Page 15 of The Last Letter of Rachel Ellsworth

Chapter Twelve

After they ate, Veronica called up a map on her phone using the Wi-Fi, saved it, and turned off her phone, which was well into the yellow on battery power. She’d charge it up when she got back, but the errand wouldn’t take long. The grocery store was only a few blocks away.

Mariah warned her that it was going to get dark early, but the rain had slowed, and it was only midafternoon.

Veronica desperately wanted to stay awake a little longer.

Mariah wasn’t even attempting it. She ate everything she’d ordered, poured down most of the pot of tea, and limped into her bedroom.

She didn’t even comment on the fact that she had the lesser of the two rooms and when Veronica would have helped her get situated, she waved her away. “I don’t really unpack,” she said.

Like a man, Veronica thought, and was embarrassed by the sexism in the observation, but it came to her twice—also while Mariah wolfed down everything on the tray as Veronica nibbled her toast. In fact, her stomach was still growly, and she wished she’d eaten more, but she didn’t want to go home busting out of her clothes, and she’d had zero exercise the past few days.

The walk would help, and maybe she could pick up some food that wouldn’t feel so extravagant. Bacon! She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d eaten it, though she’d taken one piece and found it ridiculously delicious. She’d have to watch herself.

Pulling up her hood against the drizzle, she tried to glance at the map on her phone as little as possible.

The street was not exactly thick with humans, but there were more than she would have expected on such a rainy day.

They clambered out of a bus, and ducked in and out of shops and pubs.

They carried umbrellas and huddled under them without looking around, feet sloshing through puddles on the pavement.

At the corner, a car splashed her ankles with water, which muddied her pants.

She shrugged it off, determined to show up for this.

All of it. Rain pelting down, streaking the face of her phone.

Mud splashing her. She thought of Elsie and wondered if it looked the same as it had a hundred years ago.

Many of the buildings had probably been the same.

She looked around curiously at the slim pharmacy tucked between a bakery and launderette.

A tiny café smelled of roasting meat, its doorway and windows adorned with plastic flowers.

Two blocks up, turn right. The secondary street was more of a lane, with rows of brick buildings that were clearly apartments and less grand hotels.

She looked across the uneven street to see a calico cat looking out of an upper story window.

In another was a tangle of plants. In a third, a woman talked on the phone, staring out the window, her chin up in what looked like defiance.

The road dead-ended in a shopping center. Whew. That was easy, Veronica thought, and tucked her phone in her pocket. She had a credit card Mariah had given her, so she didn’t have to worry about keeping track of her budget. Such luxury! Her means had been quite thin the past year.

Taking a shopping cart that was much smaller than any she’d encountered before, she made her way around the aisles, promising herself she could come back when she had more time.

But within moments, she was delighting in the offerings she’d never seen.

Quail eggs right next to the chicken eggs, all of them on the shelf, not in the fridge.

Goat cheese and beetroot pasta, “seriously extra strong” cheddar cheese, frozen fish pie, Thai curry soup, and dozens of packaged Indian and Chinese ready meals.

It was hard not to want to put everything in the cart, just to taste them, but she had to carry whatever she bought.

She could always come back. In the produce aisle, she gathered bananas and grapes and baby carrots; some pots of yogurt and a quart of milk, cheese and crackers.

In time, she’d find out what Mariah liked eating, but for now, this would be enough.

Her mood was light as she stepped outside. The gloaming had started to gather on the edges of the sky. Cold rose from the ground. For a moment she stood just outside the door, trying to get her bearings.

It didn’t look the same. The street she’d walked to get here wasn’t there.

Maybe she’d just come out the wrong door, she thought, and pulled out her phone.

It was on red power, but showed her the map she’d downloaded before leaving.

Of course, she wasn’t connected, so it didn’t reorient her to where she was now, but she could read a map, and she remembered a couple of things about the hotel.

It was diagonally across the street from a park, the one with red phone booths.

She found the green space on the map, and traced her way to the grocery store, and realized she’d just got turned around. No big deal.

Centering herself, she strode out, following the street that ran alongside the one she’d followed down here. She passed a few shops she thought she recognized. The rain had lifted to a mild drizzle, and she had plenty of time.

And then she came across a tube station, belching passengers out onto the wet pavement, all of them hurrying home. She imagined them going to the apartments where lights were coming on, friendly.

She began to realize she must have taken a wrong turn.

Veronica turned on her phone. A flurry of messages filled her screen, but she ignored them and opened her map. It took an agonizingly long time to refresh, and she felt power spilling out of her nearly dead phone like sugar from a bag. The marker opened—

And the phone died. “Shit.”

She lifted her head. It was definitely getting dark, and colder, but somebody would know where she’d made her wrong turn. At the first shop, she went inside.

It was a grocery store, with narrow aisles and a short produce section. People lined up for the cash registers looking miserable, tired.

For a moment, she was struck again by the diversity of the space.

Boulder was a student town, but it was still heavily Caucasian.

This was the opposite of homogenous—people of many ages and colors and backgrounds stood in line, heads covered with hats and turbans and scarves, arms covered with brownish tweed and silky red and pattered shawls.

Her heart lifted—she wasn’t in Kansas anymore.

But this wasn’t the venue to ask for directions.

She headed back out, where the rain had picked up, slanting sideways into her face.

She blinked against it, looking for a friendlier shop.

A bakery was already closed. A little dark shop seemed a bit intimidating, and then she came across a café that didn’t look too busy.

She ducked inside and couldn’t help shaking off a little, like a dog.

“Hello,” said a man behind the counter. It smelled wonderful, and her still-yearning stomach pulled her up to the glass, where skewers of meat and vegetables lay in steaming hues.

In the back of her mind, Spence dismissed the food as too fatty, too spicy, too whatever.

But her mouth watered. “Is that lamb?”

“It is, madam. Would you like a plate?”

“Do you take cards?”

“Of course.” He was already dishing up a hefty helping of meat and roasted onions and peppers, adding perfect rice, and a creamy dressing, and tomato cucumber salad, and a pita or naan bread, she wasn’t sure which. Her stomach growled again.

She gave him the card, accepted a bag with the box of food, napkins, and plasticware, and bent down to inhale the spices. “Thank you,” she breathed, and tucked the card back into her wallet.

It wasn’t until she was on her way out the door that she even remembered that she wanted directions. “Can you tell me where the Morton Hotel is?”

“One block,” he said, smiling. He pointed in the direction she’d been going.

She smiled and gave a lift of her chin, an old New Mexico gesture she’d never lost. Carrying her multiple bags, the food sending up a mouthwatering aroma, she entered the human flow, humming under her breath, and came across the hotel just where he’d said it would be.

She must have looped back up another street.

A man was coming out as she came up the steps, and he held the door.

“Thank you,” she said, and he tipped his hat.

The smell of the food enveloped her in the elevator, and she floated toward the room, letting herself in.

Mariah had gone to bed. The rooms were dark.

She turned on a lamp, put away the groceries in the little kitchen, took out a plain white glass plate and some heavy flatware, and put the kettle on to boil.

She arranged the meat and vegetables and bread on the plate, carried it to the table, and sat down with it by the window overlooking the little square.

It was the kind of meal her family never liked—Spence abhorred red meat, and her children wouldn’t eat lamb or veal and would have lectured her about it. But she didn’t have to answer to them, or to anyone.

Breathing in the scents of spice and roasted meat, she gave herself the time to anticipate as she admired the rain on the window, the lights flashing across the street, the sense of peace she felt. Finally, she lifted her fork and began to eat.

The lamb was tender, falling off the bone, the spices exactly perfect. The tomato salad could have been mushy, but it was fresh and flecked with fresh parsley.

She didn’t inhale food, ever, but she ate every single bite.

Every last shred of meat. Every tiny cucumber, every corner of the pita, because it had turned out to be a pita.

She thought of the people in the airport and the people in the shops, and her heart was lighter than it had been in years. Maybe decades.

It came to her softly, a question: What do you want your life to be?