City Boy

by Thompson, Jean

  “Not entirely. Because when I asked you both for a happy memory, hers was all about you doing things for her. How much you were willing to do for her. You’re still doing things for her. Everything you’re putting yourself through. It’s all for her.”

  After a moment Jack said, “I apologize. I know I’ve been giving you a hard time.”

  Pat smiled. “Ah, you never laid a glove on me.” But she looked weary. Jack liked her for that, for letting him see it in her.

  He said, “I guess I didn’t really expect you to fix this for me. I’ve been going a little crazy. But Christ Jesus. I don’t know any other way to be in love. If it doesn’t drive you crazy, how do you know it’s love?”

  Pat held up her silver fingernails to indicate she didn’t know.

  Jack called Chloe that night. He sat on his saggy bed and dialed from his recently acquired cell phone. A cell phone wasn’t a big deal, didn’t commit you to living anywhere.

  Jack listened to the phone purring. Chloe answered on the fourth ring, just before the machine picked up. “Hello?”

  “Guess who?” He hadn’t meant to start off like that, flippant. Nerves. “Can we talk?”

  “Talk about what?” He imagined her standing in the living room. The water lilies floating behind her.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “What do you want, Jack.”

  “Come on. I want to know how you are. With the baby and all.”

  Chloe didn’t say anything. Maybe she was weighing just how long she could carry on being sullen and aggrieved before some of it started coming back her way. She said, “Not terrific. Mornings aren’t good. They say it gets easier. You’re missing a lot of real quality throwing-up time.”

  “Have you been to a doctor?”

  “Next week.”

  A silence. Jack said, “I want to see you.”

  “What was that stunt with the clothes, huh? I turned on the light and just about jumped out of my skin. It was creepy. And stupid. I don’t like you prowling around here when I’m not home.”

  “Anything else I’ve done wrong lately?”

  “All right,” Chloe said. “All right.”

  The silence ticked. He wasn’t going to start in apologizing, “Can we meet somewhere?”

  “The last time I saw you, you were holding me hostage on a boat.”

  “Canoe.”

  “God.”

  “Sorry.” He’d said it in spite of himself. It had an ashy taste.

  As if that was what she had been waiting to hear, she agreed to meet him for coffee the next day, Saturday. “I’m just doing decaf these days. It’s another big thrill.”

  When he hung up, Jack left his apartment and drove to the old neighborhood. He hadn’t intended to go there, in fact he’d decided he was behaving stupidly, dangerously, and should stay away, but of course it did not surprise him to be ignoring his own good advice. He parked down the street and walked through the alley to the yard gate, found it locked, circled back to the street where he observed the drawn curtains in the living room and bedroom. A light was on in the kitchen. He edged between the two buildings for a closer look.

  He could see only a portion of the refrigerator, and the high shelf where they kept an enameled tea canister and two fancy wedding-present wineglasses, the kind you couldn’t really drink from. These were particularly strange; they were made in the shape of fish, fish reclining on their tails and gaping openmouthed. The tails were the stems, the mouths the bowls, so that drinking from one would give you the impression of kissing a fish. They’d kept them as a joke. He couldn’t remember who they were from. He remembered the living room of their old apartment, Chloe shrieking as they emerged from the bridal wrapping paper, Jack saying something about the thank-you note, and then a little later they’d made love on their knees, Chloe astride him. Or maybe that had been some other time. Things you thought you’d never forget, playing hide-and-seek in the neon maze of your brain. He tried to remember the last time he and Chloe had made love. And he knew he could recall it but he didn’t want to visit it just yet. He couldn’t stand the thought of last, last time. As he watched, the kitchen window went dark.

  He was meeting Chloe at three o’clock. She’d said mornings were out, you know, that morning thing. Jack couldn’t help thinking she’d chosen three because there was no possibility of turning it into a meal and lingering. It felt, weirdly, as if they were back to dating, as if he was courting her all over again. Somehow he’d lost whatever advantage her bad behavior entitled him to.

  Chloe was fifteen minutes late. Maybe that was another power play on her part but he let it pass. She wore jeans and a white shirt and carried an oversized red straw shoulder bag. People in the shop took note of her. Jack watched them watch her. It was like spotting a hummingbird. You had to keep your eyes on it until it was out of sight, or you remembered not to stare at strangers.

  Jack stood up when she reached the table, leaned over, and kissed her on the cheek. His own power play. She wasn’t expecting it, had to produce a smile. “Hi.”

  “Hi. What would you like?”

  “A decaf cappuccino.”

  Jack went to the counter to order it. Bolted, really. He’d underestimated the effect seeing her would have on him. The coffee he’d drunk was roaring through his nerves like a truck on an expressway.

  When he brought her coffee to the table, he said, “Here you go,” and watched her curl her fingers around the cup, warming them. She didn’t look pregnant yet, he guessed it was still too early for that. If anything, she looked a little thinner. She’d done careful work with her makeup but there were dark circles beneath her eyes and her face retained that taut, skull-like quality. He said, “Rough morning?”

  “Rough night. Oh well. The wages of sin.” She shrugged.

  Jack imagined himself sitting up with Chloe, massaging her neck, massaging her feet, bringing her soda crackers and ginger ale. The old habit of pleasing her. Pat had that one nailed. But wasn’t that what a marriage meant? You did things for each other.

  Pat said, “You’re still doing things for her.”

  “Come on. It works both ways. It’s not the kind of thing you can quantify.”

  “Quantify?”

  Jack looked up at Chloe, confused. She said, “You said ‘quantify.’”

  He felt stupid. He couldn’t remember saying anything. “Just mum-bling.”

  Chloe nodded. Polite. Not that interested anyway. Probably bored. Jack said, “It’s good to see you.”

  “I guess we had to start somewhere,” she said vaguely. She took a sip of her coffee, set the cup down again. “Hot.”

  “I’m glad to see you’re watching what you eat.”

  “You mean, am I drinking again.”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  “But it’s what you meant.”

  He didn’t answer. Maybe it had been what he meant. He didn’t know.

  “You don’t believe me about anything anymore, fine, but that’s the truth.”

  “Con job,” said Pat.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” The caffeine rolled through him, its sloshy tides.

  “Don’t say ‘nothing.’ I heard you. Con job! Is that what you think of me?”

  “This is so weird.”

  “Because if that’s the way—”

  “No, no, I went back to see Pat, you know? Pat …” It embarrassed him not to remember her last name. “ … anyway, now it’s like I can’t stop her from talking.”

  “That’s not funny either.”

  He tried to say he didn’t mean to be funny. When he opened his mouth, no sound came out.

  “What is wrong with you?”

  Pat said, “No happy ending.”

  “Jack, stop this.”

  He slumped over the table and buried his head in his arms. This wasn’t how he’d meant things to go at all.

  Noise buzzed in his ears. Coffee-shop voices. He tried not to hear them. Then Chloe was talkin
g. She tugged at his arm. She wanted him to look at her but he couldn’t. She wanted him to stand up, walk. Well okay. He kept his eyes on his shuffling feet.

  Once they were outside his head cleared a little. “Wow. That was so …” The sun made him squint. He felt the heat of the sidewalk through his shoes. “I guess I spaced out back there.”

  “You think?” She sounded exasperated.

  “Sorry.” He closed his eyes and waited for her to leave. The sun crept in behind his eyelids, a muddy red-orange. A space of time passed. He didn’t know how long. It was measured in sunlight.

  Chloe was still there. She said, “What’s the deal with you?”

  “It’s hard seeing you when I know you’re going to go away again.”

  “Would you look at me?” He opened his eyes. Chloe’s face was skeptical. Her not-taking-any-shit expression. “How did you get here?”

  Jack had driven, but he had just enough craftiness left in him to say, “Bus.” He didn’t want her to see his car.

  “Do you want a ride? You look shot.”

  “Thanks. Sure.” He felt as if he’d just awakened from anesthesia, or perhaps as if he’d been thoroughly beaten up. He followed Chloe along the sidewalk, trying not to bump into her.

  “Where are you staying anyway, or is that some big secret?”

  “No, it’s just … a place.”

  “Glad we got that cleared up.”

  It felt strange to be in the passenger seat with Chloe driving. He could tell she’d moved the seat up and changed the mirrors. It was her car now. “Where to?”

  Jack told her to go north on Ashland. The tired sun beat down. The sidewalks bled hot tar. Billboards offered YOUR PRODUCT OR SERVICE ADVERTISED HERE. A dozen empty semi trailers were parked in a fenced-off lot, like cows in a pasture. A storefront advertized VIENNA BEEF AND POLISH. There were times and places in Chicago that nothing you rested your eyes on was soft or easy. Chloe said, “Why did you go to see Pat?”

  He didn’t want to be reminded of that. It seemed like another failure. “Just to talk.” That sounded pathetic, as if he couldn’t get anyone else to talk to him. He added, dryly, “I had some issues.”

  “Should I be worried about you?”

  Jack thought about should. He said, “You’re riding high in April, shot down in May.”

  “What?”

  “Sinatra. ‘That’s Life.’ No. You should not worry about me.”

  Chloe braked at the next light, put her turn signal on. Jack looked over at her. She said, “Let’s just go back home, okay? Could we try this?”

  “Sure.” He didn’t know what she meant, try this, but his heart leaped up. It was sobering to think that his weakness might accomplish what all his rage could not.

  They didn’t speak much until they were at the apartment’s front door. Jack laughed. It came out lopsided. He said, “This place.”

  “What about it?” Chloe unlocked the street door and they stepped into the lobby, its familiar, coffee-colored light and anciently dirty tile floor.

  It didn’t feel like home anymore. It was an arena where gladiators clashed and lions gnawed human bones. He wanted to say they should leave here, break the lease and go someplace they could change their luck. Clean start. He said, “Nothing.”

  Once they were inside Chloe said, “Go on, lie down. You look like a stray dog.”

  “Dog,” Jack said, by way of protest. But he went into the bedroom and sank into the mattress, face in the pillows. He heard Chloe moving around the room, closing the blinds, turning on a fan so that cool air blew across him. He felt the bed give way under her slight weight and he reached out for her.

  Chloe drew in close to him and he turned onto his side and they kissed and he tasted the coffee she’d drunk and also something cooler, toothpaste, probably, and then beneath it all, just her.

  She whispered, “I don’t think we should do anything, you know, the baby …”

  “Oh, sure.” He rolled away, put a little space between them, stilled his hands. It was strange to think that there was a baby in the bed with them. He gave Chloe a loose hug that he tried to make nonsexual. “This is nice, though.”

  “Mm-hm.”

  Her body moved closer to his by degrees, turning as he turned. The old pattern of their nights together. Jack felt himself falling into sleep the way you fell into a tunnel or a well. He said, “I love you,” and sent the words back through layers of sleep and darkness.

  Jack woke up fast, as if from a sound or a touch, but there was no echo in his ears and Chloe wasn’t there. It was still daylight. His body felt stiff, deeply aching. He took a moment to register this room that both was and was not his.

  He rolled over, groaned at that portion of his spine that didn’t want to move with him. Smell of coffee. He made a stop in the bathroom. He could hear Chloe moving around in the kitchen. Told himself not to be such a chickenshit, quit hiding.

  The kitchen was flooded with light. Chloe turned around from the sink, smiled at him. “Good morning.”

  “Morning?”

  “Yes, goofball, you slept, what, fourteen hours.”

  “No way.” Among all the large and small shocks of the last few weeks this one struck him as absurd, unnecessary.

  “I let you sleep. I figured you needed it.”

  Jack found a mug, occupied himself with pouring coffee. He wanted to kiss her good morning but was unsure about how to start up all over, touch her. “It’s decaf,” Chloe warned.

  “That’s okay. I think I poisoned myself with caffeine yesterday.”

  “With something,” Chloe agreed. She was wearing shorts and a white oxford shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. She never tanned much, didn’t have the skin for it. Even now in late September there was only the faintest tint of sun to her bare legs.

  Jack said, “I feel like the guy in 2001, who wakes up on Jupiter and keeps turning into all these different ages.”

  “Do you think you could stop saying weird things?”

  But she was smiling, and Jack believed she must know what he meant. How he kept waking up in different worlds, one where his heart broke, one where Chloe loved him all over again. The enameled tea canister, the wineglasses in the shape of fish; here they were, just as he’d seen them before, or not really as before, because now he was inside with them.

  Jack said, “How are you …” He didn’t yet have a way to talk about the baby. He didn’t even have a way to feel about it. “You know, the morning thing?”

  “A little better today. I think I’m more into heartburn now.”

  It was a fine, bright, Sunday morning. There was a newspaper to get through, and a plate of toast, and orange juice. After a little while Jack went into the living room and turned on the television to watch the news shows. Dressed-up men sat behind desks and moved their mouths like puppets. It was more Space Odyssey stuff and soon he stopped trying to focus on it. On the wall the water lilies floated in their blue-violet pool. There was a dusty outline on the desk where the computer had been. And there were gaps in the bookshelves where he’d taken books. It could all be put back. It would look exactly the same as before.

  Chloe came in and sat down on the chair across from him. She looked at the television. “What’s this?”

  “Some guys. I don’t know.”

  They sat, intent on the television. Chloe said, “Should we get started? Do you want to talk?”

  “Not really.”

  “We have to.”

  “Not yet.”

  She didn’t understand. Jack said, “Let’s not say a lot of things that get us all worked up again. Let’s just go back to the way it was.”

  “I need to tell you. What it was and what it wasn’t.”

  “I don’t need to hear it.”

  “It didn’t start out to be—”

  Jack put a finger to his lips and shook his head.

  “Please can we talk about the baby. You’re going to keep all this inside and stew over it and then you�
�ll throw it all in my face.”

  “No, Chloe.”

  “You can’t be anything less than a father. Or if you can’t, I need to know now.”

  On the television screen, the puppet men moved their mouths. They talked about politics and war. Their knowledge was profound and deeply rooted, their reasoning subtle, their ideas grave. It exhausted Jack to think of all the effort that went into such heavy, heavy words. He said, “I will be a father to this child. I won’t ever throw anything in your face. Come here.”

  Chloe got up to sit next to him on the couch. Jack put his arms around her and held her close. He felt her heart beating through his own chest. He wondered if the baby had a heart yet, if it was something you could hear with careful listening.

  Over the next few days Jack stripped his rental place down to its ugly bones. He left the kitchenware he’d purchased for the next poor slob who came along. He restored the computer and everything else to its rightful place. He took the car back to Budget and signed off on the charges without looking at the receipt. There was still a lethargy in him. His head felt thick and clogged, his muscles had come unstrung. His body was catching up with the long distress of his mind. The weather changed overnight to autumn, or the first sign of it, a spell of gray, chill rain. Jack slept long and hard. Chloe often called him from work. He knew this was a kind of demonstration on her part, meant to prove something, but he was glad of it.

  They didn’t mention Spence. Steered right around his name. That part was like some Victorian melodrama, an actor declaiming on a stage: his name shall never again pass my lips, and so on. But maybe that would feel different in time. A lot of things would. In the spring the baby would be here. Everything would change.

  Jack had planned on going with Chloe to her first doctor’s appointment, but that morning he woke up with a wheezing cough. Chloe brought him a cup of tea. “Stay put. You’re not going anywhere today.”

  “But I’m the one who needs the doctor.”

  “Go back to sleep.”

  After she left Jack drank some of the tea. It was an herbal potion that made him feel genuinely invalided. He wasn’t entirely unhappy to miss Chloe’s doctor visit. He had the normal male squeamishness about the mechanics of all this, how a woman’s body turned itself into a factory made up of bleeding, swollen parts.