by Rick R. Reed
He let it go to voice mail. He knew who it was. Martha Stewart would be seeing his smiling face within seconds.
He locked his door behind him, saying a little prayer that this husband exploration would prove a lot better than the last.
It had to.
It couldn’t get any worse.
* * * *
The ride across the Sound Cody had dreaded turned out to be the complete opposite of his fears. The water shimmered under the bright sun as the Victoria Clipper cut effortlessly through it. Except for the sea and landscape flashing by, the travel was so smooth one could hardly tell they were moving.
Outside, the mountains were out in full force, a little snow still clinging to their uppermost peaks even in August. The boat itself was comfortable, with booth-like tables and panoramic views across the water wherever one looked. Cody wondered if he could ever live in a different place, since the Pacific Northwest was really one of the most beautiful he had ever seen.
To make things even better, the man sitting across from him, sipping a cup of tea and eyeing him at this very moment, had turned out to be a delight. Cody didn’t want to let himself get too optimistic, but Chappy Whelan positively radiated warmth. There was something comforting in his large, furry frame and his thick beard. His dark eyes were creased around the corners, indicating he laughed a lot. And he had an infectious smile, which Cody had commented on, using that exact term—infectious.
Chappy had quipped, “Let’s hope that’s all that’s infectious about me.”
Cody chuckled. This guy had a sense of humor, which gave him all sorts of thumbs-up points.
What Cody liked about Chappy was that he immediately made Cody feel at ease. It isn’t often, Cody thought, shortly after they had been introduced and had gotten some of the preliminary getting-to-know-you-getting-to-know-all-about-you stuff out of the way, that we meet people who right away make us feel like we’re old friends. Yet Chappy had that quality. From his easy laugh, to the forthright way he shook hands, to his honest smile, he seemed very comfortable in his own skin. And he had the ability to make you feel you were the most important person in the world and what you had to say was of genuine interest. That kind of thing couldn’t be faked, Cody thought.
Cody was charmed.
The most wonderful thing about Chappy Whelan? Once they had settled into their booth facing the sparkling water of the Sound, Cody pretty much entirely forgot the camera operators, the sound guy, and Martha Stewart herself, sitting at another table across from them, staring down intently at two different portable monitors in front of her.
Chappy had the ability to make Cody feel like it was just the two of them. That was no small task, Cody thought, when you considered how many pairs of eyes were staring at them and watching their every move, framing shots, projecting how they would edit the sequence.
They were halfway to Victoria when Cody decided to dispense with the small talk. He already knew what Chappy did for a living—he was a welder at a steel fabricating plant south of Seattle. He knew where Chappy had grown up—the midsize town of Peoria in central Illinois, along the Illinois River. He knew Chappy came from a big family—four brothers and two sisters. “Mom and Dad were Catholic and shining testimony that the rhythm method did not work,” he had quipped. Chappy loved animals and had several pets, one of which was a German shepherd named Herb who happily indulged in his master’s addiction for running with him. Chappy also volunteered at the Seattle Animal Shelter, helping out with adoptions.
Chappy, Cody discovered, even loved to read, and his favorite authors were some of the same ones that would top Cody’s own list: quirky scribes like Patricia Highsmith, Truman Capote, John Kennedy Toole, and of course, Flannery O’Connor. Chappy also loved movies and confessed to a passion for horror. They had both gotten excited as they recounted favorite moments from Rosemary’s Baby, Carnival of Souls, and Night of the Living Dead.
In short, he seemed like the perfect man. They had so much in common! Yet all this stuff, Cody thought, was superficial. He wanted to know what made Chappy tick, what was really inside him (and no, not in that way), so he asked him a question he had trotted out before with men he thought stood a chance to progress further than a first date.
He sat back in the booth and very casually asked, “If you could go back in time and be invisible and could watch a day with any person or people, who would it be and why?”
Chappy guffawed. Cody couldn’t help but join in the laughter.
“What?” Cody asked.
“That question! What did you say you were again? A headshrinker?”
“You know I’m a high school English teacher.”
“Well, I feel like that question could be some kind of Raw Shock test or whatever the hell they call it.”
“Rorschach,” Cody corrected. “But that’s one of my go-to date questions. It’s open-ended, and it’s surprising how much it says about a person.”
“Okay,” Chappy said, rubbing his beard. “I’ll play, but you gotta promise to return the favor.”
“Sure thing.”
Chappy’s dark eyes took on a faraway cast. Cody was wondering what famous person Chappy would pull out of history to spy on. Chappy was not a flashy guy, so Cody was ready to hear about someone low key and noble. Abraham Lincoln, maybe? John F. Kennedy? Or maybe a nature photographer like Audubon?
Chappy leaned forward and said softly, “I’d like to see my parents.”
“Your parents?”
“Uh-huh. When they were young. Before all of us kids came along. I’d like to maybe tag along on their first date. Mama always tells the story that she didn’t like Pop at all when they were first set up by one of her roommates at nursing school. ‘He was too frickin’ romantic for a no-nonsense gal from Back-of-the-Yards Chicago,’ she always said, referring to the working class South Side neighborhood where she grew up. But we all knew she was lying. She loved it that he not only brought her flowers on that first date but took the time to discreetly find out what her favorite was. It couldn’t have been easy to find irises in the dead of winter, but Pop did.”
“That’s sweet.”
“Right? And we didn’t see a lot of sweet growing up, not with seven kids in the house, with the biggest separation between any of us two years. They were too preoccupied with getting us out of the house, getting us fed, cleaning up our messes, whooping our butts when we needed it, to spend much time making goo-goo eyes at each other.
“So I’d like to see them when they were young, see that first blush of romance.” Chappy stopped for a moment, and Cody was surprised to see tears standing in his eyes.
“I see you lookin’! I’m busted.” Chappy grinned. “I’m a big bawl-baby, always was. But the thought of the two of them young with no idea of all the kids that would come along, the trouble to pay the bills, all the good and bad we call life, would be a treat. Not that they didn’t love us—God, we were lucky. But I’d just like to be there in those early moments, when they were focused just on each other.
“I’d like to see my handsome black-Irish father in his prime before life and us kids beat him down, before Alzheimer’s got to him.”
Cody’s mouth opened, but he didn’t say anything. This was the first he’d known of Chappy’s family being affected by this tragically debilitating illness.
“I’d like to see my pretty mother, with her red hair and green eyes, keep him in line. Because Mama was always the one who wore the pants at our house, you know? It was never ‘Wait ‘til your father gets home’ at the Whelans’. It was always ‘Wait ‘til Mama gets back’ or ‘Wait ‘til Mama hears about this.’ Put the fear of God into you, it did!” Chappy laughed.
“That’s what you’d use your wish for, then, to ride along on your parents’ first date?”
“Well, yeah. I’d like to hear what they talked about. I’d like to see who kissed who first and if I was right in guessing Mama made all the moves.” Chappy raised his eyebrows. “I wouldn’t want to see a l
ot of that kind of stuff, if that’s what you’re thinkin’! Lord no, but more I just want to hear them talk, see them look in each other’s eyes. Because as much as Mama denies it, I know there was a kind of love at first sight going on there. She would always tell us kids that there was ‘no gettin’ that man out of my hair’ once they’d met, but she was always smiling when she said it. And if Pop was around, she gave him a look that said it all.” Chappy shook his head, smiling. “You could really see the love in their eyes.” He looked out at the water. “Alzheimer’s. Shitty stuff. It’s taken all that away. Pop doesn’t even know who Mama is anymore.”
“I’m sorry,” Cody said, suddenly choked up.
Chappy waved him away. “We don’t want to get all maudlin on our first date! You wanted a happy memory. And it makes me happy to think about seeing the two of them young, healthy, and in love, just at the start of their journey. I’ll count myself very lucky if I can have even half of what they did.”
He looked pointedly at Cody, and Cody felt heat rise to his face.
“Your turn.”
Cody had been prepared to say he would have liked to be present at one of the meetings of the Algonquin Round Table, the New York City gathering of writers that included Dorothy Parker, George S. Kaufman, Tallulah Bankhead, and so many other smartasses and very clever people of their time. But in light of Chappy’s sharing, his idea, although he really would love to just sit and listen to those people talk while swilling martinis with them, seemed kind of shallow and trivial.
“What do you think, Cody? Where would you like to time travel?”
Cody didn’t allow himself to analyze. He free-associated, letting the first family memory to pop into his head materialize. He figured whatever recollection took that priority spot was bound to be important.
“Racing with my mom.”
Chappy leaned forward, listening, a slight grin on his face. “She’s a runner?”
Cody laughed. “Oh God, no.” He shook his head. The memory was so clear. He was about six. It was late at night and someone, he didn’t remember who, had dropped him and his mother off at the corner down the street from their house. “I don’t remember much about this whole night. And when you hear it, you’re not gonna think there’s much that’s special about it.” Cody stopped for a moment to catch his breath. He didn’t understand why this particular memory was causing such emotion to stir within him. It was so simple.
“Anyway,” he continued, “When I was a little boy, my mom and I must have gone somewhere together with a friend of hers. Who knows where? But the friend must have driven. And they dropped us off at the corner. It was night and very quiet. Summer. My mom wore pedal pushers and a short-sleeved white blouse with a rose pattern on it.” Cody snorted. “The things you remember!” He went on. “When we got out of the car, she said, ‘I’ll race you to the front door.’”
Cody bit his lower lip, not understanding the wetness he felt at the corners of his eyes, the hot rush of nostalgia and love he felt for his mother just then.
Chappy leaned forward to cover Cody’s hand with his own. “You okay?” His voice was gentle. He didn’t pry. He just seemed concerned.
Cody forced himself to laugh, embarrassed at being caught out like this. Vulnerable. He pressed his palms against his eyes, forcing away the tears, trying to swallow the lump in his throat. He smiled, big and false; he knew it. “I’m fine.”
“Tell me about the race. Did you win?”
Cody shook his head. “I’m not sure. I don’t remember. But that’s not the point.” He paused for a long time, looking out at the choppy surface of the water hurrying by, as if it were the water itself that was moving and not the ferry. Why did this memory mean so much?
“What is the point?” Chappy wondered.
“The point is that my mom and I were together that night, just us. The point is, for the space of just a minute or two, my mom got to be a kid again.” He looked at Chappy, the need to be understood, Cody was certain, manifesting itself in his eyes. “She didn’t get that much in her life. She was such a good woman, all about family, all about everyone else. She forgot—always, always—about herself. And that summer night, for just a moment, on a dark empty street, she got to be a little girl.” Cody laughed. “I think she did win. And I’m glad.”
Cody stared down at the table between them, tracing a pattern in its surface with his fingers. “See, my mom never got a chance to be a kid. She was the oldest of three, and when she was only seven her mom died. Then a couple of years later, her brother, the baby of the family, Johnny, died of a brain tumor. He was just starting the second grade. They buried him on top of his mother.” Cody ventured a wary look at Chappy, who looked very serious, staring into Cody’s eyes.
“My mom told me once how she overheard her dad talking to one of his sisters after her brother died, and he lamented why God couldn’t have taken one of his girls instead of his only son.”
Chappy squeezed his hand. “That’s awful. I’m so sorry she had to hear that.”
“But listen, even though he said that, my mother was always the most devoted daughter. She loved her dad. She didn’t hold what he said against him. Or if she did, it wasn’t for long. My mom always saw the good in people. She believed that family was the most important concept in the world. When her dad was dying of cancer when I was a little boy, my mom was there for him almost 24/7.”
“She sounds like a good woman.”
“She was. Is. But she just never had much happiness. My dad isn’t exactly husband of the year. He treats her bad.” Cody decided not to elaborate. “Yet she’s so full of love, so selfless.
“I guess I just like to think about that night because I like to believe that for only a few minutes, she forgot all the pain, the wrong turns, and the loss. That she just ran with her son, laughing, up a dark street, a child again.
“I’d like, if there was some magic, to know that was true. That she was able to step outside herself and be free of all the cares that weighed her down.” He wiped at his eyes again and tried to smile.
“You probably think I’m silly. A sentimental jerk.”
Chappy smiled. “Not at all. Your parents—are they still together?” He paused for a moment, and Cody wondered if he was considering what to say next. “Still with us?”
“Yes to both,” Cody answered. “Why would you ask that?”
Chappy shrugged. “You just spoke about your mother more in the past tense.”
“Maybe that’s because that version of her is in the past tense. My parents aren’t very happy people. I don’t know what keeps them together. Inertia, maybe?” He cocked his head. “I’ve begged her to divorce my dad.”
Chappy said, “Maybe there’s more there than you realize. We kids think we know everything that goes on, but we don’t. No one can know the inside of a marriage, really, but the two people in it. Maybe you should be the one who goes back and sees your parents on their first date.”
Cody stood suddenly. “I’m gonna go find the can. Blow my nose.” And he hurried away, not looking back at Chappy, or Martha Stewart, or the cameras that had, most likely, captured him at his most vulnerable.
Why had he done that? Where had it come from?
* * * *
By the time they got to the harbor at Victoria, Cody felt he knew Chappy very well. He also knew he really, really liked this man. What was not to like? Aside from having an imposing sexual presence, the kind that made Cody want to growl, there was about Chappy an aura of kindness and sensitivity.
He was the kind of guy, Cody thought, you could go to with your problems. He would listen, really listen, and not pass judgment. He wouldn’t tell you what to do but would be there with you every step of the way until you found the answer to what was bothering you.
There’s that, Cody thought, rising from their bench to follow Chappy off the ferry and into the Customs building. And then there’s his ass. My Lord, you could balance a tray on it. Bubble butt doesn’t begin to cover it.
And right now, I wish that faded denim didn’t either. Cody couldn’t help it—a laugh bubbled up and spilled over his lips.
Chappy turned around, grinning, obviously wanting to be let in on the joke. “What?”
“Nothing. Just had a funny thought.” He followed Chappy outside into the brilliant sunshine.
* * * *
The Empress Hotel was the jewel of Victoria’s inner harbor. It rose up, massive, above the water, its red-bricked, high-peaked Edwardian edifice appropriately decked out here and there in climbing ivy. As they approached it, Cody remarked, “I feel like we’re stepping back in time and we’re somewhere seaside in England.”
“Like Brighton?”
“Exactly,” Cody said, pleased Chappy got the reference so quickly. “I can imagine a coterie of royals slipping inside for high tea.” Cody thought this little exchange boded well for their weekend together.
Plus, once again, he had forgotten the cameras around them. When he was with Diesel Hunter, he’d never forgotten. Maybe that was partially due to the fact he’d felt Diesel was always preening for them and was more concerned about how he looked in their lenses than how he looked in Cody’s eyes.
* * * *
That afternoon, they were scheduled for the iconic event the Empress was known for—afternoon tea in the “tea lobby,” as the check-in clerk had referred to it. They were told by the producers that they should “dress smart” for the service because the hotel frowned upon overly casual dress. “So I should leave my Mariners baseball cap in the room?” Chappy wondered.
“Exactly,” Martha had answered. “And don’t even think about that Elephant Car Wash T-shirt or those ripped jeans I know you’re packin’.”
“But they make my basket look so tempting!” Chappy cried, inducing a smile from Cody and a trademark smirk from Martha.
“That may be, but they are all about decorum at the tea service. We’re not dropping over a hundred bucks Canadian for tea so you two can embarrass us and hold up the very American image of boorishness.”