had once lived here. CJ did most of the cooking and shopping. Without him around, Janet had allowed the cupboards to go bare. She was probably eating out a lot, or eating at her paramour’s. Before closing the door, he took out the package of deli meat—sun-dried tomato turkey—removed it from its bag and dropped the meat on the floor for Thor.
It took him just a few minutes to carry the three boxes of books to the car. Thor was at his side as he stood in the driveway, hands on hips, looking at the boxes in the trunk. Lots of space still. And there was the back seat too. Ten minutes later, his miter saw, drill, and router were nestled in the trunk with his books, and the drawers from his rolling toolbox were in the back seat, along with the TV from the guest bedroom. As he looked on his handiwork, he avoided considering what his lawyer would say.
After a satisfied grunt, he went back inside and collected Thor’s food and water dishes, and the bag of dog food from the pantry. The dog must have intuited what was happening because he positioned himself at the driver’s side door and looked expectantly at CJ. The last thing CJ did before locking and shutting the door of the house was to write a note to Janet that said, I’ll pay for the window. He suspected he would pay for a good deal more than that, but as he backed out of the driveway and drove off, his dog in the seat next to him, he only wished he could see the look on his wife’s face when she got home.
Chapter 4
Adelia, New York
It was one of those infrequent days when Artie wished six o’clock would come so he could close the store. By right, Artie could close the store whenever he wanted, but Kaddy’s had been open until six every day since his grandfather had first opened it, and the only times it had closed early, excepting holidays and the Fall Festival, were when his wife, Artie’s grandmother, went into labor with one of their five children, and when Artie’s mother had birthed him and his two sisters. Artie’s father had always chided him that the difficulty Artie had caused his mother when she was giving birth to him closed Kaddy’s for an additional day. So Artie had contributed to a red balance sheet right out of the gate.
The day had been slow, which was unusual for a Thursday. This was the day when his customers planned their Friday evening activities, which forced them to remember all the projects that waited for them over the weekend, which then brought to mind all the things they’d need to complete said projects. They would stop in and buy these things on Thursday so they could enjoy Friday night while assuaging guilt with the belief that they’d purchased everything they needed for Saturday, convincing themselves that no matter how late they stayed out on Friday, they’d still dive into their to-do lists bright and early the next morning.
Artie’s income was culled in near equal measure from those who created projects just so they could buy a tool, and those who bought a tool as a means of convincing themselves they were one step closer to taking care of that one thing they’d been telling their wives they’d take care of for months. Entrepreneurialism and guilt were Artie’s most effective salesmen.
“What do you say, Cadbury? Is this the day we close up early?”
The scarecrow didn’t answer, although Artie thought the straw man’s frown looked more disapproving than normal. But Cadbury seemed to be in a sourer mood than usual. Consequently, Artie had left him alone most of the day.
Cadbury had been a gift from his 1998 Little League team, one of many that Artie had sponsored over the years. This was the last one to win the state championship, and they’d done so in storybook fashion. As was so often the case with good baseball stories, the magical event in this one took place in the bottom of the ninth, with two out, the tying run on base, and the batter down to his last strike. Artie was just about to head to the field house to call for the pizza, to celebrate a successful, if not ultimately rewarding, year. He also had to get the trophies and the cake from his car. The pitch had come high and inside, and it seemed