Authors: Luanne Rice
“Yes.”
“Nice,” Willis said, nodding. “It’s nice when a family can be together. That’s the way it should be.” He paused, cleared his throat. “Boy, you sure make it easy to talk. This isn’t the kind of thing you tell someone you’ve just met, but you want to know the biggest change I made after my heart attack?”
Nora wasn’t sure exactly how, but she knew what he was about to say. “You got divorced,” she said.
“But how did you guess? That’s what happened!” Willis exclaimed. “This is amazing, you and me being on the same wavelength like that.”
“I guess you seem like the married type,” Nora said. “I know the difference. I don’t know why … I guess I meet a lot of people here. Some are the married type, some aren’t. So I took you for married, and then I didn’t see a wedding ring.”
“I wore one for sixteen years,” Willis said. “And the first thing I thought after they took the tubes out of my nose was, I’m not happy. Not a bit happy, and lying there in the hospital, I had plenty of opportunity to figure out why. And so I got a divorce. How long’d you wear yours?”
“My what?” Nora asked.
“Your wedding band.”
“I’ve never been married,” Nora said.
“That surprises me,” Willis said. “That really surprises me.”
Suddenly the silence turned awkward. Nora remembered that her mother was going to Providence that night to meet her father. “I have to get back to work,” she said.
“I figured. You sure you can’t get your sister to fill in for you and join me for dinner instead?”
Of all the nights for this to happen, Nora thought. She meets a man she likes, and her mother has the night off. Bonnie hardly ever worked at night, because of her kids. Nora didn’t exactly blame her, but it was moments like this that she felt different from her sisters. Cass and Bonnie were wives and mothers, and Nora was not—simple as that.
“I can’t,” Nora said. “It just won’t work out tonight. Maybe …” She wanted to ask him if he was free tomorrow night; that would give her time to work things out.
“That’s a rotten shame,” Willis said. “I was really hoping. I knew I should’ve asked you last night for dinner tonight, but the way you looked, I didn’t think you’d give me the time of day.”
“There’s always tomorrow,” Nora said in her torch-song lyric voice.
“Tomorrow I fly home to Savannah,” Willis said.
Nora felt her heartbeat flatten out. Her breath came steady once again. Things were back to normal. Even her eyes, which hadn’t left Willis’s face, went back to work. They began to scan the room for regular customers, for deadbeats, for drunks, for sailors. Nora wanted a cigarette.
“Would you like a table anyway?” Nora asked. “We’re booked, but I could squeeze you in.”
“Nah. If I have to eat alone, I’m going back to the hotel. I’ll call room service. I’ve got my lemon. They never serve lemons with room service,” he said, squeezing his lemon. “I come back on business from time to time. Maybe we could have dinner then.”
“That would be fine,” Nora said.
“Don’t you smoke,” Willis said. “I mean it. You’ve gone fifteen minutes without one, and you know you don’t need it.”
“I’ll try,” Nora said.
They said goodbye, and she started to shoulder her way through the crowd. Someone had plugged elevator music into the tape deck. Probably that sap in the kitchen, the oyster shucker her mother had hired. Nora’s hand slid into her pocket and closed around a cigarette.
“Hey, pretty Nora,” Al Sweet said as she passed by.
Her spine stiffened as she remembered their last time, facedown on his bed, his weight on her back, his voice insistent and deliberately little-boyish, begging her to let him try it a new way, a slash of pain, Nora’s quick scream. She hurried her pace, jostling a crowd of college kids. Maybe her mother hadn’t left yet. Maybe if Nora explained about Willis, her mother would stay.
“Where’s Mother?” Nora said to Bonnie. Bonnie, with a pile of menus and a wine list in her hand, was leading a group of six into the dining room.
“On her way home.”
“Can you work tonight?” Nora asked right in front of the party of six. “Can you take over for me?”
Bonnie shook her head. “I can’t. Sean is putting together his science project tonight, and I’ve got to be there.”
Nora stood still, slightly disoriented. “What’s his project? I’m a science teacher,” she heard one of the customers ask Bonnie. “A papier-mâché ocean basin,” Bonnie explained, leading them to their table. “Seamounts, guyots, and the continental shelf.”
Standing at the reservations desk, Nora raised the cigarette to her lips. She flicked her lighter and stared at the flame for a few seconds. Glancing at the barroom door, she half expected to see Willis watching her with reproach. She lit the cigarette, took a long drag. She held it between her long fingers, and she stood perfectly still, gazing at her hand for one minute, until Joe Kenneally, Bonnie’s father-in-law, came forward to ask if his table was ready.
J
osie’s sister, Belinda, and her cousin Emma Kenneally wanted her to climb out onto the roof with them, but Josie didn’t want to. She stood in Belinda’s bedroom, turning the Snoopy lamp off and on. Belinda reached through the open window for her. Belinda’s fingers wiggled, and Josie gave her a low-five, laughing.
Belinda was trying to talk her into it, but Josie kept her head down so she wouldn’t hear her.
“It’s high up,” Josie said, even though it was only the second story. She remembered once she had followed Belinda to the top of Granddad’s pine tree. She hated when Belinda dared her to do something scary, because Josie didn’t like to disappoint her. She acted very busy, frowning at the Snoopy lamp as if it were broken and her frown could fix it. She held it steady with both hands. After a while Belinda got the message, and her face disappeared from the window.
Belinda was babysitting for Josie while Cass went grocery shopping. Darcy, Josie’s regular daytime babysitter, never came anymore, because she had to take care of her old mother. Darcy’s mother had been in a nursing home, but she wasn’t happy there. Josie’s own mother had explained this to her. Josie didn’t understand what was so hard about taking care of your mother. But she felt very embarrassed to imagine Darcy’s mother, whom she had met once, in a
nursing
home, sucking on a plastic bottle or someone’s bosom. Darcy’s mother had gray hair and smoked cigarettes, and Josie would have said she was much too old to be nursing.
Belinda had her own telephone. It was made of clear plastic, and when it rang or you called someone, all the bells and wires inside would light up. Some were hot pink, some were bright blue, like the lights on the police car that had come the time Josie had run into the street.
Josie poked her head out the window to see what her sister and cousin were doing. They had forgotten about her; they were putting dark red polish on their fingernails. It smelled evil and poisonous. Josie pulled her head inside.
She lifted the telephone receiver and dialed some numbers. She waited for a long time. She wondered what it would be like to talk on the telephone. Her mother had told her in case of emergency to dial 911 and start saying her name and address over and over, even if she couldn’t hear the other person, until someone came to help.
Having the receiver against her ear reminded Josie of hearing tests. Those headphones were always hard and cool, just like this phone. Nothing like the earphones on Belinda’s Walkman, which were too small to completely cover her ears. The scratchy black fabric on them made Josie’s ears itch.
Sometimes Belinda let Josie try her Walkman, and even though no music came through, Josie wanted one of her own, to wear to school when she was old enough. Speaking into the phone, she pretended she was calling the Walkman place. “I want a red one with blue earphones. I hate black, don’t you? I don’t want the scratchy kind. The smooth kind. Okay? Okay. We have to wear them to school. Don’t forget. Call me back.”
Cass parked her car in front of the Star Market and waited for Billy. She had planned this carefully. She had asked him to call her at home before heading out to the hardware store, so that she could give him a list of things to pick up at the market. He’d called at four, said he was leaving, and she’d asked him to get milk and bread. Then she had immediately jumped into her car to intercept him.
But now it was four-thirty, there was no sign of Billy, she had grocery shopping to do, and she had to head home soon. He had taught her to drive in this exact spot. Back then, the parking-lot
lights were on a timer. They’d switch off at ten. All their friends would meet up here, then fan out to parties, the beach, the highway to Providence. Then, when they were alone, Billy would slide under Cass into the passenger seat and she would climb behind the wheel.
With his arm around her, she would circumnavigate the dark lot. Every night the landmarks changed: a lone grocery cart, a discarded tire, the occasional parked Chevy. Vacant cars seemed mysterious and sexy, hinting of married lovers coming to meet in separate cars and going off together in one of them.
Some nights, when the tar was slick, she would drive in wide circles without braking, rings spiraling smaller as she increased her speed. Holding the wheel hard to the right, she would lean into Billy, her shoulder touching his, and he’d be laughing in her ear.
Then she’d tap the brake, tap it again easy, and pull the car into the darkest corner of the lot. She’d turn off the headlights. Billy would slide down in the seat. Cass would lie half on top of him, her lips kissing his, her back arched forward, leaving just enough room between their bodies to unbuckle his belt while he undid her buttons.
She sat still, watching the entrance where Billy would drive in. She checked her watch: four-forty-five. She thought of Josie, at home alone with Belinda and Emma. A chain of worship: Josie worshipped Belinda, Belinda worshipped Emma, and Emma worshipped herself. By now Emma would have finished teaching Belinda beauty secrets of the universe. In fifteen minutes Emma would ride her bike home, and Belinda would be itching to start her homework. With regret, Cass realized she had just enough time to buy the groceries.
Climbing out of the Volvo, she spied Billy driving in. Since he hadn’t known she had been planning to seduce him, she couldn’t justify the anger she felt at his being late.
“Groceries?” he asked, kissing her.
“Yes,” she said.
He caught her tone. “What?” he asked. “What did I do?”
Explaining it would sound so stupid: Well, I got Belinda to babysit so I could fuck your brains out …
“You followed me here, didn’t you?” he asked, grabbing her bottom.
“Yes, let’s have sex right …” She kicked away a piece of glass. “Here. Right on the tar,” she said, as if she were joking.
“Too hot, Cass. You’d melt it.” He mouthed the word
“Later.”
“What do you want for dinner?” Cass asked.
“I’ll come in with you,” Billy said, surprising her. About to head offshore again, he had work to do on the
Norboca.
“Good,” she said. “We’ll get done faster.”
“That anxious? Don’t worry—it’ll keep.” He brushed his crotch with a funny, crass gesture, but Cass didn’t smile. He grimaced, holding his index fingers twelve inches apart.
“Great timing,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
She shook her head, starting to walk toward the Star Market.
“Knock off the silent treatment, okay?”
“Let’s just say I had plans,” Cass said. “You, me …” She glanced at his crotch. “You.”
“Oh, yeah? So what happened?” Billy asked, smiling.
“The time clock,” Cass said. “I have to get home. Belinda has homework to do, and Josie can’t stand being by herself.”
“Let Josie handle it for once. It’s good for her.”
“You’re full of shit,” Cass said. They walked together into the store. As a father, Billy was entitled to his theories. The problem was, he was hardly ever around to try them out. All the lust Cass had been feeling ebbed away.
“What would happen?” Billy asked. “What would be the big deal if Belinda ignored her?”
“Screaming fit,” Cass said, easing into the numb zone she inhabited when Billy didn’t grasp one of the most rudimentary facts of her daily existence.
While Cass pushed the cart, Billy threw things in. He knew what everyone liked as well as she did. He pawed through a bin of oranges, choosing six with the right color.
“These come from Florida, right?” he asked, reading the box.
“I guess so.”
“It says right here: ‘Packed in Orlando, Florida.’”
“That’s that,” Cass said, still distant. Her eyes roved the fruits and vegetables while her mind composed balanced meals for a family of five.
“I always think of coral snakes when I buy oranges,” Billy said. “Here’s this box straight from Florida. Probably packed at the groves and shipped straight to the airport. What’s to prevent a coral snake from slithering into the box while the worker’s not looking?”
“What a horrible idea,” Cass said, leaning forward to look into the box. “Could that happen?”
“Why not? When I fill a box with cod it doesn’t guarantee that a crab won’t crawl in.”
“Aren’t coral snakes poisonous?”
“The most poisonous, I’d say,” Billy replied. Cass moved the cart forward.
“Well, think of something else crawling in. Something harmless. Some nonlethal southern reptile.”
“I was thinking danger, baby. Where were you planning to seduce me, anyway?”
Cass ignored him. She knew Billy thought he was being cute, but she wasn’t ready to give in.
“Your father told George Magnano he’s thinking of retiring to Florida,” Billy said.
“Oh, were you talking to George about his boat again?” Cass asked.
“Feeling him out.”
“I don’t know,” Cass said. “I don’t see you on a Gulf shrimper.”
“A chump boat, right?” Billy said. “Better suited for John Barnard.”
Cass reached for the Pop-Tarts. Her husband was flirting, teasing her about John. They cruised into the frozen-food aisle. Billy touched the small of her back. She felt him getting to her.
“They must keep these freezers at twenty degrees,” Cass said. During the winter she never registered temperature at the grocery store. She would be bundled in a scarf, hat, and parka, so the chill never got to her. But shopping during the summer, in a jean skirt
without tights and a sleeveless shirt without a sweater, she’d be shivering halfway down this aisle. Her nipples were standing straight out under the thin cotton. She wanted Billy’s hands on her breasts, she wanted to run her tongue down the long red ridge of his penis.