’t bump around in the dresser drawers, a scatter of hair clips—to go into the main room of the apartment and look for the book.
Kent left it on the kitchen island, next to a sticky note: Adam will be here on Saturday. xoxo
Shit. First it was bad enough that Kent called Adam—in the middle of the night?—and second, that gave her today and tomorrow to build the case. If there was a case.
Kent called Adam in the middle of the night. There was a case.
Everything felt out of joint. Her usual morning rituals were thrown off to the point where she wasn’t entirely sure she’d actually used soap in the shower and she had to check the mirror to make sure she’d remembered to fully dress.
Kent finished reading the book and called Adam. Adam was coming on Saturday. She didn’t know what time on Saturday, but it wouldn’t be much more than forty-eight hours before she’d have to discuss … back then.
On the plus side—Nell was really grasping for a plus side—she was technically reading it for Art, so she could stick the book in her bag and have it with her behind the register for any downtime.
Nell knew she didn’t forget to eat breakfast, because that, at least, was a very clear thought: usually I eat breakfast, but not this morning, thanks. Her stomach was both twisted in knots and full of snakes, so there most definitely wasn’t any room for breakfast.
The bus was on time, and this morning she couldn’t stop Margaret’s name from bubbling up in her mind as she got on, Margaret’s broad, pleasant face superimposed over the anonymous older man who neither looked over nor responded to her “Good morning.”
Margaret always grinned and said “Morning, sugar.” The bus was frequently late, but Margaret was always happy to be there.
Nell nearly missed her stop.
This morning she made sure that waving to Colton was a deliberate gesture and repeated it in her mind: I’ve already waved, so I don’t have to wave again. But everything else was out of whack, like someone had snuck in a couple ersatz puzzle pieces that looked close to the real ones but didn’t quite fit. Instead of habit, she had to think things through and run down a mental checklist that was normally subconscious. Even her eyes didn’t seem to be working properly, since she couldn’t just scan the tag wall to get an idea of what they had and what was missing. She had to pause and do the list again: how many reds? Oranges? All the way down to Mary’s favorite, purple, and oh, yeah, she had to get the chairs down before the top of the hour.
At least Colton just nodded on his way out. Imagine being so thrown that a guy you barely knew stopped and used most of his daily allotment of words to ask how you were doing.
And at least that first rush of regulars consisted of people as tired and distracted as she was. Really, they all just needed coffee, and they were all lucky Nell remembered to get it brewing and fill the urns. She had a short debate but possible wakefulness won out over the threat of increased anxiety—like it could increase—and during a pause she made herself a large latte with an extra shot.
Mary didn’t stop in. Nell asked a couple of the others about her, but all she got was grunts and shrugs as they thrust the plastic tags across the counter and waited, silently, for the cups or wrapped sandwiches. Maybe Charlie and Greg and Sam and Joan didn’t know she’d ask about them, too, if she hadn’t seen them in a few days. None of them were quite as regular as Mary, but she still noticed when they weren’t there. Maybe there were other people in the world who preferred it if their absence wasn’t noticed.
Nobody here in Colchester knew anything about her life before she’d arrived here with Kent, as newlyweds, except of course a lot of what they knew was a lie. Their names, even their birth dates … the story was that they’d run off practically the minute Nell turned eighteen, in full defiance of both families because Kent was twenty-eight and neither set of parents agreed it was a good match, and stumbled into Colchester because it was middle-of-nowhere enough that no one would find them.
It was, Nell always thought, a very teenage sort of story, because clearly any family members wishing to track them down would be able to follow their names. Kent Harris’ parents could type their son’s name into a search engine and match the results to his age, and Penelope Harris, nee Green, would turn up the same way. You needed a damn good reason to get your name changed in closed court so, even if they’d picked a different last name entirely, there would be a public record.
Apparently everyone assumed that their respective parents were so disgusted with their love story that they’d washed their hands of their children completely. Maybe they also took private bets on how long this runaway marriage would last, especially when Nell was supposed to have been a teenager at the time of the vows. Eighteen, and a very young eighteen. Young enough she forgot to get pictures of their big day.
“Hey, you okay?”
She jumped, one hand going to her chest, but even as her heart pounded in her ears Nell realized she must’ve recognized Art’s voice. “Sorry.”
He frowned a little. “That’s not really an answer to my question.”
Nell looked up at the honest concern in his eyes. This was Art worried about Nell, the human being, and not the boss ready to yell at an employee for zoning out on the job. Art, however, didn’t know. All the paperwork and references he had on her told him he’d hired a teenager named Nell Harris. She cleared her throat and shook her head. “It looks, uh … it looks like someone’s finally trying to find us, and …”
“You’re happier not being found?” he supplied.
That, at least, was clear, so she nodded firmly.
Art responded in kind. “Anyone comes in looking for you, we don’t know a thing.”
He knew she didn’t want her photo displayed anywhere, of course, and he’d always been on them about not giving other people’s schedules away. That included questions about whether someone worked here, and Art even fired someone who’d ignored these orders and cheerfully passed on the information that Jessica would be in at two.
He ducked to catch her eye. “I think you need to go home.”
“Art …”
“Take the day. Grab some sandwiches, a coffee, whatever, but … head on home, Nell. It’s okay.” Then he winced and tilted his head to show that, well, leaving now was okay, even if other things weren’t.
Nell sighed and pulled out her phone to text Kent Art’s sending me home, holding it so Art could read it upside-down.
He nodded. “Good. Go home and … look, if there’s anything else I can do to help you feel safer …”
Don’t let C. J, O’Connell come and read his book here. Oh, but actually: “If you’re going to go with the reading and stuff, all those people from all over?”
Art nodded again, so she didn’t have to finish that thought. “You won’t work that night. Promise.”
Her phone buzzed. I just got up. I was going to ask how you’re doing.
Maybe Art saw something on her face because he came around the counter and made little shooing gestures. “Grab some lunch so you don’t have to make anything. Just … shelter and regroup and get your game plan in order.”
The game plan would have to wait until they saw Adam, but Nell could certainly grab some lunch. She couldn’t take a coffee in a to-go cup on the bus, but Art found a thermos in the back and filled it up with her favorite house blend, which might have been one kindness too many, but at least a group of customers came in so they didn’t have to do some sort of goodbye involving reassurances from him and maybe a bit of stiff upper lip from her. Nell was able to slip out, sandwiches tucked in her bag next to the book and thermos in one hand, and she only had to hustle a little to catch the next bus.
from Since You Went Away by C. J. O’Connell (Penguin, 2024)
Honestly, she’s just too sweet. Rosie sits there in her Rosie way, one sock foot tucked under, the other dangling, and slowly French braids her wondrous hair as she wrinkles her nose at the news.
The guy from 17, who can never remember which parking spot actually belongs to him, has disappeared. There’s his girlfriend, tearing up as she explains the last time she saw him, clutching his photograph like it’s a candlelight vigil and not a grown man who maybe learned he can’t just do whatever the hell he wants all the time.
I had some words with 17. Words is all they were—and I even kept it civil, instead of asking him exactly how small his dick is for him to go walking around with his chest puffed out like that, swaggering like it’s the only way to move around something so hefty.
It wasn’t always Rosie’s parking spot he took, but hers is closer to the door, and she’s been driving to class more. First the bus is always late, and then the regular driver flaked off, so I guess she’s lost her trust in Metro. The downside was that 17’s schedule, if he actually had a schedule—deadbeat, living off his girlfriend, and if I were her, I wouldn’t be crying so hard that he took off—meant he’d get back when Rosie was gone, so he’d steal her parking spot.
She was resigned to it. If his car was in hers, she’d park in his. Maybe there was a risk of someone actually checking the license plates against the assigned spots, but if she didn’t complain about 17, then he wasn’t going to complain about her and risk his own getting towed in the bargain.
If he had, I would’ve made sure his got towed. Check the entire lot, spot by spot, and go to town.
Rosie resigns herself to things she shouldn’t have to endure. Guys like 17, who will just keep taking and pushing and swaggering their way through life until they come up against someone who can’t be moved.
I told him I wouldn’t be moved. Maybe he suspects it’s because of Rosie, specifically, but hers isn’t the only spot he was poaching, and I work for the whole apartment complex. I thought about pulling him aside and doing a sort of bro confidential, “warning” him that management was going to start checking all the parking jobs against official lists, but 17 isn’t the kind who’d appreciate a bro helping him out.
That’s not the sort of conversation a guy like him would understand.
It’s even clearer now, though, watching the news switch to whatever comes next, that he’s really more of a mouse than a man. All he had to do was keep his car in the proper spot, but he left, instead. He didn’t want to risk running across me again, knowing he wasn’t the alpha. All he had to do was keep his head down and follow the rules, but he couldn’t even manage that.
Rosie looks at me. “Penny for your thoughts?”
“She’s better off without him.”
She tilts her head, because that’s not the sort of thing Rosie would want to actually admit, but she doesn’t say no. Because Rosie’s not one to lie, either.
I’d put my arm around her, but I don’t want to presume. Enough people take advantage of her already. This is one time when she gets to call the shots.
Chapter Five- coming January 5
Rebecca Frost 
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