The Garden of Last Days (18 page)

“Go ’head, finish your ice cream.”

“You want some?”

“I guess not.” He wanted to ask her for a beer but she was already
making her way to the couch and he didn’t want to push it, so sat down where he always used to up against the arm under the lamp near the window. From here he could always see everything: the TV; what was going on in the kitchen; Cole playing on the floor; whoever might turn off the road into their driveway. The wind from the fan cooled him. The ice had killed the pain in his wrist. She took the ice cream and sat on the opposite end of the sofa, her eyes on the muted TV, a movie or one of the shows she liked, a bunch of good-looking doctors and nurses in an emergency room saving people and sometimes failing at saving people. He’d watched it with her a few times but didn’t like seeing all the hurt everybody went through—car wreck and gunshot victims; cancer-ridden men and women and those with bad hearts; the drunk and insane, the stabbed, burned, and fallen. It was like watching your worst fears reeled out in front of you and he’d get up before it was over, check in on Cole, wash up, and check in on him again.

“You watching this, Deen? You can turn it back up if you want.”

She looked over at him. Her mouth was set in a straight line, and again, he didn’t mean to sound the way he did, as if he was giving her permission to do what she was already doing. She picked up the remote, clicked off the TV, sat there with her ice cream in her lap.

“You smell like a barroom, AJ. Is that where you’ve been going these days?”

Strip club, maybe. Not a barroom. “No. I haven’t. Just spilled some on me.” Her eyes were blue, a duller blue than Marianne’s but blue all the same.

She raised a spoonful of ice cream, then lowered it back down, put the bowl on the table.

“You’re behind in your payments, you know.”

“Yes. I do know.”

“My family’s helping, but I hate going to them, AJ.”

“You’ll get it.”

They were both quiet now. The fan whirred softly.

“Why don’t you go to those anger meetings, AJ? You could see Cole then.”

She was talking sweet, but that old bad feeling was rising up in him. He hated her right now sitting there with her hands in her wide lap, her ice cream melting in front of her. He rested the bag of ice on the back of a
TV Guide
. “Have I ever hit Cole, Deen? Or yelled at him? Or even raised my
voice
?”

She stared at the floor. Her back was straight and she looked scared, but he didn’t really give a good goddamn except he wouldn’t get anywhere with her like that, would he? He took a breath, let it out. “I’m just asking, Deena. Have I?”

“No. You’re a good dad; everybody knows that.”

“Do
you
?”

“Yeah.” She glanced over at him, then away again. Shy, maybe. Maybe not. He could see her nipples behind her shirt. The wind from the fan was warm, and he scooted over, put his good hand on her bare knee. It was smooth and clammy and fleshier than Marianne’s, but it was as familiar as anything he’d ever owned and worn or drove a long time and for a moment it was hard to remember how he’d ever been pushed away from its constant use. He touched her arm, let his fingers rest there lightly. “Except for what I did, I’m not a bad husband, am I?”

“No.”

“Was I a good husband?”

A magazine cover flapped lightly in the breeze. He knew he’d pushed it too far with that one and wished he’d kept his mouth shut. She looked at him directly and it was like seeing her for the first time all over again, her eyes—for just a second—all round and blue and respectful.
Mr. Carey
. It was funny she’d called him that. But now an older, wiser light came into them and she looked away again.

“When you weren’t mad all the time.”

The magazine kept rippling. There was the whir of the fan blades, the far-off dampened hum of Cole’s air conditioner. AJ’s mouth was dry for a cold beer but he was thinking hard about what she said. Tried to remember being like that. Couldn’t really.

“I wasn’t mad
all
the time.”

“Enough, though.”

’Cause you went off to Fantasyland and never talked to me much anymore and looked at me like I was a nothing and spent my money on your stupid hair and never wanted to fuck
—there was so much to say and more, but her arm was warm and she hadn’t moved it and all he wanted to do was go lie in their bed together and talk later; talk, talk, talk it all away later.

From down the hall came a moan, Cole’s small voice. Deena jerked her arm away and leaned forward. Cole said
Mama
and
truck
, a few more words AJ couldn’t make out. But the sound of his son’s voice cut through him and it seemed impossible that he’d been able to bear those endless days and nights he’d not heard it.

Deena sat back. “Talking in his sleep.”

“How long’s he been doing that?”

“Not long.”

It was the kind of answer that pissed him off; how long was not long? Five days? Five weeks? Since he’d been gone, at least—he knew that.

This close he could smell her, Deena’s smell, no one else’s. It did something to him, had ever since they’d parked under a live oak tree off Myakka City Road and tore at each other in the cab of his truck. His wrist was throbbing again, resting there limp and thick on the cushion between them. He should put some more ice on it, he knew, but not now. Now there was his wife, unafraid and not bitching at him, not watching the TV or getting up to do something else. Just sitting there, stuck between two worlds. He reached up and touched her cheek. Warm and plenty of it. “I miss you, hon.”

She blinked. Was she about to cry? He kissed her on the cheekbone, the same one he’d blackened and blued. How could he have done that? How did he ever get to
that
? He breathed in her woman-smell, felt himself getting hard. His wrist pinched a bit but so what, and with his good hand he put his fingers to her chin, turned her face toward his. She closed her eyes. He leaned in, his lips parted.

“No, AJ.
No
.” She pulled away. Opened her eyes. Shook her head. She thrust her hands to her sides to push herself off the couch but one of them hit his wrist, then her weight was on it, flames raging up his arm bones into his shoulder and neck. His eyes began to water, and she was up, looking down at him, her hands on her hips, an angry female blur. “You think you can just drive up here drunk and everything’s
okay
? You never
hit
me?” Her voice broke. She started crying, moving backward, one hand on her mouth, the other pointing at the door. “Get out. Please get out or I’ll call the cops on you, AJ. I will, I’ll call them right now.”

It had to be broken. He could barely put his fingers around it. That big Chinese had started it and his beautiful wife had finished it and that’s just how tonight was going to go, wasn’t it? No sweet home-coming. No lying in your own bed with your own wife.

No Cole.

And it felt like a rabid dog was gnawing at his wrist. “You hurt my arm, Deen.” She was still a blur he blinked at. He fumbled for the ice pack but couldn’t even think of pressing it to his wrist, dropped it, got himself to stand.

“I didn’t mean to, AJ, but maybe you should think about that. How’s it feel when someone does that to you?” She kept crying, a low, mournful sound that made him feel sad and wrong and useless. He held his wrist up and walked around the coffee table past the blowing fan into the still air of the linoleum where she cried.

“You act like I’m a bad man, Deena. But I’m not. I’m not a bad man.”

She shook her head, then sniffled and ran her finger under her nose, looked him in the face, hers puffy and plain but beautiful if you didn’t think about it; hurt wrist or not, he still wanted her. He put his good fingers on her hip. She stepped back like she’d been burned.

“Just go to those classes, AJ.”

Her face was tilted up at him, her chin exposed, her blue eyes rimmed with tears; he could see she loved him. She
did
. It confused him to see that and he could no longer look straight at her, lowered
his eyes, saw her pudgy feet and toes, the nails newly painted a dark womanly red.

“You’re supposed to go to thirty of them. Go to the first one is all I ask. Please.”

“I’ll go if you’re asking me to, Deena, but not if you’re telling me.”

“I am asking, AJ. I am.”

He looked back into her face. Saw a woman there. A woman who was probably stronger than he was. How did that happen? The thought left him feeling lonely. His arm buzzed and throbbed. “I need you, Deena. I really do.”

She nodded at his wrist, red and swollen, fractured for sure. “You should go to the hospital for that.”

“You hear what I said?”

“Yeah.” She pushed open the screen door, held it for him. Her cheeks were damp, but she was done crying for now; he could see that. He stepped out onto his stoop and she let the screen door close behind him. Over her shoulder and down the hall, Cole’s doorway was lit dimly from the night-light. He saw just the corner of his bed and wanted to go back there one more time. “It’s not right I don’t get to see my son.”

She spoke quietly, steadily, carefully: “They said you could have those supervised visits when you start the classes.”

Having to meet somewhere public while her folks watched everything he did with his own boy, sat there just to make sure he didn’t touch Deena. He’d seen it in his head for weeks and that picture alone was enough to keep him from going to any damn classes. There was a sharp pounding in his wrist. He had to hold it up again.

“Call me after your first one.” She wiped her nose on the back of her finger. “I’ll let you talk to Cole. We’ll set up a visit.”

“Without your folks?”

“We’ll see.” She closed the door slowly, politely, the lock on the knob clicking into place. He stood there a moment. Felt like a man pushed out of his own boat into the black sea. The TV sound came
back on but not loud enough for her to really hear it. Just a smokescreen so he wouldn’t think she was waiting for him to leave. He touched his wrist to his chest and walked directly to his truck, not looking back, squeezing between the bumpers of his F-150 and her Corolla. He couldn’t get her face out of his head, all that hurt that could only come from loving somebody. All this time he was sure she’d kicked him out not because he’d hit her but because she didn’t want him anymore—that was the real reason, and she even got the court to make it official. But climbing carefully into his truck, pulling the door shut with his right hand, the light from the TV room casting itself out toward him, it was as if he’d just gone to the big bad bank and gotten the promise of a whole new line of credit. And Deena was good for her word: one class; that’s all he had to do. Just one.

He started her up and backed out of the driveway he’d lined with pavers. Out on the road, he shifted into drive and took one last look at his home, Deena standing in the window watching him, the blowing fan at her back, Cole sleeping safely and coolly in his concrete room. AJ flicked the lights in farewell, then the road was rolling out ahead of him and he knew he should go to the hospital, but first he needed cold beer and a handful of aspirin. And he thought of Marianne. It was wrong to think of her, but he did anyway.

THE LOVE SEAT
was crowded, Retro sitting between them, her bare leg pressing against April’s.

The little foreigner had tossed the seven hundred dollars on the table so Retro could sit and now he seemed to forget about it. He sat against the arm, smoking, talking so low to Retro April heard only his murmur and the club music out on the floor. Except for her garters and high heels, she was naked. He had offered Retro a cigarette and she smoked it beside him, nodding her head at whatever he was saying, her hoops swinging slightly under her ears. April finished her champagne, reached into the ice bucket, and poured herself some more. She checked her customer’s and Retro’s, but they were still full, so she sat back and sipped, Retro’s back to her, her warm brown thigh against hers.

At first she didn’t like that he’d bought her for an hour too, but this one was odd and getting drunker and now it was nice just to sit
back and let somebody else work him for a while. Retro was wearing her floor costume, a candy red miniskirt, red tube top, red garters, and red spikes. Four or five days a week at the beach with Franny had made April tanner than she’d ever been, but next to Retro’s skin, hers looked pale. There was something deeply attractive about such dark skin. She’d always thought so.

Franny.

April wished she were back home with Jean and not sleeping in Tina’s office, though the Moët had made her feel better, had slowed and blended all the sharp stops and starts of the night. She and Glenn used to drink together, before Franny. She never liked getting completely drunk, but this feeling, this gentle drift away from the shore of all the shit that always had to get done, felt sweet and she was even mildly disappointed her strange little customer hadn’t asked her again why she did this. Because she had an answer for him. An honest answer, if he still wanted to know.