Bright stars glint and twinkle. In the distance, planes roar, coming and going from Detroit Metro. We are on the front porch. Seven years and 257 miles from where it began. Our words make white vapor in the cold evening air.
“South Dakota?” I ask. “What’s there?”
“A new art studio,” Maggie says.
“You have a studio. With a two-bedroom apartment. On the island.”
“You can have it,” she says. “After it’s empty, of course.”
“So, you’re going to load up decades of artwork, my kid, and move to South Dakota?”
“Sioux Falls,” she says.
ZuZu wraps herself around my leg. Our eyes meet. She’s tired. I’m tired.
“Daddy, I don’t want South Dakota,” she says.
“Nobody wants South Dakota, Zu.”
Maggie leans against the house. Sighs. A brown curl falls and dangles between her eyes. Like magic, she manifests an orange scrunchie from nowhere, reaches up with both hands, and pulls the fallen curl and everything else back. When she does this her jean jacket opens to reveal Frank Sinatra’s mug shot from 1938. My T-shirt. One she bought for me. Six Christmases ago.
“I want to go to South Dakota,” she snarks. “To Sioux Falls. With our kid. You, as usual, will be doing your thing, on the island for God-knows-how-long. Maybe through winter? ZuZu and I don’t need to be stuck there like Danny and Wendy in The Shining.”
“Nice literary reference.”
“Thank you,” Maggie says. “I thought you’d like it.”
“Why don’t you set up in Thunder Bay, then? At the cottage.”
Maggie rolls her eyes. Crosses her arms.
“I don’t think so.”
“You’ll have your own space. I’ll be out of your hair. And then, it’s not that long of a drive,” I say nodding toward ZuZu. “For visits and such.”
“Ninety-minutes,” Maggie says. “Then forty-five minutes of ferry time.”
“I love the ferry!” ZuZu exclaims. “The island too! I like when the horses take us up the hill in the buggy!”
Maggie moves closer then kneels to get level with ZuZu. I breathe. Slowly. Deeply. And there it is—citrus—grapefruit and bergamot. The same sweet scent from hugs we used to share—good morning, good afternoon, goodnight.
“I know, honey. I like the island too. But Daddy and I have a lot to discuss.”
“Oh, no…” ZuZu says, as she scoots across the porch away from us, “…more discussing.”
My phone CHA-CHINGS! like an old cash register.
ZuZu leaps to her feet, “Greta! Greta! Greta!” she cheers.
Maggie and I jokingly chose this notification sound the day I signed with Apple Tree Agency. A small boutique outfit owned and operated by Greta Gellhorn. A twenty-something with a Ph.D. in English, a nose for business, and a story so serendipitous, Maggie insisted I give her a shot.
I’m at The New Hudson Inn, the text reads. Thinking about my favorite writer. Meet me for drinks?
We’re all a long way from that cold December day when the recent graduate, with nothing to do but drink and read, found a beat-up copy of my self-published book, A Better Place, at the Bicentennial Bookshop in Kalamazoo. She paid seventy-five cents for it, went straight home, and splashed Vernors into Sobieski for three and a half hours until she was done. That was it, she said. She knew she wanted to help people like me—unknown writers—to get known, get read, and get paid.
“Well, what did she say?” Maggie asks.
“Book signings. Updated numbers. I hate that shit.”
ZuZu stomps her foot. Scowls. “Don’t swear, Daddy!”
“And don’t hate it,” Maggie says. “It wasn’t that long ago you were writing from a basement in the projects, and we were struggling to make ends meet.”
“I’d like to be back there now,” I say.
Maggie bites her lip. Nearly loses it to tears and crying and everything else that’s balled up and ready to spring out from inside. It’s awful seeing her like this on the porch where we used to sit and drink wine and watch ZuZu chase moths and grasshoppers. Where we talked and listened as the big sun slipped down behind the maples night after night to meet the horizon. She has something to say. It’s on the tip of her tongue. But she will not let it out to be free and run, and I don’t know how to help. Communication, intimacy, everything I thought we would always share has been lost in roles and expectations, and it is our inability to share and explain and get it all out—to get it back—that heightens my pulse, sends my heart into my guts, and makes me wish she didn’t look so pretty—even now, with darkness all around and sadness in her face—and that we weren’t falling apart like this, right now, in the middle of our life.
Maggie wipes her eyes and there is a great sparkle as her diamond catches the light.
“You’re still wearing it,” I say.
“We’re still married.”
She is on shaky ground now. About to break loose at any moment.
“Give Momma a hug,” I say to ZuZu.
Maggie lifts her and they hug.
“I don’t want South Dakota, Mommy.”
“I know, honey,” she says. “I know.”
And then they bring the tears, lots of them, but I don’t want any, so I focus on the flashing lights of planes pushing through the dark sky and I think of the men and women, husbands and wives—some of them great distances from home, great distances from themselves and each other—traveling together or alone. People with more disaster, fear, and failure stitching together their relationships—their lives—than any outsider could ever know. And I wonder, if people trust strangers to land them safely from flights so high above the earth, why can’t Maggie and I even get off the ground?
“I don’t want South Dakota,” ZuZu says again.
I head this off before it goes too far.
“Let’s not worry about South Dakota. Let’s worry about Frankenmuth.”
“I thought you were going to the Detroit Zoo?” Maggie asks.
ZuZu jumps from Maggie’s arms. Stands between us. Wipes her eyes with her arm.
“What’s Frankenmuth?” she asks.
“Frankenmuth is a town. About ninety minutes north.”
“But I want to see the polar bears,” she says.
“We’ll see bears.”
“We will?”
“Sure, black bears, and there’ll be a tiger and lion, and—”
“But I want to go into the glass cave. The tunnel with the water around us and watch the bears swim.”
“The Artic Ring of Life,” Maggie interjects, “Mommy remembers.”
“Yes!” ZuZu shouts. We can watch the blind sea lions swim and play with the big red ball.”
“That was always fun,” Maggie says.
“We’re not going to the big zoo,” I say. “We’re going to a little zoo where we can feed goats and turtles and parakeets.”
“Turtles!” She cheers and looks up at Maggie. “Turtles, Mommy!”
“They have lots of shops too. Ice cream shops, candy shops, sausage shops, cheese shops, smoothie shops. We can eat and drink whatever we want.”
Maggie glares at me, “Not too much drinking,” she says.
“Okay! Okay!” ZuZu cheers. “Let’s go!”
I pick her up, we hug, and Maggie steps closer. She touches my arm and for a moment, we are home again. Husband and wife and daughter. On our porch. Decompressing from the day. All we need is a little wine, the birds, and the light of the sun, even if only a few minutes before it disappears with no promise of a return.
“Where are you staying tonight?” I ask.
She takes her keys from her pocket. Backs away.
“Canton.”
“What’s in Canton?” I ask.
She pecks ZuZu’s cheek.
“Friends,” she says, and turns away.
My guts roil.
“Bye, Momma!”
“Bye, honey!” Maggie sings back. “I love you! See you in Thunder Bay in four days.”
ZuZu hugs me tight. Maggie walks away. Down the porch steps where we used to sit and feed breadcrumbs to the family of mallards that adopted us for three summers. Into the driveway where we played basketball and hopscotch. And into the 4Runner that took us everywhere. Grocery shopping at Meijer. To Wasabi in Westland. To Hines Park. Red Robin. The Drive-In on Ford Avenue. Tigers’ games. Bald Mountain in Lake Orion. And no matter the season, always up north, back home to Thunder Bay. The place we swore we’d return to and live one day.
“I still don’t want South Dakota,” ZuZu says.
“South Dakota’s not so bad. Mount Rushmore’s there.”
“Dead presidents in rock?”
“A great American landmark.”
She rolls her eyes.
“You’re a landmark,” she says.
“Presidential material.”
“Mom’s President,” ZuZu says.
I follow Maggie’s taillights until they are gone. Eaten up by the dark.
“Time for beer and Scooby-Doo,” I say.
“Okay,” ZuZu says. “But not too much. We need our rest.”
“You can never have too much beer and Scooby-Doo,” I say, and carry her inside.
This is an excerpt from the upcoming novel, Devotion, by KJ Stevens.
Copyright © 2024 KJ Stevens. All rights reserved.