After the Storm by Robert Earle

The bedroom had survived the storm, barely: sheets thrashed and twisted, lampshade on the night table askew, magazine splayed on the carpet, two glasses filmy with red wine on the bureau, a heavy naked man seated on a chair by the bathroom, his hair wet, a thin naked woman inserting contacts into her green eyes, a towel wrapped like a turban on her head.

She said they had to hurry. He said his head hurt. She brought him an aspirin and placed it in his outstretched palm without looking at him. She stepped into her panties.

“Ouch, I can hardly move because of you. Come on, we’re late.”

He said that he needed coffee. She told him to grab a cup in the lobby on the way out. She buttoned her blouse.

They signed the papers at the title company and drove to their new house set on a treeless ridge along with a dozen similar houses, variations on the craftsman theme, theirs with a red door.

“It’s ours, but it’s like we’re nowhere now,” she said, backing into the empty dining room for a better look at the empty living room. “We’re going to have to live in that hotel for a while until they finish the floor and the painting.”

He held onto the rim of the kitchen sink to steady himself. She came up behind him and slid her arm around him.

“I can almost feel babies filling me up like a balloon. Maybe there’s one already in there after last night.”

He cupped his hands to catch a sip of water from the faucet and then wiped them dry on his face. He looked around. Nothing in the cabinets, nothing in the refrigerator with its door open, nothing on the windowsill or in the backyard. Grass and dandelions. Some Queen Anne’s lace. He looked up at the sky. Cumulus clouds aloft in the blue. A day like the days when he was a kid. Didn’t know what to do with himself then, didn’t know now.

He followed her to look at the empty rooms upstairs where all these babies would grow up.