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“Obviously stage fright.”

“Picture this. The turtle-racing track is set up in the casinos of hotels where there’s gambling. Or in a ballroom, say. You line up eight turtles. They race for the food.”

“Race? Do we have the same definition of the word?”

“The beauty part is the race isn’t over in a minute. It can take maybe five minutes, even ten agonizing minutes.”

“I can see where it might be agonizing.”

A turtle’s head slowly appeared.

“After I get it established, I’d set up turtle tracks all over. People will get to know their favorites. It can go nationwide, international.”

“You’re thinking of TV, I suppose. A tie-in with
Wild Kingdom?
”

“TV. Offtrack betting.”

A turtle began to crawl a couple of inches to the left.

“I don’t understand it. They were going fast in my apartment.”

“Maybe they’re not ready to turn pro.”

Another period of waiting passed. The second turtle’s head appeared, the turtle did not move.

“Tony, you might be able to tie in with funeral parlors because at this pace people will be expiring.”

Rosselli looked at his turtles dejectedly. Doug patted him on the back.”

“I thought I had it,” Rosselli said.

“Some day you’re going to come up with something, Tony.”

Doug headed for the exit and Rosselli, for Doug’s benefit and his own, yelled, “You blew it, you dumbells! You coulda been stars!”

A weekend approached when the children were scheduled to be with Doug. On the phone Andy told him he was going to a late movie Friday with a friend and would be sleeping there. Karen said she didn’t know if she would be around at all for the weekend.

“Where do you plan to be, honey? It’s your time with me.”

“Jerry has to be in Quebec on business and he said he’d take me.”

“Why doesn’t he arrange it for when it’s their custodial time?”

“He’s opening a Flash store there and it’s this weekend. Quebec, Dad. I hear it’s really unique.”

“So—”

“Well, if I come to you, I’d miss it. We can make up the time. It’s not a big deal.”

“Jerry seems to be making it a big deal or you wouldn’t be so eager to go.”

“There’s going to be a big party and I’d get to see the city. Please!”

“I’ll see you Sunday night.”

“Thanks, Dad. Love you.”

That he went out the very next day to buy the Mitsubishi forty-five-inch projection screen was transparent, his attempt to compete with Flash, but he did it anyway. He needed the handyman to help him find a place for it in the apartment. The set would have overwhelmed the living room and seemed more appropriate in the bedroom, if a forty-five-inch screen could be appropriate in an apartment this size. When Andy entered the apartment he was amused to see it looming in the bedroom.

“So you got one, huh, Dad? Well, it’s large.”

“It
is
good for sports,” Doug said, trying to be low-keyed.

“Daddy, terrific!” Karen said when she arrived on Sunday night.

“Yes, we have Mitsubishis here, too,” he said.

It may not have been textbook fatherhood, but he asked only a question or two about Quebec and then cut off the discussion, since Quebec apparently was “absolutely wonderful.”

Andy was accepted by the University of Pennsylvania and Wesleyan University. He chose Wesleyan. Broeden happened to be a graduate of the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Doug had tried to be neutral, “in the best interests of the child,” but he was overjoyed at Andy’s choice of Wesleyan over Penn. He didn’t want his son going to Broeden’s alma mater.

When the children were with him, Doug never had a woman sleep in the apartment, thinking it prudent to keep his sexual activities private. Neither Doug nor Nancy was comfortable with the idea of adolescents on the premises, even sleeping ones, while they were in the bedroom together, so she did not stay over during his custodial periods. In all other respects the growing relationship was undisguised. Nancy and Doug cooked meals for the children, they all went to a Knicks game together, and to dinners in neighborhood restaurants. Doug spent a Saturday interviewing high school coaches for a column and returned to the apartment expecting to find the children there. At about 6
P.M.
they came into the house with Nancy. They had gone to the Museum of Modern Art and a movie, an arrangement he hadn’t know anything about. Nancy had called in the morning, she spoke with Andy, asked what they were doing, and invited them to spend the afternoon with her. The three of them were glowing when they came into the house, pleased with themselves for doing this. On another Saturday, when Doug had to work, Nancy asked the children to join her for a revival of
You Can’t Take It With You.
Doug sensed the ease with which the children were dealing with Nancy, their acceptance of her was a way of telling him, “This is a good person for you. Don’t lose her.”

One of Nancy’s clients was playing in a tennis tournament in New Orleans and Nancy asked if Doug would like to spend the weekend there. They flew to New Orleans on a Friday evening and went to the match the next day. The girl lost, but that she played at all was significant. She had injured her knee in a fall during a match the previous year, her career as well as her ability to walk properly had been in question. Nancy was of the opinion athletes were entitled to earn whatever money they could, their careers were so unstable, and Doug generally agreed with this, having written several columns on the subject. They talked about it at dinner and he said, “You’re like a boyhood fantasy come true. A girl who’ll sleep with you and appreciates sports.”

“A boyhood fantasy. I’m sorry I’m coming into the picture so late.”

“It’s never too late for that fantasy.”

They stayed at a hotel in the French Quarter and immersed themselves in New Orleans food, Dixieland jazz, sex. On Sunday they paused to listen to a last set of Dixieland in a bar before leaving for the airport.

“Wonderful food, sex, and a woman who understands your profession. Not a bad travel package,” he joked.

“I think you’re supposed to say ‘wonderful’ about the woman.”

“Thank you for the weekend.” And then, preoccupied, he became absorbed with the music. “You know,” he said after a while, “I haven’t listened to live Dixieland since I was a kid. We’d go to Central Plaza, a huge place, and you’d drink beer like a Big Guy. And later you’d try for heavy sex with your date who was supposed to appreciate what a Big Guy you were for drinking the beer and taking her there. I rubbed up against so many girls in apartment-house hallways after Dixieland jazz. None of it lasted. Where are those girls now?” He kissed the tips of her fingers. “This was a lovely gift, Nancy.”

“A hot time in New Orleans?”

“The chance to do a rewrite.”

Andy invited Nancy to his high school graduation, which was to be held at the Beacon Theater.

“It’s very kind of him,” she said to Doug. “But I don’t know if it’s my place.”

“He invited you. It’s his graduation.”

“Who else will be going?”

“My parents. My brother and sister-in-law. Karen, Susan, her husband, her parents.”

“Ouch.”

“I’m an outsider myself with some of those people.”

Before the doors opened for the ceremony, Andy’s guests waited on the sidewalk, divided by divorce. Nancy was coming from a breakfast meeting downtown.

“So who is this person you’re bringing?” Doug’s mother asked.

“She’s the mystery guest. A lawyer I’ve been seeing. Nancy Bauer.”

“This is serious?”

“Leave him alone, Mom,” Marty said.

“Leave him alone? He
is
alone.”

“We saw a program on TV,” Frank said. “About single parents.”

“The man,” Norma explained, “if he doesn’t have a wife, he can develop his
feminine
side.”

“These are very saucy programs you’re watching,” Doug said.

“That one,” Norma said, referring to Susan, “she got married. She didn’t wait around.”

Nancy arrived and was introduced to both families, Doug’s parents’ faces tense—is she the one who’ll save our unfortunate son from his feminine side?

Doug whispered to Nancy, “This is much too modern for me, you and Susan at the same time.”

“Think of us as just a couple of ladies you’ve slept with.”

Susan’s parents greeted Doug with warmth, the brooding disapproval of him had passed. He was old news. Doug had not seen his former in-laws in over three years, and in this period the Brooks had crossed a threshold into advancing age. Dr. Brook had been 67, he was now 70, and beginning to look less hearty. Susan’s mother, despite the typical Brook finery, also looked considerably older to him.

The Bradley chorus sang a Bruce Springsteen medley. At Doug’s high school graduation, in the fashion of the day, the chorus sang “You’ll Never Walk Alone.” June 1952. Over thirty years ago. Nearly as long as this woman I’m with has been alive. Give me strength. I could use a little “You’ll Never Walk Alone” myself right now.

As part of the ceremony three seniors delivered speeches about their views of the future. One was Andy Gardner, who spoke on the environment, an idealistic speech, but with documentation as he named prominent corporations that had been found to be polluters. The main commencement speaker was a former Bradley student and currently a domestic aide in the Reagan administration who delivered an inspirational message about American life and the vigorous job market that awaited these young people one day. Doug thought he might have been back in the Eisenhower years.

After the ceremony, while they waited for Andy, Broeden worked the crowd, passing along congratulations, asking other parents, “Who is your graduate?” so he could tell them his was Andy, “one of the speakers.” They went to Pasta!!! for lunch, and under arrangements made earlier in the week through Susan, Doug would share the expenses of the lunch with Broeden, Doug paying, Broeden sending him a check later on. As they were entering the restaurant Broeden said to Doug, “I’d like to pay for champagne for the lunch. It’s been such a great event.”

“Champagne is fine, but you don’t get to pay for it.”

“My pleasure. I want to do it.”

“We’re splitting this. You don’t get to feel any more important than anybody else around here.”

“All right. It was just a warmhearted offer. But let’s get a
good
champagne, okay?”

“That was Flash Broeden,” Doug said to Nancy.

“Yes, the flash is apparent.”

The mood in the restaurant was festive, other graduates were present with their families, youngsters were busy table-hopping. Andy and Karen told stories about school, laughing. Doug joined in the high-spiritedness and then began to reflect on the tangled path leading to this particular grouping, to be celebrating his son’s high school graduation with his ex-wife, her husband, his ex-in-laws, his current girlfriend, his brother and sister-in-law and his parents, who didn’t talk to the other side. He looked at Susan and at Andy, remembering.

“I’m so scared. What if the baby dies? What if we both die?”

“Nobody’s dying. Just do the breathing. Come on, honey, a little while longer.”

“If I die and the baby lives, you’ll get married again soon, won’t you, so the little baby will have a mother? Say you’ll do that.”

“Susan, shh. You’re going to live. The baby’s going to live. We’re all in this for the long haul.”

“It’s an absolute, clear-cut Da-Da. He’s brilliant, Doug. Yes, that’s your Da-Da. And I’m your Ma-Ma.”

“Who am I named after?”

“Nobody in particular. We picked the name Andrew because we liked it. Right, Doug?”

“Right. It’s a great name.”

“I like my name.”

“You got good gifts today. Five years old. What a big boy you are.”

“Okay, Dad, is this your card? The four of clubs?”

“It is. How did you know that?”

“The Great Andy knows the secret. Should I do it again?”

“Show Mom. Susan, you have to see this!”

“We love you equally and that’s why we’re doing it this way. We love you too much for both of us not to stay in your lives.”

“A boy, Doug. A sweet little boy. Our beautiful baby.”

Broeden was grandly ordering another bottle of Dom Perignon for the table. Doug left to go to the men’s room, not wanting the sonofabitch to see him with tears in his eyes.

“I would not call that my favorite experience,” Doug overheard Andy saying to Karen as they unpacked their belongings on a Sunday night.

“What?” Doug asked.

“We went to Westhampton by plane,” Andy said. “With Jerry flying.”

“Give that to me again slowly.”

“He has a pilot’s license and he used to fly,” Karen said. “But he stopped for a while when he didn’t have a plane. Now he has one. He keeps it in New Jersey.”

“Harry came too. He didn’t understand the lure of flying. He threw up.”

“Harry threw up. And Mom was there?”

“She was a little nervous, too, at first,” Karen said. “You get used to it and it’s really fantastic. You see everybody stuck in traffic below.”

“Yes, we ordinary mortals,” Doug said.

This playboy is taking my kids up in a plane with him flying, and I used to worry when we went on the Staten Island ferry if there were enough life preservers!

Doug didn’t want to call with the children nearby and he waited until the next day, phoning Susan at work from his office.

“I understand Jerry took my children to Westhampton and back in a light plane.”

“He’s an accomplished pilot.”

“Is he? You married Smiling Jack, did you? This is dangerous business, Susan.”

“Based on my stomach, I don’t imagine we’ll be traveling much that way.”

“Not much. Not ever. I don’t want them in any light planes with any weekend pilot.”

“It’s safer than we think.”

“It may be safer than
you
think. Susan, what’s going on? Did you leave your intelligence in the glove compartment of the Mercedes when you married this guy?”

“We don’t need that, Doug.”

“Don’t do this again, please. Little planes crash all the time. Rich people die all the time in their darling little planes. Even if the children go up on your two weeks, I don’t want to bury them on mine.”