Shotgun Lovesongs: A Novel (24 page)

I don’t think I’m a good man. I’m not good to people. I know that. What I’m good at, what I
understand
and what I
intuit,
is how to make money. Or, at least, that’s what I used to be good at. How do I explain it? That all I needed were two things, a world weather report and the nightly news, and I could tell you where to stick your money the next day in such a way that I was rarely ever wrong. I made millions,
millions
. Sticking money that most people would put into IRAs or bonds or Coke stock into corn futures, coffee, hog bellies.

But throw me into a dinner party, invite me over for your kid’s birthday party, and suddenly I’m helpless. Worse than helpless, because I can never seem to say the right thing, never do the right thing. So instead of being just plain awkward, it looks like I’m being cruel. Because I should be smart enough to navigate these things, but I can’t. Some nights Felicia would just tell me to be quiet, not to embarrass her.

I thought this mill, this building, would be the catalyst to change things for me. I thought it would give me something concrete, something real to deal with. I thought that if I came back here, resurrected this thing, that the town would pull me in, embrace me, maybe even set myself up for a run at being mayor, or a run in the state legislature. Go around the county, glad-handing farmers, kissing babies, Felicia right there at my side, looking the part, guiding me with a strategic whisper in my ear. I know that she’s smarter than me. I don’t have a problem admitting it. It’s one of the big reasons why I fell in love with her.

And now the mill is done. The basement is dry for the first time in
decades
. The general store is busy. The parking lot is full of trucks. Trains are not just coming through, they’re stopping. I’ve got a tenant lined up to take one of the converted spaces beside the general store—a Mexican restaurant. This town
needs
it, needs some spice, some flavor. The towers are all painted. All the broken windows of our teenage years and our early twenties, they’ve been replaced. When the painters asked if I wanted something, a name or a logo painted at the top of the towers, I gave it some thought, then told them that what I wanted them to paint up there was
Welcome to Little Wing
in nice, old-fashioned, slanted, cursive red paint. I could have had them paint my name up there, but I’m really trying. I’m trying to do the right thing.

Sometimes I come up here and I don’t even know why. To get away, I guess. To look out at the world. To see what’s coming next. To smoke a cigarette.

Felicia left me. She wanted children and I—I just couldn’t do it. I could never muster the excitement, the love. I loved her, I really did. I still love her. But I couldn’t see being a dad, being that kind of upright, decent man. I look at a guy like Henry—how easy he makes it look, how his kids adore him, how Beth adores him—how this town adores him—and I just think,
I can’t compete
. I can’t do that. I know who I am and I’m not Henry Brown.

She left yesterday, moved into a motel between here and Eau Claire. I told her she should have gone all the way into Eau Claire, should have gone to a nice place, a proper hotel. Even Minneapolis or St. Paul. But the wedding is on Saturday and she wanted to put her best foot forward, wanted to be there for Lucy and Ronny, stringing streamers and whatnot. Passing out wedding cake. Ushering in guests. I don’t know, helpful things, thoughtful things.

“I hope,” she told me, “that you can change your mind. Because I love you. I just can’t keep waiting. We’re not getting younger.”

“You should go,” I said. “Go, before you lose any more time. I’m sorry.”

We’d dated for seven years. She wanted to get married right away, and I wouldn’t. I wanted everything to be perfect. I wanted the money, the house, the job—everything lined up just right. Our life arranged like a vase of flowers. Beautiful and controlled. She didn’t care about any of that, she said she wanted to have kids right away, but, I don’t know—I guess I just never took it seriously. Never took
her
seriously. When we first fell in love, sleeping in my apartment on the sixtieth floor of the John Hancock building, feeling the sway of that building against the constant winds off Lake Michigan, she told me, “I want three kids before I’m thirty. I know that much. I want a house
full
of kids. I want a loud house.”

I loved her, so I kissed her head, listened to her dreams. But to me, that life she was describing seemed like living in a riot. The mess and noise and crumbs and the diapers and spilled milk and crying. What about
our lives
? What about traveling? What about nice clothing and nice hotels, what about collecting art and building up a good wine cellar?

With children, with babies, you can wait too long. My dad used to say,
He who hesitates is lost
. With men, it doesn’t matter. You can be king of the land at eighty years old, drooling on your throne, barely able to keep a crown on your head and still, you can make a baby with a beautiful young woman. But with women, it’s different. All that business about clocks—it’s true. Think about it. Once a month an egg drifts down from above, as if a little parachute, and lands in a valley of good blood. But you have to know when the egg is there, you have to hope that conditions are perfect, that, in fact, the egg has dropped, that there
are
eggs. And that the parachute opened at precisely the right time. All of that sounds very much like clockwork to me, like the machinations of a very complex, delicate system. And nights lying in bed beside Felicia, I could hear that tick-tick-tocking, too, and it scared the shit out of me.

So. She’s gone.

And I have no idea what’s next. The mill is finally finished. We’re—no,
I’m
—buried in debt. The only thing holding us afloat before was Felicia’s job. So if I now find myself up shit creek, I can hardly blame her. The only reason she agreed to move here, to Little Wing, was that she loved me. And more to the point, that she agreed it would be a good place to raise children. After that, time just got away from me. I kept thinking we had time, more time.

*   *   *

I’d jump. I’ve thought about it. In my line of work, in commodities and stocks, jumping is our seppuku—I know some guys who think it’s the only honorable thing to do. If not jumping, then a nickel-plated Colt. I’ve come up on three different occasions, actually, with the intention of ending it. But I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t. And I can’t tonight. Saturday is Ronny’s wedding. Hardly the week to make a mess on the sidewalk, as it were. Saturday is also the grand reopening of this mill, and the whole town is invited to tour the building. Saturday, I’m going to put on a nice suit (no tie, though) and I’m going to give a short speech, hand out free plastic glasses of beer, and lead a bunch of tours. Then, that evening, in one of the unrented spaces, a space with great natural sunlight, with in-floor heating, and nice, ample bathroom facilities, Ronny is going to marry Lucy. I didn’t charge them a dime. The whole town is invited. Guests are encouraged to bring a gift and a nonperishable food item. I figure, if you’re going to go bankrupt, you may as well throw a party to mark the occasion.

As I told you, I’m
trying
.

*   *   *

Lucy is six months pregnant, but you’d never guess. She looks great. Felicia threw her a baby shower a few weeks ago out at our place. It was nice. Henry and Beth came. The Girouxs—sans dates. Eddy Moffitt and his wife, their kids. Lee was there, though obviously no Chloe. The town really doesn’t know what to think. In the tabloids for sale down at the IGA, Chloe is shown in low-quality, grainy photographs with rappers, guitar gods, bonzo drummers. And they’re not even divorced yet, apparently.

The women formed a circle in our living room, the stack of presents in front of Lucy four feet high. We’d hired a caterer, and the kitchen was full of cold cuts, fresh fruit, pasta salads, wine, beer. It was cold out, but the guys huddled outside around a campfire, away from the frou-frou wrapping paper, ribbons, subdued manners, and finger sandwiches. It was oddly quiet around the fire. I don’t think Lee and Henry exchanged a single word. Normally those two are thick as thieves. We formed teams and threw horseshoes, broke out the bocce balls and smoked cigars.

“What’s the deal with Lee?” I asked Eddy. “He seems pretty sullen.”

“If my wife was banging the Billboard Top Forty, I’d be pretty friggin’ sullen too.”

So, I let it go. I’m trying to just
let things go
.

After everyone left, after the caterers took their wares away, the house was quiet. Felicia crawled into bed early that night and I found her in there, a little later on, crying.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Go away,” she said. “All right? Just leave me alone.”

I sat on the edge of the bed, looked out the windows at our big dark lawn and the fields beyond, the stars winking down on them, a set of headlights crawling over the countryside. I sighed.

“They’re pregnant and we’re not,” I said.

“
Ronny Taylor
is going to be a dad, and you’re not! Does that
sound
right to you? Ronny and a stripper are having a baby and you won’t do the same for me. Goddamn it, Kip. It’s like that board game I used to play as a little girl. You know? The one with the little cars and the colored pegs and you go around the track and you either go to school or not. You become a doctor or not. You fill your car with kids.”

“Life,” I said. “The game of Life.”

“I always wanted a full car, Kip, and I was always pretty fucking clear about that. So
fuck
you, all right?
Fuck
you. But you have to decide,
buddy
. You need to decide if you want to be a man or not, here. You need to
grow up
. Because right now, I come home, I crawl into bed. All I see is a coward. Some guy with a bat-shit crazy fantasy for an old mill in the middle of fucking nowhere. So let me be perfectly clear, in case you weren’t listening before: Either we make a baby together, or I’m out of here.”

Weeks passed. Nothing changed. When we made love, I wore a rubber. Her pills in the bathroom cupboard beside a box of tampons. Good nights and good mornings. Dozens of meals together sprinkled with polite conversation. Occasionally a bottle of wine, but not with enough frequency to necessitate a cellar.

So, she finally left. I came back from the mill one night, and she was sitting slumped over the granite countertop in the kitchen, her head resting on her arms. She looked up at me and her eyes were more tired than sad. The keys already in her hand. She stood up, walked over to me, kissed me on the lips, hard, and said, “I’m checking into a motel. I’ll come back on Friday to get ready for the wedding.”

*   *   *

One day, in my office in Chicago, my secretary knocked on the door, came in with a puzzled look on her face. She was a nice woman, Denise, reminded me of my aunt Carol. Denise still calls me once a month or so, actually checks up on me. Asks me whether or not I might want to reconsider and come back to Chicago.

“There’s a man on the telephone,” she said that day. “Says he knows you. Says it isn’t business-related, but that you’ll remember him.
Harvey Bunyan?
” She held up her hands in mystery.

Initially, the name did not resonate. “Harvey? Bunyan? And he’s not a client?”

Denise shook her head. “I already told him he had the wrong number, but he called right back. Claims he’s looking right at your business card. That he and his wife were in town for a wedding and that he thought he’d give you a call because, you
invited
him here?”

“Look,” I said sharply, “Denise, I really can’t be…”
Harvey Bunyan
. The farmer. Jesus, how long ago was that.… “I’ll take the call,” I said firmly. “Thanks, Denise.”

I collected myself, picked up the telephone.

“Hello,” I said. “Mr. Bunyan? What can I do for you, sir?” My intention was to brush him off. To file through my imaginary date book, claiming any and all manner of appointment. Everyone ranging from Warren Buffett to the secretary of the Department of Agriculture. The Jolly Green Giant. Tony the Tiger. Juan Valdez.
A man I’d met one time? At a gas station? In a town I couldn’t even remember the name of?
I could hear the sound of wind from his end of the connection; a woman’s voice, very faint, politely urging something.

“Yeah,” he said at last, the sound of gruff relief in his voice. “Harvey Bunyan. Uh. We met about a year or two ago. Talked over at the Kum & Go, and you had that fancy car. That red Mustang.”

“Absolutely. How can I help you, Mr. Bunyan?” I tried to remain formal, busy-sounding. I shuffled papers loudly, typed nonsense on my keyboard.

“Well, the thing is. Edith and I are in town for a niece’s wedding up to Evanston and I told her about you and, you know, I’ve had your business card in my wallet. Well.” He paused, coughed. “We were downtown, and I just wondered if maybe you had time for lunch.”

I looked out the window. The view was forever.

“Mr. Bunyan,” I began. “I—”

I could hear the receiver rubbing against dry hands, or maybe clothing, then murmuring, polite arguing.

“Mr. Bunyan?”

“Hello,” a voice suddenly said. “This is Edith Bunyan. Is this Mr. Cunningham?”

“Ah, yes. Hello there, Mrs. Bunyan. How can I help you, ma’am?”

“Well, it might be imprudent of me, but I’m just going to lay Harv’s cards out on the table, because you must be a little confused, and I think I can save you some time. So here goes. Harvey swears you look just like our boy, Thomas. Swears by it. Says you could be brothers.”

“Ma’am?”

“Thomas was killed in Iraq. Fallujah. IED. Our boy was. Thomas. The one you look like.”

“Ma’am, I got calls stacking up, and you know how it goes, the market doesn’t stop, I can’t just, I can’t just take the afternoon off, I’m sorry but, but I don’t even really
know
your husband—”

“Harvey.”