Her parents were at the front door when she got home. Melanie felt a sudden urge to go, possibly owing to all the beans.

“I need the bathroom.”

“I knew you wouldn’t use theirs,” said her mother as Melanie edged by. She didn’t understand the comment, and apparently neither did her dad. He looked a question at his wife.

“Their house is filthy.”

Melanie hadn’t noticed.

In bed a short while later and too stimulated to sleep, Melanie considered the Swansons. They’d only been in the neighborhood about a year, but they moved in with a splash and had never ceased being conspicuous. They were sparkly people, to Melanie’s eyes. Each was good looking and dressed well, and moved with a sharp edge, crisp and like a coloring book picture that has been outlined in dark crayon. They seemed to be always smiling or laughing. They had an awesome dog. Melanie wished she could have a dog or a cat, but her mother said animals are filthy and wouldn’t have one in the house. Her dad’s tropical fish aquarium was not the same thing.

Melanie didn’t like to be dirty herself, so she wasn’t longing for an unclean house. In fact, one of the conditions contributing to her wakefulness at that moment was the stickiness at the back of her knees when she bent her legs. She normally took a bath every night and got into her bed warm and clean, but the party had used up her bathtime that night. Still, she couldn’t see the Swanson house as sufficiently dirty to avoid it.

As it happened, she didn’t get the opportunity to decide. By the end of January the Swansons had sold their house and moved away. Their residence on the block lasted thirteen months. They had reason to move.

Christmas and Hanukah coincided that year. The festival of lights ran from the evening of Tuesday December 17th to Christmas day. It was a sociable week for the whole neighborhood. Everyone’s mood seemed good.

When Melanie came home from school the Friday after Christmas break, she headed straight to the kitchen for a snack. Her brother was already home – he only went half days – playing with his new Tonka truck in the living room. Melanie’s mother was at the sink, rings on the windowsill dish and hands in the soapy water. She knew Melanie had entered the room but she didn’t turn around. She kept washing dishes as she told Melanie that Dabney’s mother had killed herself. Then she turned off the water, wiped her hands on a towel, and lit a cigarette.

Melanie understood suicide. Her father had her sit with him and watch a television broadcast of “Madame Butterfly” two years earlier, and Melanie had accepted the idea of a person deciding to end her life. What she hadn’t understood was why a writer would choose to end a story with such a sad irrecoverable act, but that question had nothing to do with Dabney’s mother, or father, or Dabney.

Melanie felt solemn. And sorry. Of course she asked why, but her mother couldn’t answer. A week later, she noticed the For Sale sign stuck in the lawn in front of the Swanson house, and then she witnessed occasional traffic in and out. Within a month a big van pulled up and moved the furniture away. Melanie never saw Dabney or her father or Sheba leave. The next day when she woke up, their car was gone.