Q: A Novel (7 page)

In bed, he begins to doze while watching a rerun of
The Office
. Before he nods off, though, he kisses two framed photographs, which he has placed on the bedside table. One he sets back down. The other he clutches while he finally falls asleep, having either forgotten to change out of his corduroy pants or chosen not to.

As I run home to meet Q, it occurs to me, happily, that these pants from different time lines have come into contact with one another without any apparent disruption to the fabric of existence.

It occurs to me then, too, less happily, that the man wearing these pants, this sad, tired man who likes veggie burgers and soft pretzels and cookies, who wanders the city watching lovers and puppies and falls asleep dreaming of his family, is unequivocally, unambiguously, and unmistakably, me.

Chapter Seven

Y
ou have been following me.” I-60 says this directly, matter-of-factly, across our table at La Grenouille, on Fifty-third and Park, where we have gathered for Meal Number Three, a late lunch. I understand from his tone that it is pointless to deny the claim.

“It is nothing personal, I assure you.”

“What, then?”

“These are major life decisions I am facing. I need to be confident of your authenticity.”

“And you doubt this?”

“I suppose not,” I answer sheepishly. “I’m not sure. I’m not sure about anything at this point.”

“Would you like me to relate to you the details of your first romantic experience with Becky Goldstein? Would you like me to describe the comic book you wrote in first grade in which the Muppets of
Sesame Street
had secret lives as superheroes, and Ernie and Bert possessed the special power to clean at faster-than-light speed? Would you like me to discuss the state of your bunions?”

“None of that will be necessary,” I say. These are all embarrassing matters, none more so than the Becky Goldstein incident.

“Well, then,” I-60 says. “I think you owe me something of an apology.”

This gets my dander up. “I owe you an apology?”

“I take it you think otherwise.”

“You ask for meals to be arranged at the finest restaurants in the city, order seven-dollar soft drinks, and don’t so much as lift a finger to pay the check.”

“How ungrateful is this?” I-60 asks no one in particular. “Do you seriously think that I have come from thirty years in the future to mooch a few good meals off you? I am here for the gravest of reasons, to change the course of your life, so that you can be spared the pain that I have endured. Money is irrelevant. I would very much like to treat you to dinner, but it is simply not possible.”

“Why is this again?”

“I explained to you already. We are not allowed to carry much cash.”

“And that is because?”

“There were incidents, abuses. People traveled back in time to take advantage of sales or shop at outlet stores.”

“And yet you told me that time travel is quite expensive?”

“It is, but the savings at wholesalers are staggering, and our dollar goes so far in your time. When the money started flowing backward, the financial markets went haywire. Restrictions had to be established.”

“So what you told me about the consequences of physical objects from different time periods coming into contact with one another was a lie? You and I are physical objects from different time periods. I suppose that should have been a tip-off.”

“It was not a lie. It was a choice. The truth is, no one understands much about the ethical and practical implications of time travel. It is all being worked through. The scientists and philosophers just know that money is a problematic issue. When one travels through time, he or she needs to have just enough of it, no more.”

“How convenient that is.”

“But true all the same.”

“By what means are you paying for your hotel room?”

“I booked it in advance online. I used frequent-flier miles.”

“How do you have money to eat?”

“I’m on the Modern American Plan.”

“They can’t possibly still have the Modern American Plan in the future.”

“They do. Besides, this is now.”

“I didn’t think they still had it now.”

“They do.”

“What about the dessert I saw you eat in your room after watching the baseball game?”

I-60 appears confused for a moment, then it comes to him. “Ah, you mean the Oreos?”

“Yes.”

“I like to have cookies and milk before bed. As I recall, I believe you do too.”

“It’s true. I do.”

“Then, what’s the problem?”

“How did you pay for them?”

“This is easy to explain,” I-60 says. “I found some change on the street.”

“That again seems quite convenient.”

“And yet it is also the truth.”

“Why do we have to eat in such expensive restaurants? Nothing you said explains that. Why can’t we eat reasonably?”

“The food is not as good in my time. Fruits and vegetables just aren’t what they used to be.”

“But the most you ever order is clear broth?”

“I am an old man. What do you expect? Take it from me, the soup is much better in the past.”

Something still doesn’t sit right. “Why is the food worse in the future?”

“It’s another consequence of the acceleration of global warming.”

“Global warming gets worse?”

“Yes, after the decision to air-condition Las Vegas.”

“Las Vegas already has air-conditioning.”

“No, I mean they build a dome around the city and install massive refrigerators so people can walk down the Strip wearing a coat.”

“Oh,” I say.

“It was a very bad idea.”

The waiter arrives.
I-60 orders the bouillabaisse. I ask for the salad Niçoise. I have never had salad Niçoise. I think I may not like it because I abhor black olives, which are an essential ingredient of salad Niçoise. On the other hand, I feel like I should try everything once, and it is the least expensive entrée on the
menu.

I-60 holds his hand up to the waiter. “My friend,” he says to me, “you should get something other than the Niçoise.”

“It’s fine.” I say to the waiter. “I’ll have the Niçoise.”

“No, you do not care for it.”

“I have never had it,” I say curtly to I-60.

“Well, then, you will not care for it. Do not like it, will not like it, what’s the difference? You will still be hungry after lunch.”

“I’m a grown man,” I say. “I can order my own meal.”

“You’re just ordering it because it’s the cheapest thing on the menu.”

“That isn’t true.”

He stares at me, disbelieving. It’s pointless to try and deceive him. He says, “Why don’t you try the halibut with Riesling and horseradish?”

“I don’t like halibut.”

“You will. It’s just a matter of time. Same with lime. It’s really quite refreshing. Don’t just order the salad because it’s cheap—order something you will like. You’ll be happier. Trust me on this.”

“It’s okay,” I say to I-60. Even if I were inclined to take his advice, I am now too embarrassed to do so. To the waiter, who has been standing beside the table throughout the conversation, I definitively say, “I’ll have the salad Niçoise.”

“Very good, sir,” he says. “The Niçoise it is, and the bouillabaisse for your husband.”

Neither I nor I-60 is amused.

When the waiter
is gone, I-60 asks, “Do you want to hear the story now?”

“Yes. You should tell me what you came to tell me.”

“It is sad,” he says. “Unspeakably sad.”

“I have to hear it, don’t I? Is it even possible for me not to? I mean, this is the whole point of your trip, right?”

I-60 nods. “Well, then.” He pauses, takes a sip of water, then begins. “That boy—my son—your son—becomes the center of your life,” he says. “Q still gardens, you still write, but these pursuits, which had seemed so urgent, don’t seem as important anymore. In the evenings, after you finish class, you race home to hear whether he has taken a new step or uttered a new word. When he is older you play games—simple games at first—Candy Land and Chutes and Ladders, but he advances quickly. Soon you’re playing Clue Junior and Chinese checkers. He especially loves Pay Day. Whenever he lands on Sweet Sunday, he lies down on a pillow, pulls a blanket up to his head, yawns, and sighs, “Sweet Sunday!”

He is bright, and in another year or two you’re playing word games like Boggle and Scrabble. He even gives you a fair game of chess. At school he is at the top of his class. The teachers adore him, and even though he is smart, the other kids do too. This is because he has no guile or pretension. He is just a kid who wants to laugh. He loves
The Simpsons
almost as much as you do. For his sixth birthday, you buy him the movie, and in a matter of two weeks he has it committed to memory.

Each season is special. In the summer, you construct elaborate games of hide-and-seek and tag, which inevitably devolve into tickling. In the fall, you throw one another into leaf piles. In the winter you build snowmen. In the spring you have baseball.

I-60 is different now.
Perhaps I should say, more precisely, that I experience him as different now. While heretofore I have found him aloof and occasionally sanctimonious, neither of these or any other negative qualities are present when he discusses the boy. He is sincere and transparent and sad. The extraordinary qualities of his son, my son, are presented lovingly. I-60 now seems modest, self-effacing. He seems authentically me.

“QE II is not athletic,” I-60 continues. “He wears glasses, has a gangly gait, and poorer-than-average hand-eye coordination. But when he is eight years old he develops a passion for baseball. More specifically he develops a passion for the New York Mets. This is yet another act of love on his part. He knows that they are my team, and so he adopts them as his own. He starts watching games with me. Soon he learns the rules; later he immerses himself in the history of the team and the game. I, you, share with him the books that sparked our own passion for baseball. Together we read
The Kid from Tomkinsville
, and I love it on my second reading almost as much as he does on his first. It is the joy of reading it with him. He finds his way to
Shoeless Joe
by W. P. Kinsella, and we finish that together too. Soon he is off to read
Catcher in the Rye
, and whatever he can about the enigmatic Salinger, to figure out how it is that baseball could have healed him.

“Miraculously, his love extends both to the profound and the mundane. You bequeath to him our collection of Mets yearbooks, complete except for 1966, and soon he can recite the opening day lineup of the 1962 team and the stats of everyone on each of the four World Series teams. At the start of the following season, you buy him a scorebook, which he maintains with the meticulous attention to detail of a historian or a novelist. You love that boy from the moment you first lay eyes upon him. But from that little book you learn that he has the soul of a writer, just like you, and you love him all the more.

“He watches every game. He records every out and hit, but not with the conventional scratch marks. He notes the field to which the ball is batted, and the force with which it is struck, and the effort that both base runner and fielder exert on the play. Each morning at breakfast, we eat English muffins and review the most exciting plays and key strategic decisions from the previous night’s game. If I have missed it for some reason, he describes it to me in exquisite, vivid detail. If the Mets have lost, he tells me that they played lethargically or appeared nonplussed in the field; he tells me of their gallantry and their grim determination in the face of adversity. If they have won, it is not just a positive mark in the standings—it is a glorious victory of the forces of good over evil, a triumph of Greek proportions, praise be to the all-powerful gods of baseball. I sit there, sip coffee, and think to myself that no human being could love anything as much as I love that child, as much as Q does, and that I am the luckiest creature in the universe.

“That season I take him to his first baseball game. We look forward to it for weeks. It is after camp ends, the week before school starts. The Mets have already fallen out of it, but he is giddy with excitement. I ask him where he wants to sit. I can get tickets behind home plate if he wants, the supply is ample, but he says he would prefer to sit in the top row of the upper deck. ‘Are you sure?’ I ask. ‘Yes,’ he says. I question no further because that eight-year-old boy has a reason for everything he does.

“At the game, the reason is revealed. He pulls two carrots from his coat pocket and hands one to me. ‘You do color,’ he says. As the Mets take their positions he welcomes the ‘audience of vegetables’ to Citi Field, and we take them through the game, lapsing into cliché whenever possible, laughing sometimes at the absurdity of it all, and loving every second of it. David Wright singles in the ninth inning to win the game for the Mets. Wright is near the end of his career, hanging on, but he is nevertheless QE II’s favorite player. He loves to root for the underdog. Though the game means nothing, when Wright’s hit falls and the winning run scores, our son jumps for joy and gives me a bear hug. It is the best memory of my life.”

There is obviously more to the story, but I-60 stops here.

“And then?” I ask.

“And then he gets very sick, and he dies.”

I wait for more, but I-60 is done.

“That’s it? That’s all you’re going to say? What happened exactly?” I am not feeling very well.

“Does it matter? He becomes ill a few weeks after school starts. We take him to the doctor. Turns out it is serious—not just serious, but fatal. We try everything, of course. As you know, Q is relentless. They can’t cure it. He suffers a lot at the end. It destroys you—me—and Q. Do the particulars or the name of the disease matter?”

It seems as if they do; in that moment the details seem all-important to me. I want to protect that little boy, and Q too. The thought of her suffering hurts as much as anything else. But I-60 is right. What do the specifics matter? I wonder about one thing, though.

“Did you ever travel back to see him?”

“No. I could only afford one trip back in time. I decided to visit you. Going to see him somehow didn’t seem right to me.”

“Is that because it would be too sad?”

“No. That’s not it exactly.”

His voice trails off, and he stares forlornly into the bouillabaisse. I want to ask more, but I-60 appears to have reached his limit. We sit silently for a while, picking at our food.

I don’t like the Niçoise. I-60 was right.

But he delivers no I-told-you-so lecture. Perhaps he realizes that I have reached my own limit. When he speaks, he changes the subject entirely. “I noticed in the newspaper that the Mets are playing tonight. Do you think we could go? You don’t need to spend a lot of money. We can get bleacher seats. I’d just like to see the stadium.”

The Mets are terrible this season, but the thought of saying no to this request never crosses my mind.