I came back at a light jog for the sake of safety, the dogs trotting beside me. Halfway back to the cabin the rain stopped, and the sun came out. Just like that. The sky was blue everywhere except to the east, where the clouds had gone.
Mrs. Dinsmore was outside the cabin when we got there. She was around the side of the place, standing on a short stepladder cleaning the windows with a rag. The same windows I’d looked through when I’d seen her that first time. When I thought I might be looking at a corpse. And I wasn’t far enough from wrong, either.
She turned partway when she saw me.
“I hate dirty windows,” she called to me. “Especially water-spotted ones. What’s the point of living out in the middle of nature if you can’t even have a good look at it out your windows?”
I didn’t answer. Just moved closer and watched her work for a minute.
Then I said, “Can I get your advice about something?”
“I suppose.”
“If you’re going to take a person to a movie, and this person says it’s up to you to pick which movie, how do you pick? I mean, how do you know how to pick so you don’t end up with something this person’ll hate?”
She wrapped up her work on the window right about then. Stuffed the rag into her overalls pocket. As she backed down off the stepladder, she looked right into my face.
“So that’s why you’re grinning like a damn fool,” she said. “You have yourself a date with a girl.”
I hadn’t known I was grinning. But when she said that, I checked my own face. You know, from behind. And I do think I might have had some of that “nervous cheeks” thing going on. I wondered if that was why my mother had been staring at me over dinner the night before. It had been just the two of us. My father had been late coming home from work, and my mother didn’t like him nearly enough anymore to hold dinner.
“I do have a date,” I said. “And I just thought you might be able to help me with the picking problem. Because I’m not a girl. And you are. Or you were. Or, anyway . . . you’re female, is what I mean to say.” I felt my words get stumbly and my face hot. “I guess I really stepped in something with that, didn’t I?”
“Your good intentions will excuse it this time. Did you look in the paper or call the theater to see what’s playing over in Blaine?”
Blaine had the closest theater. Three screens. Ashby was too small to have a theater. Not even a one-screener.
“I did, yeah.”
“So what are your choices?”
“There’s that western with John Wayne. And then there’s a scary one. I forget the title, but it’s supposed to be really bloody. And then the one about the little VW Beetle car that talks. Or maybe it doesn’t talk. Maybe it just flies or something. I saw a trailer for it, but I don’t remember much about it now.”
“Interesting,” she said. She folded up the stepladder. Tucked it under her arm. “An interesting set of options.”
“Interesting how?”
I walked with her to the shed to put the stepladder away. That seemed to be the only way I was going to get my advice.
“Because each choice says a lot about you as a date. Let’s say you choose the western. I can’t say for a fact that this gal doesn’t like westerns. Some girls might. But she’s less likely to enjoy them than you are. And even if she does, choosing the boy movie might be seen as a way of saying, ‘Well, you let me have my choice, so I just chose what I wanted.’ Might come off a little selfish. Now, a lot of boys’ll pick the horror flick for a date. Even though that runs the risk of putting her in a terrible mood and making her have an upsetting time. Know why they might pick that one anyway?”
I stopped outside the shed and waited for her.
“No, ma’am. I don’t think I do.”
“Because they’re hoping for the girl to snuggle in close when she gets scared. But here’s the thing you need to know about girls: We’re not stupid. We know about how boys do that on purpose. We can figure stuff out. So you run the risk of her thinking you’re only after one thing.”
“I’m not,” I said, disturbed by my motives being questioned even in casual conversation.
“I didn’t think so,” she said. “But you don’t want her to get the wrong impression.”
“So, the Love Bug one.”
“Sounds like a safe choice. It’s a comedy, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, that’s good, I think. A comedy. That sends the message that you want her to have a nice time. That you’re trying to make a fun date for her.”
We started back toward the cabin together.
I felt layers of stress dropping away with every step. It was so easy. Just take her to see the Love Bug movie. I couldn’t believe I’d wasted half the night tossing and turning over something that had proved to be so simple.
“Thanks,” I said. “That’s good advice.”
“Worth it to have somebody call me a girl again,” she said. “It’s been a while.”
Chapter Eight
The Key
I knocked on Libby’s door promptly at six. And by promptly I mean I’d walked around the block for ten minutes, glancing obsessively at my watch. Then I’d stood on her welcome mat watching the second hand tick around to the top of
