silver, gelatin, silvering solution, wooden dowels, gum arabic—did I tell you it’s private? A collector.”
Dealers had profit margins to consider, and museums had budgets, not that Zanuso ever did museum work. A collector meant a maniac with money. Hanna wouldn’t have to cut a single corner.
She was the same Hanna, Grace told herself. Nothing had changed except what Grace knew about her. But all day, the sound of Hanna’s chair grinding on the floor, the clip of her pliers, her quick exhalations of accomplishment—every noise from across the table seemed threatening. Hanna, her friend, beige and orderly, had slit a woman’s throat and gone to prison. Hanna had neither hidden her past nor flaunted it. Grace had simply misjudged her, just as she was meant to.
Grace imagined shrugging over a sandwich and telling Hanna everything she’d done to end up in Jacqueline Zanuso’s basement. Impossible. Hanna had not needed to unravel any lies; she was only filling in blank spaces. Grace had crudely, hurriedly filled in her own blank spaces whenever they appeared, and never with the truth. She was like someone faking a crossword puzzle by socking in random letters so it would look finished from a distance.
Grace started at the buzz of machinery and looked up to see Hanna with the keyboard vacuum. She had taken a break from the sheep to clean the field of wheat in the centerpiece’s summer quarter. She moved the nozzle in tiny circles among the stalks in a trance. Grace had been shaken by Hanna’s confession, but Hanna wasn’t unsettled at all.
When Hanna went out for afternoon coffee, Grace went to the computer and checked the Albemarle Record —just once, quickly, crossing it off for the day—and then her e-mail. She used one address for work and another for her parents. Today there was an unwelcome e-mail from her mother.
Grace,
I saw Riley yesterday. He was at the hardware store with his father buying potting soil. I could hardly believe it, I practically fell on him hugging him, but I don’t think he wanted to see me. I can’t begin to imagine what he’s been through since I saw him.
Here is the Graham’s address in case you want to send a letter.
429 Heathcliff Ave
Garland, TN 37729
As if Grace didn’t know that address better than she knew her own name.
Why did her mother send her these e-mails about Riley? Just to punish her? To gloat that Grace’s other family lay in shambles? Because she suspected that Grace was somehow responsible? Because she’d hoped that Grace and Riley would marry and make Grace’s family Graham-adjacent? Because she was pretending, now that Grace was half a world away, to be a different kind of mother?
Riley was walking around Garland now. She could see him walking by their old college house on Orange Street and knowing that other people lived there now, boys the same age he’d been. She imagined the sun in his eyes, a car’s steering wheel in his hands, the way a grocery store would look when he hadn’t been inside one in so long, the newly sharp smell of the home that hadn’t been his home in years.
• • •
When Grace got home that evening, Mme Freindametz was at the kitchen table, drinking a cup of tea and doing a word search in a Polish magazine. Grace smiled quickly and put her pot of water on the stove to steam rice and green beans.
“What are you going to put in your nice box?” Mme Freindametz asked.
“My box?”
“Yes, your new box, the silver one.” She smiled approvingly.
At first Grace did not understand. She pointed to the tin breadbox she had bought a few months prior, which was yellow and had a picture of a topiary on it. “That? That box?”
Freindametz shook her head. “No, the one in your bedroom, the new one!”
“You were in my room?”
“Yes,” she said. “The vent was clogged, the vent behind your desk.”
“Why would you—” Grace began, but Freindametz jerked the handle of her teacup so that the tea sloshed
Dealers had profit margins to consider, and museums had budgets, not that Zanuso ever did museum work. A collector meant a maniac with money. Hanna wouldn’t have to cut a single corner.
She was the same Hanna, Grace told herself. Nothing had changed except what Grace knew about her. But all day, the sound of Hanna’s chair grinding on the floor, the clip of her pliers, her quick exhalations of accomplishment—every noise from across the table seemed threatening. Hanna, her friend, beige and orderly, had slit a woman’s throat and gone to prison. Hanna had neither hidden her past nor flaunted it. Grace had simply misjudged her, just as she was meant to.
Grace imagined shrugging over a sandwich and telling Hanna everything she’d done to end up in Jacqueline Zanuso’s basement. Impossible. Hanna had not needed to unravel any lies; she was only filling in blank spaces. Grace had crudely, hurriedly filled in her own blank spaces whenever they appeared, and never with the truth. She was like someone faking a crossword puzzle by socking in random letters so it would look finished from a distance.
Grace started at the buzz of machinery and looked up to see Hanna with the keyboard vacuum. She had taken a break from the sheep to clean the field of wheat in the centerpiece’s summer quarter. She moved the nozzle in tiny circles among the stalks in a trance. Grace had been shaken by Hanna’s confession, but Hanna wasn’t unsettled at all.
When Hanna went out for afternoon coffee, Grace went to the computer and checked the Albemarle Record —just once, quickly, crossing it off for the day—and then her e-mail. She used one address for work and another for her parents. Today there was an unwelcome e-mail from her mother.
Grace,
I saw Riley yesterday. He was at the hardware store with his father buying potting soil. I could hardly believe it, I practically fell on him hugging him, but I don’t think he wanted to see me. I can’t begin to imagine what he’s been through since I saw him.
Here is the Graham’s address in case you want to send a letter.
429 Heathcliff Ave
Garland, TN 37729
As if Grace didn’t know that address better than she knew her own name.
Why did her mother send her these e-mails about Riley? Just to punish her? To gloat that Grace’s other family lay in shambles? Because she suspected that Grace was somehow responsible? Because she’d hoped that Grace and Riley would marry and make Grace’s family Graham-adjacent? Because she was pretending, now that Grace was half a world away, to be a different kind of mother?
Riley was walking around Garland now. She could see him walking by their old college house on Orange Street and knowing that other people lived there now, boys the same age he’d been. She imagined the sun in his eyes, a car’s steering wheel in his hands, the way a grocery store would look when he hadn’t been inside one in so long, the newly sharp smell of the home that hadn’t been his home in years.
• • •
When Grace got home that evening, Mme Freindametz was at the kitchen table, drinking a cup of tea and doing a word search in a Polish magazine. Grace smiled quickly and put her pot of water on the stove to steam rice and green beans.
“What are you going to put in your nice box?” Mme Freindametz asked.
“My box?”
“Yes, your new box, the silver one.” She smiled approvingly.
At first Grace did not understand. She pointed to the tin breadbox she had bought a few months prior, which was yellow and had a picture of a topiary on it. “That? That box?”
Freindametz shook her head. “No, the one in your bedroom, the new one!”
“You were in my room?”
“Yes,” she said. “The vent was clogged, the vent behind your desk.”
“Why would you—” Grace began, but Freindametz jerked the handle of her teacup so that the tea sloshed
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