Page 31 of Summer Romance

“Okay,” he says. “Where do we start?”

“How about with the box you were sitting on?”

He stretches his arms over his head. His T-shirt rides up and reveals a bit of his sculpted stomach. I take in a little breath at the sight of it and shift my attention to the box.

“How long can you stay?” he asks.

“I don’t know. A couple of hours, maybe more.”

“He didn’t tell you when he’s bringing them back?”

“No.” I rip the tape off and pull out a bubble-wrapped ceramic turtle. “And I’m super pissed off. At him, at myself.”

He turns to me, and I really don’t want to hear what he has to say.

“I know, Scooter. I used to be in control. I get it. Now, keep, toss, donate, or sell?”

We work inrelative silence. (He keeps the ceramic turtle, which is adorable). At first I empty boxes and ask which pilehe wants things in. Then he starts opening his own boxes and making decisions without me. He gets three phone calls, which he takes in the kitchen. I can’t hear what he’s saying but I can tell by the tone of his voice that it’s personal, that he’s placating someone. I wonder if it’s the old girlfriend and think he must have been exceptionally unreliable to keep her from wanting to run her hands across his stomach all day. I’m sure she’s blond. She’s completely put together in outfits entirely made of silk because, of course, she doesn’t sweat. She buys designer toilet paper just two rolls at a time and has never set foot in a Costco. Just the thought of her and her fancy toilet paper makes me want to wring that ceramic turtle’s neck.

His phone rings again, and he takes it in front of me. “Hey,” he says. “Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll see if Vince can come fix it in the morning. Okay. Thanks.” And he hangs up.

“Everything okay?” I ask, because I’m nosy and also delighted that that didn’t sound romantic.

“Yeah, fine. It’s just some kids I know from skateboarding. The lock on the skate park fence is broken.”

“Ah, and I know how strongly you object to breaking and entering.”

“It’s the amateurs that break the locks,” he says. “I’m a pro.”

He opens a box that holds an old adding machine, a cowboy hat, and a set of porcelain chopsticks. He shakes his head and puts the whole box in the donation pile.

“But why are they calling you about the lock?” There was something so casual about the way he spoke to whoever was calling.

“They call me for everything. I told you, I’m a problem solver. I’m like their uncle who knows how to get things done.”

“And you know them from skateboarding?”

“Everything I know, I know from skateboarding.”

By five, Istill haven’t heard from Pete, and we’ve emptied two of the oak cabinets in the living room. We’ve only found a handful of things he wants to keep. It’s a critical rule of cleaning things out that you stop every few hours for a major break. If you go too long, you stop looking at what you’re sorting through and just start throwing everything away. I call it StuffFatigue™, and it’s a real problem.

Ethan seems like he’s in the zone, but I get two beers from the kitchen and tell him it’s quitting time. “Thank God,” he says, and follows me out to the patio. It’s a cloudless day and the early evening sun is making the pool sparkle. No one should be inside going through boxes.

We plop down in our two facing armchairs. “A happy life accumulates a lot of stuff,” he says.

“Any kind of life does,” I say, and we drink to that.

“I bet your house is organized like a military locker.”

I choke back a little beer. “No.”

“Seriously?”

“The cobbler’s children have no shoes,” I say.

“Fascinating.”

“It’s a lot easier to work through other people’s problems. I think I must be very attached to my own.”

---