Marina Air
“Evelyn.” Barbara didn’t turn from her post in front of the coffee machine. “You’re up early.”
“Yes.” The microwave clock read 6:05.
The only light in the apartment came from the dim bulb underneath the microwave. It was dark, and the Sheffield sweatshirt she had pulled from the box marked CLOTHES—EVELYN was on inside out and smelled of wood. Outside, in the parking lot of the Marina Air, a car’s tires squealed.
Yesterday, after her train ride, bus ride, and taxi ride from New York to Sag Neck, she’d arrived at the house and seen it was as stripped as the Petit Trianon apartment she’d left behind, down to the dust balls and electric cords. There were light rectangles on the wood where the rugs had been and there was hair and dust detritus where the grandfather clock and tea table and chaise had been. Evelyn’s room contained a sleeping bag, rolled up, and a shoe box full of old compacts and worn-down Lip Smackers that must have surfaced from some bathroom drawer. She looked into the front yard, which was when she saw the FOR SALE—SOLD sign.
Her father had walked in the door soon after. He looked folded into himself, like a Snoopy balloon after the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade, and had nearly screamed when he’d seen Evelyn at the top of the stairs. They were awkward around each other, her father not asking what she was doing there, she not discussing what had happened in her life. He’d tried to summon some of his old cheer, saying that the weather was fine and her mother was already settling in at the Marina Air apartment. He had been surprised that Evelyn didn’t know what this was: the apartment they had rented on the edge of town.
He drove her over to the Marina Air that night, a two-story structure with exterior stairs and exterior hallways located where Main Street gave way to Route 33. Evelyn thought it must have been a motel before it was converted to divorced-dad rentals. Barbara was inside apartment 2L, a dark four-room warren, unpacking boxes.
“What are you doing here, Evelyn?” Barbara had said. She looked like she hadn’t slept in a long time, either.
“I left New York,” Evelyn blurted. “I didn’t call. I was just—I’m sorry.”
“You left New York? Why on earth would you do that?”
“I left,” she repeated in a small voice.
Dale indicated that she should sit on the couch, which took up most of the living-dining room. “Is this because of the case?” he said. “I appreciate you coming down, but there’s no need to move here.”
“Yes. No.” Evelyn kept standing. “I was evicted from the apartment, or I think I would’ve been if I stayed. I lost my job. I lost my friends.”
Dale considered this as Barbara slumped down in a chair in the corner, facing away from both of them.
“Okay. That’s okay, Evelyn. People get into trouble,” Dale said.
“I was trying to fix it all. Too late, I was trying to fix it all, but I was trying. I was always trying,” Evelyn said. She looked at her father, who had balanced on the couch’s arm. “This way I can be here for the sentencing. That’s good. It wasn’t like I wanted it to come to this. I ran out of money, and did what I thought was best. Maybe it wasn’t. I was just trying to get through.”
“It’s all right,” he said, intertwining his fingers. “It’s all right.”
Her mother stayed in the chair, and her father finally gave her a kiss on the forehead and said that she was always welcome, which was unexpectedly kind. Evelyn walked to the small bedroom that Dale said was to be the guest-bed-office-and-Evelyn’s-room, where a framed Georgia O’Keeffe poster that Evelyn had bought at the Sheffield Shop her prep year, before she learned that all Georgia O’Keeffes were basically vaginas, hung a little askew. Evelyn wondered if her father or mother had hung it up.
The bedroom smelled of turpentine and Chinese plastic. Evelyn slept lightly and had been awake for an hour in the dark morning before she walked out to talk to her mother. Barbara still looked defeated, but at least she was speaking.
“You need help with the coffee machine?” Evelyn said.
Barbara swung the filter holder open and shut, and pressed a few buttons. “Your father always made the coffee.”
“When is he moving in here?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Once he’s wrapped things up at Sag Neck?”
“Is he wrapping things up at Sag Neck?” This was one of Barbara’s favorite repartee games, feigned confusion.
“I think so, Mom. I don’t know. I’m not really in the mood to deal with this. Is he waiting to move here until the sentencing?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, is he waiting to move here until the sentencing? Do we have to do this?”
“Do what?”
“Mom?”
“Yes?” Barbara replied distantly, as though Evelyn were inquiring about tennis-court availability at the Eastern.
“Is Dad not living here?”
“No.”
“Like, not planning on it?”
“I couldn’t say.”