by Vicki Grant
“Yeah, I do,” I say.
My voice must scare her. I leave her standing in the driveway with her hand over her mouth.
Chapter Thirteen
The little kids are sitting too close to the tv.
The only thing Anthony has to do all day is look after Olivia and Marlon, and he can’t even do that right.
“Where’s Daddy?” I say. That’s what they call him so that’s why I say it—but this time it almost makes me puke.
Olivia doesn’t turn away from the screen. “Downstairs. But you’re not supposed to bother him, Paddy. He’s doing his yoga.”
“Okay,” I say and take them both by the shoulders and drag them back a few feet.
I head down to the basement. Anthony is sitting cross-legged on his purple mat, in a special yoga outfit that he ordered from California. The pants only come to his calves. They’ve got little slits behind the knees. If they were pink, they’d look like something Olivia would wear.
It’s stupid but that makes me even madder. I try not to let it show.
“Hey,” I say.
I know he hears me, but he doesn’t respond.
I feel weirdly pumped. Not angry anymore. Just kind of alert. Like I’m standing in the wings, waiting to go onstage.
I lean against the washing machine and watch as Anthony pulls himself into another pose.
Pose. Even the word is embarrassing. What type of grown man poses?
He stretches his arms out straight to the side and puts one foot flat against the other knee. I’m sort of disgusted by the whole display. Then something about his hands gets me. There’s this flash in my head and I know what it is.
They look just like mine.
He slowly lowers his arms and puts his foot back on the floor. He takes a deep breath, wipes the sweat off his face with one of Mom’s good towels, then says, “Yes?”
“Didn’t mean to bother you,” I say.
“You didn’t,” he says. Clearly someone as lowly as me couldn’t distract him even if I wanted to.
There’s a glass on the counter. Anthony has to have distilled water and he can’t drink out of plastic. That pisses me off too. He picks it up and takes a drink.
I say, “I just need to know your blood type for some forms I have to fill out.”
Anyone else would realize what a lame question that is. Why would I need my stepfather’s blood type for anything?
But Anthony is the center of the universe—or at least thinks he is. It sounds perfectly natural to him.
“Oddly enough,” he says. “I do know my blood type. I sang on a cruise ship in the Mediterranean once. All the lead performers had to have a complete medical done. Insurance purposes, I guess. Lot of money invested in us…”
He yammers on and on. The guy never misses an opportunity to prove what an asshole he is. I let him dig himself in for a while, and then I say,
“Sorry, Anthony. What blood type did you say you were?”
He takes another sip of water. I never noticed before that we’re the exact same height.
“B,” he says. “B negative.”
I knew he was going to say that, but it still takes the wind out of me.
I have this sudden urge to punch him in the face. One good punch and his nose would never look just like mine again.
I know I shouldn’t hit him. It would upset the little kids if they heard noises and came running downstairs and found their father and me fighting.
I know I shouldn’t do it, but I do.
Because Anthony’s nose isn’t the only thing I inherited. I have his temper too.
Chapter Fourteen
Anthony at least has the decency to say we were just pretending. That I was helping him prepare for a play. That I just slipped and we hit each other by mistake. That it’s fake blood pouring out of my fist, fake glass all over the floor.
Marlon sort of falls for it but Olivia doesn’t. She holds on to his leg, shaking, and looks at the blood running down my arm.
“I’m okay!” I say and muss up her hair. “It’s make-believe.” Like everything else about my life.
“I’ve got to get going now,” I say. “Tell Mom I’ll call her later.”
I slip out the basement door and climb into the car out front.
I’m halfway down the street when I realize how bad I’m bleeding. I should have waited until Anthony put the glass down, but waiting wasn’t really an option at the time.
I’m less worried about the cut than getting blood on the upholstery. Dad gave me the car. He said he didn’t need it anymore. It’s just an old beater, but he took really good care of it. He’d be disappointed if I messed it up.
I pull over to the side of the road. There’s an old T-shirt under the passenger seat that I use to clean the windshield. I wrap it tight around my hand to stop the bleeding.
First aid. That’s another thing Dad taught me.
Dad, I think.
I start driving again. I don’t know where.
Can I even call him Dad anymore?
Do I call him John?
Call him, I think.
I pound my fist on the dashboard. I get a little jolt of pain, but I deserve it. What’s the matter with me? Dad, John, whoever. I was supposed to be looking for him! The guy’s missing.
How could I forget about him? He’d never forget about me.
I wiggle my cell phone out of my pocket and try to dial and drive.
The cut. The cell phone. Rush-hour traffic. It’s all too much. I’m going to kill someone like this.
I pull into the right-hand lane and park with my ass half out in the road. Some guy lays on the horn. I’m too crazed to even give him the finger.
I speed-dial Dad. No answer.
I call Earl at the commissionaire’s office again. He hasn’t heard from him either.
I call my grandmother and my aunt Bev, but I don’t want to upset them so I just make it sound like I have something funny I want to tell him.
I call the Bluenose. Martha hasn’t seen him. She says, “Try the gym. He’s been complaining that my rice pudding is starting to show.”
I wait for a break in the traffic, pull a U-turn and head to Palooka’s.
A girl named Sandi is on the desk. She’s not supposed to give out information about clients, but I smile at her. I realize that’s something Anthony would do. I don’t care. It works. She checks the computer for me. “He hasn’t been in for a couple of days—but people fall off their fitness regimes all the time.”
John Armstrong wouldn’t, I think, but I say, “Oh, okay. Thanks.”
She notices the bruise on my cheek where Anthony actually managed to land a punch. “What happened to you?” she says. “Fighting over some girl or something?”
It’s kind of funny, in a sick way, and I laugh. “Yeah, you could say that.”
I ask her to call me if anyone knows where he is. She thinks I’m coming on to her but doesn’t seem to mind. I put my hand up on the counter to write down my number.
“You should go to a doctor about that.” She almost whispers it.
I look at my hand. Blood is seeping right through the old T-shirt. I’m surprised it doesn’t hurt—then I realize that it does.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m on the way there right now,” I say.
She hands me a towel to wrap it in. She’s very pale. “All that blood,” she says. “It can’t be good.”
I have to agree with her there.
Chapter Fifteen
I get in the car and lean back against the headrest. I look out at the parking lot. What a frigging mess.
My mother has basically lied to me my whole life.
My “real” father is an asshole.
The guys in the band have replaced me.
Tara dumped me.
Who does that leave me?
The Man Formerly Known as Dad.
I realize I’ve stopped using a name for him. I think of him and I see a picture in my head instead. A short solid guy with a close sh
ave and a beige windbreaker. The guy no one else cares about except me and Martha. And Earl, I guess, at least when he doesn’t show up for work. It’s like he’s an icon on my computer desktop now. Not a real person, just a symbol representing a function.
John Armstrong might not be my father but he’s the only person I’ve ever been able to count on. Maybe I’m an idiot for thinking something’s wrong, and maybe he really is just taking a couple of well-earned days off. But the truth is, I don’t believe that.
My guess is he’s sitting somewhere, staring into space, looking at his life, too, and feeling just as bad as I am.
I’m going to find him.
I have no idea where to look but I’ll figure it out.
I get out of the car. I peel the grimy T-shirt off my hand and throw it in the garbage can outside the gym. I wrap the clean white towel around it.
I remember him in his uniform showing me how to make a sling for a broken arm.
I think Navy.
I think ship.
Then I think boat.
His new boat.
He’s on the Julie-Anne. I hate to think I inherited Anthony’s intuitive side, but who cares? I know that’s where he is.
And anyway, I’ve tried everywhere else I can think of.
I jump back in the car and slam the door.
Where did he say he moored the boat?
Herring Cove.
No, but it’s close. The name of some fish.
Salmon? Mackerel? Tuna?
Halibut.
Halibut Cove. I get the map out of the glove compartment. Good old Chief Petty Officer Armstrong. I’d never have bothered getting a map for myself, but he made sure there was one here, neatly folded, when I needed it.
I spread it out with my good arm. Halibut Cove is about where I thought it was, only farther out. It’ll probably take me an hour.
I check the time on the dash: 7:36 pm. No wonder I’m so hungry. I put the map back, only not as neatly, and find the energy bar he also left in the glove compartment for me.
I don’t know if it’s the “28 nutrients” in the bar that do it or the feeling that I’m on a mission, but I’m feeling okay.
It feels good to worry about someone else for a change.
Chapter Sixteen
I don’t know what I’m going to say to him.
Maybe worse, I don’t know what he’s going to say to me.
I turn on the radio and just try not to think about it. But all the songs are about love, or making love, or cheating on someone. I turn the radio off.
I look at the scenery instead. The road runs along the ocean. At least that’s pretty. I hope it will distract me.
There’s a ship out on the horizon.
I can’t tell from here if it’s a Navy ship or a container ship, but it makes me think of Dad and what Mom did while he was away. I can’t even look at the ocean anymore. I turn back and stare at the road.
To take my mind off things, I start to sing. I hum that little riff I was working on. Then remember what the song was going to be called.
B negative.
I snort in a way that could almost pass for a laugh.
I make myself think about Christie. She’s a lot prettier than Tara. Better body. Nice smile. I try and hang on to that image of her and the thought that this time tomorrow night I’ll be sitting across from her at the Nectar House.
But I can’t.
Thinking about Christie, me and Tara makes me think of Anthony, Mom and Dad. And that makes me think of who I thought I was and who I really am and how I got to be that way.
Everything makes me think of that. I’m never going to be able to forget it. My whole life is poisoned.
I drive and drive and drive, and the same things just keep going round in my head. I suddenly understand how people go crazy.
By the time I get outside the city limits, I’m talking to myself. Fighting with myself. Telling myself to grow up. I’m just one step removed from those homeless guys who shuffle along the street, screaming at their invisible friends. I’m even starting to smell bad.
I pass a sign saying Halibut Cove, Next Exit. It snaps me out of it. I feel something sort of like relief. I don’t know why. Maybe I just want to get it over with.
I turn off the highway. It’s getting dark, and there aren’t as many streetlights on this little road.
I drive for a while, and then the car starts to jerk and sputter.
I’m an idiot.
I slam the steering wheel with my good hand.
Gas.
I was supposed to get the light fixed on the fuel gauge weeks ago.
The car lurches. I manage to pull over to the side before it stops. The very first thing I think is, How many times did Dad tell me to keep my equipment in good repair?
I’m going to be embarrassed to tell him what happened.
I’ve always hated to disappoint him.
Then it dawns on me that he’s got bigger things to be disappointed about than a busted fuel gauge.
Chapter Seventeen
I lock the car door and start walking. I try hitchhiking, but only two cars go past and neither stop. I can’t blame them. I don’t think I’d pick up a big guy with a bruised face and a bloody hand on a dark road either.
There are only a few houses along the way and they’re pushed back from the highway. One has a light on, and I think of ringing the doorbell and asking for help, but I don’t. Somehow I don’t feel like I’m in such a hurry anymore.
The closer I get, the more scared I am. It’s like I’m walking into a big black hole.
The road is really steep and I’m tired. My head throbs. My hand feels heavy. I make myself keep moving anyway.
I get to the top of a hill and look down.
That must be Halibut Cove stretched out below me. Even in the dark, I can see the white cabins of the fishing boats on the black water. One of them could be the Julie-Anne.
My heart starts up like a metronome.
The Julie-Anne. Some guy probably named it after his wife or his girlfriend. I wonder if that’s why he sold it.
Would I still be sailing the Tara-Marie?
I get this sick picture of Anthony climbing aboard the Maura-Louise while Dad was away at sea.
I grind my eyes closed. Thinking stuff like that doesn’t help. I shake my head, open my eyes and keep going until I get down to the water.
A dog barks somewhere off in the distance. Otherwise the place seems deserted. The little parking lot is empty and the asphalt’s crumbling. Scraggly trees hang over the driveway. Doesn’t look like Halibut Cove is used much anymore.
There’s a rocky beach, which is slimy with seaweed, and an old wharf.
I climb to the end and almost fall through the rotten boards. I squint out at the water. Three boats are tied up in the bay. In this light I can’t read any of the names. I can’t even tell what color their hulls are now, but I notice a tiny red light on one of them.
It’s a cigarette. Someone’s sitting on the deck, smoking.
I cup my hands around my mouth. I call out, “Hello? Hello?”
I don’t know if the person hears me or not, but there’s no answer.
I’ve got to get closer.
For a second I think of swimming out, but that would be crazy. The water’s calm, and it’s not that far, but with this arm I’d never make it.
I climb down from the wharf and look around. There’s only one streetlight out on the road so it’s hard to see. I fumble around the parking lot. There’s an old metal shed, rusting away at the edge of the woods, but it’s locked up tight. Someone seems to have dumped some garbage over to the side. I find part of a life-saving buoy under the wharf, but it would never hold me. I toss it back in.
It hits something. I lean in to look. There’s a little upended aluminum dinghy. I don’t know how long it’s been there or how seaworthy it is, but it’s better than nothing.
I pull it out and turn it over. There are even oars, though one of the
blades is broken.
Good enough.
I drag the dinghy down to the water’s edge. I slip on the seaweed and go under. My bad hand bangs against the oarlock. I can feel the pain right up to my teeth. I swear, get up, then slip again. I sit in the water up to my armpits for a good thirty seconds before I can make myself move.
Somehow I don’t think this ever happened to John Armstrong.
I brace myself, steady the boat and get in. I start to row. My hand is practically useless. I have to keep giving a couple of extra strokes on the right side just to keep more or less in line.
My plan is to pull up alongside the fishing boat and ask the person if they know anything. I turn my head to see how much farther I have to go. I’m close enough to read the name.
Julie-Anne.
The man on board takes another puff on his cigarette.
“Dad?” I say.
“Nope. Sorry,” he says. “I think you got the wrong man, son.”
Chapter Eighteen
He doesn’t even help me aboard. He’s too drunk. I can see that immediately.
But he’s also too drunk to stop me. I pull myself onto the boat and just try to ignore the pain slicing up through my arm. The boat tips from my weight, and bottles roll across the floor. He must have been here for a while.
He doesn’t ask about the blood. He says, “So what are you doing here?”
I don’t have a chance to answer. “Hope you’re not here for your next child support payment, because I got some bad news for you, buddy.” He flicks his cigarette into the water. “I closed that bank account.”
“Dad,” I say. It’s just instinct.
He wags his finger at me. “Now that’s got to stop. I’m Mr. Armstrong to you, boy.” His voice is slurred.
He lights another cigarette. A little wave knocks the boat. A beer bottle hits my foot. I kick it out of the way. I’m suddenly mad at him.
Mad at him for drinking. Mad at him for taking off on me.
Mad at him for not being my father. Or at least not still acting like he is.
He takes a long slow puff on his cigarette, the way people do when they’re wasted. It lights up his face for a second. I can see he didn’t shave today. His hair is hanging over his eyes. I barely recognize the guy.