Passerby: A Psychological Thriller by Britney King

Author:Britney King [King , Britney]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781393465805
Publisher: Hot Banana Press
Published: 2021-07-21T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-One

Ruth

Days go by, each one passing like molasses. Festival weekend comes and goes, and each day thereafter feels pretty much like the one before it. Little is said about Danny Vera. The Holts delay a funeral for their son, although eventually the gossip and speculation around that dies out, too.

As for me, I seem to get a little less jumpy and a little more melancholy with each passing day. I become less concerned that someone is going to pop up out of nowhere and shoot me dead or run me off the road and more concerned with the fact that I’m probably never going to be a mother. All of a sudden, I become more comfortable with the idea of dying. It hardly feels like I have a lot to live for. And at any rate, all I know is that I can’t live at that level of alert, or stay on edge like that forever. Not without going crazy.

It’s amazing how fast I adjust to this new sense of normal, even though I don’t quite know what that means, other than things are different, but in many ways, very much the same as before. Ashley says that humans are wired to move past things, that it is understandable for us to want to fall back into a normal routine, and as much as I don’t want to believe anything she says, I do. I fall into a routine that looks a lot like my routine every summer. Life does not stop when things get crazy. It keeps moving on past and it leaves little room for catching up, so eventually, I suppose we all just sort of let go and fall into step.

Late one evening, I’m seated at the kitchen table poring over bills and bank statements and invoices when Julia comes to me with a pained expression on her face. She’s gripping her rosary beads, which is what she’s always done when she has bad news to deliver. “Jesus Christ, Julia,” I say impatiently. “What is it?”

She eyes me hesitantly.

I slap an open palm against the table. “Just spit it out, would ya?”

I don’t mean to snap at her. I haven’t been sleeping well and I’m frustrated, not the least of all reasons being that after the argument with Cole, I haven’t gone out to the cabin simply as a matter of principle. And aside from all of that, I hate accounting. Nothing is adding up, and what the numbers show is not what I was hoping to see. For a bed and breakfast that is always booked, it seems our margins are very thin. Money seems to be seeping out from many angles and much faster than we’re bringing it in.

Julia looks at me suspiciously, like I have lost my mind. “You should not use the Lord’s name in vain.”

“I’m not,” I say, punching numbers into the calculator. “I’m calling upon him to help you get the words out.”

“Ah, Ruthie.” She shakes a finger at me. “Your mama would have soap in your mouth if she were here.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.