His mother was quiet. Then: "Red hair. Freckles. Came in about 2004, from Scranton or Wilkes-Barre, one of those. Worked under Mr. Halloran on the client side."
Nathaniel put down his fork. "You knew her."
"I knew everybody, baby. That was the job." Eunice sipped her iced tea. "She called me Loretta. For about three months."
"Who's Loretta?"
"Loretta Pugh. Worked reception on thirty-nine. We were the only two Black women on the client floors back then, and we did not look a thing alike. Loretta was five foot nothing and light as you please, and I was—" she gestured at herself: tall still, dark, gray hair pressed and set every Friday — "this. That girl called me Loretta from September to Christmas. Gave me a poinsettia that Christmas. Nice one, too, not from the deli. Card said, Merry Christmas, Loretta, thanks for everything." She smiled without much humor. "I put it on my desk. What was I going to do, throw out a good plant?"
"Did you correct her?"
"Once, in October. She said, 'Oh my God, I'm so sorry,' went red as a beet, and called me Loretta again the next week. So I stopped. You stop. You correct everybody, you never get anything done but correcting." She looked at him over her glasses. "Somewhere around February she got it. Started saying 'Good morning, Eunice' every day like it was a prize she'd won. She was never ugly to me, I'll say that. She wasn't the worst of them. Not near."
"She won't remember you," he said. "I'd bet anything."
"Probably not. Why would she? I was furniture. Nice furniture. Kept the water cold." She tapped the table with one finger. "Now. What are you going to do to her?"
"Nothing she hasn't done to herself."
Eunice set her fork down and looked at him for a long moment.