In the kitchen, she poured herself a glass of ice water and carried the glass to her bedroom. She was undressing, tossing her clothes in the hamper and looking forward to a cool shower, when she saw the blinking light on the answering machine. She hit the play button and her mother’s voice came on, telling Sarah that she was welcome to stop by later, if she had nothing else going on. As usual, her voice sounded slightly anxious.
On the night table, next to the answering machine, was a picture of Sarah’s family: Maureen and Larry in the middle, Sarah and Brian on either end. The machine clicked and there was a second message, also from her mother: “Oh, I thought you’d be home by now…,” it began. “I hope everything’s all right.
…”
Should she go or not? Was she in the mood?
Why not? she finally decided. I’ve got nothing else to do anyway.
Miles Ryan made his way down Madame Moore’s Lane, a narrow, winding road that ran along both the Trent River and Brices Creek, from downtown New Bern to Pollocksville, a small hamlet twelve miles to the south. Originally named for the woman who once ran one of the most famous brothels in North Carolina, it rolled past the former country home and burial plot of Richard Dobbs Spaight, a southern hero who’d signed the Declaration of Independence. During the Civil War, Union soldiers exhumed the body from the grave and posted his skull on an iron gate as a warning to citizens not to resist the occupation. When he was a child, that story had kept Miles from wanting to go anywhere near the place. Despite its beauty and relative isolation, the road he was following wasn’t for children. Heavy, fully loaded logging trucks rumbled over it day and night, and drivers tended to underestimate the curves. As a homeowner in one of the communities just off the lane, Miles had been trying to lower the speed limit for years.
No one, except for Missy, had listened to him.
This road always made him think of her.
Miles tapped out another cigarette, lit it, then rolled down the window. As the warm air blew in the car, simple snapshots of the life they’d lived together surfaced in his mind; but as always, those images led inexorably to their final day together.
Ironically, he’d been gone most of the day, a Sunday. Miles had gone fishing with Charlie Curtis. He’d left the house early that morning, and though both he and Charlie came home with mahi-mahi that day, it wasn’t enough to appease his wife. Missy, her face smudged with dirt, put her hands on her hips and glared at him the moment he got home. She didn’t say anything at all, but then, she didn’t need to. The way she looked at him spoke volumes.
Her brother and sister-in-law were coming in from Atlanta the following day, and she’d been working around the house, trying to get it ready for guests. Jonah was in bed with the flu, which didn’t make it any easier, since she’d had to take care of him as well. But that wasn’t the reason for her anger; Miles himself had been the cause.
Though she’d said that she wouldn’t mind if Miles went fishing, shehad asked him to take care of the yardwork on Saturday so she wouldn’t have to worry about that as well. Work, however, had intervened, and instead of calling Charlie with his regrets, Miles had elected to go out on Sunday anyway. Charlie had teased him on and off all day-“You’ll be sleeping on the couch tonight”-and Miles knew Charlie was probably right. But yardwork was yardwork and fishing was fishing, and for the life of him, Miles knew that neither Missy’s brother nor his wife would care in the slightest whether there were a few too many weeds growing in the garden.
Besides, he’d told himself, he would take care of everything when he got back, and he meant it. He hadn’t intended to be gone all day, but as with many of his fishing trips, one thing had led to the next and he’d lost track of time. Still, he had his speech worked out-Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything, even if it takes the rest of the night and I need a flashlight.It might have worked, too, had he told her his plans before he’d slipped out of bed that morning. But he hadn’t, and by the time he got home she’d done most of the work. The yard was mowed, the walk was edged, she’d planted some pansies around the mailbox. It must have taken hours, and to say she was angry was an understatement. Even furious wasn’t sufficient. It was somewhere beyond that, the difference between a lit match and a blazing forest fire, and he knew it. He’d seen the look a few times in the years they’d been married, but only a few. He swallowed, thinking, Here we go.
“Hey, hon,” he said sheepishly, “sorry that I’m so late. We just lost track of time.” Just as he was getting ready to start his speech, Missy turned around and spoke over her shoulder.
“I’m going for a jog. Youcan take care of this, can’t you?” She’d been getting ready to blow the grass off the walkway and drive; the blower was sitting on the lawn.
Miles knew enough not to respond.
After she’d gone inside to change, Miles got the cooler from the back of the car and brought it to the kitchen. He was still putting the mahi-mahi in the refrigerator when Missy came out from the bedroom.
“I was just putting the fish away…,” he started, and Missy clenched her jaw.
“What about doing what I asked you?”
“I’m going to-just let me finish here so this won’t spoil.”
Missy rolled her eyes. “Just forget it. I’ll do it when I get back.”
The martyr tone. Miles couldn’t stand that.
“I’ll do it,” he said. “I said I would, didn’t I?”
“Just like you’d finish the lawn before you went out fishing?” He should have just bitten his lip and kept quiet. Yes, he’d spent the day fishing instead of working around the house; yes, he’d let her down. But in the whole scheme of things, it wasn’tthat big a deal, was it? It was just her brother and sister-in-law, after all. It wasn’t as if the president were coming. There wasn’t any reason to be irrational about the whole thing. Yep, he should have kept quiet. Judging from the way she looked at him after he’d said it, he would have been better off. When she slammed the door on her way out, Miles heard the windows rattle.
Once she’d been gone a little while, however, he knew he’d been wrong, and he regretted what he’d done. He’d been a jerk, and she was right to have called him on it.
He wouldn’t, however, get the chance to say he was sorry.
“Still smoking, huh?”
Charlie Curtis, the county sheriff, looked across the table at his friend just as Miles took his place at the table.
“I don’t smoke,” Miles answered quickly.
Charlie raised his hands. “I know, I know-you’ve already told me that. Hey, it’s fine with me if you want to delude yourself. But I’ll make sure to put the ashtrays out when you come by anyway.”
Miles laughed. Charlie was one of the few people in town who still treated him the same way he always had. They’d been friends for years; Charlie had been the one who suggested that Miles become a deputy sheriff, and he’d taken Miles under his wing as soon as Miles had finished his training. He was older-sixty-five, next March-and his hair was streaked with gray. He’d put on twenty pounds in the past few years, almost all of it around his middle. He wasn’t the type of sheriff who intimidated people on sight, but he was perceptive and diligent and had a way of getting the answers he needed. In the last three elections, no one had even bothered to run against him.
“I won’t be coming by,” Miles said, “unless you stop making these ridiculous accusations.”
They were sitting at a booth in the corner, and the waitress, harried by the lunchtime crowd, dropped off a pitcher of sweet tea and two glasses of ice on her way to the next table. Miles poured the tea and pushed Charlie’s glass toward him.