needed.”
“Something else?”
“A foundation.”
“Foundation? You mean, for giving away money?”
“A 501(c)3.”
“Are you kidding?”
“Dead serious. But like I say, no rush. We can talk more when you’re feeling up to it.”
They were leaving then, he and the dog, with little acknowledgment, the dog’s nails clicking across the kitchen floor. She noticed its bowls were still beside the trash can—one with a few kibbles remaining, the other with water. She and Hal had never had a dog. She thought vaguely that Hal might not have liked them very much, might have preferred cats such as the one he bought for Casey. Though he had always said he liked dogs, this might have been a white lie of sorts, she thought. Why had they never had a dog, if in fact they both liked dogs?
But it was true what he had told her about T.—her employer was sane, though certainly changed. Apparently it was straightforward: he’d turned liberal Democrat from fiscal Republican. Of course she did not know how he voted. For all she knew he never voted at all. But clearly he had some notion of being a do-gooder. (Why was the term so bitter, so resentful?) Anyway he was newly bent on charity. Such reversals were not uncommon, almost cliché, in fact: it was only the certainty with which he’d proceeded, before, the certainty of his commitment that made it seem absurd. Then again the kid was only in his twenties, barely older than Casey. She’d given him too much credit for being fully formed. He had always had a veneer of maturity.
She heard his car back out of the driveway and walked with her glass of water into the living room, past a bookshelf where there was a picture of Hal and her. It was before they had Casey, when they were young, and Casey had had it framed and set it up there. They were two young hippies, long-haired and smiling. Well, she was long-haired. Hal had never gone that way. But he did sport a mustache and the obligatory beard, which Casey always found amusing. True to its era the picture was sun-bleached and faded; they stood holding hands in front of a silver Airstream. Susan wore what appeared to be a striped muumuu, Hal a flowery tunic. She had picked out his clothes for him back then.
A n offer came in for the house and she began to sort Hal’s things into boxes to give away, boxes to move with, boxes for Casey. Into Casey’s boxes she put a model horse, toy soldiers, a sailboat with peeling blue paint. That was easy; it was the half-broken objects that were hard, the ones too slight or old to keep—a slingshot made crudely out of twigs and rubber bands, Boy Scout badges, worn baseball cards from the fifties. There were report cards. In second grade Hal had received an A in Deportment; in fifth he’d gotten a B– and the remark, in a slanted, loopy hand, At times, Hal can be boisterous .
Her own items were the bulk of it. She’d kept more than Hal had and the worst was something she’d thought she’d gotten rid of, a book of lists. It was a bound journal from years ago, from a few months after the accident, when she first started sleeping around. Mainly it was a list of men. She’d been incautious then, maybe half hoping Hal would catch her and she would be confronted, but he had never suspected, as far as she knew, and her desire for exposure had slowly waned. The book was a juvenile collection—the names, physical descriptions, the events of their meetings. She barely remembered all of them now, and looking at it felt ashamed by the childishness. It had always been about knowing and being known, about experience and diversity, but here it was clearly teenage games. Now that she was a murderer, now that she had homicide under her belt, it looked to her like evidence.
She crammed it down into the kitchen garbage, then cleaned out the refrigerator and rained down old vegetables on it—rubbery carrots, yellowing celery, a torrent of moldy beets.
She had spent her morning on real
“Something else?”
“A foundation.”
“Foundation? You mean, for giving away money?”
“A 501(c)3.”
“Are you kidding?”
“Dead serious. But like I say, no rush. We can talk more when you’re feeling up to it.”
They were leaving then, he and the dog, with little acknowledgment, the dog’s nails clicking across the kitchen floor. She noticed its bowls were still beside the trash can—one with a few kibbles remaining, the other with water. She and Hal had never had a dog. She thought vaguely that Hal might not have liked them very much, might have preferred cats such as the one he bought for Casey. Though he had always said he liked dogs, this might have been a white lie of sorts, she thought. Why had they never had a dog, if in fact they both liked dogs?
But it was true what he had told her about T.—her employer was sane, though certainly changed. Apparently it was straightforward: he’d turned liberal Democrat from fiscal Republican. Of course she did not know how he voted. For all she knew he never voted at all. But clearly he had some notion of being a do-gooder. (Why was the term so bitter, so resentful?) Anyway he was newly bent on charity. Such reversals were not uncommon, almost cliché, in fact: it was only the certainty with which he’d proceeded, before, the certainty of his commitment that made it seem absurd. Then again the kid was only in his twenties, barely older than Casey. She’d given him too much credit for being fully formed. He had always had a veneer of maturity.
She heard his car back out of the driveway and walked with her glass of water into the living room, past a bookshelf where there was a picture of Hal and her. It was before they had Casey, when they were young, and Casey had had it framed and set it up there. They were two young hippies, long-haired and smiling. Well, she was long-haired. Hal had never gone that way. But he did sport a mustache and the obligatory beard, which Casey always found amusing. True to its era the picture was sun-bleached and faded; they stood holding hands in front of a silver Airstream. Susan wore what appeared to be a striped muumuu, Hal a flowery tunic. She had picked out his clothes for him back then.
A n offer came in for the house and she began to sort Hal’s things into boxes to give away, boxes to move with, boxes for Casey. Into Casey’s boxes she put a model horse, toy soldiers, a sailboat with peeling blue paint. That was easy; it was the half-broken objects that were hard, the ones too slight or old to keep—a slingshot made crudely out of twigs and rubber bands, Boy Scout badges, worn baseball cards from the fifties. There were report cards. In second grade Hal had received an A in Deportment; in fifth he’d gotten a B– and the remark, in a slanted, loopy hand, At times, Hal can be boisterous .
Her own items were the bulk of it. She’d kept more than Hal had and the worst was something she’d thought she’d gotten rid of, a book of lists. It was a bound journal from years ago, from a few months after the accident, when she first started sleeping around. Mainly it was a list of men. She’d been incautious then, maybe half hoping Hal would catch her and she would be confronted, but he had never suspected, as far as she knew, and her desire for exposure had slowly waned. The book was a juvenile collection—the names, physical descriptions, the events of their meetings. She barely remembered all of them now, and looking at it felt ashamed by the childishness. It had always been about knowing and being known, about experience and diversity, but here it was clearly teenage games. Now that she was a murderer, now that she had homicide under her belt, it looked to her like evidence.
She crammed it down into the kitchen garbage, then cleaned out the refrigerator and rained down old vegetables on it—rubbery carrots, yellowing celery, a torrent of moldy beets.
She had spent her morning on real
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