Lucy by the Sea (18)

I told him I didn’t mind at all, that I liked the smell of smoke, which is true, I always have. And Bob sucked down that cigarette so fast, my heart unfolded toward him even more. Two seagulls flew down to the dock and then back up far into the sky.

As we sat there I thought about Bob’s brother, Jim, and how famous he had become as a lawyer defending the soul singer Wally Packer, who had been accused of killing his girlfriend. It had been a huge national trial, and Jim had gotten Wally Packer acquitted. So I said, “Jim always knew that Wally Packer was innocent, right?”

And Bob looked at me then; without his mask I could see his full expression and there was a great tenderness to it. He raised his arm as though to touch my shoulder, but he did not touch it and he put his arm back down. Then he said, “Oh Lucy, sweet thing.” And I felt embarrassed. “So he was guilty?” I said. “Did Jim know that when he was defending him?”

Bob inhaled deeply, looking at me with his kind eyes, then exhaled the smoke from the corner of his mouth. “Lucy, I used to do defense work myself, and I suspect Jim did what all defense attorneys do. I suspect he never asked Wally if he was guilty or not.”

“Okay,” I said. Then I said, “Thank you for being nice about it. I’m stupid, Bob. I’ve always been stupid about the world.”

And Bob said, “You’re not stupid about the human heart, Lucy. And I don’t think you’re stupid about the world.” He paused and then said, “But I know what you’re saying. I have a bit of that myself.”



—

As we walked back to the house, we saw Tom sitting on his steps. I waved both my arms. “Hello, Tom!” I said. And he said, “Hello, de-ah.” Then he nodded at Bob and said, “Mr. Burgess.”

“Hello, Tom,” Bob said, and we continued down the road.

“You know him?” I asked, and Bob glanced at me sideways and said, “I do. I suspect he was the one who put that sign on your car saying ‘Go Home New Yorkers.’?”

“No, he didn’t. He and I have always been friends.” But then I remembered that the sign had been there the day I first spoke to him. “Really?” I asked Bob.

Bob didn’t answer, he just kept walking.

“Well, who cares,” I said. “Tom and I are friends now.”

Bob’s eyes smiled at me above his mask. “Okay, Lucy,” he said.

We had gotten back to his car. “Let’s do this again,” Bob said.





So the next week Bob and I walked again. Then as spring was suddenly—so quickly!—arriving, Bob said that Margaret wanted to walk with William and me as well, so William and I drove to town and then followed in our car behind Bob and Margaret’s car down to the river walk, where there would be more room for the four of us to spread out. “Just please don’t leave me stuck with Margaret,” I said to William as we drove there.

He glanced over at me. “I thought you liked her,” he said.

“I do like her!” I said. “I just don’t want to be stuck with her.”

Margaret was a fast walker, and so was William, and so they walked ahead of us, but honestly, it was pleasant; that was a pleasant morning. The walk was a tarred path that went alongside the river, which sparkled in the sun that day; the leaves had finally started to come out and there was a sense of green and bright light; I thought the trees looked like young girls, tentative in their beauty. And there were dandelions here and there in the grassy areas.

Margaret stopped to talk to a number of people we passed, her eyes twinkling as she spoke, and I saw that she asked about them, about their mothers and children, and things like that. She was a minister, after all—and she did seem to be good at it. I saw that she was a really good person, is what I am saying.

vi

William kept walking to the guard tower; frequently he went in the afternoon. Every time he went he seemed glum when he came back. I noticed this, but I did not know what to say about it, and since he said nothing about it either, I did not ask.



—

I did not know how I felt about William. My feelings changed about him, they went up and down like the tides. But William was very often not there in a certain way, and it reminded me of when I was married to him, and how often I had felt that. Sometimes now when I wanted to talk—I have always liked to talk—he would roll his eyes and put his computer down and say, “What is it, Lucy?” And I hated that. So I would say, “Nothing. Forget it.” And he would roll his eyes again and say, “Oh come on, Lucy. There was something you wanted to say. So say it.”

So I might tell him about how Tom was often sitting on his front steps smoking. “Have you seen him? Do you know who I’m talking about?” And William nodded. “I like him so much,” I said. And then I would not be able to go on, because William was so clearly bored. Even when I said that Bob had suggested it was Tom who’d left the sign on our car, William simply shrugged.

At such times, I could not stand him.

But there were other times, often right before we went upstairs to our rooms, where he would soften and talk to me pleasantly. I told myself: His wife just left him last year, he has not seen any of his daughters for a few months, we are in the middle of a pandemic, he can no longer really work. Go easy on him, Lucy.