Frightened, the townspeople look to their neighbors. They almost do not recognize each other, so strained are the familiar faces with exhaustion and despair. They do not deserve a fate like this. They are good people; they have tried to live good lives. Perhaps they have not always been as kind or hospitable as they should have been; perhaps they have not always loved their neighbors as themselves. But are they so much worse than everyone else? Some of them scowl and curse the world that they imagine spinning gaily beyond their hills, all its other inhabitants dry and at peace, free of this watery nightmare from which they themselves cannot awaken.
Even Leesl shivers. She is supposed to go up to the altar and sing before the end of the ceremony, but when she sees the small pools of water that have gathered below the pedals of her instrument, she freezes in place with a quick chill of fear. She had done her best to prepare for the crisis, to stock up on food and blankets and batteries, but what good are her preparations if the water sweeps them all away? She had been pained enough to lose the old minister to the river; must she now lose the rest of her town, as well? For the first time in a long time she remembers her long-distance lover. She pictures him under a flat wash of blue sky, his limbs brown, his face warmed by the sun. How glad she is that she let him go, that she did not keep him close. Look at what comes of holding on to things!
Mrs. McGinn’s daughter and the zookeeper are still hand in hand, waiting to be told that they are married. But instead of finishing the ceremony, Mrs. McGinn clears her throat and glares up at the stained-glass windows, where the rain is rattling like stones against the panes. “Hold on,” she says. “I know what all of you are thinking. And so before this whole thing is over, I’d like to say a few words about the damn elephant that’s in the room. Because we may not have much time left, and someone should.”
From where he stands below the pulpit, Mauro sees her fingers trembling. He glances around the perimeter of the church and looks into every pen even though he knows already that there is no elephant to be found. The only one they had was carted away years ago.
Mrs. McGinn lowers her gaze, contemplating her congregation. Her face is glistening with perspiration, her hair chaotic in the humidity. “What are we doing here? What are we trying to prove?” She pauses as if to reflect. Her daughter is staring at her, dry-eyed and aghast, but the sight of her only strengthens Mrs. McGinn’s resolve to speak. “The truth, you two, is that marriage isn’t going to make you happy, and anyone who tells you differently doesn’t know what on earth they’re talking about. You’ll be happy sometimes, sure, but sometimes you’ll be frustrated and sometimes you’ll be sad or lonely and sometimes you’ll be so angry that you wish you could break the whole world into pieces. Because that’s what life is like, and marriage isn’t any different.”
From the front row, her husband nods in fierce affirmation. Well, what do you know? he says to himself in some surprise. She gets it.
While the rest of Mrs. McGinn’s congregation grows increasingly distressed, her husband finds himself at peace. His haggard face is serene as he gazes at his wife and looks around the church and marvels at the fact that all his anger has deserted him. What would his anger do for him right now, anyway? What can he destroy now that there is nothing left here but destruction?
“Listen!” Mrs. McGinn continues, gaining volume with every word. “No one ever said that we’d be safe and dry every day of our lives. Most of the time life is hard. It’s lonely and it’s brutal and it’s terrifying, it really is, and there are days when you wake up feeling like there isn’t any point in carrying on with it at all. And all you can do is hang on through the hard parts and recognize the good parts when they come and hope that there’s some purpose behind it all.” Her voice trails off.
And what if there isn’t a purpose? the townspeople would like to know. What if this is all there is? For a long moment they stare at one another, their expressions stricken and bleak. They remember how pleased they had been about the wedding, only this morning, but now the whole idea seems ridiculous. What is the sense in celebrating a commitment that is bound to be extinguished within hours?
The zookeeper and Angela Rose are holding hands so tightly that it hurts, the curtain rings digging deep into their skin. How silly they had been to argue about staying or leaving! How many hours had they spent battling over that question, when now, as it turns out, the question simply doesn’t matter? There is nothing left for them but this, the present: the darkness and the rain beyond the stained-glass windows, the lights swinging over the pews, the promise that they will not have to face the end alone. One of the penguins comes waddling down the aisle with a wedding ribbon wrapped around his foot, and Mrs. McGinn’s daughter cannot help but laugh at him before Mauro leaps to usher him away.
The sound of her daughter’s laughter seems to change Mrs. McGinn’s mood. She shakes her head to clear it, and opens her prayer book as if she has every intention of finishing the ceremony. “Well, I’ll tell you why we’re gathered here today,” she says again to her neighbors without looking down to verify the text. “You may think we’re here because we’re at the end of something, and perhaps we are—but the end of something always means the start of something else.”
She turns to the couple with her skin wrinkled and pallid, her hands steady, her gaze clear. “Your union today signifies a new beginning. And every morning that you wake up next to each other, and every day here on out, and every month and every year for all the months and years you have before you—I wish for your lives to be blessed with ten thousand times ten thousand new beginnings. I hope that you take every chance that you are given to forgive each other, that you help each other grow and change, and that you take comfort in the knowledge that you are not in this world alone.”
Before Mrs. McGinn’s words have died away, her daughter has reached for the zookeeper, now her husband, and pulled him to her. As he leans down to kiss her, the entire church fills with the sound of a high, translucent voice rising and falling in song. Behind the couple on the altar stands Leesl, little Leesl, with her back straight and her chin up, no longer hunched over her organ or pinched behind her glasses. The soft light of the candles makes her features glow. Her eyes are closed, her lips parted. The song seems to come from the depths of her rib cage, soaring out into the church with the instinctive force and joy of a beast’s release back into the wild. Mauro, chasing down the penguin, stops in his tracks and stares back at her.
Had any of them known that Leesl could sing? The melody is a pleading one, not particularly uplifting—but the longer they listen, the more they hear something serene, resolved, even triumphant in the notes. The townspeople picture the restless waves, the foaming deep of the lyrics in the world outside the stained-glass window and mull over Mrs. McGinn’s words, wondering where Leesl could have found this song, wanting to believe that someone wrote it specifically for them. Somehow, when Leesl sings, they feel as though they have not been forgotten. They close their eyes and reach out for their neighbors and in that instant they are calm, and strangely at peace. For a minute the music lifts them up and carries them forward, bears them out of the building and into a night that is starry and dry. They press their eyelids firmly shut, unwilling to open them and be reminded of where they are, wanting to believe that they will be delivered, that they, too, might yet be offered an opportunity to start over, a chance to begin again.
Their eyes are still closed when the song ends, when the church door crashes open and the sound of the rain doubles its thunderous volume. The townspeople are determined to cling to the last bit of light at the end of Leesl’s song, this final prayer. They are determined not to see the end as it comes to them, determined to hold fast to their pews while the waves rush in, and so they refuse to turn around. They stand where they are, facing the altar with their heads bowed and their hands clasped tightly together. They do not see the figure stepping through the doorway with her long dark hair whipping to one side, they do not hear her call to them
over the sound of the rain pouring into the water, and they do not see the gold lights gleaming from the boats that are idling and waiting for them, floating on the flooded town behind her.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Noah’s Wife began as a series of character sketches when I was attending the Creative Writing Program at the University of Notre Dame. The project would never have left the ground were it not for the support of my lively and talented cohort, the counsel of William O’Rourke and Steve Tomasula, and the eloquent, ever-affirming guidance of Valerie Sayers.
I am deeply indebted to my agent, Laura Langlie, who pulled my manuscript out of her slush pile and pronounced it worthy of pursuit. I am grateful not only for Laura’s keen editorial eye, but also for her patience, her confidence, and her warmth on the days when the project seemed like it would last forever.
Amy Einhorn, who purchased the book, perceived something of value in the roughest, earliest draft of the manuscript when it landed on her desk. Her staunch faith in a future version of the novel truly propelled me forward.
Liz Stein, who edited the book, consistently impressed me with her talent and her tenacity. She came to know the characters as well as I did, and the novel is stronger and deeper because of her.
Helen Richard, who ushered the final product into the world, has approached my prose time and again with precision and care. I am thankful for both her edits and her generous affirmation, and I am fortunate to have her as a champion of the novel.
Other individuals and institutions that supported this project include Ken Reininger and the staff of the beautiful North Carolina Zoo, where I was invited behind the scenes. Friends-of-friends Cheri LaFlamme Szcodronski and Joe Szcodronski were kind enough to sit down with me over dinner to share stories of the time they spent as zookeepers.
The Department of English and Comparative Literature at UNC-Chapel Hill provided me with the flexibility necessary to finish the novel while also working toward my doctoral degree. I especially appreciate the encouragement of Gregg Flaxman and Erin Carlston, my dissertation directors, and the generous support of Daniel Wallace, whom I feel lucky to count as a mentor, colleague, friend, and reader.
At UNC I had the opportunity to work as an editor of The Carolina Quarterly, where I was inspired by the fresh voices we published as well as by my fellow editors’ tireless commitment to and advocacy for contemporary literature. I was also energized by the passion, insight, and honesty of my students in Introduction to Fiction Writing (Fall 2015). I am certain that this novel would be ten times stronger if only they had been given the chance to critique it.
Throughout this process, I leaned on friends and family. Lissa Yu provided Dr. Yu’s name and served as a model for her intelligence, her commitment to her family, her dedication to medicine, and her faith in her friends. Tasha Matsumoto walked me through the first draft on our morning constitutionals in South Bend. Subsequent drafts took shape over long dinners with Katie Spencer, who mused with me about characters and pairings and who, together with Martha Precup, patiently answered time and again when I wondered aloud: “But who is Noah’s wife?” I entrusted very few people with the whole manuscript before it was finished, and I am thankful for the insight and forbearance of those rare souls who kindly volunteered to read it.
My father hosted me at the lake year after year for impromptu writer’s retreats, pored over my contract, downloaded multiple drafts on his e-reader, and built a bookshelf specifically for my book. He provided love and support in every possible way—often in the form of lattes. To his faithful and persistent inquiry, I can now reply: Yes, the book is finally done.
My mother, Lorelei, has read every single world of every single draft, and yet her enthusiasm for the project has never waned. Throughout these five years, I have been astounded time and again by her generosity, her intelligence, her sense of humor, and her faith. If the book has any wisdom to it, that wisdom is hers; I simply transcribed it.
And to Christopher, who knew when he asked me to marry him that he would be marrying this novel, too, and who went through with it all the same: Thank you for loving me in spite of the book, not because of it; and thank you for sustaining me in this world when my mind was lost in another one. Everything is better with you.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lindsay Starck was born in Wisconsin and raised in the Milwaukee Public Library. She studied literature at Yale and creative writing at Notre Dame. She currently writes and teaches in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where she lives with her husband and a golden retriever. Noah’s Wife is her first novel.
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