Nancy Culpepper by Bobbie Ann Mason

the stove. The guests talk idly. Ted has been sandblasting old paint off a brick fireplace, and Laurie complains about the gritty dust. Jack stokes the fire. The stove, hooked up through the fireplace, looks like a robot from an old science fiction movie. Nancy and Jack used to sit by the fireplace in Massachusetts, stoned, watching the blue frills of the flames, imagining that they were musical notes, visual textures of sounds on the stereo. Nobody they know smokes grass anymore. Now people sit around and talk about investments and proper flue linings. When Jack passes around the Grand Marnier, Nancy says, “In my grandparents’ house years ago, we used to sit by their fireplace. They burned coal. They didn’t call it a fireplace, though. They called it a grate.”
    “Coal burns more efficiently than wood,” Jack says.
    “Coal’s a lot cheaper in this area,” says Ted. “I wish I could switch.”
    “My grandparents had big stone fireplaces in their country house,” says Jan, who comes from Connecticut. “They were so pleasant. I always looked forward to going there. Sometimes in the summer the evenings were cool and we’d have a fire. It was lovely.”
    “I remember being cold,” says Nancy. “It was always very cold, even in the South.”
    “The heat just goes up the chimney in a fireplace,” says Jack.
    Nancy stares at Jack. She says, “I would stand in front of the fire until I was roasted. Then I would turn and roast the other side. In the evenings, my grandparents sat on the hearth and read the Bible. There wasn’t anything
lovely
about it. They were trying to keep warm. Of course, nobody had heard of insulation.”
    “There goes Nancy, talking about her deprived childhood,” Jack says with a laugh.
    Nancy says, “Jack is so concerned about wasting energy. But when he goes out he never wears a hat.” She looks at Jack. “Don’t you know your body heat just flies out the top of your head? It’s a chimney.”
    Surprised by her tone, she almost breaks into tears.
    It is the following evening, and Jack is flipping through some contact sheets of a series on solar hot-water heaters he is doing for a magazine. Robert sheds his goose-down vest, and he and Grover, on the floor, simultaneously inch away from the fire. Nancy is trying to read the novel written by the friend from Amherst, but the book is boring. She would not have recognized her witty friend from the past in the turgid prose she is reading.
    “It’s a dump on the sixties,” she tells Jack when he asks. “A really cynical look. All the characters are types.”
    “Are we in it?”
    “No. I hope not. I think it’s based on that Phil Baxter who cracked up at that party.”
    Grover raises his head, his eyes alert, and Robert jumps up, saying, “It’s time for Grover’s treat.”
    He shakes a Pet-Tab from a plastic bottle and holds it before Grover’s nose. Grover bangs his tail against the rug as he crunches the pill.
    Jack turns on the porch light and steps outside for a moment, returning with a shroud of cold air. “It’s starting to snow,” he says. “Come on out, Grover.”
    Grover struggles to stand, and Jack heaves the dog’s hind legs over the threshold.
    Later, in bed, Jack turns on his side and watches Nancy, reading her book, until she looks up at him.
    “You read so much,” he says. “You’re always reading.”
    “Hmm.”
    “We used to have more fun. We used to be silly together.”
    “What do you want to do?”
    “Just something silly.”
    “I can’t think of anything silly.” Nancy flips the page back, rereading. “God, this guy can’t write. I used to think he was so clever.”
    In the dark, touching Jack tentatively, she says, “We’ve changed. We used to lie awake all night, thrilled just to touch each other.”
    “We’ve been busy. That’s what happens. People get busy.”
    “That scares me,” says Nancy. “Do you want to have another baby?”
    “No. I want a dog.” Jack rolls away from