Families and Other Nonreturnable Gifts (4 page)

Instead, I found a comfortable home in the English department of Waltham Community College, where I make sure there’s always fresh coffee and snacks for everyone and keep things running smoothly.

I have been told the coffee I make is extraordinarily good, and when I digitalized all of our files, my boss told me I had saved her life. But she was being metaphorical, and the people who say that about Hopkins are speaking literally, so it’s not exactly the same thing, is it?

* * *

By the time I make it back up to my father’s office, no one’s left up there except Tom, who’s stolidly packing books into old printer paper boxes. He looks up when I emerge from the stairway and says, “There you are! I thought you’d abandoned me like everyone else did.”

I cross the room toward him and fluff his hair a little. It’s so thick I can make it stand straight up.

He leans his head against my hip and says, “It’s funny being up here. I was so scared of your father I think I only came up here once in all these years. He wanted me to help him put in the Wi-Fi, remember? I was terrified.”

“And now?”

“Just as terrified,” he admits with a grin.

“Poor baby,” I say and bend down to kiss him lightly on the lips.

He turns the kiss into a real one. I pull back because of where we are, and he rubs his face against my stomach. “Mmm,” he says. He burrows his nose in deeper. I slide my fingers down to the back of his neck and then fold completely over him, torn: do I want to keep going or not? His arms slip around my waist. “We could do it,” he whispers. “Right here in your father’s office. That would be a first.”

“There isn’t a real door. Someone could walk in.”

“All the more exciting.”

“I never knew you were an exhibitionist.”

“Me neither.” His fingers slide under the waist of my jeans. It’s been a while since he’s been like this, all eager and coaxing, and I’m more aroused than I’ve felt in ages.

Ten years is a long time to be together, and sex is more comfortable than exciting these days. Same old bed, same old bodies, same time of day. That kind of thing. More and more, I find myself fantasizing during sex: a stranger has grabbed me from behind, someone who’s broken into the apartment, I can’t see him, I don’t know who he is, but he’s wild with lust, and that’s turning me on even though I’m terrified.

That kind of thing.

I’d worry about it, except I read in a magazine that it’s totally normal and even healthy for people in long-term relationships to fantasize like that.

Anyway, the idea of making out in my dad’s old room is kind of weird and interesting, and I’m tempted to let Tom keep going but also scared of being caught, so I just hang over him, trying to decide what I want to do, feeling my body respond even while I’m weighing the options.

The body’s close to winning out when there’s a clatter on the steps. We spring apart so violently that Jacob, who emerges into the office, can’t miss the fact he’s interrupting something.

“Sorry,” he says and turns red. He retreats down a step.

“No worries,” Tom says genially. He’s up on his feet and has recovered more quickly than I have. He points to the box of books in front of him. “Almost finished with this one. Should I carry it down when I’m done?”

“That would be great.” Jacob comes all the way up into the room but avoids making eye contact with either of us. “Hold on,” he says, peering into the box. “Are these supposed to be the ones we’re giving away or the ones we’re keeping?”

“I packed the ones that were on the floor.”

“But they were sorted out,” Jacob says. “There were two piles.”

“Oh, sorry,” Tom says. “Didn’t realize we were supposed to keep those separate. I just figured we should get them boxed up and out of here as fast as possible.”

I feel my heart sink. It’s not a big deal—Jacob can just sort them out again—and Tom meant well, but I feel bad anyway, like it was my fault Tom messed up.

“Can I help?” I ask Jacob, who has sunk down to his knees in front of the box and is pulling books out.

“Grab another box, will you? I’ll hand you the books we don’t want to keep, and you can pack them as we go. I’ll keep the ones we want in here.”

I look around, see the tower of boxes—Mom must have gotten this batch from the supermarket because they all have food names on them like
VLASIC PICKLES
and
VELVEETA
—and bring one back, passing by Tom who’s shoved his hands in his pockets and is leaning against the angled wall as he watches Jacob fix his mistake.

“What do you want me to do?” he asks as I go by.

I glance at my watch. It’s past eleven. “Why don’t you run out and pick us up some lunch?”

“What should I get?”

I’m squatting on the floor, taking the books that Jacob hands me and packing them in the box, trying to figure out how they’ll fit in there best. “Whatever you think.”

“What about you, Jacob?”

“Don’t worry about me. I can grab something later.”

I say, “God knows what Mom has in the kitchen or how long she’ll keep us working here. Tom might as well get lunch for everyone.”

“Yeah, okay, thanks.” Jacob goes back to sorting books.

“You still haven’t told me what to get,” Tom says to me.

“Something Milton will eat. Maybe bagels?”

“How many should I get?” Tom asks.

“Whatever you think.”

“A dozen?”

“Sounds good.”

“How much cream cheese? One of those bigger containers?”

“Yeah, fine.”

He lingers one more moment uncertainly and then says, “Should I go now?”

I nod, and he disappears down the stairway.

For a little while, it’s quiet in Dad’s office. Hot, too. There’s an AC unit in one of the windows, but no one’s turned it on today and we’re having one of those weird April heat waves. It would have been the perfect day to go to the beach.

“Look at this,” Jacob says and leans over to show me a book: it’s a simple cover, but the title is in a language I can’t identify.

“What is it?”

“It’s a translation of
Political Systems
.” He moves his hand to reveal Dad’s name at the bottom, the only part that’s in English.

“Is that Russian?”

“Bulgarian, I think.” Jacob carefully inserts the book between two others in the box in front of him. “This must be his only copy—I’ve never seen it before.”

“I wonder how it sold in Bulgaria.”

“As well as any American book about philosophies of government sells in Bulgaria, I would think.” He’s done sorting through the books on the floor; he stands up and starts going through the bookshelf, pushing some books to the side, pulling others out. “So,” he says after a moment. “How’s life treating you these days?”

“Same old, same old.”

He laughs and squints at a book spine. “You sound like an old lady sometimes, Keats. You’re turning twenty-five next week, right?”

“I can’t believe you know that.”

“Your dad likes me to keep track for him. April twenty-second?”

“You’re better than those online birthday alarms.”

“That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”

We work for a moment, and then I say, “How’s Dad dealing with the move?”

“He’s okay.” There’s a pause. Then he says, “Only okay, though. He’s never been a big fan of change. And now that he’s seventy-five, it’s even harder for him. Sometimes he gets confused about where he is.”

That last sentence feels like a punch in the stomach. I have a vision of Dad wandering around Harvard Square, lost and alone. “You don’t think it’s Alzheimer’s, do you?”

“To be honest, I was worried about that, but I asked Hopkins and she said it’s just a combination of age and depression.”

“She’d know.”

“It’s useful having a neurologist in the family.”

“Mom should have just let him stay here,” I say. “It’s his house, too. I hate to think of him all alone. I bet that’s why he’s so depressed and out of it.”

“It’s not like she kicked him out because she wanted more space for herself—she wants to sell it and move. Understandably—it’s way too big.” His fingers fly along the book spines, tapping here and there. “I think she’s actually looking out for your dad, making sure he’s safely settled somewhere before all the craziness of showing the house and packing it up begins. He would have hated all that.”

I think about that. Maybe he’s right. Maybe Mom let Dad stay as long as it was comfortable for him here and then made sure he had a decent new home before their lives got disrupted.

“She’s dating,” I say and wait for his reaction. I want to see what someone else thinks of that bit of news.

But all he says is a calm “I know.”

“You know? How do you know? I only just found out.”

“Your mom happened to mention it to me the other day.”

“She told you before she told me? What else has she told you that she hasn’t told me?” I’m sort of joking, but not entirely.

He turns so he can look down at me. “Nothing, Keats. Don’t make a big deal out of this. I was moving some of your dad’s stuff out, and I heard a guy leaving a message on her machine, and she told me she was starting to date.”

“You should have called me immediately.”

“It was none of my business.”

“Oh, right,” I say. “It’s none of your business when it’s a question of letting Keats in on the whole thing. But it’s completely your business to start asking questions the second you hear a strange man’s voice on my mom’s voice mail.”

“Keats—”

“Is there anything else you’re not telling me?”

“Oh, for god’s sake.” He goes back to studying the book titles.

I jump to my feet. “That means there is. Tell me.”

“No, that means you’re being annoying.”

I walk over to the other box and snatch up the Bulgarian translation of my father’s book. I hold it by the spine, letting the pages dangle. “Tell me or the book gets it.”

“Give me a break.” He makes a grab for the book, but I skip back out of his reach. “There’s nothing to tell. Put the book down, Keats.”

“I’m serious.” I cross over to the window and stick the book halfway through the narrow opening. “Tell me or the book plunges to its death.”

“That’s not funny.”

I cock my head at him. “I’m terrifying you by threatening to harm a
book
. It’s a little bit funny.”

“Give it to me.”

“Wow, it’s really slippery,” I say. “Oops—almost dropped it!”

He runs over, but then he hesitates, too self-conscious to actually wrestle with me for the book. I think girls make him nervous: he’s never brought a girlfriend over to our house, and he comes to a
lot
of holiday meals with us. So either he hasn’t had a serious relationship since he started working for Dad, or he’s good at keeping them secret. Given how available he always seems to be, I’m guessing the former.

He reaches toward the window, but I knock his hand away. “Don’t try anything funny.”

“Fine.” He holds his hands up in surrender. “Put the book safely down, and I promise to tell you whatever you want, you lunatic.”

“Tell me and I’ll put it down,” I say, just to torment him.

“At least hold the book
inside
, will you?”

I pull the book back to the safe side of the window. “So—what else have my parents told you that they haven’t told me? What family secrets am I being kept out of?”

He shakes his head wearily. “Nothing that I know of.”

I make a darting motion with the book, but he’s anticipating that and grabs it out of my hand. I don’t fight him for it. Game’s over. “Is Dad dating, too?”

He inspects the book carefully, then looks up. “Do you really need me to answer that?”

“Is Mom serious about any of these guys?”

“Not that she’s told me.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“Because you’ve known me for a very long time and I’ve never lied to you.”

“Never lied to me that I
know
of. Anyway, there’s lying by omission.”

“I’m not doing that, either.” He slips the book back in the box. “What are you worried about, Keats? That your mother will marry someone else one day and leave your father alone forever? He’s already living by himself.”

“She might miss him now that he’s gone.”

He regards me for a moment, his light gray eyes lingering thoughtfully on my face. “I know they’re your parents, Keats,” he says gently, “but their marriage ended a long time ago.”

3.

W
e all eat bagels together in the kitchen. Mom’s about to bring one up to Milton, when I tell her that she’s only making things worse by waiting on him, that at the very least, she should make him come down a flight of stairs to eat. So she yells up to him, and he does come down, but only long enough to put some cream cheese on a bagel and eat it in three bites.

As we finish loading the dishwasher, Mom asks Tom if he’d mind changing the sink’s water filter for her, which is the kind of thing he’s great at and doesn’t mind doing. She doesn’t have a new filter in the house, though, so he volunteers to run to the hardware store to get one.

After he leaves, Mom and I go upstairs to look through our old picture books and see if there are any I might want to take before she gives them all away to the local hospital. The bookcase is in the hallway, which is poorly lit, so we have to take the books out one at a time and tilt them toward the light to see their titles.

I’m putting aside the books I think I might want to read to my own kids one day (a couple of Dr. Seuss’s, all of Maurice Sendak—whom I always secretly felt related to because our last names were so similar—and a bunch of random books I liked for one reason or another when I was little, most of which are so worn their spines are loose and their pages in danger of falling out), and after a while, Mom says, “You’re awfully quiet.”

“Am I?”

“I know I’ve thrown a lot at you today: the move, selling the house, the divorce.…You’re so capable, I forget sometimes how young you are.”

“I’m not that young anymore, Mom. I’ll be twenty-five next week.”

“That’s still incredibly young.”

“It’s really not. And I’m fine with your selling the house. It hasn’t been my home for a while. I have my own home.”