“I can’t feel the baby,” Jen said. She had called me at the station, where I was simultaneously screening callers for Wade and looking at pictures of Jessica Biel online.
“What do you mean?”
“He always kicks when I’m in the shower. Today he didn’t.”
“Maybe he’s sleeping.”
“I don’t feel right. Something’s wrong.” She was in her eighth month, and for the last few weeks her hormones were the inmates running the asylum. I had learned the hard way that it was best to pretty much agree with everything she said.
“Have you had any coffee? Maybe he just needs a little caffeine?”
“Just meet me at the doctor. I’m leaving now.”
I sighed and closed out Jessica Biel, but not before I saw the silent judgment in her eyes.
I was late getting to the hospital. Late because there were no damn parking spots and how the hell do you build a major hospital and not think to include a single substantial parking lot? So I was a half hour late, on the one day in recorded history that Jen’s doctor’s office decided to run on time. Usually you stewed for an hour in the waiting room, reading parenting magazines and trading quick sympathetic looks with the other expectant fathers, wordlessly affirming that when you weren’t sitting quietly whipped at the ob-gyn, you were out getting drunk at football games and hunting buffalo in a loincloth. But on that day, by the time I’d come in and identified myself and been led back to the examination room by the theatrically gay receptionist, Jen was already in tears, wiping the blue conducting goop from the sonogram off her belly. And as the room started to spin and my lungs started to contract, the doctor explained that our baby had been strangled in the womb by his umbilical cord. He’d already explained it all to Jen, so she had to hear it all again because I’d been late.
Jen stopped making eye contact with me after that. Our marriage had unwittingly become fused to that little ball of life growing in her belly, and when it died, so did we. And while she’d never admit to it and rationally knew that it was ridiculous, Jen simply couldn’t handle the fact that I’d been late, that I’d let her go into that examination room by herself. People need someone to blame. I had failed her in some fundamental way, and she simply couldn’t bring herself to forgive me. I think she may have tried to, but in the end, it just seemed easier for her to start sleeping with Wade instead. So now we’ve each done something unforgivable, and the universe is once again in perfect balance.
Chapter 22
11:25 a.m.
N
o visitors yet. The mornings are generally slow. Jen has left to go check into the Marriott over on Route 120. She’s going to stay overnight, determined that we talk this through further. Phillip is still being yelled at by Tracy behind closed doors not thick enough to drown out her high-pitched, weepy admonishments. I feel bad for Tracy. I don’t know much about her, but she seems to be a nice enough person. Dating Phillip brings out the slut or the shrew in a woman, and there would be no dignity in a woman her age playing the slut card. Paul has used the excuse of driving Horry to work to go check on things at the store. Alice is on the couch, balancing her coffee mug and some mini muffins on her plate. Barry’s out in the backyard, trying to run a conference call while watching the kids in the pool. Mom, Wendy, and I are sitting on regular chairs, not willing to spend a moment longer than we have to in the shiva chairs.
“What did Jen have to say for herself?” Mom says.
“Nothing. The usual.”
“She looked good,” Wendy says. “Infidelity agrees with her.” Jen’s long limbs and slim build have always been viewed by Wendy with a mixture of resentment and awe.
“I think it’s interesting that she came,” Mom says. “I think it means something.”
“What, Mom? What does it mean?”
“I’m just saying. Things may not be as finished as you think.”
“Does it mean she wasn’t screwing my boss for a year?”
“No, Judd, it doesn’t mean that. She cheated on you, and I know that hurts. But it’s only sex, Judd, scratching an itch. We’ve been programmed to attach far too much significance to it, to the point where we lose sight of everything else. It’s just one tree in a thick forest.”
“It’s a pretty big damn tree.”
“Over the course of a fifty-year marriage, one bad year isn’t very significant. Your marriage might still be there to be saved. But you’ll never know if you keep indulging your hate and anger like the world owes you reparations.”
“Thanks, Mom. As always, your unsolicited advice, however useless, is greatly appreciated.”
“You’re welcome, sweetie.”
Phillip emerges and lowers himself by his arms like a gymnast into an empty shiva chair, letting out a long, dejected sigh. “Apparently, I’m an irredeemable asshole.”
“And yet, I have a feeling she’s not done trying to redeem you,” Mom says.
“Go figure.”
“Why are you doing this, Philly?”
“Doing what?”
“Dating a cougar.” Wendy.
“Dating your mother.” Me.
“Jesus Christ.” Phillip.
“I think she’s nice,” Alice says. “And very attractive.”
“Yes, she’s lovely,” my mother says. “And closer to my age than yours.”
“I’m not as young as you like to think, Mom. And neither are you.”
“Don’t be spiteful, Philly. It doesn’t suit you.”
“And that skirt doesn’t suit you. You’ll be giving everyone crotch shots from your shiva chair.”
“I just want to make sure you’ve thought this through,” Mom says. “Because there’s no scenario in which this doesn’t end badly.”
“Much like this conversation,” I say.
“Which ends right now,” Phillip says.
“We are your family, Phillip. We love you.”
We all say “But!” at the same instant.
Mom looks around, momentarily thrown. “That’s right. But.
But
she’s too old.
But
you’re not going to start a family with her.
But
have you even thought about her in all of this?”
Phillip shakes his head, not taking the bait.
“What happens to Tracy when this runs its course, Philly? You’ll have no trouble finding new lovers—knowing you, you already have. But the older she gets, the harder it will be for her to find someone. She has so much less time than you to find the right person, and you’re wasting it for her.”
“And why can’t I be the right person?”
Mom smiles at him, sadly and with great tenderness. “Don’t be an ass.”
“That’s it, I’m out of here,” Phillip says, getting to his feet.
“I’ll come with you,” I say.
“You’re not supposed to leave the house,” Mom says. “We’re sitting shiva.”
“Ask Wendy about her marriage,” I say. “We’ll be back before the dust settles.”
“Dick,” Wendy says.
“Sorry, sis. It’s every man for himself.”
Paul, returned from the store, steps through the living room doorway just as Phillip reaches it. “Hey, Phillip,” he says, smiles, and then punches him square in the jaw, sending him sprawling back into the room, knocking over a handful of chairs.
“Paul!” Alice shrieks.
“He sucker punched me before.”
Phillip, flat on his back, props himself up on one elbow, wincing as he rubs his jaw. Tracy comes running out of her room, having heard the commotion. When she sees Phillip lying on the floor, she shakes her head in disgust and turns on her heel, disappearing back into the den. We won’t be seeing her again anytime soon.
“If I stand up, are you going to hit me again?” Phillip says to Paul.
“No, I’m good,” Paul says, rubbing his knuckles. He reaches over and offers Phillip his hand. Phillip takes it and Paul yanks him to his feet, and then, to everyone’s surprise, pulls Phillip into a little hug and whispers something into his ear. Phillip nods and pats the back of Paul’s head. Then he turns to me. “You coming?”
“Unless Paul wants to hit me too.”
“What could I do to you that the universe hasn’t already done?” Paul says.
“Oh,” Phillip says, like he’s just remembered something. “Jen’s pregnant. It’s Judd’s.”
Everyone in the room turns to stare at me.
“I think I speak for everyone when I say, holy shit!” Wendy says.
“How could you not tell me that?” Mom says.
“Now I’m going to hit you,” I say to Phillip.
He shrugs. “Every man for himself.”
Then Alice stands up and very deliberately lets her coffee mug and saucer fall to the floor, where they shatter into pieces. She looks around at all of us as tears form in her eyes. “Unbelievable,” she says. And then, before anyone can say anything, can figure out what set her off, she turns and runs crying past us, up the stairs, and moments later we all jump as the door to my old bedroom slams shut and all the lights on the first floor go out.
Chapter 23
11:45 a.m.
I
’ve never been in a Porsche before. Phillip’s rides low to the ground and I feel every seam in the road, every pebble, transmitted through the hard leather seat. The floor is strewn with plastic soda bottles and fast food wrappers, the ashtray spilling over with bent butts, and gas receipts.
“Nice car,” I say.
He shifts into third and guns it. “I know what you’re thinking,” he says.
“What’s that?”
“You’re thinking I’m a fuckup and Tracy’s rich, and I’m just with her because she pays my way and I get to drive cars like this.”
“Why are you with her?”
Phillip sighs and shakes his head. “I’ve been trying to grow up, Judd. I know I’ve kind of cemented my place as the family fuckup, but believe it or not, that’s not who I want to be. And having hit more than my share of brick walls, I figured maybe a better class of woman would be a good place to start.”
“So you’re not using her for her money. You’re using her for her class.”
“I’m not using her. Not any more than she’s using me. Isn’t that what love is? Two people who fulfill needs in each other?”
I shrug. “My wife spent the last year of our marriage sleeping with my boss. Don’t ask me about love.”
“Your pregnant wife.”
“My pregnant wife.”
Phillip grins. “Looks like I’ve got some competition in the family fuckup department.”
“It appears that way.”
“How are you dealing with that, by the way?”
“By trying really hard not to think about it.”
“That’s what I would do,” he says approvingly. “So, where can I drop you?”
“What do you mean? I thought we would get lunch or something.”
“There’s something I have to go do.”
“Something or someone?”
“Your faith in me is duly noted.”
I look out the window at a flock of geese flying by in a V formation, getting out while the getting’s good. “It’s not you, Phillip. It’s humanity in general.”
“Well, cry me a river.”
“Okay, drop me at Kelton’s.”
“The ice rink?”
“Yeah.”
He gives me a quizzical look. “Going skating, are you?”
“There’s something I want to see.”
Phillip gives me a wry look. “Something or someone?”
Then, without warning, he swerves across the double yellow line to pass the minivan in front of us, and for a second we are faced with oncoming traffic and our own mortality. A second later he yanks us back across and, without downshifting, turns left through the intersection on what feels like two wheels, the centrifugal force throwing me against the door. “Jesus Christ, Phillip!”
The Porsche’s tires gain traction and we rocket down the street to a chorus of angry horns from all the motorists he almost killed, and Phillip sighs. “Driving a Porsche is like fucking a model,” he says, and he would know. “It will never feel as good as it looks.”
12:20 p.m.
PENNY SKATES BACKWARD in circles to Huey Lewis and the News, her legs whipping and scissoring beneath her as she speeds across the ice, executing a leap and then a spin. She is wearing black leggings and a worn gray hoodie, her hair tucked into a black ski cap. She moves with grace and confidence, her face flushed from the cold, and she doesn’t see me, shivering in my polo shirt on the lowest bleacher, falling briefly in love with her again . . .
If this ain’t love, baby, just say so . . .
Huey Lewis and the News are done, and the Dream Academy comes on singing “Life in a Northern Town.” Why are all skating rinks trapped in the eighties?
Penny picks up speed and then glides backward across the ice holding one leg up over her head with her hand. As she moves past, her eyes casually sweep up to the bleachers and she sees me. The surprise throws her balance off, and she goes down on her ass hard. I run through the opened door and out onto the ice, where she’s already back on her skates, dusting the ice flakes off her leggings.
“You okay?” I say.
“You scared me,” she says.
“I didn’t mean to.”
“You’re not allowed on the ice without skates.”
“Right. Sorry.” I step back through the door onto the rubber matting.
Penny skates over to the door and gives me a long, measured look. Then she reaches into one of the pockets of her sweatshirt and tosses me a key chain. “There are hockey skates in the rental shack. Go grab yourself a pair and come on out.”
“I wasn’t planning on skating.”
“And I wasn’t planning on falling on my ass in front of an old boyfriend. Things happen. Just roll with it.”
“I was never your boyfriend.”
Penny grins. “Fuck-buddy, then.”
“We never actually had sex.”
“And we never will if you keep parsing words with me.”
The hockey skates smell like something curled up and died in them. I’m laced up and on the ice in under five minutes.