Bernice lifted the tea cup to her lips and gazed through the cafe window while her sister copied phone
numbers onto a white slip of paper - work phone, cell phone, the salon, the tennis club, several other clubs.
Outside, sunlight filtered through the leaves high above the crowded street. People rushed by or lingered on
the sidewalk, waiting for the streetcar. Small, round wafers of light drifted over the row of tables along the wall
just outside, over the cars and people passing by. A woman with a large potted cactus strode past the cafe,
dust motes trailing behind her. The flecks of dust made sunbeams in her wake that hung in the air behind her,
even after she turned the corner and followed the street that sloped down toward the Willamette River.
The dizziness passed over Bernice again. She closed her eyes for a moment to hold it at bay. Her sister,
Elizabeth, didn't seem to notice. Her tea trembled in the white, porcelain cup. She had lived on the river too
long. Too many months turning into too many years. This frantic spinning in her head might keep hanging on
like this. For days, maybe. She had packed her bags that morning and left. Bill was on his own now. For a few
days. Or maybe longer. His insulin would run out in less than a week, and he probably wouldn’t even know
where to go for more. He’d actually have to think about it, and climb up the ramp, and step onto dry land for
once.
Elizabeth passed the slip of paper across the table. “There you go Bernice. If you can't reach me at the office
or any of these other places, then I'm not reachable at all. The cell phone is just for emergencies.”
Bernice. People back home, at the marina, called her Bernie, but that wasn't bothering her so much anymore.
And not being bothered was starting to bother her. It's not like the name Bernie was any shorter than the
name Bernice, or any easier to say. That was the whole point of familiar names, wasn't it? Convenience. It
was the same with Marge from the middle marina. She wanted everyone to call her Mar, and she practically
demanded it, saying, “Go ahead and leave off the ‘g’ next time, honey.” And then there was Doris. Everyone
called her Dory. What was wrong with these people?
A name was a treacherous thing. Everything else grew from there. She had read all about it in a magazine
recently. Good economic standing could often be traced back to certain successful-sounding names. Names
were likely to affect intelligence quotient. Your name was often the first impression in new relationships. It
determined the kind of people that would be attracted to you and even the quality of your relationships as they
went along. Nicknames weren't the problem. It just depended on what the nickname was, or what it
suggested. Men named Richard who used the familiar name Rich grew up more financially successful. There
were statistics to prove it.
How different it would be down on the river if she had become friends with a Margaret or a Doris. You would
never have tea in a downtown cafe with Mar or Dory.
When Bill had convinced her to move onto the boat almost five years ago, she had tried politely to hold their
new neighbors to the name Bernice, but the name Bernie had stuck. What a stubborn, masculine name. It put
people on the defensive, as if she were an insolent, presumptuous woman who needed to be put in her place.
At least now, for the next few days, or weeks, while she was living with her sister,Elizabeth and the newest
husband downtown, she could listen to people say her real name for a change.
Elizabeth picked up her cup by its thin handle, steadying it underneath with a saucer in the other hand.
Elizabeth asked if she was OK, maybe tea had been a bad idea so soon after arriving, maybe they should take
their time, let her settle in a little before they tore up the town.
“No,” Bernice said. “It's good to be anywhere as long as it is up on dry land.”
Bernice brought the cup of tea slowly to her lips. A blue and green streetcar hissed to a stop outside and the
doors opened. A young couple outside stood up from their table, both of them fishing through their pockets.
Bernice dropped her cup into the dish with a clink.
Elizabeth asked if everything was OK with Bill.
Bernice looked out the window and told her that Bill was fine, just about to start a new job. They had both
decided a short vacation for her was a great idea before the position started.
The woman outside tossed several coins onto the tabletop, grabbed the young man's arm and pulled him
through the door of the streetcar just before it closed. The train hissed as it rolled out of sight.
Bernice was on vacation. That was what she called it - coming downtown. A vacation. That was the label Bill
had come up with earlier that morning when Bernice had packed her bags and called her sister, looking for a
place to stay. He said that a vacation was a great idea, just what was needed.
She called in sick at the office in St. Helens where she worked two days out of the week. So these were sick
days as far as the accounting firm was concerned. Sick days. Vacation days. Days to decide what to do,
whether to quit her own job and join Bill, or whether to let him go alone. He was starting the new job with the
boat brokerage the next week, a position delivering boats by water up and down the coast. And he couldn't
make these trips on his own. All this meant that they would spend even more time down on the water instead
of less.
Bernice let out a sigh, and gazed out the window. “Oh, Elizabeth, it's just so good to be up on land, having tea
in the city again, things happening all around, away from that floating trailer-park.”
“Take your time with it all, Bernice,” Elizabeth said. “We can talk whenever. When I'm not around, I'm always
near a phone.” Elizabeth reached for Bernice's hand across the table, her eyes wrinkled with concern. “I'm glad
you knew you could come to us.”
Bernice looked into her sister's eyes. “I'm on vacation, Beth. Really. Just for a few days. Don't try to make
this into something it's not.”
They grew silent for a while. The glass of the window radiated the heat of the afternoon sun. Perhaps Bernice
had overdone it a little by wearing the heavy sweater. Elizabeth had on a thin blouse and a skirt too short for
someone as old as she was. The blouse looked like it might even be made of silk.
On the other side of the glass, a man in gray rags staggered up to the table, scooped the change into his
palm, and stepped away. A coin rang as it hit the sidewalk and rolled out into the street. The man bent down
at the waist and picked it up. Elizabeth didn't seem to notice any of it. Funny. Of all the things Bernice had
seen since arriving downtown this morning, that homeless man seemed the most familiar, his loose stride, the
slow meandering way about him. He could have been someone from the marina, a liveaboard, Bill even, minus
the boat to live on and their savings account, her meager paychecks, her inheritance.
Bernice’s sister stiffened and looked at her watch. She'd forgotten something at the office. She would have to
go back, but she wouldn't stay there for long. She slid a single key across the smooth, glass tabletop and told
Bernice to go ahead and make herself at home up in the apartment. She asked if Bernice wanted her to show
the way back to the right building.
Bernice shook her head and reached for the key. She said she would stay and finish her tea. Elizabeth leaned
across the table and put an arm around Bernice's shoulder. Their cheeks touched for a moment. Bernice caught
the heavy scent of her sister's perfume, the same old stuff, that officious, secretarial kind of smell. The blouse
was made of silk. Either that or rayon.
Then Elizabeth stood up straight and looked down at her. Bernice turned to face the window again.
Elizabeth took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Bernice, I tell you what. I'll give you some space.
I don't want to crowd in when you need some room to breathe. You let me know when you want to talk
again. Jeffrey and I can head out of town for a few days if you'd like, if you need some time to yourself. We've
both got plenty of vacation time of our own. I gotta go. Just let me know. I'll see you, OK?”
When Elizabeth had passed out of sight down the sidewalk, Bernice stood up and walked toward the
bathroom. Most of the tables on the way were empty. Several people huddled close, speaking softly. A
photograph of the Portland skyline and the Willamette River hung on the wall behind the register counter.
The floor began to rock under her feet. There it was again: the dizziness. She tried to correct her balance and
then overcompensated, placing her hand on the shoulder of a woman sitting at a table. Bernice pushed off the
shoulder and grabbed onto the back of an empty chair behind her. The woman turned around, giving Bernice a
cold look.
“Oh, I'm terribly sorry,” said Bernice. She breathed deeply, walking quickly to the bathroom door, grabbing one
empty chair after another along the way. She locked the stall door and sat down on the toilet, her eyes closed,
her head spinning, and then began to rock back and forth on the seat - slowly at first, and then faster - trying to
make the spinning stop, trying to tell herself that land sickness wasn't the same thing as home sickness, that it
was nothing compared to seasickness, and that Bernice was a lovely name, an elegant name, her name, and it
would be so good to hear people say it again.
* * *
Bill would run out of insulin in a couple of days, and then he would call her for help, probably, since he didn't
know where she went to pick up refills after the old pharmacy in Scappoose closed down. Probably, he wouldn't
even remember to take it while she was gone. But Bernice wasn't going to call him about it. He could call her.
He had the number. If she called on the first day, it would mean that she was checking in on him, or updating
him on her arrival. It would confirm to him that this was indeed a vacation.
She called Dory instead. Twice on the first day. She made the first call right after arriving downtown. Bernice
had been waiting for her sister in the apartment lobby, sitting in a high-backed chair against the wall, her bags
stacked in a row beside her. A security guard, a man older even than she was, sat behind a tall, oak counter
beside the elevators nodding to those who came through the glass doors from the street outside. After he had
glanced sternly in her direction for the third time, Bernice stood up, opened her address book, found Dory’s
phone number, and paced over to the pay phone booth across the lobby, pulling the smooth glass door closed
behind her. She kept the call short, told Dory she and Bill were separated, and that she didn't want anyone to
know, that she would call back again in the evening if she got a chance, that she was fine, and that, no, she
didn't want her to go give Bill a piece of her mind.
A couple of weeks ago, Dory opened the hot dog stand on the fuel dock for the annual summer run of Polish
foot longs and local sauerkraut. She had painted a new sign for the stand that read “Let's Be Frank,” and then
hung it on the front of the red and white-striped condiment cart. Dory knew the marina news, at least the news
of found romance, dwindling romance, or lost romance, and what people were saying about it. During the rest
of the year, when she wasn't making hot dogs and doling out advice on the fuel dock, people came to her boat
to talk.
Dory insisted (with a wink) that she wasn't a chain smoker since she never lit a new cigarette off the red coal
of the previous one. She always used a lighter to get the next one going. As she puttered around the fuel
dock, she lit cigarettes. Sometimes she had several going at once, balanced on the rims of several ashtrays
among the tables where she had several different conversations going. Bernice once saw Dory stab out a
cigarette absentmindedly on the top of a fuel pump over by the only official non-smoking table on the fuel dock.
You could always count on Dory. She would be on the back deck of her boat moored several slips down from
the fuel dock, or she would be at the hot dog stand. She would be ready to talk. She would be smoking. She
would have a can of Red Dog nearby, warming in the sun or gathering drops of rain.
Bernice had only spoken to her a dozen times since moving aboard. She couldn't stand all the cigarette
smoke, and Dory didn't take a shower every day, either, but Bernice was intrigued enough to watch and listen
at a distance. Dory treated everyone the same. Names and background didn't seem to matter. The rich kids
cruising through on their speed boats and the alcoholic bachelors at the marina all got the same hot dogs from
her at the same price. Dory's sense of equality came across as effortless. If only Bernice could get through the
cloud of tobacco smoke to listen and learn, unless it was the kind of thing you couldn't learn but needed to be
born with, or the kind of thing that came from ignorance rather than thoughtful consideration.
* * *
Bernice made the second call to the marina later that first day downtown, after Elizabeth had served her and
Jeffrey a quiet dinner of noodles and vegetables with tofu. “Comfort food,” Elizabeth said with a half-smile.
Jeffrey asked if Bernice needed any money. She shook her head and excused herself to go out for a walk and
then stopped at the pay phone downstairs in the apartment lobby.
The security guard sat behind the counter, his head bent forward. He snored once loudly and then sat up
straight, but his eyes soon began drooping again.
When Dory answered, Bernice whispered into the receiver. “Hey, it's me.”
A cigarette lighter flicked once on the other end. “Talk to me, sweetie. I'm dyin' here.”
“Bill and I had a fight,” said Bernice.
* * *
Sort of. They had never fought like this before, throwing things, raising their voices, but Bill turned it into a
kind of game. Bill could laugh his way out of anything, and he usually got Bernice laughing too.
They were never supposed to stay on the water. That had been their agreement from the beginning. They
were supposed to just try it out for a little while in order to save money. But a little while had come and gone
and then Bill had been laid-off and out of work for several years until he had found this recent boat delivery job.
Then, yesterday, after Bill poured the holding-tank chemicals into the toilet on the boat and splashed them all
over her one and only evening gown, Bernice just lost it. She had smelled the chemicals and discovered several
big holes in the bottom of the dress where the stuff had eaten through. They hadn't used the toilet on the boat
in years since they had turned it into a closet for hanging up their clothes, the nicer clothes they never wore
anymore. Why would he need to pump those rancid chemicals into the holding tank when it was empty?
Bill answered, saying he was cleaning out the boat a little, getting it ready for the trip to Newport where they
would switch boats for the delivery to California. He thought maybe they could go on a short cruise downtown
before the new job started, visit some nice restaurants before the long trip down the coast. She abruptly
reminded him that now she would have nothing to wear to a nice restaurant thanks to him and then marched
over to the dresser and pulled the boat ignition keys out of the drawer and threw them out the hatch and into
the river and thanked him for letting her in on his plans. She went into the aft cabin for her purse and said she
was going for a drive into town to spend some more of her own hard-earned money. That’s when Bill strutted
over to the key box by the main hatch, pulled the car keys out and threw them outside into the river, too. He
even smiled after he did it as if out of relief, or maybe just awkwardness. Neither of them had ever done this
kind of thing to each other before. They were in uncharted territory.
Bernice started throwing more things into the river: a couple of screwdrivers, Bills deck shoes, a bag of corn
chips, the TV remote. Bill was still grinning and she started smiling a bit too, which made it worse, dissipating
the anger she wanted to feel. She turned to face him, narrowed her gaze, and called him William, which only
made them both laugh. Bernice had to leave and go for a long walk down the dock in order to stop smiling, in
order to call attention to the seriousness of what had just happened.
Later, Bill took the dinghy downstream and came back with a few things that were light enough to float. He
even brought back the bag of chips. The boat keys were on a bright yellow floating key ring, so he got those
too. But the car keys weren't. She spent the better part of the evening searching through the boat for her
spare car keys, but they never turned up.
The next day, Bernice packed her bags and stood silently by the main hatch with her arms folded while Bill
flipped through the channels on TV. The future of their lives hung heavily in the air around them. That's when
Bill said the word vacation.
numbers onto a white slip of paper - work phone, cell phone, the salon, the tennis club, several other clubs.
Outside, sunlight filtered through the leaves high above the crowded street. People rushed by or lingered on
the sidewalk, waiting for the streetcar. Small, round wafers of light drifted over the row of tables along the wall
just outside, over the cars and people passing by. A woman with a large potted cactus strode past the cafe,
dust motes trailing behind her. The flecks of dust made sunbeams in her wake that hung in the air behind her,
even after she turned the corner and followed the street that sloped down toward the Willamette River.
The dizziness passed over Bernice again. She closed her eyes for a moment to hold it at bay. Her sister,
Elizabeth, didn't seem to notice. Her tea trembled in the white, porcelain cup. She had lived on the river too
long. Too many months turning into too many years. This frantic spinning in her head might keep hanging on
like this. For days, maybe. She had packed her bags that morning and left. Bill was on his own now. For a few
days. Or maybe longer. His insulin would run out in less than a week, and he probably wouldn’t even know
where to go for more. He’d actually have to think about it, and climb up the ramp, and step onto dry land for
once.
Elizabeth passed the slip of paper across the table. “There you go Bernice. If you can't reach me at the office
or any of these other places, then I'm not reachable at all. The cell phone is just for emergencies.”
Bernice. People back home, at the marina, called her Bernie, but that wasn't bothering her so much anymore.
And not being bothered was starting to bother her. It's not like the name Bernie was any shorter than the
name Bernice, or any easier to say. That was the whole point of familiar names, wasn't it? Convenience. It
was the same with Marge from the middle marina. She wanted everyone to call her Mar, and she practically
demanded it, saying, “Go ahead and leave off the ‘g’ next time, honey.” And then there was Doris. Everyone
called her Dory. What was wrong with these people?
A name was a treacherous thing. Everything else grew from there. She had read all about it in a magazine
recently. Good economic standing could often be traced back to certain successful-sounding names. Names
were likely to affect intelligence quotient. Your name was often the first impression in new relationships. It
determined the kind of people that would be attracted to you and even the quality of your relationships as they
went along. Nicknames weren't the problem. It just depended on what the nickname was, or what it
suggested. Men named Richard who used the familiar name Rich grew up more financially successful. There
were statistics to prove it.
How different it would be down on the river if she had become friends with a Margaret or a Doris. You would
never have tea in a downtown cafe with Mar or Dory.
When Bill had convinced her to move onto the boat almost five years ago, she had tried politely to hold their
new neighbors to the name Bernice, but the name Bernie had stuck. What a stubborn, masculine name. It put
people on the defensive, as if she were an insolent, presumptuous woman who needed to be put in her place.
At least now, for the next few days, or weeks, while she was living with her sister,Elizabeth and the newest
husband downtown, she could listen to people say her real name for a change.
Elizabeth picked up her cup by its thin handle, steadying it underneath with a saucer in the other hand.
Elizabeth asked if she was OK, maybe tea had been a bad idea so soon after arriving, maybe they should take
their time, let her settle in a little before they tore up the town.
“No,” Bernice said. “It's good to be anywhere as long as it is up on dry land.”
Bernice brought the cup of tea slowly to her lips. A blue and green streetcar hissed to a stop outside and the
doors opened. A young couple outside stood up from their table, both of them fishing through their pockets.
Bernice dropped her cup into the dish with a clink.
Elizabeth asked if everything was OK with Bill.
Bernice looked out the window and told her that Bill was fine, just about to start a new job. They had both
decided a short vacation for her was a great idea before the position started.
The woman outside tossed several coins onto the tabletop, grabbed the young man's arm and pulled him
through the door of the streetcar just before it closed. The train hissed as it rolled out of sight.
Bernice was on vacation. That was what she called it - coming downtown. A vacation. That was the label Bill
had come up with earlier that morning when Bernice had packed her bags and called her sister, looking for a
place to stay. He said that a vacation was a great idea, just what was needed.
She called in sick at the office in St. Helens where she worked two days out of the week. So these were sick
days as far as the accounting firm was concerned. Sick days. Vacation days. Days to decide what to do,
whether to quit her own job and join Bill, or whether to let him go alone. He was starting the new job with the
boat brokerage the next week, a position delivering boats by water up and down the coast. And he couldn't
make these trips on his own. All this meant that they would spend even more time down on the water instead
of less.
Bernice let out a sigh, and gazed out the window. “Oh, Elizabeth, it's just so good to be up on land, having tea
in the city again, things happening all around, away from that floating trailer-park.”
“Take your time with it all, Bernice,” Elizabeth said. “We can talk whenever. When I'm not around, I'm always
near a phone.” Elizabeth reached for Bernice's hand across the table, her eyes wrinkled with concern. “I'm glad
you knew you could come to us.”
Bernice looked into her sister's eyes. “I'm on vacation, Beth. Really. Just for a few days. Don't try to make
this into something it's not.”
They grew silent for a while. The glass of the window radiated the heat of the afternoon sun. Perhaps Bernice
had overdone it a little by wearing the heavy sweater. Elizabeth had on a thin blouse and a skirt too short for
someone as old as she was. The blouse looked like it might even be made of silk.
On the other side of the glass, a man in gray rags staggered up to the table, scooped the change into his
palm, and stepped away. A coin rang as it hit the sidewalk and rolled out into the street. The man bent down
at the waist and picked it up. Elizabeth didn't seem to notice any of it. Funny. Of all the things Bernice had
seen since arriving downtown this morning, that homeless man seemed the most familiar, his loose stride, the
slow meandering way about him. He could have been someone from the marina, a liveaboard, Bill even, minus
the boat to live on and their savings account, her meager paychecks, her inheritance.
Bernice’s sister stiffened and looked at her watch. She'd forgotten something at the office. She would have to
go back, but she wouldn't stay there for long. She slid a single key across the smooth, glass tabletop and told
Bernice to go ahead and make herself at home up in the apartment. She asked if Bernice wanted her to show
the way back to the right building.
Bernice shook her head and reached for the key. She said she would stay and finish her tea. Elizabeth leaned
across the table and put an arm around Bernice's shoulder. Their cheeks touched for a moment. Bernice caught
the heavy scent of her sister's perfume, the same old stuff, that officious, secretarial kind of smell. The blouse
was made of silk. Either that or rayon.
Then Elizabeth stood up straight and looked down at her. Bernice turned to face the window again.
Elizabeth took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Bernice, I tell you what. I'll give you some space.
I don't want to crowd in when you need some room to breathe. You let me know when you want to talk
again. Jeffrey and I can head out of town for a few days if you'd like, if you need some time to yourself. We've
both got plenty of vacation time of our own. I gotta go. Just let me know. I'll see you, OK?”
When Elizabeth had passed out of sight down the sidewalk, Bernice stood up and walked toward the
bathroom. Most of the tables on the way were empty. Several people huddled close, speaking softly. A
photograph of the Portland skyline and the Willamette River hung on the wall behind the register counter.
The floor began to rock under her feet. There it was again: the dizziness. She tried to correct her balance and
then overcompensated, placing her hand on the shoulder of a woman sitting at a table. Bernice pushed off the
shoulder and grabbed onto the back of an empty chair behind her. The woman turned around, giving Bernice a
cold look.
“Oh, I'm terribly sorry,” said Bernice. She breathed deeply, walking quickly to the bathroom door, grabbing one
empty chair after another along the way. She locked the stall door and sat down on the toilet, her eyes closed,
her head spinning, and then began to rock back and forth on the seat - slowly at first, and then faster - trying to
make the spinning stop, trying to tell herself that land sickness wasn't the same thing as home sickness, that it
was nothing compared to seasickness, and that Bernice was a lovely name, an elegant name, her name, and it
would be so good to hear people say it again.
* * *
Bill would run out of insulin in a couple of days, and then he would call her for help, probably, since he didn't
know where she went to pick up refills after the old pharmacy in Scappoose closed down. Probably, he wouldn't
even remember to take it while she was gone. But Bernice wasn't going to call him about it. He could call her.
He had the number. If she called on the first day, it would mean that she was checking in on him, or updating
him on her arrival. It would confirm to him that this was indeed a vacation.
She called Dory instead. Twice on the first day. She made the first call right after arriving downtown. Bernice
had been waiting for her sister in the apartment lobby, sitting in a high-backed chair against the wall, her bags
stacked in a row beside her. A security guard, a man older even than she was, sat behind a tall, oak counter
beside the elevators nodding to those who came through the glass doors from the street outside. After he had
glanced sternly in her direction for the third time, Bernice stood up, opened her address book, found Dory’s
phone number, and paced over to the pay phone booth across the lobby, pulling the smooth glass door closed
behind her. She kept the call short, told Dory she and Bill were separated, and that she didn't want anyone to
know, that she would call back again in the evening if she got a chance, that she was fine, and that, no, she
didn't want her to go give Bill a piece of her mind.
A couple of weeks ago, Dory opened the hot dog stand on the fuel dock for the annual summer run of Polish
foot longs and local sauerkraut. She had painted a new sign for the stand that read “Let's Be Frank,” and then
hung it on the front of the red and white-striped condiment cart. Dory knew the marina news, at least the news
of found romance, dwindling romance, or lost romance, and what people were saying about it. During the rest
of the year, when she wasn't making hot dogs and doling out advice on the fuel dock, people came to her boat
to talk.
Dory insisted (with a wink) that she wasn't a chain smoker since she never lit a new cigarette off the red coal
of the previous one. She always used a lighter to get the next one going. As she puttered around the fuel
dock, she lit cigarettes. Sometimes she had several going at once, balanced on the rims of several ashtrays
among the tables where she had several different conversations going. Bernice once saw Dory stab out a
cigarette absentmindedly on the top of a fuel pump over by the only official non-smoking table on the fuel dock.
You could always count on Dory. She would be on the back deck of her boat moored several slips down from
the fuel dock, or she would be at the hot dog stand. She would be ready to talk. She would be smoking. She
would have a can of Red Dog nearby, warming in the sun or gathering drops of rain.
Bernice had only spoken to her a dozen times since moving aboard. She couldn't stand all the cigarette
smoke, and Dory didn't take a shower every day, either, but Bernice was intrigued enough to watch and listen
at a distance. Dory treated everyone the same. Names and background didn't seem to matter. The rich kids
cruising through on their speed boats and the alcoholic bachelors at the marina all got the same hot dogs from
her at the same price. Dory's sense of equality came across as effortless. If only Bernice could get through the
cloud of tobacco smoke to listen and learn, unless it was the kind of thing you couldn't learn but needed to be
born with, or the kind of thing that came from ignorance rather than thoughtful consideration.
* * *
Bernice made the second call to the marina later that first day downtown, after Elizabeth had served her and
Jeffrey a quiet dinner of noodles and vegetables with tofu. “Comfort food,” Elizabeth said with a half-smile.
Jeffrey asked if Bernice needed any money. She shook her head and excused herself to go out for a walk and
then stopped at the pay phone downstairs in the apartment lobby.
The security guard sat behind the counter, his head bent forward. He snored once loudly and then sat up
straight, but his eyes soon began drooping again.
When Dory answered, Bernice whispered into the receiver. “Hey, it's me.”
A cigarette lighter flicked once on the other end. “Talk to me, sweetie. I'm dyin' here.”
“Bill and I had a fight,” said Bernice.
* * *
Sort of. They had never fought like this before, throwing things, raising their voices, but Bill turned it into a
kind of game. Bill could laugh his way out of anything, and he usually got Bernice laughing too.
They were never supposed to stay on the water. That had been their agreement from the beginning. They
were supposed to just try it out for a little while in order to save money. But a little while had come and gone
and then Bill had been laid-off and out of work for several years until he had found this recent boat delivery job.
Then, yesterday, after Bill poured the holding-tank chemicals into the toilet on the boat and splashed them all
over her one and only evening gown, Bernice just lost it. She had smelled the chemicals and discovered several
big holes in the bottom of the dress where the stuff had eaten through. They hadn't used the toilet on the boat
in years since they had turned it into a closet for hanging up their clothes, the nicer clothes they never wore
anymore. Why would he need to pump those rancid chemicals into the holding tank when it was empty?
Bill answered, saying he was cleaning out the boat a little, getting it ready for the trip to Newport where they
would switch boats for the delivery to California. He thought maybe they could go on a short cruise downtown
before the new job started, visit some nice restaurants before the long trip down the coast. She abruptly
reminded him that now she would have nothing to wear to a nice restaurant thanks to him and then marched
over to the dresser and pulled the boat ignition keys out of the drawer and threw them out the hatch and into
the river and thanked him for letting her in on his plans. She went into the aft cabin for her purse and said she
was going for a drive into town to spend some more of her own hard-earned money. That’s when Bill strutted
over to the key box by the main hatch, pulled the car keys out and threw them outside into the river, too. He
even smiled after he did it as if out of relief, or maybe just awkwardness. Neither of them had ever done this
kind of thing to each other before. They were in uncharted territory.
Bernice started throwing more things into the river: a couple of screwdrivers, Bills deck shoes, a bag of corn
chips, the TV remote. Bill was still grinning and she started smiling a bit too, which made it worse, dissipating
the anger she wanted to feel. She turned to face him, narrowed her gaze, and called him William, which only
made them both laugh. Bernice had to leave and go for a long walk down the dock in order to stop smiling, in
order to call attention to the seriousness of what had just happened.
Later, Bill took the dinghy downstream and came back with a few things that were light enough to float. He
even brought back the bag of chips. The boat keys were on a bright yellow floating key ring, so he got those
too. But the car keys weren't. She spent the better part of the evening searching through the boat for her
spare car keys, but they never turned up.
The next day, Bernice packed her bags and stood silently by the main hatch with her arms folded while Bill
flipped through the channels on TV. The future of their lives hung heavily in the air around them. That's when
Bill said the word vacation.
r.kv.r.y. quarterly winter 2007 fiction
Land Sick by Brian Friesen
Land Sick by Brian Friesen
