Vee shakes her head.
“Okee doke.” The man heads for his truck, then shouts before closing the door: “If you’ll be so kind as to get out of my way?”
Vee moves to the edge of the driveway. She would like a ride. But a dog, she thinks, doesn’t just jump out of a truck. Does it? Not if its owner is kind?
The truck reverses to where Vee stands. The man rolls down his window, a wary look on his face. “Sure you don’t want a ride?”
She shakes her head.
“Where’d you come from?”
Is this fear? Vee wonders. Or is it shame? Her body feels heavy, her thigh muscles on the verge of collapse. The truck’s running board is oddly clean, as if he leaps into his seat instead of climbing, and she rests her gaze there, listening to the blood in her ears.
“You mute?”
“You alright?”
When she doesn’t answer, the man climbs down from the truck. “Oh god,” he says. “Don’t cry.” And Vee, who didn’t know she was crying, starts to cry harder. She feels insane suddenly, standing in a strange man’s driveway, letting him take her by the shoulders, falling into him. She has fallen into him. “Oh god,” he says again—she hears it, muffled, through her hair. “Oh no,” as his arms wrap around her. Then: “Goodness, you didn’t look this small.”
Vee has never slept with a man whose family she didn’t know. She has only slept with Alex and two boyfriends before him. He could be diseased; he could be a murderer. She leads him toward his house. She doesn’t smell pipe smoke on him, doesn’t smell it inside. She wonders if she dreamed it, if she is dreaming this, too, hallucinating the lumberjack in the woods and her hands on his neck—could it possibly be real? But if she were hallucinating, she would hallucinate a mattress on the floor and there is a bed—a simple one, built of the same wood as the house, but still a bed. If she were hallucinating, it would be a collision so hasty they would simply unbuckle and pull aside, but beneath him she is naked. The man’s eyes are open and looking into her eyes, though she can’t tell if he sees her. She barely sees him. She sees Alex pushing her to the floor, sees Suitcase Wife up in the ceiling, sees Alex pushing his hand up Suitcase Wife’s skirt, working his whole hand up inside her, then Vee feels it inside herself and Suitcase Wife has disappeared into Vee, their backs hitting the floor with a terrible sound, though that might be the thwack of Vee’s stick hitting the trees. Smack. She slams her hands against the man’s chest. She feels a rush of power. Then she sees the dog leash hanging on the bedroom doorknob, within his reach, and hears herself say in a squirrelish voice, “What about your dog?” and as the man laughs, and comes, fear grips her again, and now this is all she feels, bright, blinding fear, until he is off her. He says something but she can’t hear; she is underwater in the tub again while Alex talks at her. She finds her clothes. Her hat. Where is her stick? When did she let go of her stick? She hears his footsteps behind her and decides she’ll turn down the ride again—even if he insists, she’ll say no. She needs a cigarette. She needs to walk.
But it turns out he doesn’t offer her a ride because when Vee opens the door a dog is there, its tongue out, its tail wagging, waiting to be let in. “Good girl,” the man says, kneeling down to hug her, and Vee runs until she is out of sight.
The house is empty when she returns, Rosemary out picking up the older kids from school, and Vee goes straight into the shower. When she hears the children’s voices she doesn’t bother getting dressed, just wraps her robe around her and heads downstairs. She is ready to talk now. Something has been knocked loose and she needs to talk, to tell Rosemary what just happened and everything else that has happened and how terrified she is not to know what will happen next.
“Oh.”
It’s not Rosemary who has brought the children home. Philip stands at the kitchen counter, slicing an apple. Without looking at her, he says, “Doctor’s appointment,” and Vee, clutching her robe, turns to go back upstairs.
“Where were you?” Philip asks in his odd, blunt way, sounding neither angry nor kind.
“Walking.”
“We need to talk.”
“Let me change.”
“It won’t take long. Kids!”
The kids gather quickly, as they never do for Rosemary, and Philip, handing out the apple slices, says, “Go outside.”
The children look at their father, then at Vee, and go. Only the girl hesitates for a few seconds, peeking back at Vee through a frizzy shock of bangs, then putting an apple slice in her mouth and following her brothers out the sliding door. At four o’clock, it is already dusk outside. Philip offers Vee an apple slice. She declines. She wants him to release her before Rosemary gets home, not because Rosemary mistrusts her—Vee has to believe that Rosemary does not mistrust her—but because a woman in a robe with a husband is not something any woman, let alone a pregnant woman, needs to see.
Philip takes his time washing the paring knife and the cutting board, then drying both. Vee has never seen Alex wash anything, so though she’s impatient for Philip to speak, she is also fascinated. Philip swings the dish towel over his shoulder and it’s as if he has performed a kind of dance—that’s how impressed Vee is, despite herself. He puts each item away, opens the refrigerator, and, with his back to her, says, “You should go home.”
“I’m sorry?”
“It’s time. I got a call today, at the office.”
“From?” She
