Page 95 of Under Story

“Doesn’t sound unreasonable to me,” he says, and they lapse into silence, which Laurel maintains until they reach the Michigan border.

—

Kenji Nakamura’s visit diffused some of the tension that had dogged Laurel and Eli that fall. Soon afterward, it returned. Where to pursue Silas Two was no longer the question: the overtaker had made that point clear. Instead, they argued about takeout, about who had rights to the television, and once, at length, about whether the reheat setting on the microwave was more effective than the defrost. The vigor of these arguments approached bombast. For three years, Laurel and Eli had repressed their fear and anticipation, their burden and bewilderment. Aside from Nita and Mr. Nakamura, they’d shared with no one the truth of their presence in this universe, nor the loneliness of being alien.

They had no choice but to book the same apartment where they had stayed with Silas. A celebrity family had visited Cedar on a recent episode of their reality show, and tourist bookings surged. Laurel opened Airbnb as soon as she heard, but the only other properties were a waterfront mansion and a beach shack without indoor plumbing.

Silas had died on the eighteenth, so Laurel and Eli wanted to arrive on the nineteenth, one day earlier. They were foiled here, too: the apartment was a weekly rental, booked except for the third week of August. They would have to wait for five days, which sounded to Laurel like as many years. Eli pointed out that they’d be just as anxious at home—and that it might help to reacquaint themselves with Cedar.

They arrive just before dusk.

“Well, let’s get this over with,” Eli says, popping the trunk.

Laurel snaps when he forgets to hold the front door open for her. There are two bedrooms: the room with the bunk beds and the one with a queen. Eli offers Laurel the latter.

Laurel regards him suspiciously. “Why do you want the bunk beds?”

“I was trying to be nice.”

“You don’t have to be a martyr.”

“Fine,” says Eli. “I’ll take the queen—happily.”

Laurel drags her suitcase upstairs, glaring.

That night, tossing on a concrete mattress, she wonders why she picked a fight. She’ll apologize in the morning. Eight hours later, though, Laurel finds Eli making toast while whistling the tune of the well-rested, and she decides that her apology can wait.

Stretching out before them are five interminable days. They agree to spend the first at a distant beach. An accident slows traffic to a trickle. The air-conditioning in the car is tepid, as if it exhausted itself on the trip from Wisconsin, and both of them are hungry. The nearest restaurant is another Culver’s. This time, Laurel gets the mushroom fritter, but she takes little satisfaction in it.

“What about the park in Cedar?” Eli asks. “We can swim, and there’s shade.”

The park is where they went skinny-dipping on their honeymoon. Pine trees shadowed picnic tables, and a dock walked into the lake. The water was blue-green, the pale bottom shallow and sandy. They left their clothes in a heap.

Today, the picnic tables are occupied by families. Eli dives into the water. Seconds later, he appears in a ring of circles, shaking his head like a dog.

“Come on in,” he shouts.

His obliviousness offends her. “I’m fine,” Laurel says, pulling down the brim of her baseball cap.

—

That night, Laurel is restless again. She knew that memories of Silas would torment her in Cedar, but she didn’t expect to feel haunted by her honeymoon with Eli. How they arrived at the cottage as night fell, passing fringed black cutouts of trees. And walked barefoot through the field the next morning, the grass tips dipped in sunlight. She was teaching him: Smell this; touch that. Along the fence was milkweed, torn and pearling white sap at the seams—poisonous to many, but perfect nourishment for monarch butterflies. The seeds parachuted in floss. Feel how soft the leaves are, Laurel told Eli, who said, Like velvet. Snorting drew them to the barn where a pig fed her young. The stench carried, but Laurel still stayed to look, struck by the urge and muck of family life, the messy tenderness.

After years of parenthood, she had forgotten how it was to be alone with Eli. There were times when he came close to her and she felt the blood moving downward, a swelling. They were sensitive to the subtlest change in the other’s expression. Once, she yawned in the bath, and Eli echoed the sound one floor down. Laurel doubted that he had mirrored her consciously; it was his subconscious that responded, the animal brain that danced with hers. Even when they argued, there was a base of trust. In bed that night, he would extend a hand, and she would squeeze it.

Laurel doesn’t want to revisit any other honeymoon locations. They’ve discussed the rescue plan dozens of times, but she suggests that they spend the next day reviewing it again. First, they double-check the bag they packed at home. They brought a rope, to use as a tether, and they practice at the lake that afternoon. Afterward, they rehearse the drive to the nearest hospital. Because the beach has no phone service, they drill each other on directions over a late dinner.

“Left or right when we exit the highway?” asks Eli.

“Right,” says Laurel. Eli looks at her sharply. “Left?”

“It’s a left, then a right.”

“Trick question,” she says, flustered.

“Silas could be hypothermic, Laurel. There’s no room for error.”

“You don’t think I know that?”