The bell

Chapter 7:

The bell rings at seven in the morning.

I'm still on the stool where Kael left me. Coffee going cold. Feet wrapped. His cut still hanging off my shoulders like a coat on a hook.

Kael's hand goes flat on the bar.

"Expecting somebody?"

"No."

The door opens.

It's a woman. Seventy-something. Gray hair pinned back. A coat over a nightgown. A pot of coffee in one hand and a plate covered with a dish towel in the other.

She stops in the doorway and looks at me.

"Well," she says. "You look like hell."

Kael exhales.

"Miss Ada."

"Don't you Miss Ada me." She comes in and sets the pot on the counter. "Word's been going around since five. Carl from the gas station called my house before the sun was up. Said there's a woman at the Vipers with a busted lip and a stolen jacket."

"It's not stolen."

"It's on her, isn't it?" She pulls the dish towel off the plate. Eggs. Biscuits. Bacon. "Eat."

I look at Kael.

He tips his head at the plate.

I eat.

---

The bell rings again at seven-fifteen.

A man this time. Fifties. Overalls. A gas station jacket with a name patch that says CARL.

He's got a thermos and a brown paper bag.

"Morning, Prez."

"Carl."

"Brought coffee. And a thing of aspirin." He sets the bag on the counter. "Maria sent it. She said the aspirin's for the lady and the coffee's for you. She said you looked like you needed it worse."

Kael picks up the bag.

"Tell Maria thank you."

"I'll tell her." Carl looks at me. Then at the plate in front of me. Then back at Kael. "You need anything else, you call the station. I'm there till noon."

He leaves.

---

The bell rings at seven-forty.

Two women this time. Sisters, I think — same face, one older than the other by a few years. Both of them in aprons. Both of them carrying foil-covered dishes.

They don't introduce themselves. They just set the dishes on the counter and the older one says, "That's a casserole. It freezes. The other one's a pie."

"Thank you," Kael says.

"You're welcome." The older one looks at me. "You're Elara."

"I'm Elara."

"I'm Betty. This is Marlene. We run the diner."

"I know the diner."

"You've never been to the diner."

"I've been in town for twelve hours."

Betty almost smiles. "Fair."

They leave.

---

The bell rings six more times before eight o'clock.

A woman from the church with a blanket. A man from the hardware store with a first aid kit. Two teenagers with a box of donuts who don't say anything and leave before anybody can ask them their names.

A woman named Ruth who's ninety-something and walks with a cane and stands in the doorway for a full minute without saying a word.

Then she says, "Who did it?"

Kael looks at her.

"Her husband."

"Where's he at?"

"On his way, probably."

Ruth nods slowly.

"You need anything," she says, "you call me. I've got a shotgun and I've got a car and I'm not afraid of a rich man."

She leaves.

---

By eight-thirty there's food on every table and coffee in every pot and the bar smells like a church supper.

I haven't moved from the stool.

Kael's behind the counter with a cup of his own and a look on his face I can't read.

"Does this happen a lot?"

"What?"

"People showing up with food."

He thinks about it.

"When my father died," he says, "there was food on this counter for a week. I didn't eat any of it. I couldn't. But it was there."

I look at the plates.

"Who sent them?"

"Nobody sent them. They just came." He tips his head. "That's how this town works. Something happens, everybody wants to help, and nobody wants to be the one who didn't."

"I don't know these people."

"They don't know you either."

"Then why are they doing it?"

Kael sets his cup down.

"Because they've all got a story," he says. "Every person who walked through that door this morning has got somebody in their family who got hurt and nobody did anything about it. They've been waiting forty years for somebody to walk into this town bleeding, so they could finally do something."

I look at the food.

"I don't know what to do with this."

"Nobody does." He picks up his cup. "You eat the eggs and you say thank you and you let them do it. That's the only thing you can do."

---

Miss Ada comes back at nine.

Not with food. With a broom.

She sweeps the floor. She wipes down the tables. She washes the dishes in the sink behind the bar and stacks them on the rack.

Then she comes over to the stool.

"Stand up."

"Why?"

"Because I'm going to look at you." She sets her hands on her hips. "Stand up."

I stand up.

She walks a circle around me. She looks at the cut. At my face. At my feet. At the fingers on my neck that have gone purple and green at the edges.

Then she looks at Kael.

"You put your cut on her."

"I did."

"You know what that means."

"I do."

"You know what it's going to mean when everybody in this county sees it."

"I do."

Miss Ada nods slowly.

"Then you better be sure," she says. "Because once this town sees that jacket on her, there's no taking it back. She's under your patch. Every man in this state knows what that means. And if you can't hold it, they're going to find out."

Kael doesn't say anything.

Miss Ada picks up her coat.

"Food's in the fridge. You eat the casserole tonight, not the pie. The pie's for tomorrow."

She leaves.

---

The bar's quiet at nine-thirty.

The rain's stopped. The sun's trying to come out. And there's a stack of dishes in the rack and a casserole in the fridge and I'm still wearing a jacket that's three sizes too big for me.

Kael comes around the counter.

"How are you doing?"

"I don't know."

"That's a better answer than fine."

I look at him.

"Why did they come?"

"Because word got around."

"Why did word get around?"

"Because this town is eight hundred people and there's no such thing as a secret." He tips his head. "And because Carl's got a police scanner and a big mouth."

"Kael."

"What?"

"Did you call them?"

He's quiet.

"Did you call them and tell them to come?"

"Carl called Miss Ada. Miss Ada called Betty. Betty called the church." He tips his head. "I didn't call anybody. But I knew it was going to happen. Because it happens every time. It happened when my father died. It happened when the hardware store burned in 2011. It happened when Ruth's husband got sick."

I look at the food.

"They did it for me."

"They did it for you."

"They don't know me."

"They don't have to." He tips his head. "That's not how it works. In a town this size, you don't have to know somebody to show up for them. You just have to know somebody's having a bad day."

---

He takes me upstairs at ten.

Not for anything. Because I'm tired and my eyes won't stay open and I've been sitting on the same stool for four hours.

The stairs are narrow. My legs feel like they're made of something soft. He goes first and stops at the top and waits.

The room's the same as it was. Small bed. Lamp. Dresser. Green toothbrush.

He pulls the blanket back.

"Get in."

"Kael—"

"Get in."

I get in.

He stands there for a second with his hand on the lamp.

"I'm going to be downstairs. There's a man on the door and a man in the lot. Nobody comes through this building tonight."

"Okay."

"Sleep as long as you want. Don't come down until you're ready."

"Okay."

He turns out the lamp.

And then, in the dark, out of habit, he pulls the door shut behind him.

The lock clicks.

---

My whole body stops.

Shoulders in. Chin down. Eyes to the floor. Hands curled. Breath gone.

The dark's not dark anymore. It's Marcus's hallway. It's the bedroom door with the deadbolt. It's two years of hearing a lock turn and knowing what came after.

And I hear myself say it before I even know it's coming out of my mouth.

"Please don't."

---

Nothing comes.

Nothing at all.

Then, muffled through the wood, Kael's voice.

"Elara."

I can't answer.

"Elara. The lock's on the outside. It's the hall lock. It's an old door, it doesn't latch unless you turn the key." His voice is flat and careful. "I wasn't locking you in. I was locking the hall."

I still can't answer.

"Elara. I'm going to turn the lock back. You'll hear it. And then I'm going to open this door and leave it wide open. All night. Not cracked. Not a little. Open."

The key turns.

The door opens.

Light from the hall comes in and he's standing in it with his hands at his sides.

"You watching?"

"I'm watching."

"I turned it the wrong way. First time." He tips his head. "My habit is I lock doors behind me. Every door. Every building. I've been doing it for sixteen years. I did it just now without thinking."

He steps back from the door.

"There. It's open. And it stays open." He tips his chin at the hallway floor. "And I'm going to sleep right there. In the doorway. If you want to walk past me in the middle of the night, you walk past me. Nobody in this building will stop you. Not me. Not Jax. Not anybody."

I look at the empty doorway.

"You don't have to do that."

"Yeah, I do."

"No you don't."

"Elara." He sits down on the floor, right there in the frame, with his back against the doorjamb and his boots on the boards. "You've just spent the whole morning letting people bring you food and tell you they're glad you're here. Don't argue with me about a floor."

I look at him.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry."

"I didn't mean to—"

"Don't be sorry." His voice is quiet. "You're not the first woman who's ever flinched at a lock. You're not going to be the last. And I'd rather know about it than not."

The hallway's quiet.

"You want the door closed, you close it. You want it open, it's open. You want to leave, you leave. But I'm going to be right here until morning."

I lie back down.

The pillow smells like dust and laundry soap. The light from the hall's coming across the floor. And there's a man the size of a door sitting in the doorway with his boots on and his arms crossed and his head back against the frame.

My eyes close.

And for the first time in two years, I sleep.

Chapter 7 Ends.