The Sweetheart Deal

by Polly Dugan

  Another day I drove to the Goodwill on Broadway and spent two hours picking over the clothes there, searching for something of Leo’s I’d donated. A year ago, I had forced him to purge his closets and he had, reluctantly. And after he had, I’d gone through them and picked out what he hadn’t—items he had no business hanging on to—then when he saw what I’d put in the bag to donate, we ended up arguing over a terrible Western shirt that he insisted on keeping.

  He’d pulled it out, furious, like I’d sold his mother for a dollar.

  “You’re not giving this away,” he’d said.

  “Leo, it’s an ugly shirt,” I’d told him. “It’s teal. It doesn’t do you any favors. Take my word for it.”

  We’d engaged in a bit of a battle over it, which was unexpected. It was, after all, only an ugly Western shirt.

  “I look good in it,” he’d said. “I know what I look good in and I’m keeping it. I’m a grown man and I’m going to wear what I want when I want.”

  Of all the things he looked good in, that shirt wasn’t one of them, and nothing I could say would convince him of that.

  So I didn’t argue, I didn’t fight, and he wore the shirt proudly, as he’d said, whenever he’d wanted to. And the fucking thing still hung in his closet among the things I still hadn’t touched. Every time he’d worn it after our standoff I kept a straight face as best I could and he’d said, seeing through me, Hate the shirt, not the man. He didn’t give a shit what I thought. And God damn it, why had I even? It meant nothing. If that was what we had to argue about, a Western shirt and its fashion merit, we were in good shape.

  Of course I didn’t find anything at Goodwill. Surely anything I had brought here a year ago was long gone. And would I have recognized anything of his anyway? Late one weekday morning I drove downtown to the art museum. This is what we’re doing today, bitch. People go to the museum every day. But I didn’t go in right away. Instead I crossed the street and sat down in the park and pretended to look at my phone. Parked two blocks from the museum were four huge white vans with the guide dog school logo on them. The same guide dog school we always passed the sign for when we drove to Mount Hood. It was way out there. I watched what all the trainers were doing. Some of them wore bright blue jackets, also bearing the school’s logo, and they each got a dog out of the van and put a harness on it, like they were saddling up. Two other people, a man and a woman, who didn’t get dogs, stood waiting. Then one woman put on an enormous black eyeshade and started walking with her dog, and one of the people who had been waiting, the man, followed behind them. I wanted to follow them too. I wanted to see what happened. The woman walked so confidently, and quickly, too. The dog wasn’t walking slowly either; it had a bouncy little trot, like it was being walked on a leash by someone who could see. But the dog wasn’t the one being walked, the woman was. I didn’t know how she could surrender and follow so easily without being able to see anything, walking around downtown in complete darkness. I tried to imagine it. I would never have been able to do such a thing. If I’d had to put on that huge thing that covered my eyes and most of my face, there’s no way I could have walked a step. I think the only thing I would have been able to do was crawl. I felt like a creep but I didn’t care. I left the park and followed the woman and her dog and the man behind her from the other side of the street. If the man following them was doing his job, keeping an eye on the blindfolded woman, he wouldn’t even notice me.

  I waited for something bad to happen, although I didn’t want to see it if it did. I waited for the blindfolded woman to fall, to trip and go right down on her face. Or for the dog to screw up at the same instant the man following them made a mistake and looked away. The three of them crossed a street and turned a corner and I kept following. How did those trainers pretend all the dangers they couldn’t see weren’t there? They still existed. It was an odd threesome to be watching. No one looked worried or scared, not even the dog. I could tell the woman in the blindfold and the man following her were talking as they all continued down the block and crossed another street. Once or twice they both laughed. I stayed with them until Pioneer Square and turned around and went back to the museum. They didn’t look like they were going to do anything except keep going.

  I remembered on Mother’s Day how the boys had blindfolded me before giving me the tree. How afraid I’d been to walk—my arms flailing—and stumbled forward the mere ten or so steps from my own house to the yard. If I ever went blind, I could never trust a dog the way those trainers did. But if I closed my eyes, who would I trust enough to follow and keep me safe? The boys, I guessed, but very slowly, two feet at a time maybe. I would trust Erin, no question, but I’d be bossing her the whole time, I knew. Backseat driving from my darkness. I’d have trusted Leo—even now, as mad at him as I was, I knew he never would have let anything happen to me. Which was of course why he’d trusted Garrett. And Garrett, without knowing it at the time, had kept me safe when I’d walked through the dark, at least for a while. Until we both had fallen.

  Garrett

  From Boston, I had rented a one-bedroom apartment in Portland that I’d found on Craigslist. It was in a converted house in the Alberta Arts District, and I’d gotten practice wearing my heart on my sleeve with the landlady, who’d owned the house for decades. I could satisfy most of the move-in requirements from across the country, but beyond that I might have seemed like a tenant no one would want to gamble on, so when I told her a brief version of why I was moving, she was sympathetic.

  Three weeks after I arrived in Portland, I texted Audrey, and two weeks later I still hadn’t heard from her. I tried to pretend I’d moved anywhere, like I had so many times before, but it was very different. I bought a pullout sofa for my living room for when the boys came to visit. If they came to visit. I felt like an ex-husband, or like I imagined ex-husbands felt. I was nobody’s ex-husband and nobody’s father.

  Kevin had thrown some work my way for a family that was adding in-law quarters to their house. It was good to have a job to go to where I could exert myself to fatigue. I’d visited the websites of all the colleges and universities in town, including the community colleges, and applied for all the openings I’d found.

  One night Kevin came by with housewarming cigars—his Padróns—and a bottle of Scotch, and we drank and smoked in the big yard behind the house. My apartment was one of four in the converted foursquare—built in 1915, old for Portland—which sat on a deep lot. The landlord’s or the other tenants’—I wasn’t sure whose—Adirondack chairs and other lawn furniture dotted the yard. I bought two chairs of my own and added them to the rest, in my own corner of the yard. When Kevin came over, we sat in my chairs. It had been a beautiful September day, which faded into the gorgeous night. I’d had no idea such a lovely day was possible in Portland.

  There was one other guy who lived in the house, young, who I never saw. I think he worked at night. Single women lived alone in each of the other two apartments. I saw them regularly, Liesl and Nancy, both probably in their late twenties, and friendly and outgoing.

  While Kevin and I smoked and sipped in my chairs and admired the day, Liesl and Nancy, barefoot and wearing sunglasses, came out to the yard with a bottle of wine and two glasses. They lifted their hands and walked over.

  “Hey, Garrett,” said Liesl. “It’s a perfect night, isn’t it? I adore September.”

  “It sure is,” I said. “This is Kevin.”

  Everyone made their introductions.

  “We’ll be at the Adirondacks.” Nancy tilted her head toward them. “Bring your chairs and come join if you want.”

  They left.

  “Attractive neighbors,” said Kevin. “Young.”

  I nodded.

  “Convenient, too,” he said. “Or dangerous, potentially. If you happen to be on the market, with you all right there under the same cozy roof. You looking?”

  “Not right now.” I shook my head. “As much good as that decision’s doing for me.”

 
He raised his glass and without words we toasted my commitment to a futile pursuit. When we finished the cigars, we capped the Scotch, Kevin left, and I went inside. On my way in I waved across the yard to where the girls sat, and they waved back.

  The house was a find, no question. My apartment and yard were places I was happy enough to call home and spend time in, but not where I wanted to stay. The location was prime. I walked on Alberta every day, discovering something new. Early on, I found a neighborhood bar, Binks, and struck up a friendship with the bartender I saw regularly, Nathalie, who was beautiful, sported impressive tattoos, and took no shit. She was great to talk to if she didn’t think you were trying to bed her, which I wasn’t—very funny and smart. Often I took the paper and went early to Tin Shed for breakfast, to beat the crowds and lines that formed as the morning advanced. Alberta was a foodie, arty street with a bus line, and I was glad to live so close to so much vibrant activity, as if it tried to make up for what I didn’t have. Look, boasted the neighborhood, at how much we have to offer. As comfortable as I felt living there, hanging out, exploring—and it was a great place to do all those things—I felt a little old to be doing and liking what I did alone, without a partner or a family to walk down the street with, stopping in at the shops where we wanted to see more. I felt like I was in Portland for the first time, and in a way I was, as a single man on my own, and it was everything any newcomer could have asked for, except I had no one to share it with.

  I went over to the Rams Head one afternoon and sat at the bar and had a beer. The place was blameless, but I ached and cursed it while I drank anyway, watching the door, and through the window, at people walking past. Sitting there, I thought it wouldn’t be the craziest thing if I saw Audrey walk by, and I was disappointed and surprised when she didn’t.

  It was only a place, but places could absorb the experiences they fostered, and then haunt you with them. Sitting there with Audrey the day of that lunch, we’d looked like any man and woman, maybe, who had started something that, while still new, had promise. And that had been the beginning of everything changing. Because of what I’d done, and what I hadn’t been able to do.

  I bought a bike. Portland was a bike town, after all. Businesses delivered soup and pizzas by bike. A company called B-Line, which was in the national news, delivered all kinds of things around the city on motorized trikes. For me, biking was good for thinking, and I was never alone out there when I rode. I imagined us cyclists all thinking our millions of thoughts as we cruised around the city on our own two wheels. Although none of us would collide as we rode our routes, surely our thought balloons would have, had they been able to take on shape and mass like in comic strips. A single woman fretting about a missed period, a parent awaiting an overdue return phone call from their adult child, a husband worrying over a meager checking account holding out till payday, a man, or a woman, no longer able to deny how distant their spouse had become—a landscape of worries floating alongside my thoughts about Audrey and the boys. Pardon me, our thoughts would say to one another’s as we cruised through town. On your left. Maybe another cyclist was considering moving to Boston. Go on, just do it, my balloon would advise back. I rode to Powell’s and spent an afternoon there. I went back to the food carts on Mississippi. I checked out shops on Hawthorne where I smelled patchouli for the first time in years, and made the Esplanade loop with joggers and mothers pushing strollers. I rode past dog walkers in Forest Park.

  And one Saturday, like all the other days I’d ridden, I cruised home from New Seasons with my cargo bags full.

  I’d wait one more week, and then I would call Audrey and invite the boys over. It wouldn’t have anything to do with her. She’d have to say yes. It was only a visit. There wouldn’t be a reason for her to say no. I’d invite her, too, but I would expect the boys to come without her. I’d do burgers or we could get takeout from that Thai place they all liked behind the laundry off Mississippi. Since I was renting, I couldn’t put up a permanent hoop, but I would buy one of those burly freestanding ones on wheels. My landlady liked me. If I told her the hoop was for when my friend’s sons came over to visit, she’d agree, no problem. I’d mention it would be good for the kids on the street, who were welcome to use it too, if that would help me sell it. I’d ask her permission after it was already assembled and ready to use. I’d hand her a nice bottle of wine while I apologized and hoped she’d consent to what I’d already done.

  I rounded the corner and pedaled up the hill toward my house. Audrey was sitting on my porch, looking at an open book in her lap, so I saw her before she saw me. I braked and got off my bike, walked it to the curb, and parked it on the sidewalk. I took off my helmet and sunglasses and put them on the ground next to the front tire. When she looked up and saw me, she closed the book, took off her glasses, set them on the porch, stood up, and waited. I didn’t know what I would do when I got there, but I kept walking and climbed the stairs and stopped on the step beneath the one where she stood. When she smiled, the prettiest shy lift of her lips and eyes, in her face I saw what I wanted to: clarity, courage, forgiveness. And though her expression may have meant none of these things, I felt a measure of a comfort that was unfamiliar—maybe it was what people called faith—and I clung. When she wrapped her arms around my waist and kissed my mouth, I pulled her to me, and I held tight. There was nothing to say. Nothing that couldn’t wait.

  Acknowledgments

  For Wendy Sherman, my agent and friend: thank you for everything. The longer we work together, the greater my gratitude for what a steadfast champion of my work you are, and committed advocate for me. You were the first one to believe in this book, and because of you, others did too.

  I can’t imagine a smarter, kinder, more encouraging and generous editor than Judy Clain, who helped me make this book better than I ever thought it could be. My deepest thanks to you and Reagan Arthur for your early enthusiasm and confidence, and for showing me exactly where to “dig” when I needed direction. Thank you Amanda Brower, Meghan Deans, Pamela Marshall, Alison Kerr Miller, Carrie Neill, and everyone at Little, Brown whose individual and collective talents brought this book into existence and out into the world. When I think of my team, you’re it.

  During the course of my research, I had the great pleasure and privilege to rely on friends’ histories and to meet with generous experts who were so willing to share their knowledge and experience in order for portions of this book to be as authentic as possible. Any errors or inaccuracies are mine.

  For telling me about their closest, early friendships with other men, I’m grateful to Eric Anctil, Kyle Brakensiek, Franklin Jones, and David Morrow. Thank you for sharing what was profound and lasting about the friends and relationships you had as young men, and their impact on you. Leo and Garrett are much the better for it.

  Dr. Richard Manthey was the first expert I consulted in the earliest stages of writing this book. Thank you for sharing all you knew about fatal skiing injuries and accidents on Mount Hood. Richard answered every question I had, and what he didn’t know from his own wealth of experience, he found out and passed along to me.

  Thanks to Kathy Hurd for her personal tour of the Pittock Mansion, for sharing the rich details of the Pittock family history and also answering every question I asked.

  Thank you Donna Shuurman, chief executive officer at the Dougy Center for Grieving Children and Families, for giving me your personal tour of the magnificent rebuilt facility, and for our candid and emotional discussion about the critical work Dougy does locally and nationwide for the families it serves and strives to help heal.

  I’m grateful to Father Mike Biewend for sharing what spiritual advice he might have given to Audrey, and for always asking how the book is doing.

  Thanks to the Tin House Writers Workshop for providing such a tremendous community of and opportunities for writers. I continue to be grateful to Steve Almond and Elissa Schappell, who were the very best teachers and remain inspiring mentors and unflagging supporters.
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  For everything you have given me this past year, thank you, Shanna Mahin, for being you, and for being my dear friend. There’s no one I would have rather shared this journey with.

  Again, my greatest thanks is to my tribe—Carolyn and Jess, Mike and Ryan. Thank you for all your help with the research and for filling in the blanks on these pages and always for your love and belief and laughter and friendship. You remain the very best version of family.

  Finn and Brady, you have made me prouder and luckier than I ever thought I could be. Thank you for being my most devoted fans and for your patience on the days when the writing has had to come first.

  PJ, this one’s for you.

  Also by Polly Dugan