by John Herrick
“Why don’t you and Jesse try the scrambler instead?” Caitlyn suggested.
Yeah, in this case, Jesse put more trust in the tried and true. “Sounds good to me,” Jesse replied. “Wanna go, big guy?”
“Sure. Mom, can you hold these?” He handed his dinner to Caitlyn, who watched as he and Jesse made their way to the ticket booth.
With a compartment to themselves under flashing neon lights, the ride attendant locked them in and left to secure other passengers.
“Do you and your mom come here every year?” asked Jesse.
“Sometimes.” Given their introduction an hour ago, a shy Drew said little but seemed to enjoy his mom’s friend. The boy continued to sneak an occasional look from the corner of his eye.
“I used to ride the scrambler all the time as a kid,” Jesse said.
“Did they have black-and-white TV back then?”
“No. Why? Do I look that old?”
Drew shrugged. An innocent mistake, he now grinned at the humor in his own question. “How much older are you than me, anyway?”
“I’m your mom’s age. So I’m only eighteen years older than you.”
“That’s like, almost two decades. Did they have cable back then?”
Jesse chuckled. “You’re getting better. So what grade are you in?”
“Fourth.”
“Like it?”
“It’s okay. Homework sucks.”
With the sound of a buzzer, the ride’s tentacles and compartments whirred into motion and gained momentum. Shrieks and squeals ensued from nearby compartments as passengers dodged each other. Through shifts and spins, the ride jerked the father and son against each other in the cramped quarters. Drew giggled as Jesse exaggerated the force of momentum.
When the ride decelerated and came to a stop, Jesse and Drew stepped off to regain their balance and shake the dizziness from their heads. Drew retrieved his hot dog and soda from Caitlyn, and then took off toward a booth that caught his eye up ahead. “Mom, I’ll see you when you catch up.”
”Don’t run into anybody on the way there!” When their son was beyond earshot, Caitlyn and Jesse sauntered along the pebble-embedded walking path. “Did he talk to you?” she asked.
“Not much. Of course, we just met.”
“He’ll come around.”
The scent of funnel cakes filled the atmosphere at the park. Around the corner from a kettle-corn stand, they caught a whiff of warm butter and salt. By the time they caught up with Drew, he had finished his dinner and started to thumb his way through a rack of nature photographs, enlarged and housed in contemporary frames.
Intrigued by a color photograph of Niagara Falls, Drew lifted it from the rack. In the photo, the majestic semi-circle of water foamed and poured in a torrent. “Cool! Mom, we should go there some time. I want to take my own picture of it and frame it for my room.”
Jesse looked over his son’s shoulder. “I could show you how to take a good one. I play around with photography a little.”
“Really?”
Even Caitlyn stepped back and crossed her arms in amusement.
“I worked in a photo shop in L.A.,” Jesse explained.
“You lived in L.A.?” Drew’s eyes widened. “Did you see anyone famous?”
“Sure. It’s not as big a deal when you live there, though.”
“Why not?”
“Well, it’s normal to see people you recognize out there, so you get used to it. Kind of like getting used to snow over here—you see it so often, it seems common.”
Drew nodded, once again engrossed in the picture. “Where is this place?”
“Niagara Falls,” Caitlyn said. “It’s gorgeous.”
“Tell you what,” Jesse said, “if your mom says it’s okay, maybe we’ll head out someday and look for some good shots for your room around here.”
From behind, Caitlyn wrapped her arms around Drew. “Maybe. Right, my little guy?”
* * *
Jesse found Eden’s car already parked in the garage when he arrived at the house after midnight. He expected to find her asleep as he tiptoed into the foyer. But no sooner had he clicked the door shut when Eden raced over to him dressed in baggy shorts and an oversized T-shirt—the little-sister garb in which she had always slept. Some things never change.
“How’d it go?” she asked. “You were out late enough! Were you with them this whole time?”
“Remind me, do you run on double-A batteries?” Jesse quipped.
“Come on!” She grabbed his arm and dragged him into the living room, where she pointed to the sofa. “Sit your butt down. You know I want to know all about how it went tonight!” She only came up to his chin, and he wanted to call her Squirt.
As Jesse shed his jacket, his sister, her face ecstatic, sat opposite him. She flicked her hand with a motion that ordered him to spill his guts.
“So where did you go? What did you do?”
“We went to a craft fair near Canton.”
“And you met Drew?”
Jesse couldn’t help a broad smile. “It was—it was surreal,” he said, then settled back. His eyes sparkled with life as he recalled random details from the evening. “I took one look at him and—that little guy’s a part of me. I mean, he has my eyes and ears, Caitlyn’s hair and her chin. You can’t help but love the kid.”
“So, Caitlyn’s comfortable with your getting to know him?”
“She seems to be. She’s protective.”
“That’s understandable. I’m sure she’s glad you’re here again, but it will take time for her to realize you’re here to stay.”
As he thought through the events of that night and about his newfound son, he gleamed. Then his smile began to wither as reality set in. “It’s just … I don’t know if I have what it takes to be his dad. How could I ever measure up?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I look at Drew and he looks a lot like me. But at the same time, we’re two strangers. I have no idea how to relate to my own son.”
“You were gone a long time. He’s grown up without you in his life until now. But this is a new start. It’ll work out.”
Jesse stared at his shoelaces, one of which had come untied. “I sure hope so.”
“Hey,” Eden began. She leaned forward, gripped his ankle, and looked straight into his eyes. Her tone sincere, she said, “I guarantee Drew has wished for his dad. He needs you more than ever.” She jiggled his ankle. “You can do this. I believe in you.”
Here—this was Eden’s defining characteristic, the one that astonished him more than the others. Eden had an inherent ability to see the best in people—especially when it came to her brother. She treated him with unconditional acceptance, as if he could never fall short. Throughout the years he spent in California, as long as he wasn’t too ashamed, he could admit his shortcomings to his sister and trust she would remain nonjudgmental. To talk to Eden in their adulthood breathed fresh life into him. It made him believe he could accomplish anything.
How long had it been since Jesse had an influence like that within arm’s length?
“If Drew doesn’t know you’re his dad, who does he think you are?”
“We told him I’m a friend.”
“That’s best for now,” she said, ever the social worker. “The time will come.”
CHAPTER 29
Affixed to the second-floor’s exterior, the wooden sign read: “Naturally!” The business, sandwiched in townhouse fashion, shared its walls with a realtor’s office on one side and a denim store on the other.
On Saturday afternoon, still on an emotional high from his prior evening with Caitlyn and Drew, Jesse walked into Blake’s shop. A bell tinkled a greeting from above the doorway. If he caught the air at the correct angle when he breathed, Jesse swore he could still smell astringent. Back when Jesse last lived in Hudson, a sentimental mom-and-pop drugstore, complete with a vintage soda fountain, had occupied this retail spot, as it had for decades.
; From a far corner, Blake emerged and called out, “Jesse Barlow, you’ve graced my humble shop with your presence!”
A customer turned around to witness the episode but soon returned her attention to a container of vitamin D. Jesse wondered if he knew her.
With his arms spread wide, Blake gestured around his domain. “What do you think? Piece of beauty, isn’t it?”
Throughout the store sat rows of glass shelves filled with vitamins and herbal supplements, bags and jars of nonperishable, organic food products, and other items whose origins could be traced to one chemical-free shade of dirt or another.
“Self-employment,” Blake said. “This is my castle.”
“Nice. How long have you owned it?”
“Coupla years. Got my pharmaceutical degree and worked in the old drugstore before this.”
Blake didn’t mention Drew or Caitlyn, so Jesse assumed Eden had yet to tell him. Relieved, Jesse picked up a plastic jar of fish-oil tablets but returned it to the shelf even faster. He almost gagged at the pungent odor. “Why natural herbs and shit—I mean, stuff?”
Blake crossed his arms and examined a few expiration dates. “As a pharmacist, I saw too much. Too many people taking prescription drugs every time their legs itched, pumping chemicals into their kids to calm them down—I don’t know, regardless of what the FDA says, my conscience feels better now that I’ve turned to natural products. Not all drugs are bad, but I figure this helps keep them to a minimum.”
“But they say you can overdose on herbs,” Jesse said.
“You can overdose on water, too. As long as you keep your regimen in balance, you’re cool. It’s a natural remedy: You’re not forcing foreign garbage into your body that it’s not meant to handle, so it’ll react in a more natural way.” Blake paused, then chuckled. “Plus you’ll never fail a drug test—like Ryan Reeves from our basketball team. Remember that moron? Lives in Seattle now.”
Jesse snickered in return. “Well, my future’s filled with herbal experiences of my own: My dad gave me a job at the church—maintenance work, lawn care.”
“Hey, it’s cash, right?”
“At this point, I just want to earn a paycheck. I can look for more down the road. In the meantime, I have other things to sort out.”
When Jesse heard the overhead bell tinkle again, he turned to see a high-school-aged employee walk in for work. After a casual introduction by Blake, the teenager, Matt, headed over to the checkout counter.
With a squint toward the window, Blake scratched his chin. “When was the last time you shot some hoops?” he asked.
“Geez, not since we were on the team.”
“Matt!” Blake called over his shoulder. “”I’m gonna be out of the office for a while.” While he shouted to his employee, he shot Jesse a knowing look. “I’ve got some official business off-site.”
* * *
“Prepare to lose, Barlow!” Blake shouted.
With a dodge to Jesse, Blake attempted a three-pointer, but the ball deflected off the basketball rim and into Jesse’s hands for the rebound.
The court, empty on the weekend except for the two of them, sat at the rear of Jesse’s former elementary school. Along with other members of their basketball team, they had met here for games of pickup on countless occasions. Oftentimes they had shown up drunk on Saturday nights after a high-school party—Jesse had tried his best to hide his hangovers at church the mornings after.
Around the half court Jesse traveled before he pulled a quick move to garner a surprise two-pointer. “Here’s to your hippie life of herbs.”
“Nice moves on the court, Barlow. It’s good to see you didn’t lose your talent in L.A.—your inferior talent, that is.”
“Keep talking, Number Two.”
“Speaking of L.A., how’d you like living there?”
The question took Jesse by surprise. Gone only a week or so, he had all but forgotten about his former residence.
With a toss of the ball to Blake, who dribbled it down the center of the court, Jesse answered, “Warm and sunny. You can’t beat that.”
“Girlfriend?”
“Of course.” Jesse wiped the sweat from his brow. “Eden didn’t tell you?”
“She didn’t talk much about it.”
“Good. That means you don’t have blackmail material.”
After an unsuccessful block, Jesse watched Blake sail the ball through the hoop to bring the score to a tie. As he geared up to regain his lead, Jesse glanced over at Blake’s dark-blue convertible in the parking lot.
“How long have you had the car?”
“A few years. Bought it new. Like it?”
“A beauty.”
Blake heard his cell phone chirp from the corner of the court and ran over to answer. “Hello?” A pause. “I’m at the old stomping grounds—with Jesse Barlow … Yeah, no joke, he’s in town.”
Jesse wondered who had called and had a hunch another reunion would result.
“The elementary school,” Blake continued. “Okay, later.” He snapped the phone shut and announced, “Randy’s on his way over with Sanders. Like old times, huh? Everyone else from the team relocated after college.”
So most of Jesse’s schoolmates had departed and taken their engrafted roots with them.
A transient community in its latter years, Hudson had experienced an influx of white-collar executives who worked in the Cleveland suburbs. Nowadays, families tended to move into the area, stay less than ten years, and then transfer to positions in another state. Jesse found it humorous that when he compared his second-grade class’s yearbook pictures with those of his senior class, 90 percent of the faces must have changed. Because his father ministered at a church he himself had founded, Jesse and Eden spent most of their childhood in this community and became exceptions to the rule. Even Blake had moved to town in his sophomore year.
When he caught sight of a duo that approached the court, Jesse cracked a smile.
“Barlow! Look at you, man!” A red-headed beanpole, Randy observed his old friend’s tan through wire-rimmed glasses before he shook hands.
“You still live here?” Jesse replied. “Thought you couldn’t wait to leave!”
“I took a job with an investment company downtown, and the rest is history. I live in Twinsburg now,” Randy replied. He jerked his thumb northward to the adjacent community. “Married with two kids.”
“Married his boss’s daughter,” Sanders chimed in. With Sanders’s hair dark as charcoal, Jesse remembered him as the only guy in middle school who could grow full facial hair. His stocky build presented a stark contrast to that of Randy or Jesse.
“Do you have a wife too?” Jesse asked Sanders.
“Had a wife. We lived down in Dayton, three kids, but I returned here after the divorce. One day you’re in high school, dating half the cheerleaders who line up for you—next thing you know, the glory disappears and you’re living back here.”
“You don’t look like you’ve changed much.”
Blasé, Sanders shrugged it off. “Ah, the usual stuff: a few gray hairs around the ears, little more of a belly, and a pain in my ass—but that’s caused by my ex-wife, who insists on calling me every few months, trying to collect an extra check. Claims the child support got lost in the mail.”
Jesse wondered how Caitlyn felt as she tried to raise a son without a trace of child support. Granted, he’d had no knowledge of his son; but to the average onlooker, would his situation look like Sanders’s?
“So, Barlow, tell me more about that girlfriend of yours,” Blake said.
“Good looking?” Sanders asked.
“Sure, she was gorgeous. A child star in some local TV show.”
“Anyone I’d know?”
“Don’t let her hear you suggest she’s an unknown,” Jesse said. “Her name is Jada.”
“Sounds like a Hollywood name to me. Jada what?”
“Ferrari.”
“Jada Ferrari!” Sanders remarked. “Sounds like a lady who
feels most at home between satin sheets in the heat of passion.” A faint smile inched across Sanders’s face, his eyes now lost in the clouds above. “A woman with the name of a car. Does she go zero to sixty in four seconds?”
Jesse forgot how crude Sanders could be, even while sober. He opted to ignore the comment. “She isn’t on screen anymore. She’s an assistant to Barry Richert.”
Randy snapped his fingers. “That’s the director of—oh, the movie where the guy crashes through the stained-glass windows with a kitten under his arm.”
“Right.” The things people remember. And not always related to the plot.
“By the way, I saw you in a movie a few years ago, walking down a sidewalk.”
“Been in anything else?” Sanders asked.
“Here and there,” Jesse replied. “Gigs are kind of hard to come by. Lots of competition, even for the bottom rung.”
More small talk, more fawning over the lifestyle Jesse had once prized but, in the end, found wanting. When people asked about L.A., they dreamed of glamour. How easy it seemed to gloss over the reality of a struggle toward accomplishment and simply focus on the rewards that Jesse never experienced. These acquaintances treated him as though he had plundered a gold mine.
At last, the reunion wound down when Randy checked his watch. “Gotta go,” he said. “We were on our way to the auto shop. Sanders’s engine is getting remounted and I’m his ride.”
Sanders landed a playful punch on Jesse’s arm. “We need to get together and hang out sometime, bro. Brotherhood of the bachelors.”
“Later,” Jesse replied without a commitment.
“I’d better head back to the store,” Blake said as he watched Randy and Sanders turn onto a side street. “If I leave Mark at the counter too long, the teenagers tend to stop by and scrounge for ginseng samples.”
Jesse grabbed the basketball and the duo walked to the car.
Blake patted him on the back. “Are you going to church tomorrow? It would make Eden happy.”
“No, I don’t think so.” Jesse pursed his lips. “Maybe some other time.”