Monday, November 16
There was nowhere to put the sandwich bag because Beth had covered the kitchen table with books.
“Those are going?”
“Some.”
“Which some?”
“The ones I haven't put back.”
Willa looked at the full table, then at the empty shelves.
“Very clear.”
“Don't be funny. I've spent an hour deciding I don't want a book about sauces.”
“You might want a sauce later.”
“I can want one without owning three hundred pages about it.”
She took the bag from Willa and put it on top of a large atlas. Then she saw the grease mark beginning on the paper and moved it onto a plate.
Simon had gone to work. Beth had chosen the hours carefully. At ten she had said they could be finished by one. Now it was nearly eleven and she was still taking books out of the box Willa had put them in.
“Where do you want me?”
“Books first. Then the room.”
Beth gave her an empty box. It had once held wine, and the cardboard divisions were still inside.
“Take those out.”
Willa folded them flat and put them under the table.
Beth had sorted the books by a system only partly visible to anyone else. Cookbooks together, novels near the edge, a pile of travel books opened to places somebody had meant to go. Willa picked up a guide to northern Italy.
“Keep?”
“No.”
“Sure?”
Beth held out her hand. Willa gave it to her. Her sister looked at the cover for a long time, then put it on the shelf.
Willa opened another box. Beth took the guide down once more and put it back, spine in.
“It can stay,” Beth said, although Willa hadn't asked again. She reached past her for another book.
At the bottom of a stack was a cookbook with a broken spine, the cover worn soft at the corners. Simon had written notes in it in pencil. Willa could see one beside a recipe for beans: too much water, Beth right.
Beth took it.
“That one?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry.”
“You can ask a question.”
“Apparently I can ask one question, then it becomes a tone.”
Beth looked at her. For a moment Willa thought she'd leave, or tell her to. Instead she let out a breath.
“I am being horrible.”
“A bit.”
“I don't know how to do this.”
“Me neither.”
Beth sat down. The chair was the same one she'd used at dinner. She took the cookbook into her lap and opened it.
“He gave it to me. I used it before he did.”
“Then take it.”
“I am.”
“Good.”
Beth smiled faintly. Willa put a stack of novels in the box without asking. Beth watched her do it and didn't object.
At noon Beth shut the cookbook on her finger, swore, and said she needed to eat. Willa carried the boxes into the hall. When she came back, Beth had opened the sandwiches.
“Which one's yours?”
“The one that isn't chicken.”
“You brought chicken for me?”
“It was that or egg.”
“Fine.”
They ate standing by the counter until Beth said her feet hurt and sat on the floor. Willa sat beside her. The kitchen was warm. A truck outside was making the window vibrate gently in its frame.
“Tuesday tomorrow,” Beth said.
“Yes.”
“The recording.”
“Yes.”
Beth wiped a small trace of mayonnaise from her thumb.
“Mom told me.”
Willa looked at her.
“She left a message. She's very excited.”
“It's a pilot,” Willa said. “We record it. Mae tries to sell a series.”
“How many?”
“Six.”
“Good.”
Beth took another bite.
“We're getting paid.”
“I'd hope so.”
“Four for the pilot. For me.”
Her sister looked up. The number had reached her.
“That's good money.”
“It is.”
Willa wanted to tell her about Friday, the line Jo had given up, the thing they'd found when nobody was trying to win. She wanted Beth to know this wasn't just Willa being led through a door with a treat. It was work, and she could do it.
“We're good together,” she said.
Beth looked at the cupboard doors.
“You would be.”
Willa waited for another question. Beth was trying to pull a piece of chicken free with her teeth. She got it, looked at it, and began wrapping the sandwich up again.
“I don't want the rest. God. I bought that chicken.”
“I bought it.”
“Right.” Beth laughed once at herself. “I don't know what belongs to who anymore.”
She put it in the bag. A short burst of music came from the other side of the wall and stopped. Beth listened until it began again.
“Can we do the bedroom? I want to be out of here.”
Willa followed.
There was a large plastic bag on the bed, open, full of things Beth was giving away. Willa knelt beside it. A blue cardigan, a dress Beth had worn to somebody's wedding, trousers that looked almost new.
“These are good.”
“They don't fit.”
“They look like they fit.”
“Then you wear them.”
Willa held the trousers against herself. They would fit, probably. She liked them. Asking for them now felt strange.
Beth saw her hesitate.
“Take them.”
“Are you sure?”
“Willa. It's a pair of trousers.”
She put them in her bag.
Beth stood at the closet, taking things out of the high shelf. A box of photographs, a folded blanket, a square cushion still in its plastic from the shop. She threw the cushion onto the bed.
“Wedding present,” she said.
“From who?”
“I don't remember.”
“Keep it in the plastic. You can give it to somebody you don't remember.”
Beth laughed, a proper laugh this time, and sat on the edge of the bed.
“It's horrible.”
“It is.”
“Why did we keep it?”
“To protect the planet from knowing.”
Beth pulled the plastic off and inspected the cushion. It was beige, with little beads sewn into a pattern that seemed to have given up halfway through. She turned it over.
“No improvement.”
Willa took it and threw it lightly at her. Beth caught it against her chest, stared for a second, then threw it back harder.
“Don't start,” she said, laughing.
“I didn't.”
“You did.”
Willa threw it once more. Beth ducked, laughing, and it hit the closet door. Willa put it in the giveaway bag.
Beth pulled a shirt down from the shelf. Something caught behind it, and she had to put the shirt back to get at the thing. Willa reached up to help.
“Wait.”
Beth took down a stack of folded sweaters. Simon's, except for one of hers in the middle. She separated it, then put it back on top.
“I don't know why I'm doing his side.”
Willa lowered her arm.
Beth carried the stack to the bed. Her phone was underneath the giveaway bag. She found it, looked at the screen, and sat beside the sweaters.
“I should ask him.”
“About those?”
“All of it. I've got things of his in the kitchen box. I don't even know which things. We used them.”
She scrolled to his name. Willa saw it before Beth turned the phone away: Simon, no photograph. She had expected a photograph.
The call rang long enough for Beth to start standing up. Then she sat again.
“Hi. Are you in a class?”
She listened, rubbing the place on her finger where the cookbook had caught it.
“No. Nothing's happened. I'm here. At the house.”
Willa began folding the blue cardigan. It was going to a donation bin; she folded it anyway.
“I've got some of the books. The ones from before. But then there's—” Beth looked toward the door. “Have you got a minute?”
Whatever he said made her close her eyes.
“I know. I know you said take what I want. I'm not asking you to say it again.”
Willa pressed the cardigan into the bag beside the cushion. Beth lifted one of Simon's sweaters, found a thread on it, and put it down without pulling the thread free.
“Could we do the rest together? When you're back.”
She listened.
“I can wait. I said I can.”
Willa stopped folding. It was after one. Beth saw her looking at the clock and pointed at the giveaway bag, then at the door. Willa nodded too eagerly and bent to find her own bag.
“Not the whole afternoon,” Beth said into the phone. “You've got work. I know. Just—there's your mother's thing in that cupboard. I can't remember if she gave it to me or if I just liked it.”
Willa got the bag of clothes over one shoulder. Beth was listening now, her mouth half open. She made a little movement at the phone, as if Simon had been able to see the room before him and was getting it wrong.
“No, not that one. I know about that one.”
She looked up at Willa, remembered the trousers, and held up a finger.
“The zip sticks,” she whispered.
Willa nodded. She mouthed thank you. Beth nodded back, already listening again.
In the hall Willa found the two boxes of books. She didn't know whether to put them in the car. She set down the clothes and went back to the bedroom door.
“Boxes?” she whispered.
Beth shook her head and waved her on. The cookbook lay on the bed beside her, with Beth's sweater still on top of Simon's.
“After school, then,” she said. “Yes. I'll be here.”
Willa lifted the clothes again. She had to hold the front door with her hip to get the cushion through. Behind her, Beth said Simon's name, and Willa let the door shut before she heard what followed it.