You Could Be Home by Now

by Tracy Manaster

  “There’s nothing about that story that isn’t terrible. I’m sorry. What’s her name?”

  “Tara.” You could tell a lot about people from whether they asked is or was. Their base level of optimism, or what they wanted you to think that base level was. “She’s been on my mind. More than usual, I mean. I think seeing your Lily around—” He indicated the sodden shreds of tissues in his hand. “It’s not the hospital. I hate hospitals, but—it’s not the hospital.”

  “Eh. Hospitals are okay. They’re clean. They’re organized. Everyone in them tries their best.”

  “Maybe.” He’d had enough of hospitals for a dozen lifetimes. The cheap, waffle-weave blankets, the Tommyknocker clangs of the MRI. “My wife and I—I hate that everyone thinks we split because of Tara. We hung on for years with her gone.”

  Ben heard how that sounded. Hung on.

  Sadie said, “It must have been—I don’t like to think about how that must have been.”

  “Veronica traveled a lot for business. All over. Six, maybe seven trips a year.” That sounded like the setup for something licentious. That or Cro-Magnon. Thog want meat, Thog want fire, Thog threatened by career of second-wave spouse, and so forth. He spoke quickly. “I went along whenever I could. We’d research beforehand. It got a lot easier with the Internet. Where the missions were. Food pantries. The shelters. It was sometimes a trick to find the women’s ones. They don’t always publish addresses. A lot of times when women run it’s to hide out from a man. So evenings, Veronica would be off for cocktails and networking and I’d hit the streets, hoping. We never actually thought—we’re not stupid people. But she was our little girl.” All those times he’d dressed, midsized hotel rooms in midsized cities—Minneapolis, Baltimore, Detroit. The clothes that he and his wife had selected with the specificity of theatrical costume designers. You didn’t want to look sleek and prosperous. You didn’t want to look shriveled and desperate. He wore a knit cap over the haircut Veronica had him spend more on than he was strictly comfortable spending. Jeans, about to fray but not quite there. Army-surplus parka. Off-brand sneakers. A too-big, no-color button down. “Four years ago, in Chicago, I was robbed and beaten by two men. In Hyde Park. We were under this footbridge. They said at the mission the overflow sometimes bunked down there. It wasn’t even the worst neighborhood I’d been to that trip. It’s right by the university, you know? They have that house by Frank Lloyd Wright.”

  “I can’t believe you’re talking about architecture. Benjamin.”

  “A first-year law student found me the next morning. I don’t remember any of this. He was out for a morning jog. I was unconscious for nearly a week. That’s why I wanted to come here. You have to be careful, you know? Have them give me a solid looking-over.”

  “You were out cold.” She sounded appalled. He didn’t know if she was talking about Chicago four years ago or The Commons this afternoon. “Of course you need a doctor.”

  “Maybe. Anyhow. They think now I might be predisposed to”—he made a vague gesture in attempt to indicate breakable. “Veronica had a hard time. She’s a—she solves problems. She tries to make things balance. The kid who found me? We paid for his books till he made JD.”

  “That’s lovely. A lovely gesture.”

  “I’m not saying it wasn’t. But it shows the kind of person she is. Always an eye out for that one thing that will make things right. And that’s fine, except—it’s hard as hell, excuse my French, when you’re the thing that needs fixing. When I got out of the hospital, she’d get this look like she was waiting for some kind of PTSD crackup. I think she wanted it to happen so she could put me back together already. She’d get real quiet in bad neighborhoods. Flick on the power locks. Or we’d be driving along, talking or what have you, and then we’d pass under a bridge and she’d clam up. Not even a footbridge like the one where—a regular old bridge. Like you use to get to the other side of the river. You know how many bridges there are in Portland?”

  “No.” A sad, shaky smile. “And I can’t believe we’re back to architecture.”

  “She was on me all the time to see a shrink; she got Stephen on her side so I was getting it from all directions. I’d mispronounce a word or forget the name of a street and she’d call in the brain docs like I was one breath away from another coma. I wanted—you know that thing they say about sharks? How they have to keep moving or die? I needed to go on and on. If I stopped—” He shook his head. “People never used to dwell as much. Have you noticed that?”

  “It was a huge thing that happened to you. To you both.”

  “I know. But to talk and talk. That would make it huger. Sorry. I know that’s not a word.”

  A focused flush had come to Sadie’s cheeks despite the waiting-room cold. “Maybe not. But it’s a feeling.”

  “Veronica started having these business trips pop up at the last minute. There’d never be a chance for me to reshuffle my appointments or plane fare would be through the roof. But these were conferences, right? She used to have to register months in advance. So I’d call up her secretary and it’d turn out they’d been on the calendar forever.”

  “I can see why she—”

  “I know. I can, too. And I’m sure I wasn’t a peach to live with either. I’m not trying to make it sound like it was just the one thing. It never is. We’d been fighting for years but we were happy in between. After Chicago, the in between got shorter and shorter. Less happy too.” Beside him, Sadie waited for him to say more, but that was that. Another nurse summoned the stomach woman. It was bound to be a good sign that they’d let him stew in his seat this long. Veronica wouldn’t have stood for it though. She’d have whipped through her cell phone contacts, found someone who knew someone whose daughter-in-law was a hospital trustee. “Your granddaughter’s been gone a while,” he said so he’d be saying something.

  “I sent her for water. She’ll be back.” Sadie paled at the appalling casualness of what she’d said.

  “It’s fine.” He laid his hand briefly over hers. Over the hand on the armrest, not the one on her thigh. “Really. It is.”

  “I’m glad you told me.”

  “Me too.” It was true. Usually when he told people he regretted it right after.

  They sat a while.

  “So,” he said.

  “So. You’ve got that look again. Daydreaming.”

  “Nah. I wonder. What would Emily Post want you to say next?”

  Sadie snorted. The last sound you’d expect from a white-clad bloom of high society. “I think it’s fair to say you and I are somewhere beyond Emily.”

  “We probably are. Still.”

  “I don’t know. She’d probably have me steer us to a less personal subject.”

  He bowed slightly as if to say, after you.

  “Okay then. Let’s talk about your putting.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with my putting.”

  “Maybe. If you’re up against a baboon.”

  The nurse reappeared then, scrutinizing her clipboard. She butchered the pronunciation of his last name. Ben stood so fast it made him dizzy. He didn’t want her crossing toward them and saying something to show she mistook Sadie for his wife. He said, “Here’s hoping the doctor’s a bit older than twelve.”

  Sadie stretched, then nestled back into the chair. “Oh, I like it when they’re young. The young ones are going to fight harder. They still take the bad stuff personally.”

  Ben looked at Sadie, really looked.

  This was the only ER for miles.

  They must have brought Gary Birnam here, post-collapse.

  Her husband must have come here to die.

  He took her hand again and squeezed. He said, “I’m probably still a little in love with my wife.”

  By her face, Sadie didn’t know what to make of that. He only had the guts to say what was next because of the easy exit, the nurse on standby to lead him away. “I’m still in love with Veronica, but I like you more.”

  AN EASIER PL
ACE TO PRETEND

  SETH CUT OUT EARLY AND went up to Alison’s office. It was empty. A single orange, its PLU sticker peeling, sat on the corner of her desk. It was the only bright thing in the room. A half-dozen books occupied the shelves, their spines muted gray and green and brown. Azucena’s Table: Feeding the American Frontier. After the Golden Spike. Tribal Groups of the Four Corners Region. Arizona! A Pictorial History. Coyote, Fox, Hawk, and Bat: A Compendium of Apache Mythology. Two Stegner titles. For reasons he couldn’t begin to guess at, a Danish-English dictionary. While Seth waited, he alphabetized them. Ali’s office windows were smaller than his but oriented better. The room was thick with dust-flecked light. Two news vans—up one from the other day—were parked in the circular drive below. When she got here, he’d tell Alison that he’d given Nicky Tullbeck the Rosko story. He’d frame it as the kid’s big break. Alison would like that. She was fond of Nicky.

  Seth sat at his wife’s desk. Her chair groaned under his weight. He leaned back and the groan changed pitch. More of a squeak now. It must drive Alison up the wall. He knelt and jiggled the seat, trying to pinpoint the trouble. There. Yes. It would take all of five minutes to fix. Seth lay down to better reach the undercarriage. Loose bolts. It wasn’t even a question of WD-40.

  “Seth? What are you doing on the floor?” He hadn’t heard Alison approach.

  “Your chair squeaks.” The funny knobs of her ankles stuck out. Also her ears. There was something strange about her neck. He realized: “You’ve cut off your hair.”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s cute.” He sat up. Stood. A blunt fringe cut across Alison’s forehead. The rest cropped close to her scalp. It made her eyes enormous. There was something different about the color, too. More yellow maybe.

  “Well.” She tousled it. It was better after. Less pristine. “Now you can quit complaining about my hair in the drain.”

  “Alison.” His wife was fitter than ever. His wife was blonder than ever. And Seth was apparently no true blue American male. Because what he felt was cheated. Alison’s had always been an unexpected sort of prettiness; if she were less confident, she might even be taken for plain. Ali was all those industrious colors of a summer road trip. Hair warm and variegated like farmed grain, eyes the cool gray-blue of quarried shale. Even her freckled skin. Nothing one color or the other. Her attractiveness came from that tension, and from the vividness with which she held it all together. “This morning, I shouldn’t have said—”

  “No. It was bothering you. Of course I want you to tell me when something is bothering you.” Her voice was dangerously bright. It matched the unfamiliar scent that hung between them, all zest and false flowers. Chemical undertones. Eau de salon.

  Seth sneezed.

  “Salud.”

  “Thanks.” He looked around. Back home in Chettenford, Alison always kept a box of Kleenex on her desk. The school was constructed in 1923 and his wife was allergic to some lingering interior mold. And of course her desk saw its steady stream of weeping girls. Ms. C, it seemed, was as essential post-breakup as a pint of Ben & Jerry’s. “Kleenex?” he asked.

  Alison shook her head.

  He’d thought she might have some on hand, that maybe she cried in private now and then.

  “I’d like my chair back,” she said, tucking her bag under the desk. “I used my lunch hour at the salon. I’ve got to catch up.” A false lightness buoyed her tone. Chances were he was in trouble. It was bound to be his mucking about with the chair. She’d see it as an attack on her unquestionable competence. That was Alison all over. Chivalry was wasted on her.

  “I can wait around,” he said

  “I’ll be a while. Hoagie sprung this thing on me—he’s renaming the main town here for Adah Chalk. He wants to announce at the HOA meeting tomorrow, and then have a big to-do for Founder’s Day.” She sat, swiveled away from him, and got out her stack of Adah Chalk three-by-fives.

  “Tomorrow? And here I thought you couldn’t rush history.”

  “When you get a brainwave . . .” Her shrug was sharp without the softness of her unbound hair. Or perhaps all the running had sharpened the curve of her shoulder. Brainwave was a Lobel word; if Ali started saying folks he would know the pair had been spending entirely too much time together.

  “It’s a nice haircut,” he said. “It suits you.” It did. Seth was the one it didn’t particularly suit. Ask him again when he was used to it. Alison brushed a hand across the back of her neck. Attention there drove her wild. He wondered if the skin would start to lose its sensitivity without her hair to shield it from everyday touch. He pressed his lips to the knob at the top of her spine.

  She scooted away. Her chair squeaked. “I promised Hoagie I’d get him a draft presentation on Adah ASAP.”

  “Hoagie.”

  “It’s his name. He wants us to use it.” Her tone edged toward curt. “I’ve got to get to work.”

  “Sure. Let me run out and get you a sandwich. Or maybe a wrap from that place by The Homeplate? And an iced tea, right? With lemon. Or do you think you’ll need more serious caffeine?”

  “Seth, I’m trying to be nice. But what I really want is for you not to be in my face right now.”

  “Huh?”

  She turned the chair to face him. Sunlight coalesced around her. “You’ll never guess what happened while I was under the dryer.” She patted her newly sleek head. She beamed. She had on earrings. She usually didn’t bother. They were silver things, shaped like graduation tassels. “My phone rang. Any idea who it was?”

  She was using her teaching voice, which seldom boded well. And all at once he knew who’d called. Ross Henry, math teacher, Yankees fan, father of two. Aspiring do-gooder. Seth hoped the twins developed a lifelong affinity for the Sox. “Ross Henry,” he said. He should’ve left when Ali told him to.

  “Ross Henry, that’s right. He seemed to be under the impression you were hurting—”

  “Ali—”

  “I mean more than usual. He was very kind. He made sure to say of course you were hurting. But maybe the tiniest something more was troubling you?” She held her thumb and index finger close together. That Ross. Sometimes it was worse when people said precisely the right thing. It meant that they weren’t quite your friends anymore. It meant they’d memorized their lines in advance. “It was nice, actually,” Ali continued. “Playing hooky in the middle of the day, all this gorgeous sunlight, stylist swooning because he’s got someone in his chair whose next stop isn’t a hip replacement. And it was nice catching up with Ross. Tons of gossip. Shipley’s come up with some unenforceable student cell phone policy for next year. We took state in softball. Would’ve done baseball too, but Mark Sarrachino blew his shoulder. The twins are thriving, but Ross knew enough not to go on about it.”

  It wasn’t just the twins that got him. It was the casualness of that we. We meaning Vermont and the North Chettenford Minutemen, the weight of her life still two thousand miles away. And yet like an idiot he’d filed the story Lobel had asked for. It would run tomorrow above the fold, next to a sidebar detailing the many activities associated with Founder’s Day. He swallowed. He attempted lightness. “Well. You always said Sarrachino was going to need reconstructive surgery before he hit twenty.”

  She shrugged. Again. He hated that gesture and he hated that she hadn’t done anything with her office. There was nothing to look at here but Alison. Her profile reflected in the window. He had to squint in the invading light. She sighed. The sound was unexpectedly content. “It was a good morning. The stylist didn’t even ask if we had kids.” Another thing they hadn’t accounted for in the move. How to field that standard getting-to-know-you question. “A good morning,” she repeated. “So I thought I’d treat myself. Ice cream.” Her tongue darted out and swept across her lips. The unthinking intimacy of it rocked him. “And as I’m paying, bzzzt!, a text. What do you know? It’s Bronsted, remember? From across the hall junior year? He used to have the biggest crush on me.” It said something ab
out Alison that she’d choose this moment to remind him, and it said something about Seth that he’d have remembered anyhow. “Eric Bronsted. Never subtle.” Alison shook her head, like she was actually fond of Eric Bronsted. “Can you guess what he wrote?”

  “Probably nothing complimentary.” Bronsted had never liked Seth, but Seth had been human about it. Gracious in victory and all of that.

  “Ali. Hey. Think your man might be cracking up.” She made her voice husky but didn’t sound a thing like Bronsted.

  “The guy never liked me.”

  “Are you, Seth? Cracking up?” There was a claylike cool now to Alison’s voice, as if she were still working out how to shape it.

  “No. I’m really not.”

  “See, I wondered. Because my phone’s sure been busy.” Ali rummaged in her purse. Her skirt hitched up. He knew better than to reach for her. She found her phone. “Kerstin Buell: Are you guys okay? Jessie Jarvis: What’s up with Seth? Give us a call. Oh, and this one’s new. Aaron Fisher: Everything all right? And not one, not two, but three voicemails I haven’t had a moment to check.”

  Seth was glad she’d cut her hair. It was like someone else unloading on him.

  “Neil’s call actually rang through.” Neil was her brother, who played shortstop for the AAA IronPigs. He should have been out on the diamond. He should have been in the weight room. He got to live outside, lungs full of clipped grass and worn leather. He had no business whatsoever checking Facebook midday.

  “Okay then,” Seth said. There was no point dissembling. Alison knew. She’d seen it. They had WiFi everywhere here. The brochures had gone on and on about it. Alison leaned forward and the chair squeaked its protest. She ran her palm along the edge of her desk. Her hand skirted the orange. He wanted to take it in his. That or pick up the fruit. Peel it. Loose the scent of something other than hair gel in the room. Alison pointed and flexed her sandaled foot. Her toenails were painted soft mauve. He’d lain in bed and watched her apply that paint last weekend. She’d done it at home in Vermont, too, but back then he was the only one who’d known. Shipley had rules about open-toed shoes.