“I read it online. The guy’s coming all the way out from the city?”
“He said he has a house out here.”
“Why didn’t he tell you over the phone? He likes to give good news in person?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. He wouldn’t even give me a hint.”
The soup made a sizzling sound. Lea spun around. She snapped the burner off before it boiled over the side of the pot. “Sit down. We’re all having tomato soup. Homemade. I sliced the tomatoes and everything this morning.”
“What a homemaker.” Mark tried to kiss her again but she ducked her head as she lifted the soup pot from the stove. “Too bad you’re going away again. Who will make us homemade soup?”
“Huh? Going away? Mark, I’m going to the city tomorrow morning for one night. I’ll be back late the following day. You’re not going to make me feel guilty about a day and a half in the city, are you?”
He backed away, raising both hands in surrender. “Just teasing. You know I’ll miss you even if it’s only one night. Every minute is precious to me.”
“Shut up. You’re not funny.”
Ira and Elena were away at friends’ houses. She ladled the thick tomato soup into bowls, then joined Mark and the twins at the table.
Daniel leaned his face to the bowl and took a long whiff. “Smells so good, Mum. Tangy as sea grass drying on the beach.”
“My bruvver is a poet,” Samuel said.
“I like the way you boys speak,” Lea said, stirring her soup, watching the steam rise from the red liquid. “You have good vocabularies.”
“There’s no school on the island, Mum,” Daniel said. “But our parents, bless their souls, taught us well.”
She wished Ira could pick up some of their charm and politeness. Maybe it would rub off on him. If only he would spend some time with his new brothers. .
“Wonderful soup,” Mark said, across the table from her. He raised the pepper mill and ground a load of pepper into it. He always added pepper, no matter what the food was.
Lea had learned not to be insulted when he reseasoned her food that way.
She raised a spoon of soup and blew on it. “Careful. It’s very hot.”
The soup bubbled on the spoon. Red. So bright and red. Where had she seen that color before?
She flicked the spoon hard and sent the soup flying over Mark’s shoulder. It made a soft splash on the wall.
The rain had come down so hard. Sheets of it. All bloodred. Red as the tomato soup.
Lea raised another spoonful, whipped her hand up, and sent the soup flying across the table onto the wall.
“Hey-Lea?” Mark’s startled cry.
The twins laughed. Did they think it was
The red rain. The bloodred rain. The rain of all the victims’ blood. The dead crying their red tears down on everyone.
The dead. The raining dead. Their red tears steaming in her soup bowl.
Lea flung another spoon of the red rain, the bloodred rain, spoon after spoon splashing on the white kitchen wall. Tears rolling down her face. Sobs wrenching her throat and chest.
The red rain splashed on the wall. Splashed. Splashed again. Till Mark wrapped his arms around her from behind. Wrapped his arms around her so tight the spoon fell from her trembling hand.
“Hold on to me, Mark. Hold on to me.” Where did those words come from? “Hold on to me. Don’t let me go back there.”
25
“When will Mom be back?” Elena lifted the whole toaster waffle to her mouth and bit off an end.
Mark took a long sip of coffee from the white mug in his hand. “She just left an hour ago. She was taking the first jitney. You already want her back?”
Elena gave him the eye-roll. “Just asking, that’s all.”
“She has meetings today. She’s staying with her sister in the Village tonight. She’ll be back sometime tomorrow afternoon. Okay?”
“Okay. Why are you such a grouch?”
“Sorry. Just tense, I guess. I didn’t want her to go. She seems so shaky. She can’t seem to leave that damned island behind her.”
“Da-ad. Language.” Elena motioned toward the twins having their breakfast at the table.
“Maybe some meetings in the city will do her good. Give her something else to think about,” Roz chimed in from the other end of the table, Axl on her lap with an egg-stained face.
Elena swallowed a chunk of waffle. “Does Mom’s cell work? I need to talk to her. You’re being totally stupid and unfair.”
Mark shrugged. “Yes. Everyone tells me I’m stupid. And unfair.”
Across from Elena, Samuel and Daniel giggled. Daniel leaned toward Axl. “How’s my monkey boy?”
Axl stuck his tongue out, pleased with the attention. But Roz snapped at Daniel, “I wish you wouldn’t call him that.”
“He likes it.”
“I’m fourteen,” Elena told Mark, dropping the waffle onto the plate. “All my friends go into the city on their own.”
Mark sighed. He spun the coffee mug between his hands. The cuckoo clock above the sink chirped eight times. They were going to be late.
“You know my feeling on this. Why bring it up now?”
Elena’s dark eyebrows formed arched Vs over her eyes, the sign that she was angry. “You’re a total phony, Dad.”
The twins giggled again. That made Axl giggle, too. Roz tried to wipe the caked egg off his cheeks with a paper napkin. Ira kept his head down, concentrating on his Cheerios, keeping out of it.
“Me? A phony?”
“You wrote a book saying parents should let their kids do what they want. But you-”
“That didn’t include letting a bunch of fourteen-year-old girls go traipsing around New York City with no plan or idea of what they’re going to do.”
Elena balled her hands into fists and let out an angry growl. “We. . don’t. . traipse.” Said through gritted teeth.
“Let’s table this for later. We’re going to be late.” He balled up his paper napkin and threw it onto the table. “And stop tossing my book back at me. I know you haven’t read it. The book is a piece of research. It doesn’t mean I can’t make decisions as your father.”
“Phony, Dad.” The eye-roll again. “You’re a phony and a grouch.”
Mark watched the twins gobble down the last syrupy pieces of their toaster waffles. “How are you boys doing in the guesthouse? You like it back there?” He had to change the subject.
“We love it,” Samuel said. “Our own house. We never had our own house.”
“Our house was always crowded with a lot of strangers, don’t you know,” Daniel added.
“Really? Well, it was nice of Roz to give up her place for you, wasn’t it?”
“Mark, they’ve already thanked me a hundred times,” Roz said, obviously pleased. “And they were so sweet. They both helped me carry my stuff up to the attic. They’re very hard workers.”
