Eight o'clock

All he said was that he would be home before eight. At six, that seemed reasonable. Six gave her two hours to set the table, make dinner " pasta perhaps " and have time for a shower before he came back. That would be nice; she might even be able to take a quick bath and do up her hair. Nicky said he liked it best down, but with that dress he had bought her last Sunday, it would look splendid.

 

“Alice,” he had called from the aisle over. “Come here! Now look " wouldn’t that be pretty?” She said it was too much, but for Nicky, that never seemed relevant.

 

At seven, the table was set, the pasta made and she had her bath. Setting for two was much quicker than it had been for her family of seven before college and Nicky. She had also hated cooking before Nicky, but if he didn’t mind reheated meatloaf most nights, neither did she.

 

Really, she mused, the only point we can ever argue on is the garage. Not even his mother’s visits are more debated. He wanted his car in so it would stay cool for him out of the sun. She said if he wanted it to be cool, he ought to just get the old lemon fixed. The drain also needed attention she noticed as the water slipped from the tub prematurely and she forced herself to dry off.

 

The dress really was becoming, and she considered for the briefest moment keeping it down . . . No, up it went and she decided up it would go again for Helen’s garden party on the twenty second. Looked like Grace Kelly, she did.

 

At eight, Nicky’s car didn’t pull into the garage. She looked at the phone suspiciously, thinking she must have missed his call. Strange, since it was so loud other times that it scared her half to death when Nicky was at work and she was alone in the echoing house.

 

“Don’t be paranoid, Alice”, Nicky said in her head.

 

At nine, there was nothing either. How she hated that dratted phone. And he oughtn’t to have said eight if he would be later at work. After she had gone to the fuss of making pasta and dressing up, it was inconsiderate. Was there time to make vinaigrette for the salad . . . but, no that would be past her degree of culinary expertise and there really was no knowing of the time left when Nicky was late.

 

Eight minutes after ten, the phone rang, waking her rudely. It was Chief Newton, Nicky’s boss. There had been an incident, he said at one of the houses. The tallest ladder that the fire station owned had been left behind somehow. That left no way for Nicky to leave the twenty eighth floor of the building. He was sorry. And that was all he said.