Stiltsville: A Novel Read Online Free PDF

leave,” I said.
    He took a jug of water from the refrigerator. “You’ll be back.”
    In the bedroom, Marse was leaning toward the mirror, applying lip gloss. When she saw me come in, she turned her back to me and put both hands behind her neck, holding the ends of a red halter-top. “Do me up?” she said. I took the fabric and tied a bow. The backs of my fingers brushed her neck. “Not quite so tight,” she said. We looked at each other in the mirror. I admired the peaks of her collarbone, the hollows in her neck. The day before, at the wedding, her shoes had given her blisters—they were sling-backs, and new—so she’d taken them off and looped them around the strap of her purse so she wouldn’t forget to take them home. “You could forget your shoes?” I’d asked, and she’d said, “It’s been known to happen.” She’d greeted the bride and groom in her stockings, standing tall and straight-backed.
    “Marse—” I said.
    “It doesn’t matter.” She shook her head and shrugged.
    I retied the bow slowly, leaving a little slack. “You don’t know me,” I said, “but if you did, you’d know that this isn’t like me.”
    She thought for a moment. “If you say so,” she said. “I believe you.”
    It would have seemed ridiculous to say what I wanted to say at the time: that I hoped we could be friends. I said, “I appreciate that.”
    It seemed we were both making an enormous effort to act like grown-ups. She tugged at her halter to test the knot, then turned to face me. We both looked at her torso—the fabric was in place, everything covered. “How do I look?” she said.
    “Lovely.”
    All at once, the room went dark and the generators stilled. She said, “He always does this for dinner. Saves propane.”
    Moonlight dove in through the windows, bluing the planes of her face. She led me into the main room, where the firelight from stout white candles made shadows on the walls. The room smelled strongly of garlic cooking in butter. Kyle and Dennis set down plates piled with lobster tails and filled cups with red wine. I watched their faces in the candlelight. They were easy together, chatting and teasing. Marse joined in. Dennis pulled out a chair next to him, and when we were seated, I toasted the most beautiful scenery south of the Mason-Dixon, and Dennis toasted adventurous southern belles. The meeting of Styrofoam brims gave off a squeak. Wine sloshed onto the table and no one bothered to wipe it up. Dennis’s knee brushed mine, then stayed there. Every so often I felt him looking at me. I cherished the sense of caged joy.
    The lobster was so sweet I ate it plain. Kyle told a story about walking with a girl on the beach at night and slipping on a jellyfish. He’d cried real tears from the pain, and the girl had stopped returning his calls. Marse told a story about her first day working for a district judge—she’d been waiting for the judge to get off the telephone when he’d picked up a steno pad and written on it. He’d held it up for her to read: YOUR ZIPPER IS UNDONE, said the note. SORRY TO EMBARRASS YOU. We laughed so hard our eyes watered. During a lull, Dennis said, “The wind is up.”
    “Aye, captain,” Kyle said.
    “What does that mean?” I said.
    Marse folded her long arms on the table. “Dennis thinks a storm is coming,” she said to me. I thought she winked, but it might have been the candlelight. “He’s about to tell us we can’t stay the night.”
    Dennis leaned back in his chair and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “I’ll check the barometer after dinner.”
    “Either way,” said Marse. “Just let me follow you in. I don’t know the way at night.”
    It hadn’t occurred to me that we might stay the night. I hadn’t brought extra clothes. The boys went downstairs to check the barometer on the boat while Marse washed plates and I dried them. In the candlelight, without the thunder of the generators, the clatter of dishes punctuated the night.