Morning sun streamed through the kitchen windows like a beacon announcing the arrival of a new day. For Alex, that meant back to the routine—not quite the grind, as she worked for herself. She was one of several Alton Road residents who had argued (unsuccessfully) to hold the block party on a Sunday, not the Monday of Memorial Day. She just wanted an extra day for recovery.
She took her first desperate gulp of coffee, too aware of the pounding in her head, regretting her choice to cap off the party with that final late-night glass of wine. She’d enjoyed yesterday’s festivities well enough, but was glad it would be another year before they’d unpack the supplies to do it again.
She’d barely gotten her first rejuvenating jolt of caffeine when into the kitchen trotted Zoe, the family dog, a brownish, whitish, yellowish mutt that everyone loved and only one person fed. Zoe had come from the local animal shelter after months of Lettie begging for a pet. Nick was resistant, given their busy schedules, but Alex felt continually guilty that Lettie was an only. Eventually Nick warmed to the idea, but he never thought of Zoe as his responsibility. In his mind, this was Lettie’s dog.
In a way he was right. Without Lettie, there’d be no Zoe. Whenever Lettie cried about not having a sister or brother, Alex broke inside. It wasn’t by choice, but that was too much to explain to a child. By the time Lettie was old enough to understand, she’d grown accustomed to her status. Once she stopped asking for a sibling and started asking for a dog, Alex jumped on it. Lettie got a playmate, and Alex didn’t have to answer any uncomfortable questions.
Alex filled Zoe’s food bowl, noticing that the water bowl needed filling, too.
Nick appeared in the kitchen, doing up his tie.
“Zoe’s water bowl was empty again,” Alex said.
“And good morning to you,” said Nick. “Any post-party regrets?”
“None,” Alex lied. She felt like John Henry was trying to hammer his way out of her skull.
“Lucky,” said Nick, rubbing his temples. “I think I’m getting too old for the block party.”
Feeling no sympathy, Alex again pointed to the empty water dish. “Are you too old to pay more attention to Zoe? That’s kind of what I’m asking here. I’ve got a lot on my plate.”
“Right. And I don’t?”
“Okay, that’s not what I’m saying, Nick. I’m asking for your help, is all.”
“You do have a daughter who wanted a dog. How about asking her?”
Alex’s hands moved to her hips. She could feel her blood pressure starting to spike. Too early for that.
Calm. Stay calm, Alex told herself. No reason to take this stupid conversation to unnecessary heights … or lows.
“I’m sorry, are you refusing to help?”
Nick took the bowl over to the sink and filled it with water. “No, I’m merely pointing out that you have a daughter who begged for a dog and you never ask her to help with Zoe. Never. It’s like you’re afraid to confront her with anything these days. She’s not a fragile egg, Alex. You don’t need to handle her with kid gloves. You can push her and she’ll still love you.”
Alex’s mouth dropped open. She wanted the perfect retort, something that would really sting, but her vast vocabulary yielded only a single “Harrumph.”
Eventually she found some words. “How did this conversation turn into how I parent Lettie? And I think I’ve confronted her plenty,” said Alex, harboring visions of tossing Zoe’s water bowl at Nick’s head like a Frisbee.
“Really? You didn’t even want to punish her for getting suspended.”
“That’s not true.”
But it was true. Alex had felt that the suspension was punishment enough, but suggested grounding her for two weeks when Nick pushed back. Eventually she’d had to apply the same mediation tactics she used on her clients to herself. They came up with a compromise—no winners, no losers—grounding Lettie for six weeks instead of Nick’s proposal of the entire summer.
With coffee in hand, Nick departed the kitchen as Lettie came strolling in, her face fixated on her phone. She was grounded, but not without a lifeline to the world.
Alex did a fast reset. She didn’t want Lettie to know that she and her dad had been exchanging tense words. She could almost hear Nick’s reprimand—you can’t keep protecting her from real life.
“How’d you sleep, hon?” Alex asked.
“Fine,” said Lettie, not bothering with eye contact.
“Are you able to get your homework? Principal Corey said—”
“Mom—I’m fine,” Lettie said.
“Right,” said Alex. Why is it that talking to teens feels like handling a live grenade?
“Did Aunt Emily sell the Weaver house to that family?”
Lettie’s question took Alex by surprise. “Did you see the Kumars looking at the house yesterday?”
Before Lettie could answer, Emily, who’d let herself in as always, barged into the kitchen through the side door.
“I have a real problem,” she announced. She snatched a muffin from a plate that Alex had set out for breakfast. Emily took a bite and only then looked to Alex for permission, which she gave with a genial nod.
“Morning, Lettie,” said Emily, her mouth full of muffin.
“Morning, Aunt Emily,” Lettie responded. “Say, did you sell the Weavers’ house to that family?”
“Not yet,” answered Emily a bit tersely.
Alex knew the tone well and could guess the source of her sister’s distress.
“Cool,” said Lettie with an indifference that didn’t quite jell with her initial interest. Out went Lettie, while Emily, strangely enough, hefted the white trash bag out of the freestanding kitchen trash can.
“Um, what are you doing, Sis?” Alex asked.
“Ken went to the dump,” Emily said, as if that explained everything.
“And are you taking my trash there as well?”
“Not exactly,” said Emily, and fled out the door.
Alex didn’t hesitate to follow. “Em, where are you going with that?”
Emily didn’t answer. She was too busy crossing the street, headed for the Weavers’ house.
Alex had a mediation session scheduled for first thing that morning. She didn’t have time for her sister to have a full-on meltdown, but that was what appeared to be coming. She raced to catch up with Emily, who was moving at a pace close to a trot, the garbage bag swaying in her grasp.
“What on earth are you doing?” Alex asked as Emily entered the code on the lockbox to retrieve the key.
“I need to figure out a way to keep the Kumars from buying this house,” Emily said. She unlocked the door, entering the vacant home with urgency.
Alex followed her into the echoing foyer. The sparsely furnished rooms were staged for showing.
“Did the Kumars make an offer?”
“Twenty thousand over asking, and it’s a cash deal.” Emily made it sound like the sale had fallen through.
Alex trailed Emily down a flight of stairs into the basement, still baffled about why her sister would bring a trash bag from her home down here.
“What’s your concern?” asked Alex, moving quickly to keep pace. “Is there something wrong with the house you haven’t disclosed?”
Alex hoped that would be the case, because Emily in an emotional crisis meant a crisis for Alex as well.
“Not yet there isn’t,” Emily said.
The basement was unfinished but quite clean, with a gray concrete floor, smooth and flat as a skating rink. Emily hurried over to a corner, where she untied the trash bag. For reasons Alex couldn’t fathom, Emily proceeded to dump the trash onto the floor. Out spilled wrappers and crinkled packages, soaked coffee grounds that spread like a coating of measles, wadded paper towels and plastics that should have been recycled.
“Emily, my god!” Alex said. “What the hell are you doing?”
Emily didn’t answer. She was too busy fishing through the trash, searching with serious intent as though she might find something of value. Eventually she stood, holding—of all things—a browning banana peel.
“This will do,” she said. She left the mess on the floor and bounded back up the stairs, forcing Alex to follow.
“Emily, stop it!” cried Alex, directing her plea to her sister’s back. “What is going on with you?”
Alex followed Emily into the brightly lit living room. She recalled the sales copy advertising great sunlight, and it hadn’t lied.
Rising on tiptoes, Emily stretched to unhook a burnished metal curtain rod from its wall-mounted holder. She began to unscrew the end cap while still holding on to the banana peel.
“Emily, hon,” Alex said in a far gentler tone, “do I need to call an ambulance? Have you lost your mind?”
Emily was too busy fussing with the end cap of the curtain rod to respond. As soon as it came off, she tried to stuff the banana peel into the hollow rod, but it wouldn’t fit.
“Damn it, it’s too thick,” she lamented. “It needs to be shrimp, and I don’t have any shrimp. I’ll have to go to the store.”
“Why on earth would you put shrimp inside a curtain rod?” Alex demanded. “Whatever it is you’re doing, you need to stop it right now and talk to me.”
Emily slumped onto the hardwood floor, her body trembling. The curtain rod rolled away with a clatter. She dropped the banana peel onto her lap and buried her face in her hands.
“It’s going to happen again,” Emily moaned. “I can feel it.”
Alex had a good idea what it meant. She also could guess what Emily was up to with the trash. “Are you trying to sabotage this sale? Your sale?”
Emily nodded glumly. “I read a story on the internet about a woman who put some shrimp inside the curtain rods of her former marital home before she moved out. Nobody could find the source of the stench. Drove them all mad.”
“Oh, Em,” said Alex with a heavy sigh.
“I was thinking I’d plaster some wet cardboard on the walls too, try to grow black mold, but I don’t think I’ll have time before the inspection. I’ve only got three days!”
Alex sank to the floor and placed an arm around her sister’s shoulder. “You are completely unhinged, you know that?”
“I know,” Emily admitted, but didn’t really seem to care.
“This is about Mandy Kumar, isn’t it?” Alex’s face showed the perfect blend of empathy and love.
“I’ve seen lingering looks in my day,” Emily said. “But Ken’s eyes basically popped out of his head. I mean, Mandy is pretty—and she’s got a great figure, I’ll give her that—but I didn’t expect to need a cup to catch my husband’s drool.”
“Are you sure it happened like that?” Alex asked the question even though she’d seen it happen, just like that.
“Even worse, Mandy was all gaga for Ken,” Emily said.
“Ken is really handsome. A lot of women have that reaction to meeting him, but it doesn’t mean anything.”
Emily’s expression only soured. “I know the difference between someone casually checking out my husband and something more—and that was something more.”
“I really think you’re creating a tempest in a teapot,” said Alex. “Maybe they worked together or something? He could have recognized her, and it was just innocuous.”
“I already asked him that, and he said no, definitely not. And it would have come up in conversation if that was the case, right? Instead, Ken took my question as an opportunity to lecture me about my jealous streak. I don’t care what he says. It’s going to happen again, and it’s going to happen with her. I feel it in my bones.”
“Ken and Mandy?”
“Yes, Ken and Mandy,” Emily snarled. “I have the same feeling I had before.”
Before. Alex didn’t need any clarification.
“You can’t know that for certain,” said Alex.
“I knew he was sleeping with his secretary. I knew when he told me that he wouldn’t do something so clichéd that he was in fact doing something that clichéd.”
“That was fifteen years ago. You two have been good since then. You worked through all that.”
“Once a cheater, always a cheater,” said Emily.
Alex rose to standing, pulling Emily up with her. She set her hands on her sister’s shoulders so that Emily couldn’t hide from her stare. “Honey,” Alex said in her most compassionate voice. “You and Ken are doing well now. You did the hard work and pulled through.”
It was true. It had taken a year and a half of hard work, but Emily and Ken managed to recover from his infidelity. It had been a painful process for both, one that took humility, compromise, and uncomfortable honesty. Ken had no choice but to quit his job, sell the house, and move, which was how Emily came to live on the same street as her sister.
When Ken’s affair came to light, nobody encouraged Emily to stay with him, including Alex. Emily arrived at that decision after extensive therapy. Remorsefully, Ken agreed to hand over his phone as well as his account passwords to his wife, while begging for a second chance. It had taken years to rebuild trust and put the marriage back on stable footing.
Or so Alex believed.
“One look shouldn’t get you this upset.” Alex held up the banana peel, a scent of rotting fruit tickling her nose.
Emily rolled her eyes the way Lettie might. “Really? You’re honestly telling me you didn’t see it.”
Alex frowned, wishing honesty wasn’t the best policy. “Okay, I did see something,” she admitted. “But I can’t say it was anything more than some initial chemistry.”
“I’d say that’s enough for me to sabotage this deal.”
“Didn’t you take some kind of professional oath or something?”
“We take a pledge. I don’t think that’s the same thing.”
“It’s sort of the same. And regardless, what you’re doing here could put you in a lot of legal hot water. So I’m going home to get a broom, and we’re going to clean this mess up together. You can put the curtain rod back.”
“Fine,” Emily agreed. She seemed settled, back to her senses, as if a fast-moving storm had come and gone.
“Just promise me, Alex, promise you won’t lie to me. If you see something, say something, okay? I need my own Homeland Security system. I can’t handle another round.”
It was hard for Alex to view her sister as a mature equal. Instead, she saw Emily through an old lens, remembering her sister as a troubled teen—one who still could snap and do something crazy, like spreading trash in a home she was about to sell.
“Of course I’ll say something,” Alex said, knowing that the evidence of Ken’s betrayal would have to be unquestionable and irrefutable to make this a promise she could keep.