The hotel looks exactly as Phoebe hoped. It sits on the edge of the cliff like
an old and stately dog, patiently waiting for her arrival. She can’t see the
ocean behind it, but she knows it’s there, the same way she could pull into
her driveway and feel her husband in his office typing his manuscript.
Love was an invisible wire, connecting them always.
Phoebe steps out of the cab. A man in burgundy approaches with such
seriousness, the moment feels as if it has been choreographed long ago. It
makes her certain that what she is doing is right.
“Good evening,” the man says. “Welcome to the Cornwall Inn. May I
take your luggage?”
“I don’t have any luggage,” Phoebe says.
When she left St. Louis, it felt important to leave everything behind—
the husband, the house, the luggage. It was time to move on, which she
knew because that was what they had all agreed to last year at the end of the
divorce hearing. Phoebe was so stunned by the finality of their
conversation, by the way her husband said, “Okay, take care now,” like he
was the mailman wishing her well. She could not bring herself to do a
single thing after except climb in bed and drink gin and tonics and listen to
the sound of the refrigerator making ice. Not that there was anywhere to go.
This was mid-lockdown, when she only left the house for gin and toilet
paper and taught her virtual classes in the same black blouse every day
because what else were people supposed to wear? By the time lockdown
was over, she couldn’t remember.
But now Phoebe stands before a nineteenth-century Newport hotel in an
emerald silk dress, the only item in her closet she can honestly say she still
loves, probably because it was the one thing she had never worn. She and
her husband never did anything fancy enough for it. They were professors.
They were easygoing. Relaxed. So comfortable by the fire with the little cat
on their laps. They liked regular things, whatever was on tap, whatever was
on TV, whatever was in the fridge, whatever shirt looked the most normal,
because wasn’t that the point of clothing? To prove that you were normal?
