“Nice. I hope that works out for you,” Jo said. She stayed a short time longer, catching up on whatever details of recent events they hadn’t already shared online, and then got up to leave. “It’s been great seeing you again, Sal. I’ll stop by again when I’ve made the pickup.”
“Great. Let me just go get the packages for you. I won’t be a minute,” Sal said with a smile before disappearing off to the back of the house somewhere.
As she waited, Jo saw a flicker in the window and glanced out front; Sal’s husband was just pulling in front of the house, to judge by his car. She recognized it from previous visits; it was a massive thing, as most cars were, almost as wide as it was long. It was nearly silent as the wheels angled to allow an almost 90-degree turn in place, while Sal’s husband David roused himself from a nap on the front bench seat.
She watched as he got out of the car, retrieving his things, and was startled as she finally got a good look at his face; it was the same David, but it almost looked like he’d aged a decade since she saw him last only a few months ago. Stress was etched in every movement of his body. It was no wonder he’d napped, she thought.
They exchanged smiles and nods as he entered. His effort to banish the stress was valiant but unsuccessful. “Jo,” he acknowledged.
“David, hi,” she responded. “Sal’s just in the back.”
“Thanks. It’s good to see you again,” he said. “Honey, I’m home!” he called, and vanished upstairs.
“Okay,” she heard from further in the house, shortly before Sal reappeared with two brown-wrapped packages sealed with shipping tape. They were roughly the dimensions of shipping envelopes used to send documents, something Jo had very rarely seen, but these were thicker, probably boxes rather than envelopes. Each had a shipping label affixed to it. She’d undoubtedly planned to schedule an automated pickup, but Jo could drop it off cheaper; that was the basic premise of most of her courier work.