The Full Catastrophe

by David Carkeet

  There, he thought. That was much better. First of all, a guy could be a failure and still have a decent marriage. Look at Mr. and Mrs. Micawber—he was one of the great duds of literature, but they were a delightfully close couple. Being a failure wouldn’t necessarily doom a marriage, but being perceived as a failure would.

  Second, who said Dan was a failure? When Cook had seen him at the ball game the night before—so happy in the midst of his employees, so obviously popular—he had wanted to scrap that hypothesis altogether, though it was less than an hour old, and he would have scrapped it if he had had anything to stick in its place.

  Now he did. He felt sure that Beth thought Dan was a failure. The monster she had glimpsed and recoiled from the night before was this: she had been on the verge of accusing Dan of staying with her only because his job was connected with her—an idea that was ugly for a number of reasons, one of which was what it said about Dan as a professional success. Beth had begun to duck and cover when she heard herself start to say it, claiming she meant something general—which told Cook she meant something specific. Her dodge had fooled Dan, had snowed him completely.

  Cook summoned up an image of Mrs. Micawber, speaking with hope of her husband’s prospects, trying to shield him from the pain of the world and the pain of himself. Cook put Beth next to this image, and he found that, viewed this way, he could easily hate her.

  Cook got dressed and went downstairs. Dan and Beth had finished breakfast, and passed him on their way up. Dan gave him a curt greeting. Beth gave him a hello and a hard face. Something was up. Bitch attack, prick attack, some predawn complementary schismogenesis—who could say? Cook figured he would be Pillowing his fanny off all day.

  He ate a leisurely breakfast and read a long obituary of a former newspaper employee. He took a cup of coffee upstairs with him. Beth was in the TV room on the second floor. She was wearing a tight black leotard, a gold headband, and gold wristbands as she exercised to music and whoops of encouragement from the TV. He glanced at her face. She looked driven and unhappy.

  He went on up the stairs and found Dan back at his patching job on the third-floor landing. This time he was working with a huge sponge, running it back and forth to smooth the plaster after he applied it. He explained to Cook that he had to do the work in stages, letting a layer dry before he put on the next one.

  “Looks good,” Cook said automatically.

  “It is good,” Dan said, seizing Cook’s sentence as if it were a lifeline. “Why doesn’t she appreciate me? I do all sorts of things. Why doesn’t she appreciate me?” He looked at Cook for an actual, true answer. “Okay. Here’s an easier question. I’m talking to her, okay? I’m telling her a story. When I’m done, what does she say? She says, ‘And?’ What do you make of that?”

  “‘And?’”

  “Yeah. It pisses me off. What’s she saying? That my stories are boring? That they’re incomplete? That they don’t have a point? What’s she saying?”

  “Maybe she just wants you to go on talking.”

  Dan frowned. “Why? What about?”

  The phone rang at Dan’s side, making him jump. He grabbed it and said hello. His body sagged. “Hi, Rose. … Yeah, I’m still home. Home is where the heart is, you know. Lemme get Beth.” He looked up at the ceiling, rather than down toward where Beth actually was, and hollered, “Honey! Your mom!” He waited.

  “I don’t think she can hear you over that tape,” said Cook. “I’ll go tell her.”

  “What’s she doing? Her Jane Fonda tape? Or is it Raquel Welch? Or Clare Boothe Luce?”

  Cook went down and gave the message to Beth. She received it with ill-disguised irritation at being interrupted. When Cook returned to the third floor, Dan was holding the receiver at arm’s length high over the table. He slowly let it descend toward the cradle, lowering it at a steady rate. Cook watched with excitement. Would Beth pick up the extension before it reached the cradle or not? What if she didn’t? But she did, and when her “Hi, Mom” came over the line Dan slammed the receiver down the rest of the way.

  “When you hang up loudly,” Dan said, “can they tell or does it just feel to you like they can?”

  Cook shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “And?”

  Cook laughed.

  “See?” said Dan. “Isn’t it a bitch? Doesn’t it make you feel like you don’t talk right? I never do stuff like that with Beth—never make her feel bad with subtle digs. With all the things she does that drive me nuts, or the way she manhandles the car, I could really let her have it. But I never say a word.”

  “What’s she do to the car?”

  Dan paused and collected his thoughts. “It’s a cold winter morning, okay? The oil’s just sitting in the pan, right? Now, does she let the engine run quietly a few seconds so the oil can get pumped up and start doing some good?”

  “Something tells me the answer is no.”

  “Damn right. She just bolts away from the curb. And at the end of the day, watch her pull up in front. Or check out the right wheels on her car. She scrapes them on the curb every time, just beats the shit out of them. I could go on and on. At night, she always turns on the car lights before she starts the car. Drives me nuts.”

  “Could she make a similar complaint about you? Is there some area you’re dumb in?”

  “Sure. Cooking. So what?”

  “You’re as dumb about cooking as she is about cars?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t get in the kitchen and manhandle things. I don’t bull my way in there and mess up her equipment.”

  “But she has to drive,” Cook said.

  “I knew you were going to say that,” Dan said impatiently. “I knew it.”

  Cook felt himself tense. “You say that to Beth all the time—you knew she was going to say this, you knew she was going to say that. Sometimes sentences are predictable. So what?”

  Dan’s face went blank. He had no answer. Finally he muttered, “If she has to drive, she should learn how.”

  “She did. She just learned it a little bit wrong and it’s too hard to change.”

  “What are you saying? I should just live with it?”

  “Why did you marry her? So you could admire her clutch work?”

  “What’s your point? I can’t complain about anything? Why are you being such a hard-ass this morning?”

  “Complain about important things. Hell, you can even complain about these pressing automotive issues. Once. Maybe twice. But—”

  “I did. Once or twice. Then I dropped it. I gave up. Every day I watch her blunder, and swallow my outrage. Wouldn’t you call that working on the marriage?”

  Cook heard the sound of the phone being hung up in the bedroom—loudly—then Beth’s footsteps. He was waiting for her to go back to the den, but she stopped at the bottom of the stairs and bawled, “Honey! Honey!”

  “What?” Dan yelled.

  “Our summer is completely ruined.”

  Dan made a long-suffering face to signal to Cook that whatever might lie behind this extraordinary claim, he, for one, would not have made this leap so quickly. He looked over the railing of the landing, straight down at Beth. So did Cook. He noticed for the first time that Beth had a small cluster of gray hairs at the very top of her head.

  “What is it?” Dan said.

  “Robbie’s camp is canceled. Will you get down here?”

  “Shit,” Dan said softly. “That is bad.” He set his sponge in the bucket and went downstairs. Cook trotted after him. Dan stopped at the very bottom of the stairs, and Cook had to stop two steps up, which gave him something of an overview. Beth looked distraught.

  “Irene Hendricks’s mother told Mom that Art’s wife and son were in an accident on their way back from Colorado. They’re in the hospital. Art canceled the first session.”

  Dan’s face went blank. “Jesus. Are they hurt badly?”

  “I don’t know. They’re hospitalized. It must be pretty bad.”

  “Did you talk to Art
or one of his kids?”

  The question seemed to confuse Beth. “I talked to Mom.”

  Dan headed for the bedroom. “Let’s call the camp and see what’s what.”

  “I don’t know which son it was,” Beth said as she and Cook followed. “I wonder if it was Robbie’s counselor. What was his name? Mike?”

  “Yeah,” said Dan. “Mike.” He pressed his lips together and shook his head. “Let’s see what the story is.” He bent down and searched in the nightstand. “Where’s the phone book?”

  “Call information,” Beth said.

  “That costs money. Where is it? There should be a phone book right here.”

  “It’s downstairs. Just call information.”

  Dan said, “It’ll just take a second,” and he headed for the door. Beth made an impatient noise, grabbed the phone, and dialed information herself. Dan slowed, stopped, and returned. He said nothing.

  “Hermann, Missouri,” Beth said into the phone. “Camp Swallow.” She began to look frantically on the nightstand. “Where’s the pen?” she said. “There was a pen right here. Did you do something with it?”

  Dan began to look around for it. Cook took a pen from his pocket and handed it to her. She scribbled the number on the top of a Kleenex box on the nightstand. Then she punched the button to hang up and dialed the camp number.

  “Damn. Busy.” She dialed again. “Damn it.” She said to Dan, “You try. I’m too upset. I can’t stand this.” She and Dan switched places.

  Cook said, “Beth, could you tell me what you meant when you asked Dan if he had done something with the pen?”

  Beth frowned deeply. Before she could answer, Dan said, “Not now, Jeremy.” He squinted at the number Beth had written down, then dialed it. “Busy.”

  Cook said, “Dan, did you feel Beth was blaming you for the pen’s absence?”

  Dan ignored Cook. He said to Beth, “What else did your mom say?”

  “Nothing. Just that it’s canceled. What are we going to do with Robbie for those two weeks? We’ve got to find another camp. We’ve just got to.”

  “Well, it’s not gonna be—”

  “How about Silver Lake? Don’t the Webers send Matt there? I wonder if they have any openings.”

  “Let’s establish what the facts are first,” said Dan. “I want to talk to Art and establish the facts.”

  “Who’s Art?” said Cook. “Is he the director of the camp?”

  Before dialing again, Dan looked at Cook and said, without any acrimony whatsoever, “Jeremy, I kind of think you’re going to have to shut the fuck up right now.” He dialed, swore, and hung up. He looked at Beth. “Let me get this straight. How did your mom learn about this? Irene Hendricks told her? But how did she find out?”

  Beth shook her head. “Her mother told her.”

  “Irene’s mother told her that camp was canceled?” Dan said skeptically. “How did she find out?”

  Beth frowned. “Irene told her. What do you think?”

  Dan began to look a little wild. “You’re saying Irene told her mother, and then her mother turned around and told Irene? That doesn’t make any sense.”

  Beth said, “I’m going to scream. I swear, I’m going to scream.”

  “Pronouns and antecedents can be a real problem,” Cook said.

  They stared at him as if debating who should go first. The phone rang and Dan grabbed it. It was clear to Cook right away that a camp counselor was at the other end, informing Dan that the session was indeed canceled. Dan asked about the condition of the director’s wife and son—and was it Mike? Yes, it was, but apparently both of them would be all right. At this point Beth tried to speak to Dan, but he shushed her and asked the counselor to repeat something. A moment later, Beth tried again and got shushed again. Dan said goodbye and hung up.

  Beth was livid. “Jesus Christ!” she said. “I wanted you to ask them about other camps. Who was that?”

  “Susy?” Dan said, as if not sure.

  “Well, they would know. Call her back.”

  “Calm down, damn it,” Dan said. “You call her if I’m such a fuckup.”

  “It’s just going to be busy again.” Beth took Dan’s place at the phone. “That’s why you should have asked her when you had the chance.”

  Cook said to Dan, “All you have to do in that kind of situation is say ‘Excuse me’ to the party on the phone, and then you can give a hearing to the person you’re with.”

  Dan laughed—a high, strained laugh. “Christ, Jeremy. You sound like Miss Manners.” He looked at Beth. “I hate it when I’m on the phone and I’m being talked at from two directions.”

  “And I hate being ignored. Jeremy’s right. All you had to do was say ‘Excuse me.’ What’s the big deal?” She dialed the number. It was busy, and she slammed the phone down.

  Dan suddenly looked very tired. “Here,” he said in a flat tone. “Let me call. I made the mistake, so I’ll do the calling. Okay?”

  Beth and Dan switched places again. Beth threw Cook a glance.

  Cook said, “Beth, how do you feel when Dan suddenly concedes a point like that?”

  “She gets a hard-on,” Dan said.

  “Stop it,” said Beth.

  “You know, I don’t do things for bizarre reasons,” Dan said as he began to dial the phone number. “I imagined Susy was in a hurry, you know? She’s probably got this long list of people to call, and they’re all gonna be disappointed as hell, and she’s upset about the accident, and I just didn’t feel right about pumping her for information. So I had a reason. Hey! It’s ringing.”

  “But we have a right to ask her to recommend an alternative,” Beth said. “They owe us that. We’ve been planning on this since December. They—”

  “Hello—Susy?” Dan said into the phone, his eyes pleading with Beth to leave him alone right now. “It’s Dan Wilson again. Listen, can you recommend any other camps that run the same time that Swallow was going to run? … Well, yeah, I know you don’t know their exact schedules, but … Well, forget their schedules. What camps in the area do you think are good? … None? That’s pretty bizarre. Surely you … Yeah, well, of course we love Camp Swallow. Robbie’s crazy about it. But surely you … Well. Okay. Yeah. And I’m sorry. I hope everything works out. Bye.”

  Beth had begun to agitate as the conversation drew to an end, and now she said, “She wouldn’t recommend any?”

  Dan frowned as he hung up. “They’re pretty much sold on themselves.”

  “Shit,” said Beth. “Well, let’s make some calls and see what’s available. I’ll go get the Yellow Pages.” She headed for the door.

  “God,” Dan said with disbelief. “We’re reduced to the Yellow Pages to pick a camp.”

  Beth stopped and turned around at the door. “What else are we going to do? Do you have any ideas?” She spoke as if Dan’s words—which Cook had taken as a mere aside—were a personal challenge.

  “No,” Dan said calmly. “It’s just not the best way to go about it.”

  “I know that. I’m not going to close my eyes and stab at the page and pick one that way. I just want to see who has openings. Then we’ll make inquiries. Okay?”

  “Inquiries?”

  “Yes. We’ll call people we know and see what they know.” Beth said this slowly, as if Dan were being a blockhead.

  “Yeah. Well … people are just gonna say what they’re doing is right.”

  Beth had turned to go downstairs, but she turned around again. “What?”

  “It’s like with schools. No parent is going to say they’re sending their kid to a crummy school. People are just gonna praise the camp they’ve chosen.”

  “So what are you saying? It’s hopeless? We ought to give up? You want to take Robbie with us to Italy?”

  “No. That’s ridiculous. But that’s not the only—”

  “It’s not ridiculous. He’s old enough now. We could. And we will, another time. But this trip is just for us. You and me.” She looked at him. “Righ
t?”

  “Right.”

  “What were you going to say?”

  “Nothing. Go get the Yellow Pages.” Dan watched her leave, turned to Cook with his forefinger raised, and lowered it and pointed it straight at him. “Nothing from you. Nothing.”

  “What?”

  “I want to hear nothing from you. No questions. No fucking helpful hints. Not a word.”

  “Okay.”

  “Nothing.”

  “Okay.”

  “I guess what I’m saying is I want you to leave.” “Leave?”

  “Get out of the room. Leave us alone.”

  “Can’t I watch?”

  “No. I don’t want you here. The contract said the linguist would not be permitted in the bedroom.”

  “I’ve never seen such a contract.”

  “Well, that’s what it said. This is the bedroom. I want you to leave.”

  “But that clause—if it exists—certainly means only that bedroom activities need to be private, not—”

  Dan laughed. He pursed his lips and prudishly said “bedroom activities” in open mockery of Cook. “You’re too much. But maybe you’re right about what it means. The thing is, there might be bedroom activities. You never know what could develop.” Dan looked up at Beth, who came in with the Yellow Pages. “Honey, do you want to fuck our brains out while we make these phone calls?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “See, Jeremy?” said Dan, though in truth he looked as surprised at Beth’s response as Cook was. “You’ve got about ten seconds to clear out.”

  Cook found himself backing out the door. “I demand a full report,” he said with cinematic bravado.

  Dan laughed and laughed at that.

  Cook took a walk in the neighborhood. He came back and tried to read the paper. He took another walk. When he returned, the house was quiet.

  He went upstairs and tiptoed to the bedroom door, which was a few inches ajar. He knocked on it and swung it open. The room was empty. Before entering, he turned and called into the rest of the house, “Dan? Beth?”

  The silence had a baleful quality. Cook went into the room. The Yellow Pages lay open on the bed to a page reading “Camps,” and a series of check marks showed that Dan and Beth had worked through the entire list. On a yellow legal tablet were names of several of them, but they had been crossed out—all but one, which was circled and starred. Cook couldn’t quite read the handwriting. It looked like “Big Muffin Camp,” but he didn’t think that was right. He looked around the room for more clues. All he saw was the pen he had lent to Beth, lying on the floor. He picked it up and put it in his pocket.