“Nessa.”
He nodded, slowly, twice. Like a man putting something somewhere he would be able to find it again.
“Thank you, Nessa.”
I went inside.
I checked through the window twice before bed. Once at about half past nine and once at about eleven.
Both times he was there under the porch roof, wrapped in that blanket, with the backpack beside him and one hand resting on it.
The second time he was asleep sitting up, with his back against the wall of my house and that bag under one arm.
And I stood at that window for about four seconds and felt extremely good about myself, and went to bed.
I woke early the next morning. Junie was still out.
I put coffee on and made a simple breakfast — four eggs, because I was going to do him a plate.
And I poured a second cup, and I remember being pleased with myself about the second cup, which is a thing I would now give quite a lot not to have felt.
I went to the front door.
“Good morning,” I called, opening it.
Nothing came back.
I stepped out. The porch was empty.
The cushions were stacked. The towel was folded on top of them. The plate was washed — he had washed a plate, somewhere, with something — and set on the sill.
And the man was gone.
I stood there for about four seconds looking down the street in both directions, which was pointless, because the street was empty and had been for hours.
Then my foot caught something by the doorway and I nearly went over.
It was my mother’s blanket.
Folded. Carefully — properly, in four, with the edges squared, the way somebody does a thing when they have decided it is the last thing they can do for you.
Set down square on the doormat.
I bent and picked it up.
And the mat shifted under my hand, because there was something flat underneath it.
My first thought was that he had dropped something out of that bag in the dark and not noticed.
And then I saw the writing on the front.
One word.
Nessa.
PART 3
