The kitchen was cleaner now than it had been during the sitting. The counter was almost bare, except for a few slices of store-bought bread in a plastic bag and some shriveled apples piled in glass bowl. The only thing in the sink was Jacob’s denture glass.
"So, are you going to sell the place?" Roby asked the widow.
She had tucked a pinch of cinnamon-brown snuff behind her lower lip and worked it into place before answering. "I reckon not. When you stick your loved ones in the ground, you owe them. We talked it over. The kids will probably sell it off after I’m gone, but that’s their worry. Me, I’m going to leave this world and join Jacob with a peaceful heart."
"Amen to that," Roby said.
Marlene came into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. She stooped from the waist, rummaging on the bottom rack. Roby glanced at the curves of her rear. A door to sin, that’s what it was.
She closed the refrigerator and turned, holding a jar of bread-and-butter pickles. "Say, you know what would go good with this?"
"What?" Roby asked.
"Some of that meat you brought over the other night."
The widow squinted at him. "What meat? We done took that ham down to the bone."
"Oh, Roby knows what I’m talking about."
"You carry your bones with you," Roby said. "When you cross over. You carry your soured eggs and stale bread crumbs and molded cheese."
The widow took a step back, her eyes widening. "What in the world’s wrong with you?"
"Peggy Clemens knows. Whole hog. Waste no part of the animal."
"Alfred!" the widow yelled, her voice brittle off the kitchen enamel.
"And Beverly Parsons. She’s in on it. Barnaby, too."
Marlene held out the pickle jar as if it were a charm to ward off evil spirits. "You done gone crazy."
Alfred ran into the kitchen, with Buck and Harold right behind him.
Roby felt the sweat oozing out of the pores of his face like maggots from the holes of an electrified corpse. "Who’s going to make your pies?" he said. "When you die, who’s going to eat you?"
"Lord have mercy, better call the sheriff," Harold said. Alfred and Buck closed in on Roby from opposite sides of the counter.
This happened every single time. Roby was wracked by a wave of nausea and nearly collapsed. He grabbed for the edge of the counter and held himself up with effort. The room spun in the corners of his vision, the edges of the world dissolving like sugar in warm water. He felt hands gripping his arms, and he thought of Johnny Divine and the suitcase. Who would carry the suitcase after Roby was gone?
If Roby ever got to go, that was.
He pushed the hands away and straightened, trembling. "Sorry, folks. I just got a little carried away, is all. Been a mighty stressful time for all of us."
The widow studied him as if he were a bug on glass. "Anna Beth?"
The youngest daughter was standing behind her. "Yeah, Momma? Still want Sarah to call the law?"
The widow peered at Roby. "You been drinking?"
Roby fought off the small lightning bolts that streaked across the gray inside his skull. "Yeah. I apologize. First Jacob died, and then Glenn Isenhour. You know him, don’t you?"
"Distant cousin," the widow said.
"Well, he was my second cousin. All this dying going on at the same time, I guess I just let it get to me. But I’m fine now."
"You sure?" Buck said. "You look like you swallowed a live lizard."
"Yeah. I’ll just get a drink of water and I’ll be good as new."
He forced himself not to tremble as he walked to the sink. He filled the denture glass from the tap and took four big gulps.
"You better go lay down for a while," the widow said. "You’re a bit green around the edges."
"I can make it home," he said.
"Let me drive you," Alfred said.
"No. I done put you folks to enough trouble already."
"You sure?"
"Yeah. I feel a lot better now. Just needed to get something on my stomach."
"Well, you be careful driving home," the widow said. "That’s all we need, is to have to bury another one."
"I will. And I’m sorry for your loss."
"I guess we all lost something," Marlene said. "It’s like all this food everybody brought over. You eat and eat and eat, and you’re still empty inside."
Roby nodded, not sure what to say. He went outside and sat behind the wheel of his truck for several minutes before driving home.