After supper, Robert went looking for Katie and found her in the enclosed garden room where he had been reunited with her. She was shrugging into a light sweater.
“That new resident of yours is a bit unnerving,” he said. Katie jumped and placed her hand at her throat. “Sorry.”
She waved him off. “My fault. I was distracted. You were talking about Janice?”
“Is that her name?”
“What unnerved you about her?”
Robert shrugged. “She keeps staring at me.”
“You have those rugged good looks.” Katie wasn’t smiling. Robert couldn’t tell if she was teasing.
“Not that kind of stare.”
“Then what kind?”
“Like she knows me, though I don’t know her.”
Katie tied the sweater’s belt at her waist. “Tell me what she looks like.”
“Tall. Skinny. Unfortunately skinny. What is it with women who think—”
“You don’t really have to ask that question, do you?”
“Okay. But she could use some meat on her. Short dark brown hair. Unnaturally blue eyes.”
“Might be contacts.”
“Maybe. They take the creepy factor of her staring to a whole new level. I didn’t want to encourage her by studying her too closely, you know?”
“I’m sure many of the other women who live here find you a sight for deprived eyes.”
Robert laughed. “I haven’t noticed anyone but you.”
Katie fell silent. He’d said too much. She wasn’t ready to reciprocate. Of course she wasn’t. She didn’t have the benefit of having nothing else to think about but a long-lost friend, miraculously rediscovered. He wondered if she ever took vacations—as opposed to an afternoon off now and then.
“I enjoyed the sculptures you showed me Monday,” he offered.
“They’re beautiful, aren’t they?”
Their conversation stalled again.
“Could I ask you a favor?” Katie said.
“Anything.”
“Janice needs echinacea. We’re out of it. Could you run down to a Walgreens for some?”
“Tonight?”
“A little outing might do you good.”
“I know. I meant—never mind.” The ease of their prior conversations evaporated for reasons Robert couldn’t pinpoint. The earlier connection he’d felt to her seemed threatened, and he reached out to touch her, then stopped himself.
“Of course I’ll go. Echinacea—that’s the stuff our mothers used to make us swallow all the time, right?”
“Brown bottle, orange label.”
“You want to come?” he asked.
“Staff meeting at eight thirty. You could possibly get me back in time, but I’ve got something else I need to do first. Thanks for doing this.”
“No problem.”
Katie left the garden room through an exterior door into the back of the property. Robert almost asked if she had a flashlight along. What could she have to do out there in the dark?
Instead, he left in the opposite direction. He circumvented several sets of tables and chairs, then stepped into the hallway that separated the garden room from the atrium in the entryway. From the corner of his eye, he spotted a figure walking toward the end of the hall, as if she had passed the point where he was standing seconds ago. Janice.
Had she been listening?
When he hesitated, she turned her head to look at him. Shadows from the setting sun reached in through the windows and cloaked her eyes and propped them up on deep, dark circles, but Robert could imagine her blue stare easily enough. She continued walking, and after a few seconds she looked away.
Robert picked up his pace and crossed the tile toward the exit.