unshowered mess of a human being I’ve morphed into over the last forty-eight hours. We’re not even at Wisper Pines. We’re at the Louisville Children’s Science Center, I’ve got piss running down both of my legs, and she’s the only one in the world who sees me.
I swallow and turn away. She doesn’t try to hug me, and for that alone, I will love her forever.
She starts with the food, scooping handfuls of cereal into an empty grocery bag she finds in the kitchen. I watch for a few numb seconds, then go off to find the vacuum cleaner.
When I get back she’s holding an empty Mountain Dew bottle in each hand. “Recycling bin?”
“Can’t do it. Global warming conspiracy theory is way too mainstream.”
She doesn’t even roll her eyes, just tosses them into the trash.
I gather the tissues and chuck them too. “I had a cold,” I mutter, in case she’s wondering, but she doesn’t even raise an eyebrow.
Satan’s Cat watches it all from her perch until Annie opens up a can of cat food and scoops it into a bowl. For this, the beast hops down from her roost, slinks and weaves her way through Annie’s legs, then begins taking dainty little bites.
I glare at the beast. When I feed her, she pounces on it, stopping to hiss every few seconds to let me know her feelings for me haven’t changed just because I’m keeping her alive.
“No offense,” Annie says after a few minutes of cleaning, “but how long has it been since you showered?”
“Uh . . .” I can’t even remember what day I took them to the airport. Friday? And today’s Sunday? No, Monday. Maybe.
“Go shower.”
I obey, relieved to be bossed around, relieved to not be having another staring contest with Satan’s Cat, relieved someone is offended by my stench. And my obedience leads to the discovery of Wisper Pines’s finest amenity: the showerhead. They really should have included it in the brochure. I mean, the tennis and basketball courts plus community gardens are lovely features, but this showerhead is way better because it feels like I’m being pelted by skin-melting lasers, and it’s something I’m going to use every day. Well, theoretically. If I’d known, I would’ve spent the last two or three or four days in here instead of lying on the couch.
Facing the nozzle, I lean into the pressure wash of scalding water and steam until the grime shell is gone. I don’t turn it off until my skin is too sore for one more second. I’m raw all over. But transformed too, because I feel seventeen again—not seventy or seven—too young to be dying, too old to be homesick. Or family-sick. For now it’s all scalded away.
I shave, put on fresh clothes, and leave the bathroom to find Annie digging through my life. Basketball trophies, report cards, immunization records, a badge-covered shirt from my ill-advised foray into the world of the Boy Scouts of America. She sifts through it without taking it out of the box, then moves on to the next one.
“My clothes,” I say. “I’ll do them.” I reach down and take the box from her. She doesn’t protest or ask me why I’m such a lazy piece of crap for just letting them sit here instead of unpacking like a normal human being.
From my room I can hear her taking out the contents of the next box, and I know it’s the one I don’t want unpacked because I can hear the clinking of candlesticks.
The apartment came furnished, but my mom insisted on leaving a few things to make it like home. I know exactly what’s in there because I saw her pack it up. Family portraits in matching silver frames. Her favorite candlesticks, like I’m ever in a million years going to light candles. A hand-woven silk table runner that belonged to her mother. This ancient anthology of children’s stories she read to Sarina and me when we were little. Stuff I don’t want to see right now.
“Just leave that stuff in the box,” I call from the room.
“But some of it’s really pretty. Don’t you at least want the family pictures out? And what’s this old book?”
“I don’t want to see it right now,” I yell, too loudly, and instantly regret the blatant desperation. “Please,” I try again, softer. “Just leave it.”
Silence. I stick my head out the door and I see her small body bent over the candlesticks. She’s rewrapping them in the table runner, placing them gently back into the box like she’s afraid they’ll detonate.
By the time I’ve found drawer space for all my clothes, Annie’s long done with the living room and nearly finished unpacking the kitchen boxes too.
“Thank you,” I say, sliding into a chair at the kitchen table. I know I’m alone in believing this, but people overuse those words so they mean almost nothing at a time like this, when I need them to mean everything. I can only think of a few times in my whole life I’ve ever been more grateful. She deserves a million thank-yous.
“It’s nothing. I should’ve come by sooner.”
“No. I really mean it. I don’t think I’ve ever done anything this nice for you.”
“A couple of hours of cleaning? You spent at least twenty hours tutoring me for chemistry last semester. I bombed the final, by the way.”
“What? Why didn’t you tell me?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s embarrassing.”
“How bad?”
She tucks her hair behind her ears and squeezes her eyes shut like that’ll help her forget. “You don’t want to know. And it was algebra the semester before that, and biology the semester before that, so you do nice things for me all the time.”
I let it go. But this wasn’t nice. This was heroic. Life-altering.
“So, what’s going on with you?” I ask.
“Nothing. Sorry I haven’t called. I knew you were spending every second with your family, and then this weekend has just been kind of busy.”
“You hooked up with that guy.”
“What guy?”
“The one with the plant name. Weed.”
“Reed.”
“Yeah, whatever. Him.”
She bites her lower lip in classic Annie concentration. Her face says: formulating lie, formulating lie, formulating lie, crap,
“Noted.”
“No really. Can we not say hung out with?”
“We can, but it means something different. And it’s obvious you and the Weed have done both.”
“Why is that obvious?”
“Because otherwise you would have just answered the question.”
“Hmm.” She taps her fingers on the countertop. Her nails are pink. This is serious.
“So when do I get to meet him?” I ask.
“Never.”
“What? How is that even possible? As your husband, I demand to meet the dude you’re making out with. ”
“And as your wife, I demand you let it go. When do we meet with the lawyer?”
“If today is actually Monday, then tomorrow at nine in the morning. And he’s just a law student. Supposedly, I don’t need a real lawyer, just some know-it-all with legal tendencies to tell me which forms to fill out.”
“I’m kind of surprised you actually made the call.”
“I didn’t,” I admit. “I kept putting it off until my dad freaked out and at the last minute called for me. It’s in Louisville, but you don’t have to go if you’ve got work or hookup plans that interfere.”
“I’ll go with you,” she says, but I can tell she doesn’t want to. From the way she grimaced under the word “wife,” it’s clear she’s experiencing buyer’s remorse. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at eight?”
“Sure.”
“And do I have to know anything or say anything?”
“I don’t think so. I don’t even see the point of it. I think we just show up and smile.”
