Storm Tide

by Marge Piercy

  “Are you going to marry her?”

  He gripped the sides of his chair. “No, but what am I supposed to do? I feel trapped. She had no place to go. Laramie has to have a home.”

  “David, she has a job. She ought to be getting child support from the boy’s father. Do you want me to check if Massachusetts has a reciprocal agreement with Washington? I would pursue this for her if you want me to.”

  “I should try calling him,” David said dispiritedly.

  She wanted to shake him. He seemed flaccid, without will. “I ask you again, do you want to marry her? You seem bound on that road.”

  “I can’t hurt the boy, Judith.”

  “Do you think you’d feel this guilty about a boy you met twelve weeks ago if you saw your son on a more regular basis? If you felt truly involved with Terry?”

  “I can’t deal with that many ‘ifs.’ Terry’s my son, and the more I’m around Laramie, the bigger hole I feel in my life, hardly seeing him ….” He shook his head as if he had no hope.

  “How long do you intend for her to live with you?”

  “Just until she finds a decent place.”

  “Is she looking?”

  “Is this your best courtroom manner?” He tried a grin. It didn’t come off.

  “I use the tools I have at hand to come at the truth, David.” She forced herself to lean back in her chair. “I assume your lack of answer means she is not looking. So you plan to live with her until death do you part?”

  “I read the real estate ads to her every week.”

  “David, we can barely see each other. When we do, I never know when she is going to have the boy call or charge in herself. We can’t be together in your place. You’re always nervous with me now. If you want to go on seeing me, give her a real honest deadline.”

  “I’ll try to talk to her again. I’ll do something. I promise.”

  “Are you using condoms with her?”

  “This is not something I want to talk about. Besides, she’s on the pill.”

  “She told me she intends to have another baby with you. And that you want to have one with her. Those are her plans. Not law school.”

  He looked as if she had slapped him hard. With a sharp intake of breath, he sat in silence for several moments. “You misunderstood her.”

  “Not possible. She said she wanted to have your baby. And you wanted to father a child with her. I am quoting.”

  “I never said that. She never asked me. No, I don’t want her to have a child with me. That’s all I need!”

  “It is one hell of a lot more than I need, David.” She folded her arms tight across her chest. “I’ve told you before, and I meant it, that I would help you with getting a better situation with your son. You need an arrangement where Terry spends part of every year with you here, maybe a month in the summer, or you’ll never have a genuine relationship with him. If you really want a child, I would never rule out that possibility. More and more women my age have babies. But not while Gordon’s alive. If you want our relationship to continue as more than political allies and somewhat distant friends, then you will change your life. You will get her out of your house or at least begin serious preparations for that happening. And you will straighten things out with her about whether or not the two of you are going to make a baby. Am I getting through?”

  “Loud and clear.”

  “Good, because, David, I mean it all. I really mean it.”

  DAVID

  I found Liam’s telephone number in Crystal’s address book. I copied it while she was sleeping. I did not want to call him but I had no choice. I was not Laramie’s father. I loved him but I did not want to live with his mother. I hated feeling that the choice was her becoming homeless or becoming my wife. Everything had moved too fast. It was Judith who said, “Do you realize you’re living with a woman and child you only met twelve weeks ago?”

  I was going to ask Liam to take some responsibility for his son, to cough up some child support. Fifty dollars a week could go a long way out here, could mean Crystal finding a decent place of her own. If Laramie knew his dad was thinking about him, even enough to write a check once a month, it might give him a little confidence. In Crystal’s photograph album, Liam was a slender black-haired Irishman with a clenched smile and an icy stare. He was wearing black slacks, a white shirt, with his feet propped up, drinking a beer. I carried Liam’s picture in my mind as I carried his telephone number in my wallet. I enacted threats. Attempts to reason. Warm stories about his son. I don’t know how many times I sat behind the wheel of my truck rehearsing. I decided finally that calling him would do no good. Then, one day at work, I picked up the phone and dialed simply because I was afraid to. It was Saturday, one in the afternoon here, ten on the West Coast.

  Crystal talked about Liam the way some ’Nam vets remembered the war. With a trembling bitterness, her eyes glazed over in anger and pain. He hit her when she was pregnant and wouldn’t look at his child. Finally, I didn’t see any point to a soft approach. I wasn’t the law, but neither was Laramie just some unpaid debt.

  “Hello?” It was not a man’s voice. It sounded like a little girl.

  “Who’s this?” I asked, wondering if his number had changed.

  “I’m Molly! It’s me … Is this Uncle Mike?”

  “Is Liam there?”

  “Daddy!” she yelled. “Daddy and Sean are washing the car.”

  “Could you get him please? I’m calling long distance.”

  “Okay …” She let the phone fall with a clatter and I could hear running steps. I could hear some kind of Irish music playing and some appliance running—a mixer? a blender? It stopped. A woman’s voice called something. I waited and waited. I was ready to hang up when a man picked up the receiver. “Uncle Mike? Is that yourself, back home safe and sound?”

  “No, this is David Greene calling from Massachusetts. I’m a friend of Crystal Sinclair.” She had once mentioned that he had not lost his accent. What she hadn’t said was that there was music in it, a kind of whimsical, almost poetic rhythm. But as soon as I announced my connection to Crystal, the music turned to sarcasm. “A friend, you say? That kind of woman doesn’t have men friends. So you’re screwing the little lady, am I right? She’s your problem now.”

  “That may be. But the boy is yours.”

  “Christ, man, that’s a laugh. How do I know he’s mine? I wasn’t her only one. You should know that by now.”

  “I think he’s yours, Liam. I think you couldn’t pass a blood test to prove he wasn’t and you know it.”

  I was bluffing. I didn’t know a thing about blood testing, less how you went about forcing him to take one. Nor had Crystal mentioned other boyfriends. I heard a shuffling on the other end of the line and half expected the receiver to slam down on my ear, when Liam let out a long mournful breath. “I told her I’d pay for her not to have it. I begged her not to. I got down on my knees and pleaded. But she was always pushing. First she moved in with some cock and bull excuse. Then she got herself pregnant.”

  “I don’t think she got herself pregnant.”

  “Think what you goddamn want. I kept telling her I didn’t want a child with her. I liked to be with her, sure, but not after she did that. Not after she tricked me, told me she was safe and to mind me business then went and got knocked up.”

  “Look, there’s a child. Laramie’s yours and he’s a good boy.”

  “Then you raise him. Because if you think I’m sending a dime so you two can live off me, you’re wrong. Let me tell you, if I were you I wouldn’t be spending me time hounding some poor bloody waiter, I’d be thinking hard about saving me own ass.”

  “How can you pretend you don’t owe anything to your own son?”

  “I got two other sons that I know are mine. And my little daughter. My wife works in a hospital. I kill myself lunches and dinners six days a week and we just squeak by. I’m a family man, Greene or whoever you are. I never asked her to have a baby. I begged her not to. If
I was a rich man, I’d send her a whopping big check and tell her to go fuck herself—not that she’ll ever have to. But I don’t have an extra buck to buy a lottery ticket—you get the picture?”

  “You know, we could take this to court.”

  “If I hear you doing that, I’ll take hold of me family and move back to Dublin. I have over two dozen relatives there. Listen, I screwed her maybe twenty times. I moved out and left her me damned apartment. What else could I do? But I won’t talk with her and I won’t let her near me wife and me kids. She’s poison. Now she’s your poison. Sure, and she’s not a bit of mine, thank the saints and angels on me knees. And yes, me good wife does know about her, so don’t be trying to blackmail me about that sad old mess.” And then he did hang up.

  DAVID

  The wheels of government don’t stop long enough for a new official to learn. Elected on Tuesday, you vote on Thursday—on an issue as routine as a business license or important as a man’s career. I spent the first day just hanging around Town Hall, trying to read more than I could digest in a year and convince the secretaries I wasn’t some clock-watching reformer out to make their lives miserable. The last time I was in this building, I’d stood nervously beside the town manager’s desk. Now he ushered me into his office and offered me a padded leather chair. Through the window onto Main Street, I watched the regulars going in and out of the Binnacle, and the Compton kid on his bicycle, a one-armed teenage moron dodging delivery trucks to impress his friends. The town manager was talking policy. “I’m sure you’re concerned about our efforts to keep the tax rate steady.”

  I nodded, lips tight, the way Georgie had taught me twenty years ago: Don’t let anyone know what you don’t understand. Keep your mouth shut.

  “But of course, next year we face a property tax reval.”

  Whatever the fuck that meant.

  He glanced at the clock over my shoulder. “Is there anything in particular you were curious about, Selectman Greene?” Meaning: What kind of an ax is this guy out to grind?

  I shrugged. “Not really. Just trying to get the lay of the land.”

  “Well, then.” He needn’t waste his time.

  “Maybe, if it’s not an inconvenience … I was wondering if I could take a look at your performance evaluations for each department.”

  “That could take a while.”

  “I took off work today.”

  “What is this for, exactly?”

  “My information. Exactly. According to the charter of this town you serve at the pleasure of the Board of Selectmen. I was just elected one.”

  “Yes, of course. I didn’t mean to imply you weren’t entitled.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  “I just want you to understand that everything we do is subject to state law. You can’t get elected one day and expect me to let good people go the next.”

  “I’m not talking about good people.” I wondered if I was going to have trouble with this guy. He was already having trouble with me.

  “Good or bad, Selectman, there’s a chain of command that must be followed in this town.”

  “And we all know who’s on top, don’t we?”

  “Yes, and it can’t change overnight.”

  “I’ve got three years,” I said. “How long do you expect to stay around?”

  “Please wait here.” The town manager left me alone in his office while he talked with his secretary outside. He came back with an armload of files, explaining, “This isn’t all of what you want. But we’re looking. I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot here. I just want you to understand that the town can get into a great deal of legal trouble unless every case is handled carefully. Regardless of performance, each employee has legal rights.”

  “I was wondering. Is it true Abel Smalley and Donkey Sparks are up for reappointment?”

  “Chief Smalley has done a good job for many years. He may not be up on his computer technology and grant writing, but his people skills are a real asset in a town like this.”

  “And Donkey Sparks?”

  The town manager knew all about my problems with Donkey Sparks. But he didn’t leap to defend him. Instead, I felt him taking my measure, studying me, wondering just who he’d have to sacrifice to save his own job. Anyway, that’s what I imagined. He may have been planning his next move. He may even have known I was bluffing. Still, I appreciated the key to Town Hall he pressed into my hand; and the little card with his home and his car phone numbers and the stack of files the secretary came in with, especially the ones stamped CONFIDENTIAL.

  On the way out I remembered something that Gordon had said the night of the victory party, calling me over with his eyes. I had knelt to hear his whisper. He was right. This was going to be fun.

  JOHNNY

  “It’s true!” Crystal was laughing. Her laughter was ticklish, making him smile. “Don’t you know guys like that, Mr. Lynch? Ugly guys who walk around like movie stars and really dumb ones who think they’re Einstein.”

  “Too many,” Johnny said, watching a slice of roast beef slide out of his sandwich onto the wrapper he balanced on his lap.

  “Then there are these really good-looking guys whose self-image sucks. No matter how much somebody loves them, they just don’t believe they’re good enough. And do you know the reason for that? Mr. Lynch? Are you laughing at me?”

  “Well, there is a daub of yogurt right there on your nose.”

  “Oh, you!” She licked it off with the tip of her tongue.

  If any of the boys, Donkey or Abel, saw him eating lunch with a pretty girl in the front seat of his car, they’d never believe it was business. He’d only planned to familiarize Crystal with the river valley and the dike. She’d suggested the picnic. But the wind was up today, blowing sand in their eyes and forcing them back into the car.

  “And the reason is the person’s mother,” she said, oblivious to the grandest view Saltash had to offer, the vast harbor bluer than heaven itself, then narrowing upriver of the dike into a placid stream. Aspen leaves shimmered like silver dollars. Seabirds wheeled overhead while Crystal, God bless her, rattled on about motherhood. “Between the ages of birth and five years old, that’s the window. That’s where you have your shot. If you really dedicate yourself to making that one little person feel special, then you’re giving the gift of lifelong confidence, and that’s as important as any college education.”

  Johnny had hoped she would grasp the beauty of the place. But he might have known, since she’d never hunted or hiked and fished here as he did, that she was simply one of those people for whom the natural world was just scenery. No matter. A little naiveté could work in his favor.

  “Mr. Lynch, are you listening to me?”

  “Actually, I was applying what you said to my own boys. My wife did just that. Dedicated herself. With Jackie at least. By the time William came along, well, things had changed.”

  “Parents aren’t perfect.” Crystal was lecturing him now like a little schoolteacher. Maria said since David’s election, she was holding forth on everything from school budgets to dogs on the beaches. “Parents are people first. But no parent ever intentionally does anything to harm their child. Mrs. Lynch was sick. They didn’t understand things like depression back then.”

  Johnny was uncomfortable now. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” He crumbled the bag on his lap. He’d told Crystal a great deal about himself, but he’d never mentioned Emily Ann. That was Maria’s doing. They chattered like hens. “Now for the reason we’re here, then.” He heard the coldness in his voice. Crystal jerked upright like a child reprimanded. “Do you see how the trees grow right up to the bank of the river? Those are gray birches.”

  “They’re pretty trees,” she said. “This valley is beautiful.”

  “Beautiful to us, dear. Home to countless of God’s creatures.”

  Since the election, Johnny had a new plan to keep the dike in place. He’d give his adversaries a dose of their own medicine, raise a
grand and public stink about the environment. There had been a causeway any storm surge could overrun and a rickety wooden bridge constructed forty years before he’d even heard the name of this town. Behind the bridge there had been a salt marsh and a tidal river useful only to a few shellfish scratchers. He had replaced the bridge with a proper dike, able to withstand hurricanes and ice pileup, protecting the new land behind it. There, the old marsh had been drained, filled and had grown up into meadows and woods. Since then an entire new habitat had been formed. He didn’t know all the technical details; Crystal had agreed to work overtime to come up with the proper language, interview a few biologists to get it straight. But he knew this much, and this was his line: if the dike was torn down and the saltwater of the harbor allowed to fill the valley, thousands of animals would be flooded out of their homes. Little red foxes. Innocent baby deer. Weasels, voles, opossum. Coyote would lose their food supply and begin gobbling kittens, mauling the family dog. The issue was environmentally arguable, and sentimental as a children’s tale. The timing couldn’t be better. It was the summer people who had influence with the legislature, over twenty thousand of them, from districts all over the state. If his luck held out, if time was on his side, he would take the issue of the dike right out of the selectmen’s hands and turn it over to the media and the State House.

  After eating, they returned to the office in silence. He knew the girl’s feelings were hurt, but he didn’t know how to smooth things over. She had set herself up a desk in a back corner of the office by the copy machine, an area formerly used to store dead files. Only when the file cabinets were moved did he realize they’d been blocking a window. Now there were plants in it. She had three pictures of her son on her desk, and one of David being sworn in by the town clerk. There was a teddy bear and a dish of hard candy, a coffee mug with red hearts. He made a few forays to the copy machine in hopes of thinking of something light to say, but the other girls were always around. As he was heading back to his office the last time, Crystal said, “Mr. Lynch, I finished those letters you asked me to write.”