a motor about twice the size of a lawn mower's, and a long thick hose that
looked exactly like the cream-colored ones Celia had seen stacked neatly on the
backs of fire trucks. Only, Jack and Celia's hose wasn't stacked neatly; it had
been tossed onto the motor like a tangled net, and Celia had a pretty good idea
why.
"Jack, when was the last time you checked this?"
He shrugged. "I don't know. I guess it's been a while. I'll take care of it."
"I can help," Celia said cheerfully. She really didn't mind. She knew she needed
a certain amount of physical activity, especially on weekends. It was such a
welcome escape from the emotional demands of the workweek. Yesterday, for
instance, when Jack went into his insurance agency to catch up on some claims,
she hiked up Mount Bentman— a good five-hour effort— and later today, when it
cooled off a bit, she might hit the trails near their house.
But now they had to deal with the hose. She and Jack hauled all of it out of the
housing, then carefully laid it back in place.
As she bent over to check the gas can, she heard Jack lift up the cover of the
tank and swear.
"Come over here and get a load of this."
He pointed to more than a dozen dead rats floating on the surface of the water,
which had receded a good six or seven feet.
"God, that's disgusting. They're huge. I've never seen rats that big."
"They're just bloated from the water. You would be too if you'd been down there
that long."
"That's a horrible thought."
"What's that?"
"Being stuck down there. How long do you think they've been there?"
"Who knows?" Jack stared at the rotting rats. "I guess they drowned."
"That's a safe assumption." She laughed and squeezed her husband's shoulder
affectionately before looking back into the tank. "There sure has been a lot of
evaporation. The water level has gone way down."
"My guess is the drought forced them to try and get something to drink, but once
they fell in they couldn't get out." He nodded at the slick black plastic walls.
"Now, Christ, I guess we've got to do it for them."
"How about a shovel? We could scoop them out." She thought it might work but
Jack threw her a skeptical look.
"What about a crab net? Do we have one of those?" Celia knew that would be
perfect. She had used one as a little girl to catch crabs all along the docks of
her hometown. They were crafty little red-and-yellow creatures with dark beady
eyes that stared up at you through the oil-streaked water. They had quick stubby
legs and could scramble under the pilings so fast that if you didn't scoop them
up on the first pass, they disappeared.
Even so, she'd caught quite a few of them and dumped their struggling bodies
into a bucket. Sometimes they hung on to the net as if they were holding on for
dear life, and she'd had to take a rock or a stick and beat them till they let
go. As the pail started to fill, they'd fight and tear off one another's legs.
That would really get to her, the way they'd hold up their pincers as if they
were showing off their bloody prize. Then they'd start fighting all over again—
when there was fresh meat to steal.
"A crab net? Sure, Cel, it's right over there by the shrimp boat." Jack laughed
with good humor, much as his wife had moments ago.
"Okay, okay, but we've got to get them out or they might get sucked up into the
line." She nodded at the black intake line running down the far side of the
tank.
"No, they won't." He rubbed drops of perspiration off his upper lip. "There's a
wire cage over the end of that thing."
"Still ..." Her voice faltered as she placed her hands on her hips. With short
brown hair and pretty features, Celia could have been the girl next door, if
there had been a next door.
"Yes, I know," he sighed.
"I've got it!" She clapped her hands once, startling Jack. "We can fill up the
tank, and then we can drag them out with the rake and shovel."
"Yeah, that ought to do it," he agreed without much enthusiasm.
They linked together two fifty-foot lengths of green garden hose and turned on
the faucet. Celia could hear faint splashing sounds as they went inside to get a
drink.
Their house was attractive— single-level cedar— and had three bedrooms, the
smallest of which she used as her studio. Her favorite haunt for just hanging
out was the living room. It had a cathedral ceiling with massive beams and a
blue-enameled woodstove. The color matched the tile in the adjoining kitchen,
which easily accommodated a full-sized antique oak table and chairs. Jack
propped himself on one of them and yawned as Celia rooted in the refrigerator.
"Would you grab me a beer?" He sat down.
"Sure."
She handed him a tall-necked bottle and poured herself some mineral water, which
she doused with a splash of cranberry juice. The dark liquid blossomed into a
pink cloud as it drifted to the bottom of the glass.
Celia took a deep, satisfying drink, and almost spilled the bubbly concoction on
her cotton top. She quickly wiped away a dribble running down her chin, and
tried mightily to put aside any thoughts of the rats because more than anything
she wanted to make love. She'd been thinking about it all weekend. She was
pretty sure she was ovulating, and if they were ever going to have children
they'd have to make the most of these moments.
"How long do you think we should let those hoses go?"
"I think an hour ought to do it." Jack sipped his beer and looked dreamily out
the window.
Celia sat down and slid her hand across the table and toyed with his wedding
band. "That ought to be enough time, don't you think?"
She imagined his warm damp lips on her neck and ears and felt the first flush of
arousal. It was true Jack had put on some weight over the years, but his blond
hair remained rich and full and his smile still unsettled her in a pleasing way.
Besides, she wanted to be held and hugged, and she wanted the rougher edges too.
He glanced at her. "What do you mean?"
She wondered why he was proving so difficult, but carried on despite her
misgivings.
"I got a special-mail order, and I thought you might like to open the package
and see what's inside."
He looked around the room, as though he might find a parcel suddenly appearing
amid their well-ordered surroundings.
"Where is it?"
She took a deep breath and stood up.
"It's right under here." She lifted her top just high enough to give him a
glimpse of the pink lace. "And here." Her hands slipped inside the waistband of
her shorts and slid them down slowly, seductively, until the sheer front panel
of her panties appeared, bold and revealing in the sunlight. "From your favorite
catalog, Victoria's Secret."
Jack groaned, and her heart sank.
"I'm sorry, Cel, but Victoria's going to have to keep her secrets to herself
today. I'm too hot and tired to move."
She sat back down and stared at her glass. When she looked up, her inviting
smile was gone.
"Look, we haven't made love in weeks, and once again it's that time of the month
when all systems are on go. If we don't go for it today, we'll probably miss
another month." Her arms crossed her chest, as if she were cold all of a sudden.
"It's always one thing or another with you lately. Do you want kids or don't
you?"
He looked away as he talked. "Yes, I want kids very much, but I don't find
looking at a bunch of rats very romantic—"
"No, I can understand that, but—"
"And I'm hot and tired and it's been nothing but chores all day long. I need a
break."
"Wait a minute, did you just say chores?" This stunned Celia, that making love
to her should fall so casually into such a dreary category. "Thanks a lot."
"That's not—"
"I love being grouped along with scraping paint off the windows and cleaning up
a bunch of dead rats." Her eyebrows, dark brown like her hair, rose and fell
with her words.
Jack shook his head slowly. "I didn't say that. You're twisting it all around."
"No, I'm not. That's exactly what you said."
"Well, it's not what I meant."
She took a long swallow of her watered-down juice and tried to calm down. The
thought of making love had made her nipples flutter to life like two little
birds, but now they embarrassed her with their brazenness. She felt awkward
sitting there as Jack once again stared out the window.
Another moment of uneasiness passed before he stood up and carried his beer into
the living room. She watched him sink into the couch and pick his way through
the remains of the paper. Her skin dampened from the heat of his humbling
indifference and the flood of footlights she now trained on her every imagined
flaw. The bathroom with its cool shower beckoned.
She saw the single-edge razor lying on the vanity, with dried paint curled along
its edge, and stared at it for several seconds. Last weekend they'd painted the
inside trim but hadn't bothered to scrape off the splatters. Jack had said he'd
clean them up.
"Are you through with the window, because—"
"Yeah, I'm done," he shouted back; "you can put it away."
She brushed the shavings into the wastebasket, then noticed a paint drip left on
the window and scraped it off. She dusted the razor once more and placed it in
the cabinet below the sink.
As she stood back up she looked into the full-length mirror on the back of the
door and stepped out of her shorts and top. She unhooked her bra and slipped out
of her panties with far less fanfare than she had anticipated when she put them
on. After laying aside her clothing, she scrutinized herself.
More than Jack's distance came into play here. Last month she had turned
thirty-eight, and even though she considered it entirely unliberated she looked
for the physical signs of decline that usually began to appear on the downhill
side of the fourth decade. The sweaty humiliation that had beaded on her face
and arms minutes ago now cooled, and she looked at herself candidly. She did not
feel too abused by the experience.
Yes, I'm thirty-eight, and yes, I'm not quite what I used to be, but— her eyes
moved up and down her body— things could be worse. A cheerfulness flickered, and
an irrepressible good-naturedness soon smiled at the silliness of standing
there. She thought of how she was approaching the autumn of her life, and
consoled herself by quipping that at least the leaves hadn't started to fall.
She did regard her breasts suspiciously, as if they might let her down if she
placed too much confidence in them. They were small, but hardly absent, and her
nipples— damn them!— were still erect as church spires. She considered herself
fortunate to have been poorly endowed. She hadn't always felt so lucky. As a
teenager she envied the larger cups of her classmates and had noticed the way
the boys eyed them too, but after a period of almost ceaseless breast-building
exercises ("We must, we must ...") she gave up and resigned herself to her
diminutive status.
The braless seventies had been her first real hint that maybe small was indeed
beautiful, and every year since had reinforced this opinion. She wore a bra to
work for the sake of modesty, and she wore more suggestive styles at home for
precisely the opposite reason. Not that it had done much good lately. She
suffered her resentment of Jack briefly, and then her fingers threaded down
through the dark hairs below her pale little belly.
She turned from the mirror to the tub with its promise of simple fulfillment.
The window shade was up, and beyond the tile the tall pines stood. She leaned
over and turned on the faucets for the bath; and now both of her hands were wet
and warm, the one that touched herself and the one that tested the water.
She sat down and scooted close to the delightful pressure that spilled and
puddled and warmed her bottom. She lay back, and as her heels climbed the cool
ceramic wall she inched forward until her open legs welcomed the steady pulse
that poured from the spout. She reached to turn up the hot water just a little
and took a momentary pride in the neat tensioning of her stomach muscles. When
she leaned back they relaxed, and the soothing flow soon warmed her entire body.
2
Filthy streams of sweat poured off of Chet's bare chest and pockmarked the dusty
earth. He'd been digging for going on two hours, but the hole still looked only
about half as deep as he knew it ought to be. The damn drought had leeched out
every last drop of moisture and left the dirt as dry as adobe and as dense as
concrete.
He straightened his aching back, grabbed the pickax, and tried to make himself
work faster. He felt too damn exposed at the moment. Not that he expected any
company out here— only six or seven people had drifted by all summer— but
stranger things had happened and he wanted to finish that hole, finish with her,
and get the hell out of Idaho.
Again he raised the pickax and drove it straight down, crumbling the earth. When
he had broken up enough of it to make it worth his while, he put the shovel to
work.
The kid was no goddamn help at all, just sitting on that stump and not saying a
word. Hadn't said boo since last night, just sitting and stewing and staring.
Chet had a mind to smash her face with the pickax just to get a rise out of him,
but he had a lot of experience with young boys and knew they could be vindictive
as hell. They could also be sweet, very sweet.
"What's the matter, cat still got your tongue?"
He chuckled as he leaned on the shovel, but the boy wouldn't even look at him.