Never Come Back by David Bell

Author:David Bell [Bell, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780451417510
Google: WzTCNAEACAAJ
Amazon: 0451417518
Barnesnoble: 0451417518
Publisher: NAL
Published: 2013-09-30T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-four

Gordon Baxter sat at a table near the door of the McDonald’s. A Styrofoam cup of coffee rested in front of him, the steam rising toward his face. I bypassed the counter and went to the table, but I didn’t sit. I didn’t know what I was going to hear from this man. I didn’t know whether I wanted to hear it at all.

He looked up at me, his face benevolent. He pointed at the empty chair across the table. “Have a seat,” he said. “Or are you getting something to eat?”

I sat down. I kept the phone in my hand. I wanted it to remind me of my deadline with Dan. One hour.

It was lunchtime, and the tables on either side of us were occupied. The chattering buzz of conversation went on all around us, punctuated by the occasional scream of a child or a shout from an employee in the kitchen. Gordon Baxter sipped from his cup.

“What would you like to know?” he asked.

“You’re the one who showed up on my doorstep,” I said. “You must have something you want to say to me.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “But in order to tell you why I came by your apartment, I’m going to have to give you some background. Maybe we’ll both get the information we want.”

I didn’t say anything. I waited for him to go on.

“Like I said, your mom and I were high school sweethearts.”

I interrupted him before he got going. “And just so you know, I told my friend where I am right now. He’s going to come looking for me in an hour if I don’t call him.”

Gordon Baxter considered me. Some of the benevolence drained out of his face, and he tilted his head to the left. “Your mother wasn’t very trusting either,” he said. “She had that streak in her, that quality that told her a person had to prove their trustworthiness to her.”

“That’s fine,” I said, standing up. “I don’t want to hear this stuff.”

“So you don’t want to hear about your mother’s past?” he asked. “You don’t want to know her?”

His questions stopped me. I hated that it had worked. I settled back into my chair.

“Your mom told me that about you,” he said. “She thought you were tough to get through to.”

“You talked to my mother about me?”

“Sometimes.”

“You were in touch with her recently?”

“I’ll get there,” he said. “But you’re going to have to let me get there the way I need to.”

“Fifty-five minutes now,” I said, looking at my phone.

“Okay,” he said. “Like I said, we were high school sweethearts. And we got married around graduation. We were young and dumb, but young and dumb people used to get married back then. Our generation did that a lot. We were living over in Haxton, where we both grew up. That’s how I know Paul as well. We all grew up over there and went to school together. It sounds really quaint and all-American, and I guess it was.”

“Why didn’t Mom ever tell me about you?”

“I have my guesses.

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