Housekeeping

“The force behind the movement of time,” Ruth writes, “is a mourning that will not be comforted.” Citing the Bible, she states that the “first event” was an expulsion, and the last is “hoped” to be a return. She describes the rending of numerous biblical families—the families of Cain and Abel, Job, and Rachel. Families, Ruth says, “will not be broken” even in the face of “a thousand sorrows,” and points out that when God came to Earth in the form of Jesus, He spent his time mending broken families and easing sorrows of those he loved. Those who have lost, Ruth says, are always waiting for those “whose lack [they] always feel” to “step through the door finally” and resume their lives as usual.

Ruth knows that Sylvie does not want to lose her; she does not want to have to face the immense loss of someone she loved. Ruth believes that the measure of the intimacy between her and Sylvie is that they gave one another “almost no thought [...] at all.” Ruth realizes that if her own mother had not committed suicide, and had come back from the lake to resume a normal day with her daughters and Sylvia, Ruth would not remember her mother as poignantly or starkly as she does. As the girls grew older they might have forgotten their mother’s birthday or grown “irked and embarrassed” by her. In other words, their relationship would have grown ordinary and unremarkable.

Even as Sylvie grows nervous that her hearing, set to take place in a week’s time, will not turn out well, she “persist[s] in her housekeeping,” brightening up her mother Sylvia’s house by polishing the windows and straightening up. One afternoon, she and Ruth start a fire and burn old boxes, papers, and other hoarded things. Sylvie seems delighted by the fire, and keeps adding more and more pamphlets and soapboxes and magazines to the blaze. Ruth delights in Sylvie’s “zeal and animation” as Sylvie outlines her plans to buy Ruth a nice suit, take her to get her hair permed, and begin bringing her to church each Sunday.

Ruth says she wants to go inside, and Sylvie agrees it’s time to put the fire out. She shovels dirt onto the blaze, and then, in the total darkness, Ruth runs into the orchard and hides. Sylvie whispers loudly and reprovingly after her, but Ruth stays hidden—she knows that with the impending trial, Sylvie cannot very well go calling her name throughout the yard. Sylvie retreats into the house after urging Ruth, quietly, to come inside where it’s warm. Ruth looks at the lighted house and struggles to imagine going inside. She sees herself as a character in a fairy tale or in the Bible, and worries that walking into the house will change her forever in ways she can’t anticipate.

Ruth is startled from her game when she sees the sheriff walk up the porch and knock on the door. She overhears him talking to Sylvie—he has noticed that all the lights are on, an oddity for Sylvie, and asks to know if Ruth is home and all right. Sylvie says she’s upstairs sleeping, but when the suspicious sheriff demands to go see her, Sylvie admits that Ruth is hiding in the orchard. Ruth comes out at last, ashamed. The sheriff asks if Ruth would like to come spend the night at his house, but Ruth insists she wants to stay with Sylvie. The sheriff tries to coax Ruth into coming with him, but she remains adamant about staying, and the sheriff leaves—warning that he will come back tomorrow to talk with both of them.