How a Woman Becomes a Lake (ARC) Read online

  alone? No. She wanted him to stay home, eat dinner with her, talk

  with her in the living room, go to bed with her at nine.

  But by nine they were shouting at each other. She stomped out-

  side, furiously smoked a cigarette, stormed back into the house and

  into the bedroom, pushed her earplugs into her ears and turned off

  the light, leaving him with his bourbon in the living room. He drank

  and listened to the revelry outside. Craned his neck out the window

  to get a look at the fireworks. Counted down in a whisper, checking

  his watch. Then, with a boldness that astonished him, he left. He

  snuck out like a teenager, watched the fireworks over the harbour,

  then slunk back home. Another year. He wept, soundlessly, mouth

  open, in the studio before finally trudging into the house. He had

  trouble not catastrophizing. Every time they fought, he feared the

  marriage was over.

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 19

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  20

  marjorie celona

  “An appointment seems unlikely,” said the policeman. “Everything

  is closed.”

  “Do you think she was kidnapped?” Denny asked.

  “No, no, I think she’s lost, but—”

  “Then shouldn’t you be searching for her? It will be dark soon.

  What if my wife is out there? And we are, we are—”

  “There’s a search and rescue team being assembled as we speak,

  Mr. Gusev—what I am trying to determine now is if there’s anywhere

  else she could be.”

  “No,” said Denny.

  “How old is your wife?” the policeman asked.

  “Thirty,” said Denny.

  “Younger than—”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you have children?” the policeman asked, and Denny watched

  him scan the living room for pictures, the floor, what he could make

  out of the bedroom.

  “We’re planning to, despite—despite—listen, is my wife missing?

  Is that what you’re telling me now?”

  “I’m trying to determine that. There are other possibilities.”

  “Other possibilities?”

  The policeman took out a small notepad and began writing

  something down. “Is there anyone who can confirm that you were

  here all day?”

  “No, I don’t think so, I mean I was asleep.” He felt the guilt,

  again, spreading over him like sweat.

  Until this moment, his life had been relatively easy: his father’s

  apprentice since he was twelve; supporting himself as a custom jewel-

  ler by the time he was twenty. He was a lucky person, an exceptional

  person. Even his arthritis diagnosis had seemed beside the point at

  first—a little pain in his hands, in his knees, now and again. Big deal.

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 20

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  how a woman becomes a lake

  21

  He was an artist. He loved the process of ring-making—the magic of

  it. The moment the plaster cast exploded in the water and revealed

  the ring inside.

  “Asleep all day?” said Lewis.

  “I mean, more like napping. My car—my car’s been in the

  driveway—maybe one of the neighbours?”

  “Okay, we’ll ask. Is there anyone Vera might be with right now?

  Anyone you can call?”

  Denny picked up the bottle of bourbon, then set it down. “No.

  What is happening?”

  “Gusev—is that a Polish name?”

  “Russian,” said Denny. “It means goose. Funny, yes?”

  “Does your wife ever go to Squire Point with a friend, a compan-

  ion?” The dog had trundled back into the room and put his muzzle

  on the policeman’s knee.

  “Scout,” said Denny. “Scout, come here.” He patted his leg and

  Scout slunk over and sat on Denny’s feet. “I don’t know what to say

  right now. No.”

  Denny felt a knot of pain forming in his chest, and, unable to

  fight it, let a few tears drop from his chin onto his pants. “I love my wife,” he said to the floor. “Please, I don’t know what is happening.”

  “What do you do for a living, Mr. Goose?”

  “Gusev.”

  “Gusev, I’m sorry.”

  “I’m a goldsmith.”

  “A goldsmith, Mr. Gusev?”

  “Jewellery—I’m a custom jeweller. I have a studio at the back—

  where I do my work—I—listen, I’ll level with you. I should have

  been in my studio all day. I’m on this deadline. Lately I can’t make

  myself go out there until the evening—I don’t know why—I enjoy

  my work—”

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 21

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  22

  marjorie celona

  “What have you been doing all day?”

  Denny shook his head. “Nothing. I slept until around noon. I read

  the newspaper. I went to sleep again. I’m sorry, I’m trying to be honest, pathetic as it sounds.” He nodded at the bottle of bourbon on the

  table. “I overdid it last night. Doesn’t happen often. I don’t know—it’s been a waste of a day.”

  “Are you all right, Mr. Gusev?”

  “Maybe, I don’t know. Vera asked me that very thing last night.”

  “You argued?”

  “No, that’s not what I meant. It was simply a discussion.”

  A discussion. He glanced at the floor to see if the picture she had

  thrown at him was still there, glass in shards, but she had cleaned it up. The photograph was resting on top of the bookshelf. It was their

  wedding picture. He would get it reframed as soon as this nonsense

  was over.

  “And you make a living from your work?”

  “I do.”

  “And what does your wife do? Does she work, too?”

  Ah, that question would irk Vera. He raised his voice a bit. “Vera

  is a professor. Cinematography.”

  “A filmmaker?”

  “Experimental films,” said Denny. “I mean, if you’re about to ask

  whether you’ve seen her work—”

  The policeman gestured out the picture window, and it took

  Denny a minute to figure out that he was pointing at his car. His

  Mercedes. “You do well for yourselves.”

  “I inherited when my parents died. We bought nice cars.”

  “What brought you to Whale Bay?”

  “Vera’s position,” said Denny. “I mean, who lives here, right? It’s

  beautiful. Affordable. Ocean views. We talk about moving to the city.

  She could commute. We talk about being more normal. You know.”

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 22

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  how a woman becomes a lake

  23

  “Life insurance?”

  “What? I mean, I’m not sure. Vera might have taken out a policy

  when she was first hired. I’m sorry, I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Was she a drug user?”

  “Excuse me? No.”

  “Suicidal?”

  “No.”

  “Tattoos, piercings, or birthmarks?” said the policeman.

  “What? No. Her ears. But her rings—she’ll be wearing three rings

  I made her—one is extremely valuable, an alexandrite gemstone—”

  “Artificial limbs?”

  “No. No. Listen, the rings, the
rings are distinctive—particularly

  the alexandrite—I can show you a picture—I made them for her—”

  “Her doctor’s name?”

  “What? I think she goes to someone at the clinic downtown. The

  rings—”

  “Are you all right, Mr. Gusev?”

  “I—you keep asking me that. I—” God, he was out of breath. He

  was panting like a rabid animal. He couldn’t feel his hands. “I need to tell you about her rings.”

  “I’ll need access to her dental and medical records. And a few

  photographs.”

  “All right,” Denny said. “Let me look. She—”

  The policeman stood and picked up a photo of Vera from the

  fireplace mantel. “Does she still look like this?”

  Denny looked at the picture. Her hair, as long and black as it ever

  was, her glasses, her formidable build. She wore a red blazer with

  shoulder pads, the French Riviera in the background. She wasn’t smil-

  ing but she was proud. “Yes,” Denny said. She was in her late twenties Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 23

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  24

  marjorie celona

  in the picture and looked essentially the same. Such a perfect square jaw. “You can take it, if you want.”

  “I’ll need another. One in which she’s smiling. Okay?”

  “I am a good man.”

  “I didn’t say you weren’t, Mr. Gusev,” said the policeman. “Smiling.

  With teeth.”

  “Teeth?”

  “Teeth,” said the policeman.

  “May I ask why?” said Denny.

  “You really want to know?”

  “I do.”

  The policeman moved toward the front door and, with one finger

  raised to indicate that Denny should stay seated, opened it to reveal the snow-lit sky. “So—worst-case scenario—she can be identified by

  her skull.”

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 24

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  C h a p t e r F o u r

  Evelina

  Evelina Lucchi walked toward her small house, snow crunching

  beneath her boots. She could hear the foghorn and the ocean,

  and she wondered where Leo and her boys were, what road they were

  driving down; she wondered if he missed their life together, if he

  regretted his actions, if he ever thought about anything in a deep way,

  and whether he was serious about this woman, this Holly.

  It was only four o’clock—not late enough to panic, though it was

  getting dark already—and she let herself have the stupid thought that Leo had kidnapped her sons, taken them down to San Garcia to start

  a new life. But he was too selfish. He wouldn’t want the responsibility.

  Despite the cold, she sat on the front steps of her little beach house, waiting for Leo and the boys to return from Squire Point. She tucked

  her long skirt underneath the soles of her boots and buttoned her jacket up to her chin. After she’d kicked Leo out, she’d cut her hair, then dyed it a shimmering auburn that looked purple in the light. Leo had not

  said a word to her about it. She’d started wearing earrings again, too, long pendants that reached her shoulders—costume jewellery, Leo had

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 25

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  26

  marjorie celona

  said about the peacock feather ones that she was wearing now—and

  the occasional smear of red lipstick.

  Entering our “goddess” years, are we? she imagined him saying, for that was how most of their conversations happened these days: in

  her head.

  She tucked her earrings into her pocket, then produced the

  scratch-and-win card she’d bought at the corner store and rubbed off

  the numbers with the edge of a dime. After a few minutes, the card

  revealed she’d won five dollars. She was ashamed of her habit—

  though she could hardly call it gambling. She felt her mood grow

  lighter, tucked the winning card into her pocket, and pulled out the

  next one. A dud.

  She’d been a cook on a fishing boat before her sons were born.

  That was how she met Leo. A Christmas party at one of the captains’

  houses. Beer bottles all over the coffee table, half-empty bowls of

  chips. Evelina was in a relationship—an on-again, off-again thing

  with another cook—but couldn’t stop herself from flirting with Leo.

  He cornered her in the kitchen, slipped his hand around her waist

  before she knew his name.

  “Stop,” she whispered. “I’m with someone.”

  “Oh, shut up,” he said. And they laughed.

  She wasn’t beautiful—he told her that on their first date. But up

  close, Leo said, her features were difficult to reconcile, and that’s what made her fascinating. He could look at her face for hours and never

  understand it, he said. Something about her bone structure, its lack

  of symmetry. From every angle, she looked like a different person.

  “For instance,” he said, taking her face in his hands on their first

  night together, “if I tilt your head this way, I can see you’re sort of old-fashioned. This is your serious side, the side of you that’s mad at me for being better-looking than your boyfriend.”

  “I am not,” Evelina said, but she was.

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 26

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  how a woman becomes a lake

  27

  “Now look at me straight-on.” He scanned her eyes. “Here’s your

  vulnerability. Here’s your sad-little-person face.” He pushed her chin down toward her chest. “From this angle, you are the most beautiful.”

  “When I’m not looking at you?”

  In those days, she felt wildly out of control, like a ripped-open

  sofa cushion, the exposed springs bouncing around like a Slinky. She

  liked Leo’s matter-of-factness. She liked that he claimed to know her better than she knew herself. She liked that he was taller than she was.

  Often, when she was around other women, she felt like a giant or a

  man in drag.

  Leo pressed his mouth to hers, lifted himself on top of her and

  pushed her legs apart. “Open sesame,” he said, and she knew she would have to forget that line, to bury it somewhere deep within her mind.

  A weirdo. A weird person. Leo had grown up in San Garcia, a coastal

  city twelve hundred miles south of Whale Bay. Was estranged from

  his family and wouldn’t say why. Didn’t speak to Evelina for a week

  when his brother died because he felt she hadn’t comforted him in the right way. That was his signature move—to not speak to her if something was bothering him. It made Evelina crazy.

  But how she loved being seen with him in those early days, his

  broad shoulders in his green military jacket, his square jaw, the way he nodded at strangers to say hello. The way he always held onto her in

  some way—his hand on the back of her neck, his hand slipped up the

  back of her shirt, his hand in hers, his hand on her leg. Sometimes

  the only way she knew he was mad was if they were out in public and

  he wasn’t touching her.

  She was a weirdo like him. A misfit. A depressed teenager, high-

  school dropout. Lived here all her life, unlike her sister, who had left for the city the minute she’d gotten her high-school diploma. Evelina Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 27

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  28

  marjorie celona

  spent her summers tree planting until she found steady wor
k on a

  fishing boat. Paid well. Hard work but long stretches of time off. Felt happiest out on the water, especially once the shore disappeared.

  Didn’t feel much like a woman. More like a fish. Or a water bird.

  She’d never met a woman like herself before. She’d never seen herself in a book, or in a movie. Was more comfortable around men because

  then she didn’t have to talk.

  The first boat she worked on was a heavy wooden seiner, about

  forty feet. Just Evelina, the captain, and another deckhand. She learned how much food to purchase and how to cook easy, hearty things. She

  made ten thousand dollars in her first three months. It seemed like

  a fortune then.

  She never thought she’d get married. Never thought she’d have

  children. Thought she’d be on the deck of a steel trawler forever, even as an old woman, white hair down to her waist, maybe own a fleet

  someday. There was one woman she knew who was a captain. She

  was large and wild, and Evelina used to think she’d end up like her:

  oblivious to sexist remarks, insensitive, ready to pull out a gun and shoot a seal if it got caught in the net. Ready to shoot another boat if it got too close to hers. All the boats had guns.

  But then she met Leo at that Christmas party, and right away he

  started talking about wanting to have a baby. When they made love

  he would put his hand on her belly and close his eyes.

  Now here she was, on the cusp of becoming his ex-wife. With two

  boys. She spent her days inside now—had gotten her GED and a job

  as a bookkeeper for the Whale Bay Operatic Society. A steady pay-

  cheque, but dull. It was why she was addicted to the cards—that little rush, seeing if she’d won big. Such a pale comparison to the feeling of walking the docks, her pockets stuffed with cash, the wind in her

  hair, only nineteen years old.

  Today she’d bought two cards—she had a strict two-a-day

  Celo_9780735235823_4p_all_r1.indd 28

  9/5/19 1:22 PM

  how a woman becomes a lake

  29

  limit—and she fidgeted with the dud card, then went inside to wait

  for her sons. She’d left the kitchen window open—stupid, so stupid,

  the heating bill—and the counter was damp with a dusting of snow.

  She washed out three soup bowls and made the table lovely for her

  boys—two nubby candles, her old tobacco-leaf placemats, paper

  towels folded diagonally, even a wine carafe filled with yellow dahl-

  ias she’d bought the day before, as round and alien-looking as sea