Excerpt from Heart-Side Up

Zeke is adamantly opposed. Reckless, he says: Impulsive. Perhaps even dangerous.

— You're the one who suggested it, Zoe counters, half-flirtatious, mysteriously come back to life.

— I suggested you call Dave, he retorts: Because it seemed to me you hadn't let go of him.

— Dayton, she corrects, calm and sweet: And you were right. I hadn't let go of him.

— But Zoe, he says, eyes narrow: This is ....

She knows he's upset; usually he avoids the use of her first name.

— Are you saying that I'm crazy?

He rocks forward, lets his chair fall to its casters with a muffled thump.

— Precipitous.

She smiles, securely out of his therapeutic reach.

— Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it you who kept saying I needed to make a new life?

In the end, they talk logistics. He suggests she keep her apartment, put her things in storage.

To Zoe, he's suddenly very young, almost frightened, and she doesn't tell him that she's given notice on her lease, and that she'll fill the car with what she might need and sell the rest.

He writes a new prescription for Xanax, but warns her it will only last so long. Then he plucks a card from his drawer, writes on it everyone phone number he has, private line, home phone, pager, cell phone. Zoe stans. Her time is over. Zeke remains seated, looking up at her a long while. Worriedly, he shakes his head, gets to his feet, says:

— I always thought you were remarkable.

— Crazy as a loon, more like.

He holds out a hand, wishes her luck, and as she's going out the door, reminds her to call.

— I'm sure they must have phones there.

In fact, there is no phone. No running water, no electricity either. Only plywood flooring, untaped Sheetrock, a padlock on the front door, a little wood scattered in the shed. There is an outhouse though, and 493 acres, plus or minus. She has great affection for the plus or minus, learns that all north country deeds include this caveat, since surveying up and down and across the sides of mountains has a distinct inherent inaccuracy. She's buying herself a forest, a small clearing, and a structure that can't quite be called a house. It's a shell, weatherproofed, with a rubble trench, concrete-block foundation, a standing seam roof, plywood sheathing. There are windows though, a whole bank of them on the south wall, and doors, insulation, a gas range and gas refrigerator, a woodstove and an ocean-blue ceramic tile hearth. And for amenities, that's it.

The realtor called it a camp, tried to interest Zoe in something more civilized, a cottage or chalet, but if Zoe has one reason for buying this particular place, she has twenty.

She thinks she'll like the solitude, although she guesses what she really wants is the absence of other people's feelings.

She has the money, and she figures a project will be good for her. The people before her sank every time into it, every free hour and free weekend, until it killed their marriage. But Zoe thinks she can indulge her old interest in architecture, thinks she understands the logic of the floor plan, mutters to herself about primary space, secondary space. She will be one of those latter-twentieth-century architects who lives onsite, learns the place and its rhythms, and then she will redesign as needed, her own stamp. Before she buys the place, she stands alone on the porch and imagines a little architectural gem looming at her back.

And then there's this: she's twelve-point-two miles from Dayton's gate.

Plus or minus.