Things We Didn't Say_ A Novel - Kristina Riggle [0]
We Didn’t Say
KRISTINA RIGGLE
Dedication
In memory of Donna Ringstrom, my “bonus mom” and leader of my fan club (Up North division). We miss you.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1 - Casey
Chapter 2 - Michael
Chapter 3 - Casey
Chapter 4 - Michael
Chapter 5 - Casey
Chapter 6 - Michael
Chapter 7 - Casey
Chapter 8 - Jewel
Chapter 9 - Michael
Chapter 10 - Casey
Chapter 11 - Angel
Chapter 12 - Michael
Chapter 13 - Casey
Chapter 14 - Michael
Chapter 15 - Casey
Chapter 16 - Michael
Chapter 17 - Mallory, 1995
Chapter 18 - Michael
Chapter 19 - Casey
Chapter 20 - Michael
Chapter 21 - Dylan
Chapter 22 - Michael
Chapter 23 - Dylan
Chapter 24 - Michael
Chapter 25 - Casey
Chapter 26 - Michael
Chapter 27 - Casey
Chapter 28 - Angel
Chapter 29 - Michael
Chapter 30 - Mallory, 2000
Chapter 31 - Casey
Chapter 32 - Dylan
Chapter 33 - Michael
Chapter 34 - Casey
Chapter 35 - Mallory
Chapter 36 - Michael
Chapter 37 - Casey
Chapter 38 - Dylan
Chapter 39 - Michael
Chapter 40 - Casey
Chapter 41 - Jewel
Chapter 42 - Casey
Chapter 43 - Michael
Chapter 44 - Angel
Chapter 45 - Michael
Chapter 46 - Casey
Chapter 47 - Michael
Chapter 48 - Edna Leigh Casey
AUTHOR INSIGHTS, EXTRAS, & MORE. . .
Discussion Questions
A Conversation with the Author
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Also by the Author
Praise for Kristina Riggle
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter 1
Casey
My cigarette smoke twists through the predawn November air, until a gust breaks it apart. My hair whips across my face, so I turn into the wind, putting my cigarette behind my back to shelter it. The effect is like leaning off the prow of a ship.
The air is heavy with looming winter. Mornings like this, as a kid, I’d curse and groan, shivering at the bus stop in the cracking cold before the sun even came up. Now? I’d take this cold every day of the year if it always came with such exquisite quiet.
My boots crunch along the sidewalk in the gray stillness as I cast a glance back toward the drafty, narrow house where the children still sleep.
I thought one day they might be my children, or something like that. The day I first met them, Angel was doing up little Jewel’s hair in crazy ponytails with pink glitter hair spray, then they moved on to me and wound ribbons into braids all over my head. I looked like a maypole. Dylan, though, reminded me of my family’s half-wild outdoor cat, Patch. You had to earn his attention, and trying too hard was the worst thing to do. Dylan didn’t say much that first day. He started peeking at me from under his dark, floppy bangs. By the time I left, I had earned a quick half-smile granted when no one else was looking.
A square of weak yellow light flicks to life from the second story. Even from a block away I can tell it’s from Angel’s room. I’ve got time; she’ll be in the bathroom for an age, emerging in a puff of sweet-smelling bathroom steam when she imagines herself perfect.
My phone buzzes in the pocket of my parka, and I resume my daily trudge around the block, feeling my last free moments of the day burning down like my cigarette.
“Hi, Tony.”
“Hey, Edna Leigh.”
“I wish you wouldn’t call me that.”
“I’m just joshing with you.”
“I’m not in the mood.”
“Fine, Casey.” Though I’ve been short with him, his voice has a smile in it. I can always count on this, whatever else happens. “Does your husband get to say your real name, or do you make him use your last name, too? Shit, linebackers go by their last names.”
“If your mother had named you after a great-grandparent, you wouldn’t like it, either. How’d you like to be an Otis? Anyway, he calls me Casey, and he’s not my husband.”
“Yet?” he prompts.
“Right. Yet.”
Michael must have already left for the gym to work off his worry about his job. Every day he comes home with more news of cutbacks and layoffs and buyouts.
“When do I get to meet him?”
“Not now.”
“I’m