“I guess she forgot.” Jon’s tone was neutral and the gaze he fixed on his father was without guile.

Lionel flashed an irritated look at her and then said, “Call the plumber. Mona has the number in her Rolodex. Tell him we need an eighty-gallon water heater and the charge comes to me. The two of you can work out a time for the installation, but make it soon.”

“Thanks.”

The minute the limo turned out of the driveway, Jon felt relief wash over him. It was like getting out of prison. He loved having the big house to himself, though he spent most of his time in his rooms above the garage. The big house was pure Mona—her taste, her style, expensive and overdone. He went through all her drawers but didn’t learn much, except she used K-Y jelly.

Lionel had left him sufficient money to cover meals and gas for his motor scooter while the family was gone. In March, Jon had totaled the used car his dad had given him, and Mona was adamant about not replacing it. Fine with him. He went back to tootling around on the Vespa his dad had bought for him his freshman year. As the end of school approached, Jon asked if he could use his father’s old Olivetti typewriter for summer school, but Mona said she needed it for one of the girls. Jon had to suppress a smile. When it came to sheer predictability, the Amazing Mona was a champ.

He cruised garage sales that weekend until he came across a Smith-Corona portable electric typewriter with a manual carriage return. He paid fifteen bucks for that and then stopped at the hardware store and bought four gallons of paint. For the two years he’d been living in his aerie above the garage, he’d been content to leave it in its original bare and shabby state. Now he saw it differently. Three dormer windows looked out on the ocean and the sharply slanting eaves made the rooms feel garretlike, perfect for a writer in residence.

He painted the walls a dark charcoal gray, close to black, in part to annoy Mona, but more nearly because it soothed and quieted the chatter in his head. He went through the main house, scavenging items from linen closets and storage areas. For bedding, he’d been using a sleeping bag, flung on top of the bare mattress, but now he made up his bed with a set of Mona’s expensive cotton sheets and two quilted coverlets his mother had made. From the attic he brought down a secondhand chest of drawers and a hat rack, and he mounted a series of wooden pegs on the wall for hanging his clothes. He scrubbed his small bathroom until it was immaculate.