Flight Behavior

Tina laughed again, the same two-note ripple, and glanced over at the man, sending him some kind of signal. Ron pulled his head to the side in obvious irritation. He had not yet said a word, and now walked away toward their vehicle. Tina waited until he got in the Jeep before she spoke again in a lowered voice.

“Ron’s a little intense,” she confided. “He’ll go ballistic if we don’t meet our deadline on this assignment. He’s already talked to the neighbors down the road about getting the story from them, but I just can’t see going that way. I’m in a bind.”

“I’m sorry,” Dellarobia said. After only three minutes in the acquaintance of Tina Ultner, it seemed very important not to let her down.

Tina glanced around, appearing to size up the options. “I’ll tell you what. Go and do what you need to do with the kids, I’ll do damage control out here. But do you think in maybe, about, fifteen minutes we could put the kids in the Jeep and just scoot up there to where the things are, the butterflies, and do the shot? We’ll keep everything tight, and the kids won’t have to be out of your sight for a single minute. Maybe bring something to keep them occupied in the car?”

Dellarobia studied the Jeep. Ron was in the driver’s seat, making a phone call. You go for things, Dovey had said.

“Could we get a car seat in that thing? Does it have belts in the back?”

“Absolutely,” Tina said.

Dellarobia charged back into the house, feeling jinxed after what she’d said about their drinking the Clorox. And that crack about selling her children—what must Tina Ultner think of her? The kids were fully intact in the kitchen, praise heaven, eating their sandwiches. Dellarobia flew into action, throwing the sofa cushions back together and doing a quick pickup of the living room in case Tina had to come in later to use the bathroom. She stuffed Preston’s beloved watch and Cordie’s animal-farm toy into the diaper bag, and made quick work of her lipstick and eyeliner. The day was sunny and too warm for a coat, which was good luck, her farm jacket or dorky ten-year-old church coat being the choices. She put on a cream-colored ribbed cardigan the kids had given her for Christmas. Meaning it was picked out by her at Target, wrapped by Cub. And never yet worn, also good luck, so she wouldn’t look down and see a big stain somewhere on her front side, as per usual when she went out in public. Jewelry or not, she couldn’t decide, so opted for small fake-pearl earrings that seemed classy. Her hair still had some curl left over from yesterday’s nonsense with Dovey, so she pulled it back loosely with a baby-blue ribbon, and that was that. Before the kids knew what hit them, they were wedged with their mother into the backseat of the News Nine–mobile, bouncing toward the High Road. Dellarobia didn’t find any seat belts, but there was no room for the car seat anyway, she just held Cordie in her lap. They wouldn’t be getting up much speed. No actual car had tried out that road yet, save for Cub’s pickup with the gravel. But that was the point of all Bear’s work, as she understood it. Access to the goods. She leaned forward to direct Ron up through the field toward the gate.

“Preston and Cordelia, I am so glad to meet you both,” Tina said, turning completely around in the passenger seat. “What great names!”

“Preston was my dad’s name,” Dellarobia offered.

“And Cordelia is from King Lear. Of course!” Tina reached over the back of the seat to extend her hand to each of the kids. Preston gave the slim fingers a shake, but Cordie just stared, probably mesmerized as Dellarobia was by the manicure. Once again she wondered about Tina’s children. Where were they now, while their mother was gallivanting around? She had no idea where these folks had driven from with all their gear. Knoxville? They didn’t sound like it. Tina had turned back to Ron and was speaking in a totally different voice, more businesslike.

King Lear, of course! Dellarobia couldn’t vouch for having known that, she just liked the sound of Cordelia. Maybe, like her own mother, she had gleaned the name and forgotten the source. She heard Tina ask Ron in a low voice, “Do you think the white will go okay on camera?”

Dellarobia put a hand to her chest, realizing Tina had been scrutinizing her sweater during the introductions. “Should I have worn something else?” she asked.

“No, it’s great. Beautiful. Sometimes white goes a little dancey on the camera, is the thing. White, and stripes.”

“Actually it’s ivory,” Dellarobia said. The color of her wedding dress, worn for an audience that was very clear on the difference between off- and white. Maybe Tina wasn’t. Dellarobia could have spent all day studying the construction of her coffee-colored trench coat, which had neat parallel lines of white topstitching on the placket and belt and cuffs. Probably designer.

“So, the neighbors,” Tina said, again turning backward in the seat to use her let’s-be-friends voice. “What’s up over there? They don’t seem to be on great terms with your family.”

Dellarobia was embarrassed about her relationship with her neighbors, or lack thereof. Tina probably knew more about the Cooks now than she did. “Really the bad blood is between them and my in-laws, I’ve got nothing against them. They’ve had a run of terrible times. Their little boy came down with cancer, and it got them kind of born-again about using chemicals, so they’re into the organic thing. They lost their whole tomato crop. And they put in that peach orchard, which is dying. My father-in-law says when it rains so much you have to spray those kinds of things, or they’ll just rot.”

“So your father-in-law is not keen on the organic thing.” Tina had her left elbow cocked on the back of the seat, her other hand in her lap. Earlier, when they’d gotten in, Dellarobia saw she had a small tape recorder. She wondered if it was running.

“Well, that’s kind of typical with farming, people are slow to take up new things. You know, they have to be. When you could lose everything in a season, it’s not smart to gamble. I think my in-laws resent the healthy-and-organic business because it makes it sound like what we’re doing must be unhealthy and unorganic.”

“And your in-laws’ view of what’s happening up here, with the butterflies. Can you talk about that?”

“I don’t know. I mean, their view is their view. You should probably ask them.”

Dellarobia was distracted by the renovated road, which she hadn’t seen yet. She knew Cub and his father had squared away a lot of downed trees and flood damage, but it was the thick layer of new, whitish gravel that altered everything. They’d turned this little wilderness track into a road, with clean, defined edges against the muddy surroundings. Just a country road like any other, inviting no special expectations, its wildness tamed. Against her will, she thought of Jimmy. And of the person she must have been that day, full of desire, full of herself. Now paved over.