Chapter 16
I waited. Another five, ten minutes went by. The evening grew darker around me, and soon the flood lights clicked on overhead, pushing back the night. A faint breeze lifted the hair from my brow, and every now and then, I heard the distant sound of music drift over me—the band at the high school football field, I guessed, or the radio in a car passing by the mall.
Just when I was about ready to say fuck it and get back in the hearse, a service door opened some twenty yards away from the mall’s entrance. A handful of employees came out, some carrying trash bags they stopped to deposit in the Dumpster. I spotted Derek immediately, chatting with an older coworker—not thatmuch older, maybe in his early twenties, and dog ugly in my opinion. When he said something that made Derek laugh, I balled my hands into fists and glared at them, as if the weight of my stare would make Derek turn to see me, or maybe crush his friend into dust.