Say When (9 page)

“What is it?”

“My tooth!”

“Hey! Congratulations! Do you want to rinse your mouth out?”

“Yeah.” She got out of bed, stumbling a little, and Griffin held her arm as they walked to the bathroom. After Zoe rinsed her mouth and the tooth, she held it up to the light. “Do teeth have guts? Like way inside, do they?”

“No. They have soft insides, called pulp, but not guts, really.”

“Oh.” She admired the tooth a bit longer, turning it this way and that. Then she turned to Griffin. “Where’s Mommy?” Her cowlick, the same one he had, was at half mast. Griffin wanted to reach out and smooth it down, but he was afraid if he touched her, he’d gather her in his arms and start to cry, taking this bright moment of pleasure away from her, burying it under the pain of the people who were supposed to take care of her.

“Mommy’s downstairs.”

“How come?’

How come. He was about to say she’d gotten hungry, when Ellen appeared at the doorway. “What happened?”

“My tooth came out!”

“Oh, boy!” She hugged Zoe to her, smoothed her cowlick down. “And that was a big one, wasn’t it?”

Zoe opened her hand, showed her mother. “Ahhh,” Ellen said. “And you know the tooth fairy really, really likes those big ones.”

“Mom.”

“What?”

“There is no tooth fairy.”

“Oh? Then who is it that leaves money for you under your pillow when you lose a tooth?”

“You
do.” And then, “…Right?”

Griffin waited for Ellen to argue with Zoe, to draw her once more into some harmless fantasy that her parents enjoyed as much if not more than she. But Ellen didn’t do that. She took in a breath, looked at Zoe for a long moment, and then said, “You’re right. There is no tooth fairy.”

Zoe’s smile faded just slightly. Then, “I knew it!” she said. “I knew it all along, anyway!” She looked down at the tooth. “But…What do I do with it, then?”

Silence. And then Griffin said, “I’d like to buy it. I’d really like to buy it. Will you sell it to me?”

Zoe handed him the tooth. “You can have it, Dad.”

“Five bucks,” Griffin said. “Would five bucks be all right?”

“I said you can
have
it.” She looked at Ellen, then back at Griffin. “I’m going back to bed.” She walked out, her back straight and so small.

Ellen rinsed the last traces of blood from the sink. Then she turned to look at Griffin. What was in her face, besides pain? Ambivalence? Pleading? Was she realizing what Griffin had, that the next time a tooth came out, only one of them would be there?

She smiled sadly. “I guess we might as well tell her the truth, huh?”

Griffin didn’t answer. He left the bathroom and went into the bedroom, closed the door. He heard Ellen turn off the bathroom light, then go back down the stairs.

He undressed, put on his pajamas, and climbed into bed, lay there staring out the window. Then he got up and went into Zoe’s room.

Her eyes were closed. “Zoe?” he whispered. He wanted to offer her some reassurance, tell her that he would take care of her tooth and everything else, don’t worry, never worry. “Zoe?” Nothing. He knelt beside the bed, pulled the covers up higher, and lightly kissed her cheek. He would never leave her. Never.

Back in his bed, Griffin thought about Zoe’s classroom, about Mrs. Pierce. He wondered if Zoe fell a little in love with her teachers, as Griffin used to. He always brought a present to his teacher on the last day of class, and once, in fourth grade, asked to be given money to pick something out by himself. He’d given Mrs. Vandalia a lacy, light blue half-slip. “Well!” she’d said. “Thank you very much, Frank!” Then she’d quickly stuffed it back into the box. Griffin had understood his error when the class burst out laughing. He’d been very glad it was the last day of school.

Griffin closed his eyes, folded his hands and rested them on top of his stomach, let out a long breath. The last day of school. The weather would be so warm, all the classroom windows open, the sound of lawnmowers and birds and distant airplanes calling like siren songs. Occasionally a bee would meander in through an open window, seduced by something like geraniums blooming boldly on the sill. It would fly slow and heavy for a while, buzz angrily and pick up speed when it became aware of being trapped, then die an ignoble death at the hands of some boy who ignored the impassioned, high-pitched pleading of the girls. The oversized geography books worked particularly well. Once, Griffin had been an accomplice, had lent Vince Larson his book because Vince always forgot his at home. But afterward, Griffin had felt terrible, and brought the dead bee home with him. He made a vain effort to revive it, offering it honey on a toothpick, blowing toward the bee’s mouth in a crude attempt at mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. When it was clear that nothing was going to work, he’d put the bee in a single-serving cereal box padded with toilet paper and buried it in an apologetic backyard ceremony. He’d added blossoms from his neighbor’s rose garden to the box and marked the grave with one of his better cat’s-eyes.

Last days were always anticlimactic. You’d lost the regular feel of things—work hadn’t been serious for weeks, not with spring as a relentless saboteur. You could never say exactly when things had started changing from middle to end. But when the last day came, and it was all over, you were ready for it, because of what had begun so quietly inside you without your even noticing.

From downstairs, he heard the irregular, muffled sounds of Ellen crying. He got out of bed, closed the door, opened the window, then lay down in the exact middle of the bed and fell asleep.

I
n the morning, when Griffin came downstairs, Ellen was sitting at the kitchen table. He moved past her, saying nothing, and poured himself a cup of the coffee she’d made. When he started past her again, she said, “Griffin? Do you have a minute? I need to tell you something.”

He sat down across from her, attempted a neutral smile. A
May I help you?
smile. The skin below her eyes was bruised-looking, translucent in the morning light. Her face sagged. “You look terrible,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“Didn’t you sleep well?”

“Did you?”

“Actually, yes.”

“Well, good for you. Listen. I’ve been thinking, Griffin. Maybe it’s best if we really do live as roommates for a while. You do what you want and I…will, too.”

He said nothing, stared off to one side of her, sipped his coffee.

“Do you think we can try that?” she asked.

“You may recall that it was my suggestion.”

“Yes. So, since you went out last night, tonight will be my night. All right?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll make dinner, I just wanted to tell you.”

“Okay.”

“And then, right after dinner, I’ll go out. I’ll remember to take my phone.”

He got up, put his cup in the dishwasher. “Yeah, fine, Ellen.”

She looked down at her hands. “I suppose there’s no point in continually apologizing. I guess we just have to let this thing unfold in the way that it will.” She waited. For what? For him to offer resistance? Encouragement? Reassurance? Well, he wouldn’t. She could do whatever she wanted, so long as she understood one thing: He was done with her. He would make that clear to her tonight, after Zoe was in bed. She would not quite believe him. At first.

“I’ll get Zoe up,” he said, and headed back upstairs.

In her bedroom, he peeled back Zoe’s bedclothes, then sat down beside her.

“No,” she said.

“It’s time to get up, Zoe.”

She groaned.

“Want to go out with me after dinner and get a new video game?”

Now she was awake. She sat up excitedly. “What one?”

“Whatever one you want. You pick.”

“Any
thing?”

“That’s what I said. I have to go to work a little early this morning—I won’t be at breakfast. But you get up and get ready for school, and I’ll see you tonight.”

“Okay.
Any
game, right?”

“Right.”

Griffin dressed carefully for work, selecting a shirt his mother had sent him, which Ellen had never liked. In front of the dresser mirror, he straightened his tie, then applied a little cologne to his cheeks, to his neck. Ellen had never liked this scent, either—he’d gotten it a few months ago from a buxom young sales clerk who’d asked him suggestively, “Now…do you
splash
or
spray?”
He had never worn it because when Ellen had smelled it she’d made a face, then said, “Well, wear it if you
want
to.” He did want to, and now he would. He took the bottle over to the bed, sprinkled some cologne on the sheets. This was his bed, now. No more scent of Ellen permeating his subconscious.

He pulled up the window shade. The sun was fully out; it shone hard through the bedroom window. It was going to be a beautiful day.

He came whistling down the stairs, got his coat out of the hall closet. What the hell, maybe this really would be better for everyone. Who wanted to be married to someone who’d never wanted to be with you in the first place? What was he worried about? He was prime quality, top choice: a pretty damn good-looking man who was kind, who had a good job and a great kid and a wife who was stupid enough to be leaving him. A million women would go for him. A million and one. “Was she
nuts?”
they’d ask, and he’d say, yeah, she kind of was.

He left without saying goodbye, went out to the garage, got in the car, and started it. Good song on the radio. He’d sing along, something else Ellen never liked, owing to his inability to stay in tune. Or to remember the lyrics, big deal. But now he turned the radio up and sang along, more or less, at the top of his lungs. He put the car in reverse, backed out. From the street, he saw Ellen standing at the window and watching him. Arms crossed. Still as a mannequin. And as unreachable.

*  *  *

He called Donna from work. “Congratulations,” she said. “You passed the background check. You’re hired!”

“Just like that?”

“Well, we need you to come in for an orientation. A how-to-be-Santa class.”

“The fine art of
ho-ho-ho-
ing, huh?”

“More like what to expect. Some information on the more difficult questions kids might ask, and what you might say back. How to handle little emergencies.”

“What emergencies?”

“Well, to be honest, there was one where we had to call the police. A drunk rushed the set.”

“No kidding. What did he want?”

“He wanted to beat up Santa.”

Griffin frowned. “Really?”

“Yeah, he was pretty drunk.”

“Did any kids see? Did anyone get hurt?”

“Not many kids were there, it was late. Maybe one or two. And…well, okay, Santa got his nose broken. But that was truly an exception! Most emergencies are
much
smaller in scale.”

“Such as…?”

“Oh, a kid pulls off your beard. Or wets on your lap. Or bites you.”

“…
How
much does this job pay?”

She laughed. “Nine dollars an hour, I thought I’d told you. But you’ll like it, I can tell.”

Griffin smiled. It was so nice to hear a woman laughing, to hear a woman speaking pleasantly to him. “Oh, yeah? How can you tell I’d like it?”

“I’m just really good at reading people. I can tell a lot about someone in the first few minutes. I was man advisor in my sorority—I gave instant personality analyses. I was really accurate, too—except when it came to myself. But that’s another story.

“Anyway, the orientation is tomorrow night, seven to nine. Can you make it? ”

He thought for a moment. Tonight was Ellen’s night. And so tomorrow…"That would be fine,” he said. And then, “Maybe we could have a drink afterward.”

She said nothing.

“Or coffee.” He felt a sudden plunge in his spirits. He knew nothing about her. Maybe she was a recovering alcoholic. Maybe she was a transsexual. It was horrible to have to start all over.
I grew up in…I voted for…I have a sister and two brothers…That scar is from…The first time I this, the last time I that…
It was exhausting to even think about.

But then when she said, “I’d love to,” he felt instantly better. Her cashmere sweater, her pretty blond hair. Her open smile. His penis rose, settled, and he shifted in his seat. “I’ll see you, then.”

After he hung up, he sat staring out the window. This is how it went, he supposed. You suggested things, they happened. One thing led to the other, it must have been this way for Ellen, too. She smiled back, she met him somewhere, they talked, he leaned over slowly and kissed her that first time.

Yes. One thing led to the other, the dominos fell—they’d been up, and then they were down. You lost things you thought you couldn’t be without, and you went on anyway. He remembered being Zoe’s age and being given a silver dollar by his favorite uncle. He couldn’t believe his good fortune. He was out in the street, flipping the coin, showing off for a friend, when he dropped it and it rolled down a sewer grate. He lay on top of the grate and saw the coin shining up at him from far away. He stared at it for a long time, wishing he could make time work backward. He wouldn’t have flipped the thing. He would have put it in the cigar box he kept under his bed, maybe in its own leather pouch. He stared at the coin until his friend became impatient and told him to stop looking and come to the baseball field, where they were going to play catch. “It would be better if you couldn’t see it,” his friend said, as they walked away. But Griffin said no, this way he could still have it a little. But the next time he looked the coin was gone.

He picked up Ellen’s picture, stared into her eyes, then put it in his drawer, facedown.

Ellen met Griffin at the door. She looked much better—pretty, in fact. She was wearing an apron over a long brown skirt and a loose-knit white sweater, pearl earrings. She was holding a wooden spoon, stained red. “Spaghetti and meatballs,” she said.

“Uh huh.” Griffin moved past her, hung up his coat. “Where’s Zoe?”

He didn’t want to look at Ellen anymore.

“Upstairs. Would you tell her dinner will be ready in two minutes?”

She couldn’t wait to leave. Well, neither could he. “Yeah, I’ll tell her. By the way, I need the car tonight.”

She looked at him. “This is my night!”

“I know. But I’m taking Zoe out for some things she needs.”

“What things?”

“Her pants are getting too short for her. And she could use a new coat.”

Ellen hesitated, then said, “All right, fine. Take it. I’ll get a ride.” He heard her pick up the phone and start dialing as he went upstairs.

Zoe was sitting on the floor of her bedroom, staring into her lizard cage, which had never once held a lizard, but had been home to frogs, worms, grasshoppers, and a garter snake. Griffin sat on her bed, and she looked up at him briefly. “Hi, Dad.”

“Got something in there?”

“Yeah. An ant. He was on my windowsill. See him? He’s black. He looks like a booger.”

“Zoe.”

“Well, he does! Like two boogers stuck together.” She moved some of the shavings aside, then looked up at Griffin. “There’s nothing wrong with saying ‘booger,’ Dad. It is a natural thing that everyone has.”

“Who told you that?”

“Grandma!”

“Which grandma?”

“Grandma Griffin!”

“…Oh.”

“And it’s true! Plus I know something else, too.”

“What’s that?”

“If you don’t fart when you have to, you can blow a hole in the side of your stomach.”

“Who told you that? Grandma Griffin did
not
tell you that.”

“No. Andrew Molner. But his
dad
told him.”

“Well, that is not true, Zoe.”

“But it is true about boogers. The only thing is, you shouldn’t
eat
them, which that is
all
that Andrew
does.
One time he had to go to the principal.” She shifted the shavings again. “Now, where did he go? Oh, there he is. See?”

Griffin got on the floor, peered into the cage. “Well, I see part of a cookie.”

“Yeah, Mommy made chocolate chip.”

“And I see a grape.”

“Right. His dinner.”

“But I don’t see the ant.”

“Well, he is shy with new people. But he’s there, Dad, just
look.”

Griffin looked once more. “Oh, yeah. I see him now.”

“He’s pretty, isn’t he?”

“Very pretty. What’s his name?”

She sat back, picked at the toe of one of her socks. “I think…Amos.”

“Terrific name. Amos Ant.”

She giggled. “Yeah, ubcept his last name is not
Ant,
Dad!”

“Ex
cept.”

“Huh?”

“Ex
cept, not
ub
cept. So what is his last name?”

“Griffin,
of course! He’s in our
family.”

“I see.” Ah, Zoe.

“I’ve been teaching him to sit.”

“Really.”

“Yeah. Do you think you can teach an ant to sit?”

“What do you think?”

She sat back on her heels, sighed. “He’s not
so
good yet.”

“You might want to start with something easier.”

“Like what?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Eating from your hand, maybe.”

“I tried. He won’t. Hey, Dad, can I really get any game I want tonight?”

“Yes.”

“The one I want costs fifty dollars. Frankie Anziletti just got it, and he thinks he’s so hot.”

“Fifty bucks!”

“Yeah, but you
said.”

“You’re right.” Griffin stood up. “Time for dinner, sweetie. Go wash your hands.”

She looked at them. “Actually, I don’t need to.”

“You do need to. Wash, and then, after dinner, we’ll go get that game. Did you do your homework?”

“Yeah, stupid spelling sentences.”

“What’s stupid about that?”

“All homework is stupid.”