Page 11 of Burned in Stone
“You’re up early today, dear.”
I open my eyes to find Mrs. Yu shuffling toward the bank of washers, a small wicker basket balanced on her arm. She’s got to be pushing eighty, with steel-gray hair that’s always pinned in a neat bun and eyes that miss absolutely nothing. In the nine months I’ve been living upstairs, she’s become something between a landlord and a grandmother—the kind of woman who brings you soup when you’re sick and notices when you come home crying.
“Couldn’t sleep,” I admit. I get up and transfer my wet clothes to the dryer. The mundane action steadies my nerves.
“Me neither. Heard you come in late last night.” She turns her eyes my way and smiles. “Or should I say, early this morning.”
“I hope we didn’t wake you. I know the stairs can be loud.”
Mrs. Yu settles onto the plastic chair she keeps by the folding station. “Oh, honey, when you get to be my age, you don’t sleep much, anyway. Besides, it wasn’t the stairs making all the noise.”
My hands still on the jeans I’m shaking out. “What do you mean?”
“That motorcycle.” She gives me a knowing look as she begins sorting. “Quite the machine. And quite the man riding it, from what I could see from my window.”
Heat creeps up my neck. Of course she saw. Mrs. Yu’s apartment is in the front of the building, her bedroom window has a perfect view of the street. She watched the whole thing.
“He’s just a friend,” I say, the lie tasting bitter on my tongue.
“Mmm-hmm.” She pulls out a faded floral dress and begins folding it with the kind of perfection that comes from decades of practice. “Friends don’t usually do that finger under the chin move. I’m pretty sure I saw him sticking his thumb in your mouth too.”
“Mrs. Yu!” I tease, smiling now. “You have a dirty mind.”
“I’m just reporting what I saw.”
“He didn’t put his thumb in my mouth.” I busy myself with counting quarters for the dryer, grateful for something to do with my hands. “He just…brushed it over my bottom lip a little.”
Mrs. Yu just hums, a low, knowing sound. “Sometimes, that’s more intimate.”
My cheeks flame.
“And that mark on your neck? Did his thumb brush there, too?”
“Oh my god.” My hand flies to my throat, covering the spot as my face gets even hotter. “It’s nothing. And you are too much.”
She chuckles. “Oh, I was young once, dear. I remember that kind of fire. Back when Mr. Yu and I first got married—God rest his soul.” Her smile softens, her gaze going distant for a moment.
I shove the last of my load into the dryer and slam the door. The clang rings through the quiet. When I turn back, the twinkle in Mrs. Yu’s eyes has faded, replaced by a sharp concern that makes my stomach clench. Her hands still over the dishtowel.
“This biker,” she says, her voice losing its earlier lilt. “Does he know what you ran from?”
The heat in my cheeks vanishes, replaced by icy dread that prickles my skin. I stare at her, throat closing, the easy banter of moments ago dissolving into thick, suffocating silence.
“Does he know about your husband, Mercy?” she presses gently, her eyes full of pity I can’t stand.
Mrs. Yu is the only person in Stoneheart who knows the truth about why I’m here, about what I’m running from. She found me crying in this very laundry room six months ago, right after one ofhislawyers tracked down my new number.
Mrs. Rogers? This is Elias Webb from Webb, Kline & Associates. I’m calling on behalf of your husband?—
I’d hung up before he could finish, but the damage was done. The peace I’d built here cracked wide open. I sobbed until Mrs. Yu appeared with a cup of tea and infinite patience. Somehow, she coaxed the whole ugly story out of me—the marriage that started with charm and ended with control, the isolation, the way he stripped away every piece of my independence.
The night I finally found the courage to leave, taking nothing but the clothes on my back and what little cash I could gather.
“Gabriel.” The name scrapes out of me, tasting like ash. “No. Cash doesn’t know.” I meet her eyes. “And I intend to keep it that way.”
Mrs. Yu is quiet for a long moment, the only sound the whoosh and tumble of machines around us. When she speaks again, her voice carries the wisdom of a life spent watching people make hard choices.
“Are you sure that’s fair to him?”
