Farewell Navigator (4 page)

All those times it was me who found him, and I prayed so fast my tongue dented the roof of my mouth.

This time I don’t pray. I have this hard little thought, a stripe of cold, broken lightning:
Go ahead
.

I have this relief.

It only lasts as long as one breath takes to break in a lung. Then I am yelling, Come on! and hollering, You fucker, come on! I punch the mounded blankets, slamming and slamming my fists into the curled lump of him.

Quit it, Horace says. He wriggles his head out from under the blue knit blanket, and peeks up. Now I’m bruised, he complains.

You’re a dick.

It was a
joke
. He picks the orange bottles off the floor and rattles them at me.

I watch him back, quiet, until he can’t stand it and looks away. I keep watching. I want my eyes to shoot shame into him, or guilt, or a new conscience that will keep him from ever doing it again. Not the pretending part—the real trying it part. I stare and stare and hope I’m firing beams of living into his brain. Horace wipes a clump of black hair off his face, reaches for his cigarettes on the dresser. Jesus, he says, I’m fine.

It is common for brothers to knife the heads off sisters’ dolls, but I didn’t know that when I was six. I saw my killed doll and wondered where the blood was. I went sobbing to my father, who was watching his game. Not now, baby, he said, leaning around me to see the screen.

But Horrible committed murder! I shouted.

After the game, my brother was goaded into confessing, and because Dad was in a bad mood—his team had probably lost—he smacked him in the face. Horace, bright-lashed with tears, whispered to me: You will never be forgiven.

Yes I will, I said.

No, you won’t.

Yes I will.

Nope.

But please?

Never, Horace said.

Oh
please?
Please please please forgive me?

No matter how much you beg, he said, I will never forgive a tattler.

I report to our mother: He’s fine.

Is he? She stirs grated orange peel into a pot of boiling cranberries.

Just taking a little nap.

The boy gets far too much sleep, she says.

The man whose thirtieth birthday is scheduled for the week after Christmas pads downstairs in socks embroidered with little monkeys. A merry noon to ye wenches, he says. Shall I whip up some eggnog?

I hate eggnog.

Then what say you, Mother? Wouldn’t you relish a cup of good cheer to inaugurate the holiday season?

She says, I think it would be nice if nobody drank today.

Yeah, that sounds nice. That sounds so
nice!
Have you already dumped out all the liquor? He walks to the sink, peers in, sniffs.

Melodrama, I accuse.

My brother squints at me. I stare back. I won’t take my eyes off him. Finally, lightly, he says, You want melodrama, sweetie? Just wait till next Friday. There will be great goddamn truckloads of it to be had.

What’s next Friday?

His class reading, Mom reminds me.

Of course she wouldn’t forget.

We sit on folding chairs in a sort of rec room with exposed pipes and a troubling reek of foot-vinegar that Horace says is from the yoga classes they hold there. The first reader is a guy with platinum hair and the kind of face I imagine a surfer or woodcutter would have: red, rubbery, confident. My brother whispers to me, His cock is a worm of flab and he relies on medicine to stiffen it—according to the three women in the class who’ve slept with him since September.

The second student recites a poem about bathing in poison juice that’s gushing from a hole in her arm. After the bath, says the poem, she is finally clean. Revolting glamorizer of drug use,
gnashes my brother, that lobotomy-on-legs couldn’t write her way out of the plastic bag I’d like to hold over her head until her lungs collapse.

I wonder what he would say about
me
if ever I were to stand at a podium. Tragically boring, he’d explain to whoever was near. She goes to bed early and washes every plate as soon as it’s dirty.

There’s
nothing
you like, I hiss.

I like you, he points out, and peels a long pink strip of skin away from his thumbnail.

I ask what he’s going to read. Our mother, on the other side of Horace, leans to hear his answer.

Nothing, he says.

Mom’s face is a punched-in cake.

What do you mean? I say.

I mean nothing, he says. It’s not
required by law
.

Then why—

Did we come? finishes Mom in a little screech.

Applause rips forth for the revolting glamorizer. Horace shrugs, fists balled clapless on his thighs. What else have the two of you got to do on a Friday night? he says. Answer me that.

We sit baffled through the rest of the readers. At long last the instructor takes the podium to thank everyone for coming and to say what a great group of writers this has been to work with.

Lies, Horace whispers.

She’s pretty, I notice.

He scowls.

She’s
really
pretty.

If you like that type.

What type?

The pretty-enough-to-know-it-and-be-arrogant-about-it type. And beauty doesn’t do her much good if she’s a fool. That is, if her taste in literature is about as refined as a wrecking ball.
That is, if she tells that blond moron his shit is compelling when it certainfuckingly is
not
. Can she be that dumb? Maybe she just wants a taste of his wilted—

I’ll wait for you outside, Mom says in a tiny voice.

Horace stares at the podium where the instructor, surrounded by students, is laughing and nodding. Around one finger she twists a strand of shimmery dark hair. My brother watches her, frowning, jaw clenched. He slaps at his jacket for cigarettes, still watching.

I breathe through my mouth against the foot-vinegar. Ready, Hor?

Yeah, he says, motionless.

The instructor starts making her way in our direction. Handshakes and smiles slow her progress. I hear a strangled hum from my brother’s throat—an attempt to clear itself.

Leaving already? she cries upon reaching us.

Horace shrugs. I wait in vain to be introduced.

I can’t believe you didn’t read, she says, why didn’t you
read?
and she hits him on the shoulder. She is even younger-looking up close.

He shrugs again.

Some of us are going out, she says. You should come. If you won’t read, at least you can drink.

I wait for him to pony up some sarcastic little phrase, but he and his mouth are motionless.

Okay, well. The instructor reaches up with an elastic band to rein in her splendid hair.

I think she was flirting with you, I remark in the car.

Mom snaps to attention. Flirting? Who?

Don’t be absurd, Horace says.

At the next Sunday dinner, as we’re gamely swallowing our
mother’s stab at West African peanut stew, Horace looks even more depressed than usual. I watch Mom’s glance skitter to his ashy, swollen-eyed face, then dart away before he can yell, You’re wearing a
look of pity.

Goo, she says, what’s bothering you?

He shrugs. I never got to workshop my story. I had it finished by the last class, but there wasn’t time. We had to discuss the tale of a girl and her horse and then some sci-fi crap.

You can sign up for another workshop, can’t you? Do they offer a winter session? I’d be happy to cover the cost of a second one, if you—

Yeah, well,
maybe
. I have to check who’s teaching.

There’s a smear of peanut sauce on his chin. Mom reaches to wipe it with her napkin, and I get tears of disgust at the back of my mouth.

It is too cold to roll down the window even a little, so his cigarette takes over the car. Why do I always let him smoke?

Can you put that out, it’s getting gross in here.

Almost done, he says.

No, will you throw it out
now?
I can’t breathe.

Tobacco does not grow on trees.

This is
my
car.

Well, good for you. He takes a last, long, sumptuous drag, cracks the window, and tosses the butt. Here’s one. What does God use to clean his teeth? Wait for it—
transcendental floss!
He checks to see if I’m smiling. He clears his throat, says, So what do you want for Christmas?

I don’t know.

Come on.

Haven’t thought about it.

Oh. He gnaws his thumb. Something wrong?

No.

Oh.

We are in front of his apartment building. I rub my forehead with two fingers. He tugs the orange scarf tighter at his mother-wiped chin. When you think of what you want, let me know, he says. Unless it costs a lot.

Good night, I say.

I don’t phone or visit my brother for a week. Every day after work I drive straight home.

My mother calls to ask if I’d like to come over and decorate the tree. I got a very shapely one this year, she says.

I tell her sure. And has she checked if Horace wants to join us? I could pick him up on my way over—

No need, she flutters, he’s already here. He just put on the angel.

Oh, I say, and don’t feel like going anymore.

It is dark but not late; people are in their houses, cooking, changing out of work clothes, settling in. Horace’s windows are ablaze so I park the car. Gather the takeout cartons. That you? he croaks through the intercom.

It’s me.

Jesus Christ, he says.

The floor is ankle-deep in records and beer cans. He squats in front of the stereo, adjusting knobs. He’s drunk, I gather, from the slowness of his mouth, the droop of his red lids. He says, You can be here, but be quiet.

What are you doing?

Making a mix.

Want some food? I went to Poblano Palace—

Feh, he says.

I get one plate, one fork, one square of paper towel from the kitchen. I pour one glass of water. With my dinner spread out on the guitar case, I eat and listen to Horace choose songs. He keeps shaking his head, rewinding. He writes each title carefully on the back of an envelope.

This is a fucking great tune, he remarks over his shoulder. Don’t you think? Shit, it’s great.

I chomp rice and guacamole.

And the one before, too. In fact this whole mix is great. I would go so far as to say killer? Alas, no ears shall appreciate.

Who’s it for?

For someone who will not afuckingppreciate. Hencefore I am not going to give it. But it’s for her anyway.

Who?

Her
. The unappreciator. Where are my coffin nails?

By your foot. So who is it, Hor? (Although I am pretty sure that I know.)

None of your bitchwax. He lights a cigarette and clutches his knees to his chest. I can’t believe how good this mix is.

Why won’t you give it to her?

One, she wouldn’t like it. Two, she’d think I’m creepy for making it. Three, I have no way of finding her. Who knows where she roams? She might be here, she might be there, she might be in my underwear. He giggles, eyes closed.

Have you looked in the phone book?

And the point of that would be
what
, exactly? Do you believe—he swigs from a can, notices it is empty, picks up the one next to it—that many a girl dreams of consorting with an elderly shut-in who is doing with his life, hmm, let’s see,
not a thing?
And who can’t, because he has no car or for that matter valid driver’s license, take her to the movies?

A girl might like him anyway, I say.

Why?

I could answer
because he’s handsome
, or
because he’s smart
, or
because he’d serenade her sweetly on the guitar
. But other people are wiping his chin on too regular a basis. He lets it get dirty, knowing there’s a napkin on the way.

I haven’t yet told my mother that in the new year my eye will not be so peeled. She will say, But he has such trouble taking care of himself!

And I will say, It wasn’t your fault about Dad.

Their Christmas lists are brief: money or what can be traded in for money (brother) and a good cookbook (mother).

You must want more than a cookbook, I prod.

No, I’ve got everything I need, she answers, clamping one hand on my shoulder, the other on Horace’s. Have a good expedition! and she pulls the orange scarf snugger around his neck.

We walk in the glittery cold to the center of town, where ribbons festoon the street lamps and plowed snow hardens on the curbs. You haven’t told me what you want, he complains, and there’s only two days until Jesus.

Surprise me.

It’ll have to be an economic surprise.

At the fire station, we stop to admire the trees. They are selling some really tall ones. How come Mom bought such a fucking midget? he says. These ones are killer. She should’ve gotten one here.

Can you say one positive thing ever?

I say many positive things.

Um, not really.

Half an hour ago I told you I liked your new peacoat,
did I not?
Where are we headed? I’m fucking cold. That is—I am
delightfully cold. Cheerfully chilled. Felicitously freezing. See?
Positive
.

Let’s finish Main Street then get some lunch.

Only two days left, he repeats with fake gloom. He’ll be as relieved as I will to have Christmas over with. I never miss my father more than on the Eve, when he used to read us “’Twas the Night Before Christmas” and make up little extra parts where the reindeer said things.

I know Mom told us cookbook, Horace continues, but I think we should get her a dating guide for seniors.
To those about to die, we salute you and your waning libidos
. . . . He takes my mittened hand, settles it in the crook of his elbow, and adjusts his lope to my shorter strides. Linked, we cross the snow-scabbed bridge and follow the curve of Main Street toward the outdoor mall, directly across from the bar where cops pushed my brother’s face against a brick wall until the blood trickled onto his sneaker laces. Horace still drinks at this bar. He is becoming one of those town guys who sit on a stool, watch the game, flirt with the bartender, and at last call leave alone.