Page 25 of Just One More Thing

HOT DOG

HOT DOG (with slaw)

HOT DOG (with baked beans)

HOT DOG (with “everything”)

Everything is in quotation marks, which feels both ominous and refreshingly honest.

I’m standing here because Granny decided I needed sunshine and salt air, then handed me a twenty like she was sending me off to summer camp.

“You can’t fix your life on an empty stomach,” she’d said. “And don’t you come back with a salad.”

So here I am, afternoon heat pressing down on my shoulders, standing in line behind a man passionately debating with another whether a hot dog counts as a sandwich.

It does not.

But I’m not emotionally equipped to litigate this today. I’m just trying to buy a hot dog like a normal person who did not have a public emotional incident at Tall Tales yesterday.

No. Two days ago.

I think.

Time has become a very loose concept.

The line inches forward. The bell on the cart dings as the man ahead of me steps away clutching his paper tray like it’s sacred.

My turn.

“Well, look at you,” she says, beaming. “Emory Donovan.”

“Hi, Miss Hattie.”

“Hi,” she echoes, delighted. “You’re back in town.”

I still can’t tell when that’s meant as a welcome and when it’s meant as a finding.

“Just for a bit,” I say automatically.

She makes a little sound that says she has thoughts about that and all of them are blunt.

“Uh-huh. What can I get you?”

I’d like one hot dog with a side of the earth opening up beneath me.

“Just a hot dog,” I say instead. “With slaw.”

“Good choice.” Then she leans in. “How’s Maddy’s leg doing?”

“Still broken. Still dramatic.”

“She’s been dramatic since high school. That’s never gonna change.”

She reaches for a bun. “Tell her I’m bringing casserole and schnapps tonight.”

“I’ll pass along the threat.”

She grins, pleased with herself, then her eyes flick past me and widen in a way that would be subtle anywhere else but absolutely is not here.