“No,” she said. “He would only get mad at me when he was little. But after Ben died—”
Grandma Rosie gasped. “Beth,” she said. “Benjamin is not dead.”
“Oh, Rosie,” said his mother. “He is dead. He’s dead. If he wasn’t dead, I would know it.”
Here we go, thought Reese, let’s talk about Ben for…like our whole lives.
“Beth,” Grandpa Angelo said gently, “the children…”
“But I can’t stand it! Everyone keeps pretending he’s going to come back. I think that’s half of what makes Vincent crazy. It makes me crazy. I don’t care, Pat. I came here and why waste the money? I’m going to say this. I’m sick of it. ‘Never give up hope.’ ‘Pray, pray, pray.’ Well, why don’t we give up hope? And just let whatever happens happen?”
“Because you can’t just bury him, Beth.” His dad spoke up. “You want to just bury him before we even know. I know why you feel that way, but…”
I’m here, thought Reese. I’m here.
“It sounds like there are a couple of camps in this,” Tom put in, “and Reese is right in the middle of them. Reese, what do you think?”
Reese said, “Nothing. I don’t think about it that much.”
“Come on,” Tom urged him. “Have you ever heard of the big purple elephant in the living room? There’s this elephant right in the middle of the living room, and the whole family walks around it and pretends it isn’t there…. You’ve got to think about it, Reese. It’s right in front of you.”
“I don’t, though.”
“I don’t, either,” said his mother, and a warm pulse in Reese beat toward her. “I don’t think about it ever. What does thinking about it do?”
“Well, in my experience, it sometimes, sometimes gives you some peace,” Tom suggested, and then they were off, his mom pointing out that the family did not put Easter eggs on Ben’s grave at Easter now or in the past. “He doesn’t have a grave to begin with,” she’d snapped—or hang a stocking for him, or buy him birthday clothes one size larger each year…and his grandmother putting in that she did pray for Ben every day, and so did her daughters….
Tom struggled to keep up, asking, “Does it bother you that Beth doesn’t do that, Mrs. Cappadora? If you think she’s given up, how does that make you feel?”
Grandma Rosie reached down and fingered her locket. “I am sorry for Beth. I have known Beth all her life. I love Beth like she is my own child. I am sorry for her, because she…she has lost her heart. She has lost her faith….” His mom snorted. Reese couldn’t believe it; it was like she’d jumped up on the uneven parallel bars. But Grandma Rosie wasn’t about to give up: “Bethie, dear one, you know you have gone away from God….”
“Oh, no, Rosie. No, Rosie. It was God who took the powder, Rosie. A long time ago. No offense, but…”
Gak and gak. Back and forth. Reese realized that, although he had never heard these words spoken, they were as familiar to him as the national anthem. He covered his ears. Finally, from the white throw pillow on the floor where he’d taken refuge, he could see the forest of their legs lengthen as Tom ushered them from the room. An instant later, Kerry’s little purple twigs bounded out from behind the sofa. At last, Tom leaned down and said, “Hey, buddy, you got a minute to spare here?”
“I got five minutes, no more. In five minutes, I’m trying out for the White Sox.”
“What position?”
“Center field.”
“I don’t want to interfere with a career in the show.”
“They waited this long,” Reese told him, “they can wait five more minutes.”
“Actually, we’ve got maybe fifteen good minutes here.”
Reese got up. “Maybe I should get down on the couch here, Tom, like in the movies. I never did that. You could say, ‘So, Mister Cappadora, why do you think you look like a sheep?’”
“I think you’d fall asleep.”
“Why?”
“You look like your candle burns at both ends, ’bro. Are you putting in enough sack time? Is it the business?”
Tom meant the betting. “No,” Reese said. “That’s just…I do that mostly on the weekends.”
“It drives your father nuts, you know, Reese.” Reese knew it didn’t, not at all. His dad was as proud of his business as he was ashamed of it. It was the same way Grandpa Angelo felt about gangsters. “Most kids your age, they have a paper route.”
“I can’t have a paper route.”
“Too strenuous, huh?”
“No.” He hated to do this to Tom. “Kids…a kid once got kidnapped on his paper route. It was very famous. Johnny Gosch? They never found him. In my family, it’s just not a thing…My father…my parents would freak….” Tom wasn’t like other adults, though. His face didn’t get all waxy and soft, like he didn’t know where to put his cheek muscles, when Reese said it. He just shook himself a little—like, as Grandma Rosie said, when a goose walked over your grave—and plowed right on.
“And what about you? Would you freak?”
Stiffly, Reese told him, “It wouldn’t scare me.”
“Not even a little?”
“I don’t know. Anyway, who wants to get up at goddamn three o’clock in the morning?”
“Not me,” said Tom. “Or you. Especially if you get to bed pretty late. Do you go to bed at a reasonable hour? Ten?”
“Yeah, I go to bed.” Reese shifted. “But then I have to wake up and change the tapes, and it takes me a while to settle down again.”
“The tapes?”
“I sleep with music on.”
“Must be very restful for your parents.”
“I use earphones.”
“What d’you listen to?”
“Mostly classical stuff at night. And opera. Italiano. You know. It’s a birth defect, like you being a Red Sox fan.”
“Pardon me, Reese, but getting up to change the tape deck all night doesn’t exactly sound like healthy slumber to me.”
“It works.”
“So this is why you look like death on a cracker.”
“Well, it’s not the music….”
“What is it?”
Now. Reese thought. Now he was going to have to talk about it. He’d mentioned the running dream last session, just before they ran out of time. In fact, Tom had accused him of doing it on purpose, knowing perfectly well the time was up and the family was coming this time. Old Tom felt cheated; shrinks cranked up on dreams.
“Okay. It’s the dream I started to tell you about.”
“The running dream.”
“Yeah.”
“Where are you in it?”
“I’m in this big room, and the tiles on the floor are what I’m looking at. They’re like…they look like meatballs. It’s nutty. They’re pretty ugly.”
“Are you alone?”
“Shit, no!” Reese looked up. “I’m sorry. No. There’s a zillion people there, and they’re all talking.”
“What are they saying?”
“Well, that’s the thing. They’re not saying anything.”
“You said they’re talking.”
“I can tell they’re talking because I can see their mouths move. But I can’t hear anything. I’m just standing there, but I’m not just standing there.” Reese frowned. “I’m running.”
“But you can’t move.”
“Is that how everybody feels?”
“It’s a common thing that happens in anxiety dreams. What matters is, who’s chasing you? What are you running from?”
Reese strained. He tried to take himself back—the gulls flapped again, as if they were getting pissed, but it was okay, he knew how to breathe it down. He tried to look behind him. “There’s nobody behind me. I’m running…after somebody.”
“After who?”
“Uh…I don’t know.”
“You do know.”
“I don’t know. I mean, if I knew, why wouldn’t I tell you?”
“You tell me why you wouldn’
t tell me.”
Because I’ll die, Reese thought. I’ll die here on your couch if I tell you. Or maybe it’ll be worse than that. Maybe I’ll just shit all over your couch. Reese lay down on the couch, folding his elbows over his eyes. It wasn’t the crying he minded, or even Tom seeing him; it was that he felt so damn worn out, so hauled down by anchors.
“I’m running after…somebody on the other side of the room.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know who.”
“Listen, buddy,” said Tom, getting up and tapping on the frame of one of the thousand horse pictures. “You know what I make an hour?”
“What?”
“A hundred and twenty bucks an hour is what I make.”
“Well, congratulations,” Reese said, sitting up. “Maybe you can buy some more horse pictures.”
“And you know who pays me that hundred and twenty bucks?”
“Who?”
“Your dad.”
BFD, thought Reese. It was, after all, his dad’s idea, this whole head-shrinking party, in the first place. “So?”
“So, do you think your dad is a complete fool?”
“No, I don’t think my dad is a complete fool.”
“Well, you must. Because, if your dad wants to pay a hundred and twenty bucks an hour for you to sit here and jerk around every Saturday, and sometimes during the week, if he’s so rich that that doesn’t even matter to him, that’s jake with me. I’ll take his money….”
“You would, too,” Reese shot back. “You’d take it, even if you knew it wasn’t going to do me any good….”
“Sure, for a while. Why shouldn’t I? I make money; your dad feels like you’re talking to someone, everybody’s happy. Except there’s this kid who’s on the way to first-offender boot camp, which is you, but that’s your choice, buddy. I’m not your mommy. I see plenty of tough guys come and go. They’re all losers.” Reese felt his fists begin to curl. Different from the rest, he thought. You preppy prick. “But pretty soon, at some point, ethics dictate that I’m going to have to say, ‘Well, listen, your kid’s got his head up his butt, and he isn’t going to say jack to me—’”
“I’m going,” Reese said.
“So go,” said Kilgore. “I still get my hundred and twenty bucks.”
Reese got up. His face was itching, crawling with ants. Air. He needed some air. Then he whirled around. “You know exactly who it is,” Reese told him then, his voice snake-flat, the voice he knew scared the hell even out of the two Renaldo brothers, the twins who were juniors and had necks the size of Reese’s waist. The voice Reese didn’t even know where it came from, that sounded like some freaking Damien voice, even to him.
“Okay. Who is it? If you don’t mind my asking.”
“It’s my brother.”
“Oh. Your brother. Which brother?”
“Fuck you,” said Reese. “Fuck you sincerely.”
“Thank you very much, I’m sure. Which brother?”
“I only got one brother. Which is to say I have no brother. It’s Ben. It’s Ben.”
“And what’s he doing? Come on, Reese, what’s he doing?”
“He’s walking out the door.”
“Where?”
Reese thought he might puke. His throat tasted like acute Slim Jim poisoning. He thought he didn’t dare open his mouth. But he made it split, pried it like a hinge, and moved his tongue. Finally, he fetched a voice. “He’s walking out the door of the hotel.”
“Did you see him, Reese?”
Reese shouted, “I don’t know! I don’t know! I’m running, and I’m running. But I can’t move….”
“Did you move, Reese, in real life?”
“I don’t know! I was just a kid….”
“Look at him, Reese. Look at Ben.”
“I can’t even see him; his back is to me. And so is hers….”
“Hers? Your mother?”
“No…. No.” Reese struggled to breathe.
“Ellen? Your aunt Ellen?”
“No. No. The little old lady. The little skinny old lady.”
“What’s she doing?”
“She’s walking behind Ben. She’s following Ben. She’s…opening the door for him.”
“Reese,” said Tom, gently, so soft, sitting down next to him on the edge of the sofa. “Do you think this really happened? Or is this part of the dream?”
“I think it’s part of the dream,” said Reese, “because it really happened.” And in a moment he would remember with hot shame for years, even after it all came down, he reached out and took Tom’s hand. And Tom, thank God, acted like he didn’t even notice.
Part Two
Beth
CHAPTER 19
May 1994
Kerry was screaming with such earsplitting might that Beth barely heard the doorbell.
“Stop, Kerry!” she ordered, in the military voice she hardly ever used anymore.
But once Kerry stopped, Beth wanted to join her in a few righteous screams herself. The bell was ringing with the kind of persistence that told Beth she would not be able to pretend not to be home—it was ringing, in fact, as if someone outside were on fire.
“Wait!” she yelled. “Coming!” The bell fell silent. Then it rang again.
If she let go now, Beth could kiss all hope of untangling Kerry’s hair goodbye; the child would not let her mother come near her again with a brush in hand for three days, minimum. But because Beth so rarely remembered to brush Kerry’s fine reddish-blond hair—which Ellen insisted was an inheritance from her godmother—it was a welter of rats and snarls under a soft veneer. Kerry simply ran a wet brush over the top every morning before school. To Kerry, smooth on top was combed, just as under-the bed was clean. “My teacher thinks my hair has a lot of natural body, Mama,” she told Beth. “She says it’s like Rapunzel.”
Christ, Beth thought, the teacher’s a twit and she must think I clean toilets at a trailer park. “That was nice of her,” she’d told Kerry. “But she really thinks that because your hair is so full of tangles it sticks out from your head three inches. If you don’t brush it, Kerry, it’s going to break off and you’ll have little cowlicks all over. Real ugly.” Beth had risen this morning with a small, unexpended premium of energy; she had learned to make use of these, because she knew the drill of her ordinary days—all the other days she had nothing but minimum motion to give. She intended to buy Vincent some cleats today as well. But first she wanted to set Kerry to rights.
“I do brush it. Every day,” Kerry told Beth, her voice skating along the midline edge of whining and aggression. “It looks good.”
“But once in a while I have to,” Beth answered. And everything that came next was choreographed. All Beth had to do was wave the brush in any of the air space around Kerry’s skull and Kerry, the most docile of children, would transform herself into a rabid wolverine, kicking and squirming and letting out yowls that made Beth want to bite her.
Distracted by the thought of some Jehovah’s Witness standing on the porch, his eyes raised in a prayer for strength to minister to the occupants of a house from which such screams issued, Beth attacked one more particularly horrific clump. As she did, the hairbrush snapped, and Kerry tore off, out the door of Beth’s bedroom and down the hall stairs for the front door, while Beth slowly picked up the shards of shattered plastic, and then followed her daughter, swearing softly.
“Are you in sixth?” she heard Kerry say as she rounded the last curve of the staircase. The door swung half-open between Kerry and the visitor.
“…in third? Were you the soybean?” She heard a child’s voice, older, ungendered, say.
“Actually,” said Kerry, “I was the feed corn.” The spring festival, thought Beth. Had Pat gone?
“Who do you have?” the voice asked.
“Cook,” said Kerry.
“I had Cook!” said the voice. “She’s really nice!”
Beth jumped down the last two steps and put her arm around Kerry.
br /> The bright noon sunlight, after the dark upstairs hall, had the effect of backlighting with a hard spot; Beth held up her hand to shield her eyes, but the kid was still a shape cut of black paper, a sun-shot halo around his head. He was big, though, big and heavyset, she thought, for a sixth-grader, but then Vincent was so small. She bumped her hip against the screen door to open it.
Years before, Ellen’s mother had suffered a petit stroke. And long after, she would tell Beth it was possible for such brain events to happen in an instant, the time it took to speak a word; you could have them in your sleep and wake with nothing more than the sensation of having weathered a headache. But though the cadenza of sound Beth heard was as loud as a ripsaw and sent her staggering against the opening door, she did not lose an instant of consciousness. And she realized just as quickly that though the noise filled the street, the world, no one else could hear it. She reached up for her temple; the sound pounded, but now with a transparent quality; she could hear everything around it; the wind in the maples like water rushing from a pipe, crows clucking at each other like castanets. Bile sloshed over her tongue. But she gripped both sides of the door frame and bent nearly double, trying to measure her breathing and muster enough oxygen to fight the gathering pitchy dots that licked at the space in front of her eyes.
“Are you all right?” said the kid, backing off.
“Mommy!” cried Kerry in a tinny voice.
“I’m…all…right,” Beth gasped.
“Mommy, are you going to puke? Should I get Georgia?”
The kid was backing down the three front steps. With real fear in his voice, he told Beth, “I mow lawns. I was just dropping off this thing with my phone number. I can do it later. I’ll come back.”
But Beth was now getting breaths she believed were restorative. How much time had passed? A minute? Ten? She couldn’t stand upright, but she waved her hand at the kid, and at Kerry, in a gesture she meant to mean, No problem, right with ya. She did not want to terrify him. She tried to think of a plan, pitchforking options aside like sodden leaves. “Actually, I really need the lawn mowed,” she said. “Could you do it today?”