She gave him a hard look, her face pinched and her mouth set. “I notice you weren’t in any hurry to get home last night from telling war stories with your pals. And I don’t suppose you were drinking tea and playing shuffleboard down there at the hall, were you?” She took a long pull on the drink, walked back to her chair, sat down, and picked up the magazine. “Leave me alone, Robert. And leave Nest alone, too.”
Old Bob nodded slowly and looked off again out the window. They had lived in this house for almost the whole of their married life. It was a big, sprawling rambler on two acres of wooded land abutting the park; he’d supervised the building of it himself, back in the late fifties. He’d bought the land for two hundred dollars an acre. It was worth a hundred times that now, even without the house. Caitlin had grown up under this roof, and now Nest. Everything that had meaning in his life had happened while he was living here.
His eyes traveled over the aged wood of the kitchen cabinets to the molding and kickboards and down the hall to the paneled entry. He had even been happy here once.
He stood up, weary, resigned, still in a funk. He felt emasculated by Evelyn, helpless in the face of her fortress mentality, adrift in his life, unable to change things in any way that mattered. It had been bad between them for years and it was getting worse. What was going to become of them? Nest was all that bound them together now. Once she was gone, as she would be in a few years, what would be left for them?
He brushed at his thick white hair with his hand, smoothing it back. “I’m going downtown, see if there’s anything new with the strike,” he said. “I’ll be back in a few hours.”
She nodded without looking up. “Lunch will be on the table at noon if you want it.”
He studied her a moment longer, then went down the hall and out the front door into the summer heat.
It was another hour before Nest appeared in the kitchen. She stretched and yawned as she entered and helped herself to the orange juice. Her grandmother was still sitting at the kitchen table, smoking and drinking and reading her magazine. She looked up as Nest appeared and gave her a wan smile. “Good morning, Nest.”
“Morning, Gran,” Nest replied. She took out the bread and stuck a couple of slices in the toaster. Thinking of Bennett Scott, she stood at the counter and rolled her shoulders inside her sleep shirt to relieve the lingering ache in her muscles. “Grandpa around?”
Her grandmother put down the magazine. “He’s gone out. But he wants to talk with you. He says you went into the park last night.”
Nest hunched her shoulders one final time, then slouched against the counter, her eyes on the toaster. “Yep, he’s right. I did.”
“What happened?”
“Same as usual. The feeders got Bennett Scott this time.” She told her grandmother what had happened. “I walked her to the front door and handed her over to Jared. You should have seen his face. He was so scared. He’d looked everywhere for her. He was about to call the police. His mom still wasn’t home. She’s a dead loss, Gran. Can’t we do something about her? It isn’t fair the way she saddles Jared with all the responsibility. Did you know he has to make all the meals for those kids-or almost all? He has to be there for them after school. He has to do everything!”
Her grandmother took a deep drag on her cigarette. A cloud of smoke enveloped her. “I’ll have a talk with Mildred Walker. She’s involved with the social-services people. Maybe one of them will drop by for a chat with Enid. That woman checks her brains at the door every time a man walks in. She’s a sorry excuse for a mother, but those kids are stuck with her.”
“Bennett’s scared of George Paulsen, too. Next thing, he’ll be living there.”
Her grandmother nodded. “Well, George is good at showing up where there’s a free ride.” Her eyes shifted to find Nest’s, and her small body bent forward over the table. “Sit with me a moment. Bring your toast.”