Page 42 of Outside The Wire

“You’re awfully chipper this morning.”

“I am, aren’t I?”

“Is business going well?”

“It’s a little slow, but that’s normal for this time of year.”

I grabbed the last of my things and packed them in my bag as I continued to talk to her.

“I was just telling your father the other day that it was going to snow and then it did. He never listens to me. It was on the news.”

“Tell him to watch the weather channel.”

“He says they’re communists.”

I frowned at that. “The meteorologists or everyone at the weather channel?”

“I don’t know. Probably all of them.”

“Well…then tell him to listen to the radio. They still report the weather.”

She snorted into the phone. “I’m not allowed to listen to the radio. He insists the government is sending signals through the radio to control our brainwaves.”

I nodded. That sounded like him. “Well, I guess you’ll have to live in a bunker at some point. Are you sure the phone isn’t being tapped?”

“Don’t you even mention it. I’ll never be able to speak to you again.”

“Listen, if he gets really worried, just make him wear a tinfoil hat. That should stop anything.”

“You think?”

“It can’t hurt to try.”

The doorbell rang and I grinned. “Hey, that’s my ride. I have to go.”

“But what about your father?” my mom shouted.

I headed for the door. “Hey, you married him,” I said right before I hung up. I unlocked it and pulled it open, grinning as I let Asher in. “Hey, sorry about that. My mom was rambling about my dad and the government and brainwaves…it was a whole thing,” I laughed, waving it off.

But he didn’t laugh. In fact, he was a little off this morning. Deep circles pressed into the skin under his eyes and he even looked like he was wearing the same clothes as yesterday.

“Hey, is everything okay?”

“Oh, yeah. I just didn’t get a lot of sleep last night.”

“Were the roads that bad?” I shouldn’t have let him drive home.

“No, nothing like that.”

But he didn’t come in. He just stood there, standing on my stoop, looking completely lost. I’d never seen him like this before and I had no idea what to say or do.

“Just let me grab my bag. I’ll only be a minute.”

He ran his hand over his jaw and nodded, glancing back at the truck. I hurriedly tugged my coat on and purposely waited until I was at the door to put on my hat, just to see if he would tug it on like he usually did, but he was so out of it that he didn’t even notice I was holding it. After slinging my bag over my shoulder, I grabbed my keys and smiled up at him.

“I’m ready.”

“Alright, let’s get Naomi.”

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