Loretta asked Nadine if she would ever date. Nadine said not a man with a Sunday wife. Loretta said that is specific. Nadine said specific is how I don’t do eleven again. They laughed, short. The laugh was late and clean. Nadine did not date that year. The not-dating was not a shrine to Raymond. It was a boundary. Boundaries were the leaving, extended. She kept the box high. She kept the job. She kept the park. A man at the park asked her name. She said Nadine and nothing else. Nothing else was a skill. She went home. The lot window was dark. She liked the dark. Dark was not a parlor lamp. Parlor lamps had been too kind. She wanted a light she could switch. She switched it. Off. On. Hers.
Vera hosted the boy overnight and burned the toast. He ate it. Burned was information, he said, copying Marcus without knowing. Vera said then you are educated. They watched a show about trucks. Trucks were neutral. Neutral was a blessing. She did not tell a story about Grandpa’s car. The car was in the past with the receipts. The show ended. The boy slept in Keisha’s old room. The trophy stayed at his house. This room had a blanket. Blankets were enough. Vera checked the window lock. Locks were a grandmother. She was one. The title did not require pearls. She slept. The phone stayed quiet. Quiet was no longer a accusation. It was a night.
Keisha found a note in a coat pocket, Raymond’s handwriting, a grocery list. Milk. Batteries. Nothing east. She showed Vera. Vera said even the lists were ordinary. Keisha said that’s what scared me at the closet. Vera said we donated the closet. The list went in the drawer. One more paper. The drawer stuck and unstuck. They left it. Stuck was a personality. They did not have to fix every personality. They fixed the roof. That was enough carpentry. The rest was living. Living was the boy and the salt and the route that did not pass the parlor. Keisha drove the route on purpose once, to check. The parlor looked like a house. It was a house. Keisha would come later with the boy or she would not. Either was a full day. Nadine would not come. That absence was ordered and kept. The lilies were gone. The wood of the casket was not her table. Her table had a cup and a salt and a window on a street she had chosen. She sat down. She stayed. It did not reach out. She did not go in. In was finished. She went to her mother’s. Tea. Hot. A fact.