Page 28 of Night Shift

“Where is Calliope?” I ask.

Petra stops.

Slowly, she turns toward me.

“Where’s my Dawn?”

“The sun rose.”

“Forty-three minutes late.”

“Yes.”

Her eyes widen. “You admit it?”

“I was there.”

“Oh, I know you were there. That’s why I’m here.”

She braces both hands on the nearest table and attempts to stretch one leg behind her. Something inside her hip makes a grinding sound that concerns me.

“Are you injured?”

“I am a rock monster in my sixties who requires regular stretching so I don’t become part of the municipal infrastructure. What do you think?”

“I was not aware your condition was so precarious.”

“My condition was perfectly fine until somebody decided morning was optional.”

“I apologize.”

“You should.”

Petra straightens with visible effort and rolls one shoulder. The resulting noise resembles stones tumbling inside a cement mixer.

“I had sunrise yoga at six-thirty. Sunrise. It’s right there in the name. We had seventeen people standing by the bay in the dark waiting for the sun to come up, and by the time it finally did, Mrs. Garcia had tied herself into something she called reverse pigeon and I’d lost feeling in my left butt cheek.”

I am uncertain how to respond.

Petra points at me. “Do you know what forty-three extra minutes of darkness does to a woman with sedimentary hips?”

“I do not.”

“Neither did I until this morning, but apparently my left hamstring becomes load-bearing.”

I look at her leg.

“Should you seek medical attention?”

“THAT IS NOT THE POINT.”

Her voice rattles several cups behind the counter.

I fold my hands behind my back. “What is the point?”

“The point is that the sun comes up when it’s supposed to. People plan around these things. Birds plan around these things. I plan around these things. You can’t just move sunrise because you’re having a moment.”

“It was forty-three minutes.”