She prayed the way his grandmother did: on her knees beside the bed, hands clasped, muttering to herself. Henry looked away. She wore a nightgown and her breasts were loose inside of it, but after her praying, a pious aura surrounded her that stunted his arousal. She kissed him and said, “Is it all right if we just go to sleep now?” The look of pity on her face was annoying.

“Yes,” he said. “That’s all I want to do too.”

In the dark he clasped his hands over his chest and prayed silently. He thanked God for the day. He prayed for their happiness and future. He prayed that he would be a good husband. Then he lay rigid on his side of the bed, listening to the wind and the waves through the open windows—feeling gassy, worrying he’d pass it in the night, wishing he could be alone for a little while.

The next day was better. It was raining, but they were starving and there was no food in the house, so they had to go outside. They were soaked by the time they found the grocer’s in town.

There was life here, as it turned out. Weathered men in pea coats—fishermen, maybe. A group of Coast Guard cadets, from the training station north of town. A few men and women running errands under umbrellas. They passed a grammar school, and at least one of the windows was lighted, though they didn’t see any children anywhere. In the central part of town, several blocks inland, a candy shop was open, a dry goods store, the grocer’s on Washington Street, and beside it a hardware store and a liquor store. The old clerk at the grocer’s seemed as happy to see them as they were to see him, and Effie called out orders as if she were preparing for a banquet: a pork loin, a pound of haddock, a loaf of bread, a pound of butter, sliced ham and cheese, potatoes, eggs, peach preserves, plums, apples, strawberries—she would fill the kitchen with abundance. On the way back to the cottage the rain became a downpour and they started running, each of them hugging a bag of groceries, the paper turning soft and dark in their arms. They arrived winded, doubling over with laughter. They put the groceries away and then, up in the attic room, peeled their wet clothes off and made love, memories be damned, over a beach towel spread under them on the bed.

Afterward she lay naked against him—so casual, like it was nothing already. “I’m sorry I was so gloomy yesterday,” she said.

“You weren’t, Eff,” he said. His penis lay tipped against her thigh. He liked how it looked there. “You were tired. We’re settled in now.”