Page 12 of The Whisper Place
“Could be regret over what he did.”
“You’re one sunshiny motherfucker, you know that?”
“Yeah, yeah. But after today?” Max made another note. “Charlie Ashlock is officially on the suspect list.”
Darcy
“‘Every now and then I get a little bit lonely and you’re never coming round.’”
“Turn around.” I nudged Blake out of the way to get to the ovens and popped in a tray of honey scones. She didn’t miss a beat.
“‘Every now and then I get a little bit tired.’”
“‘Of listening to the sound of my tears.’” I chimed in, closing the oven.
Blake sang into a clean whisk, her pink braid tucked in front of one shoulder, a Molly Ringwald T-shirt hanging off the other. Her hands were dusted white with flour, which flew off her in clouds as she slunk around the butcher block. After two weeks of working at Pastries & Dreams, I had “Total Eclipse of the Heart”—Blake’s favorite song—completely memorized. It always cycled to the top of our playlist, and if she was tired or depressed or on her period she would cue it up as the first song of the day, a 4:00 a.m. power ballad that vibrated the entire kitchen and the two of us in it.
I hadn’t meant to come back after that first morning. I really hadn’t.
It was the car’s fault. I couldn’t remember where I’d parked and ended up walking the streets for over an hour while Blake’s offer swirled in the back of my head.If you’re still in town tomorrow, you know where you can make some money.
I didn’t need money immediately, but what I had wouldn’t last forever. Jobs became tricky when they asked for things like name, birthdate, and social security number. Information that would get entered into databases and could be used to find me. I couldn’t risk that. And despite all the times it would’ve been useful in my life so far, I didn’t know how to create an identity from scratch. So I needed to work under the table. Agricultural labor was an option, the kind of jobs undocumented workers filled. I didn’t mind the idea of open fields and coworkers who spoke different languages. Fewer questions that way. But Blake had stood in her gorgeous kitchen and handed me a hundred dollars, cash, without any paperwork. I didn’t have to fill out a single form. I didn’t even have to tell her my real name.
By the time I found my car, I’d decided to stick around town for a day or two. I parked in the Wal-Mart lot again to sleep that night and bought a bag of trail mix to feel better about brushing my teeth in their bathroom. Blake was so happy to see me the next day that she hugged me, right on the back step at four in the morning, mumbling—“This is intrusive. I’m sorry.”—even as she hung on. I laughed, caught between returning the hug or pulling away, until she drew back and said, “I’m in a cinnamon roll mood now. Let’s make some obnoxiously giant cinnamon rolls.”
We made cinnamon rolls and scones and cookies and bars. We made lemon zucchini bread and cheddar jalapeño rolls. Every day,I told myself I would only come back tomorrow. Just one more day and then I’d hit the road. But the longer I stayed in Blake’s kitchen, baking the air into sweetness and singing the sun up every morning, the more real Pastries & Dreams felt and the more distant the idea of the road became. The shadows I’d craved on the edges of the map faded into an abstract future. They would always be there, waiting for me whenever I needed them. And there was no reason for anyone to look for me here, minding the mixers and ovens in a tiny café somewhere in the Midwest.
Almost instantly, Blake became another reason to stay. I’d never had many close friends. We moved around a lot when I was young, and then—when we found a place that seemed more permanent—sleepovers and parties were forbidden. I never lived in the dorms in college, where most undergrads found their crew. I hovered on the edges of any classroom or gathering, gravitating toward the exits even then. Blake wasn’t like anyone I’d met before. She was obsessed with cooking shows and the eighties, calling the entire decade her origin story slash spirit animal. She loved the movies, the music, and the whole over-the-top cultural vibe. She talked constantly while we worked, but not in an exhausting way, and the questions she asked never got too personal. On my third day at the café, she demanded I rank my top five John Hughes characters to “see if we’re compatible coworkers.” I had to think about it for a half hour before deciding:
5.John Bender fromThe Breakfast Club(hot and rebellious)
4.Ferris Bueller fromFerris Bueller’s Day Off(hot and daring)
3.Jake Ryan fromSixteen Candles(hot and sweet, except for the sex trafficking)
2. Allison Reynolds fromThe Breakfast Club(hot and trying not to give a shit)
1. Watts fromSome Kind of Wonderful(hot and actually not giving a shit)
Blake listened to my entire list and reasoning without making a single comment. When I finished, she took a moment to digest with a level of seriousness that would have made more sense in an existential debate, and said, “Okay, I like where your head’s at, but you’re wrong for a few reasons.”
“How can I be wrong about my own preferences?”
“First, my girl Molly doesn’t show up anywhere and you have to be either Team Claire or Team Sam. Second, Watts is an incredible character but John Hughes didn’t directSome Kind of Wonderful. It was Howard Deutch, aka Nuanced John Hughes, which also disqualifies Duckie fromPretty in Pink.”
“I forgot about Duckie.”
“I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that.”
After picking Team Sam—because who could pick spoiled Claire over Sam?—Blake allowed me to stay. And when I made her rank her all-time favorite rom-coms, she correctly includedMy Big Fat Greek Weddingeven though it came out in 2002.
Every day after the lunch rush, she handed me another wad of twenties and told me to come back tomorrow. And I did. I explored the town in the afternoons and spent the nights in my car at Wal-Mart. Luckily, on one of my walks I stumbled across a student ID someone had lost by the river and used it to get into the university gym. I’d been showering at the gym ever since, reading discarded paperbacks at the laundromat, and running anonymous searchesof news headlines at the library. There was nothing about a missing person, the discovery of a body, or a homicide investigation. The lack of news bought me one more day in Blake’s kitchen.
“Where are you staying?” Blake asked when “Total Eclipse of the Heart” was over. My heart started pounding, even though I didn’t have anything to hide. I wasn’t homeless. My home just happened to be my car. I focused all my attention on the pan of cookies in front of me and said, “South of here.”
That was the truth. Wal-Mart was on the south side of town.
Blake shrugged and started singing the chorus of the next song. Sweet dreams are made of these. The subject was over until the end of the lunch rush, when her part-time worker showed up and Blake asked me to come upstairs.
