by Mark Sarvas
The space car attracted a surprising amount of attention. Well, it was surprising to me. To my father it was the universe acting in accordance with his grand scheme. Offers were made, some quite near his asking price. My father had once again demonstrated his ironclad grasp of his market. I began to look at my watch every few minutes in the hopes of running out the clock.
Finally, a voice on the PA announced that it was time for the dealers to begin breaking down their tables and packing their wares. I moved to grab the space car first but my father held my hand. There was always surprising violence coiled in those arms. It was only after I wrapped every other object on the table that I was permitted, to my relief, to wrap the space car.
On the drive home, failing to keep the smugness out of my voice, I said, “I believe you owe me sixty-five dollars.”
“I do not.”
I turned to look at my father, shocked and confused but not at all surprised. He was a master of the angles and I was a fool not to have seen it coming.
“But you didn’t sell it. You said you would sell it for sixty-five dollars.”
“I didn’t say when I would sell it, did I?”
“No, but—”
“No buts. I will sell the car, and I will sell it for sixty-five dollars.”
The evil genius of his plan sank in. I could never win this bet, it was open-ended in his favor.
“That’s not fair.” I sulked.
He turned to face me as though he were about to deliver the lesson of lessons. “Never bet if you can’t afford to lose,” he said. But what he surely meant was Pay attention, Matt.
In the months that followed, we attended show after show, and I packed and unpacked the pink space sperm dozens of times. The script played out without variation, interested buyers picking up the toy, examining it, making a modest offer, my father holding firm. I began to wonder whether he was dug in purely to punish me, or because he truly believed in the value of the car and refused to sell it for less. A bit of both, I suspect. Either way, I never stood a chance.
The months turned into years. Virgil, I cannot tell you how many times I packed and unpacked that fucking thing, how I grew to loathe the sight of it. Past the point where the sixty-five dollars would mean anything to me. I began to consider buying it myself, if only to spare me having to wrap the hideous thing one more time.
Of course, it happened, just as he said it would. One damp Sunday morning somewhere, maybe in Allentown, maybe in Hempstead, a young man—he would have been young, would have been male—scooped up the sperm car, clutched it close to his chest, and doled out the sixty-five dollars, all small bills and loose change, into my father’s expectant hands. Yes, Hempstead. I’m quite sure.
He was never one to miss an “I told you so,” my old man. And there was, to be sure, a gleam of self-satisfaction in his eyes as he stood at the table, holding the money. I pulled four twenties out of my battered wallet and handed them to him. He gave me back my fifteen dollars in the singles and change he’d received from his buyer, a gesture that seemed petty but probably struck him as entirely reasonable. The change sloshed around in my pocket all during the wordless drive home.
But when I awoke the next morning, the four twenties had been restored to my wallet. I never learned when, why, or how this happened. For all I knew, my mother replaced the money herself. That would be her style. But I allowed myself to believe he’d had a change of heart. It seemed important to accord him this small measure of humanity, for both of us.
* * *
WE MET TRACY for an early dinner at a neighborhood Chinese restaurant we frequented. My father was worried about jet lag after the flight from New York and wanted to get to bed, so we had the place to ourselves. He became the immediate center of the waitstaff’s attention. They were delighted to meet Matt’s father. You must be proud of your son’s success. He’s one of our favorite customers. It was excruciating for me. My father, however, transformed once again into Social Gabi, the creature I had glimpsed long ago at the Tower Club, and I marveled as he charmed them. More than once, Tracy looked at me with reproach, as if to say, “You see—he’s not so bad.”
He and Tracy fell into easy conversation, and while they avoided saying anything of substance, it was clear that, on some level, the two of them had achieved an understanding. Whether they were programmed to get each other or whether their rapport had evolved over the life of their phone calls, I didn’t know. They clasped hands as they spoke, exuding warmth, and I felt excluded, irritated. I felt them in cahoots against me. I was about to say something regrettable when my phone chimed. It was Rachel. I excused myself and stepped outside.
She was calling to tell me that a review panel had been convened on an expedited basis to hear our case. Something to do with a favor to the head of the firm, some sort of heavyweight connection. I don’t understand how these things work, and have always been cheerfully oblivious to power and its machinations. What mattered was that I would have a chance to see her again.
We made an appointment for the following Thursday and I hung up and returned to the dinner table to find Tracy and my father in midconversation. Something had shifted in my absence, the energy at the table had changed.
“You’re okay with this?” my father demanded of me as I sat back down.
I looked to Tracy. “I don’t know. Am I?”
Tracy squirmed in her chair. “Ricky’s appeal in Texas,” she explained. “I want to go out there for it.”
I wasn’t seeing it yet. “Okay,” I said. It seemed reasonable enough. I looked to my dad, waiting for more.
“It’s not appropriate. With this Brian person? Are you nuts?” This last directed to me.
Virgil, was my father actually looking out for my interests? An unimaginable development. Even worse, the more I thought about it, the more I agreed with him. Agreed with him. I turned to face Tracy.
She flushed a bit, became flustered under the double-barreled Santos scrutiny. “Oh, come on, both of you. Brian is a friend. It’s strictly professional. Matt knows that.”
Inescapable Brian.
“So is it friends or is it professional?” My father, the pit bull. I felt myself growing angry, egged on by my father.
“Both! I mean, come on. Are you serious? You trust me, don’t you, Matt?”
And there it was, the only question that mattered. We both knew it. I looked from my father to Tracy and back again, still irritated. “Of course,” I answered. I faced my father. “It will be fine. He’s a lawyer.”
My dad swiveled his eyes over to me, taking me in for the first time since we’d sat down.
“Who called you?” he asked.
“Change in my call time.”
He knew, I’m sure he did. So attuned was he to dissembling, a walking seismograph of lies. His expression, however, was inscrutable. Would he say something? Maybe later? Only to Tracy? At that moment, I decided that I had underestimated him as a cardplayer.
Tracy walked the two blocks home after encircling my father in a long and effusive farewell hug—I thought back to our own limp airport greeting—and I drove him to his hotel, where I agreed to pick him up early the next morning. Six a.m., he advised. Make sure you’re on time.
“Good night,” I said, as we idled in front of the hotel.
“Good night.” He sat for a long moment. I was aware of his proximity, of his musty, elderly odor competing with his too-sweet cologne. So little space between us. Then: “Do not fuck this up, Matt.”
“Fuck what up?”
“Pop the trunk.”
I pressed the release and the trunk lid yawned heavenward. My father nodded to me and got out of the car. He hoisted his suitcase, and I watched him shuffle up the hotel steps. No bellman came to greet him. I felt relief as he left, it’s true. I was always relieved when we concluded any exchange, thrilled to get out reasonably whole. But this time there was something else. Curiosity about his admonition? Pity? Perhaps. An unwelcome stab of sorrow sliced my heart.
But also familiarity. Recognition. And I didn’t like it, Virgil. I did not like it at all.
MY FATHER NEVER SAID “FUCK YOU,” not directly. His way of saying it would go something like this: It’s another Sunday, another toy show. I am a boy, maybe twelve, thirteen. Old enough to be distracted by girls but young enough to feel obligated to accompany my father to his early-morning toy fairs. A haggler in army surplus happens upon our table. I recognize his type at once. His dress is shabby, his hair unkempt, he’s unshaven. He wears thick glasses and has bad teeth. He is someone who exists outside most social norms. He doesn’t care what anyone thinks about him, and such people inflame my father. The haggler picks up a car to examine it and already my father is on edge, worried the piece will be damaged. The haggler turns it over for a long time, well past any meaningful examination, and my father’s irritation grows. Finally, my father says, “Make an offer or put it down.” The haggler looks at the price tag. Fifty dollars. “I’ll give you ten,” he says.
It’s an insulting offer, though the haggler doesn’t understand that. To him, it’s a logical move. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, and it costs him nothing to ask. Or so he thinks. My father would be within his rights to say “fuck you.”
“Sixty,” my father counters.
The haggler looks at him with surprise. “It says fifty. You can’t do that.”
“Now it’s sixty-five,” my father says.
Rapt, I watch as the haggler contemplates his next move.
“Fifteen.”
“Not for sale,” my father says. He takes the car from his hand, wraps it up, and returns it to his bag.
Defeated, the haggler mutters “Asshole” and walks away. My father has delivered a classic Gabor Santos “fuck you” and it appears to satisfy him, though I’m left wondering, wouldn’t it have been easier to just say what he was thinking? I feel a pang of pity for the haggler as he shuffles off. It’s true, he’s been a jerk, but he’s such a wretch, he hardly seems responsible. For some reason, I think of him on the bus, going home, unloved and unknown, and I’m angry at my father for his rough treatment of this godforsaken creature.
I suppose my father had me pegged. No killer instinct.
* * *
I PICKED HIM UP at his hotel at the appointed time and drove him to Glendale, where the toy show was taking place at the Civic Auditorium. I planned only to drop him off and pick him up, but when we arrived it became clear that he expected me to fill my old role as his assistant. To my astonishment, I complied.
How can I account for this, Virgil? Was I afraid to turn him down, fearful of his displeasure, as though he could still punish me so late in the game? A little bit, I confess. But it was not primarily fear that drove me that day. This, at last, was familiar territory. Once again, I knew the part I was intended to play, had so internalized this character, this first great role, that I knew precisely how to step in and play him. My father understood, as good actors do. He’d picked up on my rhythms and responded in kind and, all at once, we found ourselves returned to the roles that made us famous, these earliest portrayals of ourselves.
We waited outside in the early-morning sun for the doors to open. He always insisted we arrive at least a half hour ahead of time, to ensure being among the first inside, where the best bargains hung in fragile equipoise, waiting to be claimed. My father eschewed the convivial chitchat of the other dealers. His focus was singular, his thoughts, if he had any, a mystery to me. I fidgeted, stepped from foot to foot, cleared my throat. Cracked my knuckles. Anything to pierce the monotony. My father looked over at me with disapproval, and I fell still.
At last the doors opened, and my father and I moved to his assigned table. He looked me over with concern.
“You remember how to do this?”
“Yes.”
“Keep all the wrapping. Put the cars on top of their boxes.”
“I know.”
“Keep the fragile ones near the back.”
“Dad. I know. I remember.”
He nodded. “I’ll be back.”
He moved off, all business, leaving me alone with the empty table. I felt relief as he disappeared. I spread out his tablecloth, the same one I remembered, the yellow vinyl tacky to the touch from years of use. I set the suitcase on the chair and flipped open the lid. I had to admire the old man’s skill at packing, even now. Row after row of snug, bubble-wrapped capsules. I pulled the first car out and unwrapped it. I tested my memory, identifying the toy without turning it over to read the bottom: a tin Bandai MG TF. I set it on the table, watchful headlights facing the aisle, and continued unwrapping the packages, careful to return all the wrapping to the suitcase. Even as I resented my father’s presumption at dragging me along for the day, I was soothed, gratified by the act of preparing the table. I opened up each tissue capsule, examined the piece, and sought to arrange it on the table in a way that would give my father pleasure. I felt entrusted with something once again, and for those moments, thoughts of Tracy, of Rachel, of the fate of Budapest Street Scene, all left me.
He returned to the table and handed me a cup of coffee and a bagel. The concession stand had opened.
“It’s black. I didn’t remember how you liked it.”
It was a fucking cup of coffee, Virgil. Why did it make me feel like crying? “Black is fine,” I said.
My father nodded and continued on his search for overlooked bargains. I settled in to watch the table. The doors opened to the public and the aisles filled with buyers. The tables around ours seemed to be doing brisker business, but I sold a few pieces for my father. When I was a boy, he would always cut me in for a percentage of the day’s take, my “commission,” he called it. I wondered if the old arrangement would still apply. My father hurried by, deposited a cache of newly bought toy cars in my arms without a word, and dove back into the crowd. As he turned from view, I caught a glint of perspiration above his lip.
Buyers continued to examine my father’s wares, and some made offers lower than the sticker price. There was a time when I was empowered to accept certain offers, had developed a sense of what might not eat too far into my father’s profits. He wasn’t opposed to haggling on principle, and he understood it went with the territory. He just insisted it be done respectfully, and if he found the buyer sympathetic, he could be quite generous. But too much time had passed, and I had lost my confidence about what my father would or would not take. I shrugged more than once and said, “Come back later and ask my father. It’s his stuff.” Even to offers a mere ten dollars below asking. The looks I received were impossible to decipher. Pity? Contempt? Mere annoyance?
My father was gone for what was beginning to feel like an unreasonably long time, and I sat there, my mood darkening. I had to pee. My back hurt. My feet were cold. I grew disgusted with myself, with the ease with which I’d slipped into my old, subordinate role. Irritation came and went, shaded into anger, familiar resentment, but then glided into something new. As I watched the buyers crowd the aisles, I became aware that they almost all traveled solo. Solitary collectors, spending a Sunday morning trolling the aisles of a Glendale auditorium. I felt a great sadness descend upon me. It seized me, squeezing my eyes, my throat. I suddenly wanted to get out of there, needed to get out. I didn’t belong there. These were not my people.
My father finally reappeared, his arms laden with a second round of toys he had snatched up. He busied himself marking up the new prices and adding the toys to the table. He shook his head as he rearranged the cars I had set out, my positioning not finding the favor I’d hoped. I could see no improvement in his redesign. I tried to keep the pique out of my voice as I briefed him on the morning thus far, which pieces had sold. I handed over his cash and mentioned that a few offers had been made but I hadn’t been comfortable accepting them without his approval, and had advised the buyers to come back and talk to him.
“Which pieces? What did they offer?”
I told him and he looked incredulous. “It was ten dollars. You
didn’t say yes?”
“I told them to come back.”
“They won’t come back.”
“Of course they will.”
“Ten dollars, Matt. What’s wrong with you?”
My father’s rebukes were always blunt but deadly. I bit down on the inside of my cheek.
“I need to pee. I’ll be back.”
Moments later, I returned to the table, having filled up my lungs with fresh air, but I could see from down the aisle that something was wrong. My father was enraged, his face a mask of darkness. I tasted metal. Before I could say anything, he was on me.
“The Meccano mail truck.”
“What?”
“Where is it?”
“What are you talking about?”
“My Meccano mail truck. It’s not on the table.”
“I don’t remember any mail truck, Dad. Are you sure—”
“Of course I am sure, Matt.” His voice rose, drawing concerned glances.
“Dad, I’m sorry, I don’t—”
“Were you paying attention the whole time? Your attention never wandered?”
I stood there, unsure what to say. Of course my attention wandered. Wanders.
“Jesus, Matt. Someone stole my Meccano. From right under your nose.”
“You don’t know that.”
“It’s not on the table. It’s not in the suitcase. I packed it on Monday. Did it drive itself away?” Customers were backing away from our table now, my dad’s voice carrying across the aisles.
“Maybe you didn’t pack it. Maybe it’s still in New York.”
“Goddammit, Matt! Why can’t you ever admit you fucked up?” He was shaking with rage. “Be a man and don’t blame me. That’s a hundred dollars gone, a hundred dollars you owe me.”
What happened next, Virgil, I can scarcely credit. How this was possible, where it came from, after all those years, I still can’t say. But I felt something literally snap within me, a hard, dry crack deep in my chest. And for an instant, my rage had a voice, and it wasn’t a role, it was sheer fury. I tore out my wallet, seized a hundred-dollar bill, and pressed it hard against his chest with my forefinger, my nose inches from his.