Little Pretty Things Read Online Free

paint on their shutters touched up. The house was dark, but Lu’s husband had left the porch light on for her.
    “Goodnight,” I said. “See you bright and early.”
    She hesitated with her hand on the door. I could already feel how Maddy’s visit had changed how Lu thought of me. Lu and I had worked together for a few years now, and we were friends. Really friends—what Maddy had wanted from me. Lu was older than I was by about ten years, and she had a husband who remembered to leave on the porch light. We didn’t have a lot in common, but we could talk for hours about what we watched on TV or how we were so glad we didn’t live at the Mid-Night the way Billy did. About her three rowdy kids and how coming to work was like a vacation from all their noise. About her parents, back in Mexico, who she missed, or her mother-in-law, who she wished would get her own place. About how she might get her real-estate license someday. About the life she was working toward.
    It’s not like I hadn’t ever told her anything about me. I’d told her plenty.
    But now we’d both had a look at Maddy Bell and at the world outside our reach. Her real-estate license must have seemed so small, so far away.
    “Yeah,” she said, finally opening the door. “See you.”

    I stopped for gas, counting out the few bills I had on me beforehand. The numbers on the pump turned fast. Inside, I leaned against the counter and chatted with Dickie Buggit, the attendant. We’d gone to Midway High together. Sometimes I had to remind myself that I’d gone out with Dickie Buggit once—oh my God, why? But then there were a lot of guys in town like Dickie and not a lot of guys not like Dickie. Out of all the guys I’d gone out with, gone home with—hardly any—Dickie was the only one I could still be friends with. And by friends, I meant buy gas from. I counted out my change, considered a lottery ticket.
    The door chimed.
    “Aw, hell,” Dickie said under his breath. He reached for the phone, running his finger down a list of numbers taped to the wall.
    A woman bundled in two sweaters, a scarf, and house slippers stood blinking in the bright light of the station. Teeny, as everyone called her, walked the streets of Midway as the town ghost—alive, but barely there. For a short, slight wisp of a woman, tiny indeed, she had a large presence, showing up in unlikely places, uninvited and unwanted, mumbling some phrase or another to herself on repeat. She came out to the Mid-Night a lot, but there wasn’t much to steal there.
    Dickie talked in low tones into the phone. I went to an end-cap to take a look at the audio-book selection: westerns and thrillers marked down, and a few get-rich schemes at full price. I watched Teeny shopping the aisles. She liked color. A handful of gumballs went into her cardigan pocket. She considered and put back a pack of gummy bears.
    By the time she made the round trip through the store, her sweater pocket bulged with a stash of bright, round candies.
    Dickie hung up and leaned over the counter. “Come on, Teeny,” he said. “If you’re going to steal, at least be sneaky about it.”
    She didn’t seem to hear him.
    “How much are those?” I said. “The candies.”
    “Five cents apiece, for crying out loud,” Dickie said. “Cheapest thing in the store.”
    The cheapest thing could still be too much. “You called the cops on her?”
    “Nah, that place she lives,” he said. “She gets loose, they come pick her up. She’s going to get hit on the street one of these days.”
    He made her sound like someone’s loose mongrel dog. I glared at him. “Let me pay for some of those.” I turned out my pockets, letting whatever change I had fall on the counter.
    Dickie shrugged, rang me up.
    Teeny was making for the door. I followed her out into the parking lot, looking around for the car or van coming for her. “Hey, Teeny,” I said. “Let’s wait for your ride, OK?”
    She ignored me, shuffling past my car, the