Red Clocks (8 page)

The mender nods.

“I’m just telling you,” says Cotter.

She wants to sit by the stove with Malky in her lap and nothing in her head. No vigilance, no fear. “I’m tired.”

Cotter sighs. “Get to bed early, then.” He turns, is taken by the woods.

Cotter works at the P.O. Whatever people are talking about, he hears. But she knew before he told her. She’s been getting notes in her post box. From fishermen, or fishermen’s wives, frightened by the seaweed
plague.

A lace of dried dead man’s fingers does hang in a window of her cabin. Did Clementine report this to her fishermen brothers? Fishermen hate dead man’s fingers for fouling hulls in the harbor, fastening to oysters and carrying them away.

U think its funny? Its our LIVING
.

She adds pine branches to the stove. Where is Malky? “Come here, little mo.” He can’t be persuaded onto her lap,
even though he knows how much she’s missed him.

Cunt, quit hexing the water.

Her own cat does not obey her; why should seaweed?

She thought it would go a different way. She thought the way it would go would not include taking the east stairwell to lunch and seeing Ephraim’s hand in the shirt of Nouri Withers, whose eyes were shut and fluttering.

The daughter makes no sound. She creeps back up the stairs.

But she can’t breathe.

Breathe, dumblerina.

She sits on the landing, spreading her rib cage to make
room for air.

Breathe, ignorant white girl.

Still has to finish the day. Get through Latin and math. Go pick up her new retainer.

Nouri Withers? Maybe if you like tangled hair and black eye shadow and nail polish made from otter dung.

She has never missed Yasmine more than exactly right now.

Yasmine, lover of strawberries, queen of whipped cream.

Singer of hymns and smoker of weed.

Who’d
say:
Forget that Transylvanian slut.

Who’d say:
Are you even going to re
mem
ber his ass in five years?

Yasmine, who was smarter than the daughter but who got worse grades because of her “attitude.”

Yasmine came out of the bathroom and held up the pee stick.

A month earlier the federal abortion ban had gone into effect.

The daughter was thinking: we need to get you to Canada. They hadn’t closed
the border to abortion seekers yet. The Pink Wall was still just an idea.

A year and a half later the Canadian border patrol arrests American seekers and returns them to the States for prosecution. “Let’s spend the taxpayers’ money to criminalize vulnerable women, shall we?” said Ro/Miss in class, and somebody said, “But if they’re breaking the law, they
are
criminals,” and Ro/Miss said, “Laws
aren’t natural phenomena. They have particular and often horrific histories. Ever heard of the Nuremberg Laws? Ever heard of Jim Crow?”

Yasmine would have liked Ro/Miss, who talks about history in a way that makes it memorable and who wears the clothes of a kid: brown cords, green hoodies, sneakers.

A tuft of cells inside her, multiplying. Half Ephraim, half her.

You can’t be sure.

She carries
the test around unopened in her satchel.

If she
is
—

She might not be. Her body feels pretty much like it always does.

But if she is, what the hell is she going to do?

Don’t borrow worry.
—Mom

Stay in your lane.
—Dad

After all, she might not be.

In math Nouri Withers taps her steel-toed boot against the chair leg, from excitement probably; she’s thinking of her next time with Ephraim. Where
will they go? What will they do?
What have they already done?
Ash isn’t there to comfort her; the daughter has no friends in this room; it’s calculus, all eleventh- and twelfth-graders except for her. The tenth-graders think she’s a snob because she moved here from Salem and takes AP classes and her dad’s not a fisherman and she once said it was dumb to call the teachers “miss.” To prove her lack
of snobbery, she says “miss” now too.

After class Mr. Xiao pulls her aside for “a word.” She is already shaky from the combination of eight weeks late plus Ephraim’s hand up Nouri’s shirt; the prospect of a reprimand from her second-favorite teacher makes her eyes water.

“Whoa, whoa! You’re not in trouble. Jesus, Quarles, it’s
cool
.”

She dabs her eyes. “Sorry.”

“Everything all right?”

“My
period.” Men teachers don’t touch that excuse.

“Okay, well, I’ve got some good news for you. Do you know about the Oregon Math Academy?”

The daughter nods.

As if she shook her head, Mr. Xiao explains: “It’s a weeklong residential program in Eugene. The most prestigious and competitive academic camp in the state. Nobody from Central Coast has ever been selected. And I’m nominating you for it.”

She hears the words, but no feeling follows. “Thank you so much.”

“I think your chances are good. You’re bright, you’re female, and as a little bonus, I went to undergrad with one of their admissions guys.” He waits for her to look impressed.

The Matilda Quarles of last year—of last
month
—would be euphoric right now. Would be dying to get home and tell her parents.

“The deadline is January
fifteenth,” adds Mr. Xiao, who is not good at noticing how people feel unless they’re crying or yelling and so believes the daughter is just as happy as she should be.

“I look forward to applying,” she says.

She knows quite a lot, in fact, about the Oregon Math Academy. She has wanted to go since the seventh grade. She and Yasmine planned to apply together. In eighth grade Yasmine scored highest
in their school on the math section of the state exam; the daughter was two points behind her.

Going to the academy would help her get into colleges with top marine-biology departments.

Her parents would be over the moon.

The academy happens in April, over spring break.

If she’s three months pregnant now, she’ll be eight months pregnant then.

Herd crumbs into palm.

Spray table.

Wipe down table.

Rinse cups and bowls.

Place cups and bowls in dishwasher.

Open bill for Didier’s dentist co‑pay.

Open bill for plumber, who did not even fix the dripping tap.

Open overdue notice for John’s trip to the ER, where all they did was give him an antinausea pill yet somehow it cost six hundred dollars.

Write check for dentist co‑pay
because it’s only $49.84.

Slide plumber and hospital into folder labeled
PAY NEXT MONTH
.

Start a list on the back of an envelope:
Why we should go to counseling
.

Think of what to put first—not the strongest reason, nor the weakest.

In law school they teach you to end any litany on the most convincing item and bury in the middle the weakest.

Last spring, Didier’s answer was five variations
on “Because I don’t want to.”

At eleven a.m., the violet sedan pulls up.

Mrs. Costello bothers John less than she bothers Bex, and sweet John never complains on Tuesdays and Thursdays when the sedan deposits Mrs. Costello and her knitting bag. The wife is always ready with purse on shoulder, keys in hand. Four hours, twice a week, belong to her alone.

“There’s fish sticks in the freezer, and
baby carrots, and I got more PG Tips for you—”

“We’ll be splendid,” Mrs. Costello mournfully says.

And John lets her pet his blond head—John, who is nicer than the rest of the hill dwellers, who will snuggle against Mrs. Costello even though she smells like old-person teeth. Bex was an accident, but it took ten months of trying to conceive John; the wife had begun to despair; she cried every
morning after Didier left for school; then, finally, it worked. And John came murmuring into the world, leaking what looked like milk. Little white drops kept forming on his nipples. Witches’ milk.

The wife has until two forty-five, pickup time for Bex.

What should she do until pickup?

She isn’t impressed with the first-grade teacher. Homework is a sheet of fill‑in‑the-blanks or some tame question
they have to answer using a computer encyclopedia.

Does not want to shop or otherwise errand; the kids might as well be with her for that.

But what does she expect from a rural school district that can’t afford music classes.

Does not like to stay at home, hidden from John, because she’s home all the bleeding time.

The nearest private school is an hour away and Catholic and, though less expensive
than the average private, still too expensive for the Korsmos. The wife’s parents have nothing more to give them. Didier’s mother is a part-time bartender, and his father he hasn’t seen since he was fourteen.

She chooses the library. She was once a good researcher, at ease in the stacks, fetching, piling, skimming, choosing.

The rain is letting up.

The wife had her own carrel at the law library
with its thirty-foot windows, black mirrors at night.

On a low stool by the newspaper rack is Temple Percival’s niece, stinking of onion, twigs in her hair. That stool is her favorite.

The wife smiles, as she always does.

Guilty for finding her repulsive.

But she
is
repulsive.

Temple Percival once gave the wife a tarot reading, at her store: “The castle will fall.”

At one of the two blond-wood
tables, she spreads the paper before her.

“Excuse me, but are you done with the sports section?”

Armpits and aftershave. She turns. He teaches at the high school. What’s his—

“Oh, hi,” he says. “You’re Didier’s wife, yeah?”

“Susan. I think we met at the summer picnic. How are you?” It hurts her neck to look up at him, he’s so long.

“
Sweaty
. I apologize.” He pulls out the chair beside her.
“The kids are taking bubble tests so I’m free until soccer practice, and I ill-advisedly went for a run.”

“What do you teach?”

“English. For my sins.” He is big, everything about him big: neck, forearms, shoulders, head, damp shining sprouts of black hair. A dimple when he smiles.

“Sorry, but I forgot your—”

“Bryan Zakile.”

“Of course! My husband says you’re, um, a great teacher.”

“Didier’s
a good guy—kids love him.”

“So he’s always telling me,” she says.

He fingers the corner of the newspaper. “I take it you’re not reading the sports?”

“Can’t say I’m a fan.”

“Frivolous shit, I agree. But it keeps men’s lizard cortexes occupied.” The wife watches Bryan Zakile not take his eyes off her. In a lower voice: “So what
are
you a fan of?”

“Um,” she says. “Various things.”

They go two
doors down to Cone Wolf. Over single-scoop chocolates she learns a few facts about Bryan.

He played Division I college soccer and was invited to try out for the U.S. Olympic team, but a knee injury put paid to that.

He has traveled in South America.

He is starting his third year at the high school, where he got the job because the principal is married to his second cousin.

“Mrs. Fivey’s your
cousin? How is she—?”

“Talking and moving around. Still in the hospital, but going home soon.”

“Oh, that’s good. Didier said they had to induce a coma?”

“She banged her head hella hard on those stairs. Got swelling on the brain. They couldn’t wake her up until the swelling went down.”

“How did she fall—do you know?”

Bryan shrugs. He licks his spoon, throws it on the counter, crosses his arms.
“
That
was satisfying.”

The wife did not find her teensy little marble of a scoop satisfying. “Delectable,” she says, and blushes. The shop clock says 2:38. “I have to go pick up my daughter.”

“How old?”—the first question he has asked her since the library.

“Six. I also have a three-year-old son.”

“Wow, you’re a busy woman.”

The wife sees how he must see her. Shower-bunned blond hair. Drapey
scarf to hide stomach. Black yoga pants. Mom clogs.

Over the course of human evolution, did men learn to be attracted to skinny women because they were not visibly pregnant? Did voluptuousness signal that a body was already ensuring the survival of another man’s genetic material?

When Bex climbs into the booster seat, she’s on a verge. The wife has come to fear this particular after-school look:
reddened, scrunched. “Shell is so stupid.”

“What happened?”

“I hate her.”

“Seat belt, please. Did you and Shell fight?”

“I don’t
fight,
Momplee. It’s against the rules.”

“I mean argue?” The wife turns off the ignition. The cars behind them in the pickup line will just have to go around.

The girl takes a long, shuddering breath. “She said I stole her bag of pennies and I didn’t.”

“What bag
of pennies?”

“She had pennies in a bag which she wasn’t supposed to because you can’t bring money to school but she did and she couldn’t find them and said I stole them. And I
didn’t!
”

“Of course you didn’t.”

She might have.

She is her father’s daughter.

The wife and Didier make fun of Ro’s sperm donors, but what about Didier’s genes, which may have deposited in Bex a puerile interest in
drugs and a willingness to embezzle cash from a doughnut shop?

Two sets of instructions battle it out in the girl: well-shaped brown eyes vs. sunken blue-gray ones, orderly teeth vs. huge and crooked, solid SAT scores vs. never took the SAT.