That was how Vincent got to hear about how his mom was trying to kill his dad.
First, his dad put his hand on his mother’s top, around one of her boobies, which he did a lot, and which Vincent thought usually meant his dad was trying to be nice—the way Grandpa Bill did when he messed up your hair. Vincent didn’t like anyone to mess up his hair—he liked his hair just so, nice and flat and soft—but he knew that with Grandpa Bill, this hair-messing deal was like hugging. So he put up with it. That’s what the boobie thing was, too. But his mom didn’t like it any better than Vincent liked getting his hair ruffled. She pushed his father’s hand away. Then his father kissed her. She smiled then, and looked down, down into the sink, as if she were trying to find a contact lens.
“Bethie,” said Vincent’s father. “Honey, we have to talk.”
“I have to print,” his mother said. “I have four phone calls to make. I have to get Vincent ready for school.”
“He isn’t even up yet.”
Ha-ha, Daddy, thought Vincent.
“Well, he should be.”
Vincent’s dad sighed. It was a big sigh, meant to get his mom to turn around and say, “Okay, what do you want?” But she didn’t; she just kept on messing with the sink, and finally his father tried again:
“Dad wants an answer, Beth. He wants me to think about this seriously, and make a decision within the year.”
“So make a decision within the year, Pat,” said his mother.
“After all, Beth, this is what all this goddamn work I’ve put in was for….”
“Pat, I’ve heard all this—”
“This is what all the years I’ve spent at Cappadora’s, and before that, filling cartons of potato salad at my dad’s—”
“Pat, we’ve been over and over this.” Watch it, Dad, Vincent thought. That’s the voice you don’t want to hear, the voice that came right before Mom’s fingers went like a lobster claw around your upper arm. Dad was pretty smart. He got up and put his arms around Mom again; he kissed her. She let him.
“Kiss, kiss, kiss,” his dad said softly, almost as nice as if he was talking to one of the kids. “Don’t we ever just fuck anymore?”
Vincent had heard his dad use the f word before, but not in such a nice voice. He leaned forward; they weren’t looking up, so they weren’t going to see him anyway.
“Pat,” said his mother. “I have to get the baby up….” Kerry was not a baby anymore, she was going to be two, but everybody still called her that.
“We have time,” said his dad.
“Okay. You go upstairs and get my diaphragm and fill it up with gunk, and then…let’s see, we’ll have about eight minutes before I have to get some food in Vincent before he gets on the bus…want to do it right here? I can make toast at the same time?”
“That’s a lousy thing to say, Beth. It isn’t like I’m on top of you every second. We have sex about as often as we pay the water bill.”
“Talk about lousy things to say…”
“And anyway, I don’t see why you need the gunk and the diaphragm every damn time.”
“Because I don’t want to get pregnant every damn time.”
“Beth, that’s another thing….”
Vincent’s mom got quiet. His dad didn’t get the message, though; he kept right on talking: “It’s been well over a year, Bethie. We both know that Ben—”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“Jesus, Beth. Don’t you give a damn about the way I hurt?” Vincent’s dad started to go out into the hall; Vincent shrank back against the sides of the box. “I mean, Bethie, I was the guy who had three kids. Everybody thought I was nuts, you know? Three kids? But one of the worst things is, for me, that the house was so full of their noise before. I would want to run up the walk at lunch—”
Vincent’s mom flashed across the lower hall so fast he barely saw her. She opened the front door. It was a thing she did a lot, just opening the front door and letting the air in, even if it was really cold. Just standing there, blowing out her breath.
“Pat, I don’t want another child,” she said.
“You said you would think this over.”
“I have thought it over. And every time I think of having another child in me, and that maybe it would be a boy…” Her voice got funny, like she had a bread ball stuck. “Pat, it isn’t going to change anything. Don’t you see that? Just so you can be the guy who has three kids again.”
“Not just that. I’m not a fool.”
“No, I mean, it would just be numbers. It would be a compensatory child. Like a replacement part. Like getting a new gravy boat so you don’t spoil the set.”
“You’re a bitch,” said Vincent’s dad.
“I have no doubt,” said his mom, “that I’m a bitch. But the fact is, I’m not going to have a baby and I’m not going to move to Chicago so you can start a restaurant with your dad. If you want a new baby and a restaurant in Chicago, you need a new wife.”
“Is it so wrong for me to want us to be a family again? Have a normal life again?”
“Pat. There is no such thing as having a normal life again.”
Vincent heard the door bang shut, and he had the feeling his mom hadn’t done it.
“There would be, if you even tried….”
“Pat,” said his mom, and it was her being-nice voice, the voice she used to try to get him not to open the door when she had pictures in the bath and the red light was on. “Do you know what it’s like for me?”
Vincent’s dad said nothing.
“Do you?”
Nothing.
“It’s like I’m always under this giant shelf of snow or rock, and if I move, if I change my position even a little, the snow is going to start to slide, and it’s going to come down on me and bury me….”
“Oh, Beth…”
“No, it really is. I don’t dare to think about him for a full minute. I don’t dare to think about the reunion for a full minute. If I thought of having to live where I’d drive by the Tremont every day of my life…”
“We wouldn’t have to.”
“Pat, I hear you and Tree talking. You and Monica. We’d all be together again. In the old neighborhood. The kids under the table while the adults play poker. Just like the old days. Don’t you think I know that Tree hates me for keeping you up here? Away from your parents, who want you so bad, so much more now that they’re grieving? Don’t you think I know that my own father thinks I should come home, where Bick can help me, because I’m such a mess?”
“Everybody hates you, Beth, right? Nobody understands how—”
“But if I move, Pat, if I move one inch, that avalanche is going to come down on me and you’ll have to raise these kids by yourself—”
“Which I already practically do.”
“Okay, okay. I accept that. Pat’s always been the good one. Pat’s the rock. He’s the one who’s held that poor crazy woman and those little kids…like the People story, Pat. Didn’t you love it? ‘His hands sturdily on the backs of his wife and his remaining son.’ You’re such a hero, Pat.”
“And you’re such a martyr, Beth.”
“I have to get Vincent up.” Vincent got up onto his knees, ready to take off for Ben’s bed and dive in if she moved. “But Pat, you know, you can’t force me to do anything. You can’t. You can’t threaten me like when we were in college, because I don’t give a damn if you leave, or…or…or if you screw every pizza waitress in Madison.”
“What?”
“I mean, you don’t have any power over me, Pat. The worst already happened.”
“I love how you say ‘it happened.’ Like it was a tornado or something.” There was such a stillness in the hall that Vincent could hear Kerry’s mouth open in her sleep, with a tiny pop. Pretty soon she would come waddling down the hall, and that would be good, he was hungry, and they were going to fight…The sunlight spun the dust over and up, over and up. Vincent put out his hand to let it rest on his palm. They weren??
?t done. He could wish all he wanted, but they weren’t done, and he might not get breakfast at all.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Nothing,” said Vincent’s dad. It was his dad’s lie voice, the voice he used when he said “I’m not tired,” so Vincent knew something else was coming. “I mean nothing.”
“You do. You mean it didn’t just happen.”
“It just happened. Forget it, Beth.”
“No, you’ve been keeping it inside, and you want me to know that you blame me. Don’t you think I already know that you blame me, because you would never have let Ben get lost, would you, Pat? You’d never have been such a bad, shitty parent, who only cared about herself—”
“I never once said that, Beth.”
“Said it? You didn’t have to say it. It was evident, Pat. That line around your mouth, Pat. You hate my guts, and you blame me for losing your son.”
Vincent saw his dad blast out of the living room like he was going to grab his mother and knock her down.
“Okay, Beth! Do I blame you? Sure as shit I blame you! Candy blames you, and Bender does, too. So does Ellen. Don’t you think everyone thinks that if you just had a minute to take care of your kids, none of this would ever have happened? Just because they don’t tell you? Does a wall have to fall on you? Yeah, you were lucky all your life until now, Beth. You could do everything half-assed and get away with it, because I was there to clean up after you!”
“You piece of shit,” said Vincent’s mother. “You self-righteous—”
“I’m not self-righteous, Beth. I’m right! I’m just right! Kids don’t just vanish like smoke, Beth. They don’t ‘get lost.’ People lose them.”
“I hate you, Pat,” said Vincent’s mother.
Vincent jumped up and ran down the hall into Kerry’s room. His head was hot like he had a fever. He raced over to the baby’s crib and let down the bar and, reaching up, clamped his whole hand over her little nose and mouth. He didn’t want to kill her…he loved Kerry. She was struggling now, trying to get his hand away, trying to breathe, her big gray eyes scared, bubbling tears…Vincent didn’t know if he could let go yet, but finally Kerry twisted her head just right and opened her getting-blue lips and began to scream, not a baby-wet cry (Vincent knew the sniffly-wheezy quality of that; he’d heard it a million times, first with Ben) but a horror-movie scream, like a big girl’s…and Vincent’s mom was up the stairs like she had wings, knocking him to one side as she pulled Kerry out of the crib (Kerry’s lips were starting to get pink again), screaming, “What did you do to her? Vincent, answer me! What did you do to Kerry?”
His dad was right behind his mom, and he grabbed Kerry out of her arms, and they held her between them, his dad saying, “Beth, she’s okay—remember, the doctor always says if they’re crying, then they’re okay…. It looks like she lost her breath for a minute….”
Then, his mom was crying, holding Kerry in her arms, and his dad tried to pull his mom against him, but she shoved him away, harder even than she’d shoved Vincent. His dad grabbed Vincent’s arm and pulled him off the floor. “Get your sweatshirt on,” he said. “We’re going for a ride.”
“He has school!” his mom screamed.
“Not today!” his dad yelled back.
“Where are you taking him?”
“Somewhere safe, Beth! Safe from you! You’re going to kill me off sooner or later, but not him!” And Vincent was practically lifted off his feet as his father skimmed him, with his sweatshirt only one arm on, down the stairs and out into the garage.
“Daddy,” Vincent said, “wait a minute. I got to get my vitamin.”
“I’ll wait in the car,” his dad said, fumbling for a cigarette in his shirt pocket.
Vincent ran back into the house—good, she was still up in Kerry’s room; he could hear her humming and crying, the floorboards squeaking as she walked Kerry back and forth. Working quickly, Vincent went first into his dad’s office, where he set the alarm for 11:00 p.m. Then into their bedroom (he had to pass Kerry’s door for it, but the door was shut, so that was okay), where he changed the alarm setting from 6:30 to 4:30 in the morning. And then, he couldn’t think, yes…okay, the stove timer. He could barely reach it. He set that for 5:00 a.m. Maybe that wasn’t all the alarms in the house, but that was all he could think of so fast. She would notice, for sure. He could stand right next to her face while she slept, he could even put out his finger and touch her eyelid, and she wouldn’t ever wake up. He’d called her a dozen times, when he had his running-away dreams, but she’d never wake up, though sometimes his dad did, if he called more than once. She would notice this, and he wouldn’t care even if they did come back tonight, which he had a feeling they weren’t going to, because his dad had grabbed his little bag with his toothbrush and shaver in it. He wouldn’t care if the alarms woke him up, too. Or even Kerry, though this wasn’t her fault.
Vincent snatched an orange Flintstones out of the bottle on the sink and jumped into the front seat of the car. “Belt,” said his dad, staring ahead, and Vincent snapped it on and sat back. They went down the belt line, past the turnoff on Park Street for Cappadora’s, past the road that led to Rob Maltese’s, his dad’s best friend’s, house. Past the car wash. To the Janesville exit, the sign that his father once said meant, “We’re going to see Grandma!”
“Are we going to Chicago?” Vincent asked.
“Don’t you want to go see Grandma Rosie?”
“It’s a school day, Daddy. It’s not Sunday or Friday even.”
“Sometimes, we could go see Grandma Rosie even in the middle of the week, like in summer.”
“But why?”
“Just to see her. Don’t you ever want to see your mama? I just want to see my mama,” his father said, in a little-bitty voice that scared Vincent much more than the f word or any of the yelling in the hall. Pat lit a cigarette and rolled down the window. “Don’t tell Mommy I smoked in the car,” he said, like he always said.
“I won’t.”
“Okay, pal.”
Vincent leaned against the arm rest; his father was singing with the Rolling Stones on the radio, using the heels of his palms like drums; Vincent thought he might fall asleep, if he wasn’t afraid of the running-away dream, the dream which wasn’t so scary in itself as the way his dream self kept wanting to look behind him. He knew that if he looked behind him, it would be the worst thing, worse than the flabby white monster with the big red mouth he saw by accident one time when he got up and his dad had Shock Theater on in the middle of the night.
It would be worse than that, Vincent thought; he wanted to tell his dad that, but his eyes were blurry.
“Wake up,” said a voice, a voice that always sounded like it had a cough in it, or stones under it. Grandpa Angelo. “Wake up, dormi-head.” That was the Italian word for “sleepy,” part of the song Grandpa Angelo sang when Ben was little. Vincent was sweaty and shivery, but he put his arms up and Grandpa Angelo lifted him out through the window of the car and held him against the rough wool of his blue suit. Grandpa Angelo wore blue suits all the time, even on Saturday morning in the house, even when he went to get a fireplace log or spray the tomatoes. Grandma Rosie said wearing the blue suit all day made Grandpa look like an immigrant, but he told her, “Rose, a businessman has a big car and a clean suit. Not just at business—all day long.” Except playing cards. When Grandpa Angelo used to play cards with his friends—Ross, Mario, and Stuey—he wore his stripey cotton T-shirt with straps over the shoulders. You could see the tufts of white hair stick up from Grandpa’s shoulders over the straps, like feathers. If he saw Vincent, he would pull him down on his lap and rub his cigar cheek against Vincent’s, and put red wine from his good glass on his finger and let Vincent lick it off. He would ask Vincent, “Now, Maestro, do I ask this most illustrious dealer for one card, or two?” And even back then Vincent was not so little he couldn’t tell when the red or black numbers had a gap in them—and he would shake his head no, because G
randpa told him the time to draw to an inside straight was never, ever, never; it was madness and doom. Sometimes, when the weather was hot and the locusts were caroling loud, Vincent would even fall asleep under Grandpa Angelo’s white iron patio chair, the chorus of locusts and the slap of the cards and the sound of Italian swears and the hot, almost too sweet smell of cigars all wound around and around him until they seemed like one thing. And he would wake up shivery and sweaty, the sky changed from sunny to sunsetty, or from fresh to shiny overhead, just like it was now.
“My little love,” said Grandpa Angelo. “My best boy.” He carried Vincent up onto the front stoop, under the cool shade of the big green awnings. Vincent was deeply fond of the awnings, the only ones on the block, and of the shiny green, absolutely square hedges that looked like plastic but smelled like vinegar.
“I love you, Grandpa,” Vincent told him, nuzzling. And he did, too. He also loved his grandpa Bill, but his grandpa Bill always seemed to be a little nervous around Vincent. Like he would ask him, “Hey, Vince, you married yet?” Like a nine-year-old kid would be married and not even tell his own grandfather. Grandpa Angelo just gave you penne and red sauce, or white sauce if your tummy was upset, and wine from a spoon and Hershey’s kisses from his pockets, and let you pick the grapes and tomatoes and only laughed if you dropped one—and not a phony, grownup, really-mad-behind-it laugh, either. He really didn’t care what a kid did as long as a kid said his pleases and thank-yous and didn’t be a diavolo—Vincent didn’t know exactly what that meant but knew it was a bad guy.
They were passing the kitchen, going outside to the backyard, when Vincent heard his dad say, “…what else to do, Ma. I can’t take anymore.”