“They put you to work?” Thomas lights a cigarette and parks himself on a large rock.
“No kidding. And here I was thinking I’d be lounging in a chair drinking beer all day. Didn’t think I’d be doing shit. But I had no choice. And you just took off. How was it out there in nature?”
As Maloney groans and chops firewood, Thomas describes the hike, though he doesn’t say a word about how hard it was for him, and he doesn’t tell him what they talked about.
“What do you make of Luke?” he asks instead, glancing in Luke’s direction. He’s removed his T-shirt and is sitting among the women. They’re all looking at him as he tells them something. Patricia tilts her head back and laughs.
“I don’t really know. He’s all right, isn’t he?”
“You think there might be something shifty about him?”
“Nah. That wouldn’t be my first thought. What do you mean? He gave me a bottle of schnapps as compensation for whipping me at craps that one night. After the funeral. Personally, I think that’s good of him.” Maloney sets his ax aside and gulps from a water bottle.
“I just can’t get a read on him.”
“But you don’t need to. He’s Alice’s friend. So what’s it matter to you? Jenny seems to like him quite a bit. He got Alice a job.”
Thomas stares at Maloney. “He was the one?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“She works for an escort service, Maloney.”
Maloney shrugs. “So what? She’s not a hooker. I mean, she’s got to earn a living somehow. Landing a job’s hard enough these days, especially when you don’t have any experience.”
Thomas sighs, shaking his head. He glances at the flagstones then turns toward the pasture. “I told her she can start working at the store next week.”
“What store?”
“Ours, of course. I want her over at the new branch, but we need to train her first. It doesn’t cost much to have an apprentice.”
“But Thomas,” Maloney eyes him. “Hello. We’ve got Peter. And it’s not exactly free, is it? An apprentice isn’t free.” Maloney has made eye contact, and he doesn’t look away. “What are you doing anyway? I don’t get this at all.”
“I hope to increase our profits once we open the new place.”
“When you open the new place. Besides, what kind of place is it? You haven’t told me shit.”
So Thomas has to explain to Maloney that he’s this close to buying the former porn video rental store. He has big plans with it, he says, and he intends to keep his promise: Maloney won’t have to spend a dime, but they’ll apportion the surplus revenue equally between them. The place will become part of their company, but he’ll be the one buying the property and doing the renovation. Maloney leans tiredly against the chopping block.
“I don’t know what to say,” he grunts.
“You don’t need to say anything. I’ll take care of everything. Including Alice.”
Maloney glances up at the sky absentmindedly. “It’s not exactly the best way to start out as a kind of stepfather, you know, if I’m supposed to boss the girl around every single day.”
“You won’t have to.”
Maloney looks at him sadly. “But Thomas. C’mon, man. We’re running this business together. It’s not like I can pretend she’s nothing more than air, can I? I need to show her the ropes.”
“Hey!” Thomas says. “I know what we can do. We’ll put Annie in charge of her training. She can do it. She’s so organized. It’ll be good for her to have that extra responsibility. And if any problems arise, I promise I’ll handle with them. How about that? Come on, Maloney. I sure as hell don’t want her talking on the phone with horny old bastards every night. We need to give her a chance. What do you say? Especially now that she’s your ‘stepdaughter’.” Thomas chuckles briefly. It rings hollow. His laughter turns into a nasty cough. He tosses his cigarette.
“Laugh all you want,” Maloney says darkly. He leans forward and places another log on the block. He raises the ax high over his head with both hands. When it catches the light, the steel of the blade sparkles. Then he lowers the ax until it’s hanging suspended between his legs. He says, “I give up. You have to take care of all this shit on your own.”
“It’s not shit, Maloney. This is a good thing.”
Maloney quickly raises the ax again and hacks at the log. “You know how to fucking complicate things, you know that,” he mumbles. Thomas strolls away. He grabs a towel in the barn and asks Helena whether or not they still have an outdoor shower. They do. He walks around the barn. From here he can see all the way down to the lake. He undresses. And naked under the tepid jet of water, there in the grass—where he has a view of the shimmering lake and the girls and Alice splashing about in the water near the pier, and the evergreens, and the sheep, who’ve now moved away from the pasture, closer to the road, grazing on the slope beside the grove, and with fresh, cool air filling his lungs—he thinks with satisfaction: everything’s been resolved. In the water the three girls are like the Three Graces. Alice’s dark skin, the twins’ ivory. Alice’s ultra-short hair, the girls’ long, wet locks. The two nymphets cling to the young woman’s body, holding her without letting go, clutching her arms and hands, scrabbling onto her shoulders, piggybacking through the water. Shaking off water like dogs, hopping up and down, doing backflips and disappearing under the pier only to pop up on the other side. No one’s allowed to touch those girls, he thinks. I won’t allow any filthy man to touch my girls. And again he’s filled with images: a vision of the new store, his expectations running amok along with a deep, deep sense of peace. The crisis is almost over now. It was a crisis, he thinks in astonishment, watching Alice, who’s elegantly swinging herself up onto the pier. A crisis that I’ve been through. Yes, that’s what it was. Just some ridiculous crisis. Maybe he’s actually free of it now, totally free, and freer than he’s ever been. When the money is spent, he thinks, then he’s free. On top of that, I’ll have shafted the old man. So that, in the end, he was forced to give something to his family after all, the twisted cheapskate asshole. Now he can pay for his grandchild’s education. I’ve shafted him pretty fucking good. He who laughs last, laughs hardest. Thomas rubs the towel on his bony white body, rubs it hard enough to feel it, and then ties it around his waist. Then he fetches clean clothes in the barn and gets dressed, taking short, rapid breaths. Now I want a goddamn drink, he thinks, heading toward the kitchen where the women, little by little, are beginning to prepare dinner.
An enormous leg of lamb rests on the kitchen table, coated in herbs and drenched in red wine. Just as Thomas walks through the door, Kristin roars with laughter, wraps her arms around Helena, and kisses her neck. “My dove,” she says, “That’s so funny!” But Thomas never figures out what’s so funny. Patricia’s sitting on a chair in the middle of the room, and Luke’s massaging her neck. She cocks her head to one side so that he can reach under her ear. Her eyes are closed, her expression blissful. “Mm, mm, mm,” she moans. “Oh, that’s so nice.” Luke gathers her hair and lifts it off one side of her throat, letting it hang down against her cheek. Thomas tenses up. Outside, Alice and the twins emerge, now dressed. Throwing a red ball. “See,” Helena says, pointing through the window at them. “They worship her.” The green grass, the red ball, the low sun in the foliage. The girls throw themselves at the ball, running. And inside the house: Luke is touching Patricia. Someone is touching my girlfriend. Only now does Kristin see him. He’s been standing motionless in the doorway. “Thomas! Why are you standing there like a pillar of salt? Come on in!” Patricia turns and sees him, her gaze veiled and sated. He clears his throat. “I need a drink,” he says. “What would you like? A mojito? Helena just got some mint for the peas.” Luke maneuvers his hands gently across Patricia’s skin. He’s squirted a dollop of olive oil on her neck, the bottle’s on the floor. “My neck’s really sore from sunbathing,” she says. “And I’ve got an awful headache. I couldn’t adjust the deck chair.”
“That’s an old piece of crap. We never use those chairs,” Kristin says, squeezing lime juice into a glass. “We don’t have time for that out here in the country. Lazing about in the sun doing nothing!”
Luke guides his hands down the nape of Patricia’s neck, between her shoulder blades, past her dress. Thomas tries to make eye contact with Patricia, but she only lowers her head, making room for Luke. “I can do that,” Thomas says. “I can give you a massage, hon.” The words come out edgy, tense. “Thanks, but Luke’s much better at it, I think.” Then Patricia whispers, “Oh, yeah, right there . . .” Staring watchfully at Luke and Patricia, Thomas crosses the room and leans against the counter. Kristin pours rum and cane sugar in a glass. “Do we have ice, baby?” Helena nods. And Kristin puts the greenish drink in Thomas’s hand. He feels a violent urge to tear Luke away from Patricia. He wants to drown him in oil, pour it down his gullet, listen to him gurgle. Jealousy pecks at his chest, and he’s close to hyperventilating. “How was the hike?” Kristin asks. “Was it tough? You’re no spring chicken any more.” She laughs. “Speak for yourself,” Helena says. “Thomas will always be a young man to me. The young man. Our young man. Luke tells us you got a good glimpse of the coast up on Bearclaw? It’s been a long time since we were up there . . .” The two women discuss how they once got lost on that very mountain, because they wanted to veer from the trail; they wanted to venture into the wilderness. “That was back when we insisted on doing everything our own way. We thought everything was so bourgeois, so restrictive—even a forest trail,” Kristin says, and Helena chuckles, placing the lamb in the oven. Kristin observes the girls outside playing ball. She says, “The sun’s setting now. I think I’ll have one of those mint drinks too. Anyone else want one?” Luke and Patricia do. Thomas musters all his strength to bridle his anger. He doesn’t know what to do with himself. He can’t leave the kitchen. He offers to wash the dishes. “That would be great,” Helena says, and begins shelling peas. Beyond the trees the sun burns crimson, and the kitchen is temporarily bathed in a heavy, golden light, it’s almost magical—a magical moment—and then the girls come rushing in, their cheeks flushed and sweaty. Alice has promised to braid their hair. “We want many tiny braids. With beads!” Maya says eagerly. She’s morphed from being a sourpuss teenager to a happy little girl, and she doesn’t even realize she’s shouting. “C’mon! Let’s go upstairs!” The girls thump up the stairwell at Alice’s heels, bubbling with excitement.
“Where’s Jenny?” Thomas asks Patricia, wanting to connect with her.
“She’s probably with Maloney, wouldn’t you think?” Helena replies, tucking a lock of hair back behind one ear.
“Isn’t he chopping firewood?”
“Not anymore.”
“I see them,” Patricia says. She stands and gives Luke a thank-you hug. With her head resting on his shoulder, she’s looking out the windows above the kitchen table. Thomas scrubs aggressively at a pan. She’s embracing another man, she’s smiling happily. Jenny and Maloney are sitting side by side on the pier.
“What a pair of lovebirds!” Patricia says, letting go of Luke. “Hard to believe they’re dating.”
“It’s so good for Jenny,” Kristin says, sipping her drink. “I sense harmony all around this family right now. Isn’t that so? Everyone seems to be doing better.”
“Better than what?” Thomas slams a breadknife unnecessarily hard into the dish drainer.
“Better than before.”
“Better than ever,” Patricia smiles, glancing tenderly at Luke. “In any event, my head feels much better now.” Luke smiles, and sits reverse in the chair Patricia has vacated. She’s staring at the yard.
“Luke sure has many talents,” Thomas says bitterly. “You must’ve really paid attention in school.”
“You don’t learn how to massage in school, Thomas!” Patricia turns, giggling, and collects her mojito from the table. She’s wearing her blue dress, the one he’d packed for her. In it her waist seems narrower than usual, her arms plumper.
“You learn by doing.” Luke’s voice climbs slowly from the center of his body. “Like most everything.”
“I think you have an exceptional talent.” Patricia puts her glass down, picks up a dishtowel and lethargically begins drying the dishes. Thomas is ready to explode.
“I like doing things the right way,” Luke says, tipping slightly in his chair. “To see things through to the end. One of the many things I learned from Jacques.” Thomas tries to catch his breath. He wants to say something, but Helena beats him to it.
“So you’re patient? Are you a patient person?” She scrutinizes him.
“I’m not sure about that. I don’t know. But when I put my mind to something, I follow through with it. I don’t give up.”
“Sounds heroic,” Kristin says, without even trying to conceal the irony. She reaches across the table and turns on the lamp.
“Or stubborn,” Thomas says. “Or simply naïve.” Luke tilts his head back and laughs. “Yes! He always said that. You’re a stubborn one, Kid. You’ll do all right. I hope he’s right!” His laughter fades. Patricia hands him his drink. He raises the glass to his mouth and slugs it greedily. Thomas shakes his head. “I still don’t understand how we can be talking about the same man.” But no one seems to hear him. It’s getting dark now, fast, first blue, then bluish-black, the trees silhouetted clearly against midnight blue. Thomas puts down the dish brush and takes a deep breath. Going berserk won’t do any good now, even if he wants to pummel Luke’s face. He lifts his head and looks out the window. He can see the moon now. A curved little hook in the darkened sky. Kristin follows his gaze. “Won’t be a cloud in the sky tonight, I think. You’ll be able to see what a blanket of stars we have up here.”
“They’re coming in now,” Patricia says, gesturing to the window, behind which Jenny and Maloney are walking hand in hand back to the house. Maloney wedges his face against the glass and grimaces. Jenny yanks at him, smiling and shaking her head. He puts his arms around her, lifts her up, and begins to run, her pale, chunky body squirming in his arms. “He has a lot of energy all of a sudden,” Patricia says, quietly, almost forlornly, and Thomas senses envy in her. Does she want to be lifted up wriggling and whining the same way she wants to be massaged by young men and vanish several nights in a row in her shiny shoes? He sips his drink. “Patricia,” he says. “Patricia.”
“What?”
“Nothing,” he says. She smiles and shakes her head.
Patricia retreats from the window, back to the kitchen table. She picks up a stack of napkins and lays one beside every plate that Kristin has set out. “Just have to wait for the lamb now,” Helena says, pouring the shelled peas into a pan, where a hunk of butter, a few pearl onions, and heaps of chopped mint are already sizzling. Thomas walks through the living room to the sunroom. He sits on the bench and lights a cigarette. But before he has even taken a drag, Luke plops down beside him in the semi-darkness. And he inches closer. “Can I have a smoke?” he says, drying his hands on his pants. Must be the olive oil, Thomas thinks, handing him his pack. His fucking massage oil. I hope the oil catches fire. When he flicks the lighter, Thomas is surprised by the light in Luke’s eyes. As if he’s consumed by a huge bonfire raging inside his brain, right behind the frontal bone of his skull. Thomas shrinks back. “I brought you your drink,” Luke says. “If you want the rest, anyway.” Luke hands him his glass, then takes a long drag of his cigarette and leans comfortably back on the hard wooden bench. Ice clinks in his glass. Thomas fills his mouth with the dregs of his sweet citrus drink, and though the ice cubes are cold on his tongue, the rum feels hot. He turns to see Luke’s silhouette. The cigarette dangles from his thick lower lip.
“What do you want?” Thomas asks. “Why did you come out here?”
“Now? I just want to bum a cigarette.” In the expanding darkness Luke’s eyes glow. “What should I want?” A pause. He blows a spiral of white smoke from his mouth. “Should I want somethi
ng in particular?”
“No idea. It just looks as though you want something from me.”
Luke smiles. He flicks his cigarette away, and it lies smoldering on the flagstones.
“No, Thomas,” he says almost solemnly. “You’re wrong about that. I’m just happy to be here. I like this family. It seems as though there’s room for everyone, and I feel at home.”
He looks straight at Thomas. “You want to visit my mother tomorrow?”
“Your mother?!”
“Yeah. You asked about her up on the mountain. So I thought, since we’re so close to her house, you know, and since you know her. From way back when. Seems like the right occasion. To go over there. Maybe on the way home?”
“I wouldn’t say I know her. Besides, I thought you had nothing to do with her anymore.”
“I don’t. But I’ve got an urge to visit her all of a sudden. To see her . . . as though from another perspective. With you. And Alice, maybe. Through your eyes or something.” Luke leans forward, propping his elbows on his knees. “But I have to warn you: it’s a freak show over there. She’s stark raving mad.”
“So you do want something from me after all?”
Thomas has the feeling that Luke shrugs. But he’s not sure. There’s something suddenly disarming about him. They can barely see each other. The light from the living room, behind them, spills into the sunroom in squares, small squares. Small squares of light falling on the eucalyptus, a few bushes, Helena’s lavender and spices, the geraniums. They stare out into darkness. Thomas feels Luke’s presence surging around him, a kind of electrical charge.
“You want to come?” Luke asks once more.
Thomas hesitates. “Yeah, sure,” he says. And then, “Are you in love with Alice?”
“No!” Luke shakes his head tolerantly. “You already asked me that.”
“Why aren’t you in love with her?”
Luke takes a breath and holds it for a few seconds. Then he exhales.
“Because I’m attracted to different kinds of girls.”
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