Prodigal Sons

by Mike Miner

  She touched his wedding ring. “How long you been married?”

  “Five years.”

  “So I take it your wife’s not gonna be too pleased.” Her sunglasses rendered her expressions unreadable.

  “I imagine not, but she won’t know right away.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s taking a little break from me.”

  She looked at him from behind the inscrutable shades. Past the 405/101 split they made better time. Ron Sydney’s baggy clothes billowed in the breeze. Matthew held his own in his lap. She drove like an escaped mental patient, honked at anyone who got in front of her and flipped off anyone who didn’t move out of her way fast enough. It seemed a little much to Matthew. Like all of this aggression was for his benefit—to prove she wasn’t just a little girl. The chill of the day faded as they drove into the heart of the San Fernando Valley then climbed through the no man’s land of sandy mountains separating the San Fernando from the Santa Clarita Valley.

  Tommy’s sunglasses took it all in. “This looks like the moon.”

  He directed her off the freeway and guided them to his house, a picture of suburban splendor. She parked the jeep at the curb.

  “Nice house.”

  “Thanks.” Holding Ron’s pants up with his hand, he eased himself out. There was an awkward silence. “Would you like to come in?”

  “Sure. Thanks.”

  In the kitchen, she took off her sunglasses. Matthew was struck by how young she looked. What the hell was he doing? Someone or something should be stopping him. The fun police should be knocking down his front door any second to take him away, ha ha, hee hee, to the funny farm. She glanced around like an alley cat not used to being inside a house.

  “I need a drink and a shower,” he said. “How about you?” She blushed.

  “You can use the guest bath.” He pointed upstairs. “Feel free to lock the door.”

  She blushed deeper, embarrassed by her assumption, looking younger by the minute. He took a beer out of the fridge, showed her the guest bath, then went to his own room and shut the door. Looking at himself in the mirror, he couldn’t help but laugh. What an imbecile. He threw Ron Sydney’s clothes on the bed. Time became a distant, abstract thing in the shower as the beading hotness enveloped him. When he got out, he heard Tommy’s soft, bare footsteps prowling the hardwood floor downstairs.

  A picture of Matthew and his two brothers was in her hands. Noticing him, she put it down with a guilty little girl’s look—even put her hands behind her back. He smiled and looked at the picture. The three of them at Easter brunch a few years back, all in jackets and ties. His mother had arranged them from oldest to youngest on a staircase at the Goodwin Hotel in Hartford about two months before he married Lu. She had been there, beautiful in a bright peach suit. It had been a good time. The three of them looked ready to take on the world.

  Matthew—the oldest—on the top step, engaged to a beautiful, exotic Portuguese woman, moving to LA after the wedding where the angels would no doubt roll out the red carpet and welcome the new couple with open wings. Matthew could see all these thoughts swirling in his happy, Chardonnay-buzzed eyes, his thin face still glowed with optimistic health, still getting enough sleep—most of the time.

  Number two, Mark, looked swollen and comfortable in his just-starting-to-get-tight blue suit. His neck spilled over his collar, wearing a three- or four-deep Bloody Mary grin and hoping for one more helping of bacon; a year away from marriage but for all intents and purposes, already married. Conservative. Together.

  And Luke, an awkward smile, more grimace than grin, looked gangly, almost even with Mark’s head, even one step down. Home for Easter from BC, sophomore year, still not comfortable home or away. About to scratch under his collar as soon as Mrs. Flanagan finished the pictures (always with the pictures, Mrs. Flanagan, the family record keeper).

  “My brothers.”

  “No sisters?”

  “Nope. How about you?”

  After a pause, “One of each.”

  A sad story lingered behind her words. He tried to imagine what his brothers would look like today if they posed for the same picture. Older, not much wiser, he supposed. “How old are they?”

  “One older, one younger. I forget how old. I don’t see ’em anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m on my fifth foster home. They tend to split up families.”

  Matthew nodded as though he had even the vaguest notion of what California’s foster child system was like. As though he’d had anything but the perfect family life compared to this little girl’s. She didn’t offer any more on the subject. He sat on his couch and sipped his beer. She sat in the chair across from him. Back when the chair and couch were new, he remembered, it wasn’t unusual for him and Lucy to pass out in them—just where he and Tommy sat.

  “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

  “Probably.” She spoke with a studied casualness that reminded him of himself. He’d spent most of his life trying to act cool. Perfected it just in time to realize what bullshit it was.

  “You talked about them.”

  “Who?”

  “Last night. Your family. You told me about growing up with your real family.”

  He didn’t doubt it.

  “It sounded nice.” She hugged her legs to her chest.

  “I guess it was.” “Was.” The word came out slowly as though he were considering the entire concept of past tense. She had probably seen a lot in her few years. “I guess I’ll be going.” When she stood, he remembered how short she was, how young.

  “Thanks for the ride. I’m sorry about last night.”

  “Sorry for what?”

  “I get a little out of hand.” He made a vague gesture.

  She grinned and nodded. It was a magic, tragic smile, a smile that knew at once too much and too little. It broke Matthew’s heart. “I had a lot of fun.”

  “I probably did too.” He usually did, he thought.

  The thin ovals of her eyes crinkled at the corners. “I’ll see you around town.”

  He didn’t know what to say to that. Nearly said, I hope so. Instead he waved. She let herself out and he listened to the rattling lungs of the jeep’s engine as she drove away.

  After the noise faded, he sat and contemplated, not for the first time, what the hell was wrong with him. He looked at the pictures around the house and tried to see them through Tommy’s eyes. Through anybody’s eyes, his life was damned near perfect. A picture of his parents, looking at him on his wedding day, Mr. Flanagan in a tux, Mrs. Flanagan in a mint-colored dress, happy, relieved, perhaps a bit surprised at his success. He had managed, in spite of all his Dad’s warnings and Mom’s worrying, to build himself a pretty good, no, a great life. An eight by ten of Lucy on their wedding day, a close up of her face, looking down at something. He squeezed the neck of his beer. She looked like a billion dollars. Dark hair, brown eyes, a miracle of a smile. The face of a Madonna, his mother said the day she met her.

  And he had somehow managed to fuck it all up. All the warnings and worrying were justified. His Dad called it his self-destruct button. When things were going the best, that’s when his judgment was the worst. It was something he thought he’d outgrown, but he was just getting more destructive. Now he was taking others down with him. No job, no wife, and a gang of legal troubles to keep him company.

  He walked into his office and sat at his desk. “This is the desk,” he used to joke to Lucy, “where I will write the great American screenplay.” Hadn’t made that joke in a while. The great American screenplay had eluded him. The desk was a dark-stained oak resting on black, iron legs, the first piece of furniture he’d bought in LA. The only one she’d allowed him to buy on his own. Sitting at it, writing, he’d had such high hopes. He opened the only drawer. Found a bottle opener. A scavenger hunt of matchbooks from bars all over the city. A birthday card for Lucy, unsigned, never given. He couldn’t remember buying it. Added it to the pile
of items on top of the desk.

  Beneath the birthday card was a one-hundred dollar chip from the Golden Nugget casino in Las Vegas. His grandfather had died there a few years back. Matthew had flown over to help his mother with the arrangements, sending the body back to Connecticut. The chip had been in his grandfather’s pocket when the heart attack had hit him at a blackjack table. Eighty-three years old. That was the way to go, Matthew remembered thinking, and recalled his grandfather in a coma in the hospital bed, looking strange without his glasses. He never woke up. Matthew twirled the chip in his fingers like a magician, then dozed off.

  He was used to waking up feeling stupid. A quote from Sinatra comforted him: “I feel bad for people who don’t drink because when they wake up in the morning that’s as good as they’re gonna feel.” Matthew decided to make himself feel a little smarter and headed to the fridge. More booze was needed if he wanted to stay smart. His grandfather’s casino chip was still in his hand. He put it on top of the envelope Ron had given him and wondered what he should do. Like every loser ever born, he wondered how far he could push his luck. He was humming the chorus to “Viva Las Vegas” long before he found the CD and blasted it on his stereo. He was feeling very smart.

  Outside, the plastic Los Angeles sun kept up appearances. He put on blue jeans, black Dr. Marten’s, a black t-shirt, and a black leather jacket. Packed underwear, t-shirts, one white dress shirt, toothpaste, and a toothbrush. Debated whether to call a cab or enlist The Professor into his travel plans. He didn’t look at the pictures of family and friends. They would try to talk him out of this, except maybe Lucy. She would look at him with sad resignation. He also avoided the answering machine, which flashed angrily after being ignored for so long.

  The sudden sound of a car shuddering to a stop in front of his house. He zipped up his bag and opened the front door before Tommy could decide whether to knock or ring the bell.

  She looked the same, only tears snuck out from behind her sunglasses. There was no time for sad stories. He didn’t know why she was here, and didn’t care.

  “Where you been?” He threw his bag into the back of the jeep where it joined, he noticed, another hastily packed bag. “Do you mind if I drive?”

  “Are we going somewhere?”

  “I am. You coming?”

  “Where?”

  “It’s a surprise.” He suspected that the ovals under those black frames were as big as eggs and just as white. “Unless you’ve got somewhere to be. Then you can just give me a ride to the airport. But I’d rather drive if that’s okay.”

  “I guess.”

  “Excellent. Keys?” Matthew held out his hand.

  She threw him her keys.

  The engine started, the pleasant sensation of not knowing what was about to happen. A feeling he’d missed. He was a bronco who had jumped out of his fence and he wanted to see how far he could go before someone threw a rope around his neck. As he sped away, he couldn’t help muttering in his best James Cagney voice, “Come and get me coppers.”

  He was amazed when Tommy countered with, “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy night,” in flawless Bette Davis.

  As he hit Rye Canyon Road and put some real weight on the gas pedal, he felt his stomach loosen for the first time in days

  “Tell me where we’re going.”

  The enchanted word made his eyes sparkle, “Vegas.”

  LUKE 1

  Allston, Massachusetts, was nothing to write home about—not exactly a slum, not exactly safe, mostly an eyesore—but located just outside of Boston and close to everywhere Luke Flanagan needed to go. From his bedroom window, he could see the Prudential Tower, perfectly framed in the center of the glass. It was Saturday and snow had conquered the streets. In the gray sky, black silhouettes orbited the landmark. Bats twisting over the city; he saw them everywhere, lurking in the shadows, haunting the alleys and T-Stations of Boston. Looming. Watching. Their eyes, black as eight balls and as blind, seeing only his fear. From time to time, his nightmares seeped into his waking life, the midnight black running into the day—bats crouched in the corners of his vision.

  At night it was worse, when all was shadow and his mind painted them swarming above him. He wished he didn’t know as much as he did about bats, would like to unlearn that the Philippine Bamboo Bat was only about four centimeters long. Sometimes he didn’t reach into his coat pockets for fear of being bitten. How nice it would be to forget that South American vampire bats usually went for the feet of sleeping humans—his own howling usually rescued him from that dream.

  Outside, the frozen winter sky was ready to shatter as the Hancock Building jutted into it. The heat squealed through the radiator before escaping into his bedroom with a sigh. How long had he been staring out the window? He’d watched whole days disappear this way. A breeze shook the windowpane. Could he get through the day without having to taste the bitter cold? A brief thought of his oldest brother, Matthew, in California—that son of a bitch was probably staring at palm trees and complaining about the heat. No bats there. Still, things could be worse. He could be working with his father and brother, Mark, at the store back in Connecticut. He’d tried it, of course—it just hadn’t taken. Nobody had gotten him there; not that anybody got him here.

  Here. Luke considered the sad state of his apartment. It matched the state of his love life, uncluttered. In the common room, there were two couches, two end tables, two lamps and a thirteen-inch television set on a cheap wooden stand. A table from his Aunt Anne and four mismatched chairs tied the kitchen together. There was a frying pan for eggs and a bowl for boiling pasta. He and his roommate, Bear, could have been monks honoring vows of poverty. The only decoration on the cracked white walls was a long mirror hung above the never-used fireplace. Bear had found it in someone’s trash and they hadn’t realized until after they had hung it that it was warped. It was okay in the center but as you stood toward the edges your reflection became more and more warped.

  Bear, short for Bartholomew, had lived with Luke for only a few months. Luke was still taking Bear’s measure. At the moment, Bear was in hysterics in the common room. He sounded, not unpleasantly, like an agreeable madman. After Luke’s old roommate had been transferred to San Diego, there had been a scramble for someone to split the rent. For two months, Luke had lived alone with the sound of his own footsteps. Although Luke resented Bear’s constant fat, loud presence, Bear provided a welcome diversion from the musical round Luke’s thoughts became in solitude—a spinning, overlapping, mocking, haunting chorus. He could not be trusted to be alone with those voices.

  Hip-hop music bulged through the television speakers, but he could still hear Bear’s crazy laughter. He found his roommate sitting in the middle of the yellow couch. His head was even with the backrest as his ass seemed in the process of crawling onto the floor. A bloated, white belly peaked out from under a huge white t-shirt. An empty pistachio jar resting on his gut was his spittoon. A wad of dip was jammed under Bear’s lip. When he noticed Luke, he tried to speak but could only point hopelessly at the television set, completely in the throes of a giggling fit. Luke was already laughing at the plump idiot when he looked at the TV.

  “Over thirty rump-shakin’ hits,” an announcer said in a deep syrupy baritone over a commercial for “Monster Booty,” a collection of hip-hop songs devoted to the female derriere. Luke sat on the brown couch and started laughing as hard as Bear. “If you order right now, we’ll include this bumper sticker which says, ‘I brake for Monster Booty.’” Luke lost all control and tears streamed down his face. Bear leapt for the phone, dialed the number flashing on the screen.

  “I gotta have that bumper sticker!” Bear screamed, gasping for breath. “I need a credit card!”

  Luke scrambled to his bedroom, grabbed his wallet and rushed back. Bear could hardly read the number to the operator between peals of mirth. At last, he succeeded and hung up. A playful demon, the laughter took turns possessing each of them, squeezed out giggles an
d snorts and guffaws and finally whipped Bear into a fit of coughing. Then all that could be heard was their heavy breathing and the scores on SportsCenter. “How long ’til it gets here?”

  “I put a rush on it. Within a week.”

  Luke found this hysterical but was too tired to laugh. His stomach was a broken trampoline. “I feel like I just ran a marathon.” Bear stood up. “You need a beer?”

  Luke nodded. “What time is it?”

  “Time for a beer.” Bear made his way down the hall to the kitchen. Luke heard him grab two beers and walk back. He threw one to Luke. Luke caught it and twisted the cap off. It tasted good, its cold bite soothed. “So what’s the plan for today?”

  Outside, the winter cityscape now appeared full of possibility, all soft edges. The phone rang. Bear arched his eyebrows at Luke, who picked it up, ready for anything.

  “Hey, it’s Dana.”

  Except that. Dana was Luke’s off again girlfriend who had left him for some jerk from her college who followed the band Phish around the country. The last Luke had heard, she had shaved her head and joined some commune in Colorado that supported itself by selling herbs over the internet. It had been months. He had hoped he was over her. Surprise, surprise.

  “I’m in town and I thought we could hang out.”

  He mouthed the word “fuck” to Bear who took the hint and went back into his room.

  “Hang out?”

  “Are you still pissed?”

  “I hadn’t given it much thought. Maybe. What are you doing back east?” The day had started so well, too. A stiff breeze shook the leafless branches lining the street. The whole scene was a colorless shade of cold.

  “Long story. I could tell you all about it over a cup of coffee or …”

  Luke rubbed his hand down his face. Why not? He might get laid. It wasn’t like he had anything steady going. There were no strings on him. “Okay,” he said, feeling like a sucker.