Page 16 of Nora Goes Off Script
“I wouldn’t dare.”
We’re silent as the sun moves through a dark orange finale.
“Writing today?” he asks.
“Gonna try. What are you going to do?”
“I was thinking about going into town.”
Which is how I end up not writing and taking Leo Vance on a walking tour of Laurel Ridge proper. The town is pretty much one strip of shops, a small grocery at one end and a bookstore at the other. Leo buys cheese and a baguette at thegrocery. And a jar of jam in a flavor he’s never seen before. He asks if he can taste the salami and buys a pound of that. He buys berries and kiwis like a kid pulling candy off the shelf by the checkout counter.
“Planning a picnic?” I ask as we walk out, laden with bags.
“Nope. I just liked the looks of it. Let’s go in there.” He motions to an overpriced housewares store that has no chance of surviving the year in this town. In fact, I’ve never been inside, on principle.
Two saleswomen are chatting behind the counter and go silent when they see Leo. So silent, in fact, that it’s awkward. “Hello?” he says.
The older one comes out from behind the counter. “Hello. I’m sorry. I was just so surprised to see you standing there. In my store.” I admire her honesty.
Leo puts out his hand and says, absolutely unnecessarily, “I’m Leo. And this is Nora. I’m staying with her for a while.” Both women look me up and down, probably trying to divine what sorcery I’m using to put myself in this situation.He gets naked in the bathroom across the hall from where I sleep,I want to tell them. Someone needs to know.
Leo looks around the store, fingering every coffee mug, every throw pillow, every set of salad tongs. “I’ll take these,” he says holding up a set of ivory sheets and evoking a gasp from the store owner. Then to me, “What do you sleep in? A king?”
“Queen,” I say in a small voice because (1) it seems like a personal question, and (2) it’s possible I was harboring a fantasy that these women thought he’d seen my bed.
He picks up a set of queen-size sheets and hands them tothe lady. “I bet your sheets are crap,” he says to me. When I start to object, he puts up his hand to silence me. “Just let me.” He stares me down until I nod in agreement. “What else? Do you like your coffee mugs?”
“I do.”
“I do too.” He wanders around collecting small items until he finds the towels. “We need new towels. Don’t even start to argue.” Which, okay. He chooses four sets of the most luxurious towels I’ve ever felt. They’re a light aqua, a perfect match to the fading tile in the kids’ bathroom. He hands them to the slightly panting lady.
By the time he’s convinced me that my wine opener is “trash,” he’s got more stuff than we can carry. The ladies happily agree to deliver it all to my house.
“Well, my house feels like it’s had it’sPretty Womanmoment,” I say as we head to the bookstore.
“I don’t get to shop. There’s a woman Weezie hired who chooses my clothes. Someone else picked out everything in my apartment. Same for the other houses.”
“That’s weird.”
“It is. Like, it feels good to choose a towel color, decide which bananas look good.”
“Is that what’s at the heart of this suburban crisis you’re having? You want to make choices?”
Leo doesn’t answer, and I’m afraid I’ve pried. I also haven’t said “thank you,” and now it feels too late. We walk into the bookstore, and I introduce Leo to Stewart, the owner. He asks if he can take a photo with Leo for his Instagram account, and Leo is gracious.
Leo touches the spine of every book, and agrees to pose for selfies with three customers. He chooses a book on French provincial cooking (he doesn’t cook) and a newly released Stephen King novel.
I have to admit I like walking through town with Leo. People I know greet us with surprise and curiosity. Both of these things are better than pity. Everyone knows Ben left me. And everyone knows he sort of used me up and tossed me aside. “She did everything for that man,” they’d say, shaking their heads. Besides Mrs. Sanducci, who is recently widowed at eighty-six, I think I’m the only single woman in town.Look at me having fun,I want to say.Look at me next to something glamorous.
We stop at the hardware store to check in on Mr. Mapleton, and Leo buys a spray nozzle for my hose because he thinks they’re fun. I argue that I use my thumb and get the same effect, and now Leo and Mr. Mapleton have ganged up on me. “This woman lives like the Unabomber,” Leo says. “Have you been to her house?”
“That’s her, just the basics. And she’ll use and reuse something until it crumbles in her hands,” Mr. Mapleton tells Leo.
“You should see her bath towels,” Leo says and laughs.
“I can only imagine,” says Mr. Mapleton. “But not the husband. That guy was in here all the time, buying a slightly newer version of something he already had. I used to tell my wife, ‘That Ben’s got everything but a job.’ ”
I’ve heard this a thousand times, but I laugh because it’s true and also because I like how he’s always been on my side.“And he took it all with him,” I say. “I like to think of Ben wandering around the globe with six sets of torque wrenches.”
