Part 3
The rest of the lawn took forever.
My body screamed at me with every step. My lower back felt like it was full of broken glass. But finishing was the only thing that made sense to me anymore. Everything else in my life was slipping out of my control, but this one thing, this one stupid overgrown lawn, I could fix.
When I finally pushed the mower into the last corner and cut the engine, the silence rang in my ears. I wheeled it back beside her porch, wiped my hands on my shorts, and tried not to notice that my vision had gone slightly blurry at the edges.
Mrs. Higgins came down the steps and took my hand in both of hers. Her grip was surprisingly firm.
“You’re a good girl, Ariel,” she said. “Remember that.”
She looked at me with a strange, unsettling intensity, her eyes moving slowly across my face, like she was memorizing it.
“Don’t you let this world take that away from you.”
I didn’t know what to do with that, so I tried to make a joke.
“If the world wants anything from me today, it’s going to have to wait until I’ve had a nap.”
She laughed, but her eyes stayed serious. “Go get some rest, honey.”
I grabbed my stack of mail off the railing and waved as I trudged back across the yard, grateful for the shade of my own porch.
That night, I lay in bed with the fan whirring and one hand resting on my belly. I stared at the thin cracks spidering across the ceiling. I thought about Walter packing that hospital bag a month early. I thought about Mrs. Higgins patting my knee.
For the first time in months, I felt lighter. Just a little. Just for a moment.
I didn’t know it would be the last time I ever saw her.
A siren tore me out of sleep.
I bolted upright, heart slamming, one hand flying to my stomach. Blue and red lights were streaking through the gaps in my blinds, sweeping across my bedroom walls in wild, panicked stripes.
For one frantic second, my mind raced to the worst places it could find. Maybe Lee had come back to make some kind of scene. Maybe the bank had already sent someone to throw me out. Maybe I had done something wrong without even knowing it.
I grabbed the first cardigan I could find, pulled it on over my sleep shirt, and stumbled to the front door.
When I stepped outside, the street looked like a circus.
Two patrol cars sat at angles along the curb, lights still spinning. A sheriff’s SUV was parked right in front of my house. Neighbors had drifted out onto their lawns in robes and slippers, clutching coffee mugs, faces pinched with curiosity. A few of them turned to look at me the second my door opened.
And they were all standing near one house.
Mrs. Higgins’ house.
A cold feeling crept up the back of my neck. I tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, lifted my chin, and stepped onto the porch, trying to look braver than I felt.
A tall man in a tan uniform broke away from the cluster of officers and walked toward me. He was broad-shouldered and serious, with graying temples and the kind of steady presence that makes you want to stand up straighter.
“Ma’am. Are you Ariel?”
His voice was clipped, but not unkind.
I nodded. My mouth had gone completely dry.
His eyes flicked briefly toward the neighbors watching us, then back to me.
“I’m Sheriff Holt. Would it be all right if we stepped inside for a moment?”
I held the door open, and he followed me in.
My little living room suddenly felt far too small with him standing in it. The radio clipped to his shoulder crackled with quiet static. His gaze moved slowly over the room: the framed photos on the bookshelf, the half-folded laundry still heaped on the couch, the stack of unopened mail on the side table, with the bank’s logo peeking out from the top envelope.
“Is everything okay?” I managed.
He took off his hat and held it in both hands. That was when I knew.
“I wish I could tell you it was,” he said, lowering his voice. “Mrs. Higgins collapsed on her front porch early this morning. A neighbor out walking his dog saw her and called it in. The paramedics got there as fast as they could, but…”
He didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t have to.
“She didn’t make it,” I whispered.
My legs gave out, and I sank down onto the couch, right on top of the laundry.
Sheriff Holt nodded gently. “I’m very sorry.”
I pressed my hand over my mouth. Just yesterday, she had been holding my hand in both of hers. Just yesterday, she had told me I was a good girl. She had been fine. Tired and hot and proud, but fine.
“I know you helped her out yesterday,” the sheriff went on. “One of your neighbors mentioned seeing you out there mowing her lawn.”
“She was struggling,” I said, my voice thin. “It was so hot. I couldn’t just watch her.”
“That was kind of you.” He shifted his weight. “Ariel, there’s something else. When we’re called to a scene like this, we have to piece together the person’s last movements. Mrs. Higgins had a doorbell camera on her porch. We reviewed the footage this morning.”
I looked up at him, confused.
“Very early this morning, before sunrise, she walked across her yard to your house,” he said. “She put something in your mailbox. Then she went back home, sat down on her porch, and…” He paused. “That was the last thing she did.”
I stared at him.
“She put something in my mailbox?”
He nodded.
“What?”
