Last Call (14 page)

For her part, Rosamond is still in a state of shock. She thinks constantly about that first day at the baseball game when Hayden casually placed his arm around her shoulders, and how it made her spine tingle with pleasure. It was so memorable and thrilling that the next time they went to a game she’d made sure to be right next to him when it looked as if the Mets might score a home run. So why did she have to scream like that and spill ice cream all over him? It was all so horribly embarrassing. She’s too chagrined even to glance in his direction.

Hayden keeps his hands on Joey’s shoulders to avoid meeting her gaze as he gruffly asks, “You coming, Rosie?”

“I . . . I’d better help Diana with dinner.”

Diana senses that something disagreeable has transpired between Hayden and Rosamond. She takes a closer look at them and her eyes settle on the multihued goo covering the front of his khakis and Rosamond’s hazard orange–stained lips. “Dad,
what
is that all over your pants?”

He irritably barks back at her, “After thirty years in the insurance business I’ve finally fallen victim to an Act of God.”

chapter twenty-two

W
hen Joey comes back alone from getting ice cream with Hayden, and Diana hears a car pulling out of the driveway, she immediately senses that something is amiss. “Where’s your grandfather?”

“He said he’s going out,” replies Joey.

“What else did he say?” Diana insists.

“Not to wait up.” Joey goes directly to the kitchen sink and washes his hands before dinner without being asked in an effort to improve her mood. It’s not been lost on him that Diana always gets grouchy whenever Hayden goes out at night. And by checking the clock all evening she inevitably orders him off to bed much earlier than if she’s happily watching one of her favorite movies.

Throwing up her arms as if they’re goalposts for a place kicker, Diana turns to Rosamond. “I
hate it
when he goes and gets drunk with those crazy Scottish friends of his. They should all be in detox.”

“Oh dear,” says Rosamond, feeling responsible for Hayden’s departure. This must be what is meant by the expression “driving someone to drink.” Fortunately Diana doesn’t appear to blame her. Nor has she asked about what transpired in the backyard. And Rosamond has been too embarrassed to volunteer any information.

Once they’re all sitting at the dinner table, Diana turns her attention back to Joey’s bruised face, though his pained expression is more the result of a bruised ego. Diana examines the patches of green and yellow appearing beneath his swollen left eye. She reaches out to touch the scab forming above his split lip but he pushes her away.

“Well, I think we’ve had enough excitement for one day,” concludes Diana.

An hour after Joey is sent off to bed, Rosamond sits in her room trying to concentrate on a book while the voices coming from Diana’s TV in the next bedroom murmur in the background. When she hears a car pull into the driveway Rosamond jumps up, tosses the book onto the bed, and pushes back the curtains. The station wagon is parked half on the lawn and half in the driveway, and a slightly stooped Hayden is careening toward the front porch. Rosamond checks her face in the mirror, straightens her hair, and rushes downstairs to meet him.

Only there’s no sign of Hayden anywhere on the first floor. Opening the front door she finds him leaning against the house with one hand on his midsection and the other gripping the metal railing along the steps. Even in the dimness of the porch light she can make out beads of perspiration on his forehead and that his normally ruddy complexion has turned ashen.

“Hayden!” she cries, alarmed to see this normally effervescent figure so debilitated. “Are you trying to
kill
yourself?” Rosamond takes his arm in an effort to help him inside but he shrugs her off and manages to stumble over the threshold on his own steam.

“No, it’s The Cancer that’s killing me. I’m just the battleground.” He turns so that his face is only a few inches from hers and she can smell the sweet but tangy aroma of whiskey on his breath. “What do you care?” he jabs an accusing finger into her shoulder.

“Why of course I care,” she says so quietly that it’s impossible to tell whether she’s afraid of waking Joey or of the words she’s saying.

“It wasn’t as if I was goin’ ta hurt you this afternoon!”

“I know that,” she replies, trying hard to sound convincing.

“Then why’d you jump away from me?” His voice rises sharply on the word
jump
.

“I honestly don’t know.”

“Yes, I think you do.” Once again he pokes at her shoulder where a summer-weight cotton sweater covers her blouse. “Bloody Brides of Christ. Two layers of clothing over twenty layers of thick skin.”

“Dad!” Diana comes racing down the stairway. “
What
is going on here?” But she doesn’t wait for an answer. It’s obvious that Hayden has been “overserved,” as he likes to put it. She places his arm over her shoulder and half drags him toward his new room at the back of the house.

Hayden goes along with Diana more because he welcomes the support than he’s ready to call it a night. Though he manages to turn his head and yell back at Rosamond, “I wasn’t goin’ ta hurt you!”

When Diana returns to the living room Rosamond starts trying to explain recent events, but her words come out in a jumble and tears begin to fill the corners of her eyes.

Diana places an arm around her new friend. “It’s okay, don’t cry. Believe me, I can figure out what happened. I’ve been there a million times. But don’t take it personally. Dad’s drunk and he didn’t mean what he said. Let’s go watch
Algiers
with Hedy Lamarr and Charles Boyer. It starts at midnight.”

Rosamond, feeling uncharacteristically fragile, searches her pockets for a tissue. “But, what he said, I mean . . . he did, I mean . . .”

“Listen Rosamond, a man thinks that a woman has rejected him and immediately there must be something wrong with
her
, right? It can’t possibly have to do with
him
.”

“But he’s so angry with me.”

“Oh, he’s not mad, he’s just embarrassed.” Diana waves dismissively in the direction of Hayden’s room. “You’ll see, it will all be okay tomorrow. He probably won’t even remember that he saw you tonight. Welcome to family life.” She nods toward the stairs. “In the meantime, you’ll find that TV boyfriends are much better companions. You don’t need to wear makeup or high heels, and the minute they become annoying you just switch them off and go to sleep.”

chapter twenty-three

T
he next morning Rosamond nervously waits for Hayden to emerge from his room, hoping that Diana is right and that he won’t remember last night’s altercation. She wishes, in fact, that there were some way to erase
all
of yesterday from his mind.

At nine o’clock Rosamond starts back toward Hayden’s room for the third time, but upon reaching the closed door turns away, realizing that she can’t bear another round like last night. Only what can he possibly be doing in there? On a normal day, he’d have already been to the gas station and the newsstand by now.

Just when Rosamond is about to send Joey into the room, Hayden comes marching through the front door singing “The Blue Bells of Scotland” with great gusto.

“Oh where, tell me where, is your Highland laddie gone? Oh where, tell me where, is your Highland laddie gone? He’s gone wi’ streaming banners, where noble deeds are don’ And it’s oh! in my heart I wish him safe at home.”

Rosamond’s anxiety disappears as she laughs at the picture of Hayden she’s had in her head all morning, angry and ailing in his bed without anything to eat or drink. So sure was Rosamond that he was still in his room she hadn’t even thought to check if the car was in the driveway.

Hayden waltzes gaily past her, stopping just long enough to drop a small box covered in gold wrapping paper into her lap, and then disappears into the kitchen with a bakery bag. She doesn’t know what to make of the situation.
He
is giving
her
a present? When she’s the one who acted like such a frigid fool? Although maybe it isn’t a present at all. Perhaps it’s another of his suicide potions.

Rosamond tentatively peels away the paper and opens the box to find a shiny new charm bracelet with six charms already dangling from a silver chain. She carefully studies each one—the Empire State Building, an apple, a museum, a banner for the Mets, an adorable miniature rendition of the Brooklyn Bridge, and on the end a little fish. She can’t help but wonder if the fish is intended as a symbol of Christianity or a memento of their fishing trips.

Glancing toward the kitchen Rosamond hears the sounds of Hayden making coffee and pushing down the squeaky lever on the old-fashioned toaster. He must have stopped to buy bagels while he was out. Hayden loved the reaction he got from the counter people and other customers when he gleefully ordered his favorite bagel, “an everything with nothing.”

Rosamond is thrilled by the gift, but even more so with the idea of a man buying her a present. It was just like a scene out of the movies Diana is always watching. In fact, the night before last they were in Diana’s room watching
The Old Maid
when a nostalgic Bette Davis said something to the effect of: “A woman never stops thinking of the man she loves; she thinks of him in all sorts of unconscious ways—a sunset, an old song, a cameo . . . and a chain.” And Rosamond and Diana found it so breathtakingly romantic that they’d both hugged their pillows and sighed.

Holding up the bracelet and seeing it sparkle and shine in the morning light causes her heart to rise in her chest. But it abruptly falls back to earth as Rosamond remembers that she’s not allowed any jewelry other than her cross, rosary, and wedding ring. She drops the bracelet back into its box as she painfully recalls the day she sold her mother’s pearls to make a dowry that would be presented to the Church upon taking her final vows.

Then she extracts it from the box again. I
must
, she orders herself, stop reacting like a nun to every situation! That’s what caused all the trouble in the backyard yesterday—Hayden wanting to kiss her and her seeing the frowning face of her mother superior glaring down at them through the tree branches. In fact, if she’d had visions as strong as that back when she was in the convent, as some of her sisters did, it’s doubtful her faith would have faltered in the first place.

It’s when Rosamond lifts the shiny chain for the second time that she notices the little handwritten card at the bottom of the box:

Going My Way? Your friend, H.M.

Rosamond assumes that Hayden’s referring to all the places in and around New York that they’ve decided to try and see before they die. The Empire State Building has been at the top of her list and at the very bottom of Hayden’s. He declared it to be a “bloody tourist trap.” As to
your friend
, well, it could be worse. At least he doesn’t consider her an enemy. She links the bracelet around her wrist and hurries into the kitchen to thank him before she has time for any more ridiculous thoughts or flashbacks.

Joey is leaning over Hayden at the table and pointing to an ad in the local paper for the annual Coney Island Mermaid Parade. “Please can we go, Grandpa? Please, I’ll do anything—I’ll wash the car and even clean out the garage. I’ll pay for the gas.” Joey is convinced that this event will provide an opportunity for him to see half-naked women.

Rosamond attempts to get Hayden’s attention by pointing to the bracelet dangling from her wrist but he only gives her a dismissive nod and turns back to Joey. The urge to throw the bracelet right back in his face momentarily overwhelms her and she’s further surprised by this newly discovered capacity to anger so quickly, and over something so petty. But why did Hayden give her a gift in the first place if he didn’t want them to make up? Once again, Rosamond is lost at sea in the relationship game.

Then she recalls Diana’s words from the night before—
he’s not angry, he’s embarrassed.
And she understands that the peace offering isn’t supposed to be formally acknowledged, since that would only remind them of yesterday, which is what they’re both trying to forget.

“Doesn’t this look like fun, Rosie?” Joey attempts to enlist Rosamond in his campaign to attend the Mermaid Parade. “It’d be so much cooler than the craft museum, don’t you think?”

“Museums are educational,” says Rosamond.

“Mermaids are educational,” says Joey. “Hans Christian Andersen wrote about them and there’s even a statue of one in Denmark. When I get my computer back I can show it to you on the Internet!”

Hayden and Rosamond are susceptible to his boyish enthusiasm and agree to most of Joey’s more reasonable requests. After all, it was Joey who landed them at the game farm and the circus, outings that put them solidly on the path to friendship in the first place, so they consent to drive to Coney Island.

Once they’re in the car Hayden suggests to Joey, “Maybe you can work for Disney and make millions on turning those fairy tales into cartoons.”

“I’ve decided to become a priest,” announces Joey.

“What?”
Rosamond and Hayden utter simultaneously and Hayden accidentally jerks the station wagon to the right as he turns to look at Joey in the backseat.

“Just kidding,” says Joey and giggles. “Hey, what did the Buddhist say to the hot-dog vendor?”

“I don’t know.” Rosamond takes the bait. “What did the Buddhist say to the hot-dog vendor?”

“Make me one with everything!”

Rosamond laughs merrily, and Joey is thrilled by the attention she lavishes on him.

“Maybe you should become a stand-up comic,” suggests Hayden. “I’ve never known a kid who can remember so many terrible jokes.”

That’s all Joey needs to get started. “Knock knock!”

“Who’s there?” asks Rosamond.

“Mayonnaise,” says Joey.

“Mayonnaise who?” asks Rosamond.

“Mayonnaise have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

Rosamond laughs again, but Hayden just groans and shakes his head as if he’s forced to work as a bus driver for elementary school children. He digs around in the glove compartment and sticks a tape into the cassette deck. “You two acolytes may as well enjoy a little of the Gospel according to John and Paul,” says Hayden.