"I'll hold you to that." He said. Declan stood. Garrett stood. Bobby took one last bite of pie, the very last bite, the corner piece with the most filling and stood.
They moved toward the door with the easy coordinated naturalness of four people who have spent enough time together that their bodies know how to occupy shared space without negotiation. At the doorframe Mike stopped. He turned back. He looked at Leo.
"The footage," he said. Leo met his eyes. "When it comes out, and it will come out, things like this always do. The story it tells is the story of two men who made a wrong choice and then made a right one.
That's the story worth having." He paused. "Don't be ashamed of it. Learn it." Leo's throat moved. He didn't trust his voice, so he didn't use it.
He just held Mike Callahan's gaze for a long moment, long enough to make it mean something. And then he nodded. Mike turned and walked through the doorframe into the dark. Bobby followed.
Declan followed. Garrett stopped at the frame, turned back to the room, to Leo, to Corey, to Dave Pelman and his coffee, to Brenda with her reading glasses in her hand near the bat, to Harold visible in the kitchen door. And he looked at them all for just a moment, this collection of people who had been strangers 2 hours ago and were now something without an exact word for it. He raised two fingers in something that was not quite a wave and not quite a salute, but carried elements of both.
Then he was gone. The sound of four motorcycles starting up outside, first one, then three more. The engines building from ignition to idle to the full rolling authoritative sound of a Harley-Davidson under throttle came through the doorframe and filled the diner like something alive. It lasted about 15 seconds, the engines holding, and then the sound moved westward toward the highway, toward the Mojave, toward the dark and enormous distance of the California, and the tick of the diner and the four remaining people in the Pioneer Wells looking at each other across the wreckage of an extraordinary evening.