Rivera said goodbye and placed the phone on the passenger seat. Kleinman was cautious. He’d been sued many times over claims of neglect and fraud, but he had always managed to settle without going to court. Lawsuits are just part of the big picture, he said. They go with the territory.
After Marion’s call, Brenda had been in the den. She was looking over Mrs. Krause’s bookshelves and came across a Ruth Rendell novel. When she pulled it free, an envelope fell to the floor. She picked it up—a promotional invitation addressed to “occupant.” It was from The Neptune Society and under the name “America’s most trusted cremation services.” The envelope had never been opened, but Mrs. Krause had kept it, either as a bookmark or for future reference.
Then the phone had rung again. Brenda put back the book. A clean break, she told herself, and walked slowly to the kitchen. She cleared her throat before picking up the handset.
“Brenda Contay?”
“Speaking.”
“Honey, this is Noelle Harmon, James Rivera’s real estate friend? He told me you’re down here to write about boomers.”
“That’s right, I am.” The woman had a lilting southern accent.
“Well, if you’re into crazy, you came to the right place,” Harmon said. “Property appreciates so fast down here, sometimes it gets flipped twice before the closing.”
“So I heard.”
“I mean before the current downturn,” Noelle said. “It’s always a gamble, but you can leverage your money a long way. Listen, I’m free tomorrow morning, and I could use some plain old girl-talk. How’s nine sound?”
“It sounds good, Noelle. Thank you.”
She hung up. Normally, an insider’s offer of help led to a sense of expectation and interest. Brenda felt none. Sweeney had gotten it right: the boomer article was just an escape.
◆◆◆◆◆
While she was in the pool swimming laps, the sun set. By using racing turns, you could get exercise in a small pool. Twenty-five, thirty-five. As Brenda swam, she felt the night air grow cool on her back. The pool bottom shone brightly with sub-surface light.
She climbed out, dried off, and went inside to finish unpacking. Her suitcase lay open on the bed. In her Speedo, she lifted out white and black cotton sweaters, shorts and skirts, a fleece jacket, several blouses. At the bottom lay a man’s shirt, accidentally taken from her dresser drawer with the blouses.
Accidentally like hell, Brenda thought. The shirt was blue Oxford cloth, Brooks Brothers. It had been professionally laundered, with a paper band to keep it neat. Except when doing chores, Charlie always wore Brooks Brothers, and she thought that must have to do with his wife Lillie. He cleaned up for her after work, Brenda thought. And then for me.
The shirt was beautiful to her, the neat buttonholes stitched on the button-down collar, the center seam orderly and straight. She raised the shirt to her face and breathed in. The smell was fresh and held something of the steam odor from the pressing machine. Under this she smelled Charlie.
She put everything in the dresser, zipped closed the suitcase and set it in the walk-in closet.
On the kitchen counter lay the folder James Rivera had mentioned. Hello! Welcome to 1107 Paisley Court! Inside she found Do’s and Don’ts, what to wear, dining room and cocktail lounge hours. There were rules for watering lawns, when to set out the trash. The Donegal restaurant was open every night until eight. Shirts with collars, please. No jeans, caps or short shorts.
A map printed on the back displayed the Donegal course and its communities. All the roads came to an end at the edge of the folder, and the effect was that of a colony in the middle of nowhere. Whatever might happen elsewhere, Brenda felt life at Donegal would proceed like a toy train on a track.
Carnarvon Court—that was the street Patrick Sweeney had given to Rivera. She found it on the map, then her own address.
She changed into a black silk blouse and off-white linen skirt, then got the keys to the Buick from the kitchen’s pegboard. Out in the garage, Brenda pushed the button for the door opener. She backed the Buick out and started up the street.
It made sense first to see where Pat Sweeney lived. In case of an emergency or for advice on restaurants. Why the sudden change on the way to Naples? One minute, Sweeney had been a smooth-talking lobbyist with a left hook. Minutes later in the van, a lost soul.
With Charlie, there’d been small, sudden hints of all she didn’t know about him. The way he sat forward for certain pieces of music—he loved jazz as her father had. And he often saw things in movies she missed completely. But the absence of surprise, that was the thing about Charlie Schmidt. And that, too, was like her father.
Guiding Mrs. Krause’s leather-scented old car, Brenda realized she was thinking in the past tense. It pained her. You’re hard at work on the clean break, she thought. Doing what you do when things go wrong with a man.
Clean break. It took many forms, but over the years, experience had taught her that long goodbyes were always a mistake. Being insecure and needy, getting back together for a time, maybe more than once—it was always a bad idea. A weakness. Straight-no-chaser goodbyes were best.
She followed the dark road. Duplexes like Mrs. Krause’s—they were called villas in Florida—were arranged on the right, single-family houses on her left. McDougall, Cleghorn. At Carnarvon Court she turned. According to the map, Sweeney’s place would be at the far end. She crept forward, seeing moonlight reflected on tile roofs. At the turnaround, Brenda stopped. Sweeney’s windows were dark, but a streetlamp shone down on his driveway.
Heaped next to a trash barrel were inflatable beach toys. They had been partially compressed and now looked like half-formed animals. She swung the car in an arc, looked again at the mound of children’s toys, and headed back up the block. It troubled her for some reason, seeing
