All qualities that Zack presently had in short supply. He was filled with self-loathing just then. There was something about the view—something about the majesty of the sky, settling its blue and gold mantle over the majesty of the capitol—that made him feel small and mean and coldly vengeful.
What right had he to go charging into innocent
li
ves and upending them? As near as he could tell, Wendy Hodene was a woman of character. All anyone had to do was look at her face: she looked you straight in the eye, she had a warm, ready smile, and she treated everyone with the same courtesy. That was all Zack needed to know about anyone, man or woman, to judge that person's worth. She had worth.
And her son.
Tyler
. He seemed to be a likable enough kid, always with his nose in a book. Did he really need to know that his father was a bigamist and that he himself was a bastard? How did you recover from something like that? Some kids weren't very resilient. Look at Zina after their parents died; she had refused to come out of her shell for a year. Twenty-six years later, she still wasn't all the way right.
It all came down to this: Zina loved Jimmy Hayward, but Jim Hodene was never going to love her back. The only way out of the impasse was to find Zina someone else to love, and if the someone else happened to be cats and dogs, then so be it. Love was love.
Ah, but why Wendy, why do this to
her
? Zack pictured her on her way to work, doing laundry, nagging her kid. This was a real, honest-to-God, flesh-and-bones woman he was sticking it to, not some faceless CEO of a corporation. That made it hard.
He thought of their little exchange in the basement, and his mouth inched up in a wistful smile. Wendy Hodene
... keeper of the socks.
He wondered, in his new and melancholy mood, what would be coming next. The initial confrontation with Jim in the basement may have ended abruptly, but that morning Jim had gruffly demanded Zack's phone number, and Zack had obliged. Not long after that, Jim had taken off with Wendy; they hadn't returned by quitting time. In short, Zack was batting zip-nada so far, which had to be a factor in his faltering resolve.
It occurred to him that Jim might just whisk his family into hiding until Zack became bored and left. If so, Zack had only himself to blame. He had tipped his hand by announcing right up front that he was determined to protect his sister from further hurt. Boy. Some blackmailer
he
was.
He sighed. It was a beautiful, heartbreaking sunset. And utterly wasted on him.
The phone in his pocket rang. In theory it could have been Jim; but Zack was dead certain that it wasn't—so dead certain that he took out the tiny thing, flipped
it open without looking at it
, and said, "Hi, Zee."
Startled by his greeting, she said, "Oh-h-h, I'm being a pest, aren't I?"
"Not at all."
"You haven't spoken to him, or you would have called," she said with a sigh.
"Right," he said, lying merrily away. "I was just about to pick up the phone and tell you that. I'm hoping I have news for you tomorrow or shortly after."
"But
... why are you staying in
Providence
, if he isn't there? Isn't that a waste of money?"
"Nah. I found a bed-and-breakfast that suits me." In fact, it was a third-floor rathole in a huge Victorian that had been split into half a dozen apartments, most of them housing students from Brown and the Rhode Island School of Design. The rent went by the week, and an extra bonus was that he could walk to the little park he was at and breathe air that didn't reek of pot and smelly sneakers.
"Besides, I've managed to nail down a commission," he said, adding another link to the chain of his lies. "A lady on the east side wants me to repair a set of busted Chippendale chairs that she picked up for a song—well, what
she
calls a song."
Zina sounded relieved. "Oh, good! I'm glad you're going to be making some money out of this, at least."
"Hand over fist," Zack said with a reasonably straight face. He hesitated, then added, "So how're you holding up, Zee? I know this is hard on you, the waiting."
"Yes, but everyone's sick who should be working at the shelter, so I've been there every spare minute. I even took the afternoon off from the quilt shop to cover for someone—although I can't do that too many times, or, yikes, I won't be paying my rent."
That will not be a problem
,
Zack insisted to himself.
He said, "How's the skunk?"
Zina laughed and said, "Cassie's fine and she says hello. I'm becoming
so
attached to her; I'd like to adopt her myself, except that I promised my landlady I wouldn't start doing that—bringing cats home and keeping them, I mean. I think Margie's afraid that I'll end up old and gray with forty-two cats."
"You're not old," Zack said gallantly. "And you're not gray."
"But I would like forty-two cats."
"All right, then, Zee; I'll see what I can do to make your wish come true."
"Honestly, Zack. Where would I put forty-two cats?"
****
The move by Wendy and Jim from the half-demolished house on
Sheldon Street
into the wonderful house on the beach took place over the
weekend. They weren't moving enough of their things to justify calling in professional movers, so Wendy had her husband buy some boxes and wardrobes from U-Haul, and they did the job themselves. They packed their clothes, their music, some books, and their favorite pillows; more than that seemed pointless. Besides, Wendy didn't want their stuff to feel bad that other people's stuff was so much better than it was.
Jim refused to rent a U-Haul truck—too low-rent—and instead used the SUV to run a shuttle back and forth between their house and the beach house while Wendy packed and
Tyler
pretended to pack. The neighbors nodded knowingly when Wendy told them of the temporary move; clearly they didn't expect to see the Hodenes living again on
Sheldon Street
.
"Which is
not
true," she told Jim as they wolfed down pizza in the dust-filled kitchen of their house between runs. "As long as
Tyler
has so many friends and family here, why would I want to move? How many kids get to enjoy the experience of growing up in a traditional way in their ancestors' home nowadays? Almost none."
"We'll see," Jim said noncomittally between huge chomps of pizza.
He was hungry and he was in a hurry. Wendy knew that he had been working like a fiend all day because he was absolutely determined to sleep in the new house that night.
Tyler
was all for it, too, and even Wendy was excited about living in another house after having spent most of her thirty-four years on
Sheldon Street
.
"It'll seem odd not to wake up looking at the Almeidas' roof," she mused. "We've done it for eight years. I remember at the time thinking, what if we can't keep up with the payments? What if we end up on the street? I was so scared. And now look."
She finished her last slice of pizza and began folding up the box. "Jim?"
"Hm?" he answered, swigging down the last of his beer.
"What was it you wanted to tell me the other day?"
She hated asking the question; but the question had to be asked. A wife didn't forget an expression on her husband's face like the one Wendy had seen. A look like that clung to a woman's subconscious like a burr on a sweater.
The blank look on Jim's face made her give him a extra nudge. "Wasn't that the point of finding a house to live in—so we could talk in private?"
Damn it
,
she thought with dismay
.
You really are hiding something. You're going to ruin this for us, aren't you?
"Whatever it was, it's gone," he said with a shrug. "It couldn't have been too important." Going on the offensive as he liked to do, he added in a testier tone, "Besides, we're still in this fishbowl of a house at the moment, even if I could remember."
"It's Sunday, Jim; the contractors aren't here."
"
Tyler
is."
'
Tyler
l
ives here!"
"He's getting older, more observant," Jim countered. "It's harder to talk—or do—anything in private around him now."
At that point, she wasn't certain whether Jim was dragging the conversation around again to the need to buy a mansion, or whether he was simply trying to change the subject, period. In any case,
Tyler
came clomping down the stairs at that moment, so Wendy let the matter drop. But the burr clung to her sleeve; she could feel its prick, and it was upsetting for her not to be able to clear it away.
The doorbell rang at the same time as the phone.
Tyler
had reached the foot of the stairs and got the door, so
Wendy automatically picked up the phone, much to her husband's dismay.
"The machine, the
machinel"
he said in a hiss.
"Hello?" she answered, wincing in apology at him. Too late now.
No one responded, though Wendy definitely could hear something in the background. Voices, sporadically. A television? Wendy frowned in concentration, trying to make out what was being said. She thought that maybe she heard a cry
... or a groan. Something.
"Damn it, Wendy!" her husband said, and he depressed the plunger on the phone.
Stunned, Wendy said, "What'd you do
that
for?"
"I told you: I want the machine answering."
"Why? What're you trying to hide?" she shot back.
He scowled and said, "I'm sick of the nuisance calls."
"Too bad! I can answer the phone in my own home—"
A voice from behind her said, "If you do, it'll be a first. I've been getting your machine for days now."
Wendy spun around to see her mother holding a box with a bow on it and looking reproachful. Gracie Ferro said, "So: you're just ignoring all your calls nowadays? Even from family?"
Turning her attention away from Jim to deal with their visitor, Wendy said patiently, "If you had begun to leave a message, Mom, obviously I would have picked up."
"You know I don't like talking to a machine."
"Aaaggh!
But if I'm not near the phone and can't see my caller I.D., t
hen how can I know you're calling?"
"You're saying I'm a nuisance?"
"You're
a
—
?
How did you get
there
?”
The phone rang again. With a defiant glance at her husband, Wendy snatched it back up and snapped out a hello. When no one responded again, she barked, "Listen, what the hell do you want? If you have something to say, then just say it!"
No response. She hung up on the sound of a low, languid voice somewhere in the background. "
Damn
it!"
Her mother gave her a baleful look and said, "Someone seems to have her nightie in a twist."
Tyler
, nose in the refrigerator, snickered from behind the door. Wendy told him to go straight back to his room and bring down his pizza plate, because just because they were moving—
temporarily
!—it didn't mean that he could leave the place a pigsty.
Her son stomped off, muttering, "Everyone takes everything out on
me."
Which everyone more or less did. Wendy had to do a mental backflip to put herself in a better frame of mind: they were about to move into a big new playhouse, and at the moment she wasn't feeling the least bit playful. So she took a deep breath, smiled at Jim, hugged her mother, accepted the box from her, and started over.
"Mom! How nice of you to stop by! What can I do you for?"
Her mother gave her a wry look and rubbed away a smudge on her cheek. "You can start by telling your brother that if he doesn't show up for my birthday party, he may as well leave the country."
Bad as her mood had been, Wendy had to laugh at the mere concept of any of them missing the Big Six-Five. "I will certainly pass on your message," she said, not at all solemnly. "Anything else?"
"Yes," said Grace, looking first at Jim and then at Wendy. "I'd like you to host my birthday party."
"Really!"
"I'll pay for the food and refreshments," her mother said instantly.
"No, that's not what I meant. I meant, I thought you wanted to have the party at your place. We all thought that. You told us that."
"I did. But. That was before the new couch arrived."
"We're not going to use it for a trampoline or anything," Wendy said wryly. "And Ma
r
jorie's pregnant and not drinking; she won't be spilling any wine this year."
"Ha, ha, dear. Very funny. As a matter of fact, the reason
is definitely
the new couch. It makes the easy chairs look ratty. We have to replace them before anyone can come over."