Total pages in book: 38
Estimated words: 35499 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 177(@200wpm)___ 142(@250wpm)___ 118(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 35499 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 177(@200wpm)___ 142(@250wpm)___ 118(@300wpm)
But I nod anyway, because what choice do I have? I drop the sheet—the time for pretenses and privacy clearly over now—and pull yesterday's clothes back on. Legion's T-shirt hangs to my thighs, and clearly this little foray into kidnap-victim territory has caused me to lose weight, because the jeans have no intention of clinging to my hips this morning. I hold them up with one hand, nose crinkling because I now smell like spilled whiskey and stale ashes.
I sigh, wishing for more sleep. My body aches in places I don't want to think about, and I'm so hungry for more than liquid courage, my stomach is cramping.
But I follow the woman downstairs, feeling like I'm walking into judgment, as she leads me through a narrow hallway.
My bare feet stick slightly to the floor with each step.
God, I wish I had shoes.
"Where's Legion?" I ask.
She doesn't even turn around. "Church."
"Church." I sigh.
"The vote." She throws the words over her shoulder like I should know better than to ask. "When men decide things, they call it 'church'. When women decide things, they call it 'gossip'."
All right, then. She's friendly.
We reach a door at the end of the hallway, and she pushes it open without ceremony. The smell hits me first—burnt coffee and something fried hours ago. My stomach growls embarrassingly loud.
"Here," she says, gesturing me inside. "Sit."
The dining room isn't much of one. Just a scarred wooden table surrounded by mismatched chairs that look like they were rescued from various yard sales and dumpsters. Faded wallpaper peels at the corners, showing layers beneath like geological strata. Grease marks map the wall near an ancient stove visible through a pass-through window.
A metal percolator hisses in the corner, spitting coffee that smells like it could strip paint. The morning light filters weakly through a single window crusted with dust, casting everything in a tired glow.
I sit where she points, at the head of the table. Not out of respect, I realize, but so everyone can see me. Observe me.
"I'm Mama Jo," she finally says, pouring herself coffee in a mug that reads WORLD'S OKAYEST MOM. "Diesel's old lady."
I nod, recognizing the name of the burly man who fed me shots last night. "I'm—"
"I know who you are," she cuts me off. "Everyone knows who you are."
She doesn't offer me coffee. I don't ask.
"OK." I shrink a little as the silence stretches between us, uncomfortable and deliberate. I resist the urge to fill it with pleasantries or questions. This isn't a Junior League tea. This is something else entirely.
Footsteps approach, and a woman appears in the doorway. She's maybe forty, with a practical bob and the upright posture of someone with a military background. She nods at Mama Jo, then looks at me with undisguised curiosity.
"June," Mama Jo says by way of introduction. "Havoc's wife."
June doesn't smile or extend her hand. Instead, she walks to the coffee pot, pours herself a cup, and then—oddly—places a folded white handkerchief on the table in front of me. It's pristine, with a delicate "J" embroidered in the corner.
I stare at it, confused, then look up to thank her or ask why, but she's already turning away, coffee in hand.
"Wait, what—" I begin, but Mama Jo shakes her head once, sharply.
I fall silent, fingering the handkerchief. It's real cotton, soft from many washings.
Before I can process this strange interaction, another woman enters. She's younger, covered in tattoos with a pierced septum and hair dyed an electric blue. She barely glances at me as she grabs coffee, but on her way out, she drops something that clinks against the table.
A brass coin. Heavy, and worn. Like it's been through a million hands. I squint to make out the lettering. One Top-Shelf Drink. What the… then I realize what this is. A bar token.
How odd. Why did she give it to me? I look up at Mama Jo, ready to ask questions, but she cuts me off with a cold expression. "That's Sienna," Mama Jo says after she's gone. "Roach's girl."
More women arrive, one after another. Some get coffee. Some just pass through. Each leaves something behind.
A tarnished bullet on a silver chain, dropped by a woman with a sleeve of watercolor tattoos. "It never fired when it should've," she mutters, the only one to speak directly to me. Mama Jo identifies her as Lita, Chain's partner.
A heavy, old-fashioned key, laid down deliberately by Mama Jo herself. "To nothing," she says when she catches me examining it. "Not anymore."
The pile grows. A woman whose name I never catch leaves behind a faded paperback with dog-eared pages. Another drops a small jar of what looks like homemade salve.
I sit still through it all, accepting each item without comment, though confusion and curiosity burn through me. This feels like a ritual, but no one bothers to explain the tradition.