St. Patrick's Bed (Ashland, 3) (21 page)

He grinned.

"Good night." I chucked him on the arm, touching him one more time.
 

"Night."

The kettle began to whistle as I headed up the stairs.

PART FOUR

St. Patrick's Bed

I can understand myself only in the light of inner happenings. It is these that make up the singularity of my life.

—Carl Jung

Memories, Dreams, Reflections

EIGHTEEN

I

In the morning, both the ashtray and coffee mug were still there. They were empty, though. No butts, ashes, no coffee stains. Clean as a whistle.

But I could smell it. So could Jeanne.
 

"Somebody's been smoking," she said. She looked at the ashtray, then at me, strangely. "Not you."
 

"Not me."
 

"Can't be Adam."
 

"I don't think so."
 

"You're not telling me."
 

"I don't know what to tell you."
 

She hesitated. Then: "Tell me everything's okay."
 

I reached out, twisted a finger in the hair, touched her neck. "Everything's okay."

She came close, tilted her head against my chest, closed her eyes, breathed evenly.

My hand went to the back of her head, her hair soft in my palm.

"Whatcha doin'?" I asked, standing at the bedroom door.

Adam, seated in front of his computer console, smiled. "Surfing."

"Surfing," I repeated. I liked saying it. It made me feel young. "For what?"

"That's the beauty of it. You go in any direction. Bob and weave. Links here, there. You never know where you'll end up. Follow a whim."

"For instance."

"For instance, I typed in '1990 Toyota Tercel.' My car. The windshield wipers are seizing up. Wanted to get some information or advice, what to do."

"And?"

"Found out there's a linkage that's probably jammed. I'll see what I can do without taking it to a garage. The rad's pretty shot too. Jesus, you should see it. Found some prices on a new one."

"How much?"

"Two-fifty. Three hundred."

"You got the money?"

"You kidding?"

"We'll work something out." I shifted my weight, straightened in the doorway. "I thought you said there was a random flow to your surfing. Sounds pretty focused to me."

"Remember Madagascar?"

"Mm?"

"Fourth largest island in the world? My anthropology class?"

I remembered discovering that he was actually taking anthropology. "It's coming back to me."

"Look." He clicked on something. A menu popped up. He highlighted a line in blue, clicked again. A photograph of strangely shaped trees against a red sky crept slowly down the screen, text overlaying it. "Baobabs. Upside-down trees."

Another click. The image changed. People carrying what looked like a shrouded body through a village square.

"What am I looking at now?"

"It's right in the middle of death dancing season," he said.

I was quiet.

"June to September—winter down there. Malagasy families unearth loved ones from their tombs, dance with them, then carefully rewrap them for reburial before the warm weather."

I walked over to where Adam sat, stood behind him, stared at the screen.

"It happens every five years. They update their ancestors on family gossip too. Then they wrap them in new cloth, put them back, inside the family tombs, with something they liked in life—a favorite drink, food. They attend to their needs."

A coffee mug. An ashtray.

"It's not morbid. It's joyous, celebratory. They call it
famadihana."

An electric razor.

Adam shrugged. "Just surfing. It's interesting. Whatta ya think?"

"What's it mean?"

"What?"

"That word. Famadihana."

"Literal translation is 'turning of bones.' Everybody gathers round, toasts them with beer, Coke, sings songs, wears party hats. Wild, eh?"

The red garnet ring. The tackle box.

"And it's not just in remote communities. Right outside the capital too. Organized by businessmen, professionals, academics." He turned, looked at me. "You think it's nonsense? Craziness?"

I thought of the holy well and bed at
Mám Eán,
heard Brendan's words.
Lots of folks dismiss it as childish superstition, but I think they miss the point.
"No," I said. I had both hands on his shoulders now. "I think maybe they're onto something."

I missed my father. I missed my mother. I missed everybody. I saw Aidan's hand closing over the stone, squeezing. "I think I know what you should do," I said.

"About what?"

His shoulders in my hands. "About going to see your father. Later this summer."

He looked up at me. I thought of Donny Swiss, his half brother, marking maps in the pocket guide to Dayton with a yellow highlighter.

"Go," I said. "See him." See them both. Hear the music. "It's the right thing to do."

We stared at one another. His eyes widened.

I nodded. "I'll help you."

II

Two weeks later, Adam and I took his Toyota to Uptown Motors on Queen Street and had them drop in a new rad. With tax, it came to $299. I put it on my Visa. Next day, we drove up to Mr. Lube on Thorncliffe Drive—where Adam had worked the previous summer—to get a checkup and oil change. They replaced the air filter, PCV valve, wiper blades, told him everything else was okay. Before I could offer, Adam paid for it himself, with cash.

"How much?" I asked on the way home.

"They gave me a discount. As an old employee, you know." He grinned. He never did tell me how much.

Through the windshield, I looked at the new wiper blades. "You get that linkage problem straightened out?"

"Last night. After dinner. Fixed it myself."

I stared at the five o'clock shadow, his hands on the wheel, smiled.

On Monday, August 28, 1995, Adam left for Dayton with Bobby Swiss's address and phone number folded into the back pocket of his jeans. Jeanne and I watched him drive down the street, the August morning lightening in the east. He hit the horn once, quickly and lightly, a wave out the window, then was gone, around the corner.

Twenty-one, I thought. When anything is possible.

I looked at Jeanne. "It's early. Why don't we treat ourselves to breakfast?"

"Where?"

"McDonald's?" I got the smile from her, the one I wanted, the one that tells me how lucky we both are.

"Big shot. You always know how to treat a woman." Her eyes held me: a touch of Kentucky rain, soft. "You still think he'll be okay?"

I looked at her. "He'll be fine." The street was empty, the air beginning to warm. "If there's a kid out there with his head screwed on better than his, I'd like to meet him."

She was quiet. Then: "Thanks."

"For what?"

"Everything."

"The McDonald's breakfast?"

"Yeah. Right. The McDonald's breakfast."

Then the smile reappeared, a summer's end smile, melting me.

III

We didn't hear from Adam all week. Then, after dinner, Friday, September 1, five days later, he came through the front door. He was home.

Jeanne lit the outdoor candles and we sat on the back deck. I remembered she and I alone here, a few weeks earlier. I remembered she and I sipping warm beer from long-necked bottles of Bud, on the veranda of her place in Ashland, Adam with a Coke, a summer evening, eleven years ago. The past and the present, together.

Adam took a swig of cold Sleeman's ale, put it down on the plastic table, let the ring of condensation form at its base. "Good," he said, sighed. "It was a long drive."

I filled two glasses with what was left from the bottle of white chardonnay in the fridge, placed one in front of Jeanne, sat down with mine. "Cheers."

We clinked bottle and glasses.

Waited.

Adam looked down, thinking.

Without tension, the moment stretched. It would happen, I knew. Words needed to be chosen. You can tell too much. Adam knew it too.

"I took your advice, Leo. Stayed on the outskirts, at a Days Inn." He touched the beer bottle, made a line in the droplets. "Phoned him Tuesday, told him who I was, said I was in town, asked if I could see him."

He paused, but not for any dramatic effect. It was an honest pause. We could see that the words were coming slow, not doing justice to memory, feelings.

"He seemed pretty surprised at first. Then he was quiet for a minute." He shook his head. "Jesus, we were both quiet. I was almost dizzy."

I was almost dizzy listening. I glanced at Jeanne, saw her jaw rigid.

"He asked me to hold the line while he talked to his wife, then came back and said that she thought I should come to dinner the next night, what did I think of that? I asked him if he'd like that, and he said, yes, he thought he would, if I would." Adam shrugged. "So I went. The next night."

"We had meat loaf. He asked me if I'd like a beer with dinner. I said whatever he was having, so he opened two." Another pause, thinking. "I met his wife, Pam. And I met his son, Donny."

I watched Jeanne's face, but couldn't read it.

"I have a brother." And then he smiled. And when he smiled, Jeanne relaxed, and I saw the edge, the touch of relief, the start of something close to wonder, close to happiness, and found myself smiling too.

"He has a life." He was talking to his mother now. "He works at Delco. His wife takes care of Donny, who is sixteen, but has a medical problem and needs her." When he didn't elaborate, didn't dwell on it, my admiration for him stirred. "We had a nice evening." Then he nodded, remembering. "Very nice." He reached in his pocket. "He gave me this."

I stared at the audio cassette he placed on the table between us:
Roy Orbison—In Dreams: The Greatest Hits.

"I listened to it in the car on the way back. Good stuff. He knows a lot about music."

Looking around me now, at the two of them, at the city, the August night, I could hear the music.

"Will you see him again?" It was the first thing Jeanne had asked. I watched Adam lock eyes with his mother.

He was quiet for a moment, then shrugged. "Maybe."

We listened. Waited.

"It's not as important now." He was still staring at his mother. "But I'll keep in touch with Donny. I'm going to write, phone. I'll see him again. Somehow." Then he turned to me, spoke to me. "He told me I didn't need him. Said I had a good father already."

Our eyes met.

"Said to say hello to you, Leo. And that Donny loved his guide to Dayton."

Jeanne looked at me.

"He also wanted me to tell you that you owed him a buck for a pool game. And that Mamma DiSalvo says you're a good tipper."

Jeanne and Adam were both still staring at me when I closed my eyes. That was when I heard him say it to her.

"He said, tell your mother that I'm sorry."

When I opened my eyes, Jeanne's cheeks were wet. But she was smiling. She was smiling. And so was Adam.

"Only the Lonely," "In Dreams," "Running Scared," "It's Over," "Crying." Adam put the tape on in the living room and we left the screen door open so we could hear it on the back deck. We finished our drinks, talked. We listened to Roy, to that unearthly voice, heard him hit those high notes, way up there.

IV

It was the second weekend in October, the beginnings of oranges and yellows, when I finally stood back, placed the paintbrush in the tray, admired it, proud of myself. I'd knocked out the old one, measured, framed it, bought the replacement at Home Depot, screwed it into place, caulked the seams, and had just finished the final coat of paint.

The air outside had cooled. Everything would change, then return again, the seasons rolling round. The past, the present, the future.

See, I said to him. You got your new window. Slides open like a dream, anytime you want. Wide open. Look out there. Feel that breeze.