Before Will got sick, Tova used to pack a picnic for two: cheese, fruit, sometimes a bottle of red wine with two plastic tumblers. At Hamilton Park, if the tide was low, they’d scramble down and sit on the beach under the seawall. They’d bury their bare feet in the coarse sand and let the cold, foamy sound lick their ankles as it washed ashore.
Tova pulls her hatchback into the empty lot. “Park” has always been a generous term for the narrow strip of soggy grass, its two weather-worn picnic tables, and the drinking fountain that never works.
Now, Tova comes here to be alone with her thoughts, when she needs a break from being alone in her house. When even the television can’t punch through the unbearable quiet.
The top of the picnic table is surprisingly hot to the touch, burning under the now clear blue skies, basking in summer’s sudden arrival. She opens the newspaper to the crossword and brushes away eraser crumbs. The tide is low and the water is calm, waves plopping onto the beach with heavy, lazy laps. Within minutes Tova wishes she’d brought a hat; it’s so hot the sun burns on the crown of her head.
“Let’s see,” she addresses the crossword. Half its squares are filled, the product of her morning coffee hour. She resumes with Six Letters: Harry of Blondie.
She traces her pencil under the clue. The rock band Blondie. She bought Erik a cassette for Christmas one year.
He’d been about ten, so maybe it was ’79 or ’80? He played it on repeat for months, until the tape warbled. Tova can picture the cassette’s cover: a red-lipped blonde in a shimmery dress. She can’t imagine that lady being called Harry. So perhaps this clue is about something else.
Tova moves on, as she does.
The next clue is Three Letters: Flannel feature. “Talk about a softball,” Tova mutters as she fills in the squares: N, A, P.
The whizz of a coasting bicycle interrupts Tova’s contemplation of Six Letters: Italian automaker Bugatti. Then two clicks, unclipping from pedals. The man’s fancy cleats force him to walk awkwardly as he crosses the pavement to the drinking fountain. He’s tall and lean, but his waddle makes Tova think of a penguin.
“You’ll find it useless, I’m afraid,” Tova says.
“Huh?” The man turns toward Tova as if surprised she’s there.
“The drinking fountain. Out of order.” “Oh. Uh, thanks.”
Tova peers over her shoulder and watches him position his mouth over the spigot. He curses as he turns the handle. “The town should fix that,” he grumbles. He takes off his sunglasses and looks out at the sound with a parched sort of look, as if wondering how bad the seawater could really
taste.
Tova fishes an unopened bottle of water from the bottom of her bag. She always keeps one on hand, just in case. “Would you like a drink?”
He holds up a palm. “Oh no. I couldn’t.” “Please, I insist.”
“Well, okay.” The man’s cleats squish in the grass as he walks over. He twists open the bottle and chugs, washing the whole thing down in seconds. “Thanks. It’s hotter out here than I expected.”
“Yes, I should say so. Summer has finally arrived.”
He sets his sunglasses on the table and sits across from her. “Huh. I didn’t know people still did crosswords.” He leans over the paper, craning his neck at the puzzle. Reluctantly, Tova rotates the paper so it’s sideways to both of them. They gaze together at it. Somewhere over the sound, a seagull squawks, ringing through the silence. Tova suppresses a cringe as a drop of sweat falls from the man’s chin, bleeding the newsprint on the advice column.
“Ettore,” he says suddenly. “I beg your pardon?”
“Ettore. Six letters for Italian automaker. Ettore Bugatti,” the man says with a grin. “Those are bitchin’ cars.”
Tova pencils in the letters. The word fits. “Thank you,” she says.
“Oh! And that one’s Debbie. Debbie Harry of Blondie.”
Of course. Tova clicks her tongue, scolding herself as she writes. When the letters fit, the man holds his hand up for a high five. Tova hesitates, then slaps her small palm against his large, damp one.
A silly gesture, but she allows herself a smile.
“Man, I had a crush on Debbie Harry back in the day,” he says, chuckling, eyes crinkling around the edges.
Tova nods. “Yes, my son was fond of her, too.” The man stares at her. His eyes widen.
“Holy shit,” he whispers. “I beg your pardon?”
“You’re Erik Sullivan’s mom.” Tova stills. “Yes, I am.”
“Wow,” the man says under his breath.
“And you are?” Tova forces herself to ask this particular question, tamping down the others which threaten to spill out, the endless iterations of did you know him, were you there, what do you know?
“I’m Adam Wright. I went to school with Erik. We had a few classes together, senior year, before he . . .”
“Before he died.” Tova fills in the blank again.
“Right. I’m . . . so sorry.” He clips into his pedals. “Um, I should get going. Thanks for the drink.” The bike’s chain whirs as he rides off.
For a long time, Tova sits at the picnic table with the unfinished puzzle, running through all of the questions she ought to have asked him. Willing herself to breathe.
This Adam Wright. Was he one of the ones who came to the service? Who sat in that candlelight vigil they held on the football field at the school?
AT HOME, LAUNDRY waits. It’s Wednesday, which means stripping the bed and washing the sheets, along with the week’s towels.
Folded in a neat pile on top of her washing machine is the flannel bathrobe that she retrieved from Charter Village last week. Lars wore it nonstop for years, the nurse had explained. Tova wishes she’d left it there. Why would she want her dead brother’s old housecoat? Couldn’t they wash it and pass it on to someone else? Donate it to charity? Cut it up into rags for cleaning, which is what Tova usually does with her own clothing when it’s outrun its useful life?
Many people cherish things like this, the nurse said when Tova hesitated.
So now it sits in her house, a reminder to Tova of how she is unlike many people.
Last week, she’d held a pair of scissors to its hem, ready to make rags, before changing her mind, deciding she had plenty of rags for now.
The collection of Lars’s personal effects also included a small stack of photographs. Some were very old, slices of the childhood she and Lars shared. These, Tova filed among the boxes of family photos in her attic, tucking them between her own albums.
Some were rather new, relatively speaking, featuring faces Tova didn’t recognize. Slices of the life Lars led after their estrangement. Middle-aged adults smiling at a cocktail
party, a group of hikers pausing under a mountain waterfall. This was a Lars she never knew. These, she threw in the trash.
There was one photo that fit neither of these categories. It featured Lars with a teenage Erik on a sailboat, perched side by side. Two pairs of long legs dangling, suntans offset by the boat’s bright white hull.
It was Lars who taught Erik to sail. Showed him every trick in the book, a solution to every improbable nautical scenario. Such as, how to leave an anchor rope cut clean.
This photo hurt to look at. Tova nearly tossed it in the trash but stopped at the last minute and buried it in the back of her kitchen drawer that held pot holders and towels, even though it didn’t belong there, either.
