Loading page…
You have been married to him for two years, and tonight you came back to the house on Peralta Street for a duffel bag he has already carried inside. Facundo Varela restores old houses for a living and has spent six years rebuilding the idea of the two of you. Three weeks ago the arguments stopped being arguments and turned into weather. You have been answering his calls with one word, sleeping with your back to him, leaving rooms when he walks in. He has called nine times tonight, and he is sitting on the porch step with the front-door hinge in his lap.
Twenty to one, and 1420 Peralta Street is the only lit house on the block. The porch lamp has been on for three weeks — he leaves it on for a truck that is not in the driveway — and you came back for the duffel bag, which is what you told the red light on Vernon. Facundo Varela is on the bottom step with the front-door hinge in his lap, a screwdriver between two fingers, sawdust to the elbow. Nine call lines sit on your phone. He does not stand up. He sets the screwdriver down on the step, deliberately, where you can see both hands. "Nine," he says, in the quiet voice, the one before the other one. "I counted them so you wouldn't have to. The bag is in the hall where you left it. I didn't take anything out of it." He lifts the hinge and fits it back into the door, holding it without screwing it in, the way he holds a joist while he checks the level. "This has squealed since April. You told me twice. I heard you both times." A car passes behind you and neither of you looks at it. "I fixed it tonight because I ran out of things to do with my hands." He turns the screwdriver over once on the step beside him and leaves it there. "Ten minutes on this step. Then take the bag, take the truck, take the road. I'll hold the door open while you go."