A. Homes - Music for Torching

"Is Daddy home? Do you want me to talk to him?"

"Of course he's home. Does he have a life? Does he have anything to do? No, and still he can't take a minute. He can't talk to me." "I'm here, I'm here," her father says, taking the phone. "Twenty-four hours a day she wants to talk. I want one minute to think, and it turns into World War III."

"Be nice," Elaine says. "She's all you've got."

"So she says." He takes a breath. "I hear you have problems with the house."

"We had a fire."

"That's what your mother tells me. Are you insured?"

"Hopefully. They're coming today."

"Make sure you keep your receipts. Get a fireproof box; that way if anything happens, at least you have the receipt."

"Okay, Dad."

"You want your mother back, I can tell. Here she is."

"So," her mother says. "Help me with the sofa. Clearly your father isn't going to."

"I can't," Elaine says. She is determined to say no, to put her foot down. "Everything is falling apart. I have to take care of things. I'm sorry."

"How about tomorrow?" her mother asks.

"We'll see," Elaine says.

"What about your mother? Someone has to take care of your mother."

"Is it too early for a glass of wine?" Mrs. Hansen whispers while Elaine is on the phone.

"I'll call you in the morning," Elaine says, hanging up.

"Too early?" Mrs. Hansen asks again when Elaine hangs up.

"It's perfect, just perfect," Elaine says.

Mrs. Hansen uncorks the bottle.

"Have you eaten breakfast? We have to eat a little something with it," Elaine says, digging crackers out of the grocery bag.

"I don't really like to snack," Mrs. Hansen says. "It ruins the appetite."

Elaine's friend Liz pulls into the driveway, beeping her horn.

"I came the minute I heard." She rushes toward the house as though it's an emergency, as though the fire is still raging, as though she's going be the one who puts it out.

"We just got back, twenty minutes ago," Liz says, scurrying up the steps.

Liz grabs Elaine, hugging her. Elaine braces herself. "How are you?" she asks "Are you all right? Is everyone all right? What happened?"

"We had a fire," Elaine says, pulling back.

She feels so far away from Liz, from herself-she burned down her house, she had sex with someone other than her husband, she is losing her mind, and Mrs. Hansen, who she never really knew before, seems to be playing the role of full-time housekeeper. It's been less than a week, but it's like forever.

"Jennifer heard about it first. When we got home, her friend Mo was there feeding the cats, and the first thing Mo said was that your house caught fire. I ran right over. It wasn't clear whether you'd just caught on fire or what. So what happened?" Liz asks pausing for breath. "And when?"

All week Elaine's been waiting for Liz to come home; in her head she's been telling Liz everything, laying out what led to what, how it all turned to shit. But now that Liz is there, Elaine's need to tell, to confess, to relieve herself of the burden of the awkward events has evaporated. Other things, perhaps even more unbelievable, have happened. A stranger, even more unlikely scenario is unfolding.

The house burned down-worse yet, it didn't even really burn down and was only moderately damaged. Does it matter that Elaine tipped the grill? Which matters more, that Elaine tipped the grill or that she fucked Pat for breakfast? A breeze blows the plastic covering the hole in the dining-room wall. The house fills with a wingish, flapping sound.

"How was your trip?" Elaine asks. Liz and Jennifer have been touring colleges, visiting schools for Jennifer, who is going to be everything Liz and Elaine are not: doctor, lawyer, movie star.

"Wonderful," Liz says. "Jen is amazing. They all want her. Oberlin is lovely, Chicago isn't what I thought it would be. Yale was incredible, and an entire floor of the Barnard dorm is filled with girls with pierced tongues. But Jennifer wants to go somewhere far, far away, maybe Berkeley, which would be fine. We'll see. She could change her mind. Tomorrow she could become a young Republican, who can know?"

I set the house on fire, Elaine imagines herself saying. If it would make sense to anyone, it should make sense to Liz; after all, this is what she went back to school to study-the lives of women in relation to what's around them. She recently wrote thirty pages on "The Male Gaze as (Dis)played in Your Grocer's Dairy Case." Elaine remembers there being something in Liz's paper about the significance of the live-lobster tank in the fish department. She imagines Liz writing a paper on "The Burning House," finding some sociocultural explanation for what happened, revealing the truth of Elaine, not as a person but a phenomenon.

"How are Paul and the boys?" Liz asks.

Elaine pulls herself back into the conversation. "We're a little scattered," she says. "The electricity was off, and there's the smoke, the smell, and the hole."

"Come stay with me," Liz says. "We'll pack up your stuff, and you'll all come to my place until it's fixed. It'll be fun, like a slumber party."

"We've been with Pat and George," Elaine says.

Because Liz was away, because she missed the moment, she's been deposed. Now Pat has Elaine, and Elaine can't tell

Liz, because it's all so crazy. And so even though Liz is supposed to be her best friend-because they once were best friends and the assumption is that the assignment is permanent-and even though Liz is standing in front of her, asking, What can I do? practically begging, Elaine can't say anything. There's something about the new and improved Liz that annoys Elaine. Liz is making a career out of the parts of life that Elaine loathes-she found a way out by going farther in. Elaine doesn't want to celebrate women's lives, she wants to smash her life, to pummel it into a powder. And she can't deal with Liz's pronouncements, her judgment, her need to read something major into every situation.

Mrs. Hansen comes out of the kitchen and hands Elaine a glass of wine watered down with seltzer. She puts a small dish of almonds on the coffee table in the living room. "Can I get you a drink?" she asks Liz.

"We're having wine," Elaine explains.

"Yeah, sure, that'd be great," Liz says, and Mrs. Hansen goes back into the kitchen.

"New cleaning lady?"

"That's Mrs. Hansen from across the street-she's been here since the fire."

Mrs. Hansen delivers a spritzer for Liz and heads back to the kitchen.

"She's shy," Elaine says, sipping her drink.

"I've never seen you drink during the day."

"It's just a glass of wine," Elaine says.

Liz checks her watch-just past one-and takes a sip. "So," she says, "what're you going to do? You need a goal, a project."

"What's this?" Elaine asks, gesturing around the house.

"Repair work," Liz says.

There's a pause, a silence. In the kitchen something drops. "Sorry," Mrs. Hansen calls.

"It's fine," Elaine calls back. "It's fine," she says, and remembers the kiss-the satiny feel of Pat's lips, Pat's hands sliding over her skin-it's fine. Fine as long as it's only this. It's fine-if it's just one time. Fine.

"Let's get out of here," Liz says. "I'm taking you shopping. I start a summer internship next week, and I need a few things." That's another thing about the new Liz that Elaine could never have been: a convert. Liz has abandoned the cult of the home for the cult of the classroom and become an academic fanatic.

Elaine pulls the pile of Post-its from her pocket and thinks of her khakis bunched up on the floor, under Pat's kitchen table. Pick paint, repair or renovate. Contractor. Do you want a deck? French doors? Roofer-ask Pat. Make dinner plans. The car is for you-keys on the dresser. Insurance company will come. Measure.

"Paul asked me to take care of a few things. I should stay here and deal with them," Elaine says.