The Widows of Wichita County by Jodi Thomas Page B

Afterward she swore sometimes he looked right through her. He worried more about his uncle Shelby’s business than he ever did about her. If the accident hadn’t happened, he probably wouldn’t have noticed she was gone for at least a week or two.
    Randi closed her eyes wishing she could write the kind of sadness that settled in between them into a song. But singers don’t sing about love dying by inches or how it feels when there is nothing to feel anymore. None of the sad country songs she knew could ever make her hurt as badly as watching Jimmy slowly stop caring.
    She hadn’t lost him in an oil fire. She’d lost him a fraction at a time…the day he stopped calling her name when he entered their trailer…the first morning he forgot to kiss her goodbye…the night he rolled away even though he knew she wanted to make love. She hadn’t known how to say goodbye then. She wasn’t sure she knew how to say goodbye now.
    Maybe she should have had a farewell song ready the day she married. Then, every time something cut off a piece of her heart she could have turned up the volume a notch. Eventually, he would have heard it and then her leaving wouldn’t be a surprise.
    The only thing she could think to do now was to stick with the plan she’d come up with less then twenty-four hours ago. She felt like she’d wasted most of her life trying to figure out what to do. She had been leaving him,heading to Nashville to give herself a chance at a dream she’d had all her life. She would just pretend Jimmy was back here waiting for her. That he still cared. It shouldn’t be much of a stretch really, she’d been pretending someone cared about her most of her life. Pretending was easier than believing. Believing could get her hurt, but pretending could go on forever. But now that she had finally decided on a direction, she would cut and run.
    â€œIt’s time to face the champ!” Frankie yelled from the end of the bar as he raised his fist and tapped the set of boxing gloves hanging above his head.
    A young cowhand a few stools down leaned toward Randi. Long past drunk, he smelled of smoke. “What’s he talking about, ma’am?”
    Randi smiled, wondering how many times she’d explained Frankie’s last call. “It’s time to face the champ. When anyone says that to a fighter, you can bet it is your last round for the night.”
    The drunk nodded as if he understood.
    Randi lifted her purse along with his hat off the empty stool between them. “Come on, cowboy. I’ll walk you to your pickup.”
    â€œHow’d you know what I drove?” he said as she turned him toward the door. “Lucky guess.”
    Parking lot of County Memorial Hospital
2:15 a.m.
    â€œCan you drive home, Meredith?” Sheriff Farrington knelt beside the open Mustang door as he helped Meredith Allen into her car.
    She worked summers and holidays at the county clerk’s office just down the hall from his office, but she couldnever remember him using her name. Funny, when you are a schoolteacher in a small town everyone calls you by your last name. First students, then their parents. Even the other teachers in the building referred to one another as Misses or Misters. Slowly, the town knows you that way.
    Meredith knew what people thought of her. When she had been in school, she had been a “good girl,” the type boys remembered to open doors for. She figured she would grow into middle age and become a “fine woman.” Then her hair would turn from auburn to light blue and she would take her place up front in church with all the other widows and become “a sweet old dear.”
    Only now she was already a widow, and not one hair of her curly mass had turned gray. Something had gone wrong with the order of things.
    â€œI’ll be fine, Sheriff. Thanks for sitting with me.” She took a long breath and leaned back against