Chapter EIGHT
As he waited for her in a booth at the Filling Station, sipping on his second cup of coffee and watching the incoming customers pull their jackets and Windbreakers a little more tightly around themselves, Nick realized that he no longer wanted to love his sister.
There were plenty of reasons a rational person wouldn’t. She was embarrassingly loud. She still swore as much as she did as a teenager—a vice for which, admittedly, he and Mike would have to accept some measure of responsibility. It had been eight years since Patrick Shea took off and she still acted as if she were the first and only woman ever to be duped by a nice-looking guy. It wouldn’t surprise him if April were grown with kids of her own before Marcy stopped talking about the challenge of raising a girl alone, as a single parent, a single woman, in today’s ridiculously permissive society.
And now, as usual, she was late.
Try as he might, Nick was incapable of being late. Even when he left at a time he was certain would make him run late, the traffic cleared, lights turned green, he made all the correct turns, and he was always, invariably, maddeningly early. He was early for meetings, early for social events—even those he had no desire to attend. Marilyn had tended toward the fashionably late side of the equation, and it was one of the few things about her that irritated him. Nick would maintain a stony silence as they drove to whatever they were late for. Marilyn would ignore his anger and sit quietly, watching the passing landscape, maybe even humming softly. She might lean over to change the radio station, and Nick would catch a hint of her perfume. By the time they got to wherever they were going, he usually wished they could just go back home to be alone together.
Nick opened the menu for the third time since he’d arrived. Should have brought a book, he thought. That would be a good strategy for any time he and Marcy agreed to meet.
He wanted to not love his sister, but every time he resolved not to he was defeated by memories of when they were younger and in it together, she and he, against their father’s drinking, against their mother’s cancer, even against their brother’s sudden interest in girls that put an end to the sorts of antics—the faces at the dinner table, the obscene gestures when their father’s back was turned—that made all three of them laugh.
And so Nick agreed to meet Marcy despite his fears that her negative energy might bring him down after he’d been feeling pretty good. Thanks to Peggy, he saw a sliver a hope, like hallway light pulling itself through the bottom gap of a closed door, that just maybe he didn’t have to be so stunningly alone for the rest of his life. Nick’s inability to not love his sister, in fact, made him willing to enter into a conversation with her about a topic guaranteed to throw a black cloud over his recent high spirits. No good would come of this meeting, Nick decided, unless the news was that the old man had won the lottery or someone had been prescient and taken out long-term health care for him or—Nick closed the menu—the old man was dead.
Nick was composing the eulogy in his head—or, rather, the awestruck congratulations people would offer him after he delivered it—when Marcy finally arrived.
“Nothing like November in friggin’ Ohio,” she said as she threw her purse in ahead of her and slid into the booth. While shucking off her coat and apparently not even thinking of apologizing for being late, she said, “First things first. How is Peggy Gallagher in the sack?”
Nick signaled for another coffee.
“Come on, don’t be like that. You love talking about that stuff. Remember your big night with Cindy Oxford, your first trip to second base? You described it like a tour guide. No detail too insignificant: the challenge of the buttons, the complexity of the back clasp—”
“We were kids, for god’s sake,” Nick said, looking around. “I used to think a fart in church was funny, too.”
“Tell me you still don’t.”
Marcy was desperate to get a smile. Nick knew it.
“What, exactly, can I do for you, Marcy?”
The sentence was out of his mouth before he realized the impact it would have on Marcy. He had said those words once before, just before lending her money for the third or maybe it was the fourth time after she’d been fired from a job because she hadn’t yet figured out—as if he would ever be able to—how to juggle day care and after-school care with a full-time job. The two seconds it had taken to ask the question, using those words, changed their relationship irrevocably. You have no idea, she’d sobbed. And just who the f*ck are you, anyway? Marcy never again asked him for money, and Nick had not since been able to answer her question to his own satisfaction.
“When’s the last time I asked you to do anything for me, pencil dick?” she asked now.
Nick nodded. “That was patronizing,” he said. “Sorry.”
Marcy turned to stare out the window. The sun caught her eye, and he saw that she was welling up. She fought it with a butt-and-sleeves adjustment and a push of some stray strands of hair to behind her ear. Maybe it was because he didn’t see her that often now, but Nick thought that she was starting to look older.
“But pencil dick is Mike’s line,” he said.
Marcy laughed. “Definitely,” she said.
And it was—most definitely had been—Mike’s line once upon a time, when it seemed that Mike was always talking about penises. Nick wondered if that was the case with all brothers. Their beds had been separated by a tiny nightstand with a lampshade that Nick remembered glowed in the dark a few seconds after the lamp was turned off. Mike and Nick would lie in their beds and listen to the muffled conversations of their parents in the kitchen directly beneath their room. Their voices, low and high, created a kind of lullaby, accompanied by the clinking of the spoon as their father stirred sugar into his instant coffee. Mike liked to provide a running commentary.
“They’re talking about you,” he’d whisper. “They’re worried that your dick is so small.” Nick would hit Mike with his pillow and Mike would retaliate and it wasn’t long before they heard their father bellow, “Knock it off up there, you two. You don’t want me coming up there.”
They’d settle and watch the lights from the cars passing on the street crash into the ceiling. Nick would start to nod off, and suddenly Mike would lean over and whisper loudly into his ear.
They’re making a baby now!
They’re doing it on the kitchen table.
Pack your bags, pal. They’re signing the adoption papers.
By this time, Nick usually just rolled over and went to sleep. But one night Mike leaned over and said, “Mom’s giving Dad a blow job.” Nick jumped up and, to the surprise of them both, swung at— and connected with—the side of Mike’s head. The punch didn’t do much damage. Mike’s counterpunch did. Nick’s nose exploded, he screamed like a girl (as Mike described it later), the room suddenly flooded with light, and Nick saw the crimson on his T-shirt before he realized what it was. When Mike jumped up and out of bed, saying, “He started it, he punched me first,” his father backhanded him, knocking Mike against the wall.
“Bill!”
Their mother, who Nick hadn’t realized had also come up the stairs, rushed by him in a dark flash, pulling the air after her. She grabbed at her husband’s arms. While his father later claimed his elbow accidentally caught his mother on the chin when he turned, Nick had never been able to rid himself of the certainty that he had seen a split-second look between his father and mother before the arm snapped back and his mother was suddenly on her back between the beds, holding her head.
His father froze. Nick and his brother froze. The air froze.
She let out a short, soft moan. “Oh!” She sounded more surprised than hurt, as if she’d woken up from a nap she didn’t mean to take. Her feet were flat on the floor and knees bent as if she were about to do some sit-ups. She didn’t notice or care that in this position her skirt wasn’t doing its job. Nick could not stop staring. He’d rarely seen his mother in her nightgown, much less in this pitifully exposed state. It made his father’s “accident” all the more heinous—and his own staring all the more despicable. Mike noticed that he was staring and glared at him ferociously, demanding Nick’s eyes while they waited for whatever was to come next. But Nick could not look away until his father moved. He started toward his wife, who suddenly held up her hand, fingers spread. Nick wondered how, still on her back and face covered with her hands, his mother knew that his father had stepped toward her. But that hand, thrust into the air from between the beds, seemed to control all that was going to happen in that room and all that would be afterward. His father turned and walked to the bedroom door. The light from the hall turned him into a silhouette, so Nick could not see who his father was looking at when he turned and said, “You little prick.”
Mike flipped the bird at the now empty doorway and turned to his mother. Nick watched him approach her slowly. He bent over her, reaching down as if to adjust her skirt, his long arms sticking out of the pajama top he was growing out of. He hesitated, clearly uncertain how to go about such a mysterious task. He finally just touched her knee.
“Mom?”
She sat up with a small groan and, after a moment, adjusted her skirt. She stayed that way for a few moments, lightly touching her jaw, kind of the way Nick had seen her use a powder puff when she was getting ready to go out to dinner with their father. Finally, using Mike’s bed as a brace, she started to get up.
“Thank you, dear,” she said to Mike when he tried to help her up. She told them both to get into bed and said something about stopping all the silly arguing and fighting. Nick watched from his bed as she leaned over Mike and stroked his cheek.
“Are you okay, Michael?” she asked. Mike nodded, bobbing his head like an idiot, Nick knew, to ward off the tears. His mother leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. Nick decided he hated him.
“He’s never hit you before, has he,” she said. A statement, not a question. Mike, still fighting tears, shook his head vigorously. “And I know, without even talking to him about it, that he never will again. Do you understand what I’m saying, honey?”
More tearful nodding.
“It’s important for you to remember that.”
Even back then, Nick thought it was a strange thing for his mother to say. But he was too worried about being left out of his mother’s sphere of interest to give it much thought. He wouldn’t even remember those words until too few years later, after she was gone.
“What about you?” Nick called out, more to get his mother’s attention than out of any fully realized concern.
His mother looked over and—finally!—saw Nick’s bloody nose and soiled shirt.
“Oh my god!” she said. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”
Nick would never have trouble recalling the feel of the warm washcloth and the heat of the steam rising from the sink. He watched his mother’s profile in the mirror over the sink, finding comfort in the way the lines around her eyes deepened and her lips tightened as she tried to dislodge the slightly congealed blood from his upper lip and nose. He felt a strange gratitude to his father for bringing all this about. His mother helped him out of his dirty T-shirt and into a clean one before tucking him back into bed. She paused at the door.
“You two need to learn how to be friends, not just brothers,” she said.
They lay in their beds quietly after that, listening for whatever sounds were about to emerge from below. But Nick only heard the usual nighttime sounds: the hum of a house, the fade in and out of a passing car, his brother’s breathing. Exhausted now, Nick was just about asleep when he heard a voice in his ear.
See what I mean, crybaby? Even Dad says you’ve got a little prick. Mom probably thinks so, too.
Nick smiled into his cup of coffee. Mike never passed up an opportunity. No wonder he did so well in sales.
He handed Marcy a menu. “You said something about Dad.”
“You sure you wouldn’t rather talk about Peggy Gallagher?” It was Marcy’s peace offering and Nick was inclined to accept, but before he could respond, Marcy dropped the menu to the table and held up both hands. “Okay, okay, don’t get your boxers in a bollix. I’ll get straight to the point. I’m pretty sure Dad’s dying.”
The waitress appeared to ask if they were ready to order. Marcy signaled for Nick to order while she scanned the menu. After he ordered a BLT, Marcy snapped the menu shut and said she’d have the same and a cup of coffee. Black.
“What’s he got?” Nick asked when the waitress left.
Marcy stared at him, wide-eyed. “That’s it? What’s he got?”
Nick looked away. “I know how that sounds, but we both know it’s bound to happen sooner or later, right?” He waited a moment for his embarrassment to pass. “What makes you think he’s dying?” he asked.
“He’s being nice.”
Nick leaned back against the vinyl padding of the booth. “Ah. The dreaded Nice diagnosis. How long’s he got, Doc?”
Marcy closed her eyes. She shook her head and shoulders as if loosening up for a jog. She mumbled something under her breath, chantlike. Nick guessed this to be some sort of affirming statement. Was Marcy in therapy?
“Let’s start over,” she said.
And she did, telling Nick about the call from her father and the condition of his house. She spoke fast and in detail, hardly pausing for air or Nick’s reaction. It reminded him of when they were younger and she used to come into his room—Mike was always out on a date by this time—to complain over the latest outrage committed by their father or to cry about how much she missed their mother.
Then, as now, he knew he should have tried to comfort her, but he couldn’t get past the feeling that she needed to buck up, that she wasn’t the only one fighting these fights. And so he’d sit on his bed, back against the headboard, and look away or down when she started to cry—even the night she came to him in near hysterics, complaining that one of her sleepover friends had called home to have her parents pick her up because the old man had come into the family room to tell Marcy something but fell to the floor, dead drunk. “Flat on his face,” Marcy wailed. “He scared the shit out of her.”
Nick had laughed. He hadn’t known how else to react. Marcy’s friend had nothing to fear, but even now there was something hilarious about the scene as Nick saw it: his father walking in, maybe swaying a little bit, about to say something, and then . . . thunk! What could anybody do except laugh?
“Are you hearing what I’m saying?” she asked now.
“Of course,” Nick said. “What’s your suggestion?”
“Goddammit, Nick, I knew you weren’t listening. I just told you. Sunrise. It’s an assisted-living facility. One of the girls in the office has her mother there and her mother loves it.”
“Have you talked to Dad about this?”
“Not yet.”
He chuckled. “Good luck with that one.”
Marcy looked out the window. “Well, see, that’s part of why I wanted to talk with you. I figured that if it was more than just me talking to him about it, he’ll listen.” She paused, and when Nick didn’t say anything, added, “Especially since he’s trying to get the three of us together anyway.”
“The three of whom?”
“Whom? Whom do you think? Us. You. Me. Mike. So we might as well use his plan as an excuse to talk to him about ours.”
“I’m confused,” Nick said. “Who wants to see us?”
“Who have we been talking about, Nick?” Marcy now assumed a second-grade teacher voice he hadn’t heard before but suspected his niece often did. His heart went out to her. “Your father? Remember him? He wants a get-together. That’s another reason I think he’s dying.”
“He told you he wants to get together with the three of us?”
“You think I’m making this up? Of course he told me. Told Mike, too.”
“He called Mike?”
Marcy waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t get in a sibling rivalry snit, Nicky. He called Mike by accident, I think.”
Nick fiddled with a sugar packet. Marcy wasn’t telling the whole story. He felt it in his bones. “Let me make sure I’ve got this straight,” he said. “Dad wants us to get together for some reason—maybe to recover all those happy memories he lost to Jack Daniels—and you want to take the opportunity to talk him into moving into a nursing home.”
“It’s an assisted-living facility and it’s two separate issues, dickwad.”
Definitely hiding something. Nick thought about something Marcy had told him a few minutes earlier, something about her spending a lot of time lately—sometimes with April—getting the old place “in shape.”
“And what do you suggest we do about the house?” he asked.
Marcy’s face reddened. “What do you mean?” she asked.
Bingo.
“Well . . . you’ve obviously thought all this through. Any thoughts on who might list the house, once Dad moves out?”
“You think that’s what this is about?”
Nick shrugged.
Marcy stood. “I’ll tell the old man you’re too busy to see him,” she said. “Call him if you change your mind.”
Not wanting to watch her go, Nick turned his attention to the whirlpool he’d made in his coffee with his spoon. For a long while after Marilyn died, he believed she was somehow looking down on him, somehow transmitting encouragement and advice and helping him avoid doing things that would make her cringe. But what he’d just done convinced him, finally, that she wasn’t hanging around in some other life-form or energy force. She was gone. She would always be gone. He was here alone, mucking things up all by himself.
He opened the portfolio he had brought with him. Inside was Bobby Gallagher’s college essay. The prose was better than expected.
“I’ll pay for those, but I’ve changed my mind,” Nick told the waitress when she brought the two sandwiches. “Just more coffee, please.”