(23) Dead Like A River

I took Moira's arm and pulled her out of the tub, across the hall and into the dark bedroom, switching on the standing lamp by the door. I had seen Gwen pouring water in the coffee maker in the lit-up kitchen as the clock clanged five times. "Get dressed," I said to Moira. "Nobody's going to bed now."

"My clothes are in the bathroom, Hangman."

That reminded me. I went into Gwen's bedroom and finished putting my duds on.

Gwen was staring at the fridge shelves, an arm cocked on the fridge door, in her terrycloth bathrobe, her black hair held back by a clip. "Would you like some eggs with the ham?" she asked without looking at me. "I sent a text to Larry. He'll be up before sunrise." She took out a carton of brown eggs and a bottle of whole milk. She set the items on the counter by the stove and said, "What's wrong with her?"

"I don't know, some masochistic hydrophobia. I thought she'd got over it."

"She wanted attention, wanted you to find her like that. She's jealous."

"What about Larry?"

"Am I allowed to have a life?"

"Yeah, one man at a time."

"How d'you like your eggs?"

"Just scramble them like everything else."

"She's right, you know, you shouldn't have come here."

That shut me up. I went back down the hall to check on Moira and to tell her: "You're right as rain. We leave after breakfast."

She was tying her shoelaces, sitting on the bed with a foot up on an opened drawer of a chest. She had put on snug black sweatpants and a hooded grey sweatshirt. "Is she mad?"

She whispered that twice, the second time a little louder. I said, "She's just mad enough to see us on our way."

Moira shut the drawer. "I'm not hungry," she said in a normal voice.

"I'll fix it." I went back into the kitchen feeling like an overworked and underpaid errand boy. "She'll just have coffee and toast," I said, adding pointedly: "on the front porch."

Gwen drew back the cup that she was about to give me and asked in a tired manner, "How does she like it?"

I said: "Cream, with sugar and coffee." "Let the dogs out for me." They were at the stove sniffing and licking their chops as the eggs began sizzling in the skillet.

Errand Boy crossed the living room, calling and whistling to the dogs. They tore past me when I swung open the screen door of the porch. I turned on the porch light, and had just finished rolling a smoke when Gwen came out and set an insulated lidded cup on the stool by a basket chair, and a saucer of toast. "I hope she likes apple butter," she said, sighing. I predicted she'd eat it.

She patted her bathrobe pockets and smiled at me. It wasn't the happiest smile but I was sure glad to see it. "I'm sorry about what I said, about you... shouldn't have come. I'm glad you came. I got all that out of my system now. I'll tell Larry about you, and I'll bet anything he gets a motorcycle. We'll take trips. Maybe I can get him to be bad, too." We laughed at that.

Moira was looking at us through the screen door of the house. Gwen turned her smiling face to her and said cheerfully, "Come on out and watch the sun come up. There's coffee here and toast."

Moira came out like a bashful girl at her first party and eased down in the chair by the stool. "We're such a bother," she said in a wee small voice.

Gwen put her hands on her hips in a matronly fashion. "Y'all sure are," she said jokingly. Then to me, "Them eggs are burning." So we hurried back to the kitchen.

The eggs were well scorched. I scrambled them with a fork. There was just one plate on the table. Gwen said, "They're all for you." So I dumped them on the plate and put the hot skillet in the sink where it hissed up a puff of steam.

I hardly dared to turn around. When I did Gwen put her arms around my neck, kissed my confused lips, and said with her face pressed to my right arm, at the shoulder, "I'm going to my room, and I'm not coming out til I hear you ride off."

I saw a painting once of a young woman sitting on a short stone fence, shading her eyes as she stared into the distance. I couldn't tell if she was watching someone coming up the road to her, or going away. Her face kept the secret of her heart, and neither the dappling of shade, nor the sunlight fractured by the leaves overhead, knew anything of the pathos in her eyes.