Evening News

by Marly Swick

  “Do you think I should?” He scratched at the stubble underneath his chin. “It itches like hell.”

  “I always liked the beard.” She had missed its softness against her cheek. She turned away and looked out the window as two kids she didn’t recognize rode by on their bikes.

  The phone rang. She willed him not to answer it, and he didn’t. Which she took as a good sign. A hopeful sign. Usually he couldn’t resist answering. There was Dan’s taped, well-modulated voice telling the caller to please leave a message, and then Ed’s voice boomed into the room, too loud as usual. “Hey, Ted-head, it’s your dad.” Long pause, as if to give Teddy time to pick up the phone. “Guess you’re not there. Just checking in. Bye.”

  Dan was frowning. She sighed and bit her lip, irritated with Ed’s bad timing.

  “Has he been calling a lot?” Dan asked.

  “A couple of times.” She poured the beer into a glass.

  “I thought about you a lot,” he said, startling her as he pulled her toward him. “I know I was an asshole to take off like I did, but —”

  She put her hand over his moving lips. “Don’t say that.” She felt limp with relief. She hadn’t realized until this moment just how afraid she’d been that he was going to announce that he was leaving. And they’d both pretend it was “just for a little while,” even though they’d know better.

  “I know I let you down. You and Teddy.” He paused and looked at her. “I thought you might be really angry.”

  She shook her head. It had never even occurred to her that he might be worried about what she was thinking. What right did she have to be angry?

  “But I have to say,” he sighed, “that having some time to think and talk with my brother helped. I’m not saying I’m entirely okay with it.” She knew that it referred to Teddy. “But I think I’ve got a little better perspective on things.”

  She nodded and gave him a hug. “We need you so much,” she said, “Teddy and I. I know how —” Her throat clamped shut. Don’t cry, she told herself, don’t cry. She understood that he was making an effort to be strong. She owed it to him to be strong, too. “You want some more iced tea?”

  “No, thanks.” He clapped his hands together, suddenly businesslike. “I should unpack the car,” he said. “There’s stuff in the cooler.”

  “I’ll help,” she offered, starting to follow him into the garage. Then the phone rang again. She was about to ignore it when she heard Ellen’s voice. She could hear crying, Zack’s jagged wails, in the background. “There’s been a little trouble here.” Ellen spoke fast and nervously. “I was thinking I’d bring Teddy back now, but I guess you’re not home, so —”

  Giselle picked up the receiver.

  ***

  She was furious with Teddy on the drive over to Ellen’s to pick him up, and even more furious with him on the way home as he slumped silently in the passenger seat, refusing to speak. Everything had seemed to be going okay, better than she had hoped for, and now this. She had seen the way Dan’s face seemed to shut down when she told him she had to go get Teddy. It seemed that he’d whacked Zack in the stomach with a croquet mallet for no reason.

  When she arrived at the Walshes’ house, Teddy was sitting alone on the curb. The front door was open, and Ellen was keeping an eye on him — she assured Giselle that she hadn’t told him to go outside, that he’d simply refused to come back inside the house. Zack was still sniffling. When he caught sight of Giselle, he burst into fresh outrage, clutching his stomach and moaning, “It hurts! It hurts!” Ellen patted his head, trying to soothe and shush him. Giselle apologized profusely and ordered Teddy into the car.

  “Why did you do it?” she kept asking him. “What got into you?” But he maintained a stony silence, picking at a scab on his knee until it started to bleed.

  “Leave that scab alone!” she snapped at him and then sighed. In a more civil tone of voice she asked, “Did Zack do something that made you mad?”

  Teddy stopped picking at the scab but ignored her question.

  The therapist had warned Giselle that Teddy might start acting out. And to try to view such behavior as a cry for help. But Giselle was too upset for psychology. It was easy when you were being paid a zillion dollars an hour and it wasn’t your kid.

  She could see what sort of an evening the three of them had ahead of them. Teddy sulking in his room, tension seeping out from under his door like napalm, spreading through the house. Not exactly the reunion she had hoped for. She tried not to think it, but she couldn’t help it: how much easier it would be if Teddy were the one who was gone. Or maybe not, she realized as soon as the forbidden thought skulked its way into her mind. Most likely she would resent Dan for not feeling the loss she was feeling; she would hold it against him that in his heart of hearts he was relieved that it was Teddy and not Trina. It seemed that no matter what, they would not be in the same boat. No matter what, they were up shit creek without a paddle.

  When they pulled into the driveway, Giselle said, “Dan’s back.” She felt Teddy tense up. “Look —” She turned to him. He looked away. She took hold of his chin and tilted his face toward hers, pleading with her eyes. “We all have to make a special effort. We all have to try our best. Can I count on you?”

  He started to cry, shaking his head no and then yes. She plucked a tissue from the box underneath the dashboard and dabbed at the tears, then tugged his skinny braid. “I love you,” she said. “Dan loves you.”

  Teddy blew his nose in the Kleenex and tossed it on the floor instead of into the trash box.

  “Pick that up,” she snapped.

  He picked it up almost cheerfully and placed it in the trash, then unbuckled his seat belt and opened his door.

  “Where’s your backpack?” she asked, checking the backseat.

  “I don’t know,” he mumbled. “I guess I left it in the Walshes’ car.”

  “Great.”

  “I didn’t mean to,” he protested, slamming the car door.

  “I know that. I didn’t say you did, did I?”

  Dan was standing in the doorway, holding the screen door open for them. “Look who’s here!” He had a welcoming smile pasted on his face. She could see that he was making an effort. He tried to give Teddy a high five. Teddy slapped his palm against Dan’s cautiously, as if testing a stove burner. “I saw this big snake up there. Humongous.” Dan held his hands about a yard apart. “I wasn’t sure what type it was. I thought maybe we could look it up in one of your reptile books.”

  “Okay.” Teddy brushed past him into the kitchen. Dan looked over at her still standing on the garage steps, as if to make sure she saw that he was trying.

  Teddy marched over and pushed the blinking button on the answering machine. “Hey, Ted-head, it’s your dad.” Dan walked abruptly into the other room. Teddy smiled to himself as he listened to the message. Giselle shut her eyes and counted to ten. If she’d had a croquet mallet handy, she would have smashed the machine to bits. She only hoped she’d have enough self-restraint to stop there.

  Teddy grabbed the phone off the counter and started to carry it out to the back stoop.

  “Don’t call him now,” Giselle said. She grabbed hold of the cord so he couldn’t take another step.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I said so.”

  He slammed the phone down on the counter, ran back to his room, and slammed that door. She heard the shower running in the bathroom. The wall clock said 6:15. She couldn’t imagine how they were going to make it through the evening. She wished she could run next door and bum a Valium from Lois, but those days of easy neighborliness — along with everything else — were gone for good. Maybe she should run out and rent a video, something they could all watch. And make some popcorn. She was still sitting at the kitchen table attempting to summon up the energy to drive to Blockbuster or the grocery store, which was closer and sometimes had a decent selection, when Dan walked out with his wet hair slicked back, dressed in fresh khakis and a coffee-
colored T-shirt that matched his eyes. He had shaved off the stubble.

  “I’m going to school to check my mail,” he told her. She nodded, understanding his desire to get out of the house even though he had just returned. “I might stop by Harvey’s on my way back. If you don’t mind.”

  Of course she minded, but what could she say? I think you should stay here so we can all spend a miserable evening together. She shook her head and tried to look and sound pleasant. “Say hello to Harvey for me. Thank him again for the flowers.”

  “I’ll only be an hour or two,” he said, stooping to give her a peck on the cheek. He reeked of shaving lotion. Up close she could see a couple of little cuts that hadn’t quite stopped bleeding.

  ***

  As soon as he was gone, she grabbed another beer from the fridge — the last one — and headed for their bedroom. There was dead silence as she passed Teddy’s room. She supposed that she should attempt to smooth things over, soothe his ruffled feathers, but she didn’t know how long Dan would be gone. Maybe he would have second thoughts and turn the car around. His blue backpack was slumped in the corner by the closet. A dingy mound of dirty underwear was on the floor near the hamper. She knelt down and reached into the backpack, feeling around for the hard edges of the blank book he used as a journal. He always bought the same kind — black with thin-ruled pages about the size of the missal she had received for her First Communion. There were a couple of paperbacks but no journal. Curious as to what he would have felt like reading, she pulled them out. A well-worn, yellowed copy of Siddhartha by Herman Hesse and a heavily underlined copy of Thoreau’s Walden. She had never read anything by Hesse. Her senior year of high school they had read Walden, but she never actually made it through the whole book; she had just skimmed it for the final exam. When she complained to Ed, who was in the same class, about how boring it was, he had surprised her by saying that he actually kind of liked it. Ed wasn’t much of a reader. She would have thought he was just saying it to impress her, but she knew he wasn’t the type. Even without reading the book, she had aced the exam while Ed ended up with a B–. Instead of feeling guilty, she had just felt superior.

  She opened the large front flap and there it was. Surprised that she’d actually found it, she sat down on the edge of the bed and started to flip through it. Her hands trembled; she sloshed some beer onto the sheets. His handwriting was even more illegible than usual. She grabbed a pair of his jockey shorts from the floor and blotted the spilled beer. She was afraid, but she had to know. Desperate times required desperate measures. She flipped to the last entry, about two-thirds of the way through the book. It took her an instant to register that it was in Spanish. She flipped back a few pages. The rest of the journal was in English. Right up to the April 24 entry, the last entry before Trina’s death. She could make out a word or phrase here and there, but her one semester of Spanish wasn’t up to the task of translation even under less fraught circumstances. Besides, the shock of it was too much for her. The fact that he had deliberately switched to another language, a language he knew she didn’t know, seemed to confirm her worst fears. It was as if she had found a one-way ticket to South America.

  Down the hall she heard Teddy flush the toilet. She put the journal back where she’d found it and looked at her watch. The poor kid hadn’t even had any supper, not that he had much appetite. He picked at whatever she set in front of him as if he suspected she was trying to poison him. “Hey!” she called out to him as soon as the bathroom door opened. He ignored her. She reached out and grabbed his T-shirt just as he was about to slip back into his room. It was a hideous tie-dyed lime green and purple Goosebumps shirt with a grotesque tarantula on the front. Compliments of Uncle Todd, who actually had a matching one, although on him it looked as if it had shrunk a size or two. “How about McDonald’s?” she asked. His favorite. She couldn’t just let him starve.

  “Okay.” He shrugged but seemed to perk up.

  Then she remembered that she didn’t have any cash. She had been meaning to get to the bank for days. The simplest errands seemed like arduous missions. “Hey, I just remembered. I don’t have any money. You think I could borrow five dollars?”

  He sighed and rolled his eyes but seemed pleased to help as he ran off to get his stash. “I’ll be warming up the car,” she called after him. She hoped that Dan wouldn’t come back while they were out. She thought about leaving him a note, but the thought of composing it seemed like too much work. Trying to strike the right tone. Cool, wounded, apologetic, conciliatory, matter-of-fact. She took a final swig of her beer and tossed the bottle into the trash. To hell with recycling. To hell with the environment.

  ***

  She must have fallen asleep. It was after midnight when she finally heard someone at the front door. She was lying on the couch, a book open on her chest like a prop. Since the accident she had been unable to make her way through a single page without her mind wandering off. She hadn’t heard the car, and she wondered why Dan would be using the front door. For a moment she was afraid that it was someone breaking in. She leaped up and looked out the window. She could see Harvey sitting at the curb in his vintage Volvo, watching as Dan fumbled with the lock. When she opened the door, he practically fell inside. Harvey pulled smoothly away from the curb.

  “Sorry.” Dan looked sheepish. “We had a few drinks. Didn’t realize how late it was.”

  His voice sounded warped. He looked green around the gills. She had never seen him drunk before. He preferred smoking pot. And even thoroughly stoned, he was always perfectly articulate. In an abstract, elliptical way she sometimes found annoying. But never pathetic.

  “I don’t feel so good,” he mumbled. “Couple aspirin.” He veered off in the general direction of the bathroom.

  “Shit,” she muttered to herself. A minute later she heard him cursing at the childproof cap and then the pitter-patter of pills spilling all over the tile floor. When she walked to the doorway, he was on his hands and knees scooping them clumsily, like a kid in a sandbox. His helplessness touched her. She knelt down beside him. “I’ll do it,” she told him. “Go lie down.”

  He didn’t protest. He patted her on the head in what she took to be a gesture of wordless gratitude and lurched toward the bedroom. When she arrived with a glass of water and two aspirin, he was already passed out cold. She set the glass and pills on the table beside him, pulled off his shoes, loosened his belt, and turned off the harsh overhead light. The lights in the hall and bathroom she left on in case he suddenly woke up nauseous. She figured he would sleep better alone. He was something of an insomniac even under normal circumstances. When they first started sleeping together, it used to bother her when she would wake up occasionally in the middle of the night and find him watching her sleep or reading a book in the other room. She thought all men were like Ed, who conked out the instant his head hit the pillow and slept like a log until the alarm rang.

  It was a nice night and she suddenly felt like taking a walk, getting out of the house. In Lincoln she wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but here it wasn’t safe. A teenage girl had been raped walking home from a babysitting job just half a block from her parents’ house.

  Giselle took some sheets and a pillow from the linen closet and made up a bed for herself on the sofa. A bag of Teddy’s half-eaten french fries was wilting on the coffee table. She nibbled a couple of cold fries as she gathered up the paper sack and paper cups and tossed them in the kitchen trash. At the last minute they had decided on the drive-through window instead of going inside. They both seemed to shrink from crowds these days. As if everyone were looking at them, whispering behind their backs. And to add insult to injury, everywhere they went, the world seemed populated by little girls Trina’s age, smiling and crying and full of life. She turned out the lights in the kitchen and living room.

  In the bathroom she heard a stray aspirin crunch underfoot as she brushed her teeth and washed her face. She hadn’t bothered to floss since the accident. She co
uld see the reproachful look in her dental hygienist’s eyes. Fuck her. She would gladly lose all her teeth to have her daughter back for one hour. Just one more hour to cuddle her and tell her how much Mama loves her. How if anything ever happened to her, she doesn’t know what she’d do.

  ***

  In the middle of the night Teddy woke up, shouting and trembling. She held him close until he quieted down, rocking him like an infant. She asked him what the nightmare was about. He said he couldn’t remember, but she knew he was lying. Dan slept through all the commotion. As she turned off the light in Teddy’s room, he said, “Mom?”

  She paused in the doorway but kept the light off, sensing the confessional hush of the darkness between them. “Yes,” she said softly.

  “Zack said when I grow up, I’m going to prison. He said the police are just waiting for me to finish school first.” His voice quivered. “Is that true?”

  “Oh, honey,” she sighed. “No. The police know it was an accident. I explained all that, remember? They know you didn’t mean to do it. The police are never going to bother you again.”

  “Even when I’m not a kid anymore?”

  “Never,” she said firmly.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive.” She walked over and picked up his Walkman off his bureau. “How about some waves?” she asked.

  “Okay.”

  She rewound the tape and settled the headset over his ears. As she bent over to kiss him good night, she could hear the surf lapping against the shore, faint and far away.

  ***

  In the morning Dan was sheepishly hungover. As if to make amends, he surprised her by suggesting that Teddy stay home from school. “It’s a beautiful day,” he said, squinting valiantly out the sunny window. “Let’s drive to the beach.” He even insisted on running out for Danishes. Without being told, he brought Teddy his favorite: a maple-iced long john. Teddy said thank you, but only picked at it. He seemed quiet and pale. When she pressed her hand to his forehead, he jerked away, saying that he felt fine. Across the kitchen table she sent him a telepathic message, pleading with him not to throw cold water on Dan’s heroic and fragile enthusiasm.