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“Oh,” the teenager said, flinging up her hands, backing away

Charlie ran into the closest stall and sloughed the contents of her stomach into the toilet The force was so ripped the side of the boith both hands Shenoises that she would be asha to hear

But someone did hear

“Ma’a worse, because Charlie was not old enough to be called ma’am “Ma’am, are you okay?”

“Yes, thank you”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, thank you You can go away” Charlie bit her lip so that she wouldn’t curse the helpful little creature like a dog She searched for her purse It was outside the stall Her wallet had fallen out, her keys, a pack of gu tile floor like a tail She started to reach out for it, but gave up when her stomach clenched All she could do was sit on the filthy bathrooather her hair up off her neck, and pray that her troubles would be confined to one end of her body

“Ma’airl repeated

Charlie desperately wanted to tell her to get the hell out, but couldn’t risk opening her ing her ears to pick out the sound of the door closing as the girl left

Instead, the faucet was turned on Water ran into the sink Paper toere pulled from the dispenser

Charlie opened her eyes She flushed the toilet Why on earth was she so ill?

It couldn’t be the cake Charlie was lactose intolerant, but Belinda would neverwas 99 percent chee Was it the happy chicken fro roll she’d sneaked out of the fridge before going to bed? The luncheonrun? The breakfast burrito fiesta she’d gotten at Taco Bell on the way to the Y?

Jesus, she ate like a sixteen-year-old boy

The faucet turned off

Charlie should have at least opened the stall door, but a quick survey of the daed her mind Her navy skirt was hiked up Pantyhose ripped There were splatters on her white silk blouse that would likely never come out Worst of all, she had scuffed the toe of her new shoe, a navy high-heel Lenore had helped her pick out for court

“Ma’a a wet paper towel under the stall door

“Thank you,” Charlie ed She pressed the cool towel to the back of her neck and closed her eyes again Was this a sto?

“Ma’airl offered

Charlie alh-ht as well be put to use “There’s soer ale from the machine?”

The girl knelt down on the floor Charlie saw the faes sewn all over it Custo Financial Literacy Top Seller Apparently, she kne to move some cookies

Charlie said, “The bills are in the side”

The girl opened her wallet Charlie’s driver’s license was in the clear plastic part “I thought your last name was Quinn?”

“It is At work That’s my married name”

“How long have you been married?”

“Four and a half years”

“My gran says it takes five years before you hate them”

Charlie could not iine keeping up her end of this under-stall conversation The urge to puke again was tickling at the back of her throat

“Your dad is Rusty Quinn,” the girl said, which meant that she had been in town for more than ten minutes Charlie’s father had a reputation in Pikeville because of the clients he defended—convenience store robbers, drug dealers, murderers and assorted felons How people in town viewed Rusty generally depended on whether or not they or a family member ever needed his services

The girl said, “I heard he helps people”

“He does” Charlie did not like how the words echoed back to Dexter’s reminder that she had turned down hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in the city so that she could work for people who really needed her If there was one guiding ethos in Charlie’s life, it was that she was not going to be like her father

“I bet he’s expensive” The girl asked, “Are you expensive? I mean, when you help people?”

Charlie put her hand to her et her so at her?

“I enjoyed your speech,” the girl said “My mom was killed in a car accident when I was little”

Charlie waited for context, but there was none The girl slid a dollar bill out of Charlie’s wallet and finally, thankfully, left

There was nothing to do in the ensuing silence but see if she could stand Charlie had fortuitously ended up in the handica

pped stall She gripped theShe spat into the toilet a few tiain When she opened the stall door, thewoman in a 120 puke-spotted silk blouse Her dark hair looked wild Her lips had a bluish tint

Charlie lifted her hair, holding it in a ponytail She turned on the sink and slurped water into her ain as she leaned down to spit

Her mother’s eyes looked back at her Her mother’s arched eyebrow

What’s going on in that mind of yours, Charlie?

Charlie had heard this question at least three or four times a week back when herher ho to do some kind of craft project, and her mother would sit opposite her and ask the same question that she always asked

What is going on in your mind?

It was not contrived to be a conversation starter Her mother was a scientist and a scholar She had never been one for idle chitchat She was genuinely curious about what thoughts filled her thirteen-year-old daughter’s head

Until Charlie had enuine interest

The door opened The girl was back with a ginger ale She was pretty, though not conventionally so She did not seem to fit in with her perfectly coifed peers Her dark hair was long and straight, pinned back with a silver clip on one side She was young-looking, probably fifteen, but her face was absent reen Girl Scout T-shirt was tucked into her faded jeans, which Charlie felt was unfair because in her day they had been forced to wear scratchy white button-up shirts and khaki skirts with knee socks

Charlie did not knohich felt worse, that she had thrown up or that she had just employed the phrase, “in her day”

“I’ll put the change in your wallet,” the girl offered