Free In the Lake of the Woods by Tim O’Brien Page A

invisible, no wires or strings, just that large dark world where one plus one will always come to zero.
    All night he'd lie watching her.
    "Kath, sweet Kath," he'd murmur, as if summoning her spirit, feeling the rise and fall of her breath against his hand.

11. What He Did Next
    John Wade slept late the next morning, a jumpy electric sleep. It was almost noon by the time he'd showered and moved out to the kitchen. Still groggy, he brewed up a pot of coffee, scrambled three eggs, and carried his breakfast out to the porch. Another brilliant day: ivory clouds pinned to a glossy blue sky. He sat on the steps and ate his eggs. Little dream filaments kept unwinding in his head—hissing noises, a flapping sound.
    At one point he glanced behind him, startled. "Hey, Kath," he said.
    He listened.
    Then he yelled, "Kath!"
    Then he waited and yelled, "Kath, come
here
a minute!"
    Â 
    Inside, he rinsed the dishes and poured himself another cup of coffee. A half hour, he thought, and she'd show up. A nature hike or something. Most mornings she liked to head up along the shoreline or follow one of the trails out toward the fire tower. Another half hour. An hour, tops.
    Right now, he decided, it was time for some major house
cleaning. An unpleasant odor filled the air, a vegetable stink, and for starters he would do away with last night's debris. Tidy up the cottage, then go to work on his life. Wade compressed the idea into a firm resolution. Get up early from now on. Jog a few miles before breakfast, whittle off the campaign flab. Then sort through the larger mess. See if he could figure out a future for himself. Later in the day he'd sit down with Kathy and try to hammer out a few decisions; the first priority was their checkbook, a job of some sort. Make a few phone calls and see what pity could buy.
    Shape up, he thought. Start now.
    Moving briskly, Wade dug out a plastic garbage bag, marched into the living room, and collected the dead house-plants. He carried the bag outside and dumped it in one of the trash cans at the rear of the cottage. No doubt Kathy had discovered the wreckage that morning, or at least smelled it, and at some point soon he would have to come up with a fancy piece of defense work. Extenuating circumstances, he'd say. Which was the truth. A miserable night, nothing else, so he'd apologize and then prove to her that he was back in control. A solid citizen. Upright and virtuous.
    The thought gave him energy.
    He did a load of laundry, ran a mop across the kitchen floor. Already he felt better. A matter of willpower. For more than an hour he made his way through a stack of correspondence, setting aside a few items and junking the rest. Tidiness was paramount. He went through the bank statements, knocked off twenty sit-ups, put in another load of laundry, spent a few minutes wandering without aim from room to room. The place seemed curiously vacant. In the bedroom Kathy's slippers were aligned at the foot of the bed; her blue
robe hung from its hook near the door. There was a faint scent of ammonia in the air. Quietly, afraid to disturb things, he moved down the hallway to the bathroom, where Kathy's toothbrush stood bristles-up in an old jelly jar. The water faucet was dripping. He turned it off. He listened for a moment, then returned to the kitchen.
    It was a little after one-thirty. The fringes of the afternoon had already crossed into shadow.
    Wade fixed himself a vodka tonic and carried it over to the kitchen window. Vaguely, without alarm, he wondered what was keeping her. Maybe payback. The plant thing would've turned her upside down, especially in light of other revelations, and no doubt she was now sending a message. Domestic screws: the contemplation of error and misdeed.
    The thing to do, he reasoned, was maintain his resolve. Start by compiling a few lists. A self-improvement list, then a list of assets and debits, then a list of law firms in need of cheap labor. He poured another drink and sat