“Can’t stay away?” I say, wishing I had something wittier to offer.
“I figured you wouldn’t want to stay in the house with your momma, especially with Marlon up there. Thought you might want company.”
“I’ve had an awful lot of company today.”
“I’ll go, if you want. I just thought you might appreciate conversation with someone who doesn’t share any genes with you. To remind you that crazy as you are, you’re the sane one,” he says.
I can’t help smiling. It might be flattery, but I believe him, and it’s what I need to hear. “Well, it is nice to have some confirmation.”
“It must be a madhouse up there.”
“Even my grandmother is here.”
He makes a face; he doesn’t much care for Opal. She’s touchy-feely with him, too, and I suspect she may have been too appreciative of his biceps when she visited for our high school graduation. She hadn’t stopped fussing at me that whole weekend: “Is that lovely boy your boyfriend? He certainly is good-looking. Don’t string him along too long, Ava.” I suspected Zelda of oversharing, but in retrospect, Wyatt’s and my taut game of sexual tension and emotional withholding had probably been painfully obvious to anyone not caught in the throes of high school hormones.
“Icing on the cake. Your mom drinking?” he asks.
I snort. “What do you think?”
“And you?” He knows he’s on thin ice here, so he’s keeping his tone very light.
“A bit.”
“Did you eat any dinner?” I look at him sullenly, guiltily. “You look thin, Ava.” I know it’s not meant as a compliment, but I can’t help it. I’m pleased. “Let me take you for a bite to eat.”
“I’m afraid I have errands to run,” I say in irritation. I fumble in my bag for the keys to the truck, but I drop them on the dark ground. Wyatt moves catlike from his perch on the steps and has them between his fingers before I can bend down and scoop them up.
“Ava, don’t be stupid. You trying to kill yourself with carelessness?”
“Runs in the family. I always was just a little behind Zelda,” I say petulantly.
He squints. “Don’t you fucking say stuff like that. You have to take better care of yourself. Hey, you hear me?” he says when I start to turn away from him.
“Thanks for your patronizing suggestions. Noted.”
He softens. Wyatt hates to fight. “Hey, I’m just worried, Pea.” His casual use of that old nickname makes my breath catch in my throat. Pea, short for “Sweet Pea.” Corny as hell, but it hits home, like nicknames are supposed to. Shortcuts to intimacy. “Let me take you for a snack, and then we’ll do your errands together. Though I’m afraid to ask what errands you might be doing at this time of night,” he adds with a nervous quirk of his mouth.
I look at him, considering. I am a bit tipsy, and even though it’s all back roads to Kuma’s, given my druthers, I would still prefer not to drive drunk. It also crosses my mind that having him along when I head to the strip club might not be the worst idea. And, if I were to be candid with myself, a glimmer of something else flickers through my mind. I miss him.
“What’s for dinner?” I ask.
12
Like everyone else in Hector, we get dinner from Stonecat, up the road from Silenus. It’s a simple barn-shaped building that appears deceptively hick. Inside, though, there’s a rustic bar, a raised back deck that looks out onto the lake, and a shockingly capable kitchen that whips up gourmet country food. I always struggle to describe Hector to anyone not from here; it is slippery in its distillation of bumpkins, rednecks, foodies, right-wingers, and wine snobs. Some of the people I see at the bar tonight work outdoors with their hands all day and have never left the county. I recognize a neighbor who I know for a fact went to Ithaca for the first time two years ago and celebrated the journey as though he’d ventured halfway across the world. At the other end of the bar is someone who, rarely enough, made some money in the wine business and has a second home in Tuscany.
I can tell from the way the bartender looks at me that Zelda must come here often, possibly with Wyatt; I recognize him from high school and wiggle my fingers in greeting. He squints back at me suspiciously, and without greeting me in return he asks if I also want no red onion on my falafel sandwich. I don’t want onion, but perversely I tell him I’ll have it. I feel like I have to eat it, because Zelda doesn’t. Wyatt squints at me strangely.
“You know, she liked red onion,” he says when I raise my eyebrow at his expression. “She stopped eating it ’cause of you.”
“She did?” I furrow my brows, trying to remember her eating it. “No, she always asked if there was red onion before she ordered tuna salad sandwiches. She said it ruined it.”
“That was for you. You guys usually split your food.”
He’s right. I’m caught off guard, having been so blind to a small generosity. I wonder if there are others I have failed to catch.
As we wait for our sandwiches, we decide to order wine. This, too, is new for Wyatt; in high school he was definitely a beer guy. He orders me a glass of dry Sauvignon Blanc without asking, which both irritates and charms me. Wyatt drinks a red, even though it’s still hot out. The bar buzzes with summer and alcohol. His thigh brushes up against my own, hot and solid, and I feel a tremor deep behind my navel that I’m desperate to ignore.
“So, Wyatt, what are you up to these days?” I say, scooting away from him. I’m grateful when the bartender slides my glass of wine across the old cherrywood bar. The twin of this bar, an identical slab of wood, split from the same tree, props up similarly rural barflies in Trumansburg, a scant fourteen miles away.
“I thought Zelda would have told you.”
“Zelda detected that it was a sensitive subject. She didn’t mention you too much. In the emails.”
“Ah. I knew she was writing you. I assumed it was to, uh, explain. I figured I’d better let her handle it.” I squint at him, wondering if there’s subtext to the comment.
“Nope. I think it was to guilt me into coming home.” I shrug. “Finally worked.”
“Well, I finished up my degree. Environmental science and sustainability.”
“I remember,” I say testily.
“I’ve been at Silenus a lot. Helping out. You know. With the grapes.”
“I figured.”
“Zelda’s done okay, you know. She learned a whole lot, worked her ass off. She can really commit to something when she wants to.” I don’t answer, just swish the wine in my glass. “And the rest of the time, I’m working on the farm with the ’rents,” he continues.
“Soybeans still?”
“And some veggies now. We want to start a CSA, maybe. Eventually.”