Other People's Families

Apparently vacation means never having to cook. Evenings they drive to one of the nearby restaurants, swell up with salt and eat the leftovers for lunch, until everyone is so sick of it that finally Shira says, "I'll make something tonight." How grateful they are, except she can tell her mother-in-law Claudia is hiding disappointment that she doesn't cook something Traditional. Claudia is all about traditional. To her mind, the only thing better than traditional is Authentic.

Helping herself to another taco, Claudia says an Indian restaurant just opened in Duncan. "We'll have to take the ferry over one night," she says. "Shira can tell us if it's the real deal!"

To which Gabe, knowing Shira's buttons, grips her shoulder and says, "Why don't we let our chef go relax in the living room while we do the dishes."

You want traditional? My family had a Sunday-night tradition of eating Kraft dinner with ketchup (and, I admit, a sprinkle of garam masala) while my father blasted his favorite Harry Belafonte and my mother scoured the Reader's Digest for knitting patterns. Is that traditional enough for you? (Is what she wants to say.)

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Apparently marriage means vacationing with in-laws. When Gabe first brought it up, she assumed it was optional, as it had been before they were married, but then she saw his face when she casually declared she would stay home and catch up on her reading. She teaches fourth grade, which means she has a summer. People think that means her time is theirs.

They are spending June in a rented cottage on Salt Spring Island, off the coast of British Columbia. The family has been coming here since Gabe was twelve. Steps from the back deck lead down to the ocean. The air smells of jasmine and pine. There are so many deer that the islanders consider them pests.

They are not at their best. Claudia goes around solicitous and eager to please and shooting herself repeatedly in her Birkenstocked foot, while Mark offers smug financial advice to everyone they meet and alienates waiters with excruciating attempts at working class jocundity. Gabe tries hard, but slips into the entitlements of an only child without even realizing it. At restaurants he orders cocktails just because his parents are paying. He doesn't even like to drink!

One night Claudia makes chili; everyone is taking turns now cooking, the restaurants abandoned and scorned. (Never, says Claudia, trust a place that says Chinese and Canadian cuisine. They'll put celery in everything.) She has forgotten to buy cheese for the chili, which makes Mark muss up her hair and say, "Classic Claudia." He is always saying that: Classic Claudia. For their benefit he says, "Claudia here has been known to steam artichokes without water in the pan. Claudia has been known to cook up beans and rice without the rice. My beautiful space cadet," he says, nudging her in the side and looking at them, demanding complicity. Shira hates him for it. Gabe laughs easily, like he too is thinking, Classic Claudia. "It's just cheese," says Shira, but no one will meet her eye.

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She wakes early here and takes her coffee to the porch, grateful for that brief time before anyone else is up. She has lost all desire to read. Instead she watches the ocean and lets her mind go.

It goes, without fail, to Caleb. It is the thought of him that wakes her every morning, or really the feel of him, a writhing at the base of her. He is actually rendering her incapable, not just of reading but of general attention. She'll be listening to Claudia prattle on about chia seeds only to realize her mind has strayed. Worse, she'll be listening to Gabe. Over and over she luxuriates in the same memories, dipping into them for the reliable jolt of pleasure. She is scared that in this way she will wear them out, as one does repeating a word until it's senseless.

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The family develops...