It’s a kind of sweet homespun immortality.

In art history, they teach how Pope Pius V asked El Greco to paint over some nude figures Michelangelo had painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. El Greco agreed, but only if he could paint over the entire ceiling. They teach that El Greco is only famous because of his astigmatism. That’s why he distorted his human bodies, because he couldn’t see right, he stretched everybody’s arms and legs and got famous for the dramatic effect.

From famous artists to building contractors, we all want to leave our signature. Our lasting effect. Your life after death.

We all want to explain ourselves. Nobody wants to be forgotten.

That day in Ocean Park, Angel Delaporte shows Misty the dining room, the wainscoting and blue-striped wallpaper. Halfway up one wall is a busted hole of curling, torn paper and plaster dust.

Masons, she tells him, they’ll mortar a charm, a religious medal on a chain, to hang inside a chimney and keep evil spirits from coming down the flue. Masons in the Middle Ages would seal a live cat inside the walls of a new building to bring good luck. Or a live woman. To give the building a soul.

Misty, she’s watching his glass of wine. She’s talking to it instead of his face, following it around with her eyes, hoping he’ll notice and offer her a drink.

Angel Delaporte puts his puffy face, his plucked eyebrow, on the hole and says, “. . . the people of Waytansea Island will kill you the way they’ve killed everyone before . . .” He holds the little flashlight tight to the side of his head so it shines into the darkness. The bristling brass and silver keys hang down to his shoulder, bright as costume jewelry. He says, “You should see what’s written in here.”

Slow, the way a child learns to read, Angel Delaporte stares into the dark and says, “. . . now I see my wife working at the Waytansea Hotel, cleaning rooms and turning into a fat fucking slob in a pink plastic uniform . . .”

Mr. Delaporte says, “. . . She comes home and her hands smell like the latex gloves she has to wear to pick up your used rubbers . . . her blond hair’s gone gray and smells like the shit she uses to scrub out your toilets when she crawls into bed next to me . . .”

“Hmm,” he says, and drinks his wine down to his ring finger. “That’s a misplaced modifier.”

He reads, “. . . her tits hang down the front of her like a couple of dead carp. We haven’t had sex in three years . . .”

It gets so quiet Misty tries to make a little laugh.

Angel Delaporte holds out the flashlight. He drinks his bright orange wine down to where his pinkie finger is on the side of the glass, and he nods at the hole in the wall and says, “Read it for yourself.”

His ring of keys is so heavy Misty has to make a muscle to lift the little flashlight, and when she puts her eye to the small, dark hole, the words painted on the far wall say:

“. . . you’ll die wishing you’d never set foot . . .”

The missing linen closet in Seaview, the missing bathroom in Long Beach, the family room in Oysterville, whenever people go poking around, this is what they find. It’s always Peter’s same tantrum.

Your same old tantrum.

“. . . you’ll die and the world will be a better place for . . .”

In all these mainland houses Peter worked on, these investments, it’s the same filth written and sealed inside.

“. . . die screaming in terible . . .”

And behind her, Angel Delaporte says, “Tell Mr. Wilmot that he spelled terrible wrong.”

These summer people, poor Misty, she tells them, Mr. Wilmot wasn’t himself for the last year or so. He had a brain tumor he didn’t know about for—we don’t know how long. Her face still pressed to the hole in the wallpaper, she tells this Angel Delaporte how Mr. Wilmot did some work in the old Waytansea Hotel, and now the room numbers jump from 312 to 314. Where there used to be a room, there’s just perfect, seamless hallway, chair molding, baseboard, new power outlets every six feet, top-quality work. All of it code, except the room sealed inside.

And this Ocean Park man swirls the wine in his glass and says, “I hope room 313 wasn’t occupied at the time.”

Out in her car, there’s a crowbar. They can have this doorway opened back up in five minutes. It’s just drywall is all, she tells the man. Just Mr. Wilmot going crazy.

When she puts her nose in the hole and sniffs, the wallpaper smells like a million cigarettes came here to die. Inside the hole, you can smell cinnamon and dust and paint. Somewhere inside the dark, you can hear a refrigerator hum. A clock ticks.

Written around and around the walls, it’s always this same rant. In all these vacation houses. Written in a big spiral that starts at the ceiling and spins to the floor, around and around so you have to stand in the center of the room and turn to read it until you’re dizzy. Until it makes you sick. In the light from the key ring, it says:

“. . . murdered despite all your money and status . . .”

“Look,” she says. “There’s your stove. Right where you thought.” And she steps back and gives him the little flashlight.

Every contractor, Misty tells him, they’ll sign their work. Mark their territory. Finish carpenters will write on the subfloor before they lay the hardwood parquet or the carpet pad. They’ll write on the walls before the wallpaper or tile. This is what’s inside everybody’s walls, this record of pictures, prayers, names. Dates. A time capsule. Or worse, you could find lead pipes, asbestos, toxic mold, bad wiring. Brain tumors. Time bombs.

Proof that no investment is yours forever.

What you don’t really want to know—but you don’t dare forget.

Angel Delaporte, his face pressed to the hole, he reads, “. . . I love my wife and I love my kid . . .” He reads, “. . . I won’t see my family pushed down and down the ladder by you low-life parasites . . .”

He leans into the wall, his face twisting hard against the hole, and says, “This handwriting is so compelling. The way he writes the letter f in ‘set foot’ and ‘fat fucking slob,’ the top line is so long it overhangs the rest of the word. That means he’s actually a very loving, protective man.” He says, “See the k in ‘kill you’? The way the front leg is extralong shows he’s worried about something.”

Grinding his face against the hole, Angel Delaporte reads, “. . . Waytansea Island will kill every last one of God’s children if it means saving our own . . .”

He says, the way the capital I ’s are thin and pointed proves Peter’s got a keen sharp mind but he’s scared to death of his mother.

His keys jingle as he pokes the little flashlight around and reads, “. . . I have danced with your toothbrush stuck up my dirty asshole . . .”

His face jerks back from the wallpaper, and he says, “Yeah, that’s my stove all right.” He drinks the last of the wine, swishing it around, loud, in his mouth. He swallows it, saying, “I knew I had a kitchen in this house.”

Poor Misty, she says she’s sorry. She’ll rip open the doorway. Mr. Delaporte, he probably wants to go get his teeth cleaned this afternoon. That, and maybe a tetanus shot. Maybe a gamma globulin, too.

With one finger, Mr. Delaporte touches a big wet smear next to the hole in the wall. He puts his wineglass to his mouth and goes cross-eyed to find it empty. The dark, wet smear on the blue wallpaper, he touches it. Then he makes a nasty face and wipes his finger on the side of his bathrobe and says, “I hope Mr. Wilmot is heavily insured and bonded.”

“Mr. Wilmot has been unconscious in the hospital for the last few days,” Misty says.

Reaching a pack of cigarettes from his bathrobe pocket, he shakes one out and says, “So you run his remodeling firm now?”

And Misty tries to laugh. “I’m the fat fucking slob,” she says.

And the man, Mr. Delaporte says, “Pardon?”