Wit's End by Karen Joy Fowler Page B

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    Rima opened her mouth to explain why she’d sent a letter to a woman she doubted was alive, and signed it with a fictional character’s name. No one was more curious than she to hear what she would say. But Addison was still talking. “What did your dad tell you?”
    Although Rima had been wanting Addison to talk about her father, she would have liked to choose the place and time. She needed to be braced for it; the question struck her like a slap. “I never heard of Holy City until that box of letters you gave me,” she said. Her voice began shaky but leveled out. She was changing the subject, and doing it as quickly as she could. “With Constance Wellington’s letters?”
    â€œI don’t remember,” Addison started, and then she started over. “Cat lady? God, I haven’t thought of her in years.”
    The great advantage of sitting at the sushi bar was in not being face-to-face. Rima could avoid looking at Addison without appearing to avoid it. She stared instead into the glass case of ice, salmon, eel, avocado. She looked up into the round white Buddha-beaming face of the calico cat. There was music in the background; the soundtrack for this conversation was the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Rima took another piece of seaweed, raw fish, and crushed nuts, but she was too tense to eat it. What was it exactly that went on between you and my father? she practiced. This was not the way she’d planned it; the way she’d planned it was drunk. But Addison was the one with the martini. Rima had only her green tea. This was not a level playing field.
    â€œShe was a real mystery buff. Not just mine. That woman read every mystery ever written, and she wrote everyone about them too. I remember once at a convention, there was a whole panel about her and her letters. Always so sure we were all getting it wrong.
    â€œShe was postmistress out there. We used to joke about how she must give herself a bulk discount on stamps.
    â€œShe might have been the last survivor of Holy City,” Addison said. “I think she was. I picture it like something out of Flannery O’Connor. The post office long closed, cobwebs over the scales. Just her and her cats, living in a labyrinth made from piles of paperbacks.”
    â€œStill in her wedding dress,” Rima offered. What was it exactly, what was it exactly . . .
    â€œSomething like that.”
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    A sushi roll called Clouds and Rain arrived. Rima seemed to remember that Clouds and Rain was a traditional Japanese euphemism for sex. Or else Thunder and Rain. Or else it was Chinese. This Clouds and Rain was diced scallops in a spicy mayonnaise and not at all traditional.
    â€œI actually met Ms. Wellington once,” Addison said. “How ironic is that? I spend a whole evening with her, and she writes her letters to Maxwell as if I don’t exist. Not that she should remember me. I wasn’t a writer yet when we met. Though we talked for quite some time.”
    The sushi chef returned. He and Addison spoke briefly about the prospects for the Senate. A month ago it had seemed impossible. Now it all came down to Montana, where the vote was still being counted, and Virginia, where things looked awfully good. He asked about the dogs and heard about their Halloween costumes. He suggested that Rima must be really happy to be in California instead of Cleveland, but since he lived in California he said “real happy” instead of “really happy.” He asked how she liked living by the ocean. “Not that you don’t have water in Cleveland,” he said. “I know you have lakes. Great lakes is what I hear.”
    Californians always thought they were all that. They had no idea how great a lake could be. Instead of saying so, Rima did him the courtesy of pretending not to get the joke. “I like the pelicans,” she said. This severely understated the case. Rima loved the pelicans, loved