by Scott Lasser
“Do you have kids?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “But I can imagine.”
IV
CAROLYN LIKED HIM, had always liked him. She’d realized this as a girl and saw it again now: there was no artifice with David Halpert, no tics or anger or phobias or recklessness hidden in some shadow of his personality. Not that he didn’t have some of these things, but the lights were on. Also, he was not a bad-looking guy. He was losing his hair and he’d put on some weight since high school—who hadn’t?—but he still could look at her directly and get her attention. A man who could look you in the eye was not to be taken lightly.
She remembered her sister’s devotion to David. Carolyn wanted to feel so strongly about a man that nothing else mattered, but it hadn’t gone that way. Marty had come along at the right time. In the end, she’d pursued him and he’d surrendered. She saw in him a steady man, a good provider, someone who didn’t mind being left alone. A man, in short, not unlike her father. She felt secure with Marty. She never really had to worry about anything.
She asked why David had become a lawyer.
“Lack of imagination,” he said.
“What else would you have been?”
“I’m still trying to figure it out.”
He didn’t elaborate, and soon she found herself talking about her mother. The subject was too depressing, so she excused herself to go to the ladies’ room, where she could check her face. David stood when she got up from the table, as her father would have; as Marty once did, but no longer.
• • •
DAVID STOOD AGAIN when she returned to the table.
“Tell me what went wrong with your marriage. And then what went right.”
“Well, we fell in love. It wasn’t all bad, at the beginning. Then we fell out of love. What about you? Why did you get married?”
“I thought Marty would make a good husband, and it seemed like the right time.”
“I see,” he said.
She had in effect told him that she wasn’t in love with her husband, and he had understood immediately.
“I was young,” she said.
“Then there’s the boy. That makes it complicated, right? No kids and you’re like me, you both walk away and it’s no harm, no foul.”
“I’m sure,” she said, meaning the opposite.
He shrugged. “Well, you should be happy.”
“How can you say that? You don’t know me.”
“It’s just how I want to think of you,” he said.
It was like therapy, talking to David; actually, he was better than her therapist in Beverly Hills. David was a much quicker study, and refreshingly direct. There was a sadness to him, but he didn’t try to hide it—or couldn’t—and that made him that much more attractive. She could think of a dozen women back in L.A. who would crawl over each other to have dinner with this man.
“So tell me, David,” she said, “why isn’t there a woman in your life?”
“How do you know there’s not?”
“I don’t think there is.”
“You’re right,” he admitted.
• • •
HE POURED WINE into a tumbler. They were in his living room, walls the color of pudding, an Ansel Adams photo (nice enough, but out of place), carpet the color of dirt, a greenish couch she was sitting on. Before she got married, if a man had brought her to a dump like this she wouldn’t have considered him a serious contender. Tonight they’d gone to a liquor store for wine, then walked back here like a couple of teenagers. She realized that once she stopped asking him questions he became talkative, funny. She was conscious of what she was doing, that she was a married woman in the apartment of an unmarried man, the ex-boyfriend of her dead sister.
“Here’s to you,” he said. He clinked his glass to hers. “I must tell you, I think I’m drunk. I don’t drink often, but . . .”
“And yet you keep drinking,” she said. She was feeling a bit tipsy herself.
She had cheated on Marty twice before; she had considered doing it far more than that. Offers were surprisingly abundant. Just last week she had gone to lunch with the guy from her firm who was to head up the marketing campaign for a new movie. They’d been seated about five seconds when he looked at her ring and said, “So, are you happily married?”
She was appalled by his rudeness, by his lack of respect for her as a professional, and most of all by the world and its excessive store of desperation.
She wasn’t feeling any of that now. She just wanted to be reckless.
“Set down your glass,” she said. He did as he was told. She moved to him and kissed him. He was surprised at first, but he quickly adjusted. It was thrilling, almost like being young again. She hadn’t felt anything like it in years.
V
DAVID PACED IN his kitchen, wanting to call Carolyn. In the last six days they’d had dinner three times. She wouldn’t sleep with him. He’d asked—it seemed almost insulting not to—but only once, at the second dinner. She was married, after all. The last time he called she told him not to call again, but he had a hard time believing her. Yes, she was married, but she was available. He could feel it. He decided to call anyway. Maybe she would pick up. In fact, she did.
“Come over,” he said.
She hung up without a word. Half an hour later, she surprised him at his door. He greeted her, but she entered without speaking, set her purse on the dining table, threw her coat over a chair, slipped out of her shoes. She walked to the bedroom. David gave himself a moment to watch the elaborate design on the back pockets of her jeans swing back and forth.
He took a deep breath, conscious of it, and then walked into the bedroom. He found her studying the bed, arms crossed, head bowed, a picture of agony.
“I can’t,” she said.
“Then don’t.”
“But I want to.”
“Then do.”
• • •
LATER, HE HELD her in his arms, drifting in and out of sleep.
“What are we doing?” she said.
It was a good question. It was new and exciting. He liked her, and he liked himself when he was with her. He hadn’t thought about it beyond that. He stayed quiet till she gave him a nudge, a pointy elbow to his ribcage.
“I just like you,” he said.
“That’s your answer?”
“I don’t have an answer. What do you think we’re doing?”
“I’m a sucker for attention,” she said.
He was hoping for higher standards, but he’d take it.
“And you were Natalie’s boyfriend,” she said. “I always wanted what she had, and suddenly I have it.”
“It isn’t personal, you’re saying.”
“It’s very personal. But I’m married. I have a child. I have to go back home.”
“I’m thinking of moving back here,” he said. The words were out, and he found that they were settling well. The idea of a move, of change, lifted his mood. He was ready to start something new.
“Moving back?”
“It’s home, where I’m from. It seems like a silly, hopeless thing to do, so maybe it will work for me.”
“It’s like moving back to Hiroshima,” she said.
“People live there now, I’m pretty sure.” In the darkness he thought he saw her smile, or grimace. It didn’t matter which. He had made a decision.
1994
I
Marlon heard it, his name, three times, like an echo. He handed the joint back to Eric. “Gonna have to go.”
“What for?”
“My dad’s calling.”
“I ain’t heard nothing.”
“I hear him,” Marlon said. In truth, he didn’t want to go. He had a good buzz and he just wanted to hang here, behind his friend’s house, and let the afternoon wash over him, time sliding by like a river. It was what made this summer special, the afternoon high, enjoying what adults got to enjoy.
Marlon spent most every day with Eric. Sometimes th
ey said they were brothers, and they meant it like blood. Better than blood. Eric was someone he could count on. Eric lived with his mother and a real older brother, and neither one was ever around, except the brother in the middle of the night. His mother could be gone for days, and sometimes there was nothing to eat. Eric took to hiding food in his room, so his brother wouldn’t get it.
“You lucky, man,” Eric said.
“ ’Cause I gotta go?” Marlon asked.
“ ’Cause you got an old man who wants you to.”
“Usually he’s pissed at me,” Marlon said, and this was true. Marlon could hardly do anything right. “He’s always on me at home,” Marlon continued. “About doing good in school, what am I gonna do with my life, all that shit.”
Eric took a long drag, then talked while holding in the smoke. “So, that’s gotta really suck, huh? Being loved too much?”
• • •
HE WALKED IN the back door and there was his father, Everett, waiting for him, showered and scrubbed. His father always did a lot of scrubbing to get the steel plant off of him. They had chemicals at the plant that floated in the air and left everything stiff and sticky, as if it had been coated in hairspray. Just last weekend Marlon had watched his mother dump the laundry on the floor and out came his father’s work clothes, frozen in the circular shape of the laundry hamper.
“How you feeling, son?” his father asked.
“Good.”
“Took you a while to get here.”
“Just came on my own. Didn’t hear nothing.”
“Anything,” his mother said. She was at the stove, and always on him to talk white.
His father tilted his head, a way of giving an order. Marlon took his place at the table. It wasn’t so bad to sit here with a nice buzz. Also, he was starving. When the food hit the table, he dug in. At one point he looked up and both of his parents were staring at him.
“You want to take a breath?” his father asked.
“Hungry,” he explained. He finished his chicken, took the plate to the sink, and then headed for the back door. His parents were talking about some neighbor. He figured he’d head back to Eric’s while it was still light, maybe watch a video or something.
“Marlon Booker!” his mother yelled.
“Sorry, Mom.” He was supposed to ask to be excused. He put on his best hangdog look and slunk back to the table. “May I?” he asked. “Please.”
“Yes,” she said.
“No,” said his father.
“But . . .” His father never said no.
“I want to talk to you. After you help your mother clean up the kitchen.”
“What the—”
“Watch your mouth,” his mother said.
He stopped talking. He wasn’t going to win with these two. Better to stay quiet and try to save the buzz.
• • •
“YOU’RE STONED,” his father said. They were in Marlon’s room, the place he went to be alone. Marlon hated it when his father came in like he owned the place.
“What?” Marlon said, stalling.
“You heard me. Thirteen years old, Marlon, and you’re showing up to dinner stoned out of your mind. You think that’s cool? Where’d you get it, that McCall kid?”
“Dad, there’s so much smoke on the street, it’s like we in Mexico.”
“We’re in Mexico,” his father corrected.
“Shit.”
“Marlon!”
“What are we talking ’bout here? English grades or drugs?”
“Drugs.”
“Well, it’s not like it’s crack. Weed never hurt no one.”
“Smoking,” the old man said, “hurts everyone.”
Marlon just waited, and longed for this talk to be over.
“What do you want to make of yourself?” his father asked. Always that question: a week didn’t go by without that question getting asked. It was as if his father couldn’t stand the suspense of not knowing what his son would do for work twenty years from now.
“Don’t want to work in no steel plant,” Marlon said. This was true. No way, no how did he want to go to that horrible place, hot and loud with machinery that sounded like metal breaking. Not that he had any idea where he did want to go. His friends all thought they’d make it at b-ball or rap, which Marlon thought was just stupid. The world already had too many stars, and not enough people doing useful things.
“Smartest thing you’ve said all night,” his father said.
Marlon waited for him to say more, but nothing came. “We done?” Marlon asked.
“You’re grounded,” Everett said. “You’re not to leave the property without a parent. One month. At night, no TV. You stay here in your room.”
“Dad!” He made fists, squeezed them so tight he could feel his nails digging into his skin. It was the only way to keep from shouting.
“This is serious,” his father said.
“Weed, Dad? You can’t stop that.”
“I can try.”
“You gonna lose.”
His father left on that. Marlon flopped back on his bed, but the buzz was gone.
II
EVERETT DIDN’T KNOW if he would beat this cancer thing—the doctor said there was a decent chance—but what kept him awake at night was Marlon. He knew a man couldn’t control the cancer cells in his body, and perhaps the same could be said of his son. Still, he reasoned it had to be otherwise; God, he thought, wouldn’t have given us sons if we couldn’t have an impact. He wouldn’t have sent one to us himself. Everett just needed a little time. It was important. There was some shit in the world now; it was easier to go astray, and more dangerous when you did. If he could just get another five or six years he could see the kid off right.
He climbed into his truck, a ’68 GMC pickup with three on the tree, touchy as hell when you wanted to find reverse and half junkyard under the hood. The odometer was broken, which was fine with Everett, because he didn’t really want to know. The truck’s upper reaches were still army green, which faded as the steel got closer to the road till there was nothing but rust from the salt of a quarter century of Michigan winters. The effect was something like a turning oak leaf. There was a spot on the floorboard where Everett used to be able to see the road pass beneath him, which he liked, but he’d had to close it with duct tape so he didn’t get splashed when it rained. What Everett liked about the truck: nothing bad could happen to him in it. It wasn’t anything to protect.
Everett needed his friend Dirk now, and he really didn’t have much of a favor to call in. He just needed him. Over thirty years they’d known each other, and in all that time Dirk had asked Everett for only one thing. They were about twelve, walking toward school, through light flurries, stepping over a curb stacked with coffee-colored slush. “Don’t tell no one,” Dirk said, “that I have a white mother.”
“I won’t,” Everett said. And he never had.
• • •
EVERETT WANTED TO wait before starting the chemo, but the doctor wasn’t having it. There wasn’t a day to lose, said this scrawny, curly-haired guy, the kind of white kid who probably got beat up on the playground. Almost three weeks had been frittered away and now it was time to act, said the doctor.
“Where’d you go to medical school at?” Everett asked, fishing for a different diagnosis.
“McGill.”
That set Everett back. He’d never heard of the place, but the doctor said it with such pride that Everett figured he should know it, at least if he was going to keep pretending he was the kind of man who might actually know about medical schools. “That’s in—”
“Montreal.”
“Ah, well, they teach you up in Canada that sometimes a man’s got to be ready?”
The doctor set his clipboard down on the corner of the sink and sat on the stool, so that he was lower than Everett, who was sitting on the bed in his T-shirt and underwear. There ought to be a law, Everett thought, where you didn’t have to talk to a doctor unless you were dr
essed.
“Look, Mr. Booker, I wouldn’t expect you to be ready. No one is ready for cancer. But the fact is, cancer cells don’t wait. They eat the body alive. We kill them now or they kill you later. And only a little later.”
“You said before they might anyway.”
“It’s my job to try to stop them. Don’t you want to?”
Of course he did. He just didn’t want to tell his wife. Patrice would go all loopy on him and want him to quit his job, and then what was he going to do all day?
“You sure I’m going to have to stop working?” He hadn’t told the doctor that Bethlehem was closing the plant anyway.
The doctor nodded. “Yes. You work in a steel plant, right? You’re going to be weak at first, and not feeling well. There’s no alternative, really.”
“A man’s got to work to be a man.”
“We’ll get you back as soon as we can.”
“Why’d you come to the States?” Everett asked.
“My wife grew up here.”
“In Detroit?”
“Yes.”
“A white girl?”
“Yes, from Southfield, actually. Not a girl. She’s thirty-three now.”
“Still young.”
“Yes,” the doctor admitted.
“You think I coulda caught this cancer working in the steel plant?”
The doctor opened up his hands, soft and pink, hands like you found in a library. “Who knows? Maybe. Then again, you said you used to smoke. That’s the surefire way to get lung cancer.”
“I got a boy,” Everett said. “He’s gonna need me.”
“Then we better get going,” said the doctor. He looked down, and then up again. “But, Mr. Booker,” he said, “I can make you no guarantees. Now is the time to put your affairs in order. Write up a will, if you don’t have one. Make sure your wife knows where your important papers are. And if there’s any unfinished business with anyone who matters to you, now is the time to finish it.”
“You’re saying I’m going to die.”
“I’m saying I don’t know when,” he said. “I say this to all my patients. Take my advice. There’s nothing to lose in this. With a little luck, you’ll be organized and alive.”