And the Dark Sacred Night (23 page)

Kit reaches for the piece of paper Jasper’s holding. Jasper thinks about the elderly senator felled by the stroke, his possibly-soon-to-be-widow. “You could call this woman, I suppose—you could do it now, from here—but what if …”

“What if she doesn’t want to hear from me? Right,” Kit says quietly. “After all these years, why would she?”

Jasper has thought this through; Viv would be proud of him. “Well, say that’s the case. Which I doubt. Then we go ahead and look for the son. Your father.” Go slow, he reminds himself, seeing the wide-eyed, feral expression on Kit’s gentle face. Loraina’s right: people hunger to know where they came from.

“He never wanted me, did he?”

“We don’t know that,” says Jasper.

“Of course we do!” And here, finally, are the tears, angry tears, wiped roughly away with a dish towel.

“Kit.” Jasper wants to go around the table and touch him, but he figures that might not be wise. “How about I be the one to call her? I can call her right now, hand the phone to you if she gives the word.”

Kit struggles to control himself. “I’d better eat something first.”

“Tuck in.” Jasper takes his own plate, scraped clean, to the sink. “Know what? I’ll miss your cooking.”

Kit looks up from his food. “I’ll be back, Jasper. I promise.”

“You better.” Jasper decides to wash the skillet; it keeps him at the sink. Best hold his tongue on the subject of promises.

“What’s her name?” says Kit, almost inaudibly.

Only a coward would stall with
Whose name?
“Lucinda Burns.”

“Lucinda Burns.” Long pause. “So my name would have been Burns.”

“Well, maybe in a life you should probably be glad you’re not living.” The emotions are deepening in a way that makes Jasper queasy. The skillet is clean, the sink empty. He
is
a coward. “Hey,” he says, forcing himself to return to his place at the table, “like my name hasn’t served you just fine?”

“Sorry.”

“Oh, don’t be a moron. I’m ribbing you.”

Kit shakes his head. “Mom’s going to kill me, I guess.”

“Throw a few punches. Big deal,” says Jasper. “You’ve been a good son to that mother of yours.”

“Until now.”

“Forty-odd years of being the perfect son? I’d call that plenty. I’d call that boring. How about you take a page from Kyle? Though Christ, could he take a volume from you.”

Kit carries his plate to the sink. He’s rinsing it when he says, “Kyle’s not bad, not anything near bad.”

Jasper wants to object—to say
Now did I ever call him bad?
—but he has thought in those terms. He is not always a good father. Who is? And this takes his thoughts to the fellow who might have held up his side of the biological bargain and stuck around for Kit. Or no; for Daphne. For the first time in ages, for a passing moment, he feels the same shielding compassion he felt for her on the night she was brave enough to tell him her story—or what she could bear to tell of it. But Kit is the one who matters now.

“I’d better feed the beasts. Then let’s make that call.”

“I plan to help finish the work, you know.” Kit looks at the corner of the room that needs new paneling.

“Nah,” says Jasper. “You’re headed home today. I’ve got Jim signed up for that. No offense intended, but I won’t have to babysit the job.”

“No offense taken,” says Kit.

“I don’t think he’s worse off than when you last saw him,” says Sharon. “Sometimes, though, he gets a little paranoid. The doctor says that’s not unusual.”

“Who’s conspiring against him?”

“Oh, Jasper, stop expecting it to make any sense. That’s what I have to keep telling myself.”

They are sitting together on a couch in the reception area of the place Jasper has come to think of as Rayburn’s new home. More like Rayburn’s last home. Sharon’s wearing a yellow dress, an obvious effort at cheer; lipstick gives her a much-needed touch of youth. Rayburn may not be worse off than he was three weeks ago, but Sharon looks like she’s three years older. Jasper doesn’t recall those creases in her throat. She’s also become accidentally slim, the kind of slim one should resist complimenting.

“Sharon—”

“Stop. I already hear what you’re going to say. ‘Sharon, you are …’ Multiple choice. A saint. An angel. A trouper. A devoted wife.” She ticks the options off on her fingers, then pauses before making the sound of a game-show buzzer. “Wrong. Correct answer: none of the above. Want to know what I am, Jasper? A woman with no choice. Simple as that.”

Jasper had planned on option A: a saint. Useless chump that he is.

Sharon smiles apologetically. She taps Jasper’s knee. “You go see him on your own. Tell him I’ll be back for lunch tomorrow. If he asks, which I bet he won’t, I’m going home to eat takeout linguini with clams and watch
Roman Holiday
. Netflix is my latest vice.”

“Audrey Hepburn.”

“No, Jasper. Gregory Peck.” She leaves without kissing or hugging him. She’s probably sick and tired of all the affection people think will somehow make up for no husband. Worse than no husband: an impostor husband.

Rayburn perches on the edge of his bed, wearing a blue tracksuit. In his former life, Rayburn wouldn’t be caught dead in an outfit like this. He’d have called it something like yupster jammies. He needs a haircut and a shave.

The bed is made but mussed up. Two Kinky Friedman mysteries are about to slip off the mattress into the gap at the footboard, along with the local paper. (Yes, speaking of saints, there’s the story about Mitchum and Zev, the front-page picture showing the dogs outside the hospital, one posed to either side of City Boy Bruno, who’s grinning
shamelessly from his wheelchair. After the editor begged—and Loraina told Jasper to get off his high horse—Jim drove the dogs over for their big tabloid moment. How to make heroes out of scoundrels, celebrities out of blockheads.)

“Hail, chief,” states Rayburn, saluting Jasper.

“Hail to you, boss.” Jasper sits in the armchair near the window. The view is calming: the edge of a woods striped with pink-skinned birches.

“She gone?”

“She has a date with Gregory Peck.”

Rayburn looks worried; he seems to consider this. “Maybe in my situation that’s the best thing.”

“Your situation?” To think he’d begun to relax.

“Whatever you do, you mustn’t tell them.”

Jasper knows better than to ask what it is he mustn’t tell whom. He points at the paper. “See how my two ill-behaved mongrels are suddenly stars? I could charge good money for kids to come over and pet them. About all I’m fit for these days. Run a petting zoo. Every morning I get out of bed, some new joint cries uncle.”

Rayburn picks up the paper, stares at the picture of the dogs, but shows no recognition or interest. “Thing is, I couldn’t resist her. She was …” He drops the paper and groans with longing. “You remember how they are at that age.”

Jasper simply nods.

“She was ripe is all I can say. Without getting down to details. She wouldn’t like that.” He flicks his eyebrows at Jasper.
We looking at a hot dame or what, boss?
Rayburn’s expression when they spotted Daphne at the reception after Litch’s funeral.

“The bad news is, her parents are going to hunt me down here, and if Sharon finds out, I am cooked. I need some kind of decoy, a way to divert them.”

“Sharon won’t find out, I’ll make sure of that.” Jasper can’t bear this. “I have a bunch of news, though, news of my own,” he blurts out loudly. “Kit came to visit for a few days. Daphne’s boy. You remember him.”

Jasper watches Rayburn shift gears. The gears are grinding, but he’s getting there. At some point, he probably won’t be able to do
this anymore. His world, says Sharon, will keep on shrinking until it’s like a little snow globe of his own making, capable of agitation but never change.

“Christopher,” says Rayburn. “The one who stuck by you.”

It takes an effort not to praise Rayburn for getting it right. “He’s married with twins. Lives in New Jersey now.”

“That’s old news. I haven’t gone totally senile yet.”

“Well, we don’t always remember these things, do we?” It’s hard to hold fast to Rayburn’s gaze, not because Rayburn looks distracted but because he looks so intent on connection, as if to string a tightrope between them. After a moment, it’s too hard to sustain; Jasper’s eyes wander. He sees the hospital slipper socks on Rayburn’s feet, the bag of cookies Sharon must have brought. On the windowsill, not far from the cookies, a plastic pitcher with a cap, a telltale shape. It’s for pissing in.

He forces himself to look back at Rayburn, who seems to be waiting for him to continue. “The twins are nine years old now, can you believe it? Anyway, he was here for the big storm. He was with me when we found those fool hikers, the ones in the story.” He points back at the newspaper.

“He doesn’t know about me, does he?”

Jasper hesitates. “No, Rayburn, nobody does. You’re safe.”

Rayburn shakes his head. “I wish that were so.”

“Kyle was around, too. And here’s the big news: Kyle’s getting married. It’s not going to be easy—Kyle never goes for easy—but she’s more than nice. She’s strong. That’s obvious. She’s known him for long enough, too.”

Rayburn beams. “I’ve been waiting for that news. You getting married again. About time. About goddamn time. You’ve mourned too long for Viv. Bite my head off, but it’s the truth.” He holds out his hand. “Congratulations.”

Jasper shakes his head, waves his hands in denial. He laughs, trying not to sound nervous. “Kyle. Kyle’s the one getting married.”

“Kyle owes you money, doesn’t he?” says Rayburn. “I hope he appreciates all you’ve done, all these years. And you know, I don’t think his brother’s been too helpful there. I don’t care if he lives in friggin’ Siberia.”

Jasper sighs. “Can I have one of Sharon’s cookies?”

“Help yourself. Cookies are too fattening for me.” He lays a hand across his gut and whispers, “Have to stay as young as possible now, keep my mojo up and running.”

Jasper fetches the cookies. The surface of the ziplock bag is fogged, which means they’re still warm. When he opens the bag, the scent of chocolate gives him a surge of wayward bliss. In a cruel flash, he imagines marrying Sharon.

“I can’t stop seeing her,” Rayburn says urgently. “And the fact that she’d go for someone like me—would you be able to resist? It’s risky, but … life is short, as you well know.” He chuckles. “She has a ring in her belly button. Gold. Fourteen-karat gold. Tip of my tongue fits right through it.”

“Well!” Yikes. Enough of this. Returning to his chair, Jasper glances at the table beside Rayburn’s bed. He sees a list of words written on a piece of paper. The handwriting is a shakier version of Rayburn’s normal scrawl.

Rayburn sees that Jasper’s spotted the list. “My words,” he says. “Words it occurs to me I’m losing. So when I capture them, get them back for a minute, I write them down. That way I can’t lose them again. Did you know that writing actually wires stuff directly into your brain?”

“Makes sense to me,” says Jasper. Thank God for chocolate-chip cookies. He takes two and puts the bag back on the sill, careful to lay it some distance from the pitcher for pissing.

“Let me read you today’s list.” Rayburn holds the paper at a distance. “
Wavelength. Scrotum. Downpour. Arboretum. Scrotum
reminded me of that one, so I thought I’d put it down, too.
Meniscus
. Which reminded me of
hibiscus
. Also,
discus.…
And how about
hyperbole
?”

Jasper wonders if it’s a good thing, or a bad thing, that the words on this list aren’t words like
dog
or
shoe
or
pillow
.

“We’re all shedding the nouns,” says Jasper. “The nouns go first, is what I’ve been told. Personally, I can live without
arboretum
or
hyperbole
.”

“But not
scrotum
!” Rayburn exclaims with joy. “Not
vulva
!”

Jasper wants desperately to look at his watch. He wants to be with Rayburn at the nearest bar, with music too loud for all this distressing conversation. Some lousy local garage band would do. He could ask Sharon’s permission to get his old friend into some authentic
clothing and take him out, but Rayburn would probably lose his bearings, might even panic. This room, along with a few others in this big old house, is where he leads his entire life these days.

Rayburn says, “I am so glad you are getting married again. Do I know her? Tell me I know her.”

Jasper looks him in the eye and says, “Loraina.” If this gets back to Sharon, and he doubts that it will, he’ll go from there.

Rayburn looks as if he’s straining to remember her. “Whoever she is, I hope she’s your ace in the hole.”

Jasper smiles. “Quoth the cardinal to the bishop.”

Rayburn returns his smile, but with a shadow of confusion. He startles Jasper by calling loudly, “Sharon! Get in here, Sharon!” He waits, listening. “She in the kitchen? Let’s share your news.”

Jasper sighs. “Forgot to tell you, she’s gone out. Shopping. You know what? I’ll call her up later and tell her myself.”

“She’ll like that,” says Rayburn. He looks content. He closes his eyes. “I think I’m tired. Nap time. I hear that’s good for my … Well, lost another word there. Down the rabbit hole.”

“Constitution, maybe,” offers Jasper. Libido, he thinks.

“
Constitution
is a good one,” says Rayburn. “Many meanings there. A legendary ship, for one.” He locates his pen and adds it to his list. It seems he can spell just fine. He opens the drawer in his side table, slips the list in. Jasper can see that the drawer is jammed with slips of paper. Lists of lost words.

“I’ll invite you to the wedding,” says Jasper, “when I’ve got the date.” He stands up, brushing cookie crumbs from his lap onto the linoleum floor.

“Don’t tell her, either, okay? If you don’t mind. I know it’s hard to keep things from your sweetheart, but this is me asking.”

“You’re the only one who could hold me to that promise,” says Jasper. He pats his friend on one shoulder—the prominence of the bone another pulse of heartbreak.