When the Window Man arrives—pulling up too fast to the curb—I am at the outdoor grill, turning some seasoned chicken. From the boom box on the table, Van sings of a garden all misty wet with rain, but that is his vision, and this is mine. Beyond the fire pit are trees and a quiet lake. The sun shifts as evening settles.
He makes his way up the sidewalk, carrying two heavy cases. Deposits them gratefully on the patio, extends his hand. Then sizes me up: me in my jeans and flip flops, my hairclip, my unadorned finger, my older woman’ness.
Sit down, I say. And he does.
The cases are unzipped and there are window samples in clad and wood: low-E4 high performance glass and brushed nickel hardware. A familiar story—experienced in a previous life, in that Dutch Colonial on the hill… But tonight I am alone on a concrete patio in a tired cottage by the lake. Sipping at my wine, I ask him what he has for me, and there is the flurry of papers and brochures. I marvel at this, at people who sell things for a living--and this young man has his windows. He is earnest, naïve. Has plans, I can tell.
And then there is Karen, cutting her Top 40 music along with the engine. She parks on the street, makes her way up the walk.
And who is this nice boy? she says, smiling.
Karen is forfeiting a child-free Friday night to my patio by the lake. This woman who will chuck her suburban house into the weeds after the kids are gone, and move back into the city. She is freshly manicured, her patterned blouse catching the light of a disappearing sun.
He smiles back at her, at Karen’s marine-blue eyes. But there are windows to be sold and so he rifles through the brochures, reaches for those heavy cases.
As he talks, I pour Karen a glass of the same cheap Chardonnay that I am drinking—and when he gets around to telling me the price of the windows, I pour him one, too. There will be no sale tonight.
After the second glass of wine, he tells us about the girl, about her 5-year plan. Karen and I recoil, but only a little--because he describes our own lost lives. Lives that landed Karen and me across from each other at a low wooden table that day at Pre-K. We rolled our eyes at the mothers collected around those tables: so serious about things, so empty of humor. Of course we were older—living carefree partnered lives, traveling, working, spending the whole of Sunday on the couch with the Times, before the kids came.
Our glasses flush gold again, and we tell him our own muddy stories. Different means to the same end: two older women alone. And it is clear to me tonight that Karen enjoys this phase much more than I do. She talks of life in the city, of the men she is dating. As she speaks I take in the petunias, the pretty pink impatiens potted around this patio, the macaroni salad made earlier in the day. The new life I’m building in a cottage by the lake. There are gardening books stacked on the coffee table inside.
You both seem so happy, he says, tugging at the yoke of the 5-year plan. It's clear he sees two women with their faces to the sun, arms open to life. When I doubt we are that. When I know that I am not.
Karen tells him to run...
But he stays. With us. And the suggestion is made to head down to the Inn at the bottom of the hill where a hand-written sign promises "Live Music Tonight." We wait while he loads his window cases into the car.
And tonight, as he leans into the pool table and moves unencumbered limbs to the rhythm of the band, he believes that he will run. Knows that he will. He will drive along the open road--alone--following the beat of the music that thumps from his car speakers. Yet he envisions only the journey, cannot see through the lens of youth and cheap Chardonnay that it will be the same once he gets there.
Of course the truth is that he will not go, that he will not run. Instead, he will wake up tomorrow, put on his tie, drag out those window cases again. And he will send sweet texts to the girl as he drives...
***
