| |
Kate
––––––––
THE GALES OF early November have licked the trees clean. They blast Kate as she opens the sliding glass door to release Chuck to the deck. He carefully clicks his way down to the crisp grass where last week’s jack-o-lanterns have been disfigured by ravenous squirrels. She shivers and takes a bitter sip of tea. Her Nordic resignation has not kicked in yet. But there’s no hiding indoors on Election Day.
After that weekend on the Leap with Lucy, the kids had been distant. But on Brace’s last visit home from college there were no harsh words and he actually hugged his mother tight for the first time in years. Samantha was singing in the house again and needed her mom’s advice on homework and clothes and which weekends to hang out in Minneapolis with Jamie or which to meet Zev halfway to Madison. She’d even made a few new friends at WBHS.
Kate hasn’t told Erik what Lucy suspected about his father and Marcus Robeson. It would just add another wall between them, something to hurt him with. And besides, it’s nothing she can prove. If Bert was in a closet that he wanted to escape, Kate would be there for him, help Erik and Claudia navigate it too. But perhaps Bert has made his own sort of peace. It’s his sojourn, not hers. Still, she owes the memory of Marcus Robeson something. Once the election is over, she’ll invite Bert to coffee, find out what he knows.
Erik’s footsteps thump down the hall, but Kate does not turn and waits instead for the mood in his voice. Autumn has seen good days, with laughter and newfound intimacy and a clear-eyed understanding of what might occur when Lucy came back to re-open the B&B. But there were also dreary days when he sat glaring at Fox News, gave ultimatums, left his wedding ring in the soap dish, and showed only his kids whatever affection he had to give.
Today, not only will he vote on his mother’s career, but on the definition of marriage. And Kate’s as unsure of what boxes he will check as she is unsure of what will happen to their own marriage come spring. All around town civility has gone wobbly, Facebook rants escalating, friends and family retreating to their comfortable political bubbles. Something dark and shambling is on the horizon. Heaven only knows.
Kate hears a chair slide out at the dining room table and her husband’s weight creaking the wood. Is he expecting breakfast? She turns to ask what she can make him.
Erik sits, arms crossed, a manila envelope laid out before him where a bamboo place setting would normally be. He stares sternly at her and pulls out the chair next to him.
Well, this is it now, isn’t it? This is how it ends. In paperwork.
She takes a deep breath, walks over, sits down, but cannot exhale completely.
Erik slides the envelope toward her. His ring is on today. Had he forgotten to take it off? Or left it on for some tortuous reason? Why was he making her purposefully read this in front of him? To sign it in front of him? Maybe he was simply being his usual egalitarian self; they would work out the details together.
“Just open it, Kate.”
There is no address on the envelope, nor is it sealed. She turns it over, pinches the silver clips together to open the flap and pulls out a short stack of forms. Kate pages through them. The top of each reads:
––––––––
University of Minnesota
College of Veterinary Medicine
Student Application