Lake Life

by David James Poissant

  “Cobra. Big motherfucker. People think there aren’t serpents in Iceland, but let me tell you.”

  It’s fun watching the bartender decide how to proceed, watching him weigh how much work a tip is worth.

  Michael starts in on the second glass, but the wine has begun to burn. The burn isn’t the warehouse fire of moonshine or the blowtorch of scotch on the rocks. No, this fire’s sneakier, a bouquet of flowers lightly gasolined. Lean in to get a whiff, and the red wine strikes a match. He needs something to eat, something to settle the tannin-acid churn, so he orders the cheese plate, hoping it comes with crackers.

  The cheese plate, when it comes, does not come with crackers, just cheese, a big ol’ helping of gourmet mold, thin slices arranged in geometric patterns on the plate. Very well, then. He’ll eat cheese.

  The bartender asks where in Iceland Michael’s from.

  “Reykjavík,” Michael says.

  “You’re serious?” the bartender says. “I’ve never met someone from there.”

  “You probably have. We’re all over. We blend in. We’re like those insects shaped like sticks.”

  Michael feels himself smiling. He feels strangely good, like maybe everything will be all right. Maybe they’ll drag the lake and find the boy alive. Maybe Diane will miscarry and things will go back to how they were. He thinks this and does not feel bad. A minute later, he feels bad for how bad he didn’t feel.

  He drains his glass, and the bartender upends the wine bottle, filling the glass again. People say five glasses to a bottle, but when you pour them right, it’s three.

  “It must be cold there,” the bartender says.

  “A common misconception,” Michael says. “Greenland’s ice, and Iceland’s green. In summer, we wear shorts. That’s when the snakes come out.”

  The bartender wipes the bar down with his rag.

  “And we have special horses, little fellas. They’re trained to keep the snakes away.”

  “Jesus,” the bartender says. “I had no idea.”

  “Sharks too. We harpoon them, let them rot for half a year, then eat them. In Iceland, rotten shark’s a delicacy.”

  This part, the most farfetched, is true. And with this truth, he’s lost his audience. The bartender looks away. He brings two fingers to his mustache, pulls on it, and lets go. Michael wants the mustache to coil into place, like that of a villain perched over a woman tied to the train tracks, but the mustache only droops.

  He eats more cheese. He watches the wine, determined to make this glass last.

  The wine’s definitely kicking in, and he’s adrift. A friendly buzz electrifies his frontal lobe. He should be getting home. There’s moonshine at the house to drink, fish in the lake to help his father catch.

  “Just one more bottle,” Michael says.

  The bartender hesitates, then pulls a second bottle from the wall, but he’s interrupted by a dark-haired woman coming through the door.

  “Shit, Lou,” she says, “don’t pour him that.”

  The woman slips onto a stool beside Michael. She wears a silver necklace and a shimmery black dress. Michael doesn’t know anything about fabrics, but this one undulates under the bar lights like the lake under the moon. She’s too dressed up for church, too elegant for a funeral, and well overdressed for a bar in the middle of the day.

  “You don’t want that red,” she says. “If you’re on a budget, at least go for the La Crema, the pinot. The house wine here is swill.”

  Michael nods, and the bartender swaps bottles. If he’s offended by swill, he doesn’t show it, and Michael senses these two are friends.

  The woman’s lipstick is too red, her checks too rouged. She’s overly made-up, like an older woman trying to pass for young, except she’s young already, younger than Michael, thirty at the most.

  “I didn’t catch your name,” she says.

  “I didn’t give it,” Michael says. He’s not flirting. He’s flustered. He was happy drinking with the miserable mustached man, but this woman’s arrival has thrown off the afternoon.

  “This is Miss Gwendolyn DeMarco,” Lou says. “Gwen, this man’s from Iceland.”

  “I’m Michael,” he tells them.

  Lou smiles at Gwen, but Gwen’s eyes stay on Michael.

  “My dad’s from Iceland,” Gwen says.

  Lou grins and hits Michael on the arm. “Hey,” he says, “you’re right. Stick bugs!”

  Lou pours Michael a glass, then opens a second bottle and pours glasses for Gwen and himself. This wine smells better than the first, raspberries and lavender, and goes down smooth, no cheese required.

  “What part of Iceland are you from?” Gwen asks.

  “Reykjavík,” he says. It’s the only Icelandic city he knows.

  “Which district?”

  “District?”

  “East or west of the city center?”

  Michael shuts his eyes. The buzz is getting to be too much. He can’t do this anymore.

  “I’m not from Iceland,” he says.

  “Neither is my father,” she says. “I’m just fucking with you. I wanted to see how long you’d keep it going.”

  She smiles, and there’s so much makeup, but the smile seems genuine. Lou doesn’t smile. He turns to the sink behind the bar and runs his dishrag under water.

  “He’s sensitive,” Gwen whispers.

  They drink, and Michael offers Gwen his cheese, from which she picks a piece. She opens her mouth wide enough to keep her lipstick in place. Already, her wineglass rim is red.

  Lou shuts off the sink. He stands in steam. By now, his rag must be glistening. He turns and tops off all three glasses.

  “What are we drinking to?” Gwen asks.

  Michael would like to drink to the memory of the boy, but trying to remember his name, all he comes up with are those orange floats spinning, bumping the side of the boat.

  “To Iceland,” Michael says.

  Gwen laughs. Lou doesn’t. “To Iceland.” They drink. They set their glasses down.

  Lou pulls a pack of Marlboros from his apron pocket and a cigarette from the pack.

  “Back in a minute,” he says, and leaves through a door behind the bar.

  Michael drinks more wine. It’s soothing, being away from his family, but he misses Diane. He’s sure she loves him still. Like, a couple of nights ago, he forgot his mouth guard before bed, and she woke him in his grinding, then brought the mouth guard to him, freshly scrubbed. To hand-wash another person’s spitty dental appliance, now that is love, the kind that never leaves you, the kind that stays beside you when you’re old. His father’s right. He needs to fix this. He’d be a fool to lose Diane.

  Yet, given the chance to prove, if not love, his affection at least, what does he do? He fucks it up. He trades the inexpensive print Diane would have treasured for the chance to fuck over some guy he’ll never see again. All because he thought the man thought he was better than Michael.

  And who knows if even that is true? What if everyone with money isn’t always looking down on him? What if thinking so is easier than admitting the things he thinks about himself?

  Behind the bar, the wall is mirrored where a row of bottles ought to be, and Michael watches Gwen in the mirror. Her stool creaks, and she turns to face him. Her dress cut low, the silver necklace disappears between her breasts. She wears no wedding ring. She splays her hands on the bar, as though to emphasize this point.

  “Where are you from, really?” Gwen says. Her lips are very red.

  He tells her Texas. He lifts his glass, finds it empty, and fills his glass halfway. Already his second bottle is getting awfully low.

  “Here,” Gwen says, tipping her bottle and topping off his glass. Her hand finds his arm, two fingers at his wrist, as though checking for a pulse. He lets the hand linger there a second, which is a second too long, before he pulls his arm away.

  He should leave. He’s never cheated, and he ought to pay and leave right now.

  Alternatively, he could
keep drinking and see where this goes. He doesn’t want Gwen. The attention, it’s just so flattering, like he’s stumbled into someone else’s life. Michael’s life isn’t like this. In all the afternoons and evenings he’s spent in bars, for all the desperate men he’s seen trying to pick women up, he can’t think of a time a woman’s hit on him.

  And is this how it happened to his father, attention turned to flattery turned to indiscretion before he knew what he was doing? He can’t picture it, can’t fathom who would want to fuck his dad.

  The bar’s air-conditioning kicks on, and cool air shoots from a dust-encrusted vent overhead.

  “What do you do in Texas, Michael?” Gwen asks. “Wait, let me guess. You’re an architect.”

  Michael shakes his head. If the bruising and the bandage hasn’t scared her off, maybe learning what he does will do the trick.

  “Lawyer.”

  “Nope.”

  “You’re a doctor. No. CFO! You’re head of finance for a Fortune 500 company.”

  “Stop,” he says. “Please. Every guess makes it worse when you find out.”

  Gwen frowns. “Come on. How bad could it be?”

  “I sell shoes.” It’s been a while since he last said it out loud. “In Fort Worth, there’s a shitty indoor mall. ‘The Sad Mall,’ people call it. Half the stores are gated. Even the pretzel place shut down. There’s not much left. A Sears, a Sbarro, an optical boutique. And Foot Locker. That’s me.”

  Gwen smiles. “So, you’re a business owner. What’s wrong with that?”

  “Not owner,” Michael says.

  “Manager?”

  “Not manager. And I’ll save you some time. I’m not the shift manager or the floor manager or a sales associate or a junior sales associate or an assistant sales associate.”

  “What’s lower than assistant sales associate?”

  He sips his wine. “Junior assistant sales associate. Low as you can go. And you know what’s funny? I’ve been there the longest. Every person I work beneath, I trained.”

  Gwen’s stool squeaks, and she turns back to the bar. The cheese plate’s still full, slices gone sweaty under the bar lights, and she eats another piece.

  “Can you imagine?” Michael says. “To be thirty-three, taking orders from eighteen-year-olds? Spending the day on your knees, lacing sneakers you can’t even afford, slipping them onto other people’s feet. Do you know how bad other people’s feet smell, Gwen?”

  Gwen looks in the mirror and fluffs her hair with both hands.

  “I’m Al Bundy! My life’s a joke, and I’m the punch line!”

  No more flirting. She’s finished with him now. Once more, his life is his own.

  “And the customers! My God. You wouldn’t believe how they treat employees.”

  Lou’s back, smelling like smoke.

  “He gets it!” Michael says. “Don’t you, Lou? Lou, tell Gwen just how awful people are.”

  “People aren’t awful,” Gwen says.

  “They are. People are the worst. That thing the girl said. The Jewish girl. What was her name? The girl who hid from Nazis, kept a diary?”

  “Anne Frank?”

  “Anne Frank! That thing she wrote: ‘In spite of everything…’ What’s the quote?”

  “I know the line you mean,” Gwen says.

  Michael knows he’s drunk. He knows he should shut up.

  Gwen looks at Lou. Maybe they’re lovers, maybe just old friends. Whatever their connection, it’s just like at the gallery. Michael is the story they’ll tell all their friends.

  Michael pulls his phone from his pocket and googles the quote. “ ‘In spite of everything, I still believe that people are truly good at heart.’ ”

  Things are going sideways now, the barstool beneath him loosening.

  “ ‘In spite of everything, I still believe that people are truly good at heart.’ That’s the line. And you know what, Gwen? It’s bullshit. It sounds nice, but it’s bullshit.”

  “Please shut up,” Gwen says.

  “I’ll tell you this much. Anne Frank never worked a day at Foot Locker.”

  Michael doesn’t see the fist coming. He’s on his barstool, then he’s on the floor.

  Briefly, on the floor, the boy floats by. He drifts, eyes shut, just out of reach. His limbs are spread. His face is calm. Then the boy is gone, and Lou is standing over him.

  Michael’s been punched before, though Lou never seemed the type to throw a punch. Maybe Lou’s Jewish. Maybe he felt he was protecting Gwen. Maybe he’s just had enough of Michael. Regardless, there’s a reason Michael knows every watering hole in the Dallas–Fort Worth area. It’s because he rarely drinks without getting kicked out. Most places, he’s lucky to make it a week before pissing someone off.

  “I’m sorry,” Lou says. He offers a hand, and Michael takes it, lets Lou lift him to his feet. The room spins. Gwen watches from her stool.

  The floor is a jumble of triangles and squares, and it takes Michael a minute to comprehend that he knocked the cheese plate over when he fell.

  He pulls his wallet from his pocket. He doesn’t know the price of the wine. Even if he did, he’s drunk too much to do the math. He drops what cash he has onto the bar. He knows it’s not enough. He’s leaving, but Lou’s voice stops him at the door.

  “What really happened to your head?”

  Michael checks the bandage, still in place. His jaw hurts from Lou’s fist.

  “I tried to save a life,” he says. “I failed.”

  30.

  Thad finds Nico’s empty. Not closed, but unattended. He calls for Teddy, but Teddy doesn’t emerge from the back.

  The Blue Cross Teddy sold him has Thad anxious, that or a weekend surrounded by family, plagued by death, has Thad anxious and the Blue Cross can’t keep up. He needs a strain with less sativa, maybe. But Teddy’s the expert. Teddy will know what he needs. What he needs, really, is his medications adjusted. That happens every five years, give or take: ’05, ’08, ’13. It’s 2018. It’s time. But that will have to wait for next week. For now, Teddy’s weed will have to do.

  Later, the ice cream parlor will be packed with locals and vacationers alike, the deck chairs full. But this has always been Thad’s favorite time, the midday lull, too late for lunch, the evening crowd still hours away. He stands a minute more in the parlor, then checks the deck. He follows the stairs down to the porch, then follows the path through the trees to the river rock he found himself on Friday night. Smooth and wide, the rock overhangs the river like a tongue hesitant to taste, and Teddy sits on the rock, smoking a joint.

  Teddy waves Thad over. His hair is greasy. His shirt, stomach-stretched and threadbare, reads: LOVE IN AN ELEVATOR. Thad doesn’t have to look to know that the back reads: LIVIN’ IT UP WHEN I’M GOIN’ DOWN.

  Teddy offers him the joint, which he takes. He hesitates, then returns the joint to Teddy without taking a hit. He wants to be right-thinking when Jake comes home. If Jake comes home. He hadn’t planned to give his boyfriend an ultimatum yesterday, hadn’t expected Jake to take off early this morning without saying where he was going. Asheville, Thad’s assuming, though whether that’s to tell Marco off or to jump in bed with him, Thad couldn’t say. Either way, he doesn’t need to be stoned in the middle of the day. He needs to wait, sober, for Jake’s call.

  Teddy takes another hit. “Where’s the fam?”

  “I don’t know,” Thad says, joining Teddy on the rock. He sits. “Everyone spread out for the day. Mom’s at church. Dad’s fishing.”

  “What’s he fishing for?”

  “The usual. Bass, brim, crappie.”

  “Crappie,” Teddy says, pronouncing it agriculturally—crop-ie—not the way Thad’s dad says it, like something to do with shit. “Crappie are too easy in that lake. You get on top of them, in a few hours you’ll have a freezer full.”

  It’s true. Thad and his father have caught so many in one night that, by the third or fourth dozen, the fishing lost its appeal and began to f
eel like work, at least to Thad. Less so to his father, who could probably fish day and night without tiring.

  “Fucking crappie,” Teddy says. “I don’t trust any animal that comes to you. My dinner, I want to outsmart it. Crappie are dumb as mullet. Probably you could whistle their wet asses into the boat.”

  Teddy is a stoner, sure. But he may also be a genius. There is much that stands in the way of this hypothesis, but whistle their wet asses? No weed is that good, and Thad feels the pang he feels when found poetry arrives better than any line his pen has ever put to paper.

  “Give me liberty,” Teddy says, “and give me trout. Give me a rainbow, a brook, a brown. That should be the challenge. Not how many fish a person can catch in a day. Not weight or length. One’s goals should be nobler. Composition, a variety of kind. That should be the fisher’s goal.”

  He takes a hit, and Thad can’t stand it, the smoke, the smell, the river, the clear, warm day. He takes the joint. He takes a hit.

  “A nobleness of goals,” Teddy says. “I haven’t pulled a brown trout from this river in years. Yet, should the universe see fit, should I catch three different trout from this stream in one day—a rainbow, a brook, a brown—that day I’ll put down my pole for good and die a happy man.”

  Thad takes another hit. Already he’s too far gone. On the far shore, the leaves of trees are dancing, and the trees’ long arms reach over the river, as though to shake his hand. Thad pulls his shirtfront over his face.

  “I should have warned you,” Teddy says. “This weed’s strong.”

  Thad tugs his shirt away. Across the river, the trees are just trees, the branches just branches.

  Twice today he’s tried Jake’s cell. Twice, Jake’s failed to answer. Thad wants this day to be over. He wants to know whether they’ll stay together, relationship open or closed.

  “There’s a brookie who lives under here,” Teddy says.

  Teddy takes a last pull on the joint and flicks the spent roach downstream. The river rushes past them, but the world beyond the water lags in stoned slow motion.

  Then Teddy’s on his belly on the rock. He reminds Thad of a sea lion, a sea lion with hands and feet and a sweaty Aerosmith shirt. He beckons, and Thad joins him on his stomach at his side.