Page 40 of Rhodes

Looks like something off the bottom of a piling.

It's called percebes. they are gooseneck barnacles they pull them off cliffs with the tide coming in and it's insane. guys die doing it. twelve euros a plate and I ate three plates.

I set the plate down and lean on the counter. My thumbs move on their own.

You're going to die eating shit like that. I hope it doesn't give you dysentery.

worth it. this place, man. the whole town runs on the water. everybody's got shell under their nails. it's home but Spanish.

He sounds like himself, and that's what makes me smile, even after the shitty day I've had. He sounds like Coop before the funeral, before the flat, careful voice he used the whole last month. Whatever Galicia's doing to him, it's the right thing.

Good. You look good, so they must be doing something right.

how's it going with the wild animal? she break you yet?

She's good. I helped her with a shoreline build yesterday out in the marsh. She's a machine out there.

I think about her text from Trey. Fucking Trey.

she let you help?

Grudgingly.

that's my sister. i'm glad she let you come do that with her. that says a lot. maybe she's coming back.

I know what he means by coming back. He says she's different since she got clean: more angry, guarded, hellbent on being self-sufficient. I say she’s always been like that

No, she's out doing something. She was gone when I got home.

good. she needs that. thank you, man. for real. I sleep better knowing it's you.

Enjoy Spain, Bro. Eat another barnacle.

cheers-

The screen holds a second, then goes black. My face comes up faint in it, then that's gone too.

I gave him the clean version and called it handled. She's good, she's got people, she's out. Every word of that is true, and I kept the rest back. That’s not lying.

I throw the egg sandwich in the trash, put the plate in the sink, and don't wash it.

The house is too quiet, and the hall still smells like her. I go to my room and shut the door out of habit, since there's nobody here to shut it against.

I lie down on top of the covers with my arm over my eyes.

It's the perfume. I'm hard before I've decided anything.

I know what I'm doing when I get my hand around myself. There's no talking myself into it and no pretending it's about somebody else. It's the green dress, it’s her on one knee under my sink with those shorts riding up while I stood over her counting tile like a coward.

It's fast, and it isn't good. It's a job I give my own hand to shut something up.

After, I lie there in the dark. My chest heaves, the fan clicks, and the goddamned perfume is still in the hall.

TWELVE

Tilly

Salvage: A mantel pulled from another house can be the right period, the right wood, and the right dimensions, and still be wrong in the room. Nobody can say why until they see it set in place.