To Lily, he said only, “He’s your brother.”
He made coffee, fetched the Sunday paper from the front porch and popped some whole wheat bread in the toaster. He ate in the dining room, newspaper spread out before him. As always, he read with an eye to how world and national events and economic trends would affect his business.
The perpetual tensions in the Middle East made him shake his head. Why didn’t the administration concentrate on developing alternative sources of energy rather than plunge the nation billions more in debt by using military might to protect its ability to buy oil?
Unemployment had risen yet again in the state of Washington, hardly a surprise with the airlines still in trouble and Boeing laying workers off. Not good. Consumers were more likely to pay a little extra for renewable energy in good times.
Before he reached the sports page, Lily bounced into the dining room.
“Can we go to Alki? We could eat fish and chips, and play on the beach.”
He had the fleeting wish that Helen was free and he could ask her and her daughter to come.
But she wasn’t, and his own kids deserved his undivided attention for once.
“Works for me,” he said. “I’ll go get Devlin up.”
His first knock on the boy’s door brought only silence; the second, a snarled “I’m sleeping!”
“Not anymore,” Alec said through the door. “We’re having a family day. Up and at ’em. We’re going to Alki.”
“I don’t want to go! I’m sleeping in.”
“It’s almost eleven o’clock. You’ve already slept in. I’ll expect you downstairs in ten minutes.”
Way to win his son’s heart, Alec thought, as he walked down the hall ignoring the bellow of outrage behind him. But nothing else was working, either. About all he had going for him was the fact that Dev did still obey direct orders.
Devlin grumbled while he ate breakfast and sulked the whole way to West Seattle and Alki Beach, but at least he reserved his glares for his father. Maybe he thought their evil Dad had made Lily go, too.
Once he sneered at his father. “So, did you have a hot date last night?”
Alec’s jaw muscles tightened, but he ungritted his teeth to say, in an even tone, “If you mean, did I have a good time, yes I did.”
“Is she nice?” Lily asked timidly.
They were crossing the West Seattle bridge, the industrial south of the city spread beneath them.
“Very nice. Helen has an eight-year-old daughter who helps out at the craft fairs.”
“What is she, divorced or something?”
Devlin was trying for disagreeable. Alec suspected he was more curious than he wanted to let on. His father hadn’t dated much.
“Her husband died three years ago. He had a brain tumor.”
Lily let out a gasp. Dev turned his head away quickly and didn’t say another word until they had parked and were walking to the shore.
Because of their late breakfast, they agreed to put off lunch. After wandering on the rocky beach with the kids, Alec finally found a comfortable spot where he could sit with his back to a driftwood log. He thought about reading the paperback he’d set down beside their towels and kite, but instead savored the scent of the salt air, the sound of seagulls calling and children playing, and small waves whooshing against the shore. Seattle sprawled before him on the other side of the sound. Green-and-white Washington State ferries left Seattle for Bainbridge Island and Bremerton at regular intervals, their horns blasting deep goodbyes, the arriving ferries crossing their wakes.
Lily brought a crab for him to inspect, then took it back to the water’s edge. Dev’s mood seemed to improve when a gaggle of teenage girls in skimpy shorts and bikini tops settled nearby on a blanket, where they spread suntan lotion on each other’s shoulders and giggled, casting sidelong glances at the other boys on the beach.
His son was a good-looking kid, Alec thought, trying to be objective. He had his mother’s blond hair and height and classic Scandinavian features. He’d be starting his freshman year in high school this fall, and the basketball coach had already made his acquaintance. Right now, he was gawky, with big feet that occasionally tripped over each other, but he was also a natural athlete, quick, smart and intense. Alec was praying that sports would be Devlin’s salvation. His grades had dropped since his mother’s death, he’d been involved in a couple of fights in middle school, and he resented just about everything his father asked of him.
Maybe Dev’s teenage years would have been tempestuous even if his mother hadn’t died. A counselor ventured the opinion that Devlin was “testing” his father. He was so afraid of losing both parents that he had to make sure his father loved him and would stick by him no matter what.
It all seemed pretty convoluted to Alec. He could see it if Linda had walked out. But she hadn’t. Dev had been old enough to understand her illness and the fact that she hadn’t wanted to die.
As far as Alec was concerned, that had been the worst part: her fear and wrenching grief. Helen had expressed the belief that a quicker death was better, but he still wasn’t so sure. Given more time, Linda might have achieved acceptance. She might have been able to gather precious moments with her children that would have given them all peace. Sure there would have been more time to regret and to suffer. But Linda would have also had more time to think of what she needed her children to know and remember about her, to put photos into albums, write notes and to help them let go.
But the astonishing, horrifying speed of Linda’s illness had swept them all up as if it were the rare big wave that snatched unlucky beach-goers from a rock. The first week had been spent finding out what was wrong with her. The next deciding on treatment, and too many of the ones after that believing she’d get better. There was so little time left once Alec and Linda realized she was going to die, much had gone unspoken. They had barely said goodbye. Maybe he’d been too stubborn in refusing to believe modern medicine couldn’t save her. Maybe he’d communicated his misplaced faith and baffled rage to the children.
Alec didn’t know. After the funeral, he, Lily and Devlin had clung together, trying to figure out how to function without their linchpin. How would days begin? Who would do the tasks that had magically been done before? Who would fill this silence, tuck in that child?
He tried; they all did. At first they were grateful when Alec donned any of their mother’s roles, and forgiving when he fouled up or forgot to do something. After he had the minor heart attack, they’d even tried to take care of him. He couldn’t seem to convince them that he’d just had a plumbing problem. An artery was clogged, the cardiologist had reamed it out, and Dad was fine.
It was several months later he started noticing that, as far as Dev was concerned, everything he did was wrong.
“You’re late,” he’d snap, throwing himself into the car after basketball practice.
Or he’d push his plate away at dinner. “This doesn’t taste like Mom’s.”
“Mom would have let me” became his favorite, sulky refrain.
A few times Alec had cracked and said, “I’m not your mother.”
The return was always a snotty, “Yeah, you’re not.”
Lily had been very, very quiet for months. Sometimes her eyes would unexpectedly fill with tears and she’d bolt to her bedroom. But she remained cooperative, and she was just as apt to bury her face against her dad when sadness overcame her.
Alec had been patient with his older child. Maybe too patient. He’d tell himself that this was a tough time for Dev. He was at a bad age to lose a parent. He was mad at fate. He’d get over it.
Only, he hadn’t. In two years, he’d gone from being a skinny kid who cried when he thought of his mother to a six-foot tall teenager who spoke to his father as little as possible and then with a sneer in his voice.
But today, despite his awareness of the teenage girls on the beach, Dev stuck close to his little sister. Taking up his book, Alec would read a few pages then glance u
p to see them crouched side by side examining a tide pool or trying to get their kite up despite the still air. Once Devlin’s shout of laughter rang out, a sound that brought Alec’s head up and a lump to his throat. When was the last time he’d heard his son laugh?
Midafternoon they left to have fish and chips. At a small outdoor table, knees touching, they concentrated hungrily on their food.
Alec finally sighed. “Boy, this tastes good.”
Even Devlin mumbled an agreement.
Devlin slouched in the front seat on the drive home, but his expression was more peaceful than usual. He looked younger, his hair tousled and his posture relaxed instead of rebellious.
Maybe there was hope.
In the garage at home, Alec turned off the engine. He turned to his son and said quietly, “Thank you for coming.”
Under other circumstances, it might have been funny watching half a dozen emotions and unspoken responses chase each other across the boy’s face. As it was, Alec braced himself and sensed Lily, in the back seat, doing the same.
But after a minute Dev shrugged. Grudgingly he said, “It was okay.”
Praise of the highest order.
“We need to do things as a family more often.”
Back to form, the fourteen-year-old curled his lip. “I’m not a little kid.”
“If I can make time, maybe you can, too.” Alec grabbed the keys and opened his door before Devlin had time to think of a comeback.
In the house, Lily wrapped her arms around his waist and gave a quick squeeze. “I had fun, Daddy,” she whispered, then darted off.
Smiling, Alec headed for his den. God help him if his daughter woke up one morning transformed into a pouty teenager wanting to get her belly button pierced.
The teenage part couldn’t be held back. Today, she’d been a little girl. But he had a bad feeling that back-to-school shopping was going to be different this year. Lily was going into sixth grade. He’d seen signs of her noticing boys. One of her friends was already “going out” with a guy, a relationship which seemed to consist of no more than the announcement.
“And they I.M. each other,” his daughter had told him. “They talk a lot.” Clearly she was impressed. Now that, her tone told him, was a real relationship. Even if it was taking place online.
Alec had hidden his amusement—and dismay. Damn it, his daughter was a little girl! He didn’t like the idea of some boy having the right to grope her when she was sixteen or seventeen, never mind eleven or twelve.
Nonetheless, Lily was going to want jeans barely more decent than Christina Aguilera’s, tops that exposed her midriff and knee-high boots instead of canvas tennis shoes.
He was going to be seriously out of his depth. Mothers were supposed to shepherd their daughters through the lingerie department and the travails of becoming women. Not fathers. What did he know about sanitary napkins or the right cup size for the budding breasts of a preteen? Hell, he didn’t even like to think about the fact that his little girl had budding breasts!
Upstairs, the heavy throb of Dev’s music vibrated the floor. From the family room came canned voices from the television.
Alec wondered what time Helen got off work.
HELEN PRETENDED that she wasn’t waiting for Alec to call.
Tomorrow, he’d said, but he might not have meant that literally. Anyway, weren’t men famous for saying “I’ll call” and not meaning it?
But, secretly, she knew he was going to. He’d seemed as startled as she to discover how many hours they’d spent together. He had found her as easy to talk to as she had found him. And, while his kiss had been gentle, she was experienced enough to realize the desire he was restraining. She had seen it in his eyes, felt the reluctance with which he broke away.
When the phone rang at 8:05 p.m., Emma jumped to answer it. But Helen, reading at one end of the couch while Ginny sketched at the other, felt a shiver of excitement run through her.
“Helen?” Emma said with surprise. “Oh. Yes. Just a minute.” Face alive with curiosity, she handed the cordless over and then plopped onto the arm of the couch to eavesdrop.
Conscious of her audience, which included Logan slouched with the newspaper in an easy chair across the room, Helen said, “Hello?”
“Hi, this is Alec. I hope I caught you at a good time.”
“Um…” She eyed her audience. “This is fine. I’ll just take the phone into the other room.”
Logan barely glanced at her. He might genuinely not have been paying attention. But Ginny watched her mother rise and leave the room with narrowed eyes, while Emma said loudly, “Cool! Helen has a boyfriend.”
Kathleen was in the kitchen—no privacy there. Helen climbed the stairs.
“I’m going to have to hide out in my bedroom,” she told Alec. “There are too many people in this house.”
He laughed. “Sort of like a college dorm?”
“A little bit,” she admitted. “Although nobody has loud parties spilling into the hall.”
“My son would like to.”
“So would Emma, I suspect. Kathleen does try to be relaxed, but she’s a little too uptight to endure Eminem at full volume and teenagers making out under the stairs.”
“I’m beginning to realize that your attitude changes when it’s your teenager making out.”
It was Helen’s turn to laugh. “I wouldn’t know yet.”
“I was looking at Lily today and realizing we need to buy her a bra.” If his dismay hadn’t been so real, it would have been comical. “Not a task my experience prepares me for. And she was chattering earlier about one of her friends who is ‘going out’ with some guy named Shane. Realizing it could be her scared the crap out of me.”
Going into her room and shutting her door, Helen said, “She’s eleven, huh?”
“Almost twelve.”
“I had a boyfriend when I was twelve,” she remembered. “His friends asked my friends if I’d go with him, and I sent word back that, yes, I would. But I’ve got to tell you, I don’t remember that we even talked, and we sure didn’t kiss or anything. We danced together, and that was about it. Honestly, I think he was terrified of me.”
She loved his laugh, a low, rusty rumble.
“Yeah, girls scared me at that age. They’re a lot more mature than the boys are.”
“And the girls know it. Sadly, the high school boys aren’t much interested in sixth-or seventh-graders.”
He laughed again, but with a wry note. “Thank God,” he muttered.
Helen sat on the bed, one leg tucked under her. “So, did you enjoy the sunshine today?”
He told her about taking his kids to Alki and his son’s slight softening.
“He’s not a bad kid. He’s just mad. He gets in fights, irritates his teachers, and defies me at every turn.”
“Have you talked to his friends’ parents? Maybe they’re all like that.”
“Oh, they can all be snotty, but you can feel him seething darn near all the time. That can’t be normal.”
“No-o,” she said hesitantly. “But you’ve tried counseling.”
“For what it’s worth.”
“Have you actually, um, confronted him about it? Asked him to think about why he’s mad at you?”
He was quiet. “No. We’re more likely to fight.”
She must sound preachy. “As if I’m any expert. Ginny just…withdrew. And clung to me. The opposite, I guess.”
“Yeah, Lily got real quiet,” Alec said. “And eager to be helpful and cooperative. Sometimes I thought she was trying to step into her mother’s shoes. I don’t know. It was great to have her want to cook dinner once in a while. That kind of thing. But the kid was only nine years old. She acted like an adult. My guess was that Lily was trying to fill a vacuum. Things were wrong. She thought somehow she could make them right.”
They talked more about their kids, and why each reacted in such an individual way to the same tragedy. He told her some of what the counselor had tried to make h
im understand, and Helen quoted books she’d read.
“I keep thinking that there must be some secret, some bit of wisdom out there. If I can just find it, I can make sure Ginny isn’t left with scars from losing her dad the way she did.”
“Maybe that isn’t the right way to look at it,” Alec said thoughtfully. “We’re each a product of our genes and our childhood, right? All of our experiences, good and bad, shape us. Does the death of a parent ‘scar’ you, or is it just one of those life experiences—good or bad—that alters who you’ll be? Maybe Lily will be more responsible than she would have been otherwise. Maybe Ginny will focus more intensely on her goals.”
Helen liked the idea, which wove Ben’s death into a tapestry of life: Moments small or large that shaped and colored Ginny’s life. Perhaps Ben’s illness was a striking pattern or a strong color that darkened the whole, but it was not a flaw, only part of the whole.
“And Devlin?” she asked.
Alec made a sound in his throat. “I think that, more than either of our daughters, Dev isn’t finished with his grieving. I have no idea how he’ll come out at the other end.”
“But he had his mother for twelve years, and he still has you. Those influences have to be stronger than grief.”
Alec didn’t say anything for a moment; when he did, his voice was a little thick, as if she had moved him in some way. “I hope you’re right.”
Helen didn’t quite know what to say after that. For the first time in the conversation, the silence felt awkward.
“I actually called,” he said, “to find out your schedule and see if we can get together this week. I spent a good part of the day thinking about last night. Things I said, didn’t say, wanted to ask you or tell you.”
“Me, too,” she admitted, just above a whisper.
“I want to see you.”
Her chest felt tight. “That would be nice.”
“Good,” he said, in a deep, quiet voice.
They settled on lunch Tuesday. Helen worked the afternoon and evening; he said he could leave the office for a couple of hours.
The New Man Page 7