Do you? He kept his eyes on the road. She's a good neighbor. Malik looked at him the way children look at adults when they know they're being given a non-answer and are deciding whether to push on it. He decided not to push.
He turned back to his quartz. But the question stayed in the car the whole drive to school, and it stayed with Marcus all the way to the shop, and it was still sitting somewhere behind his sternum when he lifted the hood of a 1994 Bayliner and got to work. He was good at working. Work didn't ask questions. He put his hands on the engine and let everything else go quiet.
Three hours later, Raymond showed up. Raymond Briggs had been Marcus's best friend since they were both 17 and working summers at a marina in Savannah. He was 51 now, broad-shouldered, perpetually wearing a Braves cap that had seen better decades, and constitutionally incapable of walking into any room without immediately identifying what was different about it. He walked into the shop, looked at Marcus and said, "Something happened." "Morning to you, too, Raymond."
"I'm serious. You've got that thing on your face. What thing? That thing where you're thinking about something and trying so hard not to think about it that you can't think about anything else. Raymond grabbed a stool and sat down without being invited because he never was and never needed to be.
So, what happened? Marcus kept his hands on the engine. New neighbor moved into the blue house. Raymond waited. She's Marcus stopped.
Started again. She's a woman. Moved in about 2 weeks ago. Okay. She brought me coffee.
Raymond's eyebrows went up slowly like a drawbridge. She brought you coffee. Left it on the windowsill. Few times now. And?
And my dog likes her. Malik likes her. Marcus set down his wrench. I accidentally saw her look. It doesn't matter.
She said something. I can't stop thinking about it. Raymond stared at him for a long moment. Marcus, he said very carefully like he was diffusing something. Is this a woman situation?
It's not a situation. It sounds like a situation. She's a neighbor. You just told me your son likes her. Your dog likes her.
She brings you coffee and you can't stop thinking about something she said. Raymond spread his hands. My friend, that is the very definition of a situation. Marcus picked the wrench back up. I'm not ready for a situation.
I know you're not. Raymond said. And his voice dropped the teasing and got quiet. But, Marcus. It's been 4 years.
I know how long it's been. You know what your problem is? You treat everything like an engine. You think if you just don't engage with it, it won't run. He stood up, dropped a hand on Marcus's shoulder for just a second.
Sometimes things run whether you turn the key or not. He left after that. He always knew when to leave. That was the other reason they'd been friends for 34 years. Marcus stood over the engine for a long time.
He thought about what Raymond said. Then he went back to work because what else was there to do? That evening, picking up Malik from school, he found his son in the middle of a conversation with another kid. A bigger kid, maybe 10 or 11 standing with his arms crossed and a look on his face that Marcus recognized immediately. Because he'd seen that look in a lot of different faces over a lot of different years.
And it never meant anything good. He parked, got out, and walked over. Don't even have a real family, the bigger kid was saying. Just a dad. That's only half.
Malik was standing very still. His bag was over one shoulder. His rock collection bag was in his hand. He had the expression of someone who has been hit but is refusing to fall. Marcus walked up and stopped beside his son.
The bigger kid looked up, saw Marcus, and the bravado went out of him like air from a punctured tire. We done? Marcus asked quietly. The kid walked away fast. Marcus looked down at Malik.
Malik was staring at the ground. His jaw was tight. Eight years old trying so hard not to let anything show on his face, and Marcus recognized that, too. Because he'd invented that face, and seeing it on his son was like looking in a mirror that told you things you didn't want to know. Hey.
Marcus crouched down to eye level. Look at me. Malik looked at him. His eyes were dry. He was determined they would stay that way.
What he said was wrong, Marcus told him. You understand me. Half a family, that's not a thing. There's no such thing. Then why did it feel true?
Malik asked. And Marcus had no answer for that. Not immediately. Because the question was real, and his son deserved a real answer, and not the kind of answer that sounds right in the moment, but falls apart when you get home and think about it. He took the bag from Malik's hand.
Come on, he said. They drove home mostly quiet. Malik had his forehead against the passenger window watching things go by. When they pulled into the driveway, Claire was sitting on her porch. She looked at them both, and something shifted in her face.
Not pity, Marcus had seen pity and hated it. Something more careful than that. She set her book down. Malik got out of the car and walked across the yard toward her before Marcus could say a word. He watched his son sit down on her porch steps.
He watched Claire say something he couldn't hear. He watched Malik's shoulders, which had been up around his ears since the parking lot drop, about 2 in. He saw Marcus sat in the car for a moment. Then he got out and walked over. Bad day at school, he said, because he felt he owed her an explanation.