The Salt House
Lisa Duffy
For Thomas Wotton Wheble
Tell her this
And more,—
That the king of the seas
Weeps too, old, helpless man.
The bustling fates
Heap his hands with corpses
Until he stands like a child
With surplus of toys.
—STEPHEN CRANE,
THE BLACK RIDERS AND OTHER LINES, XXXVIII
?1
Kat
The night Mom threw Dad out we had a dinner party at our house. We lived on the first floor of a tan two-story on the bay side of town. Mom grew up there, but on the top floor, where Grandma lived.
Mom loved to cook and play games, and Dad loved Mom, so they entertained often, or they used to at least, before Maddie. Jess and I were always included. Mom said it was because she liked having her favorite people around. “Am I one of your favorites, Hope?” Dad sometimes asked, his dark eyes drilling a hole into the back of Mom’s head. You got the sense he was holding his breath when he asked the question. It would get him a laugh and a hug, but over her shoulder, Dad wasn’t laughing. In those moments, if need had a face, it would’ve looked like Dad.
I was in charge of coats at the party. I’d sulked about that all afternoon and told Mom that carrying coats to the bedroom didn’t seem like an important job, since it was summer and who wore a coat in June?
Mom was on her knees on the kitchen floor, looking for the Crock-Pot, half her body missing inside the cabinet, the sound of pans bumping against one another ringing through the room. I heard her say something about June nights in Maine and how they sometimes had a chill to them, but when she sat back on her heels, her eyes were a little wild, and there was a dark smudge on her forehead, and still no Crock-Pot.
She looked at me and must have seen how serious I was, because she sighed and told me to go set the kids’ table then, with whatever plates I wanted, which seemed like a much better job.
That’s how Jess and I got to drink Shirley Temples in old mismatched fancy glasses, set with our best china and cloth napkins just like the adult table. It was perfect, even though Jess told me to stop calling it the kids’ table, since it was just me and her sitting there and she was almost seventeen and only home on a Saturday night because everyone except for her was on vacation somewhere else.
I kept quiet because once Jess got in one of her moods, forget it. It wasn’t worth pointing out that by everyone she meant Carly and Betsy, her two best friends, and they only visited family for a couple of weeks each summer. Betsy down to Kittery, and Carly up to Boothbay. Each one less than an hour away, which, in my opinion, didn’t count as a vacation. But Jess always had to be right, so I didn’t argue with her.
The Alfonsos arrived first. They came with their sheepdog, a hulking black-and-white thing with patches of skin peeking from where his fur should’ve been. He crept close to the floor when he walked and lowered his sad eyes like he knew he was overstepping. He’d had some sort of breakdown after Mrs. Alfonso went back to work full-time, leaving him alone in an empty house.
They got another dog so he wouldn’t be lonely, a long-haired retriever named Molly. Mrs. Alfonso said she’d never seen him so happy. Then Molly got hit by a car six months later and died. He started losing hair after that. Separation anxiety, Mrs. Alfonso told Mom, wringing her hands and sighing as she watched him hunker down under our table, his large body hitting the floor like a sack of potatoes.
So sorry for the inconvenience, Mrs. Alfonso repeated over and over. Mom shushed her and rubbed Mrs. Alfonso’s shoulder and said she understood. Sometimes, Mom said, love isn’t convenient. Mom had a big heart like that. Dad rolled his eyes but stared at Mom like he could devour her alive. I didn’t think it was whatever anxiety the doctor called it. Looked like a broken heart to me. I’d seen that before.
The Donovans and the Martins came next. The last ones in were Mom’s friend, Peggy, and a man who held out his hand to Mom and said his name was Ryland Finn, but she should call him Ry, and Mom said, “Oh, what a great name,” and waited like he might have a story about it.
But he just shrugged and glanced over her shoulder into the room behind her, as if he were searching for something he’d lost. Then nobody said anything until finally Mom said, “Well, let’s get you two introduced, shall we?”
We started with mussels in marinara sauce, one of Mom’s specialties and easy to make, since Dad brought them home from the shop whenever Jess and I asked. Dad was a lobsterman and did some shellfishing on the side, which we loved. We could never get enough steamers, mussels, and clams on the half shell. Dad said we were spoiled, ate like queens. But he winked at Mom while we dug in.
They played charades after dinner. Dad put up a fuss about playing, but Mom talked him into one round. He got To Kill a Mockingbird, and Mom thought he was acting out a horror movie. She guessed bird when he flapped his arms but finally got it when he pretended to play a harp. Dad said he should’ve done the harp bit first, since Mom was a writer and always remembered authors. Mr. Finn said he didn’t get the harp bit, and Peggy looked at him with tired eyes and said Harper Lee wrote it. Mom got up to put coffee on, and everyone looked at the couple whose turn it was next, except for Mr. Finn, who was sitting behind the group, watching Mom as she left the room. I watched Dad, watching Mr. Finn, watching Mom.
Later, in my bed, long after I should’ve been asleep, I listened to Mom and Dad clean up after everyone left. The kitchen and my bedroom shared a wall, and my dresser sat on the opposite wall from my bed, across from the kitchen doorway, its tall mirror reflecting the round table, giving me a clear view of the room. In our small house there wasn’t much I couldn’t hear.
Sometimes I loved it. Hushed voices carrying me to sleep or the noise from the television drifting in and out. Sometimes I hated it. Especially when Mom and Dad fought, their voices low and angry. Mom usually stomped off and went to bed upset. Dad never knew when he pushed his luck too far. Grandma said when it came to Mom, Dad lived with his heart on his sleeve and his head up his ass.