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Howard cranked open the patio window in the middle of the day. He liked the window because it was clean and clear and smooth. He didn't own anything as good as that window, which of course was not his window. He had decided to open it to let the air into the house because the air inside felt clingy. It also felt powdery to him. It reminded him of the tiny grains of sand that tumble down from the tops of ant hills. After the window, he walked over to the kitchen counter and picked up a crystal cup from the green granite. It made a tiny sound as he picked it up because he accidentally bumped it against the counter top.
"Oops," he said. But in fact he liked the sound. He didn't know why he said anything at all, since he had the room to himself.
Howard wife, Miss Butterfly sat on the couch in the other room, looking at a book. She thought she might start reading it, but later. It had a purple cover, and it said Jazz on it, in a fancy cursive script, which she very much enjoyed. Then she thought, "No." She put the book down on the pine foot table in front of her. (Just beyond the foot table sat another white couch, just like the one into which she had tucked herself!) She picked up the crossword puzzle she had been working on all week.
Howard and Miss Butterfly were house sitting for the Magnolias in Machiasport, Maine. Miss Butterfly was an artist and Howard did not know what he wanted to do for work in the long run, so he mowed a lawn in town for the time being. Miss Butterfly's artwork ate up the light on a late afternoon, which would not occur for a few hours yet. When it ate up the light, that meant it grabbed so much of their attention that they could do little else but look at it for a while. The little couple would not have the pleasure of seeing her artwork eat up the light today, however, because it happened to be in a storage unit in New Bedford, Massachusetts. In the storage unit, all the paintings leaned against the walls, as if hiding, with their painted sides facing the walls. Miss Butterfly had no idea that her artwork ate up late afternoon sunshine because she had never seen her own work. She painted from behind a blindfold.
Howard came into the living room, which creaked wherever he put his feet. He thought the house might be trying to say, "Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!" Somebody had built the house in 1860. But he knew the house had no feelings. Houses were not living creatures. Nor were windows. Howard creaked over to the couch across the pine foot table from his wife. He put his feet on the dark, grainy wood and thought about flexing his toes. From early childhood, he had a phobia about his toes falling off the moment he bent them downward. He stared at the toes for a few seconds.
Then Miss Butterfly interrupted: "Lobster boat races tonight. Want to go, baby?"
"Lame!" said Howard. "They don't really go very fast anyway." He thought about the long, silly looking hulls slapping and flapping against the waves, trying to go faster and faster. All the slapping and flapping slowed them down and swamped them. All the racers drowned, unfortunately.
"Please?" She could not remember what a lobster boat looked like at just that moment, so she substituted a massive dump truck for one. It sat deep in the water and pushed big dangerous looking waves in front. It barely moved, but she loved it for working so hard. For trying. "Please?"
"I hate to bring this up," said Howard, "but at the end of the races everybody gets so crazy you might get hurt."
Miss Butterfly knew it was a safe family-friendly event. Last year she saw the Shriners go-cart squad loading everything onto the trailer. One of them waved at her, and she waved back, from her kitchen window. Howard sometimes said things like this: “you might get hurt,” that were only half thought out, in a sense. She knew that it was far from a realistic concern. Howard annoyed her with that ill conceived warning of his.
Howard leaned over on the couch arm, until he found a comfortable spot. He expected Miss Butterfly to warn him about how easily the white couch would show his face oils. He wanted her to say something about it, but he did not know what he would do next. He wanted to say something smart and sharp, but he did not know what that would be. So, he put his foot on the pine foot table, sliding it a little out of alignment. She did not seem to notice. She seemed more in love with her crossword puzzle.
"What is a word that means plurality?" she asked.
"Majority!"
"Doesn't fit." She didn't really care about finishing the puzzle. Little noises tended to distract her. For instance, the humingbird just outside the window emitted a dazzling mechanized sound, much too low pitched and rugged to come from such a delicate creature. The hummingbird sounded a little scary, through the glass. It reminded her of the dump truck boat, except much more effective.
That night, Howard woke up around four in the morning. In the wee hours. Well before the garbage truck came. He decided to read a book down in the kitchen, where he had accidentally left the window open. Sitting at the table, next to the window, it definitely felt as though the cool draft had claimed the spot. He closed it but he still felt cold. The house seemed much more quiet than ever before. It was a nice house, on the rocky coast. In the basement, the owners had installed a nice salt water hot tub, which they liked to keep at 104 degrees, even when nobody was around. Howard had never used it, though. He disliked the idea of dipping his body into that salty fever. He might fall asleep and his body temperature would rise up and fry his brain.
He heard an occasional sloshing sound, which might have come from the ocean, had there been someone trying to run through waist-deep water. He heard it every few minutes or so, which made him believe it came from down in the basement. It scared him, but as long as he sat at the table, he would not have to face it, and would probably fall tired again soon anyway. In the morning, he would take a look. Unfortunately he believed in ghosts. For instance, he once house sat for a nice family with one dog for a couple of days. He let the family think he slept there every night, but in truth he did not. He only spend one night there because the house kept making a sound like the front door opening and closing. He knew that was the sound because the front door was open when he came into the kitchen, and when he closed it, it made the right noise. Now, in the Magnolia's house, he was not about to slosh through the hot tub to see if it made the same sound as what he heard every now and then.
Machiasport had a reputation for ghost stories. Miss Butterfly did not care to listen to such stories because they scared her. Howard was scared too, now, sitting in the kitchen in the cold spot by the window. It felt bad. He did not want to keep feeling this way, but he had no choice. He felt unable to move. If he moved, he might see something he did not want to see. He just sat still, listening by the window.
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It's a tough old world. Better critique me before I make my way down that list to you.
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Where My Faith Went
