Margaret had a tight mouth, small features and the personality to match, but she was in charge of the neighborhood committee, so she extended an invitation to the annual gathering at our mutual neighbor’s house across the street. They’d invited over the local policeman and a firefighter and all the dogs and children. It was an event.
The Nelsons—their name was on the mailbox—were a tall, blond family with two golden retrievers. They liked to throw sticks, which seemed to be a major hobby in the neighborhood. James and I rang the doorbell at six, as directed.
A woman with red suspenders and Wellies opened the door. The firefighter. “You must be John and Susan,” she said, “from the pink house across the street.”
“I always thought it was more of a dusty rose than a proper pink,” I said, “but maybe you’re talking about some other house, with some other people. I’m Sophie, and this is James. Maybe we’re in the wrong place. Is this one of those keys-in-the-bowl parties?”
The firelady waved her hand in front of her face. “Oh, no, that’s right. James and Sophie. It’s hard to keep track, such turnover. You planning on staying long?” She was eating a large, flat cookie the color of cardboard, and when she took a bite, a cloud of dust settled on her black t-shirt. “No offense.”
“None taken,” James said. “Always a pleasure to meet one of the city’s bravest.” I hadn’t even noticed that the firelady was pretty, but she was. She had curly dyed red hair, and crumbs all over her bottom lip, which was rather pouty and plump. The suspenders interacted poorly with her breasts, which were also rather plump. I wanted to remind James that we were no longer living in a city of eight million, and that you probably didn’t have to be all that brave to rescue cats from trees and save college kids from mishaps with their barbeques, but instead I excused myself and went to find the cookies. I made a mental note to call friends at home and tell them about our yard: it existed. They could come over and we could stand in it, eating cookies, even if we were too afraid to commit to buying lawn furniture.
The Nelsons had framed photos on every available surface. They enjoyed skiing in the winter, sailing in the summer, and smiling all year round. Even the teenagers were pimple-free and well-adjusted. I nodded a hello to all the ladies with sensible haircuts who were gathered in the living room, and pushed through the swinging door towards what I hoped would be the kitchen.
A thick-bodied wall of a teenaged boy sat on one of the stools, facing the back window. I recognized him from the yard. Margaret’s over-sized son. The Nelsons lived on the better side of the street, the lake side, and their kitchen windows overlooked the water. Outside, people sped by on small boats, laughing. The athletes—the ones with the bulging arms and the spandex unitards—steered kayaks and canoes. It made me tired just to watch.
“Hi, I’m your next-door neighbor,” I said.
The boy grunted. He was wearing his orange hunting cap, which I realized I had never seen him without, despite the oppressive heat. He spun around on the stool and faced me. “I’m Mud,” he seemed to say. He looked less like a teenager from the front. His jaw was too wide, his forehead too big.
He’d said either ‘Mud’ or ‘Mutt,’ both of which I was fairly sure were not names that nice people gave to their children.
“I’ve met your mother,” I said. “She brought us some iced tea, my husband and I.”
“Whoop-de-doo,” Mud said, spinning back around.
“Know where the cookies are?” I was actually enjoying this, the first sign of unfriendliness in a month.
“In the living room, with all the freaks,” he said. “But they’re probably poison. The Nelsons eat babies. I’ve seen them. They used to have like twelve kids, you know.”
“Poison, huh. I’ll take my chances.”
He raised and lowered his hunting cap, as if saluting the happy people scooting by on motorboats, and mumbled something about karate.
Back in the living room, the firelady had moved on to the bald guy from three doors down. James had acquired a mug full of alcoholic cider. The whole room smelled like nutmeg: Christmas in August.
“I think the boy who lives next door is a serial killer,” I whispered.
James nodded. “Good cider,” he said, unimpressed by my discovery.
Mrs. Nelson and the local policeman appeared in front of us. “Jim, Sally, this is Officer Sheffield. He’s been in charge of our little neighborhood for, oh, how long is it now, Greg, ten years?”
Officer Sheffield nodded. “And not a B & E since. One stolen car, and even that turned out to be a mistake. City towed it around the corner. Mrs. Dearborn never did leave the house too much.”
“Murder? Rape? Animal cruelty?” I said, thinking of everything my mother warned me about when we moved to Brooklyn. Mud had been of age for at least a few years, and I couldn’t imagine there wasn’t a pile of missing cats somewhere.
Mrs. Nelson clasped a fist over her sternum. “Oh, gosh, no! Where did you think you’d moved, Milwaukee?” Her cheeks had darts of crimson in them. “Course, you probably won’t be here long. That pink house is just a revolving door, honestly.”
“It’s a rental,” I said, realizing when I said it that our house was the only rental on the block. Maybe something unseemly had happened there: adultery, Judaism, modern dance.
Behind them, Mud skulked out of the kitchen and towards the plate of cookies on the mantelpiece. He took three, and returned to the kitchen before the announcements began. There was going to be a potluck over the holidays, and not everyone could bring dessert. There were audible sighs.
James and I held hands as we crossed the street and walked back to our house. “Don’t you think,” I asked, “that if that party had been in New York, the cookies would have been an ironic stroke of genius?”
He nodded, and pulled a folded napkin out of his jacket pocket, sending crumbs to the sidewalk in front of our steps. “Unironic cookies taste better.” He opened the napkin and showed me a short stack of pilfered baked goods.
Fly-Over State is available in its entirety at FlatmanCROOKED and at BookCourt/u>. Emma Straub is, among many other things, the co-editor of this blog. More information can be found at www.emmastraub.net.
