Shallow Graves

the antiques had been bought on a single occasion, at an auction in Vermont. Country rustic some of them, painted and distressed, and a lot of Victorian. (And a whorehouse of a bathroom, she kept thinking.Gotta change that.) Dried flowers, wreaths, vases and doilies were everywhere. On the living room walls were photographs from the 1800s, mounted on sepia paper. She’d bought them in a local antique store for a dollar each and mounted them in old frames. She sometimes told visitors they were her ancestors and made up elaborate stories about them.
    Meg dimmed the lights in the sconces and stood looking for a moment at the romantic ambience. She shook her head. She turned the lights back full and trotted up the stairs.
    Keith was sitting on the bed, putting a shine on his shoes. Now he examined the loafers like a diamond cutter.
    Until she began to undress. One glossy shoe dropped in his hand. He was grinning.
    “Hey, boy,” Meg said, “we got a guest in twenty minutes. Get that thought out of your mind.”
    He dropped his shoes, stepped into them, kissed her chastely. Left the bedroom. Meg tossed her clothes onto the hamper, slipped into her robe.
    Do Do a Do. . . .
    She stepped into the bathroom.
    Don’t Do a Don’t. . . .
    In the shower, her hair protected under a translucent shower cap printed with somber seagulls (a Christmas present from Sam), Meg felt the stinging water and wondered about the Don’ts for this evening.
    It became a private joke, Meg’s and Keith’s, after she’d told him about a movie she’d seen in high school hygiene class. “Don’t Do a Don’t, and Do Do a Do” was the theme of the film, which warnedabout sexual risks in such delicate euphemisms that nobody could figure out exactly what the Don’ts were.
    She decided that tonight’s Don’ts were: Don’t talk about the movie, about his friend’s death, about Hollywood. . . .
    Which made her wonder why she’d invited him in the first place.
    When she got out of the shower she heard the comforting sound of her husband flipping through the Moebius strip of TV channels downstairs.
    She laid out a black angora sweater with a star in pearls above her left breast and black slacks. She sat at her dressing table. She spread the heavy foundation powder over her face and began working with blue eyeshadow. Her hand paused.
    What’s so Cleary about me?
    Five years, not ten, Mr. Pellam.
    Bzzzzt.
    Meg walked into the bathroom and cleaned off the makeup with Ponds. From the back of the toilet, she pulled a recent Vogue magazine and began flipping through it.
    “ HEY THERE,” JOHN Pellam said.
    In her heart, Meg knew that every man from Hollywood believed fidelity to one’s wife was an idea so odd it could be a headline in the National Enquirer. But Pellam’s weak handshake and chaste cheek kiss told her she might have found an exception.
    His eyes, however, did a complicated reconnaissance of her face and she almost laughed as he tried to figure out exactly what was different about her.She could tell he decided it was the French braid of her hair.
    Keith did the same scan and said, “New sweater, darling. Looks super.” He’d given it to her two Christmases ago.
    Pellam was wearing black jeans and a gray shirt, buttoned at the neck, without a tie, and a black sports jacket.
    He was smiling steadily, looking around the house and talking to Keith. She heard her husband say, “You look like you’re recovering pretty well from your little run-in with my wife, excuse the expression. Ought to be a town ordinance. Everybody else’s got to wear crash helmets when Meg drives. . . .”
    “All right, buddy boy,” she said, offering a wry smile, “you want to talk fenders? You want to talk body work.”
    Keith rolled his eyes. Said, “Okay, sometimes I run into things, true.”
    “You found the place okay?” she asked Pellam.
    “Perfect directions.”
    Keith was looking out the door. “Oh, a Winnebago?” He stepped out on the porch.
    “Home sweet home.” To Meg, Pellam said, “Brought you a present.” He handed her a small, flat bag. “Oh, yeah,” he said. He added to it a paper-wrapped bottle, which turned out coincidentally to be one of her favorite merlots.
    Meg looked at the small bag. “What’s this?”
    Pellam shrugged.
    She opened it and began to laugh. “Honey!” she called to Keith. Pellam cracked a grin. She held up a bumper sticker: So many pedestrians. So little time.
    Keith laughed hard.