The Sweetheart Deal (12 page)

T
he next week, I was reading and having a beer in the living room while Audrey made dinner. The day's last rays sliced through the clouds that had hovered for hours, and streamed in through the windows over the fireplace. I stood up to get a better look—I was acclimating to Portland's strange weather and its unpredictable, unlikely transitions. Christopher was texting on his phone and Brian was doodling. We were the picture of domestic contentment—none of us talking, but none of us very far away from each other. Except for Andrew. He was outside in front of the house, shooting hoops alone. I watched him. He looked unhappy even though he made one basket after another. The only sounds came from the kitchen and the intermittent, then more frequent text alerts from Christopher's phone.

“Can you silence that thing?” said Brian.

“Go somewhere else,” said Christopher.

“You go somewhere else,” said Brian, “or turn that thing off. It's distracting.”

“Who keeps texting you?” I said.

“
Meredith,
I bet,” said Brian. “His girlfriend.”

“No, and she's not my girlfriend, ass,” Christopher hissed.

“Language!” said Audrey from the kitchen. I don't know how she heard it.

“Well, she wants to be,” Brian said, and Christopher flipped him the bird.

“Boys,” Audrey said. Like that, she was in the middle of the room between her sons. “If you can't keep it clean, it's going to cost you. The next time, I collect five dollars from the offending party.”

“Sorry, Mom,” Christopher said.

“Will you make him turn that thing off, please?” said Brian.

Audrey looked at me and rolled her eyes. “Chris, can you please mute it, or relocate? It was so peaceful there for a few minutes that I thought I was in someone else's house.” She walked back to the kitchen.

“So, Chris,” I said. “What's wrong with Meredith, anyway? Not saying you need a girlfriend. Brian, your love life's next.”

“Gah!” said Brian.

“You keep your yap shut, Brian,” Christopher said. He shrugged. “She's cool, I guess. She just bugs me. I don't want that drama. I have the rest of my life to have a girlfriend. The whole idea seems kind of lame.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I get that.” He had no idea how much.

“Plus there's Mrs. Maguire,” Brian said, under his breath.

“What did I say, loser?” Christopher gritted his teeth.

“Who's that?” I said.

Brian leaned forward in his chair. “Chris thinks his friend's mom is hot.”

Christopher didn't say anything. He sat there and simmered, glaring at Brian.

I felt bad for Chris; Brian was being a shit. “So how come you know so much, FBI?” I said.

Brian shrugged and looked down at his sketchpad. “I've caught him stalking her Facebook page.”

“You don't have anything better to do?” I laughed. “You're spying on him while you think he's stalking? You don't see the irony in that? You're on the hook too, bro.”

Brian shrank a little. “I just want to have some time on the computer, which is impossible since he's always hogging it.”

“So you can look at naked pictures,” said Christopher.

“They're
nudes,
” said Brian. “They're paintings. It's fine art. God.”

“Guys, as much fun as this has been, and it really has,” I said, “I'm going to go out and shoot with Andrew for a few minutes.”

“Whatever,” they both said. I left them at an impasse, glaring at each other. I felt like I had egged each of them on, and I felt bad about it.
Are they always like this?
I wanted to ask Leo. I could ask Audrey, but boys are different in front of their mothers, I knew. Not better, but different.

“Dinner in ten!” said Audrey as I walked past her and got another beer. “What was that in there?”

“I don't know,” I said. “But I stepped right in the middle of it and made it worse.”

She shook her head. “They never sit with me like that anymore. They hardly ever tell me anything without me prying it from them.”

“I'll get Andrew,” I said.

I walked outside and set my beer on the porch. “Throw it here,” I said.

Andrew scowled.

“How about a quick game of HORSE?” I said. “We're almost ready to eat.”

“HORSE is retarded,” said Andrew.

“Jesus,
really,
Andrew? Don't say ‘retarded,'” I said. “It's unkind and you sound like you have a lousy vocabulary. Very unbecoming. And, if I tell your mom, she'll fine you. Let's play and I won't rat you out.”

Andrew rolled his eyes. “Sorry,” he muttered. He threw me the ball.

I started out in the middle of the street and made it.

“Great,” he said. “You couldn't start closer?”

“Why should I?” I said. “As good as you are.”

He made his shot from my spot. He looked a little less unhappy.

We were matched shot for shot for a while, but by the time Audrey opened the front door and called us in, I was at “R” and he only had “H.” The kid was good. I wasn't letting him win.

“Hang on, Mom! Just a sec!” Andrew yelled.

“We'll be right there,” I said. Both of us were sweating and committed.

Audrey stood on the porch watching us, waiting.

Andrew could lay up from either side, but I couldn't nail it from the left, so with those last two shots, I was done.

“Shit,” I said. I couldn't make the shots he did, not like I used to.

“Language!” Andrew called as he ran past me to go inside. Audrey held out her hand and he high-fived her on the way. I followed him inside and she closed the door.

Brian and Christopher were already at the table. “I beat Garrett at HORSE!” Andrew gloated.

“Go wash your hands,” said Audrey.

“You hate HORSE,” said Brian.

Chris laughed.

“Not anymore!” Andrew called from the bathroom. “Garrett's pretty good, but I'm better!”

He came out and sat down. “Nice job, but don't be a little shit when you win,” I said. “Very unbecoming.”

“Language,” Audrey said. “
Garrett
. Jesus.”

The boys all howled.

“Sorry,” I said.

“Sorry,” said Andrew. “Good game.”

“Yeah, good game.” I winked at him, and while we ate, we were all content and everyone was friends again.

A
fter the sparring between Christopher and Brian, I looked up Colleen Maguire on Facebook. Once I eliminated the teenagers and the women who in my opinion
weren't
hot, I figured out who I thought she was. And she was a looker, I had to give Chris that. Poor guy. Who knows if what Brian said was true. That afternoon Chris had been so vulnerable, to Brian and to me, in his own house—it really hadn't been fair.

One night when Audrey and Andrew were at the Dougy Center, Chris, Brian, and I were home alone. Brian was watching TV in the living room, and Chris was on the computer in the kitchen. He closed it when I walked in the room.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey, Garrett, what's up?”

“You know, I want to apologize for the other night,” I said.

He looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“When you and Brian and I were sitting around and he got in your business about Meredith and that shit about your friend's mom,” I said. “I stirred the pot and it was none of my business. I'm sorry if I made things worse.”

“That's okay,” he said. “It's cool.”

“Well, okay, thanks. But I've been thinking about it,” I said. “You know, I never have a girlfriend for very long, even now, so you've got
my
blessing to be single. But your dad gave me a lot of grief about how I did things in that department.”

“Do you think you'll ever get married?” he said.

“I don't know,” I said. “Probably not. If I haven't by now, it's kind of hard to imagine. Either I haven't found the right person or I'm just not built that way.”

“Huh.” Christopher folded his hands and looked at his feet. “What if you found the right person but it wasn't possible? Or it was impossible for the time being? Because of certain circumstances.”

I didn't know if he was talking about Colleen Maguire or not, but my heart went out to him—I knew how he felt. There was an undergraduate, or two, every term, who made me think,
If I could just get my hands on you.
Like the senior who'd blossomed into a beauty from the shy, bookish freshman I'd taught. I saw her a few times at a bar near campus, and I would catch her staring at me. I always lifted my hand and waved, friendly, to diffuse any tension and to clarify any uncertainty. She always waved back, and on those nights I never looked her way again. But one night, after she returned the acknowledgment by wiggling her fingers at me, like an invitation, I settled my tab and went home. I'd done what I could to keep the lines from blurring into something I wouldn't be able to reverse. And there was the black-haired, blue-eyed junior, three years ago, with her tiny, glittering nose ring, who was a very good writer. She's stayed with me too.

“I'm no expert,” I said to Christopher. “You should know that right off. But what I think are two things: If something is impossible right now, but
could
be possible later, having to wait tests you for how much you want it.”

He looked up from his feet and nodded at me. He looked hopeful.

“Or, it's impossible right now and will never be possible, but having found that person changes you—it makes you know what it is you're looking for. You know, gives you some criteria. You won't settle for anything less than as close as you can get to that.”

He nodded again, more slowly. He looked less hopeful.

“You can talk to me if you want,” I said. “I'm not your dad, and I'm clueless more than not about this stuff. Ask your mom.”

He laughed.

“I mean it,” I said. “I am. All I know is, don't toy with Meredith. Just be kind even if you don't like her ‘that way.' I can't always say I've done the same.”

He shrugged. “She's a pain in my ass. Girls are a pain in the ass. If I'm even a little bit nice, she's going to think it's something totally different anyway. You don't know her.”

“For whatever it's worth, Chris,” I said. “We're a pain in their ass too.”

“Yeah,” he laughed. “Probably.”

I left him to go back to the computer and sat down next to Brian on the couch. He was watching PBS.

“Hey,” he said.

“What's this?” I said.

“A thing on the Sistine Chapel and Michelangelo,” he said.

We watched for a few minutes.

“Hey, Brian,” I said. “Sorry about the other night. I didn't need to get in the middle of your business with Chris. You guys didn't need me doing that. I just couldn't help myself.”

He laughed. “You've been worrying about that? It's cool, Garrett.”

“Okay, well, I wanted you to know I shouldn't have gotten in the middle,” I said. “You guys know how to figure that stuff out.”

“Yeah,” he said. “But thanks anyway.”

I stood up.

“You can stay and watch this if you want,” he said. “It's pretty amazing.”

“Yeah, maybe,” I said. I sat back down.

“Well, I'm recording it too,” Brian said. “So you can always watch it later if you change your mind.”

After I'd talked to them I felt like a jackass. Christopher and Brian had been working out their sibling kinks long before I'd appeared. But, in my defense to myself, I felt like I had only done what I would have if Leo and Audrey had taken a trip somewhere together and asked me to watch the boys while they were gone. Temporary, but as long I was there, I'd do what I could. I imagined Audrey prepping me with all the minute instructions for everything I'd need to know for every possible scenario, and after she'd finished, I imagined Leo adding,
And as for everything else, well, you'll figure it out.

M
y friends had all been hanging out together right after school since Thanksgiving, at one of our houses. Sometimes people were missing because of a practice or a game, but it was always the same group. Me, my best friend, Joe Assante, Mike Doyle, and Ben Maguire. And the girls, Meredith McCann, Rose Ferguson, Theresa Murphy, and M. H. Chandler. It had just kind of happened; Joe and I were friends, but I'd worked to include Ben, and he brought Mike along with him. The girls came as a unit of four, and since Rose lived on the same street as Ben, they already had years of hanging out together in the neighborhood, and now combined all their people. It was easy, since all our houses were within walking distance of the school. But since my dad died, I'd stayed away. After the accident, Joe sometimes walked home with me and did homework, and went home after.

After everyone had finally stopped being weird around me, I thought about joining them again, so one day after school, I checked in with Meredith, who I knew I could rely on.

“Hey,” I said. “What're you doing this afternoon?”

“Hey yourself.” She smiled. “You're not going home today?”

“Maybe. What's everybody else doing?”

“Going to Maguire's,” she said.

“I'll tell Joe,” I said. “We'll see you there.”

In the Maguires' basement, we had chips and salsa and soda, and the iPod played on the dock. The girls clustered together, texting, Ben played his guitar, and Joe and Mike played tennis on the Wii, until Rose challenged Mike and everyone watched her kick his ass. While she was texting, I caught Meredith watching me, and when I did, I looked away. Ben's mom wasn't there like I'd hoped she would be. If it had been anyone else's house this afternoon, I might have gone home like usual.

I knew where the bathroom was, but I cruised through the basement, checking it out. Everyone was oblivious, doing what they were doing, but I was ready to say that my mom wanted to remodel our basement too if anyone asked.

Around the corner from the party room, I opened a door. Inside was the furnace, mechanical stuff. I closed the door. Down the hall I opened another. Tools, shop stuff. I closed that door. The third door was the laundry room. In front of the washer and dryer stood two drying racks. Jeans, khakis, and a fancy blouse hung on one. Perched on the end of the other was a black pair of panties and a pink bra. I shut the door behind me. I grabbed the panties, wadded them in my front pocket, walked out, and closed the door behind me. When I got back to everyone, they were doing the same things as when I'd left.

“Hey, Ben, I've got to go,” I said. “I got a text from my mom and I have to go home and watch my brothers.”

“Okay, later, Chris,” Ben said. He lifted his head but kept his fingers on the strings of his guitar.

“Thanks,” I said. “See you all tomorrow.”

Meredith got off the couch and came over. “You're leaving?” she said. “You just got here.”

“I know,” I said. “Sorry, I have to help my mom when she needs me.”

“Yeah, too bad.” She touched my arm. “I'm glad you came today—it's nice hanging out with you again. See you later.”

“Yeah,” I said, “later.”

I sprinted from Ben's house and back to mine. I'd never stolen anything in my life, but I had taken Colleen Maguire's underwear.