He said, “Do you want to talk?”
Alice shook her head. “I want you to stand here with me for five minutes and not talk, then I’ll be ready to go have fun.”
Mikey gazed at her.
Alice tapped her left wrist with her right index finger. “Five minutes,” she said. “Starting now. Don’t talk. Just tell me when it’s time, and I’ll be ready.”
Issa’s cousin was at the piano and playing “North of the Sunset” when they reentered the house. Alice took a few calming breaths and blew her nose into a cocktail napkin she’d pulled from her pocket. Then she bobbed her head along with the whimsical tune as she removed her boots. She threw her hair out of her face in handfuls.
As they made their way back toward the group, Alice whispered to Mikey, “I just had the best idea for the most messed-up trick to get back at Jimmy.”
“Get back at Jimmy? For what?”
“For that evil story he told us at his lake house! Scared the crap out of me. I think about it every time I see a couple getting their picture taken. Every time I hear a train.”
“What do you have in mind?”
“I’m not telling you because you’ll forbid it.”
Mikey filled a plate for himself with barbecued chicken and curried cauliflower, and he refilled his glass with prosecco. He watched Alice out of the corner of his eye as she engaged in conversation with Lynn’s aunt.
The two of them parted, and Alice made her way across the room where, Mikey could see, she had a good view of Jimmy.
Mikey made eye contact with Alice. Her expression was giddy with anticipation. She tipped her chin toward Jimmy, indicating that Mikey should listen in. Mikey posted himself up against the wall several feet away from Jimmy and Audwin, and he sipped his prosecco.
Lynn’s aunt casually approached Jimmy and Audwin. She introduced herself to the two of them, and Jimmy introduced himself as a close childhood friend of Lynn’s.
“Another one!” Lynn’s aunt said.
Jimmy nodded.
Lynn’s aunt said, “So now I’ve met you, and Alice, and Sam, and Mikey, and the blond.”
Jimmy cocked his head at her perplexedly.
Mikey felt a pumping, mischievous laugh in his chest, a perverse thrill as he realized what Alice was up to.
Lynn’s aunt looked at Jimmy, her face owlish and quizzical. She said, “The thin blond. Another childhood friend? Introduced herself to me outside before the ceremony, then she just sort of disappeared.”
Jimmy’s face displayed a stunned horror for only a split second before his eyes rolled dramatically and his posture relaxed. “Alice,” he growled, looking for her in the room. He turned briefly to Lynn’s aunt. “She’s good,” he said. “And you’re good. Almost had me.”
Alice bounded over from the far side of the room and practically tackled Jimmy.
“Almost had you!” she said.
Jimmy said, “You and your twisted, nihilistic little games.”
They laughed and laughed as Mikey explained the trick to Audwin, whose eyes glimmered with admiration as he clucked his tongue at Alice and said, “This woman seems very hip.”
They ate and drank and toasted and danced and laughed for hours, the whole room loose and dizzy with happiness.
Eventually, it was completely dark outside, the food was gone, and the bride and groom were weary.
They all said their farewells to Lynn and Issa and one another, and made plans for a reunion in June or July. Sam suggested that everyone come to Georgia, but said they had only one spare bedroom at their home. Jimmy said he’d look into a week-long rental in their area that would accommodate all of them.
Outside, there were several inches of fresh snow, packed hard on the streets, which had not been plowed. The sky was starry and clear.
Chapter 29
Mikey followed Alice to the Budget Inn ten minutes away, where they both checked into their rooms. Alice gave Mikey the second key to her room and invited him to come over as soon as he was settled in. She said she was going to order a pizza and asked if Mikey had a preference on toppings.
Alice was sitting upright in the queen bed when Mikey entered her room a bit later. A bottle of whiskey was on the bedside table, and she was sipping out of a little plastic cup. The pizza had arrived and was on the middle of the bed. Alice plucked a steaming pepperoni off it.
The TV was on, an old episode of Law & Order playing at low volume.
Alice patted the pillow next to her.
Mikey poured himself a whiskey, using the plastic cup sitting next to the single-serve coffee machine, and took a seat next to her on the bed. The springs of the cheap bed bounced and crunched beneath him.
Alice said, “I beg of you, please do not pass gas in my bed.”
She reached for a piece of pizza and pulled it onto a paper plate, a string of hot cheese trailing behind it. She twisted this around her finger until it broke.
It was quiet for a few minutes as they ate pizza and watched TV.
Eventually, Alice said, “Just so you know, I’m not going to make you talk about what you don’t want to talk about. Unless you want to talk about it.”
Mikey helped himself to a second slice of pizza. “You mean the phone call. A baby.”
Alice nodded. She looked utterly miserable. “Please just don’t,” she said. “I know what you’re going to say. Don’t speak. Shut up. Leave me alone.” She tossed her black hair over her shoulders.
Mikey looked at her.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’m being mean because I’m feeling vulnerable. And I know what you’re going to say.”
“Do you?”
She pointed at the actor on-screen. “I read that that guy kicks his dog in real life.”
“Really?” Mikey said.
“No, I’m just trying to change the subject.”
Mikey adjusted his glasses over the bridge of his nose. “I talked to my eye doctor,” he said.
Alice turned to face him.
Mikey said, “It’s over a ninety percent chance it’s hereditary. Can’t be sure without any information on my biological father, but there’s a very high likelihood that my children would suffer early-onset macular degeneration. Go blind at a young age.”
Alice nodded. “I understand,” she said.
“I don’t want to pass this on to someone.” Mikey sipped his whiskey. “You know, I’d never given much thought to having kids before you brought it up. When the doc told me this . . . it upset me more than I thought it would.”
“The idea of not having kids?” Alice said.
Mikey shook his head. “Not that.” He chewed on a piece of ice and swallowed. “The idea of not being able to give you what you want.”
Alice said, “Oh.” She tapped a crust of pizza over her knee.
Mikey was quiet for a bit. Then he said, “Would you consider doing it any other way?”
Alice took a bite of pizza and chewed slowly. She looked directly at Mikey, pushing black hair from her eyes. “I won’t do this if it’s not with you. And I’m not saying that to make you feel bad.” She paused, gulped down the last of her whiskey, poured herself another, and handed the bottle to Mikey. “I know I’m pushy, but I couldn’t push you into something this big. I wouldn’t. I won’t. I respect your decision, it’s over, and it’s okay.” Alice looked back toward the TV.
Mikey shifted on the bed. “Maybe I’d reconsider if—”
Alice cut him off with a hand in the air. “Mikey? It’s over. And it’s okay.”
Mikey caught her hand out of the air, laced his fingers through hers, and held it tightly. A few seconds later she pulled away and said, “Your hand is hot and wet, and I don’t like it.”
It was quiet for a long while.
Eventually, Alice closed the empty pizza box and tossed it toward the foot
of the bed. She said, “The Saint and I divorced because he tried to force me to have a kid with him. So I’m not about to do that to you.”
Mikey turned to face her. “He wanted kids and you didn’t?” he said. “Was that it?”
“Not exactly. I just wasn’t sure one way or the other. Hadn’t even given it much thought. Then, all of a sudden, I was pregnant. I missed my period, bought a test, and took it on my own. Got the ol’ double line.”
“Huh?”
“Means it’s positive.”
“Did you tell him right away?”
Alice sighed. “No. I wanted to think things through privately first. I called up the nearest women’s health center to talk through my options. I was only six weeks along. I didn’t make an appointment, but I got all the info and decided to sit on it for a bit.”
“So what happened?”
“That same night, Jason saw the number for the women’s health center in my phone.”
“Who?” It occurred to Mikey that he had never even known The Saint’s real name. “Oh, oh, oh.”
“Apparently he snooped on my phone all the time,” Alice said, “paranoid that I was cheating. I wasn’t. I was careful with the pregnancy test itself to hide all the evidence, the receipt, all that, but I didn’t think to erase the outgoing call in my phone. He saw the number on my phone that same night and figured out what was going on.”
“He was upset?”
Alice nodded. “Furious that I would even consider not keeping it without consulting him first. I tried to explain that I hadn’t made the decision yet, I’d only wanted to weigh my options on my own first, but that didn’t matter. He threatened to put me on lockdown. Take my phone and the keys to my car and my credit cards, so I couldn’t do anything without him. He threatened to basically hold me hostage for nine months. Threatened to sue me. Told me I was legally required to get his consent. I’d done my research; I knew I wasn’t. He told me I was possessed, I was evil. He threatened to bomb the clinic. All sorts of craziness.”
“Had he ever lost his head like that before? Did he scare you?”
Alice shook her head. “Not even close. Nothing like it. But, Mikey, as soon as I learned that I was pregnant with his child, something inside of me just knew it wasn’t right. Why else wouldn’t my first phone call be to him? Something inside of me just knew it was not the life that I wanted.”
Alice tucked her hair behind her ears. She uncrossed and recrossed her long legs over the bed, and picked at a little stain on the comforter beneath her.
“So then what happened?”
“I ran out of the house and never went back. Left all my clothes, my computer, my books . . . everything I owned. Ran out the door and drove to my brother’s house a couple hours away. Never looked back.”
“Sheezus. And . . . the pregnancy?”
“I miscarried a few days later. They say stress can bring it on.”
“And how did you feel?”
“Mostly relieved.”
“I’d imagine.”
“He tried to get in touch with me through everyone we knew right after I left: my parents, brothers, mutual friends . . . He told everybody I had run away with his baby, and he begged them to stop me from ending the pregnancy. He even said he didn’t even care if he never saw me again; we could separate, and he would happily raise that baby on his own. Can you believe that? My brother finally told him I’d miscarried, and then my brother helped me with the paperwork, got the divorce legalized without my ever having to sit in the same room with him. Years later, Jason looked me up on Facebook. Said he’d come to peace with me, even though I had hurt him worse than anyone ever had and probably ever would. I sent him some curt little response. He still reaches out from time to time. And every time I hear from him, he reminds me that he’s still praying for me.” Alice snorted. “Although he’s never specified what exactly he’s praying for for me. Salvation or the seven plagues. I just hope whoever’s listening to his prayers gets where I was coming from.”
Mikey said, “Why did you never want to tell me any of this? Were you worried what I would think?”
Alice was quiet for a bit. “Do you remember back at the lake house last month when somebody brought up the worst thing you’ve ever done? Or the worst thing someone has ever done to you? I can’t remember the context. I bet you if someone asked The Saint what the worst thing anyone has ever done to him was, his answer would be that I called to find out the price of ending a pregnancy before telling him I was pregnant. What I’m saying is that, in his mind, what I did to him will probably always be the worst.”
“You’re probably right.”
“But for me,” Alice went on, “questioning whether I wanted to keep it and then ultimately deciding to leave him was probably the best thing I’ve ever done.”
“So?”
“That sucks!” Alice said, throwing her hands into the air. “Shouldn’t my answer to the question What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done? be the thing that hurt someone else the most?”
“No way,” Mikey shook his head. “This is just the reality when you have reasons for doing something that could never be understood by someone else.”
“It wasn’t until years after we separated that I could actually appreciate the loss from his perspective. I didn’t share his feelings about the pregnancy, but I couldn’t discount them entirely either. Frankly, I’m amazed by the depth of emotion he had toward that tiny little sac of cells. See, I don’t think this was entirely about controlling me; that had never been part of his nature before. I think this was actually about the baby. He cared that deeply. Wanted that badly to protect it, felt that was his duty. He . . . dare I say . . . already loved it? Is that possible? I don’t actually know the answer to that.” Alice paused and sipped her whiskey.
Mikey said, “I don’t either.”
“My point is that I can laugh at The Saint. I can resent him. Despise him, even. But I can’t quite find it in me to diminish his pain, or find any humor in it. I don’t want to be someone’s worst thing. That hurts me.”
“I’m surprised you’re bothered by a thing like that.”
“Mikey, you know I like to consider myself a loose cannon but ultimately harmless.”
“Nobody is harmless,” Mikey said. “Sorry.”
Alice sniffed and rubbed each nostril.
It was quiet for a few moments.
Eventually, Alice said, “Sally cutting herself off was one of the worst things that happened to all of us. Maybe the worst. But maybe it was the best thing for her. Like you said. We could never understand her reasons.” Alice reached for her cup of whiskey and finished it in a single swallow. “Like you said,” she remarked. “Nobody is harmless.”
Mikey said, “How do we live with that?”
“What’s the alternative to living with something that hurts?” Alice said. “Jump off a bridge?” She hesitated. “I don’t mean that as a joke. How does anybody live with anything? You just . . . march on, I guess, even when your heart’s not in it.”
Alice was quiet for a little while. Then she lifted her own sleeve, rolled it back, and pointed at a large patch of inflamed red skin running all up her forearm to the inside of her elbow, some small areas gleaming with pus, some spots of dried black blood. “Poison oak,” she said matter-of-factly. “From bushwhacking behind the marina. New owner’s gonna put in a two-car garage. It’s driving me nuts, and if I scratch, it only gets worse. Disgusting. Are you disgusted?”
Mikey said, “I’m impressed.”
“Impressed?” Alice rolled her sleeve back down. “A scar is something to be impressed by, Mikey. A rash is just vulgar.”
She patted her forearm, pulled a pillow onto Mikey’s lap and rested her head there. She turned up the volume of the TV, as though she was done talking.
An hour passed.
Mikey watched a f
ull episode of Law & Order as Alice rested. Benson was right about the perp again. When would those other cops ever learn? Benson’s instincts were never wrong!
Mikey gazed down at Alice’s face, moving his head around to bring her fully into focus as best as he could. Broad, pale cheeks, small C-shaped indents at the corners of her mouth, lips parted, uncommonly peaceful, although even in sleep her eyebrows arched high, as if she were waiting for a punch line. Mikey felt deeply sad. He looked around the hotel room. A single rogue slat on the gray drawstring shutters, and beyond that, the black outdoors, dusted with stars that were low and shy. A bone-colored ashtray sitting on the bedstand, hilariously, next to a small laminated card that read no smoking. A sizable purple stain on the carpet. Cheap red wine—had to be. A shabby little desk, no accompanying chair, with a thick blue Ethernet cord snaked across it. He looked back at Alice’s face—Debussy’s Arabesque No. 1 for piano—then he had to look away.
Eventually, Alice stirred. She sat upright in the bed, rubbed her eyes, yawned, pushed black hair from her face, and squinted over at the digital clock on the cable box. It was nearly midnight.
She said, “I suppose I oughta send you back to your room for the night. I don’t sleep well with anyone else in the bed, anyway. And you’d probably sweat up the sheets. But first I’m going to tell you about dying.”
Mikey gazed at her, and she stared straight ahead at the TV.
Then she said, “You remember Jake, my dog when we were kids?”
“Of course.”
“Good dog,” Alice said. “I was in my freshman year of college. Jake was old as dirt by that time. Blind and deaf. Couldn’t keep food down, he was skin and bones. My parents said that it was time, they were gonna put him down, and I begged them to wait until I was home for Christmas so I could say good-bye.”
“Did they?”
Alice nodded. “They kept him around until I got home, the week before Christmas. But that same night, after I’d seen Jake, middle of the night and while I was in bed, he crawled down to the basement, God knows how, his hipbones were probably practically dust at that point. He hadn’t done stairs in ages, but he made his way down there and into the far corner, way back behind the water heater, far as he could get from the people in the house, curled himself up and died. It took us forever to find him the next day.”
The Gunners Page 21