Goodbye Earl(47)

So there she was, standing in front of Silas Castelow, wishing he’d fuss at her for running away. Wishing he’d tell her again how much she broke his heart. How he thought he’d literally die from it. Then, she could finally tell him she thought she’d literally die too.

But she hadn’t died.

She was still here.

So now what?

“Yeah, um, step out here with me real quick?” Silas said, moving toward the door of the station and holding it open for her. She walked out and he followed her. She was clutching the bag of muffins with both hands like a little girl with her school lunch. A few cars whizzed by in the morning heat. One of them honked at Silas and the guy stuck his hand out of the window, waved. Silas waved back and then started talking. “Kasey, come on; we were kids. And you had to deal with entirely too much darkness growing up. Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I slowly realized all you weren’t telling me? Yeah, it broke my heart when you left, because to me, we were golden. That’s what made sense to me when we were in high school, but that was a long time ago—fifteen years. I don’t blame you for leaving. I don’t,” Silas said, shaking his head.

“I should’ve kept talking to you. I shouldn’t have shut you out. I shouldn’t have shut the girls out so much. I didn’t know what else to do except run away, but I didn’t mean it! I didn’t,” Kasey said, clutching the muffin bag even tighter to keep her hands from shaking. Silas gently undid her fingers and took it from her. She let herself cry and it felt really good after the horror of what she’d seen at Caroline’s.

“Look. I’m not saying you didn’t break my heart. I think I’ve been clear about that, right?” Silas asked. “And I keep telling you I can’t stand to see you cry, but apparently, you don’t give a damn about that, do you?” He touched her shoulder.

Kasey shook her head.

“I don’t want you to think I’ve been mad at you for fifteen years. How could I sustain that, Fritz? It’s poison,” Silas said.

“I don’t know if I’ll see you again before I leave.”

“You’ve got plans with the girls tonight?”

Kasey nodded.

“Maybe I can swing by the hotel later? We can have a drink?”

Kasey nodded again. “The bar there is too nice. That place is ridiculous.”

“Very ridiculous, so let’s do it. I’ll text you,” he said. “Thank you for this and this.” He held up his coffee and the bag. She got on her tiptoes to put her lips against his cheek. “Thanks for the extra sugar too,” Silas said. He put his arms around her.

*



Kasey, Rosemarie, and Basie were in the sunny, soft conversation pit. Rosemarie had started crying when Kasey’d told her what she’d seen, which made Kasey start crying all over again too.

“I’ll cut his dick off, and I swear to you I’m serious. Men ain’t shit! I…I truly hate him,” Rosemarie said.

“What should we do? What can we do?” Kasey said. She was petting Basie’s head, rubbing behind her ears. Rosemarie pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, and she seemed so tired. The week had wrung them all out. Every emotion was turned to high—fifteen years of feelings rushing through the Goldie streets like the dam had broken wide open.

“Convince her to leave him. She has to divorce him—she has to.”

“Right, but that can turn into the worst time for a woman who’s being abused. Trey will go ballistic if she tells him she wants out. He has to control her. If he feels like he’s losing that control, he’ll hurt her even worse,” Kasey said. She paused. Everything she was saying was hitting too close. She saw her mom’s face, fresh in her mind. Heard her mom’s voice saying her name. Kasey took a shaky breath in.

“We’ll…we’ll hide her, then. Send her off somewhere until he calms down and finds someone else…but oh God, I don’t want him to get with anyone else and do this to her either. I don’t know. I don’t know exactly what to do, but we have to do something,” Rosemarie said. She stood and got Basie’s leash off the hook by the door. “Let’s take her for a walk. We need the swampy—I mean fresh—air. Come on, get up. Time for walk and talk.”

Kasey stepped out of the conversation pit and slipped on her sandals.

*



Since Caro couldn’t make it to the restaurant until nine, Kasey had told Ada that she and Rosemarie would be there at eight so they could discuss everything before Caro showed up. Ada had prepared a beautiful spread for them, but they only picked at it as Kasey and Rosemarie told her everything. Ada cried, distraught and blaming herself, claiming she should’ve noticed the signs. She and Caroline saw each other practically every day, and yet, Ada had so many other things on her mind.

Ada told them that her life hadn’t been as perfect as it seemed lately, and she hated that people thought her life was so perfect anyway. Living up to that was impossible, and Ada had never asked for it. Her mom had chronic back pain, and after several surgeries stretched over the past fifteen years, recently, she’d been really struggling with needing more and more pain pills.

“Ada, stop. I’m so sorry to hear about your mom, and we’ll do all we can to help you get through this, but what’s happening with Caro isn’t on you. This isn’t anyone’s fault but Trey’s. He’s an Earl, period. Like Dumbass and more than half the men in this town.” Rosemarie said the last bit through gritted teeth.