by Megan Hart
She had mentioned it, yes. After they’d bought the fainting couch she’d looked at a few of the dining room sets in the same antique shop. They’d been sleek, Art Deco, with designs of inlaid wood and matching buffets that had beautiful and ornate drawer handles. Nothing like this square, sharp-edged, utilitarian wooden monstrosity. This table wasn’t an antique, really. It was just…old. And well used, she thought, noticing the carved initials along one short side. CMM. Someone had been naughty.
“From the basement, Sean? Really?”
He looked at it. “You can polish it up, it’ll be great. But if you don’t like it—”
“No,” she interrupted him. “No. It’s fine. We need a dining room table, and this way I can take my time looking for something. Someday.”
Until then, they could use this table, even if it was ugly. Even if it wasn’t what she wanted. She could make the best of things.
He settled his hands on her hips to pull her close for a kiss. “Have I told you how awesome you are?”
He had, many times, which only made her feel worse about hating the table he’d so obviously been happy to bring her. Ginny pushed onto her tiptoes, just a little, to kiss him back. “Hmm. Because I ply you with sweets?”
“You’ll make me fat.”
“Then I won’t have to worry about any sexy, young chicks chasing after you,” she teased, patting his flat, hard stomach. Sean never had to work out.
He looked at her seriously. “You never have to worry about that, Ginny.”
She’d meant it only as a joke, but his reply was so solemn it set her back. She cupped his face in her hands and kissed him again. “I love you.”
He nodded, eyes searching hers. “You do?”
“Of course I do,” she told him, uneasy with the intensity of his expression. “Of course.”
“Good,” Sean said. “Let’s eat brownies.”
Chapter Nineteen
The smell. It was repulsive. Thick and cloying, the unmistakable stink of rot.
Ginny sniffed the air, then again. “Ugh. God. Sean, you need to check the glue traps.”
“I did, yesterday. Nothing.” He rattled the paper instructions for the TV stand with a growl. “Insert rod A into slot B. What the hell? There is no slot B.”
Ginny sniffed again, walking slowly around the living room, which was still cluttered with a few boxes, even though it felt like they’d been unpacking forever. Sean had decided this was the weekend to put together the new television stand he’d insisted they needed for the new flat screen. He’d been cursing at it for the past hour and a half.
“Can’t you smell that?”
He sifted through a bag of small metal parts and plucked out a screw, then cursed some more when it didn’t fit into the right hole. “No. Smell what?”
“I smell it.” She sniffed again, nosing along the wall and over the vent. “I can’t believe you can’t smell it. Something died in the walls, Sean. I’m sure of it.”
“I thought you told me the exterminator said mice wouldn’t smell that bad.”
“I know what he said, but I’m telling you, I smell something disgusting. It’s…” She leaned over the vent blowing warm air that was nowhere near hot, and grimaced. She pulled her sweatshirt sleeve over her fingers and held it over her mouth and nose. “It’s stronger when the heat’s on.”
“Could be something in the ductwork.” Sean shrugged, clearly unconcerned as he struggled with the TV stand’s legs. “God dammit. Why do they have to make these things so hard to build.”
“We could’ve paid someone to put it together in the store,” she reminded him, and wished she hadn’t when she saw the set of his shoulders.
“They wanted to charge a hundred bucks for set-up and delivery.”
“I know they did.” But if they’d done that, they could now be watching a movie together or doing something else instead of this.
“I can do it anyway.”
She sighed. “I know you can.”
The smell, thank God, had faded. Or she’d become immune to the stench. Either way, she could breathe with the filter of her sweatshirt. She watched him for a few more minutes, but knew better than to offer her help.
The next time the heat kicked on, though, the smell was back. She coughed from it, and Sean gave her a curious look. Ginny waved a hand in front of her face.
“You really don’t smell that?”
Sean stood and took a long, deep breath. “Yeah. I smell something. It’s faint, though.”
“Please check those glue boards again. I’m sure something’s dead on one!”
He sighed. “Sure, babe. Can I finish this first?”
Her look must’ve been answer enough, because Sean let out another sigh and hung his head. Without another word, he left the living room. She heard the slow tread of his feet on the stairs, in the hall, and finally into the nursery. She heard the creak of the cubbyhole door opening. More footsteps in the hall, then in their bedroom. She couldn’t hear the cubbyhole door in their closet opening or closing. He came down a few minutes later with empty hands.
“I told you. Nothing. I mean, the guy said he didn’t see any signs of anything, right?”
“I still hear things,” Ginny said stubbornly. “In the walls. I told you.”
Sean sighed and came closer, rubbing her upper arms to soothe her. “I’m sure you do…”
“I just heard it the other night,” she pointed out. She did not add that she’d heard it while she was wakeful, unable to sleep, and he was snoring away.
He hugged her, stroking her hair. His shirt was damp. He smelled of sweat; she had to turn her head.
“All I can say is, I checked the traps. He said he’d be back to check the bait boxes. Right?”
“Yes.”
“So,” Sean said, “the next time he comes, ask him if he can smell it.”
“Fine,” she said, though it wasn’t fine at all.
He worked in silence while she flipped through a couple of magazines. When he’d finished, he stood and waved at it. “All done.”
“Looks good.”
Shit, now they’d been reduced to single syllables. Ginny sighed. “You want some help hooking up the TV and stuff?”
“No. I got it.”
She went to the kitchen while he worked and made him an ice-cream sundae as a peace offering. She took it to him in the living room, then stood and shivered while he ate it. He offered her some, but she shook her head.
“I’m freezing.” Ginny rubbed her arms and went to the vent in the floor, feeling a waft of lukewarm air. “The kitchen’s sweltering. I don’t get it.”
Sean sighed and handed her the empty ice-cream bowl. “I’ll call the repairman again tomorrow. Okay?”
Ginny looked at the bowl, then at him. “Yeah. That would be great.”
Sometimes, he did get it. Sean got to his feet and hugged her, acting like he didn’t notice that she’d turned her face when he tried to kiss her. “Can’t have my honey being cold, can I?”
“It’s just that it should work,” Ginny said. “It’s supposed to be an almost-brand-new system, right? We just had the guy out here to check it out. It should just work.”
“Lots of things should just work, but they don’t.” Sean looked at the TV stand.
Ginny knew that was certainly true. Marriage was one of them. Or maybe it was the other way around; marriage shouldn’t work but did.
She looked toward the kitchen, then the bowl. “You want anything else?”
Sean, engrossed in his task, just grunted.
Ginny took the bowl into the kitchen and put it into the dishwasher. She stretched, slowly, droplets of sweat pearling on her forehead. The kitchen was still so stinking hot. The clock on the microwave blinked from their last power outage, and as she set it to the correct time, she noticed two t
hings. The first, that it was getting late and she was getting tired. Second, Noodles had not yet been fed.
The reason she hadn’t noticed was because the cat, who normally made her demands well known with a variety of vocal yowlings, had not seen fit to demand Ginny’s services as head can opener. This was definitely not normal, but not entirely unheard of. Noodles could be cranky and sometimes suspicious, and Ginny was convinced the cat could also hold a grudge. If being shooed off Ginny’s pillow this morning had sufficiently put her little pink nose out of joint, it was possible she was still hiding upstairs, even at the expense of her empty belly.
Opening the can would bring her running, at least it usually did. Not this time. Ginny opened the can and scraped the gloopy, stinky contents into a bowl and set it on the special mat by the back door. No Noodles.
“Noodles! Ssss, ssss, sss!”
No cat. In the sweltering kitchen, Ginny licked the sweat from her lip and fought off a wave of unease. She went through the dining room to the living room, where Sean still fought with the TV stand. She didn’t bother asking him if he’d seen the cat. She went past him, into the front hall, up the stairs, into the bedroom. She got on her hands and knees and looked under the bed.
Nothing.
Ginny sat up, her breath coming a little too short in her lungs. She closed her eyes, trying to remember the last time she’d seen Noodles. This morning. The cat had been making herself at home, not just on Ginny’s side of the bed, but on her pillow, and Ginny had clapped her hands and shouted to chase her away. She hadn’t seen her since.
“Shit. Shit, shit…” Ginny rubbed her face, got up and went downstairs.
“Sean. Have you seen Noodles?”
He looked up at her, the building instructions crumpled in his fist. “Huh? No.”
Ginny sat slowly on the couch, which was still nowhere near where she wanted it to be. “She’s missing.”
“What do you mean, missing?” Sean wasn’t paying attention to her, his focus still on the TV stand, which now at least looked as though it could hold the TV. “I’m sure she’s around. Did you call her?”
“Yes. Of course. I opened her food, she didn’t come running. I’m worried she got out of the house, maybe when I went out to get the mail.”
“I’m sure she’ll turn up.” Sean turned back to fussing with cords and wires.
This answer didn’t suit Ginny, who went through the house, calling the cat’s name over and over with an increasing amount of desperation. Ginny looked in every closet, every crawl space, under every piece of furniture, behind every door. No Noodles. She opened the front door and called out into the night, thinking that if the cat had run out, she’d be more than eager to run back inside to her safe, warm house, but the only answer was a car passing by, splashing up a puddle from the day’s earlier rain.
“She’s gone,” she told Sean in the living room, where he’d finally finished his project. “I can’t find her anywhere.”
He looked up with a frown. “She’ll turn up. Even if she ran outside—”
“I called for her outside. She didn’t come.”
“Someone will find her.” Sean looked at the TV, then at her. She could see the struggle on his face, the desire to finish getting his new toy set up and the knowledge he should somehow comfort her.
At least he thought he should. Ginny wasn’t interested in being comforted. She backed up a step when it looked like her husband meant to come and hold her. She wanted to find her cat. Not be woo-wooed and petted.
“She’ll come home,” Sean said. “If she’s outside, someone will find her, or she’ll come home.”
The floor vibrated beneath Ginny’s bare toes as the furnace kicked on. The curtains blew gently. Ginny took a breath, her hormone-enhanced sense of smell working hard. The faint scent of rot swirled around her, and she clapped a hand over her mouth and nose.
“What if she’s not outside?”
“Then she’s fine,” Sean soothed. He moved toward her but the cords tangled on his foot, and the television leashed him in place.
“No, no. I mean, what if she’s in the house, but…trapped somewhere? Don’t you smell that?” Ginny cried, shuddering. “Christ, Sean. Tell me you smell it.”
He took a long, deep breath. “I smell it. But it’s hardly anything, honey. It’s a mouse, like the guy said. Got stuck in the walls. It’s not Noodles.”
Sean dropped the cords. This time, Ginny didn’t move away when he came to hold her. She pressed herself against him, her eyes closed, as he rubbed her back. Her belly made a bigger distance between them than she was used to, really noticeable for the first time.
“We’ll find her. I promise.”
She knew he couldn’t promise anything of the sort, but she let him anyway.
Chapter Twenty
Ginny’s gran might not always be completely locked in the present day, but she never looked anything less than her best. Compared to Ginny’s mom, who wore a sweatshirt with a stain on it, her hair frowzy, her jeans out of style, Gran was the epitome of a classy lady. From her carefully coiffed perm to the shoes that matched her bag that matched her belt, Gran looked like she’d just stepped out of a salon run by fashion elves slaving to dress her. There was no such thing, of course. Ginny’s mom had been the one to make sure Gran had everything she needed, and she wasn’t afraid to make sure Ginny and everyone else knew it.
“Hours,” she said. “Hours it took us to get ready.”
“Well, Gertrude, if you took some care with your own appearance, perhaps mine might not be such an offense,” Gran said with a sniff and held her hand out for Sean to take as she hobbled through the front door.
He looked at it as though he wasn’t sure if she meant for him to kiss it, and Ginny stifled a laugh. Gran had never approved of Sean, who’d shown up to his first family function wearing a black-leather jacket and a week’s worth of beard scruff, riding a Harley-Davidson motorcycle. That he’d sold the bike and kept the jacket in the back of a closet now wouldn’t make a difference. Gran could forget what she had for breakfast that morning, but she’d never forget that Ginny’s “boy” was of the bad sort.
“Virginia. You’re looking fat.”
“Thanks, Gran.” Ginny stepped aside so Sean and her mom could ease Gran into the living room and onto the couch, which stuck out awkwardly in the middle of the room because they’d stacked up all the still-unpacked boxes behind it.
“Mother, Ginny’s not fat. She’s pregnant,” Ginny’s mom said too loudly. “Remember? We’re here for Ginny’s baby shower!”
“And I’m old, not deaf,” Gran retorted. She gave Sean an up-and-down look before turning back to Ginny. “Virginia, have your boy bring me something to drink. Two fingers of Scotch, no ice.”
“Mother,” Ginny’s mom began, but Ginny waved her quiet.
Sean backed up a step. “I’ll get it.”
He already knew to make the drink only half the alcohol Gran requested, the other half water. She complained it was too strong the other way and wouldn’t finish more than a few sips.
Ginny gestured for her mom to sit in the armchair while she took the other. They both looked at Gran, who stared back.
“Are you going to give me food, or what?” Gran asked suddenly. “It’s mashed-potatoes-and-meat-loaf night at home. What are you going to feed me?”
“There’s plenty of food, Gran.” Ginny smoothed her shirt over her belly, feeling self-conscious though she wasn’t any fatter now than she’d been this morning when she got dressed.
Gran snorted as Sean brought the drink and pressed it into her hand. She stared up at him. “You look much better clean-shaven.”
Sean passed a hand over his cheeks and chin, then gave Ginny a brow-raised glance and a quick smile. “Thanks.”
“I liked his scruff,” Ginny blurted. “I liked it when he looked a little ragge
d.”
Sean looked surprised. Then pleased. Gran, however, sniffed and daintily sipped from her glass before making a face and holding it out for him to take.
“This drink tastes like a ruffian made it.”
“Can I be a ruffian if I’m clean-shaven?” Sean said it with a straight face but a twinkle in his eyes.
Before Gran could reply, the doorbell rang and Sean went to answer it. Soon the living room overflowed with guests, and Ginny wished, hard, she’d been more demanding about unpacking the boxes Sean had insisted would be fine shoved up along the wall under the windows. She cringed as Billy’s daughter Kristen, running after her brother, ran into a box that made a definite jingling sound when bumped.
That made her think of Noodles and the bell on her collar, and how the cat would’ve hated this crowd, and how they’d have had to lock her in a room to keep her from darting out the front door. How she’d probably have peed on something out of spite. Maybe, Ginny thought suddenly, with the door opening so often, Noodles would make her way back home, reappearing underfoot like the triumphant small queen the cat had always been.
She didn’t, though, and playing hostess gave Ginny little time to think about it further. The present opening was an extravaganza of paper and ribbon, onesies and booties and diapers and plush toys. Such generosity moved Ginny to tears more than once, but it seemed quite acceptable for the expectant mother to cry when she opened a handmade and embroidered quilt it must’ve taken her mother more than a year to make. Ginny didn’t point out what that meant, not when they were all there to celebrate. But she knew.
It was a big party, bigger than Ginny wanted, but her mom and Peg had insisted on inviting everyone who could possibly be invited, plus some people Ginny wasn’t even sure she knew. Sean’s mother hovered around making sure the food was all set up and drinks poured, which was nice but gave Ginny nothing to do but sit and hold court. Barb had also brought along all the paper products and baked a cake with plastic babies riding carrots on the top that looked like something out of a horror movie. Now she nursed a glass of white zinfandel and laughed too loudly at whatever Ginny’s mom was saying to her.