Page 62 of A Better World

“Yes,” she agreed. She didn’t often get to talk about Gal Parker. Though this town could be incredibly gossipy, Gal and her kids were off limits. It was as if they found the memory of the whole event too painful to contemplate. Even blunt Rachel had closed the lid on all conversation relating to Gal.Woman, you gotta shut up about this. It’s too sad. I can’t take ithad been her exact words.

“Can I ask you a question about that night?” Linda asked.

“Of course.”

“Did you have any idea she might start that fire?”

“Absolutely not,” he said with wide-eyed sincerity.

“Me neither,” Linda said. “I feel a little dumb every time I remember that car ride. That whole night.”

Cyrus said nothing, probably because he was a wet-behind-the-ears kid unequipped to handle a middle-aged woman’s emotions. Linda laughed at herself. “Can I get you something? Tea? My housekeeper made a sourdough. I’d take credit but who’d believe me? They’re impossible to get right.”

“No, thank you. I’m here on business.”

She waited, thinking he was probably making the rounds, asking for volunteers. Assembling the race route and banquet tables for Thanksgiving was probably a lot of work.

“You heard about the stop sign that got smashed?”

Linda puffed air into her cheeks. Not an auspicious question.

He produced his device and handed it to her. On-screen, she saw a still photo of Josie wailing on a stop sign with what looked like a flour-stuffed sock while her crew of about twenty kids watched.

“This is your daughter?” Galani asked.

Linda had been taught from a young age, by a town full of people who did a lot of illegal drugs, to never admit to anything, and to always get a lawyer. “Hmm,” she answered. “Is that a flour sock?”

“I don’t know,” Cyrus said. “What’s a flour sock?”

It’s when you wet flour inside a tube sock and swing it like a weapon, she might have said.For Halloween pranks. Not exactly wholesome, but a far cry from a knife or gun. “I don’t know,” she said. “I saw one on a screenie one time.”

Cyrus pointed at the inside-out number fourteen on her shirt. “This is your daughter, Josie Farmer-Bowen.”

“Can you actually break a sign with a flour sock?” she asked. “That’s what this is about, right? The sign?”

“She defaced it,” he said. “This is Josie?”

“Oh,” she said, squinting. “I can’t tell. I hope not!”

Cyrus gave her a dirty look. “Itisher. The department agreed that her punishment is community service. She’ll set chairs up all day on Thanksgiving.”

Linda didn’t know what to say to that.

“She reports to the station first thing in the morning. She can appeal this decision on the basis of her innocence, but to do so, she needs to report to the department or face charges of contempt.”

Cyrus handed Linda a short blue piece of paper.Summons, it read along the top. She took it from him, flashed back to when she’d first met him in an empty parking lot. Gal had gotten in first, lying flat on the seat and sliding herself over on her stomach like a weirdo. Linda had gone next, holding fast to the side as she’d lowered down, to keep from falling. He’d nodded ever so briefly, then looked straight ahead as if to say:Don’t worry. Your level of drunkenness is none of my business.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t know what to say. You’ve caught me off guard.”

“They all go through this,” he said.

“Rebellion?” she asked.

“No. They all hate Plymouth Valley. I went through it, too, and not very long ago. But they get over it.”

“I don’t think she hates it here,” Linda said. “She’s on the soccer team and she gets straight As. She’s not a troublemaker. She doesn’t have dark-enough feelings to make trouble.”

He fiddled with his device and started playing something on the screen: the footage of the stop sign attack. “Look at this.”

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