“What? What is it?”
“They’re divorced.” Alice let her phone drop at her side. Her eyes traced the shelves of red. “I thought the red books were stories that hadn’t changed, that the couples were still in love.”
“Let me see that.” Madeline reached for the phone and read the divorce record. She began typing on Alice’s phone, quickly growing frustrated and handing it back. “I don’t understand how you all rely on these things. They’re too disobedient.”
“What are you trying to find?”
“An address.”
“Why?”
“This is my magnum opus. I refuse to believe it failed.”
It took Alice three clicks to locate two addresses in North State, one for Walter Peabody and another for Esther Peabody. “They live across the street from each other,” she said, noting the consecutive numbers of their addresses.
They were in the car and on the Peabodys’ street a half hour later, passing several murals painted on the sides of commercial buildings, on garage doors, the cement bases of fences. Whirls of black hair. Braids woven into swans. Collections of blue eyes lined in violet that could only be described as opaline.
“Esther,” Madeline said as her eyes lingered on an image of the woman’s face painted on the side of a little free library.
Alice pulled up to the curb outside Walter’s house. They needed to hear both sides of the story, for the full truth was likely buried somewhere in between. They decided to start with Walter because he was the one who had hired Madeline.
When they knocked on the door, Esther, her jet-black hair now streaked with white, answered.
“Yes?” Those opaline eyes blinked eagerly as she smiled at the two women at her door, one old, one young, both unknown to her.
“I’m sorry.” Alice checked the addresses she’d found online. “I thought this was Walter’s house.”
Esther called over her shoulder to the dim hallway behind her. “Walt, there’s someone here to see you.”
He was slighter than Alice had imagined, with dark eyes and the strong forearms of a craftsman. He reminded her of Duncan, of his arms, his hands, muscular in places where Alice didn’t know people could be strong. Walter gently massaged Esther’s shoulders as he popped his head over her shoulder to see who was at the door. His face lit up.
“Madeline!” he exclaimed. “Is that really you?”
“Who else would it be?” she said acerbically but not without affection.
“Come,” Walter said, “we were just about to make lunch. Essie’s garden is bigger than mine, but she can’t grow nightshades like I do.”
Esther gave him a light shove. “Now you’re going to take credit for the angles of the sun? It’s amazing,” she said to Alice and Madeline, “what difference a stretch of road can make. My yard is always overcast. Here it’s blinding.”
The backyard was awash in warm sunlight, raised beds lining a stone patio. Alice and Madeline sat at the table, watching as Walter and Esther debated which tomatoes to pluck from the plants, which cucumbers were fully ripened. Once they’d collected their bounty, Esther carried the vegetables inside, using the apron tied over her skirt as a basket.
Walter sat beside Madeline, locked his hands behind his thick head of salt-and-pepper hair and leaned back on two legs of his patio chair. “This,” he said, “is the good life.”
“Aren’t you divorced?” Alice asked.
“I am indeed.” Walter smiled and picked up his feet, his chair thudding as it steadied on all four legs. “Going on fourteen years now.”
Esther came back outside and placed a large bowl of salad, a loaf of home-baked bread, and four plates at the center of the table. Walter reached for a piece of tomato, but Esther swatted him away.
“You think I’d want to be married to someone with these table manners?” she said.
As Esther said grace, the four of them tilted their heads down, shutting their eyes. Alice peeked at Walter, who was nodding along as Esther conveyed gratitude for the meal. She thanked Demeter and Helios, the worms that kept the soil rich.
Alice’s eyes flicked back and forth between Walter and Esther, as she tried to comprehend how they could be so happily divorced.
“Everything was perfect until we got married,” Esther said, poking at her lettuce, deciding which piece to pierce first.
“Essie eats like she doesn’t trust her food, even when she makes it.”
