Nine Suppers in a Bass Boat

The Eighth Night

On the eighth night it rained.

It came in from the west about five, a soft, steady May rain. I stood at the window in the living room and watched it bead up on the metal flake.

Rick came in from the garage. He stood beside me.

“We can’t eat out there in this,” he said.

“Sure we can,” I said. I got the big golf umbrella from the closet, the one from the bank’s customer appreciation day, and a second tablecloth, the plastic one, to go over the good one.

We sat in that boat under a golf umbrella and ate beef stew. The rain drummed on the umbrella and dripped off the edges onto my shoulders. The Mason jar candle went out in the first five minutes and I did not bother to relight it.

Across the street, Marlys sat on her front step under her porch roof in her lawn chair, wrapped in an afghan, drinking coffee.

“That woman,” Rick said, “has no life of her own.”

“She has ours,” I said.

He laughed, and then he did not laugh. He set his spoon down in his bowl.

“Karen. What do you want me to do?”

It was the first time in eight nights he had asked me that. I looked at him across the bench. Water was dripping off the bill of his cap. He looked fifty-five years old and fourteen at the same time.

“I don’t want you to do anything because I want you to,” I said. “That’s not how this works, Rick. You know that. I’m not your daddy and I’m not selling anything at a farm sale.”

He flinched. I had not meant to say that last part. But I did not take it back.

“I’m going to make supper tomorrow night,” I said. “Pot roast, because it’s Saturday. And I’m going to serve it right here. Whatever you decide, I’ll be sitting on this seat at six o’clock.”

We finished our stew in the rain.