Empire Falls

quite believe her good fortune to have Zack Minty interested in her—which shows she’s not entirely stupid, Tick thinks, since he isn’t. What he’ll do is continue flirting with Candace until he’s sure that Tick really doesn’t care, and then he’ll tell people it was all just a joke. What Tick’s coming to realize is that in some way Zack’s never been interested in her either, though not, she suspects, in the same way he’s not interested in Candace. While part of her would like to understand this better, the other part is glad she doesn’t.
    “Oh-my-God-oh-my-God … I’ve got it!” Candace shrieks. Whatever she’s got is just too great. She can hardly stand it. “Is it okay if I say it?” she asks Tick. She’d like to be forgiven in advance of her disloyalty. She’s been asking her all day if it’s okay that she and Zack are maybe going to start hanging out. Now she’d like to be sure it’s okay if she participates in this new “Let’s Make Fun of Tick’s New Boyfriend” game.
    “Knock yourself out,” Tick tells her, not wanting to deny Candace pleasure. If her windshield weren’t all fogged up, she’d see heartbreak speeding right at her, its high beams on.
    The bell is going to ring in just a few minutes and what Tick would like to know is whether her painting is finished. That’s one of the many things Bill Taylor is always so sure about. She’d also like to know whether Mrs. Roderigue will recognize herself looming out of focus behind the Red table.
    “Goober,” Candace says with a peal of laughter. “Goober Hickman.”
    Zack Minty turns to regard her, deadpan. “That’s really funny. Laugh, I thought I’d die,” he says, and the girl’s laughter dies in her throat.
    “It’s as funny as what you said,” Justin Dibble offers, causing Tick to glance in his direction. She catches his eye for a split second before he looks away. She has long suspected he’s fond of Candace, that his teasing her has been intended as a courtship ritual. Since Zack began flirting with Candace earlier in the week, Justin has been wearing an expression of hurt and betrayal, though he hasn’t openly broken ranks until now. Tick wonders what the cost of his doing so will be.
    Zack may be pondering the same question, because he does not register his friend’s challenge except to include him when he turns his attention back to silent John Voss. “Let’s let John Voss decide,” he suggests. “Hey, John. The subject is Tick’s new boyfriend. Which is the funnier name? Hickman or Goober?”
    John Voss raises his eyes to look at Tick, and it occurs to her that this may be the first time he’s heard about Donny. He quickly drops his eyes again, but before he does, Tick sends him a look she hopes will suggest that it doesn’t matter if he wants to answer.
    “Okay, how about this?” Zack says, when the boy doesn’t respond. “Which do you think your grandmother would think is funnier?”
    The bell rings then, and Minty shoves his chair back and stands up, pausing for a moment to tower over John Voss, who seems not even to have heard the bell. Candace quickly gets to her feet too—girl on a string—and after a beat they head for the door together, Justin watching them go through narrowed eyes.
    “Ask her for us, okay, John?” Zack calls over his shoulder.
    Her painting, Tick decides, is finished. For the same reason that Bill Taylor’s paintings are always finished. Because the hour is up.

CHAPTER 26
    H E RECOGNIZED HER VOICE immediately, though it had been nearly four years, at his high school graduation, since he’d heard it last. “Hello, dear boy,” she said, and the “hello” was all it took, the “dear boy” merely confirming and intensifying his visceral reaction. Was this what criminals in the Witness Protection Program felt like when they were recognized on the street by a former associate? “I’ve been trying to reach you for days. I’m afraid you’d better come home.”
    Just that quickly, everything in his life changed. How long had it taken to make the arrangements? Fifteen minutes? Had he spoken or merely listened? Later, he was unable to reconstruct much of the conversation, but he had not resisted. Of that much he was sure. After all, he wasn’t in the Witness Protection Program. He was Miles Roby, and his mother was dying .
    The reason Mrs. Whiting hadn’t been able to reach him was that his roommate, Peter, and his girlfriend, Dawn, had convinced