by James King
The funny feeling had moved up to April’s throat, threatening to explode. “I am so sorry.”
“That car’s had a pretty . . . what do you call it? . . . charmed life.” Her grandfather patted her hand. He continued. “It’s what—twentysomething years old? Never been in an accident. Somehow, that’s just not right. You can’t reasonably expect to live that long and not get dinged a few times. Sooner or later, there’s got to be some sort of payback. It’s like what Clare—your grandmother—used to tell me, that sooner or later—”
He stopped abruptly and stared at the floor. April wasn’t sure what to do. This was one of those awkward moments that she found both baffling and annoying. Was her grandfather just putting a happy face on the fact that he was truly and mightily pissed off? Did he want her to apologize again? She wanted to. But he suddenly seemed on edge and she wasn’t sure what effect her words would have. Maybe he’d tell her sorry wasn’t good enough. Maybe he’d tell her he understood. Worst of all, maybe he’d tell her that the driving lessons weren’t such a good idea, after all.
“Anyway,” he said suddenly, “lots of people have trouble remembering which way to turn in a skid. Although most people don’t normally assume the gas pedal is the answer.”
He winked.
April wanted to laugh. She tried to laugh. In fact, she thought she was laughing. But she was crying and she put her head in her hands and leaned forward and sobbed and waited for her grandfather to wrap his arms around her, but he just seemed to sit there, which made her cry harder, but then, finally, she felt his hands on her shoulder and she was being pulled forward and someone was murmuring in her ear and she felt and then smelled the breath, but it wasn’t smoky or tobacco-y but more garlicky . . .
Her mother.
It took a while for April to stop crying but probably less time than it would have taken if it had been her grandfather holding her and stroking her hair. When she stopped and looked up, she saw that her mother was squatting in front of her, giving her one of those meaningful I ’m-looking-you-straight-in-the-eyes-to-show-I-care l ooks that she probably read about in Parents magazine.
“So. Tell me what happened.”
“April’s been working hard on this school assignment of hers,” her grandfather answered. “So I thought she deserved some hot chocolate. The kind you used to—”
“I’m asking my daughter,” her mother said, not taking her eyes off April’s. Must have been a technique covered in the article—maybe a sidebar tip: Do Not Break Eye Contact When Interrogating Your Delinquent Teenager.
“You asked what happened,” her grandfather continued. “That’s what happened. We were headed to Friendly’s when we hit a little ice. Knocked some poor guy’s mailbox over. Accident. That’s all.”
Still staring at April but in a low voice that April knew was actually the first rumblings of an impending volcanic eruption, her mother said, “That’s all?”
April felt her grandfather shift his weight.
“Yeah. We were going to Friendly’s to get a hot chocolate like I said, and we got in an accident. That’s all. No biggie, as you kids used to say.”
Now her mother finally broke eye contact and stood, directing her death stare at her grandfather. April saw that her grandfather was smiling, but she knew—and it felt like a secret—that it was a phony smile. But his smile wilted as her mother stepped closer.
“Easy for you to say, old man, when it’s someone else, not you, who needed stitches to close a huge gash just inches from her eye. No biggie for you!”
“Mom! Chill!”
“Don’t tell me to chill. Do you have any idea how terrifying it was to get that phone call to come to the hospital? I’m in the middle of a meeting and I get this call and I have to rush to the hospital not knowing anything. Not knowing if you were alive or—”
“Uh, Mom? Since I’m the one who called you, I’m not sure you had to wonder if—”
“Don’t smart-mouth me, young lady. You know what I mean.”
April shook her head and looked away. She wanted to sleep.
Her mother turned her attention back to her grandfather.
“Let’s cut to the chase, old man. Were you drinking?”
April watched her grandfather smile sadly. He looked down and didn’t answer. If it hadn’t been for his white stubble and the gross gray hair in his ear, he would have looked like a little boy—a little boy who needed to be rescued.
“Mom, Grandpa’s the one who insisted we come here. I wanted to go home.”
“Well, bully for him,” Marcy said. “For the first time ever, he demonstrates more sense than a fifteen-year-old. Stop the presses.”
The sudden silence that followed her mother’s remark reminded April that they were in the emergency room of a hospital. She supposed that their argument was helping the other patients take their minds off their pain, if only for a few minutes.
“Which Friendly’s?” her mother asked, locked in on her grandfather.
“You know which one,” he replied. “The one on Forest.”
“Oh! The one on Forest.”
“Right. The one we used to go to. On Forest.”
“The one on Forest that closed five years ago? That one on Forest?”
April tried not to look over as her grandfather reached down to fiddle with one of the snaps on his boots. “Really? Didn’t know that. Guess we would have found out when we got there.”
Her mother snorted so loudly April thought she might honk out half her nose. “You are so full of it,” she said.
“Leave him alone, Mom.”
“I will! And so will you! You’re not to get in a car with him again.”
“Jesus, Mom.”
“I’m not going to tell you again. Don’t ‘Jesus’ me.” Marcy turned to her father. “Okay, Billy Boy, here it is. You can’t take care of your house, you can’t remember that Friendly’s, a few blocks from your house, closed years ago, and April tells me you sometimes forget her name. It’s time to stop driving.”
April felt the flush again—not at her mother’s assholeness, but at her own betrayal of her grandfather by mentioning the memory lapses. To April’s immense relief, her grandfather, head still bowed, tilted his head toward April just enough to make eye contact. He looked like a playground coconspirator. He winked.
Her mother’s cell phone rang. She glanced at the display.
“Mortgage broker. I’ve got to take this.”
“Uh, mom?”
April pointed to a sign on the wall: ABSOLUTELY NO CELL PHONES.
“Stay here,” Marcy said.
As if I have a choice, April thought.
She and her grandfather sat quietly for a few moments. A heavily accented voice on the PA called for a Dr. Woodson.
“Thanks for lying for me,” April said.
“Who lied? I told your mom we got in an accident. Truth.”
“The hot chocolate . . . Friendly’s . . .”
“That’s true, too. I just didn’t tell you I was going to treat you. A surprise. You like surprises, don’t you?”
“But Mom thinks you were driving. And now she thinks you’re too old to drive. And she thinks this is all your fault.”
Bill reached over and patted April’s hand. His hand felt thin and papery.
“Two things. First, your mom is right. It is my fault. Second, you can’t control what people think—no matter what you say or even do. Sometimes it’s not worth the effort.” He winked again. “Life lesson number whatever.”
There was a sudden swish of the curtain opening and closing, and a white coat appeared before them, worn by a short, rotund man with a few wisps of hair and a nose exploding with red veins.
“I’m Dr. Brennan,” he said, and extended his hand to April’s grandfather. “And you are . . . ?”
“Yes, I still am. Plan to be for a while.”
The doctor frowned. “Your relationship to the young lady here?”
“Grandfather. Plan to be that f
or a while, too.” He gave April a playful jab in the side with his elbow. Definitely coconspirators.
“And her mother or father is . . . ?”
“Her mother is outside on her cell phone. She’ll be back in a second. Never mind about her father. Out of the picture.”
April’s grandfather smiled at the doctor as if he’d just remarked on what a beautiful day it was. The doctor seemed confused.
“I see,” he said. “Well, I have to get to a consultation, so if Mom has any questions, she can call me.” He turned to April. “In the meantime, young lady, you should take it easy for the rest of the day. Tylenol for the pain, if you need it. Any questions?”
“Nope,” her grandfather answered.
The doctor glanced at him, then back at April. “I was asking the young lady,” he said.
“No,” April said. “No questions.”
“See?” her grandfather said. “She’s tough. Like her granddad.”
The doctor didn’t seem to be listening. He jotted something on the chart. He then clicked his pen and put it in the front pocket of his white coat. He looked at April seriously, and she had a feeling he was about to do her the immense favor of dispensing some wise and kindly doctorly advice.
“You should see the people who come in here who don’t wear a seat belt,” he intoned. “They often don’t walk out. Judging from that cut and the bump on your head from the steering wheel, it’s a good thing you were wearing one.” He turned to leave, which was fine with April. The guy gave her the creeps. But just then the curtain opened. April didn’t even look up. She could feel who it was.
“And you are?” the doctor asked.
“Marcy Shea. Her mother. Can I have a word with you, Doctor?”
She didn’t give him much of a choice, April saw, as her mother grabbed the doctor by the elbow and led him out into the hall. April looked up at her grandfather. He winked at her.
“Don’t worry, kid. We’ll get through this.”
Before April could respond, her mother was in front of them, staring hard at April.
“So. You were driving.”
“Look, Marcy.”
“Shut up old, old man,” her mother said. “I’m speaking to my daughter. I already know—oh, god, do I know—that you’re a liar. I need to find out if my daughter is.”
Was this it? April wondered. Was this the moment she had been planning for, the moment she had been writing about in her journal, in her songs? The moment, finally, to use the word that she knew would hurt her mom most. Failure as a mother. Failure as a wife. Failure in careers. In her daydreams of the event, she delivered the verdicts calmly, her mother cowering, cowering, until she begged for forgiveness. They would be in a restaurant, and she pictured herself standing up suddenly, towering over her mother, and finally walking away to leave her mother staring at the half-eaten Chilean sea bass or whatever.
Later, when April thought back to this moment in the hospital, she wondered if her grandfather, her coconspirator, had somehow sensed what April was planning and had decided, as April had a few minutes earlier decided for him, that she needed to be rescued. Because it was he who spoke up at this point, not April. He looked calm, but sad.
“Your daughter is not a liar, Marcy,” he said. “She’s a good kid. You’ve done a great job.”
Her mother’s reaction was exactly what April had been hoping for in her fantasies: surprise, shock, and—best of all—silence.
And then, without a look back—no nod, no conspiratorial wink, no nothing—her grandfather walked down the hall. April and her mother watched him go. He looked tall to April. Tall and strong, even in that ridiculous jacket and those embarrassing galoshes and even if he took small steps and had to pause at the end of the hall, right beneath the exit sign, to figure out which way to go.
CHAPTER TEN
Marcy winced when Hank smacked his lips after a sip of merlot and leaned forward, nearly upsetting his water glass.
“It’s time,” he said, looking serious. “It won’t be easy. But you’ve got to do it.”
She was reminded of the old joke that the best way to tell if a lawyer is lying is to see if his mouth is moving. Substitute “male” for “lawyer” and you’ve got a pretty good rule of thumb.
She didn’t want to think that way about Hank. After all, Hank had done nothing but help her get acclimated to the office, offer tips on showing houses, and warn her about some of the more obscure legalese and shady tactics she’d run up against during closings. He’d asked her to dinner several times and was in every way a gentleman, focusing all his attention on her: how she liked her job, what she liked to do when she wasn’t working, even what she preferred to talk about when she was with a “nosy old sales hound like Hank Johnson.”
Hank Johnson made her laugh. Given the crap she was going through with April—the moods, the long silences, the threats to someday ignore her the way she, Marcy, was ignoring the old man—Marcy appreciated anyone who could make her smile. And he listened, too. He didn’t pretend to listen as a prelude to boasting about the glory days as a high school football star or some such puerile bull. He asked questions about what she had just said. He actually knew how to converse.
Still, Hank Johnson was a male. And most males, particularly the one she had been married to for nearly ten years, eventually and inevitably revealed their small personality quirks, like lying, avoiding responsibility, and trying to stick their dicks into . . . well, anything. She couldn’t let go of what that woman had said about Hankering Hank.
“Did I say something wrong?” he asked now, jolting back as if he suddenly realized he was getting too close to the shock line of an invisible fence. “I should mind my own business. Forget what I said.”
“No, no,” Marcy said. She refolded her napkin for about the fourth time. “It’s just that I don’t think we’re going to get much for it. The way he’s let the place go, the value must have dropped by at least 50 percent. My brothers and I are going to have to . . .”
Hank was shaking his head like a bobble doll.
“What?”
Hank held up both hands just above the table. “I wasn’t talking about the house,” he said. “I’m just saying you need to go see him. I know it won’t be easy, with what happened with April and all. But from what you’ve told me, he’s trying to reach out. Making a mess of it, but trying. . . .”
Marcy was caught between smiling and crying. He knew so much more about her than she did about him. But then, he asked a hell of a lot more questions of her than she did of him. And he was right about her father.
The son of a bitch.
And so early the next afternoon she found herself on the familiar street, driving slowly and trying to observe everything she saw from the fresh new perspective she was determined to take during her overdue, unannounced visit. There were still traces of dirty snow on the side of the road, but people were out and about, taking advantage of the thaw. She passed a father and son digging a hole next to a damaged mailbox, their dedication to home improvement a sharp contrast to what she encountered a few minutes later as she approached the front walk of her father’s house, where signs of early spring life—to say nothing of spring cleaning—were nowhere to be seen. She saw through the picture window that he was watching television. He didn’t notice her even when she threw her hands up in the air to regain her balance on the wet leaves, extra slick from months under snow.
“Never did rake the goddamn yard, did you?” she called out in a mock-angry voice when she walked in the house.
The only reply came from the television. Her father was asleep in front of it, pipe in his lap. It looked—and now she noticed the smell—like he’d been smoking it recently.
She went to touch his shoulder when someone on the television said, “What have you got to say for yourself, Bill?”
It was a Jerry Springer-type show. Marcy had no idea who the host was. She wondered if her father did. She wondered if he actually watched this crap every day. The
Bill in this case was a pale, skinny, twenty-something skinheaded neo-Nazi. Facing him in a chair opposite was a young black woman, a young nebbish-looking man, and a priest.
“Bill?” the Jerry-host asked.
What have you got to say for yourself, Bill? Marcy imagined herself sitting on the stage, flanked by Nick and Mike. Jerry would look into the camera and say, “Now let’s hear Dad’s side of the story.” The old man would walk onstage to a chorus of boos. The camera would zoom in on a few beefy security guys snapping to attention, ready if the crowd rushed forward. Her father would take his seat, the camera capturing every twitch while the studio audience catcalled.
And now, Bill, the Jerry-host would say, preacher now, stern orchestrator of this Come to Jesus moment, You’ve heard what the children, your children, have said. You’ve heard in their voices the pain in their hearts, a pain that hasn’t diminished even after all these years. Now it’s your turn. I’m going to ask you a simple question. You owe your children a simple, straightforward answer. This is your opportunity, once and for all, to clear things up, your chance to tell your side of the story. And the question, Bill, is simply, finally, this: Why, Bill?
Go ahead, Bill.
We’re waiting, Billy Boy.
How do you respond, old man?
“What in holy hell?” Her father suddenly stood, brushing away ashes from his trousers.
“Christ almighty, what are you doing, sneaking up on me like that?”
“Sorry,” Marcy said. “You were asleep. I was about to—”
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Is Marcy okay?”
Marcy couldn’t help feeling touched by his concern and therefore put aside the twinge of worry she felt at the misnomer. “She’s fine, as you can see. Do you mean April?”
“You know who I mean.”
“I’ll let you know if I ever have a civil conversation with her.” Marcy took off her jacket and threw it on the newspapers that covered the couch. “Since when did you become a Jerry Springer fan? Or whoever?”
“Ah, turn that off, will you?”
“I see that you’ve kept up with your cleaning,” Marcy said, fishing through the clutter for the remote. She swept her arm around her to extend her judgment beyond the piles of newspapers to the discarded tobacco pouches and the dirty glasses, cups, and mugs. But the old man merely sat back in his chair and gazed indifferently at the mess around him.