The Puzzle Master by Heather Spiva Page B

the crowd.
    “So Iris was sick?” Marshall didn’t want to look at Luke. He didn’t know if Iris even wanted Luke to know that he knew. The comment sort of slipped out.
    “Oh, she told you? She hasn’t told anyone other than me, here in town.” He finished his cigarette, and a little girl bought a set of old coloring books. Marshall wanted to get back to Iris, to tell her he was here, but he had to know something else.
    “Guess she trusts you,” Luke finished.
    “I was just wondering,” Marshall said slowly, “Is she … um … is she really over it?” His heart was pounding hard, as if it was going to burst from his chest. He wasn’t sure he even wanted to know the answer to that. He just wanted reassurance—to know that his friend was better.
    His voice was raspy, and he could feel his chest restricting. Probably just the smoke affecting him, even though it hadn’t done that before. But he felt his pocket anyway, fingering the device through his shorts.
    “She’s fine as much as I can tell.” Luke ran a hand through his brownish-gray, shaggy hair and crossed his arms. “Her aunt is in a nursing home, and can’t talk so well, so I’ve been communicating some with her doctor. Iris seems to be cancer-free, but she goes in for a checkup next week.”
    Marshall put a hand in his pocket. The cool plastic and metal felt good in the palm of his hand. It felt comfortable. He could breathe. Everything was going to be fine. “The doctor’s visit, is that a bad thing?”
    “No, just routine. She had her last bone marrow treatment six months ago. They just want to make sure the cancer is still gone.” Someone bought another set of two bikes.
    Marshall suddenly had to get back to the room. Iris would wonder where he was. They had to get the puzzle done. Marshall watched more people walk through the door and thought again about the bikes that people were buying left and right. Marshall began walking away and said, “I’ll be in the back.”
    Iris was on the floor on her elbows, putting together the perimeter of the thousand-piece puzzle.
    “Hey,” he said with a smile. “What are you doing? And without me?”
    She looked up at him. Her hair bobbed around, framing her face like a picture; a picture of perfection. “This is all for practice right?”
    Marshall nodded and sat down next to her. The puzzle was the picture of two black stallions galloping along a green pasture. Their manes were flying from the speed, and the black on black made for one heck of a puzzle to put together. “You already got almost the whole perimeter,” Marshall observed.
    “Uh huh, and look,” Iris pointed to behind them at a different corner of the wall. “I did the other five hundred piece one.”
    Marshall opened his eyes wide. “You did?” He got up and looked at it. It was a scene of four kittens sitting in a basket, grey, white black and orange, all looking furry and sweet. Not his type of picture, but definitely Iris’ type.
    “You were supposed to wait for me, you know,” he said, even though he wasn’t in the least bit angry. “We were supposed to do them together.”
    “Well, I was here early with the sale and needed something to do.”
    “So you started this one today?” he asked, turning toward her with one eye squinted.
    “This morning, actually.”
    “That’s fast for a beginner.”
    She smiled. “I learn from the best.”
    They spent the next two hours filling in almost half of the stallion picture. But after a while, all the colors looked the same, and they couldn’t tell which ones went which way, or were upside down, or were right side up. They decided to take a break.
    Iris took two orange sodas out of the mini fridge. She popped them open and peeked out into the room. The store was closing, but a few stragglers were still there looking in bins, overturning boxes, asking questions.
    “Think your uncle wishes they would just go home?” Marshall asked after gulping down most of his drink. He’d