The code of buddyhood, p.27
The Code of Buddyhood, page 27
“Daddy! Stop!”
Bobby snatched the Walkman, removed the cassette, and began ripping out the tape. “He never knows when to quit. I told him repeatedly I didn’t want you exposed to this crap and I meant it!”
Tears welled up in her eyes. “Dad-dee!” she screamed. “I was listnin’ to that!”
Bobby continued destroying the cassette. “Wrong. You were finished.”
Janie jumped to her feet. She wiped the tears from her face. “You spoil everything!” she shouted. “Everything! I never wanna see you again. Ever. I hate you!” She raced out of the room and ran up the stairs.
Bobby’s jaws clenched tightly together. “Yeah?” He threw the cassette on the floor. “Fine,” he said quietly. “Hell with you.”
He turned around and walked out the door, into the rain.
“Well, you finally succeeded,” Siobhan said. She strode into the bedroom, pulled a suitcase out from under the bed and threw it on top of the cedar chest. “It was difficult, but you finally managed to convince your own daughter that you’re the most despicable man who ever lived.”
Bobby was lying on the bed, his head propped up against the headboard. “Where’s Mark?”
“How the hell should I know? Why do you ask?”
Bobby briefly told her about the business at the office with Louise Meyer’s psychiatric file.
“If I were you, I would’ve called his bluff right then and there. Made him fess up to what a manipulative liar he is.”
Siobhan bent over the sock drawer, trying to peer inside without toppling over. “How dare he pull something like that without your permission. Worse, when you expressly refused to give your permission. You should have exposed him.” She closed the drawer and walked into her clothes closet.
“Siobhan, tampering with medical records is a Class E felony. Mark was standing right there in the room.” His fingers formed a little steeple on his chest. “I couldn’t give him the shaft right then and there.”
“Oh, I see,” Siobhan shouted from inside the closet. “If he had been somewhere else, you could have shafted him. But since he was there, no way.”
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“That’s what it sounded like to me.” She emerged from the closet holding two formal maternity dresses. “Which do you like best, the red or the blue?”
“I like them both.”
“Did you even look at them?”
“Of course I looked at them. I like them both.”
“Which one do you think I should take?”
“Either would be fine.”
“I didn’t ask which one would be fine, I asked which one you liked.”
“I really don’t care. You pick.”
“Sure. Don’t make a commitment. Like always.” She flung both dresses on top of her suitcase. “That’s why you didn’t stand up to Mark. You just want to throw temper tantrums and sit around feeling sorry for yourself. You should have told him off.”
“Don’t lecture me.”
“I’m not lecturing you. I’m telling you what you should have done.”
“Who the hell do you think you are? Jiminy Cricket?”
“Prick,” she muttered.
“What?” She seemed uncommonly hostile tonight, even more so than lately. “I didn’t tell off Mark, as you say, because he’s my friend.”
She opened another drawer and began yanking out scarves. “Some friend. A stunt like that could have gotten you booted out of the clinic. For that matter, your license to practice could’ve been suspended!”
“Well, none of that happened, so why get traumatized about it?”
“Typical.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. Where did you two buddies go last night?”
“To the club.”
“You mean the wellness center?”
“Yup.”
“Figures.” She slammed the scarf drawer shut. “Did you two boys have a lot of fun leering at the young girls in their tight sweaty leotards? Maybe you both pretended you were single and swapped some phone numbers? Probably.” She marched back into her clothes closet.
Bobby heard the sound of shoeboxes falling to the floor. “We didn’t do anything like that.”
“Then you probably talked about Annie all night long. Right?”
“That’s not true either.”
“Is that so?” She emerged from the closet. “Look me in the eye and tell me her name didn’t come up in your conversation last night.”
There was a long, heavy silence. “I don’t see why I need to be quizzed by you,” Bobby said at last. “I’ll talk about whatever the hell I want to talk about.”
“I guess I know what that answer means.” She held a pair of white sandals and a pair of black pumps next to her red dress. “Which pair should I take?”
“I really don’t care,” Bobby said wearily.
She threw the shoes down on the suitcase. “Son of a bitch. Prick.”
“What did you call me?”
“You heard me. Prick, prick, prick, prick, prick.”
Bobby jumped to his feet. His face and neck tensed. “I can’t believe you. I’ve spent the whole goddamn day working double-time, just hoping that when it was all over I could come home and have a few minutes to relax and be treated with a little respect—”
“You’re breaking my heart.” She flung several pairs of maternity panties into the suitcase.
“—just hoping I could come home and relax, never suspecting that I would instead be treated to more mind games by my house guest and a tour de force by the queen bitch of the universe—”
“You bastard!” She slammed the suitcase shut. Then, suddenly, she lifted it up and threw it at him. “You fucking, son of a bitch bastard. How dare you!”
Bobby took a step toward her. They were only inches apart. “How dare you treat me like this, when I’ve been—”
“Been doing what? Huh? What?” She was breathing much too rapidly. Red blotches covered her face and neck. “Have you done anything for Janie today, other than yelling at her?”
Bobby’s head trembled. In silence.
“No. Of course not.” She placed her hand against her extended belly. “Have you done anything for your pregnant wife today, other than yelling at me and calling me a bitch?”
Bobby’s jaw clenched tight.
“No. Of course not. Have you even fixed the goddamn garbage disposal yet?” She was shrieking. Veins distorted the shape of her neck. “No. Of course not. That would require thinking about other human beings.”
“I don’t want to hear about the goddamn garbage disposal!” he shouted back at her.
“Of course you don’t. You don’t want to hear anything that inconveniences you. You don’t want to hear anything that keeps you from doing exactly what you want to do every single solitary second of your life. You’re really every bit as selfish as your buddy Mark. Except you’re worse, really. At least he had the decency never to marry anybody!”
Lights flashed in Bobby’s eyes. His fist swung around and struck Siobhan on the side of the face. She fell back against the cedar chest, lost her balance, and tumbled backward onto the floor.
She lay there on the floor, her face in the carpet. Bobby stared down at her. He felt paralyzed, immobile.
After several moments passed, Siobhan slowly and with great effort turned herself over. Her face was pained, stricken, horrified. The side of her face was already beginning to swell. She made a raspy, choking noise, as if a catch in her throat had finally given way. Tears began to stream from her eyes.
Bobby couldn’t speak. He fell back against the bed and pulled a pillow over his head.
“I’m going to leave you, Bobby.”
He closed his eyes.
“I’m going to leave you and never come back.”
I should say something here, he thought. But nothing came. The buzz of the air conditioner seemed incredibly loud.
“Did you hear me?”
“You’re going to leave me. On the eve of my reunion.”
She laughed bitterly. “How typical. Even now you only think of yourself. Yes, Bobby, you’re going to be embarrassed in front of all your dear buddies that you haven’t seen for years. And your mother, too, not that you care. I’m sure you’ll think of something to say. Just tell everyone you’re single. Why wait until the last minute?”
She pulled a wadded piece of paper out of the pocket of her bathrobe. “I went into the guest room today while Mark was out to straighten up the mess he’s made of it. I wasn’t going through his things—not intentionally, anyway. But when I saw a notebook labeled Portfolio of Mark A. Szasz, I couldn’t resist taking a look.”
She threw the paper down in his lap. Barely moving, Bobby lifted the paper and read. He recognized it instantly. It was a poem, or more accurately, a song lyric. “Special Love.” It began:
I know there is a special place
That most men never see;
Perhaps I’ve never been there
But I see it constantly.
And at the bottom, after the third verse, beneath Bobby’s signature, he had written: For Annie.
“You told me you wrote that song for me,” Siobhan said. “On our second real date.” She was trying to sound detached and sophisticated, but her eyes were spewing forth tears. “I should have known it was a lie. Even from the very first day of our relationship, it was all a lie. I was just part of the Mark and Bobby routine.”
Bobby stared at the ceiling, speechless. He was sixteen years old again, and he had been caught. He saw his mother’s face shimmering before his eyes.
Siobhan snatched the lyric sheet back from him, tearing it. “Would it have been so much to write one song for me? To pick your favorite dress one time? To fix the garbage disposal, just once?”
She pressed both hands against her belly and inhaled deeply. “Never mind.” She folded up her suitcase and clicked the latches closed. “You could still stop me.” She laughed, a very small laugh. “If you told me you were sorry, or even if you weren’t sorry, but you really just didn’t want me to go, you wanted me to stay and be with you. I probably would, you know.” She took another choking, raspy breath. “But you won’t. That would involve taking a stand, making a commitment. And that would involve some inconvenience to you. Maybe even some embarrassment. So you won’t do it. No matter what. You’d sooner let me go.” She lifted the suitcase. “And Janie.”
Bobby blinked, trying unsuccessfully to focus. There was a fog in the room, thick and heavy. It made it impossible to move, or talk, or think clearly. He had never felt so heavy in his entire life.
Siobhan slowly walked to the door. “I’m going to check on Janie,” she said. Her voice seemed exhausted, almost gone. “I hope she hasn’t been listening. But I expect she has.” She took another step forward. “We’ll leave tonight. Might as well.” After several more moments, she left the room.
Bobby continued to lie on the bed. He heard Siobhan walk to Janie’s room, and sometime after that heard them both walk downstairs, through the garage door, and then he couldn’t hear them anymore.
The buzz of the air conditioner was incredibly loud.
Thirty-Three
Bobby stared at the mass of papers on his desk until his vision blurred. He had only been poring over Max’s notes for the last three days, but it seemed as if he’d been doing it since the day he was born. Last night, as he tried unsuccessfully to sleep, he kept seeing the dots and squiggles and hieroglyphs drifting through his mind’s eye. And Siobhan. The way she looked as she . . . left. During the few moments he had been able to enjoy something like sleep, he’d dreamed of traveling fee and unrestrained through the cosmos, of finding meaning in meaningless patterns, of flying through the orange skies of Miriago.
“Max?”
Max was sitting by the coffee table, industriously making notes on his notes. “Yes?”
“Oh, nothing. Just checking.”
“Checking?”
“Yeah. You were quiet for a while. I thought you might’ve taken a trip to Miriago. You know, to check the records.”
“Oh. No.” Max placed his pencil down on the table. “This is taking a lot longer than you thought it would, huh?”
“Not really. I’m just having a little trouble focusing today.” Bobby glanced at his watch. “It’s about time for me to hit the road anyway. I’ll call you.”
“What’s bothering you today, Doctor? You seem . . . distracted. Did I do something wrong?”
“Oh, no. I’m just tired. Didn’t get much sleep last night.”
“You feel all right?”
“Other than being tired. Why?”
“Well . . . you look awful.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“Why do you have to leave so early? The reunion isn’t until eight.”
“I promised to stop in and visit my mother, while I’m in Norman. She lives practically on campus.”
“I see.” Max seemed to be thinking about something. “I guess you really love your mother.”
Bobby’s eyes narrowed. “I suppose.”
“Then why doesn’t she live with you?”
Bobby passed a hand across his face. “Well, Max . . . you’ve touched on kind of a sore spot . . .”
“Oh. Okay.” Max picked up his pencil. “I’d give anything if my mother could come and live with me,” he said.
He returned his attention to the stars.
After saying his goodbyes and remonstrating Max to keep working, Bobby left his office. He found Sheila standing just outside Claudia’s secretarial station, talking to Mark. They seemed friendly enough; Mark must have turned on a lot of charm to smooth over his brush-off the day before. Claudia feigned typing, but Bobby could tell she was keeping a close eye on Mark and Sheila. Tsk. The green-eyed monster invades the workplace.
“I see Dr. Marcus remembered to return your file,” Bobby said, approaching them.
“Yes,” Sheila said. “He was just telling me the two of you are going to a reunion of your college dormitory.”
“Yeah,” Bobby said. “We’re leaving now.”
“Really?” She looked from one buddy to the other. “Just . . . the two of you?”
“Yes. Just the two of us.”
Her delight was utterly undisguised. “Well, I can’t say I’m surprised.” She took the tiniest step closer to Bobby. “I’ll be anxiously awaiting your return,” she whispered. “And your answer.”
Mark grabbed Bobby by the shoulder. “C’mon, buddy. If we don’t leave now, we’ll never make it to the reunion.”
Bobby thought he was very possibly correct.
“I’m sorry, Max, but that’s just not good enough.”
Bobby wedged the telephone receiver between his head and shoulder. “Either the homeland of the bird-people is north of the desert kingdom of Alcona, or it’s just across the Trixuli River from the monastic temples of the Ebertonions. It can’t be both. They’re on opposite sides of the planet.”
Mrs. Beresford glanced at Mark. “Has he been making calls like this for long?”
Mark nodded. “Alas, yes.”
“Well,” Bobby said, “keep working at it. I’ll be back in town tomorrow. Try to resolve as much as you can—the star chart problems, the flora and fauna contradictions, the ethnic discrepancies. This would be a great time to zoom up to Miriago.” Pause. “Uh-huh. Well, perhaps soon.”
After a few hurried closing remarks, Bobby hung up the phone. “I think he’s come a long way. Light-years, you might say.”
Mrs. Beresford didn’t smile. “I’ve instructed Lenore to prepare some lemonade. Is there anything else I can serve you?”
Bobby didn’t bother to answer; she was clearly speaking to Mark. To his surprise, she and Mark seemed to be getting along famously. For every wacko, pseudoscientific statement Mark made, his mother had just read an article about that in one of her magazines, thereby proving its veracity. Mark, of course, was enjoying the chance to talk with someone new, to cast the old spell.
Bobby had barely spoken to him during the entire drive to Norman, and answered most of his questions with monosyllabic replies. Bobby hadn’t mentioned the Meyer file controversy, or the meditation tape, or even asked how his date with Claudia went. Mark hadn’t asked why Siobhan and Janie weren’t at home, or why they weren’t coming to the reunion, or to what Sheila had been elliptically referring. And no one had mentioned Annie.
“We’ll have to leave for the reunion in just a few minutes, Mother,” Bobby said.
“In that case, I would like to speak with you privately. Will you excuse us, Mark?”
“Of course.”
Mrs. Beresford glanced at Bobby. “Would you join me in the parlor?”
“Said the spider to the fly,” Bobby mumbled. He followed his mother into the adjoining room. It was decorated principally in subdued pastels, shades of pink and lime-green, with lots of frilly ornamentation and knickknacks.
Bobby and Mrs. Beresford seated themselves on opposite ends of a small antique whist table. He could hardly bear to look at her. He remembered her as being so pretty, but the past decade had not been kind. She’d had another face-lift, but it only served to make her look stretched and ghastly.
“What did you want to talk about, Mother? We don’t have much time.”
“This won’t take long,” she said. She rubbed a finger against her rubbery cheek. “I just want to ask you what’s going on.”
“What’s going on? I don’t know what you mean.”
“Yes, you do. What’s happening between you and Siobhan?”
“Since when did you care about me and Siobhan?”
Mrs. Beresford’s eyelids fluttered. “Please, Bobby, you’re not sixteen anymore. Don’t act like it.”
“Sorry.” He sat up straight in his chair. “It just kind of rubs me the wrong way to see you acting so concerned eight years after you did everything you could think of to keep me from marrying her.”
His mother sighed, slowly and wearily. “My initial opposition to your marriage is irrelevant now, isn’t it? You are, in fact, married. And you would be stupid to throw that away.”
