Tangents, vol 1

by Rae Agatha

  They were, however, as cautious as possible; they used pre-paid phones which numbers were known only to them and never paid for their meals and hotels or Christmas gifts by credit cards. That was also part of the fun. Dan and Julie – how to trick the world.

  ***

  “Taylor is her maiden name, thought you knew. The name she officially uses now is Mann, her husband’s last name.” Kate kept on looking at him. Dan felt the blood pressure in his veins rising. He put away his spoon and had no idea what to say.

  “So, you do know her,” she sighed and put away her mug. “Martin Mann met me a week ago, we drank a coffee. He told me he found out his wife, Julie, was having an affair with you. I asked him if he was absolutely positive about it, if he was sure it was you, the Dan Salinger, he said yes. He showed me her pre-paid phone, the text messages, the photos you were sending to each other, I saw it all, Dan,” she was saying it and was becoming angrier with every second when she was realizing she was about to cry. That was not the way she wanted to handle things, she wanted to be brave, dignified, not show any weakness. He didn’t deserve to see the pain he had caused her.

  “Kate,” he said.

  “No, Dan, there’s nothing you can say. The first messages on the phone were from almost two years ago. You were perfidiously lying to me, cheating on me for two years.”

  He didn’t know what to say. He could have confessed, after all, the cards were on the table, but he was too much of a coward to admit to everything; he just wasn’t able say it out loud, so he just sat there, tense, looking at her, not knowing what to do or how to react.

  “Dan, our marriage is falling to pieces. You know that, because you’re the main reason why it’s happening. I have never cheated on you, and I don’t know why you think I deserved what you’ve been doing to me, how you’ve been treating me, Honest to God I don’t know,” Kate said and started sobbing. “I was doing my best. I know you didn’t love me when you proposed to me, it’s always been obvious to me, but I guess I’ve hoped, against everything, that maybe, one day, you will. But you humiliated me, Dan.”

  He felt tears coming to his eyes. He had never thought of it in that way, that he was humiliating her, it had never been his intention.

  “No, don’t say that, I’ve never wanted you to feel that way,” he said.

  “Really, Dan? You’ve never thought that sleeping with someone, living a double life, lying to me, cheating on me, you’ve really never thought it was humiliating me? Making a fool of me? Ridiculing the life I have lived with you for all those years,” she was crying.

  “I – I wasn’t thinking like that,” he replied. It was true. He was so focused on his needs to live fully, his feeling of unjust that he completely moved Kate aside. Dan never connected his actions with her, not in that way.

  “Dan, I packed a few things and I am going away for the weekend. Please, pick up Johnny from Michael’s the address on the chest of drawers in the bedroom,” she dried her eyes with her hands and got up.

  “Wait, Kate,” he said and got up, too. He grabbed her by her arms, wanted to say so many things, wanted to explain everything, but he couldn’t. He didn’t know what to say, he wasn’t able to find any words. His mind was empty.

  “Let me go, Dan,” Kate said quietly. She was resigned, devastated.

  “You’ve taken away my dignity, save yourself some left-overs. If you had the courage to live a double life for two years, have the courage to at least admit it,” she said and moved away from him. She was walking to the front door when she turned around and said, “On Monday I want you to tell me what your decision is. By the way, Martin made it clear Julie is not leaving him. He told me she’d had such episodes before. Most probably you haven’t been the only one during the two years.”

  “What?” He sighed.

  “You heard me, Dan,” she replied, took her suitcase and left. He heard her car on the driveway and that was it, there was a complete silence around him.

  IX

  Dan was sitting in the bedroom crumpling the piece of paper with Michael’s address in his hand. He thought about calling Julie, of asking her if she truly had other lovers apart from him, but he decided to drop it. It wasn’t really important, what would it change anyway? It would only mean he was even a bigger moron. This morning was his wake-up call.He looked at himself in the dresser’s mirror and he couldn’t stand his own sight. What was happening with him during the past years? What had he done? Chasing after some illusion of freedom; doing something which, in the end, would only hurt everyone around him. He thought of Johnny. What would he say to him? What if one day Johnny found out what Dan did to his mother? Would his boy hate him? Would he understand? Probably not, why would he? It was all black or white from his perspective. It should be like that from Dan’s perspective, too, but he couldn’t see it, not in the past years.

  Dan lay on the bed, covered his face with his hands and started crying.

  ***

  Two hours later, he arrived at Michael’s parents’ house to pick Johnny up. Michael’s mom called to his son who was overjoyed to see his dad waiting for him in the hallway.

  “I hope he wasn’t any trouble for you,” Dan said, his tone was friendly.

  “Oh, no, not at all, he’s a wonderful boy,” she replied. “He can come here as often as he’d like, the boys are getting on really nicely.”

  “Dad!” Johnny shouted as he was running down the stairs.

  “How are you doing?” Dan greeted him, lifted him up and kissed him.

  “Dad, you need to see something in Michael’s room, come on! It’s amazing!” Johnny shouted and started pulling Dan to walk upstairs.

  “May I?” Dan asked Michael’s mother.

  “Of course, go ahead!” She laughed.Johnny and Dan went to Michael’s room. Johnny’s friend was sitting by the desk opposite the door, he looked up at them.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  “Hi,” Dan replied and shook Michael’s hand.

  “Mike, I had to show my dad the globe,” Johnny said. “Dad, you’ll love it, it’s amazing!”

  “Okay,” Dan smiled.

  Michael stepped up on a chair and took a big globe down from the wardrobe. Dan thought it looked pretty causal, did not understand what made his son so crazy about it.

  “Check this out, Dad!” Johnny plugged the globe in and the light bulb inside the sphere lit up. The whole globe changed from political map to geographical one with mountains painted in red and brown, valleys painted green and oceans and seas painted blue. The meridians had time zones marked on them and, what’s more, the globe was also moving around

  “That’s not all, look!” Johnny added the model of the sun, attached it to one of the meridians and it was now possible to observe the sun’s movement from East to West.

  “That is cool, it really is,” Dan said and he meant it. “I like it a lot.”

  “Can I have one of those, Dad? Can I?”

  “We’ll think about it, son. Come on, we need to go,” Dan replied. Johnny was disappointed at first, but he said goodbye to Michael and walked down with his dad. He put his shoes on, took his backpack and they went outside.

  “So, how was it?” Dan asked when they were driving away.

  “It was amazing!”

  Dan smiled. “Amazing” had been Johnny’s number one word for some time now.

  “What did you guys do?”

  “We played some video games, watched a movie, played with Cat. He’s nuts, Cat, you should hear him bark, Dad,” Johnny laughed.

  “Cat barks?” Dan asked surprised.

  “Well, d’oh, it’s a schnauzer, so what else is he supposed to do?” The boy asked smiling.

  “Oh, they have a dog named Cat, ha, that’s funny,” Dan said. Weird people. “Did you eat breakfast?”

  “Yes, we had pancakes.”

  “Nice, sounds great. How about ice-cream, would you like some? I

  feel like having ice-cream.”

  “You bet! Dad,
that would be amazing!”

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought, okay, we’re going,” Dan laughed.

  “Amazing!”

  An hour later they were strolling around the city, eating their ice-creams, talking about Michael and school. It was in early March, 2005, the air was already smelling like spring, and it was a quite warm Saturday. For Dan it was shocking to discover how many things had slipped his mind; Johnny’s new friends, new subjects at school, new films and action heroes he enjoyed. It was all very painful; he was so engaged by Julie, by the job, that he started missing the most important thing for him – his son’s life. Was this what it would look like if Kate divorced him?

  “Maybe we should go and see mom, she might be worried,” Johnny said.

  “Well,” Dan replied and handed him a handkerchief to clean his mouth; the kid had chocolate on half of his face. “She won’t be worried, because she’s not home, she told me in the morning she needed to go somewhere to rest, she’s been feeling tired.”

  Johnny looked at him surprised. “She said she needed to rest?”

  “Yes,” Dan said. “It’ll be all right, she will be back on Monday.”

  “By herself?”

  “What do you mean? Will it be a problem, you think?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Johnny said finishing his ice-cream. “I just thought it’s nicer to be with someone when you go to hospital.”

  “What? What are you talking about?!” Dan looked at him intensely. “Son, what hospital?”

  “That’s where mom is. She told me on Thursday she was going to hospital on Saturday and that on Monday she would be back. I didn’t want to go to Michael’s when she told me, I wanted to spend time with her, but she said it was okay, that she wanted me to have some fun time as she needed to get ready to go and she told me not to worry. She said she was going to be fine.”

  Dan had problems comprehending what Johnny was saying. Hospital? What the hell was going on?

  “Dad, you didn’t know she was going to hospital?” The boy asked.

  “No, of course I knew, it, it just slipped my mind,” he replied clumsily.

  “So, let’s go, I really want to see mom,” Johnny pulled his dad’s sleeve.

  “Okay, sure. We’ll see grandma first, okay? Only for a second, I promise.”

  “All right, but then we’re going to mom, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  On their way to Will and Janet’s place, Dan kept on thinking about Kate. He hadn’t the slightest clue as to what was happening, why she was in hospital? How long had she known she was going to go there. He couldn’t understand why she didn’t tell him; it wasn’t until two days before when she found out about Julie, so why hadn’t she let him know?Because he didn’t deserve to know, his guilt screamed in his head. You something was wrong. God don’t let it be life-threatening.

  They arrived at their old apartment, Dan pushed the doorbell and was waiting for what seemed to be two years minimum. Finally, Will opened. Dan looked down at him.

  “Hi, Will, can we come in for a minute?”

  “Hi, grandpa!” Johnny smiled and walked inside.

  “He’s the only reason why you’re walking inside,” Will hissed at Dan and moved away on his wheelchair allowing him to get in.

  “Johnny, why don’t you feed the fish while I talk to your dad, all right?” Will said.

  “Okay,” Johnny replied and went to the living room.

  “Where is she, Will?” Dan asked when he was alone with his father-in-law. They were talking in the kitchen to make sure Johnny wouldn’t hear them.

  “What, you forgot to ask her?” He replied harshly, “Or you had no time to get interested in her problems? Being busy with your new lady –“

  “Will, this is something between me and my wife. I am asking you to tell me where she is so Johnny can visit her, he wants to see her and I have no idea where to take him.”

  “You’re a real son of a bitch, you know that?” Will asked angrily.

  “Explain to your eight-year-old grandson why he won’t see his mom today or save your comments to yourself.”

  Will looked at Dan with pure hatred, but finally told him, “The Bridge Hospital.”

  Dan was about to leave when Will grabbed him by his leg, “Janet’s there, do not expect a warm welcome.”

  “Come on, Johnny, let’s go, mom’s waiting.”

  “Coming, Dad!” the boy replied and came to the kitchen. “Bye, grandpa!” he said and hugged Will.

  “Bye, see you soon,” he replied and hugged him back.

  X

  An hour later Dan and Johnny were at the hospital. Dan looked around for the reception desk but his son led him to the elevators; apparently he knew exactly where to go. They got off on the 4th floor, a surgical ward. Janet was sitting on a chair next to one of the rooms.

  “Janet!” Dan exclaimed. She looked at him and nervously turned her head around. Johnny ran to her and she hugged him.

  “What’s going on? How is she?” Dan asked, trying not to pay attention to his mother-in-law’s body language.

  “Would you like to see mommy?” Janet asked Johnny.

  “Sure!”

  “Come on,” she took his hand and got up. They walked up to the room and Johnny looked around. “What about dad? Isn’t he coming with us?”

  “He’ll be there, I just need to talk to him for a minute, okay?” Janet kissed his head.

  “Okay.”

  She opened the door and walked inside the room with Johnny. After a few minutes, she returned and walked over to Dan. He got up.

  “How is she doing?” He asked.

  “Pretty good, actually. She’s having the surgery tomorrow, not today, so if you want to move out, Johnny can stay with us until Tuesday,” she said coldly.

  “Move out? I don’t want to move out. Why would I,” he started, but saw Janet’s look. She knew. Of course. There was no point of discussing that matter any further. “Listen, you need to tell me what’s going on, I had no idea she was going to hospital.”

  “She didn’t want to tell you.”

  “Yes, I know, but what’s happening?”

  Janet was looking at him, her lips were sealed.

  “Oh, come on Janet, I’m her husband.”

  “And now you remember, how about that,” she scoffed. Finally she sat on the chair and pointed at Dan to sit next to her.

  “She’s having a surgery.”

  “What? Why? What’s wrong?”

  “I think it’s best if she tells you. I mean, she has her reasons not to trust you, okay? That’s why she didn’t tell you anything. I feel like I’m already crossing the line here, so maybe she should decide if she wants you to know any details.”

  “Yeah, okay, sure” he said quietly and leaned on the chair. “I – I had no idea she was having problems.“

  “Dan, it’s none of my business. All I know is that for some time now, she’s been suffering a lot because of you, that she’s been thinking of leaving you, but kept on hoping you’d – change.”

  “She wanted to leave me?”

  “Yes. I kept telling her it was not a way out, that Johnny was too young, wouldn’t understand why his father could no longer live with them. I told her she needed to talk to you, make you understand how she felt.”

  Dan began to comprehend that before Kate found out about Julie, she didn’t want to leave him, but the affair she’d found out about the previous week had filled her cup of bitterness to the brim.

  The door opened and Johnny walked out of the room. “Dad, why aren’t you coming?”

  “How’s mom, is she sleeping?”

  “No, I told her you’re here. She said you could come in.”

  Dan got up, looked at Janet who turned her eyes away. He understood, she was stepping aside, it wasn’t her business.

  “Johnny, come on, let’s go for a walk,” she said. “Grandma needs to stretch her legs all this sitting is bad for my knees.”

  “Mom, wil
l you be okay? I’ll be back soon,” Johnny, standing in the doorway, looked over his shoulder at her and stepped out when Kate nodded her head.

  When Janet walked away with Jonny, Dan walked into the room. Kate was lying on the bed, looking at him with a clear lack of enthusiasm. He closed the door and came closer to her bed.

  “Kate –“