A Cabinet of Curiosity

by Bradford Morrow

  Ridiculous, to imply, as (Matthew) Smith seems to have implied, that Kizer has had some sort of long affair with Lisa. No.

  In (Matthew) Smith’s own marriage, that might be the case. Why the marriage ended.

  “My Lisa is—is not—in love with another man, I am sure.”

  (Matt) Smith laughs dismissively, as if that were proof.

  In a friendly toast, unless it’s a mocking toast, (Matthew) Smith lifts his Bloody Mary toward (Matt) Smith, taps (Matt) Smith’s glass with his own.

  “Here’s to us. Fuck them.”

  Boastfully, (Matthew) Smith allows (Matt) Smith to know that he’d dropped out of college in his freshman year at UC Irvine, only barely graduated from high school—“Too much weed. Jesus! I think my cerebral cortex turned to vapor.” But (Matthew) Smith laughs, indulgently. Better than hanging himself, which was the alternative at fifteen, never got over being rejected by Coach Fenner trying out for JV softball, the blunt way Fenner dismissed him in front of the others, mean son of a bitch not seeming to know how vulnerable a fifteen-year-old boy is, especially a fifteen-year-old with acne. Why he’d spent most of high school stoned. His only friend was Kizer, who felt sorry for him, frankly. Wouldn’t have had the courage to actually hang himself just like on the river, when he’d panicked and overturned the canoe he hadn’t had the courage to swim to shore and had almost drowned Kizer trying to help him, Jesus!—never live it down, his dying day he’d be remembering.

  Well—he’d gone back to college. San Jose State. Lost contact with Kizer until he moved back to San Rafael and started some kind of new life, or tried to.

  “Weird thing was they’d known each other in college. I mean, when they were in college. Though they didn’t go to the same college. Kizer and Lisa. They’d—you know …” (Matthew) Smith makes a crude, obscene gesture, of a kind (Matt) Smith has not seen in decades.

  “And you know this how?” (Matt) Smith is repelled.

  “She told me. When it was over between us. Rubbing salt in my wounds, like a bitch will do.”

  (Matt) Smith laughs. (Matthew) Smith is so crude!

  (Matthew) Smith stares at (Matt) Smith, considering. “You think that she—‘your’ Lisa—wasn’t fucking Kizer, off and on for years? Really? And you know this how?”

  “I won’t dignify that by answering.”

  “Well, good for you! That’s what a man like me lacks, fatally—dignity.” (Matthew) Smith laughs.

  In truth, (Matt) Smith is fevered with curiosity. Almost a sort of sexual hunger. But goddamn, he will not be baited.

  The men decide, it seems simultaneously, to take another tack: children.

  “You have children, Matt? How many?”

  “Yes! Two girls, one boy.” (Matt) Smith smiles proudly. A daddy whose children adore him. “And you?”

  “None.”

  “None? Not—even one?”

  “‘Not even one.’”

  “Well—that’s too bad. …”

  Awkward words. (Matt) Smith is stricken with curiosity but hesitates to blunder further for perhaps (Matthew) Smith or his wife is infertile. …

  “You could say ‘minus-one.’ A miscarriage.” (Matthew) Smith speaks in a voice flat as the tabletop.

  “Hey. I’m sorry. …” (Matt) Smith is taken by surprise.

  “Why sorry? It happened a long time ago. Seems like it could’ve been other people actually.”

  (Matt) Smith ponders. Is (Matthew) Smith speaking bravely, to disguise sorrow or is (Matthew) Smith speaking with an infuriating air of complacency, just this side of a snigger?

  Recalling that Lisa had had a miscarriage too—hadn’t she? In an early year of their marriage. …

  “At least, that’s what Lisa claimed. Frankly,” (Matthew) Smith snorts with laughter, “I had a suspicion at the time that she might’ve had an abortion. At the women’s clinic, in secret.”

  “When was this?”

  “When? What difference does it make? Might’ve been a year or two after we were married.”

  (Matt) Smith feels a sensation of cold. Horror. (Matthew) Smith’s laughter is inappropriate, bizarre. (Matt) Smith frowns gravely; he will not be drawn into the other’s mood. Thinking how if Lisa had lost their first baby, Constance would never have been born. … Their daughter, now a senior at USC.

  (Matt) Smith loves his daughter Constance. Wanting to gloat to (Matthew) Smith—You have no idea what it is, the love of a beautiful daughter. Poor bastard.

  “The second pregnancy, or whatever it was,” (Matthew) Smith continues imperturbably, “we’d both agreed should be terminated. The world is a ‘terrible place’—‘already too many people on the planet’—plus I’d been transferred to San Jose preparatory to being ‘downsized.’ The saying in our business is San Jose, doom on the way. And we weren’t getting along too well, even then. Then,” (Matthew) Smith says, with a smirk of a smile, “the bitch dared to claim later that she’d been coerced by me into having an abortion—in fact, more than one—and she’d actually wanted to have children.” (Matthew) Smith snorts with mirthless laughter.

  “Wait. I don’t understand. …”

  “I do. It’s only required of the husband, to understand.”

  What this means (Matt) Smith is not curious to know. Saying quickly, as one might grab a towel to cover one’s groin in Boy Scout camp: “ My wife—my Lisa—wanted children from the start. Lisa always loved babies. She’d played with dolls—she said. Lisa and I love our kids. Lisa has been a wonderful mother. Can’t imagine what our lives would be like without our children. …” (Matt) Smith hears these words trundle across the table like dull, thumping dominoes, falling.

  “‘Can’t imagine’—? Really?” (Matthew) Smith is frankly sniggering now. “I can’t imagine what my life would’ve been like with children dragging me down.”

  (Matt) Smith protests: “Children don’t drag you down, they buoy you up.”

  His words sound hollow, insincere. Doggedly he perseveres: “When your spirits are low, when you doubt the worth of living, you have only to look at your children, and understand that they are the reason you were born.”

  As these words issue from (Matt) Smith’s mouth he feels a numbing sensation suffuse his mouth, his throat, and lungs as if he is breathing in ether.

  (Matthew) Smith nods gravely, ironically. As if he has never heard anything so profound.

  “‘When your spirits are low, when you doubt the worth of living, you have only to look at your children, and see the blessings you’ve been given. …’ That sounds even more beautiful, Matt. Makes me rethink everything I’ve believed, or wanted to believe. Maybe I should’ve made my wife have children.”

  Seeing that (Matt) Smith blinks at him in astonishment, (Matthew) Smith bursts into laughter.

  Loose jowled, fatty chest, rippling flesh around his waist. How in hell has (Matthew) Smith let himself go, not yet fifty years old? Shame!

  “You are despicable,” (Matt) Smith says coldly. “You make a mockery of everything decent. You’ve let your entire life be ruined by—an act of cowardice when you were eleven years old.”

  “What do you know about me? You don’t know shit about me.”

  “You don’t know shit about me.”

  So distracted by their conversation, the men have stopped eating. Each is trembling, indignant.

  Oh, where is Kizer? Kizer would know what to make of this impasse like King Solomon rendering judgment. (Matt) Smith knows, just knows, that Kizer would rule for him.

  A precarious moment when each of the men is about to spring up from the table, back away from the other in dismay and disgust, and depart—except—the thought occurs to (Matt) Smith, random and whimsical as the small yellow butterfly drifting past his head, that he has the power to make (Matthew) Smith laugh, even against his will—“What do an atheist and a dyslexic have in common?”

  One of his father’s jokes. The old man believed in laughter, joking—Best cure for a broken heart is a broken funny bone
.

  (Matthew) Smith furrows his brow. (Matthew) Smith twists his mouth. “‘What do an atheist and a dyslexic have in common?’—how the hell should I know?”

  5.

  In a voice that signals This is funny, prepare to laugh, (Matt) Smith asks (Matthew) Smith: “What do an atheist and a dyslexic have in common?”

  (Matthew) Smith furrows his brow as if the question is profound, crucial.

  “Staying up all night wondering if there’s a God?”

  (Matt) Smith laughs, indulgently. “No. You’ve got it reversed. ‘Staying up all night wondering if there’s a dog.’” Waits for (Matthew) Smith to laugh but (Matthew) Smith does not laugh, continues to look puzzled, vexed. “See, the joke is dog when people expect you to say God.”

  “But why would anyone expect you to say God in any case? Why is this funny? I always thought Dad’s jokes were painfully unfunny.”

  “Dad’s jokes were very funny. We all laughed.”

  “What do you mean, we all laughed? I didn’t laugh.”

  “You did. I did.”

  “I did not laugh.”

  There is a pause. Both men are agitated; neither can bring himself to look at the other.

  “Anyway, the old man is dead. That is incontestable.”

  (Matthew) Smith speaks with such bitterness, (Matt) Smith decides to let this pass. To him his father was Dad, to this unhappy person his father was the old man.

  The one, blessed. The other, accursed.

  “The one smart thing Mom did was leave. Just—pick up, pack her things, leave.”

  “When was this?” (Matt) is shocked.

  “When I was at San Jose State. Should’ve spent more time with her, helping her deal with him, but—I guess …” (Matthew) Smith shrugs weakly.

  “My mother is still alive. In a retirement village on Castille Avenue.”

  (Matt) Smith speaks hesitantly. (Is his mother still alive? She has been failing, steadily. Losing her memory, as his father had lost his. Must visit her soon, before it’s too late.)

  “My mother is still alive too. I believe.”

  “When did you last see her?” (Matt) Smith is skeptical.

  “Not—for a while.”

  There is a pause. (Matt) Smith feels a quiver of righteousness, indignation.

  “Our lives have swerved in different directions, it seems.”

  To this claim—flat, blunt, accusing yet wistful—(Matthew) Smith has no reply.

  After a moment (Matthew) Smith clears his throat and says suddenly, reverently, as if he has just thought of it: “Thor.”

  “‘Thor’—?”

  “Our dog. Big, beautiful German shepherd. …”

  With a pang of grief, (Matt) Smith recalls. Silver—“Silver” had been the family dog’s name, not “Thor”—had been a German shepherd and husky mix, with a coat of myriad colors, intelligent eyes that could peer into a child’s soul. Through (Matt) Smith’s childhood Silver had been a constant companion, a protector.

  “‘Silver.’ Yes. …”

  Stricken to the heart, remembering. A wave of love, loss, regret, pathos. That such a beautiful, selfless creature suffused with love for him and for others should have passed from his life. …

  Has to confess, his heart was broken when Silver died. Recalling how Kizer had loved Silver too; the two had wept together when the beautiful, aged dog died of kidney failure.

  “… never got over …”

  “… most beautiful, loving …”

  “… unconditionally loving …”

  (Matt) Smith is deeply moved. His disgust, anger at (Matthew) Smith begins to fade. He finds himself thinking suddenly—as if a window has been opened in an airless, closed space—that Lisa must have had postpartum depression, not diagnosed at the time. Accusing him of coercing her into having children, three children in all, when he should have known she was psychologically fragile. …

  But (Matt) Smith had not known. Had not.

  (Matthew) says, wiping at his eyes: “Kizer loved Thor too. That’s why I forgave him about Lisa. A part of me wanted to murder him but then I realized I’d lose both my wife and my best friend. And by this time it was over between them, and Lisa had moved to Santa Monica. And Kizer and I have been closer than ever since.”

  (Matt) Smith feels another pang of jealousy. But—no: why should he be jealous of (Matthew) Smith, whose marriage has ended in divorce? Who has not the consolation of children, in middle age? In old age, to come?

  No. Not jealousy, pity. Sympathy.

  (Matt) Smith touches the other’s wrist, not knowing what he is doing. But the gesture seems correct somehow.

  Is their lunch ending? The men glance at their watches: 2:15 p.m. Kizer has never arrived.

  Where is Kizer? Curiosity in their guts like something livid, living.

  Their plates, half-eaten meals, are cleared away. Emptied Bloody Mary glasses, away. (Matt) Smith orders a cappuccino, and (Matthew) Smith orders coffee into which he will heap brown sugar, cream.

  A warm, balmy June afternoon. Lavender wisteria in bloom, boxes of marigolds, nasturtiums, geraniums bordering the terrace café and the parking lot. Still the outdoor café is filled with diners, most of them women. (Matt) Smith glances about the terrace, oddly smiling. It’s true, Kizer has failed to arrive. And yet …

  In a lowered voice, as if he is speaking to (Matt) Smith conspiratorially, (Matthew) Smith says: “Remember thinking, as a kid, that the constellations are—insects?”

  “The Big Dipper is the Big Preying Mantis. The Pleiades are a necklace delicate as lace—that is, lice.”

  (Matthew) Smith giggles. “Weevils, beetles, palmetto bugs—all over the sky.”

  Hours of nighttime scrutiny, years ago. Why has no one else ever noticed? Is humankind too cowardly to confront such knowledge?

  Thoughtfully (Matt) Smith says: “We have to feel that there is a creator, and this creator created us in his image. We could not bear to think that the creator is a gigantic beetle.”

  Never has he articulated this thought so clearly. Not even to Kizer, when they spoke as they sometimes did of abstruse philosophical matters.

  Like fitting the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle into place. Or—the penultimate piece.

  (Matthew) Smith says, tapping at the magazine beneath his elbow as if it had become relevant in some way, “Darwin said: ‘God must have loved beetles, he made so many of them.”

  “Did Darwin say that?” (Matt) Smith feels a moment’s resentment, that the less educated, less intelligent, and less civilized Smith should know something that he does not.

  As in an expressionist film a shadow falls across the bright-lit table. Both men glance up, narrowing their eyes.

  “Excuse me?” At their table, looming above them, is a coarse-skinned, unkempt middle-aged man, a stranger. His face is ravaged, forehead and cheeks blotched, reddened with scar tissue. Is this a homeless person, a beggar, who has forced his way onto the terrace, pushing through the wisteria, bypassing the proper entrance? (Matt) Smith has been vaguely aware of the disheveled figure making its way across the terrace, rebuffed, ignored by most of the other diners; in another minute, one of the waiters will hurry to escort him from the Purple Onion Café, directed by the frowning hostess/manager. Perhaps the disheveled man comes here often, at this time of day, from the parking lot of the restaurant, hoping to garner a few dollars before he is discovered and made to leave; except now, he seems to have been drawn to (Matt) Smith and (Matthew) Smith specifically, staring at them with the frozen half smile of a paralytic. His sand-colored, graying hair has nearly receded from his oblong head, except for greasy quills that fall about his face. He wears filth-stiffened mismatched clothes and gives off a pungent odor of unwashed, despondent flesh. Behind badly smudged eyeglasses his small glassy eyes wink in a fever of hectic excitement.

  Excitedly telling (Matt) Smith and (Matthew) Smith that they look familiar to him. “D’you think we might be related? My family used to live around here.
”

  As if the coarse-skinned face is blindingly bright, (Matt) Smith and (Matthew) Smith flinch from the unkempt man.

  Quickly (Matt) Smith says, reaching for the check, “No. I don’t think so.”

  “I don’t think so,” (Matthew) Smith says, hurriedly taking out his wallet. “And anyway, lunch is over.”

  6.

  “Well!”

  “Well.”

  “The son of a bitch never arrived.”

  It is 2:23 p.m. (Matt) Smith and (Matthew) Smith are about to leave the Purple Onion Café. Each man is exhausted, exhilarated. Each man is deeply moved, and confused as if he has been taken up and thrown into a spinning barrel.

  Each is eager to escape the other, and never see him again.

  (Matthew) Smith signals to (Matt) Smith with an ominous grunt: “Look.”

  “Oh, Jesus.”

  A disheveled, homeless man has appeared on the terrace of the Purple Onion Café among the chattering women diners who are doing their best to ignore him as he drifts past their tables, pauses to lean over them, an arthritic bird of prey begging for handouts. His face is ravaged. His oblong head is near hairless, hard looking with a gunmetal sheen. The skin of his hands and forearms appears jaundiced, like oil scum on water. His body is a sort of landslide or collapse, with thin arms, a thick torso, sagging belly. His small eyes twinkle with a kind of malicious merriment.

  (Matthew) Smith whistles thinly through his big teeth.

  “He didn’t get the carcinomas treated in time, poor bastard.”

  (Matt) Smith and (Matthew) Smith observe the disheveled stranger as he makes his way toward them. Sights them, stares in disbelief, scratches at his neck. Curiosity like raw hunger in the ravaged face.

  “Excuse me? Hey—d’you know me?”

  “No …”

  “N-no.”

  But the stranger is looking so yearning, neither (Matt) Smith nor (Matthew) Smith has the heart to send him away, and so he joins them at their table.

  His name, it turns out, is—Maynard.

  Last name—Smith.