They allowed Jazmynn and her partner to choose one object to keep for the trouble of having a large hole dug into their empty land. The rest would be stored in a white man’s museum. Jazmynn chose the pipe. Her partner chose a bottle of champagne, but later changed his mind. He took the eyeglasses instead—I want something I won’t waste, he told her.

The steamboat had been stuck in the mud, forty-five feet underground, waiting. Like Jazmynn, waiting.

He was gone. It was the third time Jazmynn had been alone in the house. She took out her braids alone and with her calloused fingertips. Jazmynn’s undone, unraveled hair had waves in it, like water. She put on her red lipstick, her black panties, her black bra, her blue sundress.

Jazmynn took the key from its place on the highest shelf. She unlocked the front door (which had to be unlocked from the inside), because she didn’t want her partner to have to knock. She waited for him to come.

Jazmynn made pasta with capers and tuna and olives. She sat on the kitchen floor with her back curved and in a pool of blue fabric. While she ate, Jazmynn read about steamboats and a river in a small book borrowed from the library.

The front door was opened as she read about the rerouting of the river, its change, its narrowing, why parts of what was once a river were now under homes such as theirs, under uncultivated land such as theirs. It was a slight creak, almost inaudible, but Jazmynn heard it and she knew with certainty that her partner would not be returning.

It was a woman who entered, a small woman, much smaller than Jazmynn. The small woman had brown eyes, the same black hair, only shorter, thicker, curlier, and she wore a large necklace, a vulgar piece. Jazmynn’s hands held the plate of pasta while the small woman explained that Law had sent her to check on things. The small woman said, Law sent me to check on things.

The small woman closed the door behind her and stood there; she seemed anxious. After a few minutes of quiet Jazmynn decided to move, to go to the bedroom and grab the floral tablecloth and the orange sundress. She returned to set the table and serve the small woman a plate of pasta with tuna and olives and capers.

At Jazmynn’s request the small woman undressed; she turned her back to do so. She put on the orange sundress (too long) and the red lipstick (too bright). The small woman ate ravenously.

After a few minutes of quiet, and of forks scraping plates, and of mouths chewing, the two women began to talk. They talked about different things: about what Jazmynn had learned of the steamboat—the metal and barnacles under the earth—and about the items that were found, the shoes and the eyeglasses, the pipes, the champagne.