Read Online Love & Darts (9781937316075) by Nath Jones - Free Book Online Page B

the door
to the basement stairs, and disappears.
    Back in the kitchen Mrs. Swindan has come
downstairs. She and Mrs. Roth are working away. “Doesn’t it seem
unlikely?” Mrs. Swindan says it as if caught—an eagle in a tall
chicken wire fence. A fight is useless. They are sisters. And so
the reply from Mrs. Roth, “Mmm.” She preheats the oven and begins
to pour a layer of rock salt into a jelly roll pan. The sound of
the salt against the metal is muffled by jazz.
    The sink is full of ice. The kitchen walls
bask in the last of the afternoon sun. The white wine, in glasses
lined up in the window, holds glimpses of the light. Leaning on the
stove, hands on the aprons, sipping periodically, the sisters clean
and straighten up nothing that needs to be done. They are waiting
for the oysters.
    The conversation dies easily. A pattern made
by a thousand arguments not bothered with in the presence of
guests, like this nosy young wife of one of the older
grandchildren. The matronly sisters pretend not to notice that she
keeps popping up every time they both turn around. Mrs. Roth might
involve her but cannot remember her name. So instead she watches a
group of children trample her sugar snap peas in the garden as they
squabble about who should retrieve the soccer ball. Her children
and her sister’s children and some children of friends are trying
to be careful, but the soccer ball has wreaked havoc enough.
    The peas can handle it. She turns away from
the window and tries to remember the name of the young woman Mrs.
Hamel must have rebuffed, picks up her glass, and puts the back of
her hand against the oven door, testing the heat.
    “What’s Owen’s new wife’s name?”
    “I thought you knew. She stood there
hovering and I had absolutely no idea. I was about to ask.”
    “Mrs. Hamel must have said something to her.
She slithered down the stairs two minutes ago.”
    “I didn’t see that. Are you sure?”
    “Yes. You know how she can be.”
    “Who?”
    Mrs. Hamel overhears Mrs. Swindan and Mrs.
Roth. She said, “Her name is Christa. And I didn’t say a word. The
girl’s got no—”
    But Mrs. Swindan doesn’t wait for her
comment. She yanks the basement door open. “Christa!”
    Christa hurries up the stairs. She stands
close to Mrs. Roth who quickly hands her the salad tongs. “Just
toss everything together. Be sure to get the tomatoes and olives
off the bottom.” Mrs. Swindan doesn’t bother to remind her sister
that three people asked for salad without dressing and that two
others hate olives, which is why things were as they were with the
dressing on the bottom.
    But. Mrs. Hamel forgets nothing. “What do
you expect Andre to do?” Christa looks first to Mrs. Roth, who has
obviously forgotten, then to Mrs. Swindan, who shakes her head, and
lastly to Mrs. Hamel who throws her hands up proving herself beyond
all culpability. Christa says, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
    Everyone is relieved by the sound of the
garage door rising. Two men laugh heartily. One opens the door. The
other backs his way up the stairs, slowly. They each hold one
handle of an old metal tub. They carry it awkwardly through the
door and steady it with slow steps, outstretched arms, and
dictatorial statements. The women disperse like a flock of
starlings that rises just a few feet and settles again on a
different part of the lawn. Because they’ve arrived. Not the men
but what they carry.
    No one says a word. Everyone watches while
the two men lift the tub, tilt it, slowly, slowly. One says,
“Steady.” And the other wraps his lips around his teeth in a
grimace. “Pull it back. Yeah. Okay. Now go.” They let the ocean
water splash down into the sink. The oysters rattle, clatter,
tumble, and fall, piling onto each other in a haze of the sea on
ice.
    The men tip the tub a few inches further, to
be sure, to be absolutely sure. One of them grabs both handles,
tips it all the way upside-down to be a hundred percent certain.
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