One month later, when the renovations are complete, a moving truck with Texas plates lumbers through Sowell Bay. Tova doesn’t notice. She’s preparing for battle.
“You’re toast,” she calls, unfolding the game board and scrambling the letter tiles. Outside, a brisk fall wind slices across the water. A harbinger of winter, these whitecaps whipping over the water’s colorless surface, which blends seamlessly into the gray sky.
“Please. I’m about to own you.” Cameron emerges from the luxury kitchen in Tova’s new condominium with a tray of sliced cheddar and round crackers. Tova frowns. She’s been lobbying hard for him to try lutefisk with hardtack, which is what a good Swede would eat. But the crackers were on special at Shop-Way, Cameron had explained. Buy-one-get- one. She can’t be upset about that.
Tova knows Terry would’ve been thrilled to keep Cameron on at the aquarium, but the hours and pay just weren’t enough, although Cameron stayed on to train his replacement. Now, Cameron works excruciating, long days for a contractor over at one of those custom homes in Adam Wright and Sandy Hewitt’s neighborhood. He’s talking about taking classes at the community college down in Elland come January, engineering prerequisites. He insists on paying his own way, in spite of Tova’s objections. She’ll work on that.
“You go first,” Tova says, arranging her tiles.
“No, go ahead. Age before beauty,” Cameron teases, studying his own tray while fiddling absently with his father’s class ring, which he wears on his right hand.
She mock-scowls. “I have fifty years of daily crossword puzzles stored in here.” She taps her temple.
Cameron grins. “I don’t know shit, really, but somehow I’m good at these things.”
Shit, really. That’s the sort of language now woven into the tapestry of her life, and she wouldn’t have it any other way. She opens with “JUKEBOX” (seventy-seven points, an incredibly lucky draw). On this, Cameron plays “JAM” (thirty- nine points).
“I’m glad you’re here,” she says quietly. “Are you kidding? Where else would I be?” “With your aunt Jeanne.”
Cameron rolls his eyes. “She’s living her best life, trust me. Did I tell you about Wally Perkins and his—”
Tova holds up a hand. “Yes. You did.”
“It’s amazing up here. Aunt Jeanne will for sure come visit. She’s already talking about trying to track down her sister over in Eastern Washington. To which I say, good luck
—who knows what mess she’ll dig up there.” Cameron face tenses, but it’s short-lived. “And Elizabeth is already planning to bring the baby up in the spring. Well, Brad, too, of course, but I guess he’s freaking out about taking baby Henry on a plane—germs or something. Elizabeth will talk him into it, though, and Uncle Cam will put the pressure on if needed.” He laughs.
Tova laughs, too. A baby in the family. Although she hasn’t met Elizabeth or Brad yet, somehow Cameron has convinced her that she’s their grandmother, too. She gazes out the window. It is amazing here. Hurricane-grade glass from floor to vaulted ceiling run the entire length of the living room, interrupted only by French doors, which lead to a balcony set on sturdy pilings. When the tide is high, Tova
likes to have coffee out there, listening to the water slap the deck boards underneath.
WHEN THANKSGIVING COMES, Tova and Cameron set a table for three.
It would’ve been four, but Avery backed out, promising to swing by later with pie. Apparently, she decided to keep the paddle shop open on Thanksgiving Day but didn’t want to make any of her employees work. People starting their holiday shopping on a holiday, how ridiculous. But Avery always says that the shop is doing so well this year, on the upswing, like Sowell Bay itself. She probably didn’t want to pass up a day of decent sales. Cameron said he understood, and anyway, he sees her all the time.
Marco might come with Avery today. Cameron’s voice had dropped, serious, when he explained this to Tova. He bought a green Nerf football on his way home from work the other day. Marco might want to toss it around on the beach, he said. Maybe. If he doesn’t, no hard feelings.
Ethan claims his seat, arriving half an hour early for turkey supper. Sometimes it seems he spends every free minute in Tova’s condo. But, in truth, Tova doesn’t mind. Mostly, he sits in her living room, in the recliner next to the little curio shelf where she displays her Dala Horses. Ethan loves listening to records on Will’s old turntable, an apparatus he treats with almost religious reverence. Although Tova never desired an education on rock music, she’s receiving one. It’s nice to have Ethan around.
When Ethan shrugs off his jacket, Cameron yelps. “Where’d you get that?”
“Oh, this?” Ethan’s eyes twinkle. He runs a hand over his belly, which strains against a yellow T-shirt that’s clearly a bit small. Garish lettering across the chest reads MOTH SAUSAGE.
Good heavens. What is a Moth Sausage?
Cameron’s eyes are still saucers. “That’s mine! I haven’t seen it since—holy shit, did my luggage finally come?”
“You mean that ruddy green duffel is your luggage?” Ethan winks. “Thought it was just my lucky day when I found it on my porch this morning.”
“Finally.” Cameron laughs. “That bag has been all over the world. I’ll bet it’s got some stories to tell.”
After the turkey and gravy have been eaten, Ethan, Cameron, and Tova leave a scandalous mountain of dirty dishes in the sink and bundle up for a walk down the waterfront, where Puget Sound shivers like a great gray ghost beyond the pier. The old ticket booth with its diagonal- cracked window sits alone under a blanket of clouds.
In front of the aquarium, they stop, all three admiring the new installation. A bronze statue with eight arms, a heavy- looking mantle. Round, inscrutable eyes on either side of its head.
The aquarium had balked at her hefty donation, but Tova insisted. Too much cash sitting unused in a bank account. Now, she passes the new statue three times a week, when she arrives for her volunteer position, passing out pamphlets and standing in front of the giant Pacific octopus tank, helping visitors understand the creature. Pippa the Grippa is still quite shy, spending most of her public-facing time as a pink blob suctioned to the glass in the corner of the tank. Living up to her name, Tova supposes. But that’s okay. When it’s slow, Tova talks to her while surreptitiously wiping away stray fingerprints on the glass. She can’t help herself.
A couple of tanks down, the sea cucumber population now remains stable. To Terry’s great relief, Pippa appears disinclined to roam the hallways, collecting lost artifacts.
Secretly, this makes Tova happy, too. Marcellus was, in fact, an exceptional octopus.
They continue along the waterfront, past the jetty. Marcellus’s jetty. The tide is high, clinging snug to the
seawall like someone drawing blanket to chin on a cold winter night. Gentle waves play peekaboo with the mussel- crusted boulders that line the wall. Cameron and Ethan have been yapping about football for the last half hour, so Tova tunes them out.
If they kept going up the shore, they’d eventually pass underneath her old house, perched up on the hillside. Sometimes Tova walks there at dusk, and often when she passes the house, the big attic window glows golden through the trees. Once, she was certain she saw a string of paper dolls fixed to the window.
She has returned to the house only one time. A woman with a Texas accent called her cell phone, having obtained the number from Ethan. It seemed the woman had come through the checkout lane at the Shop-Way with a stack of cat food cans, and mentioned that there was a gray cat that wouldn’t leave her yard. Now, Cat loves hunting rock crabs on the beach under Tova’s deck when the tide is out. He prefers being outdoors, as if he doesn’t quite trust that this new place is home, and Tova can’t blame him. It’s a difficult adjustment. But as the weather gets colder, he seems increasingly resigned to spending more time inside the condo, curled on the davenport or sitting in front of the window, yellow eyes fixed on the seagulls that wander the skies.
When they circle back to the pier, Tova slips away and stands at the railing, alone. To the somber bay that took them both, a cherished son and an exceptional octopus, she whispers inscrutably: “I miss you. Both of you.” She taps her heart.
Then she turns and heads back to the others. They ought to get back to the condo.
Avery is coming for pie. And there’s a Scrabble game to win, after all.
