Life After Genius (29 page)

Mead’s knees turn to water. He reaches for the spare bed, the one on which his suitcase is resting, and sits down. He is going to throw up, in a second he is going to hawk up the entire contents of his stomach.

“He was on his way back home when it happened,” Herman says. “His car swerved off the road and hit a tree. He was killed on impact.”

Mead looks up, not certain he has heard right. “My cousin? My cousin is dead?” Herman nods and Mead is overcome with relief. His parents are fine. They aren’t dead. But that relief is immediately replaced by guilt. Percy is dead. He came by to visit Mead, found out he wasn’t here, turned around to head home, and hit a tree. Mead stands up. “I have to go. I have to catch the next train to Alton. I have to get home for my cousin’s funeral.” He grabs his suitcase and hauls it off the bed, forgetting that it is stuffed full of paper, forgetting how heavy it is. The suitcase drops to the floor with a loud thud. Mead sets it upright and then tries to drag it toward the door but Herman blocks his path. “Get out of my way, Weinstein. I have to go.”

“It’s too late,” Herman says. “The funeral was four days ago.”

Too late? It’s too late? First he missed his cousin and now he has missed his funeral? “When?” Mead says. “When did this accident happen?”

“Last Monday. In the afternoon. Around one o’clock.”

One o’clock. Which means it was two o’clock on the east coast. Exactly when Mead heard the crashing noise that woke him up. But he couldn’t have heard. He was over a thousand miles away. That must be why the phone was busy when Mead tried to call home, why the line was tied up for so long. It was the coroner calling, all right, to tell Mead’s father that his nephew was dead. Or maybe his father was trying to get in touch with Mead at the dorm. Only he wasn’t there. Shit. Shit. Shit.

“I’m sorry,” Herman says. “I’m so sorry.” And he hugs Mead.

But this is all Herman’s fault, isn’t it? If he hadn’t kidnapped Mead and taken him out east, then Mead could have been here when Percy dropped by to visit. And if he had been here, then Percy would have been here too. In the dorms. At one o’clock in the afternoon. And not out on some road getting killed.

Mead pushes Herman away, grabs his suitcase, and drags it out the door and down the hall. He half expects Herman to come after him and stop him. But he doesn’t. The guy just stands in his doorway and watches as Mead drags his suitcase down the stairs.
Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump.

9

COUNTERCLOCKWISE

High Grove
Four Days Before Graduation

Y
OU BETTER HURRY UP AND GET DRESSED
,” Mead’s dad says. “I’m leaving in ten minutes.”

Mead looks up from his plate of scrambled eggs. “I am dressed.”

His father stares at his T-shirt and blue jeans. “You need to put on a tailored shirt and a proper pair of pants. I can’t have you out on the showroom floor looking like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you just fell off the back of a hay truck,” his mother says.

“Like a customer,” his dad says, “instead of a salesperson.”

Mead scoops up the rest of the eggs. Talking with his mouth full, he says, “Sorry, I can’t make it today, Dad. I have a gig.”

“A gig?” his mother says.

“Yes. I’m playing in a rock band and we have a gig over at Grange Hall.”

His mother places her palm to his forehead and Mead pushes it away. “I’m serious, Mom. I joined a rock band yesterday.”

He can see it in both of their faces: disappointment. But Mead was being honest the other night when Principal Jeavons came over for supper, when he told them he just wants to be normal. Another overlooked face in the crowd. Someone no one could possibly be jealous or envious of. And no one could possibly be jealous or envious of a cello player in a half-assed garage band.

“I see,” his father says, looking all let down and everything as he picks up the car keys. He’s laying it on thick this morning, his disillusionment in his son.

“You see what?” Mead says. Shit, he liked it better when he couldn’t read his father’s moods, when the old man’s face was a blank slate. When did this happen? When did Mead acquire the ability to read faces? He would rather his mother scream at him than look one moment longer at his father’s long face.

“It’s just that I thought you’d be spending more time at the store,” his dad says.

“I will be. This just came up.”

Mead’s mother looks pleased. Her husband and son are fighting. A split in the seam of their male bond has begun to show; a fissure in her husband’s all-too-compliant acceptance of their son’s return home has begun to open. Her look says: I may once again have a shot at getting things to go my way.

“All right,” his father says, but he doesn’t look all right.

“I’ll come by the store later,” Mead says. “After the gig. I promise.”

His father doesn’t respond, just opens the back door and leaves.

M
EAD HELPS NELSON,
a pudgy boy whose eyes have become dulled by the consumption of too many refined sugars, unload his drums from the back of an old VW bus, circa 1968. They carry each piece, one by one, up onto the stage, making several trips past the folding tables and metal chairs that have been set up to accommodate today’s event: some kid’s sixteenth birthday party. Blue and yellow paper streamers have been draped around the room in an attempt to add a touch of festivity to the otherwise austere ambience of the meeting hall. Helium balloons hover in clumps above the middle of each table as if afraid to venture out on their own. The whole place has an air of forced gaiety. And it depresses the hell out of Mead.

Similar preparations are taking place in Chicago. A stage is being built. The grassy lawns of the quad are being cut short to create a carpet for the rows upon rows of folding chairs the university is setting up for its own annual party: the graduation of another class of students. In just four days. The last of the final exams have now been taken, most of the underclassmen gone home. Only the near-graduates remain, wandering the campus like stunned survivors, surprised that it is suddenly all over, finding sentiment in the arch of a doorway or the mustiness of an old classroom that they are seeing and smelling for the last time. Taking a moment to reflect before launching into the next phase of their lives.

Forsbeck is probably sound asleep, recovering from a late night of partying. Has anyone stripped down Mead’s bed? Or is it as he left it: sheets tucked neatly under the mattress, pillow fluffed, blanket pressed smooth. Waiting for his return. And what about Herman? The poor guy probably hasn’t slept a wink in days. Pacing up and down the halls all night, eyes rimmed in red, trying to figure out his next move. Wondering where he went wrong. Wondering when Mead is going to knuckle under and come back. Holding tight to his belief that he knows what makes Mead tick, that he knows Mead better than Mead knows himself, that his plan can still come to fruition. But Mead isn’t going back. Because to do so would be admitting to something he is not yet ready to admit to. No, Mead is going to stay right where he is for as long as he has to. Until he is proved wrong. Until Herman comes to him. Which he will. And when he does, Mead will be waiting. And watching. Because that’s what the best hunters do: They watch their prey. They study them until they have begun to think like them. And then they make their move.

“So how exactly did we get this gig?” Mead asks Eric as he switches on his guitar and strums a few discordant notes, the feedback from the amplifier giving off a resounding vote of no-confidence.

“Through Nelson. He works for Roger Frohlich over at the Burger Haven.”

“If you need a job,” Nelson says. “I can put in a good word for you.”

“But you don’t even know me,” Mead says.

Nelson shrugs. “So?”

“Roger’s cousin, Beth, is getting married next month,” Eric says. “If he likes what he hears here today, he’s gonna hire us to play at her wedding too.”

“Grange Hall today, Madison Square Garden tomorrow,” Mead says.

“Nah,” Nelson says. “The reception’s gonna be over at the Lodge.”

E
RIC AND THE OIL LEAKS
(a name Eric came up with just last night) manage to mangle and make almost indecipherable a whole medley of rock classics, but none of the guests seem to much mind, mainly because no one is listening. There must be close to fifty sixteen-year-olds in the Hall, all of them talking at once, none of them paying the slightest bit of attention to the three young men onstage. Mead feels utterly invisible. He may very well have found his calling.

A buffet has been set up along the west wall and when the Oil Leaks take a break, after forty-five minutes or so, Mead heads straight for it, his pay for this gig consisting of twenty dollars and all he can eat. The servers are wearing red-and-yellow jerseys and red-and-yellow caps with the letters BH stitched onto them. Mead has his choice of a double cheeseburger or fish fillet sandwich, french fries or cole slaw, and either a Pepsi, Coke, or Snapple iced tea. He asks for a can of Coke but instead of handing one to him, the server says, “What the fuck are you doing here?” Mead’s ears are ringing from standing in front of the amplifier, so at first he thinks he has heard wrong, then looks more carefully at the guy and sees Freddy Waseleski looking back.

It’s hard to say which one of them looks more ridiculous: the High Grove High School valedictorian dressed like a no-frills rock star or the high school dropout dressed like a fast-food vendor. Freddy has a smirk on his face, the same one he wore down by the creek the day Mead stood before him in nothing but his birthday suit, a look that still has the power to send a shiver up Mead’s spine.

“What happened to you, freak? Didja flunk outta college or something?”

“No,” Mead says. “I left voluntarily. For ethical reasons.”

Freddy scrunches up his face. “Well, you still talk like a fucking freak. So this is what you do now? Play some stupid violin in a rock band?”

“Cello,” Mead says. “And yes, my life has amounted to nothing. That should make you happy. I mean, that is what you always hoped would happen to me, isn’t it, Freddy? That I would fail? That I’d end up a nobody like you?”

“Whadaya mean, nobody? You’re in a fucking rock band, freak. I’d kill to be in a fucking rock band.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

A cloud rolls in over Freddy’s face. “You’re still the same snot-nosed kid. The boy with everything who don’t even know how good he’s got it. So what’s the real reason you came home, freak? Has someone else threatened to shove a ruler up your ass?”

Mead lunges across the buffet table, sending Coke and Pepsi cans flying everywhere, grabs Freddy by the collar, and lifts him clear off his feet. “You’re a prick, Freddy. A nobody, loser prick who I was once foolish enough to feel sorry for. Well, not anymore. Gum under my heel. That’s all you’ll ever be, Freddy, gum under my heel.”

Freddy’s eyes are bugging out of his face. He looks the way Mead felt down by the creek. Terrified. The look frightens Mead and so he lowers Freddy to the ground and lets him go. Shit. Why the hell did he go and do that? To Freddy Waseleski of all people. Mead shakes out his hand, still sore from punching Forsbeck in the face a few days ago, and wraps it around an ice-cold can of Coke before walking off.

M
EAD HELPS NELSON LOAD THE LAST OF THE DRUMS
back onto the VW van. Eric slides the door shut, shoves a ten-dollar bill into Mead’s hand, and says, “Here’s your cut. Now take your cello and get lost, you’re out of the band.”

“Out?” Mead says. “But I’m the only person in this band who actually knows how to play an instrument.”

Eric turns to address Nelson. “Your boss Roger says we can forget about playing at his cousin’s wedding next month.”

“How come?” Nelson says.

“Because our bass player here punched one of his employees in the face.”

“I did not punch Freddy in his face,” Mead says. “I just grabbed him.”

“That’s not what Roger says.”

“Well, Roger is wrong.”

“I saw the guy’s face, Fegley. It was all splotchy and puffed out.”

“That’s not from being hit, Eric, that’s from subsisting on a diet of french fries and sugary colas.”

Eric shakes his head. “What is it with you Fegleys? You all walk around this town acting like you’re better than the rest of us.”

“As if,” Mead says, “as if you’re better than the rest of us.”

Eric looks at Mead as if he were dirt. “You’re a prick, Fegley, just like that dead cousin of yours.” He turns to walk away.

Mead grabs him by the sleeve. “What did you say? You take that back.”

“Why, are you gonna hit me if I don’t?”

“Yes.”

But Eric doesn’t take it back and Mead doesn’t hit him. Because for all he knows Eric did think Percy is a prick, the same way Freddy thinks Mead is a freak. Instead he says, “You still owe me the other half of my pay.”

“That’s all you’re getting, Fegley. Ten bucks. I’m keeping the rest as compensation for the fact that you cost us our next paying job with your hot temper.”

“I don’t have a temper,” Mead says and realizes that he still has Eric’s shirt balled up in his fist. He lets go of it and steps back. “And I didn’t cost you your next job; you lost it because you can’t carry a tune. I don’t care what excuse Roger Frohlich gave you; the truth of the matter is you suck as a musician.”

Mead picks up his cello and turns to go. Freddy Waseleski is loading trays of cold french fries and uneaten fish fillet sandwiches into the back of the Burger Haven van. He glares at Mead with hate in his eyes. The poor bastard, he didn’t think Mead had it in him to fight back, to stand up for himself. And quite frankly, neither did Mead.

“STAY OUT OF THE LIVING ROOM
.” That is what Mead’s mother says as he comes through the back door. Not “the dean called again and you have to call him back.” Not “what the hell is wrong with you, you should be graduating, you’re ruining your life.” She’s all dressed up. Pearl necklace around her neck, apron around her waist. Guests must be imminent. But it is too early for supper and too late for lunch. She scurries from refrigerator to stove to sink, trimming the crust off bread, piercing olives with toothpicks, spreading cream cheese over crackers. Which can mean only one thing: her bridge group is coming over. Well, his mother has nothing to worry about. Mead is no more interested in socializing with them than with Freddy Waseleski. The windbags of High Grove, that’s what Mead’s grandfather Henry Charles used to call them. The poor fellow spent the last six months of his life on a rollaway bed in the living room behind a folding screen, one organ after another withering and dying. But his hearing was just as sharp as ever and he used to have to lie there and listen to Mead’s mother and her seven lady friends talk about everything from who was sleeping with the butcher to how much so-and-so spent on her daughter’s wedding to what Mrs. Next-Door-Neighbor had done to her eyelids while on vacation in Florida. Afterward Mead’s mother would feed him leftovers. Scallops wrapped in bacon, caviar on crackers, cheese melted over ham —none of which were allowed on his restricted diet and all of which probably contributed to his swift decline. Not that she’d admit it. She swore she was trying to make the man’s last days on earth more enjoyable, but Mead is convinced she just wanted to get the stinky old guy out of her living room and into his grave as quickly as possible.