you?”
I sat at the kitchen table and put the nine millimeter down in front of me, like it was a fork or a spoon. Rubbed my face with two hands.
“I sleep light,” I said.
“So I’ve noticed.” She stood next to me and touched my shoulder and smiled in that way that meant she wanted something. “There’s not a damn thing in that fridge…Would you do me a favor?”
“Who do you want me to kill?”
She gave me a reproving look. One might say, a wifely look.
Then her expression softened and she asked, “Could you please make a convenience store run?”
I just looked at her. She had no notion of the significance of her request.
Janet gestured around the little kitchen, like a disaster survivor talking to a reporter about the damage. “We have cereal here, but no milk. I can make a little list…Would you mind, terribly? And, uh-this is embarrassing, but…”
And now the poor-pitiful-me look.
“…would you mind picking up some Tampax?”
I let out a long sigh, pushed out the chair, stood, and said, “No problem.”
She touched my face and kissed my cheek. “You are so sweet…”
Maybe I was.
But I took the nine millimeter with me.
