The Man Who Cancelled Himself (55 page)

“And, like, maybe some coffee?”

“Of course, how cloddish of me. I’ll get right on it.”

“Wait, I can make the coffee, boy,” Thor offered hurriedly.

Fortunately, Merilee picked this moment to emerge, wheeling Tracy toward us in her buggy. At least I think Tracy was in there somewhere, interred under several blankets, the little cap Merilee’s sister, Gretchen, had knit for her planted firmly on her abnormally large head. Merilee was dressed for the mud in her denim bib overalls and green rubber wellies. Her waist-length golden hair was in a ponytail. She wore no makeup.

“By God, woman,” Thor exclaimed, his voice booming. “You get prettier every time I see you!”

“And you, Mr. Gibbs,” she said airily, “get more and more full of baked beans.”

He gave her a big bear hug, lifting her off her feet.

“Careful, you’ll get a hernia.”

He laughed his lion’s roar of a laugh. “Nonsense. You’re light as a feather. Come meet my Clethra,” he commanded, dragging Merilee toward her.

Merilee, still one of Miss Porter’s girls, treated her young guest to a dazzling smile. “Hello, Clethra. And welcome.”

Clethra treated her to a bored shrug. And said nothing.

“She needs a shower,” I said, between clenched teeth.

Thor added, “I was just about to make a pot of coffee.”

“Nonsense, I’ll do it,” Merilee assured him.

“Like, I don’t even have a change of clothes,” Clethra complained to her. “But I guess
you
wouldn’t have anything that would fit me.”

“Why, of course I would,” Merilee assured her cheerfully. Not so much as a nostril flared. “I hope you don’t mind spit-up stains.”

“She’s a fine, strong baby, Merilee,” Thor observed, gazing down at Tracy in her buggy. “You must be very proud.”

“Well, maybe a little,” Merilee admitted, glowing radiantly. The two of them stood there making a fuss over Tracy for a moment. Too long a moment.

At least it was as far as Lulu was concerned. Unloved and unappreciated, she went skulking slowly off toward the pond, ears back, tail between her legs. Clearly, suicide was the only answer. She paused for a moment at the water’s edge, considering the gravity of what she was about to do, then steeled herself and waded glumly in.

“Oh, God, there she goes again.” Quickly, I unlaced my ankle boots. She was already in over her ears, which doesn’t take her very long.

“Don’t worry, Mr. H!” Dwayne called out. “I’ll save her!” He went running in after her, sending the ducks scattering. The pond’s not deep, no more than three feet at its lowest spot, but by the time he’d waded over to her she’d already sunk to the bottom with à
glug-glug-glug.
He reached in and grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and yanked her back out, snarfling and barfling and yelping in protest. Then he carried her to shore, where she shook herself, shivering miserably. The water was damned cold now. She also didn’t smell her best. She tends not to when she’s wet.

Merilee ran in and got towels for both of them. I toweled Lulu dry and said a few stern, fatherly things to her I won’t bother to repeat here. Dwayne refused his towel. Also our thanks. Just put his boots back on over his wet socks and went right back to work. He didn’t even seem to notice that his jeans were soaked through.

“I’m taking Hoagy away from you this evening, Merilee,” Thor announced with that familiar gleam of inspired lunacy in his eyes.

Merilee raised an eyebrow at this. “Oh?”

“We need to sit around a campfire,” he explained. “Reestablish a feeling of common manhood.”

“How cute,” she said sweetly. “Will the two of you be pounding on little drums?”

“Thor’s not into that,” I answered her, also sweetly. “I suspect we’ll mostly fart and spit and talk about girls.”

“We girls will be having much more fun,” Merilee assured us.

“We will?” Clethra said doubtfully. “What’ll we be doing?”

“Putting up pickles and spiced pears,” Merilee informed her brightly.

Clethra made a face. “No way. I don’t
do
the kitchen thing.”

“We’ll be just like two pioneer women,” Merilee plowed on gamely. “Come on, it’s fun.”

“It bites,” Clethra snapped.

Merilee took a deep breath. “Okay, what would
you
like to do?”

“I wanna watch
The Brady Bunch
.”

“Why would you want to do that?” I wondered.

“Do you have cable?” she asked Merilee, ignoring me.

“We have cable,” Merilee said tightly.

“Cool. Then I’m good to go.”

“You and I need to talk, Clethra,” I said. “After your shower, I mean.”

She curled her lip at me. “What about?”

“Your book. I’m going to help you with it.” Either that or dunk her in the pond. Possibly both.

“Good man,” exulted Thor, clapping me on the back. “I won’t forget this, Hoagy.”

“I don’t believe I will either.”

Clethra merely shrugged and mumbled, “Whatever.” And went inside.

Merilee went in after her, pausing first to curl her lip at me. A flawless impersonation. I stayed outside with Tracy and Lulu, who was standing in between my legs, her front paws resting on my feet. She often gets a bit needy when she’s been acting out.

Thor stripped to his waist and got to work chopping firewood. There was nothing lazy or casual about how he did it. This was work, hard work, and Thor Gibbs believed in hard work. He brought the ax down with thundering power, shaking the ground with his every swing, his huge muscles rippling. Sweat soon streamed down his barrel chest and flat, taut stomach. Me, I couldn’t imagine being in such shape when I was seventy-one. Hell, I couldn’t even imagine being alive. He was lucky to be alive himself. I couldn’t help but notice the three-inch scar on his back, still fresh and pink, from when Ruth had tried to stab him to death.

“I can’t believe it, man,” Dwayne marveled, his voice hushed with reverence. “Thorvin fucking Gibbs. What a trip.”

“That he is.”

“And that Clethra …” Dwayne let out a low, admiring whistle. “Man, I sure would like to empty my scrotum in her monkey cave.”

Lulu howled at the very thought of this.

“Thank you for sharing that with me, Dwayne. Thank you very much.”

“Can’t help how I feel, Mr. H.”

“No, but you could shut up about it.”

“Thing is, I meet a bazillion chicks over at Slim Jim’s. And compared to her, they’re pigs. I mean, she’s different. She’s
nice.
”

I peered at him curiously. “She is?”

“Well, she’s got a real nice smile, don’t ya think?”

“Oh, so that’s it.”

Dwayne frowned at me. “That’s what, Mr. H?”

“One of the three great misconceptions men have about women, Dwayne. Misconception number one is that if a woman has a nice smile she’s nice. Number two is that if she laughs at your jokes she has a great sense of humor. Number three is that if she agrees with every intelligent thing you have to say she’s smart.”

Dwayne considered this a moment, scratching his greasy hair. “That’s real interesting, Mr. H. Are there, like, any great misconceptions that they have about us?”

“Just one. That we actually
have
anything intelligent to say.”

“I guess I’d just like to meet a girl where it’s about something more than sex, y’know?”

“I do. The physical part is plenty at first, but after a while—”

“It’ll blow over?”

“So to speak. In my experience the fever breaks in six or—how old are you again?”

“Nineteen.”

“—eight weeks. After that, there has to be something more. Can I ask you a favor, Dwayne?”

“Sure, Mr. H.”

“Could you keep it to yourself that the two of them are here? We don’t want anyone else to know.”

His face dropped. “You mean I can’t tell anyone? Not even the guys?”

“One word gets out and the press will be all over this place. And then they’ll have to leave.”

He tugged at his scraggly goatee. “Well, if that’s how it is then I’m cool with it.”

“You’re a good man, Dwayne.”

His eyes were on Thor again. “Hope I get a chance to have some more talks with him. I mean, you’re a bright guy and all, and I enjoy rapping with you about books and stuff, but Mr. Gibbs … he’s like a true wise man.”

I left that one alone.

Dwayne turned and looked at me. “Well, isn’t he?”

“I suppose he is, Dwayne. I suppose he is.”

I took Clethra to the mall for our little talk. The nearest was the Crystal Mall, which was about twenty miles away in New London, where the Coast Guard Academy and Naval Submarine Base were found. I hate the mall. Any mall. Something about all of those loud, tacky stores selling 163 different kinds of loud, tacky crap that people don’t need and can’t afford. Something about all of those fat, greedy housewives in polyester sweat suits elbowing and grabbing their way deeper and deeper into debt. Something about all of those brain-dead teenagers in reversed baseball caps milling aimlessly around, chewing on limp french fries, when they should have been in school learning how to spell. All it takes me is one trip to the mall and I want to flee this country for good. Sometimes, I want to do that anyway. But when I asked her where she wanted to go she said the mall. She needed clothes. So we went to the mall.

Lulu, of course, loves the place. They have a pet store there with tropical fish that’s one of her absolute fave places to hang. Oh, well, at least she barked at the guy who was dressed up like Barney.

I sat on a bench drinking a tepid, oily brown coffee-like liquid while Clethra shopped. The Seventies, I noticed, were back again. Flared hiphuggers, body shirts, stacked platform heels … all back in fashion. Made me think I’d lost the last twenty years with the blink of an eye. I frequently feel that way—that I’m still twenty-one, still trying to figure the world out, positive that it will all make sense to me someday. I’m still waiting for it to make sense. Only now I know it never will. This, I am told, is maturity.

Clethra bought jeans at the Gap and flannel shirts at Eddie Bauer and some socks and tights and underwear at a place that sold socks and tights and underwear. She had to come looking for me when it came time to pay, what with Ruth having nuked her credit cards. I had to use mine. I started out in a hole with Clethra Feingold, to the tune of $317.64. And if you want to know the truth I never climbed out of it.

“This mall sucks.” She flopped down on the bench next to me with her purchases. She had one of her new flannel shirts on over a gray gym shirt of Merilee’s. “There’s no Vicky’s Secret, no Banana Republic …”

“Don’t you have anything nice to say about anything?”

“Why should I?” she sniffed. “You don’t.”

“That’s different. I’ve earned the right to be so utterly disillusioned.”

“Hey, it’s not easy bein’ happy if you’re a child livin’ in this free world,” she moaned. This was her being tragic and vulnerable, vintage Sylvia Plath by way of Kurt Cobain, with a generous side order of gag me with a spoon, Muffy. “Does Dwayne have a girlfriend?”

“He’s never mentioned one.”

“Like, don’t you think he looks like T-Bone?”

“T-Bone?”

“Tommy Lee, the Crue drummer. One who’s married to Pam Anderson from
Baywatch.
He used to be married to Heather Locklear. Is Heather really as big a bitch in real life as she is on
Melrose Place
?”

“You mean
Melrose Place
isn’t real life?”

“Oh, go to hell.”

“This is hell. Want to buy any more jeans?”

“Do you and Merilee fuck a lot?”

“Constantly. Like animals.”

She sighed, the eternally suffering teen. “Geez, I’m like, why are you dogging me, homes? I’m totally fucking serious.”

And she looked serious, too. Totally fucking serious. But this wasn’t about serious. This was about her testing me, much the way a child tests a new baby-sitter. Nothing to do with her age. Every celebrity I’ve ever worked for has done it.

“That doesn’t mean you’re entitled to an answer.”

“Oh, I get it.” Now she copped a gangsta attitude, poking herself in the chest with her thumbs. “Like, I’m supposed to be straight up with you but you don’t have to be straight with me? What bullshit.”

“You’re right, it is. But I’m not the one who’s getting paid two million dollars.”

“So why are you helping me?” she demanded.

“Because I enjoy getting crapped on. I’m a little kinky that way.”

She let out a girlish shriek of a laugh, and immediately clapped her hand over her mouth, reddening. I had to keep reminding myself just how young she was. “I just wondered if the two of you got along together all the time, that’s all.”

“No one does.”

“Thor and my mom sure didn’t.”

I glanced at her. She was twirling her hair around and around her finger. “They fought a lot?”

“Like, all the time. You two aren’t married?”

“We were.”

“But you’re not anymore?”

“That’s correct.”

“So she’s like your perma-date or something?”

“Or something.”

“That’s kicking,” she said approvingly. “It’s, like, you don’t care what other people think of you.”

“Now you’re catching on.”

She reached over and seized my hand. Hers was soft and rather hot. She turned mine over and squinted intently down at the lines in my palm, reading them with a look of spirited devilment on her face. This was her trying to be flirty and fascinating. I’m quite sure she thought she was, too. After all, she was eighteen—the zenith of female desirability if you go by all of the lingerie ads and rock videos. But that was image. Reality was quite different. Reality was that she hadn’t done anything in life except go to school and buy and watch and listen to whatever we had told her to buy and watch and listen to. Reality was that she was nobody at all, just a pepper pot of attitudes still in desperate search of a person. Me, I was her tour guide.

“Whew,” she gasped, dropping my hand. “You are
hostile.
”

Well, maybe she did know how to read palms.

I now became aware that three middle-aged chunkettes in stretch wear were standing there gaping at us.

“Omigod! It’s
her!
”