C HAPTER T WENTY-TWO

By the time I’m finished talking my father and my son look almost windblown, as if they’ve been taken for a ride across a desert on an open wagon. Jake can just stare at me.

“My God,” he finally says, peculiar words indeed to be hearing from the son of an agnostic and a fallen Catholic. Something else is going on with my father, something I’ve never seen before.

He is weeping, and making no attempt to hide his tears, which make his eyes seem bigger and bluer than ever. I think he is crying because he’s just learned that his wife wanted to be a nun, and that she thought he wasn’t good enough to be my father, but I am wrong.

“Sammy,” he says, “can you forgive me?”

“Forgive you for what?”

“For not…being strong for you.”

I’m shocked to hear him say this. “Dad. You’re the strongest person I’ve ever known!”

He wipes his eyes with the back of his hand. “Usually, yeah. But those few times, I really fucked up, Sammy. I should’ve been strong enough to keep you from going on that ridiculous trip to Scranton. And then I should have been strong enough to stay here, instead of goin’ hunting with Charlie, leavin’ you here with your mother and that crazy priest.”

“It doesn’t matter, Dad.”

“Oh, it matters, all right.”

“Not anymore. What happened, happened. I feel better just talking it all out. I feel…good.”

I realize I’m telling the truth. I do feel good, maybe not James Brown good, but better than I’ve felt since the day I was born, and that’s something.

“Funny, you look good,” Jake says. “You look…I don’t know. Younger.”

“Thank you, son.”

“I want to thank you, Dad.”

“For what?”

“For disobeying your mother’s wishes and not becoming a priest so you could go on to become my father, that’s what for.”

“You’re welcome.”

Jake hesitates before adding, “I’m glad I was born, and I’m glad you’re my father.”

It’s an amazing thing to hear. Jake speaks the words as if he’s reading them off a plaque. I turn to my own father and repeat those exact same words. We all gather in the middle of the kitchen for a triple hug, brief but sincere.

And now it seems that there’s just one more thing I need to know from my father. I take a sip of beer for courage.

“Dad,” I begin, “please tell me. Why in the world did you marry Mom?”

For the first time ever, my father has a sheepish look on his face. “Why do you think? She was pregnant.”

I choke on the beer. Jake is suddenly behind me, patting my back, kneading my shoulders. “Easy, Dad. You’ll be all right.”

I watch my father open a fresh beer and take a long, leisurely swallow.

“I never knew,” I finally manage to say. “Never even suspected anything like that.”

Of course I didn’t. My mother, engaging in premarital sex? It was hard enough to imagine her taking part in postmarital sex!

My father shakes his head. “You got it in your skull that she was a saint. She wasn’t. The only saints are the statues. It’s an impossible challenge for anyone with blood and bone. And let me tell you—before the church really grabbed her, your mother could be a hell of a lot of fun. What the hell are you smilin’ about, Jake?”

“Oh, nothing. It’s just that my mother was pregnant when Dad married her.”

“Yes, I knew that,” my father says. “I can count to nine.” He laughs out loud, hoists his beer bottle. “Here’s to the Sullivan males! A potent bunch, if nothing else! You be careful out there, Jake, or you’ll be pushin’ a stroller before you’re twenty!”

He and Jake clink beer bottles and drink.

Somehow I guess I’ve always had it in my head that nobody’s life is as complicated as mine. Now, suddenly, I can see that I’m just a link in a chain of messes. It’s not exactly a comforting thought, but it does make things a little less lonely.

I grasp Jake by the forearm. It’s time for the question I always thought I would take to my grave, but it’s clear that I must ask it now, right now.

“Jake. How badly have I hurt you?”

I’m looking right into those green eyes of his, like two seas. And right now the seas are calm.

“Dad,” he says, “I always knew you were trying your best. That’s what counts.”

It’s the greatest thing anyone’s ever said to me. My father respects the moment by hoisting his bottle and gently saying, “Hear, hear.”

My lips are quivering as I turn to my father. “You don’t hate me, Dad?”

“What a question. Of course not. You’re too busy hating yourself for anybody else to have a chance at it!”

He grins at me, winks at me, and is startled when I reach over and grasp his forearm. I’m the link between these two people, and while holding their arms I’m flooded by the same sweet, gooey feeling I used to get after confessing my sins to a priest. Back then, that feeling lasted for about five minutes. I’m hoping for something longer this time.

My father pulls out of my grasp. “Enough of that already, unless you plan to buy me a corsage.”

Just then the front doorbell rings. The pizza has arrived.

“I got it, Dad,” I say, and he doesn’t object. He’s still a little weepy-eyed, and doesn’t want the delivery boy to see him this way.

Jake comes to the front door with me, where a dark-haired, skinny kid who could have been me thirty years ago stands there holding two boxes containing the pizzas—strong boxes, corrugated cardboard that doesn’t bend or leak. Where were these boxes when I was delivering for Napoli’s?

“What do we owe you?”

“Comes to twenty-five fifty.”

I give the kid thirty bucks and tell him to keep the change. He mutters his thanks and walks off, and then I happen to see his bicycle at the curb, and my heart drops. I hand the boxes to Jake and tell him to take them inside.

“Where are you going, Dad?” He seems worried about me, afraid to leave me alone.

“I just want to talk to this kid for a minute.”

Jake smiles with relief. “Pizza delivery boy shop talk, eh?”

“Something like that. Get started, don’t wait for me.”

Jake goes to the kitchen and I run after the delivery boy. He’s just boarding the bike when I startle him by grabbing it by the handlebars.

“Hey! What the hell you doin’, man!”

“Could I just see this bike for a second?”

“My bike?”

A big basket has been welded to the handlebars and the frame has been painted black, but the cracked leather seat is the original, and there they are, the letters BOB etched into the back of it. This is Fran’s ex-husband’s bicycle, still in service.

I start to laugh, still gripping the handlebars. The kid looks scared.

“Mister—”

“Do you believe in miracles, kid?”

“Huh?”

“Miracles. Do you believe that miracles happen?”

Clearly, nobody has ever asked him this question before. He has to think about it. “No,” he finally decides. “No, I don’t.”

I can see that he’s one of those sad, serious kids who works harder than he should for a boss who doesn’t appreciate it. He also thinks I’m nuts.

“Mister, I gotta get back.”

“I know you do.” I release the handlebars. “I used to have your job, delivering for Napoli’s.”

His eyebrows rise. “No foolin’?”

“Swear to God. Like thirty years ago, maybe more, when the real Napoli owned the joint.”

“Jesus, it’s been around that long?”

“Yeah, and so has this bike. This was my delivery bike.”

“You’re shittin’ me.”

“I’m not.”

I show him Bob’s name on the back of the seat. “You want to hear the story about this bike?”

“Sure.”

I tell him everything that happened to me that night—the bachelor party and the stripper and the bicycle theft, and losing my cherry to Fran, and the way she gave me her ex’s bike. The kid listens to my story the way you hope kids will listen to stories, but I guess that makes sense, one old delivery boy telling a war story to another. By the end of my tale he’s smiling, his teeth a radiant white.

“Great story,” he says, “but I’m not sure I’d call it a miracle.”

“You wouldn’t?”

“Nah. It’s just an old bike that’s still around.” He climbs aboard, spins the pedals around to getaway position. “Take it easy, man.”

“What’s your name?”

“Paul.”

“Paul what?”

“Paul Fishetti.”

Oh man. This can’t be, but on the other hand, it can’t be anything else.

“Is your father Alonzo Fishetti?”

“Hey! How’d you know that?”

“I went to school with him a long time ago. He was the coolest kid in the class.”

Paul laughs out loud. “My father was cool? Gimme a break!”

“I’m telling you!”

“Bullshit!”

“What’s he doing these days?”

“He’s a plumber.”

“Yeah? What else is he up to?”

“He watches TV and he argues with my mother…. What was so cool about him?”

I tell him how his dad used to sneak cigarettes in the schoolyard, and how he busted his ankle that time he fell from the ledge.

Paul is fascinated. “Why’d he climb out on the ledge?”

“He wanted to peek into the girls’ changing room. Wanted to get a look at Margaret Thompson. We were all in love with a girl named Margaret Thompson.”

Paul puts his head back and howls. “Oh man,” he says, “that is pretty wild.”

“What is?”

“Margaret Thompson.”

“What about her?”

“She’s my mother.”

Paul is beaming now, and suddenly I can see his mother in his face—the perky ears, the hint of green on the outskirts of those brown irises, the playfulness. I have to grip the handlebars again to keep from falling.

“You okay, mister?”

I catch my breath, straighten up, release the bike. “You got brothers and sisters, Paul?”

“Yeah, there’s four of us.”

“You the oldest?”

“Youngest. My brother Richie’s wife just had a kid.”

So there it was. Margaret Thompson, the great unrequited love of my life, married the toughest kid in the class, and now she’s a grandmother.

I want to ask Paul all about his mother, of course, but you can’t ask a boy if he thinks his mother is pretty, and if she’s turned fat and embittered I really don’t want to hear about it.

But there’s one thing I do want from this kid, and I amaze myself by actually asking for it.

“Listen, Paul. Mind if I take a little ride on your bike?”

He looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. “A ride? Are you serious?”

“Just around the block. Come on, I’m not going to steal it.”

He looks at his watch. “I’m already late gettin’ back, man.”

I hand him a ten-dollar bill. He sticks it in his pocket and says, “Don’t change the gears, they’re all fucked up.”

I jump aboard the bike and started pedaling as if I’ve just robbed a bank.

“Just around the block!” Paul yells at my back. My shirt billows like a sail as I pick up speed. It still rides straight and true, Fran’s ex-husband’s ex-bike, so I am able to take my hands off the handlebars and hike my arms to the sky on the straightaways.

I have things on my mind and a million responsibilities, but I have never, ever felt so goddamn free.

I’m good to my word, returning the bike to Paul after one turn around the block. He climbs aboard and races off to Napoli’s.

“Tell your parents Sammy Sullivan says hello!” I shout, but I doubt that he hears me.

Back in the house my son and my father are working on their second slices.

“What the hell took you?” my father asks.

“Just having a little chat with the delivery kid,” I reply. I could tell them more, but I don’t want to. I’ve emptied out all my secrets today, shared all the stories I’ve got to tell, but this one’s all mine.

We polish off both pizza pies, and though we don’t speak much while eating, it’s not an uncomfortable time. We’re three soldiers in the same foxhole, chowing down to stay strong for whatever’s coming next. And we would do anything for each other.

My father gets our clothes from the dryer. Jake and I get changed, and I realize we should get going to rest up for tomorrow’s big battle.

My father accompanies us to the sidewalk, along the dug-up trench that soon will be a cobblestone path. He tells us he’s going to wait until next weekend to lay the stones, and Jake tells him he wants to help. Just like that, they have a date for next Saturday morning.

“Gonna teach him about stonework,” my father says. “A trade that could come in handy, now that his formal education is over.”

“Actually, Danny,” Jake says, “I’d like to think that it’s just starting.”

He grabs Jake in a rough embrace, full of giggles and tickles. “See you next weekend, kiddo.”

“Okay, Danny.”

My father turns to me and extends a hand. I grasp it just as I used to all those birthdays and Christmases ago, and we both squeeze hard. My father releases the pressure first and I think it’s over, but as I’m slipping from his grip he startles me by pulling me against him in the same kind of embrace he’s just shared with Jake.

“Be strong tomorrrow when you see Doris,” he whispers in my ear. “Don’t do what I did. Be there. Don’t bail out.”

“I won’t.”

“What do you think this plan of Jake’s is all about?”

“I have no idea.”

“If you like it, back him up. Back him up all the fucking way.”

“I will.”

He releases his grasp, pulls back to look at me. “It was good to see you,” he says, and I think I’m imagining it but in fact I am not when he presses his dry lips to my cheek in what could only be called a kiss.

“I’m sorry we lost all those years, Dad.”

He shrugs. “I’m glad we’ve got whatever’s left.” He thumps himself on his bony chest. “I ain’t plannin’ on checkin’ out any time soon, I can tell you that.”

He turns and goes back inside while Jake and I, brimming with beer, walk toward what I hope turns out to be Francis Lewis Boulevard, and the stop for the Q-76 bus. We both have to stop and piss into somebody’s hedge on the way, and in the midst of it Jake’s cell phone goes off and of course it’s his mother, saying she’ll be catching an earlier train than she was scheduled to take and will be home tomorrow by noon. High noon, you might say.

We find our bus stop. You’d think a father and son might have a lot to say to each other after such a day, but you’d be wrong. We are all talked out, and I am in a state of awe over the way this magical day has unfolded.

My son has saved me. There’s no other way to look at it. Suddenly I realize there’s one more thing to say, one more thing to do.

“Jake, we have to stop in the Village before we go home.”

“The Village? What for?”

“You’ll see.”

We reach Matt Umanov’s guitar shop on Bleecker Street half an hour before closing time.

“Oh no, Dad.”

“Pick out the one you want.”

“You don’t have to do this.”

“Did you hear what I said? Pick out the one you want.”

“Are you sure?”

“Just promise me you won’t set it on fire.”

Jake confers with a bushy-haired clerk before selecting a honey-yellow acoustic guitar, made in Spain. It’s just under seven hundred dollars, including the guitar case, and it’s far and away the best money I’ve ever spent.

“Dad. I don’t know how to thank you.”

“Funny, I was going to say the same thing to you.”

But there’s no way I can thank him for what he’s done for me. I’m out of the cage I’ve lived in for so long, and the liberty is absolutely intoxicating. Anything seems possible now. Who knows? I might even be able to have a real relationship with a woman. My son put the wings back on my shoulders, and so what if I can’t really fly? The trick isn’t getting airborne. The trick is dreaming that you can do it. It’s good to dream, even when dreams remain nothing but dreams.

At Christopher Street we board the Number 1 local for the ride uptown. Jake cannot wait. He takes out his guitar and begins playing it, his hair hanging over his eyes.

“Go ahead, kid,” I tell him. “Just think of it as a cello turned sideways.”

I sit across from Jake and watch his fingers introduce themselves to the strings, like the hesitant moves of an infatuated boy holding a girl for the first time.

He gains confidence by the moment. By the time we reach Twenty-eighth Street, he’s strumming it with ease. At Columbus Circle, he begins to play “Yesterday.” It’s a heartfelt rendition, all the more beautiful for its uncertainty. He finishes the song, and a few people actually applaud. The train stops at Seventy-ninth Street, and a man tosses three quarters into the open guitar case on his way out. Jake looks at me in wonder.

“Congratulations, son. You just turned pro.”

We are exhausted by the time we get back to the apartment. For the second straight night we flop on top of the bedspreads, fully clothed. Jake gently strums his guitar, which has already become his old friend. In minutes we’ll both conk out.

But first, Jake says something I will never forget. “I like Danny,” he tells me. “He’s a good guy. He’s amusing. But you’re the better man.”

The better man.

I want to ask him what he means by that. I also want to take a last shot at asking him about this plan he’s got for tomorrow, but I’m too late. The little cobblestone thief is snoring away.

I wait until his sleep deepens before taking the guitar from his embrace and locking it up in its case. I pull off his boots and cover him with a blanket. His face is smooth and his brow is relaxed. He looks the way he used to look, long before anything bad ever happened to him. Once again, my boy is king of the monkey bars.

“You lied to me again, Dad.”

I’m shocked to hear his voice. I thought he was in a deep deep, sleep. His eyes are closed, but he is wide-awake.

“What did I lie about?”

“Your childhood.” He smiles, keeping his eyes shut. “You told me you had a dull childhood.”