“You didn’t have to pay for me.”

She waves off my money. “I want to. Call it payback for you telling me stuff about Tillie.” Her smirk is subtle, but I catch it. “Or for me scaring you so bad you fell down the stairs.”

“You didn’t scare me. I tripped.”

“Uh-huh.”

Once we’re seated at a booth near the back of the café, she starts with the questions again: How old is Tillie? (Forty.) What hobbies does she have? (Sewing, crafting, volunteer work.) What music does she listen to? (Sappy country love songs and a lot of jazz, which I despise, but tolerated, for her.)

“And you don’t know why she left?”

“No clue.”

“Did she owe money or something?”

“Not that I know of. She does now—the utility companies and some credit cards—but that was all after she left.” I take another bite from my sandwich and realize, suddenly, I’m starving; I forgot to eat dinner last night. “She didn’t owe anything on the house, though. She left the outlet after she paid it off, then got a job as a freelance editor. So I don’t know why she up and left the way she did.”

“That’s why you live there,” she says, so proud of herself, like she’s solved a mystery. “No mortgage, no rent. Not a bad deal.”

“The house would just sit there and rot, if I left,” I point out.

She takes a long sip of her drink. “Is that why you’ve let the yard get so overgrown, or refused to take in the mail?”

She’s got you there. “Okay, so I’m not the best housekeeper. Let’s get back to the real topic.”

Lila shakes her head, but, thankfully, takes her focus off me again. “So was she the type to take off like that, no warning?”

“At first I thought she was on vacation. She was kind of impulsive like that: sudden trips, buying furniture on a whim, signing up for random classes. Like this one time, we saw a documentary on candle-making? She went and signed up for a candle workshop, right then and there.”

Lila laughs. The sound is quiet, drowned out by a blender at the counter.

“Anyway,” I shrug, “she’s up and left before, so I didn’t find it that strange until a few weeks passed. I called the police after a month to report her missing.”

I mean for this to be casual—just telling Lila the facts—but her face makes it obvious it’s anything but. She sits back against the booth, like I knocked the air out of her.

“Sorry. Maybe I should have told you that sooner.”

She blinks, getting her bearings. “Um…did they find anything? Leads, suspects?”

I almost laugh, but know better than to show it. “It’s not exactly a ‘foul play’ kind of situation,” I explain. “Since she took her suitcase and wallet, all that, the cops basically told me there wasn’t anything they could do. The verdict is that she left willingly and doesn’t want to be found.”

“That makes sense, I guess.” Lila coughs, but her voice stays raspy.

“I, uh—I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“No, no,” she says quickly. “It’s fine. I mean, I asked, right?”

“They’re still looking for her, if that helps.” Technically, I’m lying. The police are willing to keep looking, but can’t actually do it: there’s no evidence to go on. But I don’t see the point in telling that to Lila.

“Was she by herself?”

I think a minute. “She was seeing a guy she met at this singles group thing. I didn’t think they were that serious, but maybe she went with him. Guess that would explain the car thing, too.”

“I assume you don’t know his name or number.”

“Nope. Sorry.”

Lila studies the tabletop. “What does she look like?”

I wipe my mouth again and look at the widow’s peak in her hair, her eyes with shifting colors: green and blue, like lake water, but clearer.

“Actually,” I say, “like you.”

“Really?”

Her smile, for some reason, makes me smile. “Really.”

After lunch, we sit in her car with the heater blasting. “I just wish I could find her,” she sighs. “It’s stupid, how much I want to meet her, when I didn’t even know she existed until a few days ago.”

“That’s not stupid.”

She smiles again, this time sadly, and shakes out a cigarette. Her lighter sputters, but won’t ignite. “I just bought this one,” she grumbles.

“Hang on, I think I have matches.” I pull the contents of my pocket out piece by piece and pile them in my lap. Paper scraps, receipts, a mint. When I finally come up with the matches, she’s staring at my crotch.

“Where did you get that?” She reaches for something.

It’s the photo from the locket.

“This is me,” she whispers, turning it in the light. “My parents, they had this photo on their mantle. And it was in my file at the agency, too.” Her eyes turn on me. “How did you get this?”

Just like that, I feel like a dirt bag again.

“It was in some stuff Tillie left,” I shrug. That’s it: play it casual. “You can have it. I mean, it’s yours, basically.”

“It’s cut into a heart.” Her breathing is louder now. I have the feeling I’ll be walking home.

Especially since, compelled by some God-awful force I don’t understand, I feel like I have to tell her the truth.

“It was in a locket.”

“A locket,” she repeats.

“Yeah, like, this gold heart locket, and it had KD on it. I guess...that was Kathryn Davidson.” I force my eyes to hers. “You.”

Lila stares at me so hard, I have to look away again. “Where is it?”

I shift my jaw. “I pawned it.”

“You what?”

“I’m not proud of it, okay? And it’s not like I knew it was yours.”

“But you did know it wasn’t yours.” She sighs through her nose, closing the picture up in her palm. “I could have you arrested for this, you know.”

“Over a locket?”

“Yeah,” she snaps, “because if she left pretty much everything she owned behind, I’m willing to bet you pawned a lot of stuff before you got desperate enough to sell a locket.”

Damn. She’s pretty smart.

“Hey, as far as I knew,” I argue, “Tillie had no family or friends whatsoever, other than me. And she was gone for three months before I even touched the stuff she left. The necklace didn’t look important—it’s not like it was in some fancy jewelry box in her room.” I sit back against my seat and fold my arms. “Like I said, I’m not proud of it. I needed some extra money, and that stuff was just sitting there in the basement, rotting in a bunch of moldy boxes.”

“If you need money, you get a job,” she seethes. “You don’t steal.”

“It wasn’t stealing. It’s abandoned property. And for the record, I have a job.”

“You probably steal from the outlet, too.”

“I didn’t steal anything from the outlet,” I say, getting angry myself. “And I don’t work there anymore. I do day labor and odd jobs, but it’s winter, so it isn’t paying great, okay? I’m saving up, and I figured...why not get some cash for that stuff, when it’s just sitting and getting ruined, anyway?”

“Saving up for what?”

My throat hurts. I blame it on the heater. “I don’t know. To take a trip, you know, get out of town. Move to a new place, start over.”

“Why?”

“Just to go. God, does it matter?”

Lila sets her unlit cigarette in the cupholder and puts the car in gear. “Which pawnshop? I’m getting it back.”

“It’s downtown. You’re going to hit a ton of traffic.”

“I don’t care.”

I rub my eyes to fight the oncoming headache. It’s been months since I’ve spent this much uninterrupted time with another human, and it’s a little exhausting. Of course, that might just be Lila herself. She’s kind of a whirlwind.

“Fifth and Forge,” I tell her. “Next to the bike shop and that Vietnamese place.” I pause. “Across from the studio apartments.”

“You better hope it’s still there.”

“Yeah?” I can’t help but laugh. “Or what?” She doesn’t answer, eyes locked straight ahead on the road.

“I’m sure it’s still there,” I tell her, feeling bad again. Her focus doesn’t relax, but her shoulders do, just a little.