“Oh well—she’s just Lucy.”
“She ended up quoting someone, some Russian guy, I think, about life’s meaning being the maturity of the soul.”
“Oh, right. What’s-his-name said that.”
Bob gave a huge sigh and said, “Who in the world knows the meaning of life unless you’re a Buddhist monk or some deeply religious person who’s been handed a plate of these answers?”
Margaret said lightly, “Bob, that’s offensive.”
“Well, anyway. Tell me more about your day.”
“I already did,” Margaret said, turning to give him a smile. Then Margaret said, “I was thinking of having Lucy and William over for your birthday, but how about we just have a quiet day, the two of us?”
“That sounds great,” Bob said. His birthday was in three weeks.
—
He bent his head and kissed his wife.
*
Matt called him the next day and said, “Bob, I cried in front of Katherine Caskey. I could die.”
Bob told him, “No, that sounds healthy to me.”
“That’s what she said. I brought in my mother’s journals, and we went through them together, and I started to cry.”
“Cry your head off. That’s exactly what she’s there for. Trust me, she’s seen everything, and I’m sure she likes you. Don’t worry, Matt,” Bob said.
“I love her,” Matt said.
And Bob told him that was healthy too. “That happens with a therapist all the time.”
“It does?” Matt asked.
“Yeah. Perfectly normal. I keep telling you, Matt. You’re a lot more normal than you think you are.”
13
For the next three weeks there was no contact between Bob and Lucy. He was amazed by this, and yet he did not reach out to her. As people do in such situations, he occasionally listed to himself her faults: She was a child. She could be petulant. She was a hovering mother, why didn’t she just let her girls be? She blew off Arlene Cleary in the grocery store. She had not been kind about William’s daughter Bridget. And so on. Back and forth his feelings went, and yet he could not deny to himself feeling a sense of relief. And he could not deny either that he was slowly beginning to enjoy Margaret’s company more than he had in a long while. He and Margaret—now that it was light late in the evenings—would go for a drive sometimes after their dinner, and they spoke with the intimacy of people who have been married for years. One time she packed a picnic, the weather had turned warm again, and they sat at a public table a few towns away by an inlet of water and he felt an unhurried gladness move through him.
—
One other evening—when the sun was streaming through the trees—Margaret suggested that they drive to a town half an hour away where they could buy ice cream at a stand they both remembered. As they got into the car Bob said, “Oh, I forgot my wallet,” and Margaret said it didn’t matter, she had money. Driving through the narrow roads with fields on one side and small inlets on the other, the sun slashing through the trees, everything so green and glorious, Bob felt a sense of open happiness. And yet when they got to the ice cream place a sign outside it said CASH ONLY, and it turned out that Margaret had no cash. They drove further to a gas station where there was a machine for Margaret to get cash, but when she returned to the car she said gaily, “I couldn’t remember my PIN number.”
Bob’s happiness left him.
And as they were driving back home the clouds had come in and the town seemed dreary and stark.
*
The day before Bob’s birthday, William called Bob. “I need your advice. I’m going to go take one of those electric cars for a test run tomorrow, and I’d love to have you come with me. There’s no one else I know I can talk to about getting an electric car.”
“Sure,” Bob said. He knew nothing about electric cars.
When he checked with Margaret later, she said, “Oh, that’s fine, just be home by five o’clock.” She added, “Wear a nice shirt, though, you don’t want to look dumpy for William,” and Bob found that a little strange.
So the next afternoon, William pulled into their driveway and Bob went with him three towns away where these electric cars were being sold. William seemed laconic about the whole car business; Bob had thought he would be telling Bob the whole way over why electric cars were so great. As they drove over the large bridge the water twinkled below them, and then they were near all the car dealerships.
As they turned into the electric car area, William pulled into a parking spot and said this: “I asked Lucy to marry me again, and she said yes.”
Bob looked over at him. With William’s sunglasses on, Bob could not see the man’s eyes, but his tone had sounded serious and glad.
“You did? She did?”
Through the open car window, the wind made William’s hair stick up on the side as he turned his face briefly toward Bob’s. “Yes to both your questions. I mean, we’re getting older, what’s wrong with us getting married again? It would make me feel better. But for a while she kept saying no, she said she didn’t see any reason for that.” He added, “She said something about screwing up the girls again—you know they had a hard time when we got together again during the pandemic—but that was then, and this is now.” William pushed his hand through his white hair. “It’s not like I’m going to cheat on her again at this age. And then two nights ago she said, Let’s do it, William.” William turned the engine off.
Bob looked out his car window. He felt an odd tingling in his chin.
“But that’s great, William. That’s really good,” Bob said, turning to look at him again.
William said, “I have to tell you, Bob, it makes me so happy. I’m crazy about Lucy. Now tell me how you are? By the way, I know I talk about my parasites too much. Lucy told me that, and I’m sorry.”
“I think they’re interesting,” Bob said.
The whole time that William was talking to the car people, the whole time he was taking a test drive in the car, Bob’s mind was fuzzy. Lucy was going to marry William. On the drive back, Bob had trouble concentrating on what William was saying, something about his half sister, how great she’d turned out to be. “Life is good, Bob,” William said.
—
