The Vast Fields of Ordinary (24 page)

All through dinner with my father I kept staring out at the golf course and thinking of the previous evening. I wondered where Alex was, why he hadn’t texted me back. My father and I hardly spoke through dinner, so in that respect everything was back to normal. The only way this night out differed from the other was that my father wasn’t allowing me to drink. I was stuck with soda.

“So your mother and I are going on a trip,” he said after Cindy had brought our key lime pie.

“When?”

“Next week.”

“That’s soon. What for?”

“To work things out. We have a lot to talk about, Dade.” He leaned forward, made a steeple with his fingertips that signified some sort of serious plan was being put in motion. Such a Ned Hamilton move. “Your mother and I do. We have some decisions to make.”

“Well,” I said, “I guess it’s good that you’re finally going to actually make the decisions.”

“Yes. Making decisions is a decisive step in the right direction.” The type of phrase he would probably have on his tombstone. “What about that woman?”

“Vicki?” he asked.

“Yes. Vicki.”

He cleared his through. “Vicki and I are no longer seeing each other.”

“That’s good to hear.”

“It was the right thing to do.”

“I agree.”

We were quiet for a moment.

“So where are you going?” I asked. “Is this trip happening for sure?”

“For sure. We’re going around Europe for a couple of weeks. We’ve wanted it and now’s the time to have it. Now’s as good a time as any. We’ll be back a week before you head off to Michigan, so don’t worry about that.”

“Don’t worry,” I said with an obviously forced smile. “I wasn’t.”

“Dade, your mother and I need to know that you’re going to be okay here on your own.”

“I’ll be fine,” I said.

“Mrs. Savage is going to be checking in on you while we’re gone, but she won’t be babysitting you. Because you’re not a baby. Obviously. But she’ll be checking in.”

“Obviously.”

“No drinking, Dade,” he said. “No lawn shenanigans. There’s a part of me that’s apprehensive about leaving you here.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“If you honestly want your mother and me to try our best to work these things out, then we need to be able to trust you.”

I didn’t really see what one thing had to do with the other.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”

“And I want you to know that your mother and I are fine with your homosexuality. We are. Really.”

I nodded. For some reason I didn’t believe it. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because my father was the kind of person who told himself things over and over until he believed them, who could justify almost anything. What I wanted was for it to
really
be okay. I wanted him to really not care, to maybe even be happy about it. Instead he was acting like I was making a bad career choice, like I was passing up an English degree at Fairmont in favor of a bartending certificate at the local community college.

“Did you really always know?” I asked.

“I had my suspicions.”

I took a bite of pie. My father looked out over the golf course as he always did. The sun was just beginning its descent. His sun, his sky.

“Beautiful evening,” he said.

“So it’s okay?” I said.

He looked back at me. “Yes. It’s fine.”

I nodded slowly and went on eating.

“Do you have a boyfriend?” he asked.

“Um . . .”

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” he said. “I just figured—”

“No,” I said. “Actually, there is someone. It’s just that it’s hard to describe exactly what he is.”

“Oh. Okay. I get what you mean. What’s his name?”

“Alex.”

“Alex,” he repeated. “You know, I always thought that maybe you and Pablo were . . .”

“Pablo and I were just friends, Dad. Nothing else. And we’re not even that anymore. All that is through.”

“You know, I never liked him.”

“That means a lot to me, Dad. It really does.”

“He was a scowler. He was always scowling.”

I thought back to the previous night, of Pablo somewhere off in the shadows watching as I left with Alex.

“Yeah,” I said. “And he still is.”

When we got home we found my mother in the living room reading some book called
Finding Your Awareness
. My father sat down beside her and put his arm around her, then leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. She gave him a sideways glance and strained smile. I fought the urge to retreat to my room and instead took a seat on the sofa across from them.

“How was dinner?” my mother asked.

“Dinner was great,” my dad said. “It’s always good to spend time with Dade.”

I looked off into the dining room, the kitchen. There were no other lights on on the first floor. I hated when the house was lit like this, when the idea of even going into the kitchen carried some weird abstract terror. I thought of walking upstairs, seeing Jenny on the first-floor landing, and literally dying of shock.

“Did you have the sea bass?” my mother asked.

“I had steak. Dade had scallops.”

“You love scallops,” she said.

What to say to that? “Um, yeah. Totally.”

“Did your father tell you about our trip?” she asked.

“He did. I told him I was jealous.”

“Rome, Paris, Florence.”

“It’ll be great,” my father said. “New beginnings.”

“New beginnings.”

Weren’t kids supposed to hold out hope for their parents, to believe until the bitter end that they weren’t going to get a divorce? That’s what the after-school specials always said. But right then, all I wanted was for it to be over. What I wouldn’t have given for one of them to go upstairs, pack their things, and walk out the door toward a happier existence. I didn’t care which one. Somebody just needed to do it, for all of our sakes.

“Can Alex come over for dinner sometime before you go?” I asked.

“Who’s Alex?” my mother asked.

My father said, “Alex is Dade’s friend.”

“My special friend,” I added. Both my parents shot me a watch-your-tone look.

“Boyfriend?” my mother asked.

Who knew? He hadn’t answered my text from earlier. I thought of him out with some other guy, driving around in his car with him, making out at stoplights. No, he wasn’t like that. I pushed the thought away.

“It’s sorta indefinable right now, but I guess he’s on the boyfriend track. Maybe.”

My mother looked over at my father. He was looking at me and grinning broadly. It was hard to believe he was actually there in the moment. His smile seemed forced, like it was hiding something.

“I’d like you to meet him,” I said. “He’s become sort of a big part of my life.”

“How long have you known this boy?” my mom asked.

“A few weeks.”

“How did he become such a big part of your life in such a short amount of time?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “It just happened. You know?”

My mother looked over at my dad.

“Young love, Peggy. You remember when you and I first met, don’t you?”

“Is he the one that convinced you to shave your head?” she asked.

“That’s a complicated question.”

“What do you mean?”

“Leave him alone, Peggy.”

My mom shot my dad a look and then looked at her lap, at the book butterflied between her thighs. She’d been outvoted. She said, “Well, if he’s such a big part of your life, I guess we should meet him.”

My father played absently with a piece of my mother’s hair. She went back to reading, ignoring us both. How long would he do that? How long would she let him? My phone rang in my pocket. It was Alex. I got up without saying anything. I hurried upstairs, answering when I got to the top.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m at home,” he said. He let out a sigh. “Just doing nothing. I was just thinking about you, thought I’d call. I got your text earlier, but there was a massive guacamole spill in the kitchen at work, so I was cleaning that up forever. What are you doing?”

I smiled. So he thought about me. I wanted to know more. What did he think about me? Did he think about us making out? Or us just sitting and talking? Or did he turn me over in his mind and wonder when he’d know things like where the scar on my right shin came from or what my favorite ice cream flavor was?

I stretched out on my bed and smiled up at the ceiling fan.

“Do you ever just lie on your bed and think?” I said.

“I did a lot of that this morning. My grandmother calls it being antisocial.”

“My mother calls it meditating. My mom used to be really into meditation, but now I think she just uses her meditation room as a place to hide and sling back the booze.”

“A hiding spot?”

“Somewhere to go where my father and I won’t come looking for her.”

“Wow. A meditation room? Really? Next thing you’ll say is that you have a bowling alley in your basement.”

“No bowling alley. But who knows. One of them could suggest an addition.” I paused, took a deep breath. “Hey, my parents are leaving town. Having an emergency marriage-rebuilding vacation.”

“Sounds urgent.”

“Sirens everywhere,” I said.

“Where are they going?”

“Europe.”

“Urgent
and
fancy.”

“No kidding. Family vacations with us usually involve going to some crappy colonial place where they show you how to make your own jelly. Now they’re going to Europe without me. Figures.”

“Ultrawack. So when do they leave?”

“Next week.” I said. And then I let out what I’d been thinking about since my father mentioned they were going on the trip. “You should sleep over.” I winced at the phrase
sleep over
. What was I, twelve?

He laughed. “Yeah. I’d love to sleep over.”

Somehow the words seemed less juvenile coming out of his mouth, more romantic.

“So I have another question,” I said.

“And what is that?”

“Do you want to come over for dinner tomorrow night?”

“Dinner?”

“Yeah,” I said. “With my parents. They kinda want to meet you.”

“Oh.”

An awkward pause. I winced again.

“Yeah,” I said. “I hope you don’t think that’s weird. It’s not like I think we’re going to get married or something.” I instantly regretted mentioning the word
married
. “Sorry. I didn’t mean any of that. Or I did, but just not the stupid parts.”

“No. I get you.”

“It’s just that I want you to, like, know me.”

“No. I know what you mean. I do.” He paused before going on. “Sometimes I think about you and I think about this town and I want to run away with you. Get you out of here.”

This is what those pop songs were about. All those bad clichés. This is why people spoke in low voices when they talked about the serious parts of falling in love. I imagined climbing down the side of my house, climbing down a trellis we didn’t have, and running to his car as he revved the engine in defiance of everything we were about to leave behind.

“No. I know what you mean. Is it bad that there’s part of me that’s jealous of that girl that disappeared? Jenny Moore? I feel like she’s okay. I know that sounds weird. I was really scared for her for a long time, and now I feel like she’s just in a better place.”

“You mean, like she’s dead?”

“No. Not dead. That’s not what I meant.” I rubbed my eyes. “I guess I don’t know what I mean.”

He laughed. “Are you drunk?”

“No,” I said. “I meant that she’s just like somewhere else, you know? Not dead. Just not here.”

He laughed again. “Dude, I’m trying to follow you. Honestly, I am.”

I sighed. “I want to tell you something. But you can’t get freaked out.”