The Newman Resident (12 page)

Richard leaned forward towards his wife. “Okay, Carol, let’s talk. What are you really upset about?”

“If you don’t ever write, then the book will never get done. And if the book doesn’t get done, we don’t even have a slight chance of making any money off it.”

“That’s not it. Come on, what is it?”

“Don’t worry,” Carol said, standing up, “I’m not counting on a dime.”

“Okay, I’ll play along. It’s money.”

“It wouldn’t hurt—”

“Cause if it is,” Richard said as he stood up, “maybe we could save a little by cutting out some expensive restaurants.”

“I don’t eat out a lot.”

“Sorry, I jumped to conclusions. Maybe you didn’t have to pay.”

“What are you getting at?”

“I saw you and some other man going into a restaurant today.”

“What were you doing, spying on me?”

“Did you have a good dessert?”

“Look—”

“Who was it? Someone from work? Someone at your gym?”

“I don’t have to—”

“Wait a minute,” Richard said, falling back into the couch. “It was Hunter, wasn’t it?”

“So I ate lunch with him,” she said. “He’s just helping me figure out this Christopher thing. He is a psychologist, you know.”

“‘This Christopher thing’?”

“Don’t play stupid.”

Carol left for their bedroom, pulling the door behind her. He heard the door lock.

“I don’t know how much longer I can take this,” Richard said, looking up at the ceiling.

“Maybe I should return home.”

Christopher was standing in the hall, holding his Scrabble box like most boys would have held a teddy bear.

“What do you mean? You are home.”

“To my home.”

“This is your home, son,” Richard said, walking toward him.

“But I only make you two unhappy.”

“Oh, son,” Richard said as he knelt in front of Christopher, “you make me happy every day.”

The little boy closed his eyes. His left hand started twitching.

“Let’s get you back to bed.”

“I didn’t ask to come to this place,” Christopher said, “or to be left in that room alone with the game. And I didn’t ask to be born. At least not to parents who don’t want me. I want to go back home where I belong.”

Christopher ran into his room and slammed the door. Stunned, Richard slowly walked over to the door and knelt down.

“You don’t really want to be a resident again, do you?”

“I like it there,” Christopher said between sobs. “The teachers are nice. They call me their little lion cub. But Carol doesn’t want me here. You don’t want me here. What am I doing here?”

“I want you—”

“Don’t lie to me, Richard. I’m just a kid, but I’m not stupid.”

“Christopher—”

“Just send me back home.”

“Son—”

“Go away.”

Richard slowly got up. He leaned against his son’s door. His heart told him to not go away, to go into his son’s room and talk
with him. He had no idea what he would say, but maybe the words would come. He just kept hearing those words: “Go away.” Why didn’t he ever know the best thing to do?

Richard listened. He could hear Christopher trying not to cry, or at least trying not to be heard. Maybe he should try one more time.

“Christopher. I really didn’t mean—”

“Go away.”

He went away.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE

“W
hat’s going on?” Richard whispered into his cell phone.

“Richard, I didn’t know you cared.”

“Look, Hunter, you know what I’m talking about.”

“What’s your problem?”

“Today. Lunch. I saw you two.”

“Are you serious?” Hunter laughed. “This is about lunch? Look, Carol and I have been friends for a long time. We’re big kids now. We can go to lunch like adults without anyone worrying about us.”

Richard paced around the home office, trying to figure out what to say next. He wasn’t even sure why he called and felt stupid; of course, Carol would never cheat on him. Hunter, he wasn’t so sure about. But something wasn’t right with this.

“I just don’t like—”

“Look, we’re not having an affair,” Hunter said. “I’m a happily married man, just like you.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about.”

“Then what are you talking about, Richard?”

“I’m talking about…about…I’m talking about what you and Carol were talking about.”

“What?”

“That’s my question,” Richard said, stopping in the middle of the office. “What did you talk about today at lunch?”

“Nothing. Just friends talking—”

“You were talking about Christopher.”

“Sure, a little, but—”

Richard parted the curtain. The street light was still out—had been for at least a month. “What are you two planning?”

“You’re getting paranoid, my friend.”

“You’re dodging the question. What are you and my wife up to?”

Hunter hung up.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX

I
t was dark, maybe one or two in the morning, but Richard was still just sitting on the couch looking at the closed blinds.

This was not the life he’d planned on living—certainly not the one he’d dreamed of living. He’d always wanted to be a writer, ever since he wrote his first story when he was about Christopher’s age. And he’d wanted to marry and have children. Now he was a writer, a husband, and a father, but he was failing at all three—the words wouldn’t come, his wife avoided him, and his son told him to go away. He’d hoped this summer he and Christopher would become close, inseparable, and Carol would realize how important it was to have him home with them. He didn’t expect her to be completely won over by the end of the summer, but enough to want to keep Christopher and try being a family. It might take a little longer with her, but by Christmas he’d figured she would be glad the three of them were together. Now he wasn’t sure if there was any reason for hope at all.

Richard got up from the couch and decided to see if Carol had unlocked the bedroom door. He walked by Christopher’s room and listened again. Nothing. Not a sound. He opened the door and looked in.

Christopher was still in his clothes, asleep on his bed. His curtains were open, and the moon gently lit the room. Richard looked around the room at the bare walls and thought how much it appeared to be the room of someone who wasn’t planning to stay for very long. There were no posters or pictures or calendars, and the only thing on the dresser, the picture of them at the Brooklyn Bridge, was turned now, facing the bed.

Richard took the blanket from the foot of the bed and covered his son. He was afraid of waking Christopher, but he reached down and stroked his son’s hair.

“I apologize,” Christopher whispered, without opening his eyes.

Richard pulled back. “I’m sorry. I thought you were asleep.”

“We weren’t allowed to speak that way back home. I shouldn’t have done it here.”

It was late, they both needed their sleep, but Richard knelt down next to the bed. “What happened when someone did?” Richard asked.

Silence.

“Please tell me.”

“The adults took those kinds of residents away,” Christopher said, his eyes still closed.

“Where? Where would they take them?”

Christopher winced a little, and Richard quit stroking his hair.

“I’m sorry. You don’t have to talk about it.” Richard started to stand up, but Christopher grabbed his hand.

“Please don’t stop,” Christopher said.

Richard resumed stroking his son’s hair. It was thick and dark brown, like his.

“I don’t know,” Christopher said. “The residents would come back to class the next day and not talk that way anymore.”

Maybe they could finally talk, in the dark. Eyes closed. Richard looked up at the moon and thought he felt warmth coming from it.

“It’s good to tell me how you feel,” Richard said.

“I thought if I went back home, you and Carol would be happier.”

“You belong here. We all just need to be patient while we make the adjustment.”

Christopher turned on his side, facing the wall, his eyes still closed.

“Why doesn’t she like me?”

Richard stared down at the wooden floor, so linear, so straight and properly lined up and perfectly placed.

“She loves you. Very much. And she’s showing it the only way she knows how.”

“How?”

Richard smiled. “This may not make much sense, but she’s fighting for your future, trying to give you what that school claims to give kids. That’s what she does when she cares about something. She fights for it.”

“What is she afraid of?” Christopher asked.

“What do you mean?”

“People fight when they’re afraid, don’t they?”

“I don’t know.” Richard thought. “Maybe. Maybe people fight when they’re afraid.”

“What are you afraid of, Richard?”

Richard looked down at Christopher’s face. His eyes were still closed, and he looked so much like a little boy, but he talked so old. He shouldn’t have to be old at such a young age.

“I better let you get some sleep now,” Richard said. “You dream about what you’d like to do tomorrow, then tell me in the
morning. Let’s make it a good day tomorrow.” He adjusted the blanket around his son.

“Do you know what I’d really like to do tomorrow? I’d like to get a notebook, just like yours.”

“What would you do with that?”

“Write.”

“Really?”

“Of course,” Christopher said.

“You know, Christopher,” Richard whispered after a moment had passed, “one day I was at the playground and saw a boy writing. Did you ever write out on the playground?”

He could see his son’s body tense a little.

“We don’t have to get me a notebook if you don’t want to.”

“No, no, that would be great. We’ll get you one.”

“Just like yours.”

“Just like mine.”

Christopher turned in his bed so he could face his father, but he kept his eyes closed. “Tell me about the book you’re writing.”

“Well,” Richard said, “it’s about a boy. It’s about being a boy. About growing up and having to deal with the world around you.”

Christopher smiled, something Richard rarely saw.

“What? Why are you smiling?”

Christopher stopped. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry. It’s good to smile.”

Christopher smiled again.

“Yes, I like that face,” Richard said. “Now, why are you smiling?”

“How do you know what it’s like to be a boy?”

Richard chuckled. He told him what it was like for him to grow up in Vermont with his parents and brother. He lost himself in the details of the TV programs they watched together, places
they liked to visit, until he could hear his son’s breathing get deeper. He looked so at peace, so happy to be with this father.

He continued to stroke his son’s hair, feeling close, when he felt something under his finger. Just below the hairline on the side of Christopher’s head, not far from his ear. Richard pulled back the hair just a little and saw it. A thin, red line remaining from an incision of some kind.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN

H
arold Solomon called with what he said was urgent news, but he refused to tell Richard over the phone. They had to talk in person, he insisted. Richard had been lying on the couch for about an hour, trying to figure out a way to fall asleep. He checked on Christopher and saw that he was asleep. Then he checked their bedroom door, but it was still locked. He figured he’d be gone for just a few minutes and Carol would never know he’d been gone, but he left a note on the table saying that he had left just in case she woke up.

He made it down to the street and found a cab. The traffic was light. He sat in the back of the cab and thought about how he hated those kinds of calls—no one ever called that late with good news. When he was twenty years old, home from college for Christmas break, the phone rang at about two o’clock in the morning. Richard had almost held his breath to try to hear what it was about, but he could only hear the low mumblings of his father talking two rooms down. He’d heard his father hang up the phone, then start talking quietly to his mother.

He couldn’t hear anything for a while, then his father left the bedroom and ran down the stairs, getting into the truck. Richard
waited for his mother to come in, but she never did. Finally, he walked into the hall and heard his mother crying. Her bedroom door was open.

“What’s wrong, Mom?” he asked.

She didn’t answer.

“Is it David?”

She nodded.

“Is he...okay?”

She told him David was alive, but in trouble. Richard didn’t know what to do. He’d wanted to sit by her and comfort her, but he didn’t feel strong enough. So he backed away from the door and returned to his room. He sat in his bed, pulled the covers up to his waist, and waited for an hour, then two, hoping to hear the garage door open.

The cab driver turned on Water Street and pulled up to South Street Seaport. Richard paid him, got out of the cab, and finally found Harold in front of a small souvenir shop.

“What couldn’t you tell me over the phone?” Richard asked.

“Let’s walk a little,” Harold said.

The men started walking along the pier. Despite the late hour, the Seaport was crowded with people drinking too much and talking too loud at the outdoor restaurant tables. A large yacht, with an alternative-techno band and a deck full of screaming dancers, made its way along the pier to dock.

“Do you remember Sandra?” Harold asked.

“Yes. The one whose husband didn’t see anything wrong with Newman. They’re your neighbors.”

“Right. Their daughter is Tanya. I don’t think they ever told you her name.”

Harold kept walking, without saying anything, until they got to the end of the shops. They turned the corner and stood next
to the railing, just a few feet from the water. The Brooklyn Bridge was brightly lit, looking old and big and powerful as it spanned the waters.

“So, what happened?” Richard asked. “Is she okay?”

“Sandra couldn’t take it any longer and called the school. She said she wanted her little girl to come home for a couple of days, even though it wasn’t time for a quarterly visit. They refused, of course. Then she went down there and demanded to see her daughter. Not take her out, just
see
her daughter in the lobby. They told her to wait a minute while they got her, but instead they phoned her husband. He came down to the school, angry and embarrassed, and took Sandra home. She was almost hysterical. Then the next morning....”