What Love is Really About

"I'm not saying we fire Joey, I just think it's time to try someone new in the kitchen." His wife was offering ideas on the car ride home, her red head leaning out the window as if the humidity might offer refreshment.

"Joey has two good entrees and we can't risk losing him now." Peter could smell fresh compost as they passed the park on the way. It was July. "I don't want to focus on rearranging staff. We've tried that before and all it does is cause heartburn."

"But it's a business. We have to do what's best for the business."

"You say that as if you mean it."

"I do."

"You're the last person to throw a friend out the door." He could sense Gillian closing in on herself. She couldn't help it, worrying about other people's misfortunes. Heck, there was one dishwasher who was so bad they had to re-do his dishes every night after he left. But he was supporting four kids and a set of illegal immigrant grandparents. Not the type Gillian could easily let go of.

"You're the one who keeps saying we're losing time," she said. "I'm pointing out some ideas."

"Okay then."

"I'd be happy to hear yours."

He rolled his window down all the way, the car's speed creating a sense of wind though he knew the air was stagnant. Tomorrow a new meat and fish delivery was coming. The invoice for the previous one was overdue. They could hold on part of the shipment, the tenderloin for instance. But that would be dealing in pennies. He knew better.

In six months, they'd have to take out a second loan on their mortgage or claim bankruptcy. They'd kept the place afloat for over two years now, covering operating expenses, but had yet to make a profit, a real profit, the kind you can live on and raise a family with. Gillian was turning thirty-one and liked to tease him about losing her pills. "Forgot 'em, flushed them down the toilet. Took them last week and didn't this week so you never know what might turn up. Put them in your cereal. Crushed them and blended them into the meat sauce." She got him every time though he pretended he too was in on the joke.

It wasn't always like that. Not when they met at the Crab Shanty in Salem. The place was a stone structure built in 1878 with an earthen basement feel. Peter was manager at the time. Gillian, the hostess. Always tilting her head to one side or the other, responding to someone. She had a way of greeting guests as if they were already in acquaintance. Sometimes she'd help Peter tally the day's take. "There are so few competent people in the world," she told him one night. "Must be lonely for you." Her eyes were green and welcoming. It was winter then, bone-cold outside, snow banks forming along the road so you could hardly see the car in front. The Crab Shanty's sign hung loosely from its sign-post, carved of wood, with a crab sculpted out. Crab bisque, the real kind, brewed in the kitchen in an enormous black iron pot, the kind the settlers might've used, fireproof, worthy, sturdy and you could taste the richness in the soup, ladled out in brown crock pots with oyster crackers floating on top.

He imagined owning a place like the Crab Shanty, instead of their American-themed restaurant with its red vinyl booths and checkered tablecloths. The menu featured the Super Soup, the Big Pasta Plate and Cordon Bleu for You.

The condo was dark when they pulled up. The wall lantern still needed to be replaced. Shuggs greeted them at the door with a sloppy yelp. Old dog, nearly twenty years by now and his breath smelled like it.

"I'm gonna get a cold, bubbly bath." Gillian unbuttoned her blouse, her skin freckled and friendly. How easily she could lend herself to the moment, red hair swaying in thick, rollicking waves. "You should shower off too."

"I'm not complaining."

She kissed him full on the mouth and headed up the stairs, Shuggs following at her heels. Peter could hear the water running and her humming along with the rush. The mail basket contained solicitations, catalogues and bills. A notice about the new walk-in refrigerator, the three-month, no-money-down deal was over. A bill for the electrical guy. An offer from Linens Express.

Running his hand through his hair, he decided the mail could wait. For now, a bourbon while Gillian was out of the room. He kept the Maker's Mark in the back of the storage closet. The liquor trickled over the ice and he circled the glass, watching the cubes reflect the overhead light. Out the window, the moon was bright against the night sky. Peter was tired and knew he'd be better off in bed but took his time anyway.

After, he climbed upstairs trying to convince himself that if tomorrow went as well as today, they might be onto something. A slit of light came from beneath the bathroom door. He could hear the swish of water, the note of Gillian's voice. The bedroom was cool and he lay down without undressing, falling quickly into a vacant, restless slumber.

At four o'clock in the morning, Shuggs licked his hand. Gillian hadn't come to bed. He sat up in the darkness and listened to the dog's desperate pants then slipped out and headed down to find her. She may have fallen asleep in front of the TV. Only the foyer light was lit. Her purse was missing from the brass hook. He could still smell her hairspray as he took a seat on the bottom step, noticing for the fiftieth time that two of the floor tiles were cracked and collecting black gunk in the fissures. Acid churned in the bottom of his stomach and he hunched over, hoping that might help.

He started with the phone. "I'm calling to see if anyone's reported a car accident." He knew the Sherriff, but not the new cadet. "Or any incidences in the past three or four hours."

"None that we've been informed of, sir. Is there something you'd like to call in?"

Peter tapped his pinky on his lip. "Well, nothing yet. I'd just appreciate if you'd keep an eye out for a woman with red hair, thirty-one years old, freckled."

"She hurt or running from something?"

"Not that, no."

"What should we be looking for?"

"Anything out of the ordinary." He left his name and phone number for the incident report. If Billy were there, he'd of understood the nature of the situation but he was on holiday on the Cape with his kids and the in-laws and Peter knew better than to call him on his cell for this.

He got in the car and headed north on Pine. At this time of year, you hear the sea charging against the shore and even if you couldn't see the black water, you could feel it rise and ram against the rocks, boulders that'd been holding the sea at bay for hundreds of years.

The road was empty and he felt foolish pausing at the stop signs with no one else in sight. If Gillian were in the car, she'd of told him to close his eyes and go. She was out there with the night, that much he knew. He pressed on the gas.

The very first time he saw Gillian, he didn't actually see her. She was crouched down on the floor looking for an escaped pen, singing: "Make me an angel. That flies from Montgomery. Make me a poster from an old rodeo. Just give me one thing that I can hold onto. To believe in this living. Is such a hard way to go." It was a song his mother used to sing while ironing her blouses. A melancholy lived in the notes and lyrics and he could remember the way his mother used to pause at the end before starting anew. She'd be bent over ironing, scrubbing, rinsing, darning. Until eventually arthritis forced her off her feet, hands trembling as if missing the work. In the nursing home, they played pinochle and bridge, the card games she liked, but he knew she didn't like it. The stillness.

He neared the Shoreline Tavern, scanning the parking lot for Gillian's red sedan. It wasn't there but he went inside anyway. One man sat on the opposite end of the bar. Peter nodded to him and ordered a whiskey. The bartender, Henry, was gruff and had been there for as long as Peter could remember. He didn't like to think of her coming in here but it was the only place still open so he had no choice. "How's things, Henry?"

Henry continued reading yesterday's newspaper.

"A good summer? The restaurant's having a reasonable summer, not bad." Behind the bar hung the skeleton of a ten feet-long shark.

"Your wife came by," Henry mumbled out of the left side of his mouth; face a sandy crab with hard lines where his smile used to be. "Left about twenty minutes ago. Alone."

"On foot?"

"I'm no ace detective."

He drove further down Pine. Stopped at the stop sign by Pleasant Road. Flicked his blinkers to turn towards Bridge Street. Still no sign of her car and he knew she had to be driving it, oblivious; it took no more than a few drinks for her. Oddly, he wasn't panicking the way he used to. The first time this happened he'd spent four hours racing around in a police car with the sheriff. She'd disappeared into Gloucester and spent the night singing her favorite Patsy Cline songs with Albert Barnaby of the Barnaby B&B. Barnaby thought she was enchanting and offered her a room free of charge. He didn't want her driving home so late, all alone. She looked liked another woman when Peter finally roused her out of bed the next day; sun streaming in the window and its handmade gingham curtains. The aroma of coffee freshly brewed and muffins cooking in the oven. She looked old, worn, the face of someone who'd lived to see the contours of failure.

"There are two kinds of drunks in this world: the mean ones and the sad ones." Gillian told him once when were walking through Masconomo Park, watching gulls collect and disperse along the water's edge. "My father was the mean kind. He fought everyone when he drank. He punched my mother so hard once we had to drive her straight-away to hospital. My brother was twelve but knew how to use the truck and I sat in back holding mama's hand. You'd think she'd be whimpering or making up excuses for us but she said nothing. All she did was bleed. That's a horrible legacy, don't you think? A person has to know their limits, where they begin, where they end and what they can tolerate in between. If you don't know that, there can be no inner peace."

A streak of orange and pink in the sky, edging toward sunrise. He never understood why they called it sunrise when it was the earth that bowed to the sun. He pictured Gillian alone in her car, watching the streaks with one open eye, slumped against the seat. She'd have the air conditioner on still and the radio tuned to 102.3 and she'd be singing, voice cracked and broken, but in tune and knowing every word. Her voice was simple, of all things, believable when she sang to herself. He'd catch her in the bath sometimes, when he was leaving and she thought he'd already gone; he'd hear the change -- subtle, an aftertaste, something earned and distilled over the years.

Heading east, a vague suggestion of day. The charters and fishing boats would be out by now to catch the first light. Water cool and undulating. The beaches still owned by the birds. He rubbed his eyes, trying to distract himself by thinking of how he used to fish as a boy. The vessel would be lulled by the water, rocking as if boat and sea were meant to be in each other's company. Not one bearing into the other, beating the hull until cracks formed and sea leaked in.

The sky mutated into a haze of grey. Few cars out and lots mostly empty. He saw something red parked on Hale Street and slowed, heart palpitating. It turned out to be a Ford with no one seated inside.

Rounding back into downtown Beverly, the sleepy street made him restless and he forced himself upright to focus. The streetlight yellowed and he waited. On green, he spotted her red Sedan right in front of the Bay Bakery. Gillian loved that bakery.

As he pulled over, he could see the familiar head of red hair tipping towards the glass display of donuts. "Chocolate frosted with vanilla creme. Two." That would be what she was saying. The woman behind the counter bent down to pull out one of the metal trays.

He hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath. A pain in his chest pressed against his sternum and the taste of acid climbing up his throat. If he could just tuck her into bed without a word, kiss her forehead and clean her face while she slept. She'd wake up grinning, teasing him in her way: "Peter, Peter, pumpkin eater."

He walked past her car and looked in for who knows what. Her purse sat in the passenger seat with the window open and he reached in to retrieve it, feeling like a thief even if it was for her own good.

The donut shop was brightly lit with pink and yellow countertops and a banner reading: "Start your day the delicious way."

"Thought you might need this." He handed the purse to Gillian, avoiding her face and the rub of makeup darkening the space beneath her eyes.

She buried her head in his chest. "You found me."

"Come on." He gathered a fistful of hair and tugged playfully. "We'll come back for the car later." The place smelled thickly sweet.

"I won't let you down again. You can count on me, I swear." She must have been drinking scotch, the cheap stuff; he could smell the acrid odor.

"Let's get you home."

"Don't sell the restaurant. I can make it. I can. You're not thinking of selling, are you? I'll work harder, you'll see."

"I don't have any plans."

"You wouldn't give up that easily, right?" She stopped him and made him look her in the eyes, smudged and unrecognizable. "I know you, it's not in you to do that, right? Am I right?"

Day hadn't fully started. They drove home in the quiet of undefined light. Soon enough, Gillian fell asleep with her head against the door and he leaned over to fasten her seatbelt, just in case, before realizing a car had stopped in front of him. He hauled on the brakes but hit the bumper anyway. A minor scrape. Gillian stirred and whimpered, "I can't do this, Peter, stop the noise."

He examined her forehead, nose, cheeks, ran his fingers down her spine. She was unblemished, breathing small, wispy breathes. He kissed the palm of her sleeping hand. "You're not hurt, see?"

The other driver waited in the half-light as he pulled off the road and jogged over. "You okay? Are you hurt?"

The driver was a woman, close to his mother's age and anxious in the brow.

"No, no, I'm fine. I'm not from here and I got turned around and it's my friend's car and I knew I shouldn't of borrowed it."

"I just scratched the bumper but everything else looks okay. Better than I expected, really, it's okay." He gave her his name and phone number. "I'm so sorry I scared you. I didn't even see your car stopped."

"It's hard to see when the light's like this."

"I can't stand driving this time of day."

"Me either." She glanced nervously back at the car and up at him then into the rearview mirror at his car, where Gillian slept pressed against the window, distorted by the glass.

"Call me if I can help," he said. "I'm near broke but I'd be glad to do what I can."

She glanced back at his car. "We're all fine and that's what counts."

Shuggs practically knocked him over when he opened their front door. "Easy, boy." He helped Gillian up the stairs, the dog following faithfully behind. He slipped off her sandals, helped her out of her skirt and into bed, pulling the blanket up to her chin.

"It's so hot." She rolled onto her side and took his hand with her. "Don't call Jodi about AA yet, okay? I'll call her this week, I swear, just not today. I can't talk about forgiveness today."

He removed the blanket and got her a glass of water. She was deep asleep by the time he returned, with Shuggs curled up beside her, tail wagging as he shut those big eyes.

In two hours, Peter had to be back to the restaurant. He shuffled downstairs and tried to make himself comfortable on the couch. Out the window, he could see it would be a clear day, not a scratch of white in the sky. A weariness overtook him as he lay there.

"If you want to marry me, you'll have to do it with four white horses and a black fitted frock, just like Daniel Webster might've worn." Gillian two years ago, on the beach, night, a black sky with a half moon. She was wearing the white sundress with thin straps and buttons down the front. "You should come singing my name and I'll call back in trebles. The birds can join in and the flower girls follow right on cue. Ready?" She spun with him on the sand. It was cool that evening, the air readying itself for fall. A foghorn blew in the distance and the ever-present sound of waves rose and receded. Her eyes were glimmering green, like ocean treasures, her mouth salty and sweet. They'd had oysters with dinner and lemon meringue for dessert. She was in motion, always in motion. He'd follow the freckles down her neck, imagining he could steady her with his mouth.

Less than two hours to go, no chance of sleep now. The skin is a malleable and porous substance, he decided, studying the calluses that dotted the pads of his palm.

He rose slowly, back aching right in the nook above his tailbone. Coffee would help. He brewed a pot and found a pink notepad by the phone. Dear Gillian, he wrote in careful, tiny letters, I've got you covered. Get some sleep and come by tonight if you're up for it. Don't forget to drink your water. XX, Peter.

Outside, a pure sky, far brighter than he was prepared for.

The bill from the car accident showed up in the mail a week later. Peter grimaced when he opened the envelope but wasn't entirely surprised. If he reported the incident to his insurance company, his rate would go up. If he paid it in full, he'd fall short on his mortgage. He could take over waiting on tables for a few weeks and save a few hundred in tips. He could do that, it would be exhausting and Cynthia wouldn't understand why he'd asked her to take the entire month off. It was business, he'd have to explain, as simple as that.

That evening, Gillian arrived at the restaurant a half hour before they opened for dinner. He wasn't expecting her. Wednesday was her night off. She came in wearing a denim skirt and a sky blue tank top. Her skin was golden and even more freckled from her day off on the shore. She clapped her hands and twirled her way to him.

"I had the best idea for our fall menu." She kissed the top of his shoulder the way he liked. "Seafood chowder, the real kind that's thick and chunky. We could get Sal to save those little catches for us. You should see, I found this crazy recipe book this morning. It's fatter than an encyclopedia, baby, it's big."

If he could just start here, with her green eyes absorbing him, he'd believe every word she said. Holding his breath, he pretended hers was a song that he knew how to sing.