CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The First Coat of
Varnish
“You’re playing like
a drone,” my father said as we sat across from each other during
our next chess match. “Your moves are totally
predictable.”
“If they’re so
predictable, why are you having so much trouble countering
them?”
“I have to do
something to keep myself entertained.”
A comment like this
would have stung a few weeks earlier. But I knew that the books I’d
read and the practice games I’d played online were making me
better. There was still no chance that I could beat my father, but
I was putting up more resistance. Hence the “trash talk” from him.
I think this was his way of letting me know that I was becoming a
worthier opponent.
I sat back and took a
bite from my bagel. Whole wheat, which would never be my first
choice. My favorites were salt bagels, but eating one in front of
my father seemed cruel. He moved his Queen’s Bishop to King Five. I
quickly countered.
“I saw that one
coming,” I said. “Speaking of predictable.”
He scowled. “I’m
baiting you and you don’t even realize it.”
“How do you know that
I’m not baiting you?”
He glanced up at me
as though he was giving my question a moment’s consideration and
then looked back down at the board. Consideration
over.
It turned out to be
the longest match we’d played to date. I’d been keeping track of
the number of moves it took until checkmate for several weeks
now.
When we were
finished, I reached into a bag that I’d gotten from the bagel store
and pulled out a glazed chocolate doughnut. I broke the doughnut in
two and reached out with a piece to my father.
“Whoa,” he said.
“This is not exactly on my approved diet.”
“I gave you the
smaller piece.”
He took the doughnut
from me. “Have you decided that since you can’t beat me you’re
going to kill me?”
“You saw right
through that one, huh?”
He looked at the
doughnut for nearly a minute before taking a bite. After he did, he
took another one quickly and then closed his eyes, as though this
would allow him to heighten the sensation of the taste. When he
opened his eyes, his expression was sadder than I would have
expected and he put the unfinished piece down on his
plate.
“I feel like my life
is over,” he said.
In many ways, I’d
been expecting this conversation from the very first time I set up
the chessboard.
“Baby steps, Dad,” I
said.
“I’m not taking any
steps at all.”
“You are taking some. You’re kicking my ass in chess.
That requires at least a little effort, right?”
“Not
much.”
“But it’s something.
And you can take more. The doctor says you can, doesn’t
he?”
“The doctor doesn’t
live inside of me.”
“Do you feel like
something is happening? Do you feel weak? Do you feel like
something is coming on?”
“I just feel
wrong.”
He pulled his robe
close around him and, for the first time in a week, tied the sash.
He got up and moved tentatively to his chair.
“You’ve never gone
through anything like this before,” I said.
“I’ve gone through
something like this before,” he said
sharply.
“I meant you’ve never
gone through anything like this physically.”
“What’s your
point?”
“That maybe you’re
supposed to feel wrong because your body is making
adjustments.”
“Or maybe I feel
wrong because my heart is about fail on me at any
minute.”
“So from your
perspective it’s better to petrify than to die, huh?” This came out
more critical than I’d intended and I thought about saying
something else to soften it. But when my father looked at me, he
didn’t seem angry or hurt, but rather a little
baffled.
He settled back in
his chair and reached for the remote control. “Let’s leave this for
now,” he said, turning on the television. “You played a good match
today.”
I kissed him on the
forehead and walked away. Before I left the room, I took the rest
of his doughnut.
Iris and I usually
spoke on the phone at least once every couple of days, but in the
five days since we’d been on the beach, I hadn’t called her and she
hadn’t called me. I knew this was sending her a message. I just
wasn’t sure whether I wanted to send it or not and, regardless, I
didn’t know what else to do. Eventually it didn’t matter anymore
when my mother woke me out of a sound sleep with the phone in her
hand.
“It’s Iris,” she
said, turning to go back to her room before I could even apologize
for waking her.
“I wasn’t expecting
to get your mother,” Iris said. “Why don’t you answer the
phone?”
“It’s not my house.
Why didn’t you call my cell?”
“It went straight to
voice mail. Do you think your mother’s angry with me?”
“I think she’s
probably asleep again already.”
We fell silent. I sat
back against the headboard.
“You haven’t called,”
she said.
“I
know.”
“I’ve kinda gotten
used to you calling.”
“I know. I’m sorry, I
should have called.”
“That was a little
weird on the beach last Wednesday, wasn’t it?”
I slid down to lay my
head on the pillow. “I don’t know what it was last Wednesday. I
guess I have been feeling a little weird about it.”
“I shouldn’t have
told you about the pregnancy.”
“Of course you should
have told me about the pregnancy. We’re supposed to be able to talk
to each other like that, aren’t we?”
“Are
we?”
I thought for a
minute. “Yeah, of course we are.”
“But it still made
you feel weird.”
“I didn’t say that
there would never be a time when we would feel
uncomfortable.”
“What are you
uncomfortable about?”
“I’m currently
uncomfortable with feeling uncomfortable, so this might not be the
best time to ask me that question.”
“I don’t want you to
lose respect for me.”
“The very last thing
you ever have to be concerned about is my losing respect for
you.”
“Are you
sure?”
“Very sure. Whatever
I’m feeling has nothing to do with that. You being pregnant with
Chase’s kid was a bombshell. We haven’t talked about anything at
that level before. And going back to the day that Chase died
brought up a lot of stuff. It’s not a big thing.”
“It’s a big thing to
me that you haven’t called.”
“I was planning on
calling. You haven’t called me, either.”
“But I did just call. As your mother, currently tossing
and turning because I woke her up, will attest.”
“You’re right; I was
wrong.”
The air between us
was still for several seconds. “I felt a little weird, too,” Iris
said.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.
Telling you that stuff, I guess. Hearing what you had to say about
that night with Chase. I was feeling pretty naked out
there.”
“I
know.”
Things fell silent
again. I was glad to have her here. Glad to know that she’d reached
out to me. If we were together, it wouldn’t have seemed so strange
that we weren’t saying anything.
“What have you been
doing?” she said.
“The usual stuff with
the store, working on display cases down in the basement, losing to
my father, reading Updike. I special ordered a couple of books
about New Mexico and they came in yesterday, so I’ve been reading
those. I’m starting to have second thoughts about
Tucumcari.”
“Specifically
Tucumcari or about New Mexico in general?”
“No, specifically
Tucumcari. Some other towns sound more interesting. That’s
assuming, of course, that the store ever sells and I get
sprung.”
“It’ll sell. You’ll
get the chance to make your get-away soon enough.”
“I should be so
lucky.”
There was another
pause.
“Listen, Hugh, I know
I’m supposed to play along with this and tell you to keep your chin
up and that you’ll be free soon, but I wouldn’t be honest if I did
that. I don’t want to lose you. I feel like over the last few days
that I’ve lost you a little and I don’t like that. Your friendship
has become much too important to me. New Mexico is very far
away.”
I wasn’t sure how to
feel about this. I’d been missing Iris over the past five days,
missing how she energized and expanded me. Even if Chase’s ghost
had his arm draped permanently around her shoulders, I felt
diminished being away from her. And even though I had no idea what
it meant to her that my friendship had become so important, it
meant a great deal to me to hear her say it.
“You’re not going to
lose me,” I said. “I promise you that.”
“That’s why I had to
call you.”
“I’m glad you called.
And I think I hear my mother snoring in her bedroom.”
“Then everything
works out.”
“Yeah,
everything.”
“Are you coming up on
Wednesday?”
“Of course. If you
want me to.”
“Didn’t we just have
this conversation?”
“I’ll be
there.”
“You should get back
to sleep now.”
“Thanks. And thanks
for waking me up.”
The cases I’d been
building weren’t ready yet, but some of the other changes were
already in place. The iPod dock I’d bought played Lucy Kaplansky’s
“Ten Year Night” album. The music wasn’t loud, but I did-n’t set
the player on “1,” either. We’d repositioned the candy rack and I’d
not only ordered more BlisterSnax, but I’d added several other
renegade confections as well. The vendor seemed nervous about this
at first, but then brought in samples from his car to hook me
further.
We’d remerchandised
the magazine rack, organizing it by interest category and putting
some hotter titles in prime locations. We’d received a shipment of
mildly subversive stuffed animals and put them up front, were
expecting a shipment of hand-painted tiles from Mexico early next
week, and handmade coffee mugs from Northern California a few days
after that. I’d ordered dozens of new catalogs on the Web and had
made tentative plans to go to a craft show in Norwalk a couple of
weeks hence in search of writing supplies.
I’d contacted the
greeting card guy who lived down the street from Iris and ordered
an assortment of his home-printed work. This shipment had just
arrived and Tyler and I struck a four-foot display to put them up.
The order consisted of two vastly different styles of work. One was
on glossy white stock with pen-and-ink drawings on the front in
black and red. Lots of sharp lines and bold images. The other was
on marbled paper with brushstrokes in metallic ink and calligraphic
writing. Many of both sets of cards were blank inside, which was
what I liked. Those that did have sentiments were crisp and clever
in the former case and understated in the latter.
“These are fabulous,”
Tyler said, reading one before putting it on display.
“Here, listen to
this,” I said as I opened a card. “This one reads, ‘I think you
pressed my reset button. ’”
“Hey, I know what he
means.”
“Or this: ‘I’m not
celebrating this birthday. I’m celebrating all of your birthdays.
Thanks for being alive.’” I picked up a marbled card and read, “‘I
love you because of the spaces.’ If I were going to buy cards with
writing in them, these are the kinds I would buy.”
“But you
wouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t
what?”
“Wouldn’t buy cards
with writing in them.”
“Anything’s
possible.”
I opened another
package, peered inside the top card, and put it on the rack. The
title cut from the Lucy Kaplansky album came on, an achingly
romantic song about a couple’s tenth anniversary.
“I love her,” Tyler
said.
“Sarah?”
Tyler laughed. “Maybe
her, too. But I was talking about Lucy Kaplansky.”
“Yeah, she’s great.
And this is a great song. You love Sarah?”
“I think I might,” he
said, smiling. “I think there’s a very real chance that I might. We
have a lot of range. I mean, it hasn’t been that long, but we have
all of these modes and all of them seem to be in good working
order.”
“Could be
love.”
“Could
be.”
It was that easy for
him. A woman comes into the store, they start talking, they go out,
discover how much range they have, and fall in love. And while
there might be complications there that Tyler wasn’t telling me
about (or maybe wasn’t even aware of), the opportunity was
available. I wondered if Tyler realized how lucky he was to be in
this place. I guessed that he probably did.
Brian, the guy
handling the register up front, walked over to let me know that his
shift was supposed to be over fifteen minutes ago. I’d lost track
of time. The ever reliable Tab was scheduled to take over. I asked
him if he could hang on for her arrival and he rolled his eyes and
returned to the counter.
Tyler and I finished
putting up the new cards and then stood back to admire them. This
little four-foot section of the store seemed transformed by them,
though the cards looked a bit incongruous juxtaposed against the
others in the section. In an effort to announce their arrival,
Tyler and I arranged a few cards against easels on the front
counter, moving a spinner rack of costume jewelry that had been
there since before Tyler was born. As we were doing so, Tab
arrived.
“More new stuff,” she
said as she walked through the door. I turned to see her looking at
the display indifferently and a surprising spurt of anger shot
through my system.
“Is that code for,
‘God, I’m so sorry that I’m late and that I’ve forced Brian to stay
here after his shift is over?’”
She shrugged. “I’m
not that late.” She nodded and smiled at Brian. “And Brian could
probably use the extra cash, right?”
I looked at my watch.
“You were supposed to be here forty minutes ago,” I
said.
“It’s okay, Hugh,”
she said. “I’m here now.” She started to walk behind the counter
and I realized that I’d been harboring some form of grudge against
her from nearly the moment I met her.
“Go,” I said.
Obviously, Tab thought I was talking to Brian, because she didn’t
react to this.
“Tab,” I said,
“go.”
She had been putting
her purse under the counter and she looked up at me.
“What?”
“You don’t work here
anymore. Go.”
“You’re firing me
because I came in a little late?”
“I’m firing you
because you think forty minutes is a little late. To name one of
several hundred reasons.”
She stood up,
switching her weight to her right leg. “I don’t think you can do
that. Don’t you have to talk to your father or something
first?”
“It’s done, Tab.
Leave. I’ll mail you your last check.”
She looked to Tyler
and then to Brian. She seemed surprised and a little flustered,
truly the most emotion I’d seen from her the entire time I’d known
her. Then she simply took her purse from under the counter and
walked out.
“That was the right
thing to do, right?” I asked Tyler after she left.
“That was the right
thing to do six months ago.”
I told Brian he could
leave and Tyler and I walked behind the counter.
“Steve and Chris,
too,” I said. “I’m gonna get rid of all the people who are barely
conscious around here.”
“Wow,” Tyler said.
“The Terminator.”
“Yeah, the
Terminator.” I went toward the office to get Steve and Chris’ phone
numbers. “Do you have any idea how to go about hiring
people?”
I was varnishing the
first of the display cases that night when my mother came down to
the basement. We hadn’t spoken all that much lately, though she’d
begun to show a certain amount of interest in the chess matches I
was having with my father.
“Looks nice,” she
said, running a hand along a dry side of the case. “This is for the
store?”
“I’m replacing the
Formica display in the front. I talked to Dad about
it.”
“He told me. Are you
enjoying doing this stuff again?” She looked over at the
woodworking station.
“I am, actually. It’s
coming back to me.”
She sat down on the
rotating chair. “I remember when we bought this equipment from Ben
Truesdale down the street when he got new things. He asked your
father what kind of work he was planning to do with it. When your
father told him that this was for you, Ben said, ‘these are not
toys, Rich.’ I think he was seriously considering giving your
father his money back and selling this equipment to someone else.
Your father took great pleasure in inviting him over to look at
that lamp you made for us.”
She’d never told me
that story before. “Ben was kind of a lump, wasn’t he?” I
said.
“A nice man, but
definitely a lump. And it was a very beautiful lamp.”
“Thanks.” I turned
back to my work.
“You always loved
building things. Even when you were a little kid. I think your
first major project was a robot – at least you said it was a robot
– that you made out of Play-Doh and Popsicle sticks for your
brother right after he was born. When Chase was about one, he
thought that robot was the greatest thing in the world. He’d carry
it all around with him. One day he was running and he dropped it
and it broke into dozens of pieces. He cried for twenty
minutes.”
I had no memory of
this at all. I wished in some ways that I could remember what the
world felt like when Chase arrived. It’s a funny thing that the
birth of a sibling is such a huge event in someone’s life, yet many
of us are too young when it happens to have any recollection of the
event.
“Play-Doh and
Popsicle sticks. I should have considered that medium for this
display. Maybe the next one.” I concentrated on finishing a side
panel while my mother sat there quietly watching.
“Your father says
you’re doing some other things to spruce up the
store.”
“A few things, yeah.
It needed the sprucing.”
“I’m sure that’s
true. It would be hard for us to see that after all this
time.”
“I know; it always
is. Hopefully it’ll help increase buyer interest in the
store.”
“That hasn’t gone
well at all, has it?”
“That’s a kind way of
putting it.” I finished the first coat on the first side and moved
toward the back. “Was there a reason why you came down
here?”
“No reason, really. I
was just curious that you’d taken to doing this again and I thought
I’d come down to see what you were working on. You never let me sit
here like this when you were a teenager.”
I remember thinking
of her visits back then as invasions. The last thing that most
teenaged boys want is their mothers peering over their shoulders
while they work at a hobby. “I’m easier about that kind of stuff
now,” I said.
“I appreciate
it.”
She continued to sit
there while I put the first coat of varnish on the rest of the
case. I would apply another coat tomorrow night and a third the
night after that. When I was finished, I cleaned the brush and went
back to the workbench where she was sitting to get started on
another piece. When I did, she got up from the chair and kissed me
on the cheek.
“I know you’ll be
gone again soon, Hugh,” she said. “But it’s good to have you here
with us now.”
She kissed me one
more time and then went back upstairs.