"What, all four foot of you, Harris?" Bennie spoke in jest but she didn't quite smile. Instead, her hands itched for something to do and cursed her for the recent decision to stop smoking. She sighed into the night and brought her knees to her chest, the bonnet of her truck creaked gently beneath her in complaint. "I haven't been avoiding you, you know, not on purpose." It had made sense at the time, to leave. She no longer had home, nothing left for her in Stamford. Now she wasn't so sure. The days had stretched out in long, contemplative silence. Bennie had often been alone but the farm work she had taken down south had not been the distraction she had longed for. It had been empty. Lonely. Maybe she'd always end up right back where she had been. "I missed you." She dared a short glance at Cleo, even though the knot in her stomach felt like guilt and regret.