Wish You Were Here

by Stewart O'Nan

  “I know. I’m sorry. How much was it? Because he’s going to pay for it, I don’t know how, but he will.”

  “I’d have to ask Sarah.”

  “Please do. And let her know it has nothing to do with her. He’s always liked her.”

  “That might even be a part of it.”

  “It could be,” she agreed.

  She gathered their toothbrushes and threw away Ken’s razor. She checked the medicine cabinet and the shower stall again, searching it up and down. The bathroom was done. She’d already gone through the dresser drawers and checked under the beds. There was nothing on the clothes tree or the low wardrobe, and the handmade ashtray was staying. If there was anything else of theirs it was downstairs.

  Ken came up, sweating.

  “Got the cedar chest in, barely. How are we doing up here?”

  “This one’s ready,” Lise said. “We were just having a talk with Sam about Sarah’s watch.”

  “What did he say?” Ken seemed hopeful, as if it had all been taken care of, the problem magically solved.

  “What do you think he said? I’ll tell you what, it’s going to be a long ride home.”

  4

  Justin was already in the van with Tigger, buried under Sarah’s sleeping bag laid out flat across the backseat. Aunt Arlene reached in through the window and kissed him. Aunt Margaret was still talking with Grandma, the keys in her hand. The front doors were open and Sarah’s backpack sat in her seat. Ella waited until Sarah was done hugging her father, and then she turned and opened her arms and she was holding Ella the way she’d dreamed of, her hair smelling sweet. Ella had to be careful.

  “I’m going to miss you,” Sarah said.

  It surprised Ella so much that she could only say, “I’m going to miss you too.”

  “Write me,” Sarah said, “okay?”

  Ella promised to, and held her hand a second before letting go. Sarah got in and shut the door. She’d saved Ella for last. She couldn’t roll her window down until Aunt Margaret started the car, and then she waved, saying good-bye as they backed out. Ella walked beside her to the edge of the road.

  “See you, Just,” she called, but he was already playing his Game Boy.

  “We’ll see you at Christmas,” Aunt Arlene called.

  “Drive safe,” her father called.

  The van started forward and Aunt Margaret honked for them.

  “Good-bye, we love you!”

  When they were little, Ella and Sam used to chase after Aunt Margaret’s station wagon on their bikes, Sarah and Justin in the way back, facing them. Now everyone stood on the lawn watching them go, shadows flowing over the van as it rolled by the other driveways. Ella kept her eye on Sarah’s arm, still waving, like she might have a last, secret message for her. The van reached the patch of sunlight by the Nevilles’, and all they could see was the back of it, moving away.

  “There they go,” Grandma said, and then the road was empty, just the trees and the other houses, and they all walked back to the porch.

  “Okay,” her father said, “time to saddle up. Now’s a good time to go to the bathroom if you haven’t been already.”

  She used it as an excuse to go upstairs and get away from everyone. She was going to be with them in the car all day. She almost didn’t care. Climbing the stairs, she felt tired, like she might fall asleep.

  The fan was off and the air was hot. The beds had been stripped so there were just the silvery blue mattresses and the pink blankets folded at their feet. Squares of sun from the far window showed the dust floating above the carpet. The box of toys was gone. The only thing left that reminded her of Sarah was the dresser they shared. She ran her hand over the top, but it was just paint and wood. She walked to the spot where they slept every night and sat down, pushing her fingers through the loose strands of the rug, then smoothing it flat again. She thought of Sarah in the van, moving away from her, and looked at the ring Grandma had given them that made them twins. She turned it on her finger, wishing it was magic, that she could send her thoughts through it and that wherever Sarah was she could feel what she was feeling, all she had to do was touch her ring.

  It was different, the way they would miss each other. To Sarah, she was just her cousin.

  She slid the ring off so her hand was bare and squeezed the thin band in her fingertips. She turned it so it was an O and looked through the circle at her bony knee, more proof that she was fooling herself.

  “Ella,” her father yelled up the stairs. “C’mon, hon, we’re leaving.”

  She didn’t want to go, but she didn’t want him to come up either, and she slipped her ring back on and stood. She took a last look at everything—the slanted ceilings and the window at the end, the beds, the dresser, the rug. She’d thought it would be easier if she could stay here instead of going home, but now she saw that it didn’t matter. It would be bad anywhere.

  “Ella!”

  “Hang on!” she said. “I’m coming.”

  5

  “I forgot my seethreepio,” Justin said.

  “Your what?” Meg said, turning down the radio and leaning back to hear him better.

  “My C-3PO I got at the flea market.”

  “Well, bud, we can’t go back for it now. Sorry. Maybe Sam will remember it for you.”

  “He’ll remember it,” Sarah said.

  “Stop, that’s not nice.”

  “It’s true.”

  “It is not, and you need to be more forgiving. We’re not all perfect like you.”

  “What?” Justin asked, puzzled.

  “Nothing,” Meg said, and Sarah looked away, disgusted. “I’ll call Uncle Ken tonight and see if they have it, okay?”

  It was—it would have to be—and Meg turned the radio up again, watching the cars in front of her change lanes and brake for the exit ahead, a line stopped on the ramp, all of them signaling right.

  “Must be something going on at the Institute,” she said, but they weren’t interested.

  She moved to the left and slipped past and there was open sailing. She checked her speedometer, a steady seventy. The road was new through here and she had to make sure she didn’t go too fast. The median was full of wooded islands the cops liked to hide in.

  17 was the easy part of the drive—once they hit 90 it would be wall-to-wall trucks. Here she could let her mind roll out over the dairy farms or follow a hawk, her hands unconsciously keeping the van between the lines. She needed the time to think. The week hadn’t been the nightmare she’d expected. She’d actually been able to talk with her mother—it shocked her even now how understanding she’d been. Ken she knew would be supportive of her, and Arlene, but she couldn’t remember ever spending so much time with Lise, and thought they’d grown closer. It was strange how she felt, away from them, as if she were realizing only now what they meant to her—like her life, she was tempted to say, but didn’t trust the feeling. They were her family, that was enough.

  “Look,” she said, and turned the radio down, because they were passing a sign that said they were now on INTERSTATE 86/OLD 17.

  “Old 17,” she said, but they didn’t get it. “They just built this. Remember all the graders last year, and the big trucks?”

  “Oh yeah,” Justin said.

  “That was two years ago,” Sarah said. “Last year it was like this.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Last year there was that Winnebago with the flat tire.”

  “How do you remember that?”

  They were so bored they were talking to each other, and Meg thought she’d better take advantage of it. She turned off the radio.

  “Okay,” she said, “who wants to play a game?”

  6

  Arlene was right, the puzzle would be left undone, and then when she’d cleaned it up and stacked it on the shelf, there was the problem of the card table. How many hands of bridge and Michigan rummy and penny poker had passed over its mouse-brown skin, how many drinks spilled over its edges?
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br />   “There’s no room,” Emily said. “Besides, I think we’ve gotten our money’s worth out of that one.”

  Rufus had been banished for being underfoot, and the house was quiet as they moved from room to room, unplugging everything. The radio was coming, and the answering machine, the two of them bound with their own cords and waiting on the ottoman. Some of the windows were stuck from the humidity. Arlene found a mallet in the garage and wrapped its head in a dish towel, tapped the frames so she wouldn’t crack the glass. Upstairs she latched the trapdoor for the fan so the squirrels couldn’t get in. She remembered Henry painting the dresser for the children. The daybed was from their guest room at home; as a girl she’d been warned repeatedly for bouncing on it like a trampoline. She couldn’t believe they were leaving so much. She wanted to take the toilet paper and the waste-baskets, the frosted ceiling fixtures.

  “What about the water?” she asked downstairs.

  “I think they want us to leave that on.”

  Right, the cleaning people. She hadn’t thought. “What else is there?”

  “That’s pretty much it. All we have to do is take the food out and lock up.”

  “Is the garage locked?”

  “I’m getting to it.”

  “What about the fireplace, did Kenneth close it up?”

  “It’s all taken care of,” Emily said. “Why don’t you take the cooler out to the car if you’re done in here?”

  But she wasn’t done. She had to do another lap of the downstairs, and grabbed a box of tissues and a cherry-wood nut dish from the mantel. There had to be room for that.

  “Enough,” Emily said, and herded her out the kitchen door and locked it behind them.

  Rufus was waiting, whisking his tail as if they might forget him.

  “Don’t worry,” Emily said. “You can ride on the roof.”

  While she closed the garage and the pump house, Arlene walked across the lawn to the water’s edge. Out in the middle it was a busy Saturday, powerboats hot-rodding back and forth, but here in the shade it was calm, a gentle sloshing. The rocks at the bottom were the color of tea, and then the smooth, gray mud, a few grassy weeds reaching for the surface. She sat on the bank and slipped off her shoes, rolled up her cuffs and stepped in, wading straight into the shallows with her arms out like a child, and like the girl whose family came here every year before the war, she promised the lake that she’d be back.

  7

  All morning they drove into the sun. There was nothing from Jamestown all the way to Corning, and Ken was glad they had gas. The scenery was relentlessly forgettable, and he felt vaguely disloyal, as if he were escaping for good, freeing himself from the tangle of jealousies and hurt feelings. He accused himself of getting what he wanted, of getting away too cleanly. At home, in their own bed at last, he would thank Lise for putting up with them, a further, necessary betrayal.

  PLOW REPAIRS, a sign on a fence advertised, ALL KINDS. The road curved and dipped with the hills, past cows lounging under weed trees and trailers with plywood mudrooms and used tires on the roof—secondhand Walker Evans. Lise borrowed a pillow from Ella and fell asleep. Every so often she’d wake up, her face creased, and ask if he was doing all right.

  “I’m fine,” he said. “You rest.”

  She missed the exit for Steamburg and Onoville, and the sign welcoming them to the Seneca Nation. The Allegany Reservoir was higher than when they’d crossed it coming the other way, the mudflats and stranded logs covered. It seemed longer than a week ago. Tracy Ann Caler had only been missing six days. He could check on her through the Internet to see if there was any news.

  He wasn’t sure if the pictures would be any good, or if Morgan would be disappointed. He’d shot all forty rolls, a lot considering the weather. He’d tried the Holga, even if he didn’t believe in it, and he’d gotten solid coverage of the garage with the Nikon.

  He hadn’t taken Sam fishing, and he regretted that. Maybe they’d go for a weekend when they got home. His father’s tackle was in the back with his clubs.

  In the mirror, Ella was scrunched sideways against the cooler, out with her mouth open. Sam had been playing his Game Boy nonstop since they left. Finally he turned it off and curled up with his sleeping bag. Ken set the cruise control to seventy-five, ten miles above the limit but not fast enough to attract attention. He had Bill Evans simmering on the CD player and the air-conditioning on low, and as they ate up the miles he felt pleasantly in between the two worlds of vacation and home, satisfied that he was done with one and equally happy that he didn’t have to start the other, not yet. He felt light, and lucky, inside this cushion of time, as if he’d gotten away with something. And he had—they had. Once again, they’d survived.

  8

  The city was still there, unchanged, the towers of downtown rising like a wall on the far shore. Emily couldn’t see how the new stadium was doing, but the Pirates were playing at Three Rivers, the ferries docked on the near side. Emily had had a coffee with her McDonald’s, and the water called to her bladder. She distracted herself with the Bayer clock and the Incline, finding the two red cars on the hillside just as they passed each other, one climbing, one falling. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been on it—with Henry, an anniversary dinner at Le Mont or the Tin Angel, but exactly when she had no clue, maybe the eighties.

  They took the parkway, riding low beside the Mon and then cutting up through Oakland, past the hospitals and the library, the streets empty in the heat.

  “What’s the weather supposed to be like this week?” she asked.

  “Couldn’t tell you,” Arlene said. “How’s Rufus doing?”

  He’d lost his seat because they had so much junk. He was curled on his towel next to the TV set, his head tucked to his tail as if he were freezing.

  “He’s fine.”

  She thought she was getting low on his food and hoped there was a new bag in the laundry room. It didn’t matter. She’d have to go to the store anyway.

  “Are you sure you’re going to be all right with that dresser?” she asked.

  “I’m not carrying it. That’s what they pay him for. I’m sure he’s got a dolly.”

  She didn’t sound convincing, but Emily let it go. She’d offered, that was all she could do.

  From here she could count the stoplights. In the week she’d been gone the neighborhood hadn’t changed. It hadn’t rained—the lawns were still burnt, the roses blown. Every porch, every sycamore was familiar, and she noticed her anticipation growing, as if there were someone waiting for her.

  They turned up Grafton and she saw the house was fine. Rufus knew, raising his head and panting.

  “Here we are,” she said. “Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.”

  Her house key was in her purse. She had it out before Arlene parked.

  “Thank you for driving.”

  “Thank you for the furniture.”

  She was surprised by how hot it was—she’d been spoiled by Chautauqua, she thought. Her first steps were creaky from sitting for so long. Rufus had to christen the lawn, and she could feel the coffee. She opened up while Arlene popped the back hatch.

  It was dark inside, a veiled twilight leaking through the curtains, and the air was stale and thick. The dehumidifier was probably full. She didn’t have time to check. She set her purse on the front hall table, closed the bathroom door and sat before flipping the switches. The bulb flashed white and died with a fizzle; the fan whirred.

  “Welcome home,” Emily said.

  She’d have to stand on a chair to unscrew the fixture. She didn’t even know if she had the right size bulb. It would have to wait. She needed to get her things in and start the laundry.

  Of course Arlene needed to pee too.

  “The light would have to give out now,” Emily apologized.

  She brought her bags in one at a time, trying not to overdo it. Her golf clubs she walked to the garage—locked, the Olds safe in the window, a cobweb strung from the antenna.
The toys she had Arlene leave by the basement stairs. She’d have to wash the box of kitchen stuff, meaning she had to put away the load she’d run before she left, and there was the food in the cooler to deal with. Rufus had begun to pester her, so she put him out in the backyard. He stood on the porch, looking through the sliding door at her.

  Arlene was at the car, wiping the carpet in back with his towel.

  “Did he have an accident?” Emily asked.

  “It’s just drool.”

  There was nothing else of hers. She asked again if Arlene would be all right with the dresser and the TV. It was no problem, Arlene said. Her super liked her. They said good-bye in the street, pecking each other’s cheeks.

  “Give me a call on Monday,” Emily said. “I’m going to need tomorrow to get things in order.”

  She waved Arlene away and went inside. Rufus wagged at the back door, and she relented.

  “But you have to stay out of my way,” she said.

  She went around throwing open the curtains and windows, trying to get a breeze going. Upstairs it was worse, and there was Henry’s dresser, large as ever, and the picture Kenneth had taken of him reading the paper. She’d had a vacation from him as well.

  “Back to reality.”

  She started with the laundry, tossing in a load of darks and draping her slack bags over the newel post. Next she emptied the cooler and wiped it out with a paper towel. There were three messages on her machine, but they could wait. Kenneth and Margaret wouldn’t be home yet anyway. She’d have to call Louise.

  The dehumidifier, she’d forgotten it. She took the cooler down to the moldy basement and brought back the heavy plastic catch bucket and splashed the musty water into the sink. On her way down again she took the box of toys and the orange extension cord nobody wanted and set them on Henry’s bench. She’d find a place for them later. As she passed the fridge at the bottom of the stairs, she thought she should get rid of those old bottles, but not now. There was too much to do.

  She opened the cupboards and emptied the dishwasher, the stacks of plates and bowls clashing as she put them away. She unpacked the box of kitchen stuff, setting the salt and pepper shakers on the table and admiring them a second before rinsing everything else. At the sink, with her hands full, she looked around the counter, sure she’d forgotten something, searching for a clue, pausing on the aloe plant and Henry’s Hamilton and then the garage-door opener. Her golf clubs, right, she didn’t want to leave them outside.