Bygones (34 page)

He started the engine, turned the fan on, then off again when the blast of engine heat proved hotter than the motionless air had been. He put in a tape of Mike and the Mechanics and began pulling out of the parking lot.

Something hit the car like a falling rock.

Jesus, what was that?

He braked and craned around to find Pike Watson had thumped on the trunk to stop him. His bearded face appeared at the open window.

“Hey, Curran, not so fast.”

“Was that you? I thought I ran over a kid or something.” Randy turned down the stereo.

“It was me. Listen, we want you to be our rimshot.”

Shock suffused Randy. It went through his body faster than a hit of marijuana. Felt better, too.

“You serious?”

“We knew before you went out the door. We just have this policy, we all talk it over, no one person decides. Wanna come back inside and get in a couple hours of practice?”

Randy stared, dumbfounded. He whispered, “Jesus . . .” and after a pause, “I don't believe this.”

Watson wagged his head. “You're good, man. Believe it. But we've got only six days to work you into four hours' worth of music, so what do you say?”

Randy smiled. “Let me park this thing.”

He parked the car and stepped onto the blacktop, wondering how he'd operate the foot pedals with his knees this weak, how he could do licks with his body trembling so. Pike Watson shook his hand as they headed back inside the club.

“You get that union card as quick as you can.”

“Anything you say,” Randy replied, matching him pace for pace as he headed toward paradise.

* * *

It had been three days since Michael's evening with Bess. At work, he had been withdrawn. In his car, he had ridden with the radio off. At home, he'd spent a lot of time sitting on the deck with his feet on the railing, staring at the sails on the water.

That's where he was on Tuesday evening when his phone rang.

He answered and heard Lisa's voice.

“Hi, Dad. I'm down in the lobby. Let me in.”

He was waiting in his open door when she stepped off the elevator, looking quite ballooned, in blue shorts and a white maternity blouse.

“Well, look at you,” he said, opening his arms as she hove up against him. “Getting rounder every day.”

She rested a hand on her stomach. “Yup. Not unlike the St. Paul Cathedral.” The church had a dome that could be seen for miles.

“This is a nice surprise. Come on in.”

They sat on deck chairs, sipping root beer, watching evening slant in behind them and tint the tips of the trees golden. The water was jeweled and the smell of wild sweet clover drifted from nearby roadsides.

“How've you been, Daddy?”

“Okay.”

“I haven't heard from you in a while.”

“Been busy.” He told her about the Victoria and Grand plans and the attendant hassle with the locals. He told her he'd been sailing some and had seen the new movie
Dick Tracy,
and asked if she and Mark had seen it. He mentioned his cooking classes and how he was enjoying his new skills.

“I hear you made dinner for Mother Saturday night.”

“How did you hear that?”

“Randy called, about something else, actually, but he mentioned it.”

“I suppose Randy wasn't too pleased.”

“Randy's got other things on his mind right now. He auditioned for a band called The Edge, and they hired him.”

Michael's face brightened. “Great!”

“He's blown away, rehearsing all morning with tapes and all afternoon with the band.”

“When did all this happen?”

“Yesterday. Didn't Mother call you and tell you?”

“No, she didn't.”

“But if the two of you were together on Saturday night . . .” Lisa let the suggestion hang.

“Things didn't go too well between us.”

Lisa got up and went to the railing. “Damn.”

Michael studied her back, her hair knotted in a loose French braid and tied off with a puckered circle of blue cloth.

“Honey, you've got to stop dreaming that Mom and I will get back together. I don't think that's ever going to happen.”

Lisa flounced around to face him and rested her backside on the railing. “But why? You're divorced, she's free, you're both lonely. Why?”

He rose and caught her around the neck with one arm, turning her to face the lake. “It's not that simple. There's history between us that's got to be considered.”

“What? Your affair? Mother can't honestly be hung up on that anymore, can she?”

Lisa had never used the word before. Hearing her speak it now, forthrightly, throwing it out for honest examination, Michael discovered the two of them crossing some new plateau as a father and a daughter.

“We've never talked about it before, you and I.”

She shrugged. “I knew about it all along.”

“But you never held it against me the way the others did.”

“I figured you had your reasons.” He wasn't going to delineate them at this late date. Lisa added, “All I ever heard was Mom's side of the story but I remember things weren't so super around our house at that time, and part of it was her fault.”

“Well, thanks for the benefit of the doubt.”

“Dad?” Lisa looked up at him. “Will you tell me something?”

“Depends on what the question is.” She bore so much resemblance to Bess as she looked straight into Michael's eyes.

“Do you still love Mom—I mean, even a little bit?” she finished hopefully.

He dropped his arm from around her and sighed. “Oh, Lisa . . .”

“Do you? Because the way you were acting at my wedding, it seemed like both of you had some feelings for each other.”

“Maybe we do, but—”

“Then, please don't give up.”

“You didn't let me finish. Maybe we do but we're both a lot more cautious now, especially your mother.”

“I think she loves you. A lot. But I can understand why she'd be scared to let you know. Heck, who wouldn't be when a guy has left you for another woman? Now, don't get upset that I said that. I
didn't
take sides when you left Mom but now I am. I'm taking both of your sides, because I want you back together again so badly, I just . . . I just don't even know how to say it.” She turned to him with tears magnifying her eyes. “Give me your hand, Daddy.”

He knew what she would do even as he complied. She placed his palm against her stomach and said, “This is your grandchild in here, some little thing who's probably going to come out looking like you and Mom in some way, right? I want him to have all the best advantages a child can have, and that includes a grandpa and grandma's house to go to at Christmastime, and the two of you together picking him up sometime and taking him to the circus, or to Valley Fair, or going to his school programs, or . . . or . . . oh, you know what I mean. Please, Daddy, don't give up on Mother. You're the one who left her; you've got to be the one to go back and convince her it was a mistake in the first place. Will you try?”

Michael took Lisa in his arms and held her loosely.

“It's dangerous to idealize things so.”

“Will you?”

He didn't answer.

“I'm not idealizing. I saw you two together. I know there was something between you the night of my wedding, I just know it. Please, Daddy?”

It had been far easier to promise her he'd have her piano moved forever.

“Lisa, I can't promise such a thing. If things had gone better between us the other night . . .”

The note upon which the night had ended had made mockery of his and Bess's sexual encounter. Since then Michael had viewed his actions as foolish and willful. Lisa's remarks only ripened his disillusionment into confusion. If Bess loved him as Lisa suspected, she had a strange way of showing it. If she didn't, her way was stranger yet.

Lisa drew herself out of his arms, looking forlorn.

“Well, I thought I'd try,” she said. “Guess I better go.”

He walked her to the door and rode the elevator with her down to the lobby, where she stopped and turned to him.

“There's something else I'd like to ask you, Dad.”

“Ask away.”

“It's about when the baby's born. I wondered if you'd like to be there during the delivery. We're inviting Mark's folks, too.”

“And your mother, too, no doubt.”

“Of course.”

“Another attempt to work us back together, Lisa?”

Lisa shrugged. “Sure. Why not? But it might be the only chance you get to witness the awesome spectacle. I know you weren't there when Randy and I were born, so I thought . . .” She shrugged again.

“Thanks for asking. I'll think about it.”

When Lisa was gone, Michael's thoughts returned to Bess, plunging him into a limbo of indecisiveness.

Ever since Saturday night he'd passed telephones the way sinners pass confessionals, wanting to reach out and dial Bess's number and say he was sorry, he needed absolution. But to call her was to place himself in a position of even greater vulnerability, so he resisted the urge once again.

* * *

The following day, however, he dialed the house at eleven o'clock in the morning, expecting Randy to answer.

To his surprise, Bess did.

“Bess!” he exclaimed, lunging forward in his desk chair and feeling his face ignite. “What are you doing home!”

“Grabbing a sandwich and picking up some catalogs I forgot before I head out for a noon appointment.”

“I didn't expect you to be there. I called for Randy.”

“He's not here, sorry.”

“I wanted to congratulate him. I hear he's found a job with a band.”

“That's right.”

“I suppose he's really excited, huh?”

“Is he ever. He's quit his job at the nut house and he's practicing here every morning and with the band every afternoon. Today, though, he's out shopping for a used van. Says he's got to have one to haul his drums in.”

“Has he got any money?”

“Probably not but I didn't volunteer any.”

“What do you think? Should I?”

“That's up to you.”

“I'm asking your advice, Bess. He's our son and I want to do what you think will be best for him.”

“All right, then, I think it's best to let him struggle and find his own way to get a van. If he wants the job badly enough—and of course he does—he'll work it out.”

“All right, I won't offer.”

A lull fell. End of one subject, opening for another . . .

Michael picked up a stapler, moved it to a different spot on his desktop, moved it back where it had been. “Bess, about Saturday night . . .” She said nothing. He depressed the head of the stapler four times, not quite hard enough to release staples. “All week long I've been thinking I should call you and apologize.”

Neither of them spoke for a long time. His fingertips lingered over the stapler, polishing it as if it were dusty.

“Bess, I think you were right. That wasn't a very smart thing we did.”

“No. It only complicates matters.”

“So I guess we shouldn't see each other anymore, should we?”

Again, no answer.

“We're only getting Lisa's hopes up for nothing. I mean, it isn't going to lead to anything, so why do we put ourselves through it?”

His heart was drumming hard enough to loosen the stitches on his shirt pocket. Sweet Jesus, it was just like when they used to talk this way on the phone in college, longing to be together yet summoning willpower to do the right thing, which they inevitably failed to do once they were together.

When he spoke again the words emerged in a ragged whisper. “Bess, are you there?”

Her voice, too, sounded strained. “The damned awful truth is that it's the best piece of sex I've had since the last good one you and I had together when we were still married. I've thought about it so much since Saturday night, about all those years of learning it took to get it right together, and how comfortable and easy it felt with you. Did it feel that way for you, too?”

“Yes,” he whispered hoarsely while beneath the desk he felt himself grow priapic.

“And that's important, isn't it?”

“Of course.”

“But it isn't enough. It's the kind of reasoning teenagers use, and we're not teenagers any longer.”

“What are you saying, Bess?”

“I'm saying I'm scared. I'm saying I've been walking around thinking of nothing but you since Saturday night and it scares the living hell out of me. I'm scared of getting hurt again, Michael.”