Taking Stock (21 page)

*

“Where does Eric keep the Meat schedule?” I say. I’m recently home from my Saturday shift, which I spent very hungover. Gilbert’s here, and he’s lying on my bed reading the copy of “The King of Diamonds” I printed out for him. I’m sitting at my computer.

He lowers the sheaf of papers. “Why do you want to know?”

“Curious.”

“In a black binder, in the Meat room. I’d be careful, though. Eric doesn’t like people snooping around in there.”

“Think he might have something to hide?”

“It’s possible to care about privacy without having something to hide. For example, I don’t conceal that I’m sexually active, but I still don’t want any Sheldon Masons watching.”

“Did you get with that blonde, last night?”

“A gentleman never pushes the boundaries of the Kama Sutra and tells.” He holds up my story. “This is going to cause a lot of trouble for you. It’s clearly about what happened with you and Cassandra.”

I turn my chair to face the computer.

“What are you doing?”

“Proving you wrong. I’m sending it to Donovan. See if he mentions anything.”

“That’s definitely a bad idea.” He looks down at the manuscript again. “Why does he lock his mother in the dungeon?” He tosses it on the floor. “Freud would have had a field day with this thing.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

In high school, whenever I was rejected by a girl, Mom used to say that whoever it was would look back later in life and regret it. Lately, I’ve been picturing all the girls who ever turned me down, sitting in a room together and sobbing about letting me get away.

“What have we done?” they’d say. “How could we let failed writer Sheldon Mason slip through our fingers so easily?” Dabbing with handkerchiefs. “He’s quite respected, you know, at the local grocery store. Have you heard what an efficient fronter he is? Are you aware how many cases per hour he’s known to stock?”

I’ve taken a few more breaks with Theresa, and they’ve been fun enough. But I can’t discuss anything real with her—not while we’re at Spend Easy. I can tell from the way she shifts in her chair that it makes her uncomfortable whenever we stray too close to such topics.

She looks thin.

It’s Sunday, and Casey, Donovan, and Gilbert are at my apartment. It’s raining outside, and I’m definitely not motivated enough to walk to the shed. We’re gonna have to smoke inside.

Gilbert’s phone rings.

“Hello? Hi.” He listens. “Can’t. Busy.” He listens some more. “Mom. Your mothering is over. Mother’s Day is now purely symbolic. Dad’s going with you, isn’t he? There you go. Eat a wonton for me.” He hangs up, and looks at Donovan. “Wanted me to come to supper.”

“You should go,” I say. “We’re not doing anything important. You should be with your Mom.”

“We are doing something important,” Gilbert says. He points at Donovan. “Jamaican hot box?”

A Jamaican hot box, Donovan explains, entails turning on the shower as hot as it will go, stuffing a towel under the bathroom door, and smoking a joint.

“Not just one,” Gilbert says. “Several joints.”

“Or a really big one,” Donovan says.

“If you’re having a Jamaican hot box, you need to smoke a lot of weed. Otherwise, why bother?”

Donovan rolls one of the biggest joints I’ve ever encountered, using a quarter ounce of pot and multiple rolling papers. Then we go to the bathroom and turn on the light.

“The fan came on,” Donovan says.

“Yeah,” I say. “The light and fan are controlled by the same switch.”

“That won’t do. Do you have a flashlight?”

I search for one. Meanwhile, Donovan turns the hot water on and closes the door. “Hurry,” he calls.

I find the flashlight, and rejoin the others inside the bathroom. We’re about to close the door when Marcus Brutus starts sniffing around outside and meowing. “Has your cat ever been stoned?” Donovan says.

“Not to my knowledge.”

“We should get him in here. It’ll be hilarious.”

“Could that hurt him?”

“Nah, man. Cats love weed.” He picks Marcus Brutus up, rolls of cat fat bunching beneath his fingers, and brings him in with us, shutting the door. He stuffs a wet towel into the crack at the bottom.

We take turns smoking the enormous joint while someone else trains the flashlight on it. Whoever’s holding the flashlight periodically jerks the light away, of course, or shines it in someone’s eyes, or points it at the cat, who sits as close to the door as he can get, meowing constantly. It gets steamy pretty quick, and soon the flashlight’s beam reveals only hazy outlines.

The joint is almost a roach when Marcus Brutus goes silent

Casey points the light at him. “The cat is plotting something.”

Gilbert’s sitting on the edge of the tub. “So, Donovan. You read Sheldon’s story?”

“Yeah, finished it last night. It’s based on what happened with you and Cassandra, right, Sheldon?”

“Oh my God. No. It’s not.”

“It obviously is. She comes off as a huge bitch, too. It’s pretty hilarious. I forwarded it to Paul and Claude.”

“Why did you do that?”

Donovan shrugs. “Thought they’d enjoy it. Does it matter?”

“No. I just hope it doesn’t get back to her.”

“I thought it wasn’t about Cassandra.”

“It’s not.”

When we open the door, the cat gets down on its stomach and creeps out into the hall. We follow him into the clear, cold air of the apartment. Marcus Brutus paws at empty space. We laugh. He walks slowly down the hall, goes into the living room, and hides under the coffee table. We all sit.

“Now what?” Gilbert says.

“I have more weed in my car,” Donovan says. “We could roll it now, to smoke later.”

“Who’s gonna get it?”

“I will,” Casey says. He gets up and opens the door. “It stopped raining.”

Marcus Brutus darts from under the coffee table, past Casey, and out the door. “Shit,” Casey says. “He’s gone, Sheldon.”

I reach deep into myself and locate a final reservoir of energy I didn’t know was there. I get up and go to the open door. “Here kitty,” I call. “Here Marcus Brutus. Here Brute.”

Casey and I look at each other.

“He’ll come back,” I say, and return to the couch.

Chapter Thirty

Her last day in the psych ward, Theresa led me out into the fenced-off garden by the hand.

Seated side-by-side on the concrete bench, she said, “I think you need to talk about the reason you’re here, Sheldon. I don’t want to pressure you. But to get better, I think you need to start processing why you wanted to kill yourself.”

I didn’t answer, for a while. I looked out on the busy road beyond the chain-link fence, with cars hurtling past in both directions.

Then I told her about Herman Barry, the man who got drunk one day and drove down Foresail Road.

Even sober, human reflexes aren’t fast enough to operate cars. You get distracted for a second, by a text message or a pretty girl or whatever, and something dies. A squirrel, a dog. You. There’s a car-related death every 30 seconds. After my mother was hit, 137 other people died before I got the news.

I decided not to attend Barry’s trial. The chance to put a face to the name of my mother’s killer just didn’t appeal. I had no yearning for revenge. There were witnesses, and I was assured he would go to jail. That was enough. I didn’t want to think about it anymore.

So when his wife knocked on the door of my new apartment and introduced herself, I was surprised at the anger that welled up, making my heart pound and my vision blur.

She couldn’t meet my eyes. Her son could—a boy of around seven, peeking from behind her right hip. She took a piece of folded loose leaf from her pocket and held it out. “Herman asked me to give you this.”

I unfolded it. “What is it?” I said.

Eyes lowered, she said nothing.

“Is this an apology letter? Are you fucking kidding me?”

I made a fist. The crumpled note landed on some grass growing through a crack in the concrete step.

“What’s your name?” I asked the boy.

He didn’t answer.

“What’s your name?”

“Herman,” his mother said.

“Do you love your mommy, Herman?”

The boy’s chin dipped a fraction of an inch. He moved closer to his mother. I was scaring him.

“Your daddy took my mommy,” I said. “She’s never coming back. She’s gone, forever. Because of what your daddy did.” My voice cracked. “Do you understand?”

I didn’t wait for an answer. I went back inside and closed the door. I took two steps, and then, slowly, I sank to my knees. I let myself fall over onto my side. I hated the tears that started and didn’t stop. I hated Herman Barry. And I hated myself.

I stayed there, curled up, crying, for what must have been an hour. Then I stood and opened the door. The letter was still on the doorstep. It was spread out again, with a stone sitting on top to keep it in place. I removed the rock and took the paper inside.

In his letter, Barry wrote about a childhood under the yoke of a chronically drunk father, who took pleasure in knocking him down, and knocking his mother down, and his sisters, and the dog. He wrote about having his first drink at 10, and about his struggles with alcoholism ever since. The AA meetings. The interventions. He wrote about his pride in never touching his wife or son, except with love. He wrote about divorcing his wife, and spending long, sober years trying to win her back. And, when he finally did, getting hammered soon after, and running a woman down in the street.

He wrote about how, when driving really drunk, you’ll steer toward things you’re trying to avoid. You concentrate so hard on the thing you don’t want to hit that you drive straight for it.

It helps, of course, when the thing you’re trying to avoid killing is also trying to avoid being killed. This, Barry wrote, was not the case with my mother. He saw her a few seconds before striking her, and she saw him. But she didn’t move. She didn’t try to get out of the way.

She saw him coming, and she just stood there.

When I finished reading, I found a lighter and burned Barry’s letter in the kitchen sink.

(The black marks are still there.) I decided that Barry was a liar. And I tried my hardest to forget what I’d read.

But over the following months, memories resurfaced that hadn’t seemed important before. Mom sleeping in more, and being reprimanded at work for lateness. Letting her bedroom become disordered. Eating less. Falling out of touch with her friends. Staring out the living room window, chin in hand—not reacting even when Brute rubbed against her calves, and cried.

The signs were there, but I ignored them. Too caught up in my own shit.

I was sobbing by the time I finished talking, and Theresa held me, and rubbed my back, and told me it wasn’t my fault.

I knew she was right. But I didn’t believe her.

*

I’m supposed to work the day after Brute ran away, but I call the store and say I’m too sick to come in. I’ve never called in sick before, and Ralph doesn’t ask any questions—he only says he hopes I feel better soon. I thank him, and then I spend the day looking for Marcus Brutus.

It’s sunny today, though a little cold. I warm up soon enough, walking in progressively larger loops around the house, expanding my search into side streets and parking lots. “Here, Marcus Brutus!” I call. “Here, Brute! Here, kitty!” Over and over again.

The day wears on, and I begin retracing my footsteps, working my way back to the house. He wouldn’t stray too far, would he? Does he hate living with me that much?

My throat’s getting sore. If I don’t find him today, I’ll have to start calling animal shelters, and printing off posters with his photo. A reward might help, but I don’t have anything to offer as one.

I knock on Sam’s door.

“Have you seen my cat?” I say when he appears.

“No. He’s missing?”

“Yeah. He got outside yesterday.”

“Sorry to hear. I’ll keep an eye out for him. Let you know if I see him.”

“Thanks, Sam.”

“How are you doing? You don’t look that great.”

“I’m just tired.”

“You wanna come in?”

“Nah. I better keep looking. Thanks, though.”

“Okay. Take care, Sheldon.”

“You too.”

I walk around for another hour, and then decide to head home for a short nap. After, I’ll start designing those lost cat posters.

I lie on the couch, but I can’t sleep. God damn that cat. As much as he annoys me, I’d give anything to have him here in the apartment right now. To hear his piercing, high-pitched meow. When he gets back, I’ll give him two cans of Turkey Giblets in Gravy. Three, if he wants.

Gilbert comes over, and asks if I want to smoke a joint. I tell him no—I’m afraid it’ll knock me out for the night, and I want to get these posters done before I go to sleep. He sticks around, though, and we shoot the shit while I work on them.

He leaves just as I’m finishing. I print one off, and it looks pretty good. The clearest photo I could find is one where Mom has him in her arms, their faces pressed together. Mom’s smiling, and it sort of looks like Brute is, too.

There’s a knock on the door, and I get up to answer it. It’s Gilbert, holding Brute, who dangles from his arms, limp.

“Sorry, man,” he says. “He must have been lying under the Hummer. I felt the tire go over something, and I got out…”

I take Brute. His body hangs limp in my arms, his head dangling. Red seeps from a gash along his side.

I look at Gilbert. He actually seems kind of upset. I manage to speak: “It’s not your fault. You didn’t know he was there.”

He leaves. I get a Spend Easy bag, and I gently lower Brute into it.

Mom’s last remaining culture bomb. For a second, that makes me smile. Then I drop the bag, put my head against the wall, and cry.