Bullies Spit On A Waitress — Unaware She Was A Commander For 10 Years!
Chapter 29
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"That's not weird," she said. "That's what it feels like when something's finally done."He nodded. He looked out the window at the hills. "What happens now?" he said."To Mace," she said, "the legal process, which takes time, but it'll hold. The land title will be contested, and given what you just testified under oath, it'll be contested with cause.""And to me?" he said.She glanced at him. "Whatever you want," she said. "That's the point. Whatever you actually want."He was quiet for a moment. "I'd like to be outside more," he said. "I've been inside a lot.""That seems like a good place to start," she said.They drove in comfortable silence for a while. Then Kevin said, "Claire.""Yeah," she said."Thank you," he said. "For the promise. And for keeping it."She kept her eyes on the road. "James would have done the same," she said."I know," Kevin said. "That's why I said thank you to you."She didn't answer that. But something in the set of her shoulders changed slightly; something released, very slightly—the way something releases in a person who has been holding a weight, not because they were told to, but because they chose to, and who has now finally put it down in the right place.They arrived in Keswick Falls at 11:15. She dropped Kevin at his house. He got out. He stood on the sidewalk for a moment and looked at the street, at the houses, at the ordinary November morning of a small Virginia town. He looked at the truck in his driveway.He turned to Claire. "I might go for a drive later," he said. "The long way around.""The road's clear," she said.He almost smiled.She drove to Harland's Diner. She parked. She sat in the truck for a moment. She looked at the diner through the windshield: the red booths visible through the window, Donna moving behind the counter, the hand-painted sign—Good Food, Good People. Thirty-one years of that sign meaning exactly what it said.She got out. She pushed open the door; the bell rang.Donna looked up. The diner was quiet. The morning rush was long over: a few people at tables; Frank in his corner; Harriet still there with her crossword, which she'd apparently been doing for the past three hours.Donna reached under the counter. She brought out the white apron—the one Claire had folded and left there Wednesday night, the one Tyler had thrown on the floor. Donna had washed it, pressed it, folded it with the same care you'd fold something that had been disrespected and deserved to be treated well in return. She set it on the counter. She didn't say anything; she didn't need to.