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From the half-insulated attic—a space he's been wanting to carve out as an office if he can ever even get some goddamned drywall up at least, Jack, please—he calls over there. Lets it ring. His big plan: Run bookcases down the sides, replace the windows in the two gable ends, put a desk under each window. Maybe set a couple of upholstered chairs out in the middle, and a rug, and it'd be nice up here, a place they could sit in the evenings, have a drink. She'd like that. Ice in glasses, sprigs of mint. Coasters on little low tables. How was your day, dear? That'd be just grand as hell. It rings. Six times. Eight. He's calling to tell Beth that he needs to come by to drop Hen off. It's Canavan who finally picks up.

"Hey, Jack," Canavan says. He sounds sleepy.

"I wake you guys up?" Jack says.

"You're calling for Beth," says Canavan.

He doesn't feel any real need to answer that. "No jobs this morning?" he asks. Canavan cuts trees down. Likes to call himself a tree surgeon, like there's a medical degree that goes with it.

"Not till later on," says Canavan. "Slow Friday."

Jack can hear sheets and blankets, and then also what sounds like dishes, like plates. "You two eating breakfast in bed?"

"No," Canavan says. "It's dinner."

Jack checks his watch. "It's eight in the morning."

"Yeah, I know. It's from last night. Beth made us soup and bread. Campeloni."

Somewhere in the background, Beth says, "Cannellini."

"Cannellini," Canavan says. "Apparently."

"Beth made you soup and bread," says Jack. Beth is not a huge cook.

"Cannellini," he says again, as if it's some kind of explanation. "Tomatoes in it. It was pretty good."

Jack holds the phone out in front of him, like he'll somehow be able to look in there through the little array of holes and see them in bed, his wife and his excellent friend Terry Canavan and all the plates and bowls from soup and bread. At least she doesn't have a suitcase with her yet. Every time he's come back home this week he's checked the closets first thing. All the suitcases are still right there. And her clothes, too, he's pretty sure, or most of them. Which only means she's probably over there wearing some old sweatshirt Canavan's found her, or his Carhartt fucking jacket he's so proud of, the one with the zip-off arms. Zippers everywhere. That's how Jack pictures her, then, little panties and the unsleeved vest of Canavan's jacket. Hair all in knots. "Gimme Beth," he says.

"Yeah. Hang on." Canavan puts the phone down and Jack hears them talking, but can't make out the words. Then Beth picks up.

"Hey, Jackie," she says.

"Hey," he says back, and then just stands there. In their attic. He doesn't know why he came up here to make the call. Sometimes he does things like this. Now he feels a little like zipping his own arms off.

"You called me," says Beth.

"Yeah," he says, recovering some. "I need to drop Hendrick by. I'm going in to the yard."

"I have a class," she says. "Summer session started yesterday. You know this."

The way she says it, like he's a kid. You know this. "You couldn't take him with you?" he asks her.

"What, to my class? I don't think so, Jack. And anyway, why can't he go with you? He went with you yesterday. And Wednesday."

"Fridays are crazy," he says. "Plus with the weather like this, the line'll be out off the lot. We probably won't even get to break for lunch." He picks at the windowsill, can't really believe he's having this conversation. "It's not like I'm dying to come over there and, what, help you two clean up your dishes from last night, maybe straighten the covers for you, put a mint on your pillow—"

"Stop it, OK?" she says, her voice gone all brittle. Just like that. "I'll figure something out. I'll take him. Let's not do this right now."

"Hey, I know: Let's not do it at all."

"Jack," she says, and then quits.

He waits for her to start talking again. A piece of someone else's conversation breaks in on the line, then disappears. On her end, there's something like the sound of Canavan rearranging the dressers in the bedroom. Or bowling. "I'll be by, then," Jack says finally, to fill up the space. He checks his watch again. "In half an hour." And instead of waiting for more quiet, he hangs up on her, stabbing at the button on the handset a few times, which just makes him feel a whole lot better. Bitch, he thinks, and right away feels sorry for that, or stupid about it, or both. One more thing done wrong. He puts the phone in his pocket and goes downstairs to find Hendrick. Whatever else there is, there's this: She will have been gone one week tomorrow.

—from This Is Just Exactly Like You