She chuckles softly. “I can’t help myself, can I?”
On the far side of the tank, the grimy rim is just out of reach. She shifts her weight, stretching her arm, then suddenly the stool starts to wobble beneath her feet. In a flash, the octopus’s tentacles slip through her fingertips. She lands in a painful crumple on the hard tile.
“Goodness gracious!” she mutters, taking mental inventory of her various parts. Her left ankle feels tender, but when she stands, it bears weight. She plucks up her rag from where it landed beneath the tank. The octopus peers from behind his rock, where he must’ve retreated with all of the clatter. “I’m fine,” she says with a relieved sigh. Everything intact.
Except for the step stool.
It lies on its side, jammed against a pile of clutter next to the tank pump. It must’ve shot out from underneath her when she moved. Now its upper rung dangles, one end detached. “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she grumbles, limping across the room to retrieve it. She tries to jam the rung back into place, but it’s missing some doohickey. She scans the tile for a screwlike object, squinting in the pale blue light, then retrieves her glasses from her apron pocket and looks again. Nothing.
She tries again, more urgently this time, to fit the rung back on, but it’s no use. How will she explain this to Terry? She is not supposed to be climbing on stools, and certainly not pump room stools. For a fleeting moment she considers disposing of the evidence. Pitching the broken stool into the dumpster along with the night’s trash. Or better yet, removing it from the scene of the crime altogether. Taking it home with her and setting it out on her curb on trash day. But what if Terry were to drive by her house and see it there? Her heart hammers at the thought.
“No, I can’t do that,” she says firmly. And she can’t. Tova Sullivan is no liar. She’ll have to tell him.
Perhaps Terry will relieve her of her duties. At her age, he’ll conclude, the risk is too great. She won’t blame him.
Something sloshes behind her, and when she turns, the octopus is already partway out of his tank.
Tova freezes, rapt. “Terry was right,” she whispers, watching the creature flatten one of his thick arms and, in a way that seems to defy the laws of physics, squeeze it through the narrow gap between pump and the lid. It should be impossible. The gap can’t be wider than a couple inches. When he somehow morphs his enormous mantle, easily as large as a late-August watermelon, into seemingly liquid goo and works that through as well, Tova realizes she’s actually holding her breath in anticipation.
She exhales as he slides down the wall, then slinks across the tile and slips under one of the cabinets against the wall, vanishing completely. When he doesn’t promptly reappear, Tova wonders whether he intends to return. Perhaps he’s escaping for good. She swallows, surprised at the sting she feels at the thought. Like he ought to have at least said goodbye.
“Oh, there you are,” she says as he emerges from under the cabinet a moment later. Looking her directly in the eye, he slides over and, with one of his curled arms, deposits a small silver object at the toe of her sneaker.
Tova gapes. A screw. The missing doohickey.
“Thank you,” she says, but by then he’s already slipping back into his tank.
THE NEXT MORNING, when Tova wakes and steps into her slippers, she crumples to the ground again.
“What on earth?” She blinks. Her left ankle. Only when she sees the blush of purple spread over her foot does she realize it’s throbbing painfully.
On her second attempt to stand, she’s ready. Wincing, she shuffles down the hallway to the kitchen and puts on coffee.
She lasts until lunchtime before even considering a phone call to Dr. Remy.
By late afternoon, she’s convinced herself to retrieve the booklet of phone numbers she keeps stashed in the console in the den. She sits in Will’s old spot on the davenport, her leg propped on the coffee table with a sack of frozen peas balanced on her ankle, and flips through the pages. Then she sets the book down next to her on the cushion and turns on the television.
It’s nearly five when she finally places the call. Dr. Remy’s office closes at five.
“Snohomish Medical Associates.” The voice is tinged with annoyance. Tova pictures Gretchen, the receptionist, leaning over the desk, phone receiver cradled under her ear as she juggles the jacket and pocketbook she’s already gathered. Perhaps she ought not to have called. But her ankle has swollen to the size and color of a plum, and as much as she dislikes admitting it, she might need medical attention. She gives her name and date of birth, and briefly explains her predicament, omitting the part about the incident having occurred at work. And she definitely doesn’t mention it happened while talking to a giant Pacific octopus. She simply says she fell from a stool while cleaning, which is technically true.