“Awesome. You need my address?”
“Sir, I’m afraid your item is in Naples.”
“Naples . . . Florida?”
“Naples, Italy.”
“Italy?” Cameron’s voice jumps up an octave. “Does JoyJet even fly to Italy?”
“Hold on a moment, sir . . . Let me check something.” The woman’s keyboard strokes sound even more aggressive now, somehow. “Ah, I see what happened. Somehow, your item was transferred to one of our European partners.” She lets out a low whistle. “Wow, that’s pretty awful, even for us.”
“Yeah, you think?” Cameron fights to keep his voice calm. “So how do I get it back? There are some . . . things in there that are . . . important.”
“Sir, we advise all passengers to remove any valuables before they check—”
“But I didn’t have a choice.” Cameron explodes. “They made me check my carry-on at the gate, along with a million other people, because your overhead bins are the size of matchboxes. Do the people who design your airplanes have any idea what a typical suitcase looks like?”
After a long pause, the agent says, “Sir, I’m going to have to transfer you to our European partner’s office, who will assign a new claim number. I can get the paperwork started here, then I’ll patch you over. If I could start with your last name . . .”
Epitaph and Pens
Tova’s day starts early. She has much to accomplish.
First, she drives downtown and parks her hatchback, which is no small task because of this enormous ramshackle camper taking up two spaces between the realtor’s office and the paddle shop next door. Blocking the view of oncoming traffic. Not that there’s much oncoming traffic in downtown Sowell Bay at nine in the morning on a Thursday, but one can never be too careful.
Shooting one last perturbed glare at the hulking vehicle, she shuffles into her destination. Jessica Snell tilts her head curiously as she comes through the door.
“May I help you, Mrs. Sullivan?”
“Yes, I should say so.” Tova calmly recites the explanation she rehearsed, then leaves the office thirty minutes later with an appointment for the realtor to come for a preliminary walk-though at the house this afternoon.
Next, she walks down the block to the bank. The Charter Village application requires a cashier’s check and a copy of her account balances. To make sure she can afford it, Tova supposes. She wishes they would take her word for it that her finances won’t be a problem. Her accounts at Sowell Bay Community Bank have always been robust; the substantial sum she received from her mother’s estate has hardly been touched all these years. Tova has never needed to spend much.
As she pulls open the bank door and steps into the lobby, which smells like fresh ink and peppermint candies, as usual, it occurs to her Lars must have used up most of his half of their parent’s inheritance with his stay at Charter Village. When the lawyer followed up about the other assets, it was only a few hundred dollars. Practically speaking, Lars died with only a bathrobe left. For a moment, she hesitates. It really is an extravagant sort of lifestyle they promote at Charter Village. Not her style. But at least it’s clean. And Lars lived there for over a decade. The monthly dues add up.
“Thank you, Bryan,” she says to the teller, who hands her the check with an ever-so-slightly raised brow. Bryan’s father, Cesar, used to play golf with Will. She wonders whether Bryan will phone him and tell him about today’s transaction.
She makes a deliberate decision not to care. Such things are going to happen. People will talk. People in Sowell Bay always talk.
Her next stop is Janice Kim’s house. Janice’s son has some fancy computer scanner, and when Tova called this morning to ask if she could stop by and use it, Janice agreed immediately.
“You hanging in there?” Janice lowers her glasses, eyeing Tova’s boot skeptically. Tova isn’t known for requesting spur-of-the-moment visits.
“Of course. Why do you ask?” Tova keeps her voice even. The application requires a copy of her driver’s license, but when Tova explains this, she declines to elaborate on the nature of the paperwork.
Janice helps her scan the card and shows her which buttons to press on the printer. When they’re finished, she asks, “You want to stay for coffee?”
Tova anticipated this. She built a Janice coffee delay into her schedule.
An hour later, after departing the Kim home, Tova drives down to Elland. This would be a quick ten-minute trip if she took the interstate, but as always, Tova takes the back roads. Half an hour later, she arrives at the chain drugstore listed under “Passport Photos” in the Snohomish County phone book. The application requires two such photos, and having never been issued a passport, Tova is in possession of no such thing.
A young woman who could not possibly be more bored with her job directs Tova to stand against a blank white wall and instructs her to remove her eyeglasses, which she does without argument, clutching them in her hand and squinting at the camera as it flashes twice.
“That’ll be eighteen fifty,” the clerk says, handing over a small folio with the two square, unsmiling photos tucked inside.
“Eighteen dollars?”
“And fifty cents.”
“Good heavens.” Tova pulls a twenty-dollar bill from her pocketbook. Who would’ve thought two tiny photographs could cost so much?
Her final errand brings her back to the northern edge of Sowell Bay, nearly an hour-long journey from Elland, to Fairview Memorial Park. The afternoon has grown lovely, and the gates are propped open like welcoming arms under the clear, cloudless sky. A footpath winds around the cemetery lawn, gentle curves heading this way and that, never a straight line. Like it was designed to make the walk seem as soft as possible. The grass is flawless, edged meticulously around the identical headstones.
She kneels on the grass and traces along the engraving on his stone. The smooth, polished rock is warm under her fingers, basking in the hot July sun. WILLIAM PATRICK SULLIVAN: 1938–2017. HUSBAND, FATHER, FRIEND.
When she’d submitted the epitaph to Fairview Memorial Park’s coordinator, the woman had the nerve to ask if she was sure she didn’t want to add more. The package included up to 120 characters, she explained, and Tova had only used half. But sometimes less is more. Will was a simple man.
Next to Will’s headstone is Erik’s. Tova hadn’t wanted one; Will had insisted. It has always bothered her that Erik’s commemoration lies here, in this grassy field, when his body never left the sea. But the stone sits here, with its overly fussy font that reads, ERIK ERNEST SULLIVAN. Whomever Will had designated to take care of it hadn’t even bothered to record Erik’s name correctly. Tova’s maiden name, Lindgren, is supposed to be Erik’s second middle name. She has always fantasized about stealing Erik’s headstone and hurling it off the end of the pier, but one can’t do things like that, of course.
The third stone in the row is blank, meant for her. There’s a series of questions on the application about this, too. Wishes, preferences. Meant to be a supplement to one’s legal arrangements, Tova supposes. She has made her preferences clear in her own documents, of course, but what if someone tries to insist on a service? She could see Barb, in particular, doing something like that. Tova must broach the topic with her before she leaves. A marker will be fine, but she prefers no service.
Voices drift across the lawn. She turns to see old Mrs. Kretch ambling up the path. Heavens, the woman must be in her midnineties. But she’s getting around well, by the looks of it. She’s brought her great-granddaughter with her today, a coltish thing with legs as long and straight as a pair of knitting needles.
“Hi, Mrs. Sullivan,” the great-granddaughter says as they pass. Old Mrs. Kretch nods, her eyes meeting Tova’s just long enough to impart a pitying look.