Life After Genius (31 page)

His father grabs the door as it begins to close again. “Teddy, it’s all right. Get off the elevator.”

“No,” Mead says. “This is important to me.”

He knows what his father is thinking: that he is being ridiculous. That he is grandstanding. That he doesn’t really want to do this. Maybe that’s all true, but it doesn’t matter because he’s doing it anyway. And no one is going to stop him.

“Okay,” his father says, and lets go of the door.

10

PARENTS’ WEEKEND

Chicago
Six Weeks Before Graduation

T
HERE’S A TRADE SHOW IN CHICAGO THIS WEEK
. Well, there’s probably a trade show in Chicago every week, but this one Mead knows about because his father attends it every year. It’s sponsored by the National Association of Funeral Homes. A hundred thousand square feet of booths selling everything from formaldehyde to suits to forceps to caskets. Plus seminars on flower displays, the best techniques for preparing an autopsied body for the open casket, and the relaxation response for stressed-out funeral directors.

Mead has never attended one of these trade shows. He’s usually too busy with classes and studying and life in general. His father usually just stops by the dorms on the evening of his last day and takes him out to dinner, someplace that offers an early-bird special. Not because the man is cheap but because he wants to get on the road as soon as possible for the six-hour drive back to High Grove.

This year, however, Mead’s mother decided to come along.

M
EAD GLANCES OUT
the window. He’s not expecting his parents for another ten minutes but sometimes his father shows up early. Not late, like most people, but early. A man whose life revolves around other’s people schedules, who thinks nothing of getting up in the middle of the night to remove a body from the home of the deceased. A man who has spent many a birthday at memorial services, several wedding anniversaries presiding over graveside funerals, and a fair share of national holidays consoling the bereaved.

Mead digs through his dresser drawer for a tie. If it were just his father coming he wouldn’t bother. But he knows his mother and she is going to want to go to someplace nice. Someplace where the men are required to wear a tie. But the only tie he owns has been sitting in the back of his sock drawer for almost three years now. The last time he wore it was to his high school graduation. It was a present from his mother, a gift for the gifted. He spent an entire hour in the bathroom trying to get the knot just right, then his mother took one look at it, sighed, and retied it herself. No son of hers was going to stand before a gymnasium full of parents and give the valedictory address looking as if he had just stepped off the back of a hay truck even if half the men in the room actually had just stepped off hay trucks.

The navy blue tie in question is covered in white sock lint, which Mead attempts to remove with a piece of scotch tape but a few stubborn specks cling as if for life and he has to pinch them off between his thumb and forefinger, like aphids from a rose bush. The tie is creased too, in several places, so Mead takes it down the hall to the bathroom. He tries to smooth out the wrinkles by wetting his palm under the hot water faucet and then pressing it down over the creases. But this doesn’t work. It just makes things worse. Now he has a wrinkled tie with dark, wet splotches all over it.

Mead puts it on anyway, consulting the bathroom mirror to make sure it at least hangs straight. It’s the first thing his mother will notice: his tie. She reads ties the way a fortune-teller reads a crystal ball. As if one’s destiny can be seen in it. And he knows exactly what she’ll see when she spots his: a small-town boy who still has bits of straw stuck in his hair.

A toilet flushes and one of the stall doors behind Mead opens. Herman steps out wearing a silk bathrobe. It’s open in the front so Mead can see what he’s wearing underneath it. Which isn’t much, just a pair of jockey shorts. It’s a common enough sight around here. Boys in jockey shorts. Or no shorts at all for that matter. Ducking in and out of the shower. Not Mead, though, he prefers to keep his private parts private, a result of always being three to four years younger than his classmates. He not only wears boxers but he wears them straight into the shower, removing them just long enough to clean his crotch before wrapping a towel around his waist and dashing back to his room.

Herman steps up to the sink next to Mead to wash his hands and nods at the tie. “What’s the big occasion?”

“My parents are in town. They’re taking me out to lunch.”

Herman shuts off the water and reaches for a paper towel. He studies Mead in the mirror, shakes his head, and says, “Come with me.”

“I can’t. They’re going to be here any minute. What’re you doing in here anyway? Your room isn’t even on this floor.” And he looks at the open robe again, at Herman’s hairless chest, at his white jockey shorts, and wonders where the guy left the rest of his clothes.

Herman grabs Mead’s tie and pulls on it, choking him. “This is a disgrace,” he says. “I’ve got a hundred better ones hanging in my closet. You can have your pick.”

Mead yanks the tie out of his hand, loosens the collar. “No, thanks. Besides, they’re probably here already.”

Herman shrugs. “Okay, it’s your funeral,” he says, as if he knows Mead’s mother well, as if he knows what she will say, and heads out of the bathroom.

Mead looks in the mirror and watches him go. Relieved. The way he always feels when Herman leaves. Even after the trip out east. Which was by far and away the nicest thing anyone has ever done for Mead. And yet he still finds himself feeling wary whenever Herman is around. On guard. Against what he is not quite sure. There was that incident in the men’s room with the two pairs of shoes. But Mead has no proof that it was Herman. Or Dr. Kustrup. And then there was that time in the basement of Bell Labs when Herman was looking at Mead all weird and stuff. But then people have been looking at Mead like that his whole life. What he has got to do is stop assuming that the world is out to get him. He’s been trying to work on it, trying to improve his social skills the way Dr. Kustrup suggested instead of hiding in the stacks of the library all the time; he just hasn’t yet found the right opportunity.

Mead turns his attention back to his reflection, to his tie. He sees his mother take one look at him and shake her head, much as Herman just did. Only she won’t shrug and walk away, she’ll make stabs at him all through lunch. Tell him that he needs to get a haircut, to tuck in his shirt, to hike up his pants so the cuffs won’t drag on the ground. That he should sit up straight, chew with his mouth closed, and get his elbows off the table. All things of which Mead is guilty, it’s true. He does let his shirt hang out and his cuffs drag, he does slouch at the table and talk with food in his mouth, but he only does these things when his mother is around, to bug her.

Mead pulls off the tie, tosses it into the trash, and steps out into the hall just as Herman is starting up the stairs. He looks back when Mead pokes his head out the door.

“You got anything up there that’ll match this shirt?”

Herman smiles. “Go to your room. I’ll be right back.”

S
HE’S SITTING ON FORSBECK’S BED
, the unmade bed. She probably assumes that it belongs to her son but Mead made his bed this morning. He makes it every morning, something he started doing as soon as he moved out of his mother’s house. It grosses him out, the fact that his mother is sitting on his roommate’s soiled bedsheets, home to dust mites, mildew, sweat, and millions of microscopic Forsbecks that met with certain death last night thanks to the
Penthouse
magazine that Mead’s roommate “reads” every night before drifting off to sleep. It grosses him out but at the same time it pleases him.

“There you are,” she says. “Your father and I were beginning to think you’d taken off again. Without notice. He’s sitting downstairs in the car, keeping an eye out for your whereabouts.”

Mead glances at his watch. It’s a quarter to twelve. He had no idea he’d been in the bathroom that long. He wonders who let his mother in the building, how she found her way to his room. “I’m sorry, Mother. I’ve apologized for that like a million times. What else do you want me to do?”

She gets up off the bed, pulling herself to her full height that, even in heels, only brings the top of her head to Mead’s chin. But what she lacks in stature, she makes up for in tone. “For starters, you could write your aunt and uncle a letter.”

“I sent them a condolence card.”

“A card? He’s your cousin, Teddy. Or was. The closest thing you’ll ever have to a brother. I think you can do better than a card.”

It’s all his fault, that’s what she is really trying to say. That he wasn’t where he was supposed to be and now his cousin is dead. “Fine, I’ll write a letter. I’ll apologize for my existence. Will that make you happy?”

“I don’t appreciate the sarcasm, Teddy.”

“Was I being sarcastic? I didn’t notice. I mean I’ve been kind of busy, Mother. I have a paper to write by the end of the year. For the dean. That’s why I was out there. I was doing research, collecting important data. I was working, Mother, not goofing off. This paper is to take the place of my final exams and I have to hand in a comprehensive outline of it on Monday. That’s in three days.”

“This week. I want you to write that letter this week,” his mother says, then grabs the collar of his shirt and adds, “Why aren’t you wearing a tie?”

H
ERMAN APPEARS IN THE DOORWAY
at that very moment, holding a Pierre Cardin tie, a navy blue and maroon number that probably cost as much as the dress suit Mead’s mother is wearing. And she wears nice clothes. The woman does all her shopping at Marshall Field’s right here in Chicago. Albeit mostly by mail. Herman has changed out of his bathrobe into a pair of pressed trousers and a shirt that he is still buttoning up when he hands Mead the tie and says, “You ran off in a hurry and left this in my room.”

Mead’s mother looks horrified, always at the ready to believe the worst about her son. As if Herman just handed him a pair of boxer shorts instead of a tie. Mead sighs and says, “He’s kidding, Mother. It’s a loan. He’s loaning me one of his ties.”

“Ah,” Herman says, “so this must be the mother of the genius. Mead talks about you all the time, Mrs. Fegley. It’s an honor to finally meet.” And he takes her hand, as he took his own mother’s hand, and kisses the back of it.

He’s lying, of course. Mead has barely said a word about his mother to Herman. And the few words he has said have been anything but complimentary. But it’s a lie that Mead appreciates, especially when he sees the effect it has on her.

“And who might you be?” she asks like a preteen girl with a sudden crush.

“Herman Weinstein, ma’am. The thoughtless soul who whisked your son off at a moment’s notice without once entertaining the notion that his absence would cause such a stir or result in such a horrible and unspeakable outcome. May I extend to you my deepest condolences on your recent loss. I truly, truly am sorry.” And the whole time he’s talking, he’s holding her manicured hand between his two manicured hands, as if cupping a baby bird. Even for Herman, he’s laying it on pretty thick. So thick that Mead fears he might gag. But his mother doesn’t seem to notice the affectation. Or perhaps she doesn’t care. She laps up his attention like an alley cat that hasn’t seen milk in a month and says, “Oh, so you must be Teddy’s friend from out east. The one from Princeton. Herman, did you say?”

He looks at Mead and smiles. “So you’ve told them about me then.”

Mead blushes for reasons he is not quite sure. He is either embarrassed for himself or for his mother or for them both, it’s hard to say. “No. Yes. I mean I had to explain where I was when I disappeared. How I paid for the round-trip airfare. How I got access to the Cray X-MP.”

“My father was very impressed with your son, Mrs. Fegley. And the man is not easily impressed, believe you me.”

This is news to Mead. He had no idea he had impressed Mr. Weinstein. But which one? The one in Princeton, the one married to Mrs. Weinstein, the one with connections to the Institute for Advanced Study? Or the other one, the one who works at Bell Labs, Herman’s biological father? Either way, Mead is pleased to learn that he —Theodore Mead Fegley of High Grove, Illinois —was able to impress such powerful and important men. Especially considering how little time he spent in their presence. Of course, they both knew why Mead was out there, that he spent two weeks in the basement of Bell Labs cranking out the largest number of zeta zeros known to man. Herman most certainly told them. And Earl would have backed up this claim. It’s probably a good thing Mead didn’t spend more time in their presence. If he had, they might have picked up on the fact that he doesn’t much care for them personally. As father figures, they both suck. Big time. But Mead isn’t looking for a father figure; he already has a perfectly good one. What he needs are influential men with important connections who can get him into that Institute in Princeton. And either Mr. Weinstein will fit that bill quite nicely.

Unless, of course, Herman is lying.

“I’d love it if you could join us for lunch,” Mead’s mother says. “As a way of our thanking you for your generosity toward our son.”

“Herman can’t join us,” Mead says. “He has to go to class. This is a university, after all, Mother, not a country club.”

“I’d love to,” Herman says.

“Wonderful,” Mead’s mother says.

I
T FEELS STRANGE SITTING IN THE BACK
of his father’s Cadillac with Herman Weinstein seated next to him. Like two parallel planes intersecting. An impossibility in the world of mathematics. And yet here Mead sits, straddled between two separate worlds that were never intended to meet. It feels wrong, like something bad is going to happen. Like his mother is going to pull out a photo album and show Herman baby pictures of her son. Or tell him about the time Mead was four and ran around the backyard in nothing but his birthday suit. Embarrassing stuff. The kind of stuff you hope to leave behind when you pack your bags and move three hundred miles away from your parents. When you change your name from Teddy to Mead in hopes that you are finished with the past. Or maybe Herman will mention something about the scantily clad girls in the unisex bathrooms. Or the marijuana smoke that slips out from under closed doors on the weekend. Stuff Mead would prefer his parents not know about, stuff they wouldn’t understand, stuff his mother would automatically assume he was taking part in.