I said that would be fine.
Leo and I stood on the narrow band of grass between the footpath and the Willahock. The river was calm; the afternoon was bright. Leo wore one of his Armani suits with a black tie. I wore khakis and my blue blazer and a floral tie I’d gone looking for that morning in a resale shop.
“Do you want to say anything?” I asked him.
He shook his head.
I opened the box he’d brought back from Michigan, took out the canister, and unscrewed the flat lid. I leaned over the river and let the strange gray mix of dust and chips fall until nothing more came out. Then I bent to the water and held the canister under, so that the river could take all of her.
We spoke silently then, each of us alone, to the river and to the past, until she was gone. Then we turned and walked up the hill, to where Amanda was standing.
Jack Fredrickson
Jack Fredrickson's first Dek Elstrom mystery, A Safe Place for Dying, was nominated for the Shamus Award for Best First Novel. His short fiction has appeared in the acclaimed Chicago Blues and in Michael Connelly's Burden of the Badge anthologies. He lives with his wife, Susan, west of Chicago, where he is crafting the next Dek Elstrom novel.
