Page 1 of Clara Knows Best

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Clara knew she was looking her best when she entered the kitchen.

She was a firm believer in good first impressions, or whatever you called the impression you were about to make on the childhood crush you hadn’t seen since you were a gawky teenager. The tailored midi dress she’d worn to work might show that she cleaned up nice or was a productive member of society, and the picture she’d taken of it would be well-received by her followers when it was eventually posted, but it was all wrong for this mission. On the other hand, the trousers and sneakers she wore now saidI look this good without trying, and that was important to her ego, because whenshe’dbeen a gawky teenager,he’dbeen a handsome, brooding medical student with great hair.

“I like that sweater,” her mother greeted her, hardly glancing up from the newspaper.

“Thanks! It’s my first time wearing it. You think it goes with hunter green pants?”

“Yeah, I do,” Dr. Wilder said, looking again. She was a pretty woman, slim and on the taller side of average. Her shoulder-length brown bob was always perfect, and she had an unflappable, scholarly air about her that people seemed to find either soothing or intimidating. She was a snappy dresser herself, in an understated way, so her opinion counted.

Clara glanced at the microwave clock and did some mental math. “Do I have time to make an iced coffee?”

“Definitely.”

They kept a carafe of strong brew in the refrigerator for the purpose. She filled a rose gold Stanley camp mug with ice, saying loudly over the noise of the ice dispenser, “I’m kind of surprised he wanted a ride.”

Dr. Wilder was turning a page of the newspaper. “He didn’t,” she admitted. “I had to insist.”

That made more sense. Jesse had never liked to be beholden—an understandable sentiment in a foster child.

On a whim, Clara chose a black mug for her passenger. She filled both with coffee and added simple syrup, half-and-half, and a drop of vanilla.

“All right, see ya,” she said to her mother, shaking both mugs to mix them.

Her mother lowered the paper and looked at her for a moment.

Clara did a 360-degree turn to show off the high-waisted, wide-leg trousers that she’d paired with a little crop top and an oversized cardigan.

A smile tugged at Dr. Wilder’s mouth. “Drive safely,” she merely said, and returned to her reading.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Outside, the Colonel’s shiny blue truck waited, the attached flatbed trailer behind it a not-so-subtle reminder that she hadvolunteered to pick up a month’s supply of alfalfa from a farm near Marfa and her father was trusting her with the mission.

She’d also be fetching Dr. Jesse Flores, her mother’s protégé, from the small municipal airfield.

Two birds, one polished little stone.

She climbed into the high cab, where she waited for the seat to adjust itself to her inferior height and weight. Her phone connected automatically and soon her driving playlist came over the sound system.

Jesse had been her parents’ first foster, and for Clara it had been love at first sight; he’d lived with them from the time she was nine until he left for college when she was twelve, and in those three years her crush on him had not wavered. She had been beneath his notice, of course, but like Don Quixote, happy to worship from afar.

After he moved out she saw him very occasionally, mostly on holidays and at graduations, but he had fallen completely out of touch in recent years. Her parents were oddly uncommunicative on the subject.

Warring emotions, she decided, was the term for her current inner turmoil. It was hard to believe that six years had gone by since she had seen him, and at the same time it felt much longer; she was curious to see how he had changed, and certain that he was the same as ever; she was embarrassed to recall her past infatuation and yet brazenly anticipating looking him in the eye.

The prospect of Jesse Flores in his thirties thrilled her for reasons she could not quite verbalize.

The forty-five-minute drive from the airport today would be the most time they had ever spent alone together and she was not sure what to expect. Would they make polite chitchat? Sit in sullen silence? She had never been very good at silences, but Jesse had not been a promiscuous talker. She didn’t think they’d ever really had a conversation beyond a dust-up involving hisprecious comic books, when he told her nine-year-old self that she wasentitledandlacked boundaries.

She laughed ruefully at the memory as she merged onto the interstate; rather than being devastated by the criticism, she had basked in his undivided attention and found his absurdly disproportionate wrath adorable. Had it deterred her from entering his room without permission? Not at all.

It was just possible that she had been a total brat.

At the airport, she parked at the curb and went inside to wait. She was immediately hailed by the man behind the counter, and waved a careless hand at him.

But he called to her again, adding, “Long time no see! How’s your brother Hart doing?”

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