The lion was unmarked precisely because it was so special. Craig Furst said the inkwell was Austrian, 1860s; the porcelain interior was the giveaway, and he’d never seen a piece quite like it. Usually, he wrote, the “power” animal motifs in inkwells are standing, looking predatory and masculine, etc. But your lion, sitting down, looks . . . cute. The glass eyes are really wild. Was your grandfather a big softie? (And not that you asked, but I’d say $800–$1,100 retail.)
Grace called an antiques store in Nashville, the first fancy-looking listing she found. She told them what she thought she had and asked if they were interested, and they were. Could she send a picture?
Sure, she almost said. But then she realized that she’d already screwed up, taking a picture of it for Craig. Now there was a trail, however short, going right into her e-mail.
“I can just bring it in,” she said. “I’m in the area this weekend.”
The next day, she took a Greyhound bus to Nashville and sold the lion inkwell for $655. She told Riley the good news when she got home, insisting he take the money for his car payment or repair, whatever he was prioritizing. “We’re married,” she said. “Your problems are my problems too.”
If Grace could have relied on the docents’ poor eyesight and consistent amnesia, she would have robbed the Wynne House every day, one little objet at a time. She felt sharp and in control. She’d helped Riley, and she’d hurt no one. But she had already been there three times. She couldn’t go back again.
She hated that she’d lied to Riley about where she’d gotten the inkwell. How stupid and unnecessary—that lie chewed at her, another sin to atone for without his knowing. She never used to lie to him. There was one thing she would never tell him, but these little lies had to stop. She knew they made her lonelier, built the wall between her and Riley, or between what they had now and the love they used to have, a few bricks higher every time she told one. And Riley would have loved the idea of stealing desk accessories from the Wynne House. He would have eaten it up.
“I have to tell you something,” she said in bed the next night. “Don’t worry.”
“Uh-oh,” he said.
“I didn’t buy that inkwell from Lamb’s,” she smirked, rolling to face him in the dark.
“You didn’t?”
“I stole it,” she said. He looked at her, waiting, sure he hadn’t heard right. “I stole it from the Wynne House. I went on a tour—”
“Again? Another tour?”
“Another tour, and I took it. The docent wasn’t looking, and I just—took it.”
“Christ,” he said. “Why?”
“So you could make your car payment. And to see if I could, I guess. To see what would happen.” She tried to sound sassy, playful, but it sounded wrong. She’d said it all wrong.
He sat up and turned on the light.
“That stuff is all just sitting there, and nobody gives a shit about it, and—what? I thought you would—” she faltered. Would what? Congratulate her?
“Would what?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I can’t say it right.”
“What’s the matter with you?”
She swallowed. “What do you mean?”
“Lately, you’re just—not yourself. Really weird, actually. Irresponsible.”
“Sorry, Riley, but there’s not much to be responsible for. I get up, have nothing to do, read, run, look at the jobs, wait for you—”
“I mean, I figured you were depressed about school, but you won’t tell me what went so wrong up there—”
“I flunked out,” she said angrily. “I failed three of my four classes and the fourth gave me a B, but I have no idea why.” She shut her eyes.
“Oh my God,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“What the fuck would I say? There’s no good reason. There’s no excuse. It just happened. I got that job, and I got way too involved, and I forgot that school was, you know.” She shrugged, awkwardly, since she was still lying down. “The reason I was there.” The truth was even more humiliating once she said it out loud. She had loved her job’s proximity to precious objects—being trusted with them, in a way. For as long as she could remember, she’d studied how she appeared to others, but to become the appraiser? To wield the power of evaluation, approval, dismissal? Knocking an old chair down a few hundred dollars had given her pleasure. All for Donald, at thirteen dollars an hour, ostensibly to help her pay for a college that was costing her $302 each day, many of which she had skipped to work.
She started to cry and tried to keep talking through her seizing throat. “I couldn’t tell anyone. It’s just too pathetic.”
“Christ.” He pulled her toward him and she wept on his chest. “You should have told me.”
“I didn’t want to disappoint you.”
“It would have explained a lot. I thought you were unhappy with me.”
“No,” she blubbered. “I could never be unhappy with you.”
He sighed and stroked her head, and there they lay in repair, the forgiver and the forgiven.
19
No one wanted Riley’s car. He’d felt so flush when he bought it, he admitted; he couldn’t imagine not having more money. He thought he’d sell a painting every month, that the commissions would come rolling in. But he’d satisfied Garland’s needs better than he’d meant to.
They tacitly agreed to revise their memories of the inkwell argument for a tonal adjustment. Riley was determined to laugh—at the inkwell, at himself. He pointed to the objects in Grace’s photos from the Wynne House, playing a version of The Price Is Right. “How much for that one? Three grand? Four? Too bad you couldn’t fit that in your pocket.”
She knew now how she’d screwed up. He had always been the rascal. She was supposed to play the goody-goody, Pollyanna looking over her shoulder for parents, teachers, and cops. Taking something from the Wynne House should have been his idea. If Riley had been on the tour with her that day, Grace could have cocked an eyebrow and he would have put the lion in his pocket, and later, he would have gloated as she pretended to scold him. That was how they worked; she knew their roles, and yet she hadn’t really seen their limits until now. She vowed to do better. Every couple hit a rough patch from time to time. She would pull them through.
? ? ?
On a Tuesday night in late February, Grace was eating vanilla ice cream in the Grahams’ living room after dinner with Riley, his brother Colin, and Dr. and Mrs. Graham. They were all talking about basketball, or they had been, and Grace had gotten lost imagining her teeth in Alls’s shoulder, the nakedness of his stare, and (God, how unfair to remember this so well) the way he’d nuzzled down her belly, down between her thighs to tease them apart.
“Gracie and I are bored,” Mrs. Graham said, startling Grace out of her daydream. “We’ll see y’all later.” She crooked a finger at Grace for her to follow.
Mrs. Graham led Grace upstairs into the master bedroom and shut the door behind her.
“They do go on, don’t they?” she said, going to her closet. “Gracie, tell me, how are you doing?”
“Fine.” Grace swallowed. “Relieved. To be home.” Since she’d come home, she’d avoided being alone with Mrs. Graham, fearing that Riley’s mother would somehow know, that she would look at Grace and see exactly what she was hiding.
“I know you two must have missed each other something awful,” Mrs. Graham said. “You’ve never had to be apart before.”
So this would be that conversation. “Yeah,” Grace said. “I thought I could imagine it, but I just couldn’t do it. I mean, I didn’t want to.”