“I feel like…” he says. “Do you think … I seem to recall some rumor? About your grandfather?”
“You mean that he was an alcoholic? Yeah, not a rumor. That’s true. Did I ever tell you that he died falling through a plate glass window while drunk?”
“No.” Evan shakes his head. “Yes. You did tell me that. Way back. But…”
He taps the page.
“This might be about him. Because of him.”
“Wait. You mean Sam Packard was gay? That can’t be right.”
“But you said he was discharged? Somewhat unceremoniously? The rumor was…” Evan squints hard. “I swear there was something about this. My aunt mentioned…”
“No. God no. That’s wrong. I didn’t know him, and he had his problems. But. No. Those weren’t the issues he had.”
Even as Bess says this, she wonders. An alcoholic is never just an alcoholic. He’s someone with a genetic predisposition and a trigger, a reason to self-medicate. He’s depressed. Injured. Suppressing some unwanted emotion. Then there were her grandfather’s discharge papers. Psychoneurosis. A flimsy diagnosis, like what a 1940s doctor might say if he was too nice to call you a pervert.
“I’m probably wrong,” Evan says. “I apologize for letting my imagination get away from me. Funny how long-standing family rumors eventually morph into a presumptive truth. Anyhow, you forgot Miss Rutter’s seminal conclusion.”
“What’s that?”
Bess blinks at him, confused, unsure what to think.
“Here’s how she wraps up the article,” Evan says, picking it back up. “‘So if your son isn’t a sporty type, and he’d rather help you shop or pick out china, don’t get too comfortable having him on friendly soil. The USA must accept the truth. Homosexuals are fit to serve.’”
Something picks at the back of Bess’s mind.
“And there you have it,” Evan says. “What was, I’m sure, a very pro-gay and revolutionary viewpoint, courtesy of Miss Harriet Rutter.”
“Evan!” Bess yelps. She clutches his arm. “China!”
“Uh, what?”
“Grandma Ruby’s…” She shakes her head and looks outside. “I left a box of her china outside.”
“Bess?”
She turns away from him and breaks down the hallway in a full sprint.
55
Sunday Morning
Bess slams through the double kitchen doors and books it out to the patio, where she finds Cissy sprawled on a lounger, clutching a highball like it’s three o’clock on the French Riviera and not midmorning on Nantucket. Meanwhile, there’s enough rain and bluster around them to garner a special storm name. That there’s never been a Hurricane Cissy seems like a gross injustice.
“Hi Bessie-boo,” Cissy says, and picks up her drink.
The wind whirls so mightily that even Cissy’s iced tea is sloshing around in its glass, or what Bess assumes is iced tea. Cissy normally drinks vodka but you never know. Along with the drink of debatable content, Cissy has a copy of Gone with the Wind splayed across her legs. Gone with the freaking wind. How maddeningly on the nose.
Bess has no time for this now. She sprints to the edge of the patio, then stops short. Her heart scrambles up into her throat. The patio is smaller, yes? Closer yet. She stands shivering as the rain and sand drive sideways, prickling her face.
“The box,” Bess says. “Where is it?”
“What box?” Cissy asks, and sips her drink.
Sneakers clomp out onto the patio.
“Hello there, Evan Mayhew,” Bess hears her mother say. “I’d recognize those cocksure footsteps anywhere. You know, I don’t say it nearly enough. Or ever. But you’ve turned into quite a nice young human, sabbaticals in Costa Rica notwithstanding.”
“Uh, thanks?” he says.
“It’s a miracle since you have no mom and the world’s most obnoxious and pigheaded dad.”
“Cissy!” Bess whips around. “Jesus, you’d think you were the only person in this family to ever get dumped by a Mayhew.”
“Hey!”
“Mother. Where the hell is my box?”
“Hmmm.” Cissy shrugs. “I’m not sure what box you’re referring to.”
“A cardboard box.” Bess demonstrates its size, very roughly, with her hands. “I left it here last night. It was filled with Grandma Ruby’s china. There were mice or something in it, so I brought it outside.”
Bess retraces her steps.
“Then we started talking about the hookers … er, uh, about the demise of my marriage. Then it got dark—”
“Oh yeah, it got dark all right.”
“The sun set.” Bess rolls her eyes. “We went to get dinner and I completely forgot about it.”
“Strange,” Cissy says with another shrug. “Sorry I can’t help you.”
“Are you sure you didn’t move it? Maybe you don’t remember?”
Cissy laughs dryly.
“I’ve had enough box-moving,” she says, “to want to strike out on my own. But thanks for playing. It could’ve blown away? It’s kinda breezy today.”
“Breezy?” Evan says with a scoff.
“Cis, it was a box of Grandma’s china. I broke a sweat carrying it downstairs. It couldn’t ‘blow away.’ Even in this wind.”
Bess toes up to the edge of the veranda and cranes her neck out over the cliff. As her stomach somersaults, Bess reaches behind her, as if on instinct, and is surprised to find Evan within her grasp. She gloms on to him to steady herself, though the very touch of him topples her off-balance in an entirely different way.
“Is that it?” Bess squints.
Her eyes sting from the wind and the sand and a million other things besides.
“Oh my God.”
There it is, her box of china, scattered and cracked on the embankment. They’ve lost more bluff overnight.
“Cissy!”
Bess spins back around and staggers toward her mom as Evan conducts his own inspection. His hand flies to his chest and he keeps it there, as if trying to physically hold in his breath.
“Cissy, we have to leave. Now.”
Bess is almost panting.
“You sucked me in,” she says. “I’ve gotten too comfortable here. This is beyond dangerous. We’re losing feet by the day!”
“What’s a little patio?”
“Yes, it is now quite a little patio, that’s the problem. And God knows what’s happening to the foundation of the house. Cis, it’s pouring. Are you familiar with the concept of a mudslide?”
“It’s hardly pouring. By California standards, I guess. Don’t be so dramatic.”
“It’s probably time to get a little dramatic,” Evan notes as he backs up to the house.
This is a guy who climbs roofs for a living and his face has gone completely white.
“I know you’re still trying to find a new engineer,” Bess says. “And that’s fine. I’ll even help make calls! But we need to leave. The both of us. Now.”
“It’s over,” Cissy says.
“I know it’s over, that’s what I’m trying to say.”
“I can’t get anyone to relocate our home.”
“Oh, Mom,” Bess says, and frowns. “I’m sorry but…”
“I tried to figure out if I could move it myself, but in the end it’s out of reach. Oh, this poor old girl.” Cissy looks up at the porch’s ceiling. “She won’t see a hundred years after all. Why’d my grandmother make her so large?”