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“The unwitting femme fatale,” De
“Is Elise having any fun?” Jea
“I have no idea,” Amanda said. “I’m only her mother.”
“I guess ballet has kind of taken her away from things.”
Amanda didn’t answer. The three of them were silent a moment, their gazes fixed on a nearby toddler in a swim diaper who was pursuing a committee of gulls. The gulls strutted ahead of him at a dignified pace, gradually speeding up although they pretended not to notice him.
“How about Susan?” Jea
“She’s having a great time,” he said. “She really likes coming here. These are the only cousins she’s got.”
“Oh, does Carla not have any siblings?”
“Just an unmarried brother.”
Jea
“How is Carla these days?” Amanda asked after a moment.
“Fine as far as I know.”
“Do you see much of her?”
“No.”
“Do you see anybody?”
“Do I see anybody?”
“You know what I mean. Any women.”
“Not really,” De
“Why not?” Jea
“Well, I kind of come across as a deadbeat. I mean, it’s not as if I’ve been blazing an impressive career path all these years.”
“Oh, that’s ridiculous. Lots of women would fall for you.”
“No,” De
“So? You’re a teacher! Or a substitute teacher, at least.”
“Right,” De
A little girl ran past them toward the water — the granddaughter of the next-door people. Reflexively, De
“Have we ever found out for sure that they come for just the one week?” Amanda asked. “Maybe they’re here all summer.”
“No,” Jea
“Maybe they stay on, then, after we leave.”
“Well, maybe. I guess they could. But I like to think that they go when we do. They have the same conversation we always have: next year, should they make it two weeks? But by the end of their vacation they say, ‘Oh, one week is enough, really.’ And so they come for the same week year after year, and fifty years from now we’ll be saying”—here Jea
“They’ve brought their lunch today,” De
Jea
“It would be a disappointment,” Amanda said.
“How come?”
“They would turn out to have some boring name, like Smith or Brown. They’d work in, let’s say, advertising, or computer sales or consulting. Whatever they worked in, it would be a letdown. They’d say, ‘Oh, how nice to meet you; we’ve always wondered about you,’ and then we’d have to give our boring names, and our boring occupations.”
“You really think they wonder about us?”
“Well, of course they do.”
“You think they like us?”
“How could they not?” Amanda asked.
Her tone was jokey, but she wasn’t smiling. She was openly studying the next-door people with a serious, searching expression, as if she weren’t so sure after all. Did they find the Whitshanks attractive? Intriguing? Did they admire their large numbers and their closeness? Or had they noticed a hidden crack somewhere — a sharp exchange or an edgy silence or some sign of strain? Oh, what was their opinion? What insights could they reveal, if the Whitshanks walked over to them that very instant and asked?
It was the custom for the men to do the dishes every evening while they were on vacation. They would shoo the women out—“Go on, now! Go! Yes, we know: put the leftovers in the fridge”—and then De
Amanda’s Hugh wasn’t around for this. Her little family ate most of their suppers in town.
On their final evening, Thursday, the cleanup was more extensive. Every leftover had to be dumped, and the refrigerator shelves had to be emptied and wiped down. Jea
“What’s the plan for tomorrow?” De
Hugh said, “Well, I should, at least. I’ve got half a dozen messages on my cell phone.” He meant messages from the college. “Lots of stuff to see to in the dorms.”
“So,” De
“Pretty soon,” Stem said. He returned a not-quite-clean plate to the sink.
“You don’t want to wait too long to move back home,” De
Stem was drying another plate. He stopped for a second, but then he went on drying. “They’ve already switched,” he said. “Nora registered both of the older boys last week.”
“But it makes more sense for you to move back, now that I’m staying on.”
Stem laid the plate on a stack of others.
“You’re not staying,” he said.
“What?”
“You’ll be leaving any time now.”
“What are you talking about?”
De
“That’s bullshit,” De
Jea
“You just say that because you wish I weren’t staying,” De
“I don’t want you out of the way,” Stem said. They were facing each other squarely now. Stem was gripping a plate in one hand and the towel in the other, and he spoke a little more loudly than he needed to. “God! What do I have to do to convince you I’m not out to get you? I don’t want anything that’s yours. I never have! I’m just trying to be a help to Mom and Dad!”
Red said, “What? Wait.”
“Well, isn’t that just like you,” De
Stem started to say something more; he drew in a breath and opened his mouth. Then he made a despairing noise that sounded like “Aarr!” and without even seeming to think about it, he wheeled toward De