The boy goes back to the car without saying good-bye. I stand in the hallway and look out the door. He gets in the car and slams the door shut. Behind him, the sun is setting. It’s another one of those pink-to-orange sunsets that used to take my breath away. I move back from the door quickly, though, because I know the caterer is on her way out. Truth is, if I don’t have to exchange amenities with her, all the better. I’m not good at thinking of things to say to people I don’t know.
The caterer ducks her head into the room where I’m standing. She says, “You have a good party tonight. I think you’re really going to like the fiery-hot bean dip.” She smiles and — to my surprise — shrugs. The shrug seems to have no context.
My wife comes out of the kitchen, carrying a tray of sliced meat. I offer to carry platters with her, but she says she’s fussy and she’d rather do it herself. That way, she’ll know where she’s placed everything. I wonder whether she couldn’t just look at the table and see where she’s put things, but when my wife is preparing for something it is not the time to ask questions. She’ll snap and get in a bad mood. So I go out to the front porch and watch the sky darken.
The caterer honks as she pulls away, and for some reason — probably because he’s sitting so straight — the boy reminds me of what happened when part of the highway in to Washington was reserved for cars carrying at least three passengers: people around here started buying inflatable dolls and sitting them in the car. They put hats and coats on them.
“Mary Virushi and her husband are having a trial separation, but she’s coming to the party with him anyway,” my wife says from the doorway.
“Why’d you have to tell me that?” I say, turning away from the sunset and coming back into the house. “It’ll just make me feel uncomfortable around them.”
“Oh, you’ll survive,” she says. She often uses this expression. She hands me a stack of paper plates and asks me to divide it in thirds and place the stacks along the front of the table. She asks me to get the napkins out of the cabinet and put piles of them down the middle of the table, between the vases of daisies.
“Nobody’s supposed to know about the Virushis,” she says, carrying out a tray of vegetables. Fanned out around the bowl in the middle, their colors — orange and red and white — remind me of the sky and the way it looked a few minutes ago.
“Also,” she says, “please don’t make it a point to rush to refill Oren’s glass every time it’s empty. He’s making an effort to cut back.”
“You do it,” I say. “If you know everything, you do everything.”
“You always get nervous when we entertain,” she says. She brushes past me. When she comes back, she says, “The caterer really did a beautiful job. All I have to do is wash the platters and put them out on the porch tomorrow, and she’ll take them away. Isn’t that wonderful?” She kisses my shoulder. “Have to get dressed,” she says. “Are you going to wear what you’ve got on?”
I have on white jeans and a blue knit shirt. I nod yes. Surprisingly, she doesn’t argue. As she walks up the stairs, she says, “I can’t imagine needing air-conditioning, but do what you think best.”
I go back to the porch and stand there a minute. The sky is darker. I can see a firefly or two. One of the little boys in the neighborhood passes by on his bike, all shiny blue, with training wheels on the back. There are streamers on the handlebars. The cat that kills birds walks by. I’ve been known to fill a water pistol and squirt the cat when nobody’s looking. I’ve also turned the hose on it. It walks on the edge of our lawn. I know just what it’s thinking.
I go in and take a look at the table. Upstairs, water is running in the shower. I wonder if Marie will wear one of her sundresses. She has a handsome back, and she looks lovely in the dresses. In spite of what she says, I do travel — and I often like it. Five years ago, we went to Bermuda. I bought the sundresses for her there. She never changes size.
On the table, there’s enough food to feed an army. Half a watermelon has been hollowed out and filled with melon balls and strawberries. I have a strawberry. There are what look like cheese balls, rolled in nuts, and several bowls of dip, with vegetables around some and crackers in a bowl next to the others. I spear a piece of pineapple wrapped in prosciutto. I drop the toothpick in my pocket and push the pieces closer together, so the one I took won’t be missed. Before the caterer came, my wife put out the liquor on the deep window ledge. There are candles with matches, ready to light. She might be wrong about the music — at least, it might be nice to have some music playing just as the first few people show up — but why argue? I agree that since there’s a nice breeze we don’t need air-conditioning.
In a little while, Marie comes down. She does not have on a sundress. She is wearing a blue linen dress I’ve never been fond of, and she is carrying a suitcase. She is not smiling. She looks, suddenly, quite drawn. Her hair is damp, and pulled back in a clip. I blink, not quite believing it.
“There isn’t any party,” she says. “I’d like you to see what it’s like, to have food prepared — even though you didn’t prepare it — and then just to wait. To wait and wait. Maybe this way you’ll see what that’s like.”
As fast as I think You’re kidding! I also know the answer. She isn’t kidding. But the marriage counselor — no marriage counselor would agree that what she’s doing is all right.
“You couldn’t possibly be so childish,” I say.
But she’s out the door, going down the walk. Moths fly into the house. One flies across my mouth, tickling my skin. “What are you going to say about this to Dr. Ford?” I say.
She turns. “Why don’t you ask Dr. Ford over for cocktails?” she says. “Or do you think the sight of real life might be too much for him?”
“Are you quitting?” I say. But I’ve lost heart. I’m out of steam, nearly out of breath. I say it so quietly I’m not sure that she heard. “Are you ignoring me?” I holler. When she doesn’t answer, I know she is. She gets in the car, starts it, and drives away.
For a minute I’m so stunned that I sink down in one of the porch chairs and just stare. The street is unusually quiet. The cicadas have started to send up their sound. As I sit there, trying to calm myself, the boy on the bike pedals slowly up the hill. The neighbor’s poodles start barking. I hear her shushing them. Then the barking subsides.
What was Marie thinking of? I can’t remember the last time I was late for dinner. It was years ago. Years.
Katrina Duvall comes by. “Mitch?” she says, raising her hand over her brow and looking at the porch.
“Yes?” I say.
“Have you gotten your paper the last couple of Sundays?”
“Yes,” I call back.
“We stopped it when we went to Ocean City, and we can’t get it started again,” she says. “I knew I should have just asked you to take it in, but you know Jack.” Jack is her son, who is slightly retarded. She either does everything to please Jack or says that she does. The implication is that he is a tyrant. I know very little about him except that he slurs his words and once, during a snowstorm, he helped me dig out my driveway.
“All right, then,” she says, and walks away.
In the distance, I hear rock and roll. There is loud laughter in the Vandergrifts’ house. Who is having such a good time, if the child is sick? I squint hard at the house, but where the windows are lit it’s too bright to see in. A squeal, and more laughing. I get up and walk across the lawn. I knock on the door. Molly, breathless, answers.
“Hi,” I say. “I know this is a silly question, but did my wife invite you for drinks tonight?”