The Fives Run North-South (6 page)

“Thanks, Dad.”

“For what?”

“No speeches about being more responsible. You know, the old ‘don’t dance on the roof while drunk’ speech every dad has to give his kid at least once in life.”

“I got it out of my system while you were unconscious,” I said. “Besides, I’m proud you took out your nonwriting hand. Gets you back to the books more quickly.”

“No one writes in school any more. We type now. Or
point
-
and
-
click
.”

“Yeah, we used ink quills back in my school days. Wrote by candlelight.”

He gave a polite chuckle that tuned into a cough. “Damn, my throat’s dry. Can you ring up one of those ladies in their pajamas to get me a drink?”

“Sure.” I stood up.

Then he looked around. “Dad?” he said.

“Yes?”

“Where’s Mom?”

“Took a walk. She’ll be back in a bit.”

“Can I tell you something? Don’t freak out.”

“Sure.”

“I said the same thing to her before they took me in.”

“No sweat, Scrapper. What’s up?”

His expression stole the smile from my face. He was a bit frightened. His mouth moved slightly as if trying to preform the words.

“Whatever it is, you can speak your mind,” I encouraged him.

“Well, I just want to say I know I’m a lucky guy. Had a great family life for the most part. Better than most. I just think I have to say this.”

“What?”

“I’m out of the house now. Don’t plan on coming back. For good, anyway.”

“Either way, we have no plans to convert your bedroom into a workout room or anything.”

“I know. I’m just saying. I want you to know if you and mom are staying together because of me, you don’t need to. If a divorce is going to make each of you happier, that’s what I want. I’d hate to think you’re making an unnecessary sacrifice for my sake.”

I wanted to push back a little, to ask him why he’d be thinking that way. Maybe send him a clear message that he was off base and that we were in it for the long haul. Sure, I’d even surprised myself the day the red SUV cut me off by allowing the thought of divorce to dance around my skull for the first time. But that’s as far as it had gone; and it’d clearly rooted itself more firmly in his thoughts based on what I was seeing. That was unnerving but strangely reassuring. I put my hand on his shoulder.

“Appreciate hearing that. But today’s about you and getting you back to dancing on rooftops. Less steep ones next time, you think?”

Only later did it occur to me to wonder how Suze had reacted to him.

It was getting darker in the hospital room, and my head was getting heavy and fuzzy as I sat in the potbelly pig chair beside Peter’s bed. Suze was curled up asleep on a smallish couch under the window. She’s great in situations like this. I’d watched her comfort Peter, take charge of the nurses, and draw information out of the doctors in a way that I’d have been incapable of. I admired her for that and for the good it was doing my son. Soon I’d make my way to the adjacent hotel, take a shower, and try to sleep. But for a second I just wanted to sit at Peter’s bedside.

I was looking at his face as he slept. It’s one of those things that punches your gut as a parent, looking at the face of your child as he sleeps. We don’t do it often enough. The shape of the nose. The places where the skin is a little tighter. The dash of freckles. We hold their face in our minds always younger than they are at the moment. And as I really looked at it, I saw signs of aging that surprised me. Time had marked him in ways that I hadn’t noticed.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d held Peter’s hand.

Probably not unusual, but there had to be a
last
time. I do remember holding it. A few times stick out in my mind, but there were probably hundreds. Back when he was young. Crossing the street. Early Halloween walks. Entering a crowded party, him looking for reassurance. But there had to be a last time. Did it plenty when he was three years old. Four. Six. But at seven? Nine? I couldn’t have recognized the final time it had happened; I’m sure I’d have marked the moment. You do that with the big things; you try to keep a snapshot. What we
miss
—
and
what fades more
quickly
—
is
the ordinary, the faded days where a young family has gravity, and the comfort of permanence. Easier to recall are the
standard
-
fare
big moments.

I remember clearly the day he left for college.

We walked down to the car, packed up and ready to take him from our home to his college dorm up in Vermont. I remember how I had to fight the urge to reach out and take that hand again, knowing if I did he’d look at me in surprise with an edge of discomfort. It would be followed by a smile and a retreat; the required display of masculine embarrassment. No, the last time I held his hand would remain just that.

As we strolled from the house to the car, I was recalling another
time
—
the
time I first realized that I couldn’t put him inside the hard shell of my care (why is it that those slightly more painful snapshots have to be the ones to so easily stick?). He had been twelve, perhaps thirteen. One of those school events, I don’t know, science fair, play, something. Suze and I had been seated in the bleachers; he’d been below us on the gym floor talking with a friend. His ears…always those ears. They grew out when he was five and it took another twelve years for his body to catch up to them. Made him easy to pick out in a crowd, poor kid. And then that other boy had walked by him. I remember the face: it had that smirk that made it evident he expected the world’s seas to part before him. You wanted to smack it off his face because he was probably right and it simply wasn’t fair. He was a head taller and much broader than my boy. And as he passed by he’d chucked his fist into my son’s ribs. I’d watched as my son’s face mixed shock, embarrassment, fear, and shame, all of which merged into a weak smile as he looked up at the smirking boy. A smile that said: “Ha. That was funny how you poked me.” Smirk Boy had just rolled his eyes and walked on. And I’d simply clenched my fists. You can’t put that hard shell over them, and that’s when I first felt the pit. In my side, like someone scooped out part of the meat from under my ribs and replaced it with a clench.

As I held the door to the car open the pit came back. Peter was looking in at his friend Alex, anxious to get going to Vermont. Behind me Suze hugged herself and forced a smile.

“You good on cash?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Well, if you’re offering…” he said.

For the third time that hour, I pulled out my wallet and slipped more bills into his eager hand. He stuffed them in his jean pocket, another ball of money for the collection.

“You going to let us know when you get there?” I asked.

“I’ll text ya’,” he said, jumping into the car.

I flicked his ear. “Hug your mother,” I said.

“Oh, yeah,” he said, although his face told me that he’d thought the one back in the house had counted. He jumped over and, to his credit, gave her a warm embrace. Her hand went to the back of his head, and I saw her run her fingers through his hair, start to tighten, and loosen as he pulled away. He turned to me.

“Well,” he said.

“Money’s all gone,” I said.

He smiled, though his eye flicked just briefly to the car and to the road in front of it. So I put my hands on his shoulders, squeezed for a second, and turned him around. “Get in,” I said. “You have to beat rush hour in the tunnel.”

“Thanks, Dad,” he said. He reached up, nearly touching my hand as I pulled it away. I think we both paused, but I’m not sure. As the door shut, Alex said something and they both laughed. I didn’t catch it, but I did see the look on their faces, and recognized it. It was the look of what was ahead of them, not behind. But that’s how it’s supposed to be, isn’t it?

And now, nearly two years later I sat next to his hospital bed and looked at a face that had grown a bit stranger to me, and I found it hard to breathe. I was glad I’d avoided the excuses and made the trip from my office to his bedside. For a second, I felt like tossing it all away: my company, Kyle Thomas, the red SUV, the bits and pieces that were outside the walls of this room, and the people inside. As crappy as this room was, it had formed a bubble around us. It was just us here now: Peter, Suze, and me. Quiet and calm (Peter, with the help of medication, but hey…), the buzz of the world was alien just now, just here.

I found myself looking at Peter’s hand.
When was the last time you held it? Why not now? Then you’d always know the answer to the question.
Behind me I heard Suze stir. The urge to grab my son’s hand faded in a wisp. The door opened and the night nurse came in, giving me a look of mild surprise that we were still here. She followed that up with a look of mild annoyance.

“I have to check his vitals,” she said.

And as I watched, she grabbed that very hand I’d been looking at just moments ago so she could lift it up and put her other hand over his wrist to check his pulse. Behind me, Suze moaned softly as she pulled herself out of sleep.

When was the last time you held your son’s hand?

As I saw his limp hand in the nurse’s, I comforted myself with the thought that some answers are okay if they remain a mystery. Holding hands only counts if he can hold mine back, and those days were over. He’d be all right.

I turned to Suze. “You want to get over to the hotel?”

She nodded. We both looked at Peter again for a second and walked out.

“You going back to the office tomorrow?” she asked.

I nodded.

6

E
nough of that.

I was nearly home as the late afternoon shadows drew across the roadway ahead. I couldn’t get back fast enough. I looked forward to running the shower extra hot to try and peel away the layer of slime that always seems to stick after spending hours in a hospital. Probably more my imagination than anything, but there seemed a thick, airborne cocktail of dusty germs, cough spray, and chemicals layered on my skin, hair, and clothing.

Peter would be all right. Suze was where she wanted to be; any excuse to stay by her son rather than with her husband. And I was going back to where I was really needed. The
two
-
day
break, while not an ideal way to spend time with family, had been a
slow
-
paced
and somewhat reflective oasis. But ultimately, we all have to give the world our attention. And I found myself wanting time to spin ahead quickly, eager to be at my desk, energized to push ahead in my fight to maintain status quo at FMP. I’d start with getting Chester back to
full
-
froth
squirm, and work my way up. As I drove, scenarios played out in my head. I even found myself speaking aloud: my side of upcoming conversations in which I’d reassert my dominance, scoring points quickly (all
three
-
pointers)
. As I worked the gas and brake pedals, my left leg bounced as if I were ready to run a race.

That’s more like it.

I was further buoyed by the thought of having the house to myself for at least this week, maybe more. I could return at the end of each day confident in relaxing. No battles to wage, no eggshells to skip over. Who knows, perhaps a bit of time apart might be the best medicine. Not even counting the financial implications, I could only imagine that the process of a divorce is a colossal waste of energy and time.

I cruised onto the exit ramp near our neighborhood. I considered stopping off to pick up some food but really didn’t want to do anything but park the car and take that shower. I was sure I’d find a box of something in the freezer. Worst case: call out for pizza.

I thought of Suze again. Doing the math, there are certainly more points in the win column than the sum of all the collective rough spots from our marriage. I remember just a year after meeting her, Suze had to go away for a couple weeks. Not sure where, really. Couldn’t have been her job, because back then she was with Norris Publishing. Proofreading textbooks. Gave a guy like me quite an advantage in the early days of our relationship. It’s surprisingly easy to be witty and exciting at night when your young girlfriend spends the day proofreading
junior
-
high
-
level
social studies textbooks. Looking back, I think she was traveling for a family thing. Not a wedding, though. No way she’d go to a wedding alone. She would have taken
me
—
even
if we’d only been on a single
date
—
to
save herself from being alone with her relatives. I’m thinking it was probably a funeral.

Anyway, I recall a conversation shortly after I’d picked her up at the airport. As we sat in the car waiting to pay the parking garage attendant, I turned to her and said: “It’s weird. Had a busy week. At the end of every day, it felt strange not telling you about what happened. It’s gotten so that when I do or see something, it doesn’t become real until I tell you about it.”

That made her cry. A happy cry.

Strangely, I still kind of feel that way, perhaps more so. But it’s not something I’d tell her. And I don’t make her cry anymore. Not in that way, anyway.

Up ahead, I saw the entrance to our subdivision. I was already beginning to relax and plan which bottle of wine I’d open. As I rounded the bend to approach our house, I looked at it and saw the same thing I’ve seen hundreds of times, meanwhile feeling the relief of a long car ride coming to completion.

Except something wasn’t right.

I pumped the brakes and looked again. When I saw it, I was filled with dread and apprehension. At the very least, I knew a hot shower and tall glass of wine both just faded a bit from my mind.

The front door was open and ajar.

The best
theory
—
at
least the one that made me the most
comfortable
—
is
pretty realistic. In fact, had I not just experienced the events of the last week, it’s exactly where I’d find the explanation: Suze, who comes and goes with alarming frequency during the day (gym and back, store and back, coffee with Patty/Sue/Tamra/Lynda, or some combination of those four and back…) she never bothers to pull her car into the garage until the last loop of the day. From the drive, it was easier to use the front door rather than the utility room door that exited into the garage. And upon hearing about Peter, she made a mad rush to gather her things and hop in the car (with, I’m sure, at least four or five hectic trips back into the house to grab
something
—
her
phone, her keys, a shoe, who knows?) before she’d have pulled out of the driveway. And with all likelihood, the last trip had been so hurried and harried that she didn’t bring the door to a complete close. A light draft pushed it open sometime after she left, and voila.

Like I said, that was a theory.

I brought the car to a stop in the driveway. got out slowly, and looked at the entrance. When people hear I’m a CEO, they have certain preconceived notions about assorted aspects of my life, one of which would be the size of my home. Is it large? Sure. Larger than necessary for the two or even three inhabitants. It’s certainly not of the size and scope of most CEOs I know in equivalently sized companies. It can be argued we live in only the
second
-
nicest
community in our city, and our home’s not the largest in our subdivision. Every so often, Suze gets a touch of house envy and suggests we could have aimed higher. We both came from modest backgrounds, smaller childhood homes in
middle
-
class
neighborhoods. It’s kept us grounded, and makes it easy to recognize the absurdity of now occupying a house where we have two people sharing a bedroom while five others sit empty. And if we wanted to feel extravagant (and get a little bonus exercise) we could take a dump in one bathroom, wipe in another, wash in a third, dry our hands in a fourth, and still leave a half bath unused.

I also liked that our house appeared more modest from the front than it really was. So what if strangers who drove or strolled by our home didn’t fully appreciate the total scope of our home? I rarely felt the need to flaunt anything or to measure my worth by home size. The narrowest part of the home was the front; it expanded in size toward the back of the lot, which faced woods (so perhaps a perceptive squirrel or two could be impressed). I walked briskly from the drive to the front
entrance
—
unable
to help noticing a few things I’d like to point out to the overpriced landscape
company
—
climbed
up the front steps and walked cautiously to the door. I gave it a nudge and stood in the doorway as it swung completely open. To my relief, I saw nothing disturbed or missing. Really, no indication that anyone had been in there. At least from where I stood. Next step: walk the house. For a second I considered going back to the garage and grabbing a golf club or something, but decided it was foolish.

I walked into the living room. The house was darkening as evening approached. Nothing was amiss; it looked as unused and empty as ever. (We have eight rooms that are almost never occupied: living room; formal dining room; two guest rooms; three baths; and the play room. Somehow when we bought the place, I’d been excited about the play room. We always imagine we’ll have more leisure time. Or entertain more. But bottom line: most of my home went unused.)

Walking through the living room, I went straight to the kitchen and flipped on the lights. The LED spots flooded the room, spreading out into the eating area and den. I saw some dishes in the sink (another indication Suze left in a rush…she hated the sight of dishes in the sink almost as much as seeing bath towels on the floor. Or limb amputation, because I swear, her reaction sometimes seems to be on that level).

Looking around, there was no indication that anyone had been or was still in our home. Now I had a decision to make: 1) chalk it up to my theory that Suze left it ajar in haste, get that shower and wine, and enjoy an evening of relaxation; or 2) search every nook and closet in the place for an intruder. The question, I supposed, was this: could I truly relax if I had a
thought
-
thorn
tickling the back of my mind with the possibility that I wasn’t actually alone?

I cocked my head to listen. The house was silent, which in truth didn’t really help matters as much as you’d think. In a house of this size, the silence is riddled with smaller noises. Small hums, buzzes, and creaks. Absent the noise of
life
—
background
conversations, music, televisions in other rooms, active
appliances
—
any
house creeps close to haunted when empty and inactive; an unnatural state that is unnerving.

Well, maybe wine before shower. And hold off on the shower until I take a small stroll around…not really checking all closets and corners like some
obsessive
-
compulsive
paranoid, but stretch the legs and make sure all the valuable stuff was still in place. Think I have a good bottle of pinot noir in the…

And that’s when the ice maker in the standing freezer decided to drop a load of fresh ice into the holding tank with a
thunk.

I finally understood why startled people wet their pants. And while I didn’t actually do that, I enjoyed the feeling of having to catch myself. Followed up by a new feeling of one part embarrassment and two parts pissed. I let out a classic
combo
-
curse
and slammed my hand against the stainless steel surface of the freezer. Which hurt. And didn’t ease my heart rate. But somehow made me feel a bit better, simply because I went from being afraid of finding someone in my home to sort of hoping I’d find someone so that I could take out an aggression or two (as long as that someone wasn’t extremely larger than me).

With newfound determination, I walked through some of the key areas of the house. I saw no signs of disturbance, and of course didn’t find any evil SUV drivers hiding out. I passed through our den and pulled a bottle of wine from the rack. Twisting out the cork, I poured a glass and practically inhaled my first sip. Running my fingers through my
hair
—
slippery
with grease and hospital
grunge
—
I
moved toward my shower so that I could resume my original plan of relaxing for the remaining Sunday.

Five hours later, I went to bed. I was beginning to assemble the structure of my Monday, feeling relief in the narrow focus of my company and what I needed to accomplish. All of the events outside of that faded out as if they were some show I’d seen on TV; engrossing for a while, but ultimately disposable. Even Peter’s injury would simply turn out to be a story that would in time become a humorous family anecdote. Before turning off the light, I called Suze from our bed.

“You awake?” I asked. She’d answered with a husky, clogged voice.

“I think so,” she said. “Not really sure.”

“You don’t do him any good if you’re not sharp. It’s not like he’s going to get out of that bed and try to dance drunk on the hospital roof.”

“Very funny,” she said. “You know, it’s just so miserable in this hospital room. Even though he won’t admit it, having me here has to make it more tolerable.”