San Diego. But I’m trying to get him to come up on weekends when he can.”
“Weekends,” Dabney repeated. She would spend a summer’s worth of weekends with CJ? When Dabney closed her eyes, she saw a thick, olive-green fog. Agnes’s coming home was the best surprise Dabney could have hoped for. Dabney could save Agnes. And Agnes, quite possibly, could save Dabney.
Clendenin
H e couldn’t cut a steak, he couldn’t tie his shoes, and he couldn’t button the cuffs of his shirt. A grocery cart was okay, but not a grocery basket. Childproof pill bottle, forget about it. Chopping a tomato was difficult but not impossible; he hadn’t yet tried to shuck corn. Typing was a slow and arduous process, so he wrote everything longhand now, then read it into a special program on his computer. He had a hard time folding his laundry, and uncorking a bottle of wine.
He could shave, but he had always hated shaving anyway, so he’d let his beard grow in for four months, two weeks, three days—the amount of time that had passed since he’d lost his arm.
Transactions like paying the pizza guy from his wallet and then accepting the hot box was a complicated dance that frustrated Clen and embarrassed the deliveryman. It was his left arm that was gone, so shaking hands was still okay.
He probably shouldn’t hold a baby, but there were no babies in his life.
He could crack an egg, flip an omelet, ride his bicycle, and swim. And he could smoke, thanks to the invention of the Bic. Lighting a match was a trick from his past.
Usually when dusk descended, which happened later and later as June approached, Clen stood on his porch and took aim at the crows with his BB gun—he was getting pretty good—and then he smoked a cigarette and dropped the butt into the mayonnaise jar half filled with water at his feet. It was a nasty habit he’d picked up overseas; it had been impossible to live in Bangkok, and later Hanoi, and later still Siem Reap, and not smoke. He had thought he would give it up when he returned, but he had given up so much already that he couldn’t quit the cigarettes.
He either made himself something to eat (an omelet, fried rice) or he called something in, hence the awkward relationship with the pizza-delivery guy, although Benny knew him now.
And then, when it was fully dark, Clen climbed into the car left at his disposal—he had gotten a special driver’s license, valid as long as he wore his prosthetic, which he never did—and he drove into town, past the house on Charter Street where Dabney lived.
If he had told anyone he did this, they would have thought him a stalker, a creep, a man hopelessly mired in the past. He didn’t feel like any of those things. He drove past Dabney’s house because he liked to see the lights on and think of her inside—tossing a salad or sticking fresh flowers in a vase of water, or reading Jane Austen in bed.
He knew she was married. He knew there was next to no chance that she would leave the economist just because Clen had decided to come back. But he loved her in a way that could not be ignored, and so he was determined to try. The kiss in front of his cottage had been the kiss of a lifetime. If he got nothing else, he would be happy with that.
In every dream he’d had since being back on Nantucket, he had both his arms. It was because of Dabney. She returned him to his whole self.
Clen had found out about the baby in a letter from Dabney, the sort penned on a thin, light-blue airmail envelope—from the outside, identical in appearance to the three letters Dabney had sent that had preceded Clen’s arrival in Bangkok, those saying how much she loved and missed him. The letter about her pregnancy had reached Clen after he returned to Bangkok from a grueling three-week assignment in Pattaya, which was a more disturbing, derelict, and soulless place than Clen could have imagined existed. He had been overseas for slightly less than two months, enough time for him to
“Weekends,” Dabney repeated. She would spend a summer’s worth of weekends with CJ? When Dabney closed her eyes, she saw a thick, olive-green fog. Agnes’s coming home was the best surprise Dabney could have hoped for. Dabney could save Agnes. And Agnes, quite possibly, could save Dabney.
Clendenin
H e couldn’t cut a steak, he couldn’t tie his shoes, and he couldn’t button the cuffs of his shirt. A grocery cart was okay, but not a grocery basket. Childproof pill bottle, forget about it. Chopping a tomato was difficult but not impossible; he hadn’t yet tried to shuck corn. Typing was a slow and arduous process, so he wrote everything longhand now, then read it into a special program on his computer. He had a hard time folding his laundry, and uncorking a bottle of wine.
He could shave, but he had always hated shaving anyway, so he’d let his beard grow in for four months, two weeks, three days—the amount of time that had passed since he’d lost his arm.
Transactions like paying the pizza guy from his wallet and then accepting the hot box was a complicated dance that frustrated Clen and embarrassed the deliveryman. It was his left arm that was gone, so shaking hands was still okay.
He probably shouldn’t hold a baby, but there were no babies in his life.
He could crack an egg, flip an omelet, ride his bicycle, and swim. And he could smoke, thanks to the invention of the Bic. Lighting a match was a trick from his past.
Usually when dusk descended, which happened later and later as June approached, Clen stood on his porch and took aim at the crows with his BB gun—he was getting pretty good—and then he smoked a cigarette and dropped the butt into the mayonnaise jar half filled with water at his feet. It was a nasty habit he’d picked up overseas; it had been impossible to live in Bangkok, and later Hanoi, and later still Siem Reap, and not smoke. He had thought he would give it up when he returned, but he had given up so much already that he couldn’t quit the cigarettes.
He either made himself something to eat (an omelet, fried rice) or he called something in, hence the awkward relationship with the pizza-delivery guy, although Benny knew him now.
And then, when it was fully dark, Clen climbed into the car left at his disposal—he had gotten a special driver’s license, valid as long as he wore his prosthetic, which he never did—and he drove into town, past the house on Charter Street where Dabney lived.
If he had told anyone he did this, they would have thought him a stalker, a creep, a man hopelessly mired in the past. He didn’t feel like any of those things. He drove past Dabney’s house because he liked to see the lights on and think of her inside—tossing a salad or sticking fresh flowers in a vase of water, or reading Jane Austen in bed.
He knew she was married. He knew there was next to no chance that she would leave the economist just because Clen had decided to come back. But he loved her in a way that could not be ignored, and so he was determined to try. The kiss in front of his cottage had been the kiss of a lifetime. If he got nothing else, he would be happy with that.
In every dream he’d had since being back on Nantucket, he had both his arms. It was because of Dabney. She returned him to his whole self.
Clen had found out about the baby in a letter from Dabney, the sort penned on a thin, light-blue airmail envelope—from the outside, identical in appearance to the three letters Dabney had sent that had preceded Clen’s arrival in Bangkok, those saying how much she loved and missed him. The letter about her pregnancy had reached Clen after he returned to Bangkok from a grueling three-week assignment in Pattaya, which was a more disturbing, derelict, and soulless place than Clen could have imagined existed. He had been overseas for slightly less than two months, enough time for him to
Similar Books
