Valley of Ashes (23 page)

“It’s important that what we say gets reported accurately, compellingly. I trust her to do that,” she continued.

“I’d be happy to spring for a babysitter,” said Dean. “I’ll be away for a few days.”

Mimi looked at her watch and stood up, smiling at us both. “I should hit it, let you guys have your dinner.”

When he went ahead of her to open the door, she gave me a big fat wink.

Dean went upstairs to pack. I called McNally, who was still at the office. Lucky for me since I didn’t have his home number.

“Acetone,” I said, when he picked up. “And I have money for a babysitter.”

“Yeah, I figured.”

“That I’d get the money, or that it was acetone?”

“That it was acetone,” he said.

“Why?”

“It’s miscible with water.”

“Meaning what?” I asked.

“If someone uses most petroleum distillates as an accelerant—kerosene, gasoline—they don’t mix with water. So sometimes you might see a rainbow sheen on any water left at the scene. And you’ll continue to get an odor, too, especially if you hit the fire with water
early. The water keeps non-miscible liquids from evaporating for a while, so the scent lingers. Acetone mixes with water, so it evaporates more quickly. Doesn’t leave any smell by that point, doesn’t rainbow.”

“Huh.”

“You were there. What do you remember?”

“The water in that back room wasn’t rainbowed, and the house didn’t smell like gasoline or kerosene.”

“Exactly,” he said.

“
Arson
Guy had been using acetone, so you all kind of already figured that’s what had been used this time, right? Before Mimi got the gas-chromatography results back.”

“Pretty much, yeah,” he said.

“Glad I didn’t have any money riding on this, then.”

He laughed. “And we won’t be mentioning
any
of these details in any articles we write, either.”

“Of course not. Why give a primer to wannabes?”

“You’ve been trained well.”

“I like to think so. Some might beg to differ.”

“So,” McNally said, “you said you have a babysitter?”

“I have
money
. Finding someone willing to take it is step two.”

The chick I’d used for the business dinner always wanted a week’s notice, at the very least. So she was out.

“Anybody in mind?”

“Yeah, actually.”

“Good,” he said.

C
ary made me read your article this afternoon,” said Dean, as we were lying in bed a couple of hours later. “Mimi’s right. You did good pieces for the paper in Syracuse, but you’ve learned a lot since then. You’re even better at it now.”

“So is that your way of saying I don’t need to give up this writing shit because you want a homemaker?”

Even in the room’s moonlit half dark, I could see him wince.

“I
said
that?” he asked, contrite.

“Today. At lunch.”

He laughed at himself. “Jesus, your husband is such a prick, Bunny. I don’t know how you put up with him.”

“He’s mostly patient with my absolute lack of homemaking skills. But yeah, he can occasionally be a total pain in the ass. Especially lately.”

“He better start flying right then, appreciate how good he has it at home.”

“Ya think?”

“Definitely,” he said. “And this is my official apology,
mea maxima culpa
. You need to take advantage of work that makes you happy, and I need to shut up about it and help out more, okay?”

I turned toward him, sliding my arm across his chest, pulling his head close to kiss him. “Okay.”

“Let’s have Mimi over for dinner when I get back,” he said, turning toward me, his breath sweet and warm on my cheek. “She was fascinating.”

“She’s damn good at her job.”

“No doubt.”

“Raised five kids, too.”

“Wonder Woman. Like you.” He snaked his arm under my ribs, started stroking my back.

A galleon of cloud sailed across the moon outside, leaving us in shadow.

When it reappeared I could see Dean’s face more clearly, my vision sharpened by the interlude of darkness. Blue light played along his cheekbones, the stripe of fair hair that had fallen across his brow.

He looked about ten years old, and I told him so.

“You’re my best friend,” I said. “You know that?”

He kissed my forehead, then my mouth, whispering, “I’ll try not to fuck it up. Any more than I have already.”

“Hey,” I whispered, “the two of us? Navigating all this grown-up shit? I
feel
like a ten-year-old, most days. At least in terms of general competence.”

Dean tucked a wisp of hair behind my ear. “You’re doing a great job. You’re an amazing mother.”

“Dude, come on—we both know I’m barely domestic enough to housekeep a fucking
tree
fort, with someone else’s mom providing snacks.”

He pulled me closer, resting his chin on the top of my head. “That’s not how I see you at all.”

I turned my ear to his chest, looking up at the light-dappled ceiling. “What do you see?”

“The woman I’d want with me in a wagon train.”

I could hear the words rumble, behind his ribs.

“Calico dress and a prairie bonnet?” I kissed his collarbone, amused.

“I’m serious,” he said. “That’s the first thing I knew for sure, when I came to see you in Williamstown for our second date.”

I trailed a fingertip down his waist, slowing along the crest of his hip. “Probably because I hadn’t shaved, the first time we slept together.”

“No, Bunny, I mean the way you
look
it didn’t matter. Most chicks, Jesus… three months on the Oregon Trail, no access to waxing?” He shivered. “But you, you’d just get tanner and blonder. And you’d think it was an adventure. You’d make it more fun, instead of whining.”

“Oh, please,” I said, “I’d’ve been bitching about the lack of Szechuan before we crossed the Missouri.”

“And meanwhile would’ve shot an elk, skinned it out, and stir-fried that sucker over the campfire in a little hot oil and black bean paste.”

“Huh,” I said, quite pleased with us both.

“You know I’m right.”

“Okay, but if we ever fall through a rent in the fabric of the space-time continuum and have to actually
do
this?”

“Mmm?”

“We’re bringing paper plates.”

He laughed, yawning.

I brought my hand up to his cheek. “Are you leaving really early, tomorrow?”

“No.” Dean yawned again, voice fading. “Couple of hours at work. I’ll catch the Airporter from there.”

“How long will you be away this time?”

He didn’t answer, already asleep.

I closed my eyes, happy the evening had borne out all those strident parking-lot marital pronouncements I’d made to Cary, after lunch.

Admittedly, I was even happier that he’d forced Dean to finally read my article.

True friends are the ones who totally see through your bullshit façade of humility and self-sacrifice whenever you protest too much.

I raised myself up on one elbow, peering over Dean’s shoulder at the glow of the digital clock.

“Ten
P.M.
,” I whispered, “and all’s well.”

Famous last words.

D
ean got off without a hitch the next morning, and I called Setsuko as soon as the office opened.

I apologized for asking her whether she could babysit at the last minute, but she was really great about it—telling me she was glad I needed her that night, as she was taking a couple of vacation days to go skiing the next morning.

And then I asked her if she could connect me to Cary, who practically begged me to bring him to the arson meeting.

“Are you sure?” I asked. “I mean, it’s going to be listening to people talk about fires and shit. I thought you didn’t like fires and shit.”

“Madeline, I
hate
fires and shit. Which is why I want to avoid having an arsonist wandering around in my neighborhood. This seems like a good way to find out how, you know?”

“Well, okay then. And I’d love company.”

He offered to drive me there, but I figured I’d rather walk, relishing the relative freedom of not having to drag the wagon behind me for once.

After that I tried to clean the house,
thoroughly
, over the course of the day—not wanting to scare poor Setsuko.

She arrived early and got settled in with the girls before shooing me out the door for the meeting.

“Go,” she said, smiling at me. “Enjoy yourself, Madeline. It’s beautiful out and we’ll be fine.”

And it
was
beautiful out—the light only just going softly gold.

The mountain peaks above me looked ancient and wise and close enough to touch. The spring air was dew-soft to breathe, fragrant with green promise. The houses sat companionably close on their modest lots. There were porch swings and knee-high picket fences and tabby cats sunning themselves and irises everywhere, begging to be picked by the armful.

Approaching strangers wished me “good evening,” as I did them, and we all really meant it.

I felt suffused with this fizzy, feathery luminosity of gratitude. Poignant, ephemeral.

If there’d been a pay phone, Information would, I’m certain, have magically parted with Spalding Gray’s home number in Manhattan to my perfect-stranger self just so I could call him up and say, “Dude, you totally don’t know me, but I’m having a Perfect Moment right goddamn
now
and I wouldn’t even have known that’s what it was if you hadn’t made
Swimming to Cambodia
. So thank you.”

Cary was waiting for me outside the church. We were both a little early. Me because hey, I actually had an excuse to leave my house unencumbered with offspring for once, tra la, at Setsuko’s behest, and him for no good reason I could think of.

“Want to go inside, get a front-row seat while they last?” he asked, when I’d come within reasonable hailing distance.

“It’s so gorgeous out,” I said. “I just want to marinate in all this outdoorsy freedom for a little longer, you know?”

“It’s Boulder,” he said, amused. “Isn’t outdoorsy freedom kind of a given?”

A pack of Rollerbladers whizzed down the street past us, as if to underscore his point.

“It feels so
different
when I’m not pulling a wagonload of children, though.” I spread my arms wide, tempted to break into a little dance step on the sidewalk. “Like, all the way here, I kept having this odd sensation that I was breaking the law or something. It felt
too
good,
walking through the neighborhood. And then I realized it was just being alone. This is like…
recess
.”

Cary laughed. “Four-square and monkey bars?”

“Exactly. And I should probably wait for my pal Mimi. I want to introduce you guys before things get officially under way.”

People started drifting into the church in twos and threes as we stood there, chatting.

A big red official Boulder FD car pulled up. Its driver put on his dress-uniform hat before he got out.

I didn’t catch his full name from the tag on his chest, but it was prefaced with the word C
APT.

Mimi backed her truck into a spot across the street. I raised my arm in greeting.

She waved back and jogged across to us, once a couple of cars had passed.

“The best way you can help us right now is to be aware of who’s in your neighborhood, and to check the perimeters of your houses and places of business regularly,” the captain was saying.

Cary, Mimi, and I had gotten seats together, third pew from the front.

“Captain’s name is Buzz Rainer,” she whispered. “Good guy.”

“Clear away any brush that you can,” Rainer continued. “And keep trash to a minimum. Especially in the alleyways, and around outbuildings like garages or sheds.”

I’d had a notebook open on my knee for ten minutes, but that was the first thing I wrote down.

“Arson can be a crime of opportunity,” he continued. “We’ll be passing out padlocks for residential garbage cans and commercial Dumpsters to anyone who wants them, following the meeting tonight. I know that might sound like a hassle, having to unlock something every time you take out a bag of trash, but you don’t want to provide this guy with the tools of the trade. A number of recent fires were
started with bits of burning cardboard, shoved under a rear door. A pizza box, in one instance.”