“Oh, that’s telling him,” Eleanor said.
Nathan had been somewhat prepared for her reaction. He knew she would take exception to his thinking on the matter. But he had not expected sarcasm to come out of her mouth. So far as he could remember, she had never spoken sarcastically to him.
He sat on the edge of the bed and watched her brush her hair in front of the mirror at the dresser. He had never seen her brush it quite so viciously before.
“It’s his dream.”
“To hit people for a living? To go around with black eyes and stitches in his lip and butterfly bandages holding the skin under his eyebrow together? To hang out in seedy places with seedy people? To take bets on whether he can knock some big bruiser down before he’s put in the hospital himself? That’s the dream you want to support in him?”
Nathan took a deep breath and considered his words carefully.
“Every word you just said adds up to one thing and one thing only. In my mind, anyway. That it’s Nat’s dream, not yours. You can’t tell someone to pursue their dream only if it’s a good match for your own. You can’t dictate what dream he should pursue.”
She dropped her hands to her sides and turned to face him directly.
“You went back on your word,” she said, pointing the hairbrush at him. “Your one absolute condition for his living here was that he had to hold a job.”
“I know,” Nathan said. “I know that.” He paused again, to gather his thoughts. It seemed that the careful selection of words had never been more crucial. “I seem to remember that Gandhi once said his commitment was to truth, not consistency. Not that I’m comparing myself to the man in any way. Just borrowing some of his wisdom.”
Eleanor looked to the bedroom window, as if something had caught her eye. “I thought you said he was shoveling snow for the neighbors.”
Nathan looked out the window and saw that Nat had shoveled almost to the garage in their own driveway. “Maybe because I told him it was too early to knock on doors.”
“Maybe because it’s easier to ask you for money than it is to ask a stranger. I always taught my son that a certain amount of work around the house was part of what it meant to live there. Especially after age eighteen.”
“I would tend to agree with that.”
“I never had these problems with my own son.”
“You had the advantage of influencing his behavior from day one.”
“So what will you say when he comes back in and tells you that will be twenty dollars?”
“Maybe that’s an ‘if’ and not a ‘when.’ Eleanor. Please don’t take this the wrong way. I really don’t say this in criticism of you. But I feel that I need to say it, because I believe it’s true. I think the fact that you have this chip on your shoulder against Nat is what’s causing the bulk of the unrest around here.”
She didn’t answer.
She set her brush down on the dresser and walked out of the room.
Nathan found her in the kitchen, pouring herself a cup of coffee.
“So,” she said. “The problem is not that I have this big nail sticking into my foot. Digging in every time I take a step. The problem is that I mind it.”
Nathan sighed. “How is he hurting you, Eleanor? How does it even affect you? Can you please explain to me how it directly injures you if Nat goes to his trainer’s every day instead of to a job on a loading dock?”
Before she could even answer, Nat appeared in the kitchen doorway, still bundled against the cold, and very much out of breath.
“Nat,” Eleanor said. “You’re dripping all over my clean floor.”
“Oh. Sorry. I did our driveway. No charge for that, of course. Now I’m going to go out and see if I can earn some money.”
He hurried out again.
Eleanor simply turned back to her coffee, and Nathan wisely decided not to say it. Not only would he avoid saying “I told you so,” but he would avoid saying any more on the subject at all.
He tore a few paper towels off the roll and mopped up the melted snow that had dripped off Nat’s winter boots.
4 March 1979
Like, Pretty Much Any Minute Now
“Oh, my goodness,” Eleanor said when she heard the front door slam. “Nat’s home for dinner. Nat hasn’t been home for dinner in months.”
“I think it will be good to see him,” Nathan said. Carefully laying out his view that Nat’s presence was a welcome surprise.
Nearly every day since last November, Nat had been gone by the time they got to the breakfast table, leaving only a dirty cereal bowl in the sink as evidence that he lived in the house at all. Eleanor always left a dinner plate in the refrigerator for him, covered in plastic wrap. Nathan often heard the boy come in as late as midnight.
He’d initially thought it was the sign of an active social life, but Nat had re-educated him. Carol always needed to be home by nine. House rules. The reason Nat stayed out so late was because his trainer, the man Nat called Little Manny, had to wait until after closing time to let them both into the downstairs gym with his key. Training involved more than just hitting punching bags, he was told. It was an overall system of fitness, and required a lot of professional equipment.
Nathan hated to admit it, but things had finally settled down at his home, and in his marriage. Much as he wished it didn’t have to be that way, the more Nat stayed gone, the more Eleanor found her way back to happiness.
“I’ll set an extra place,” she said.
Nat appeared in the dining room doorway. Holding the hand of a young woman.
Nathan knew Carol was Nat’s age, but she looked younger. She seemed slight and shy. Pretty. Very pretty, with her thick brown hair and freckled nose. Physically, she was much as Nat had described her. Yet somehow Nathan had expected her to be a tough girl. More fitting to Nat’s element. More worldly.
Then he wondered why he would make an assumption like that. And what exactly was Nat’s element, anyway?
“Nat,” Eleanor said. “What happened to your eye?”
Nat’s hand came up to touch a dark, swollen bruise. “Oh. Nothing. I mean, it was just sparring. Little Manny’s been taking me to a gym across town where I can spar with some decent fighters. Nathan? Eleanor? This is Carol.”
Nathan crossed the dining room to shake her hand.
“Pleased to meet you,” Carol muttered, so quietly that Nathan almost had to guess by context what she must have said.
“We need to talk to you both,” Nat said.
“Don’t make it sound terrible,” Carol told him. Nathan noticed that her voice gained more confidence — not to mention volume — when she spoke to Nat.
“No, no, it’s not,” Nat said. “It’s not a bad thing. Not at all. It’s good news. And a favor. Maybe we could go sit down in the living room?”
“We were just sitting down to dinner,” Eleanor said. “I was just setting an extra place for you, Nat. Are you both hungry? I could set two extra places.”
Nat wore a look on his face that said dinner might be an entirely foreign concept to him. At least, at this moment. As if someone had unexpectedly asked him if he wanted to go on an elephant ride or fly to Greenland.
“Um. Is there enough?”
“I guess there could be,” Eleanor said. “I could whip up a green salad. And we could have some bread and butter on the side.”
“Carol eats like a bird, anyway,” Nat said. “And I’m not even very hungry.”
“My goodness,” Eleanor said. “Since when are you not hungry after a long day of training?”
When he’s nervous, Nathan thought. He loses his appetite when he’s nervous, or excited, or both. But of course he did not share that thought out loud.
? ? ?
“We’re getting married.”
“Way to blurt it out, Nat.”
“Well, how am I supposed to say it if I don’t just say it?”
They had not even finished passing around the tuna casserole and dishing it on to their plates.
Nathan set down his fork. “That is good news.”
“See?” Nat said, obviously to Carol, though he wasn’t looking at her. “I told you he’d be OK.”
Then Nat looked at Eleanor, who glanced up and caught him watching.
“I think it’s wonderful, Nat,” she said.
Nathan had no doubt, judging from her voice, that she spoke sincerely. He only hoped she was genuinely happy for Nat, rather than simply relieved to see him forging out on his own.
“How long have you two known each other now?” Nathan asked.
“About five months.”
“That’s a reasonable enough time to start making your plans, I suppose. When were you thinking of setting the date?”
“Soon,” Nat said.
“How soon?”
“Very soon.”
“Months? Weeks?”
“Pretty much right away.”
Nathan dabbed at his mouth with the cloth napkin, then set it thoughtlessly beside his plate, rather than back in his lap. As if he had finished eating. “I’m not sure that’s ideal planning, Nat.”
“I knew you’d say that. But we’ll be OK.”
Carol nibbled at her casserole in the tiniest bites imaginable. Head down.
“Where will you live?”
“Well, that’s the other good news. You know those little apartments over the gym? Where my trainer lives? We think there’s one coming open at the end of this month. We’re about seventy-five per cent sure one’s coming open.”
“Sixty per cent sure,” Carol said.
“Seventy-five. Little Manny is pretty sure. He usually has the inside line on stuff like that. And they’re really cheap.”
“If you saw them you’d know why,” Carol said.
“Yeah, it’ll take us for ever to clean it up. And it’s just one room. But we’ll find a way to make it livable. And then I’ll be right where I need to be to train.”
“But how will you afford any rent at all? You have no job.”
“Carol has a job. We can get by on that for a little bit. It’ll be tight. But we’ll manage.”
“I don’t understand. Why not wait and make a solid, reasonable plan?”
“We like this plan,” Nat said.
They ate in silence for several minutes.
Nathan noticed that Carol glanced up every few seconds, as if taking the emotional temperature of the room.
Then Nathan remembered something he had briefly forgotten. When Nat first came in, he’d said he had good news, and also a favor. But he hadn’t asked any favors. Yet.
“What was the favor you wanted to ask?”
“Carol’s father wants to meet you. You know. Meet my family.”
“We want his blessing,” Carol added.
“We don’t need it,” Nat said. “She’s eighteen. So we don’t need it.”
“But we want it,” Carol added.
Nathan breathed an inward sigh of relief. Looming requests for favors tended to make him edgy. “Why, of course. That’s no problem at all.”
“We’ll invite them over to dinner,” Eleanor said.
“Well, it’s not really a them,” Nat said. “It’s more just a him. Carol just lives with her father.”
“We’ll ask him to come to dinner,” Nathan said. “That’s no problem at all. We’re happy to do it. We’ll be happy to meet him. Just ask him what night he’d like to come, and then let us know. All right?”
“There’s one other thing,” Nat added cautiously.
Nathan noticed that he didn’t feel at all surprised. Of course there was one other thing. Wasn’t there always one other thing? Not only with Nat specifically, but with life in general.
He said nothing. Just waited for Nat to elaborate.
“He thinks you’re my grandfather.”
“Because you told him I was?”
“Well. Um, yeah. Pretty much. Yeah.”
“I’m not going to lie to him.”
“But you don’t have to, like, jump up and say I’m a liar and you’re no blood relation. Right?”
“I suppose not. I think it’s unlikely that he’ll look straight into my face and say, ‘You really are Nat’s grandfather, aren’t you?’”
“Thanks,” Nat said. “I knew I could count on you.”
? ? ?
After Eleanor and Carol cleared the table — Carol had insisted on helping — the women surprised Nathan by remaining in the kitchen, tackling the dishes together. The sound of running water seemed a good enough screen for a private conversation.
“She seems like a very nice girl.”
“She’s great. She’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.”
“You can tell me this is none of my business if you want to, Nat. But I’m going to ask you anyway. I’m going to risk being unconscionably rude. Is Carol pregnant?”
Nat’s head jerked up. He looked truly stunned. Nathan knew, just by the look on the boy’s face, that she was not.
“No. God, no. Why would you think a thing like that?”
“I just wondered why the big hurry.”
Maybe just young love, he thought. Heaven knows Nat was impetuous enough even when he wasn’t in love.
“No. If she was, it would only be the second time in history that ever happened,” Nat said. “Carol isn’t like that. She’s not that kind of girl. She goes to church. She was— She’s going to be pure on her wedding night. You know?”
“Oh. I see,” Nathan said. Still processing how much that really explained. “I apologize. I didn’t mean to pry.”
? ? ?
As soon as they had gone, Eleanor said, “We had the nicest talk. She is just a delightful girl.”
“I’m glad you like her.”
They stood in the foyer, having just closed the door behind the young pair. They hadn’t even gone back into the living room to sit.
“I know it would sound terrible if I said I wonder what she sees in our Nat.”
“Actually, yes,” Nathan said. “It would. It would be a highly uncharitable comment.”
“I know. I feel guilty for saying it. I feel guilty for thinking it. But, really … doesn’t it have just a tiny ring of truth to you?”
“I hope not,” Nathan replied. “If there’s some hidden part of me that thinks like that, I’d rather not go searching for it. Maybe she sees some value in Nat that you don’t.”
“She definitely loves him. There’s no doubt in my mind about that. I think she has this idea that her love will be the missing piece in his life. That she’s that one needed addition that will change everything for him.”
“Hmm,” Nathan said. “That’s always problematical.”
“My thought exactly,” Eleanor said.