Page 26 of Beneath the Poet's House

To their left is a dining room, LED candles flickering from the tables’ white linen centers. To the right is a lounge packed tightly with high tops. The bar faces the typical row of stools to its front, but is backed against another high counter that’s open to the kitchen. Beyond the bar, a small stage twinkles with lights. At the sight of the microphone, nerves rush through Saoirse’s midsection. Why did the sign have to call out poetry and prose in addition to music, as if Emmit was right and it was some sort of portent? Better yet, why couldn’t the restaurant not have had an open mic at all?

“We could have stumbled on a hell of a lot worse,” Emmit says.

Saoirse murmurs an agreement just as the hostess acknowledges them. “Two?” she asks from behind a menu-strewn counter.

“Please,” Emmit replies.

“Dining room or lounge?”

“Lounge,” Emmit answers enthusiastically. “We want to be close to the open-mic action, should inspiration strike.”

Saoirse starts to protest, but the hostess has picked up menus and is leading them in that direction, saying, “Of course. Right this way.”

No sooner are they settled at a cozy two-top than a waitress appears to take their drink order. Emmit raises an eyebrow at Saoirse. “Shall we split a bottle of wine?”

Saoirse should be arranging a seven-dollar pumpkin on her front stoop and lamenting her decision not to trek home with an armload of mums. Instead, one of the country’s greatest authors is asking her to split a bottle of wine, a man who’s been making a habit of catering to her every whim, and who seems thrilled at the prospect of simply talking with her, of reading at an open-mic night—what Jonathan used to call the writerly equivalent of foreplay—and really getting to know her.

Is that what he’s thrilled by?the voice of her disillusioned, dream-killing husband asks.Or are you being obtuse? I mean, clearly he’s too good to be true. I should know. On top of that, you’re not a drinker. Not since your diagnosis.

One glass of wine won’t kill me,she thinks, then shakes her head to quiet the voice—not Jonathan’s but her own—that reminds her:it might. To Emmit, she says, “Sure. Maybe a pinot noir?”

Emmit chooses one, hands the waitress the wine list, and takes a sip of water from the glass the bus girl has just filled. “I have to admit,” he says when the waitress has walked away. “My brain is reeling.” He checks his watch. “My flight for Baltimore would have taken off in the last twenty minutes.”

Saoirse nods. “I’m right there with you in the ‘reeling brain’ department.”

From across the table, Emmit stares into her eyes, and Saoirse is transported back to the Athenæum, when his penetrating gaze froze her at the top of the stairs like a rabbit in the headlights of a careening semi. She swallows. “It’s nice, though,” she says.

Are you sure about that?Jonathan asks.

“Really nice,” she adds emphatically, hoping to shut her dead husband up.

The waitress appears with the wine, and Emmit gestures to Saoirse’s glass, where the woman pours several ounces of deep-red liquid. Saoirse lifts the glass to her lips, feeling self-conscious. Jonathan had always been the one who determined what and when they would drink. “It’s great,” she says quickly. The waitress fills their glasses. When they’re alone again, Saoirse wraps her fingers around the stem but doesn’t move to take another sip. Emmit lifts his glass and angles it toward her.

“Cheers to meeting someone where they’re at,” he says. “No preconceived notions of significance or hidden meaning. No baggage or expectations.”

“To meeting someone where they’re at,” Saoirse echoes and takes a long, luxuriant pull from her glass, reveling in the tart warmth as it coats her throat and spreads across her insides. It’s been so long since she’s allowed herself this small indulgence.

When she places the glass back on the table, Emmit is staring again. His lips are wet from the wine, and his dark hair hangs over his forehead on one side. He would look so much like Jonathan it would be frightening if not for the interest, the excitement, in his eyes. For the second half of their ten-year marriage, Jonathan looked at Saoirse the way he would someone whose feelings he considered himself unobligated to consider. A maid, or a therapist. Or maybe some sort of kitchen appliance: a mere object that he used to go about his day.

“Do you know what you’re going to order?” she asks, trying to lighten the mood.

Emmit leans across the table. “Who cares what we’re getting to eat. I want to know what you’re going to read up on that stage.”

“That’s easy,” Saoirse laughs. “I’m not reading anything at all.”

Emmit blinks and shakes his head, the left corner of his mouth lifting in that crooked smile she’s coming to know well.

“What about you?” she asks pointedly. “You’ve been blocked too. Are you telling me you’re going to go up there on a wing and a prayer and freestyle something new?”

Emmit leans forward farther, and she’s treated to another flash of his endearingly crooked smile. She wishes the wine wasn’t drawing attention to his perfectly smooth, perfectly full lips.

“Oh, no,” he says matter-of-factly. “I’ll just read a bit of Edgar Allan Poe.”

Saoirse feels the color drain from her face. She never mentioned anything about Poe or Whitman to Emmit at the coffee shop. Not the house she’s moved into or people’s fascination with it; neither did she tell him about stumbling onto the Ath exhibit. But before she can say as much, the waitress is there, asking what they’d like to eat. Emmit nods for Saoirse to go first, and she mumbles out the name of a pasta dish with a side of broccoli rabe. Emmit orders chicken parmigiana.

When the waitress has left them, Saoirse leans into the table so hard, water sloshes over the lip of her glass. “Okay, what the hell is going on? Why did you say Edgar Allan Poe?”

Emmit scrunches his face, and she sees for the first time that there are dimples in his cheeks. There’s also a small cleft in his chin that deepens when he’s thinking ... or confused, as he appears to be now.

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