When You Never Said Goodbye

by Meg Kearney

  jacket, a gift from her ex-boyfriend Chris.

  She glances up from her phone. “You’re late.”

  “I know,” I say, “I’m sorry! There was this

  woman in the park—I’m never late—

  but her voice—she was playing a guitar—”

  Rhett looks up. “Yeah, her name—Liz, are you

  okay?” I just stare at her. “There’s a bar

  near Astor Place where they won’t card you

  if it’s before four,” she says, grabbing my

  arm. A bar? Who’s going to argue? Not I.

  My First Time at The Rock, Where I Tell

  Rhett About the Woman in the Park and

  She Tells Me Her Life Story

  I. Recognition

  Gray cement steps and a black iron rail

  lead down one flight to the dark door

  of The Rock. Inside it’s dimly lit

  and smells of wood, wool, and the steak

  fries they cook in a tiny kitchen behind

  the bar—slices of potato fried golden

  brown, slices thick as a lumberjack’s

  fingers. That’s what I say, “Thick as

  a lumberjack’s fingers,” when the waitress

  sets the basket on the table between Rhett

  and me. “What do you know about

  lumberjacks?” says Rhett, and I say,

  “Nothing except for Paul Bunyan and his

  blue ox.” My Dad used to tell stories,

  I explain, and out spills the tale of his heart

  attack last spring and my drinking binges

  last summer and thinking maybe I wouldn’t

  go to college and my missing him above

  everything. The waitress comes back

  with the two vodka gimlets Rhett ordered,

  no questions asked. I cross my legs, sit up

  straighter. Then Rhett tells me her story

  and it’s as if a door’s opening between us—

  we’re each walking, talking through it,

  one toward the other, discovering we’re not

  strangers at all but instead silently exclaiming,

  Oh, you! I’ve been looking all over for you.

  II. Rhett’s Story (In Her Voice, with Her Permission)

  It was always summertime

  until I was nine. My brother

  Don and I rode bikes in sunshine,

  climbed trees, raced with our mother

  on roller skates through the town

  park. When our father was home,

  our mother played piano; we sang “Down

  the Old Ohio” and “Where the Buffalo Roam.”

  Then Mom got sick, and it was fall.

  We learned the word “chemo.” Her skin

  turned weird colors. Then it was all

  about hospitals, doctors, radiation.

  But the last leaf fell. She was gone.

  Winter set in fast—there was no more

  piano, no roller skating, no sun.

  Our world had been drained of color.

  Dad took his truck on longer hauls

  than ever, leaving us with Uncle Zack.

  Zack drank lots of beer, played softball,

  taught us how to play gin and black jack.

  By the time we were fifteen, sixteen,

  Don and I were failing in school.

  We were drinking, smoking, played a mean

  game of rummy. It’s all a bad dream

  now, ’cause spring arrived that year.

  Dad met Janet, brought her home

  to meet us. Day one, it was clear

  she liked us. She couldn’t be Mom,

  but we liked her, too. So Dad

  quit his truck, got a job in town.

  He bought all the roses the florist had;

  Janet and I chose her wedding gown.

  Now they’re married. We call Janet “Moms.”

  In the Navy, Don says things happen for a reason.

  Sometimes I long for those summer days—songs,

  bikes, skates—but everything has its season.

  III. Mystery

  It’s quarter to four and we’re on our second

  gimlet. My head’s swirly; I’m feeling giddy

  by the time I remember to ask about that

  musician in the park. Rhett whips out

  a pack of matches from her purse, lights

  the candle on our table, a booth near

  the dart board along the bar’s back wall.

  She is a soul sister, I think, and she says

  she rates bars and restaurants on their level

  of darkness. I hold up my drink and we

  clink glasses. “So that singer—in the park—”

  I say. “Her name starts with an R,” Rhett

  says. I ask how she knows her. Turns out

  she doesn’t really, but “Sam’s brother

  Dan who’s a senior says she used to play

  in clubs around the city.” “Well, Ms. R

  sang this totally amazing song. And her

  voice blew me away—it sounded so,

  so familiar,” I say. Rhett wants to know

  if that’s why I had that look on my face

  when we met earlier today. The vodka’s

  made me spacey but now my reaction

  to Ms. R’s voice seems over the top.

  “Did I?” I say. Rhett looks at me funny

  but then checks her phone. Time’s up—

  they’ll be carding us soon. We slip out,

  head back to our room. Outside is so

  bright! We’d forgotten it was still

  afternoon. At The Rock, every day

  is always a kind of blurry night.

  Tim

  Tim is a golf course in spring—wide open,

  welcoming views edged by pines chiming

  with bird song. He is the song, too—a flutey

  melody backed by guitar strum sure to soothe

  the bluest part of you. True alchemist, he takes

  that blue, makes it shine like moonlight on

  the darkest night until you rise, a new sun

  inside you. Rain, not even snow can chill you

  then—though there he is, making a shelter

  of his arms just to be sure. So you move in

  closer. Wonder about the future. And suddenly

  you know as sure as you can sing your own

  heart’s hymn: you’ll be seen, you’ll be loved,

  you’ll be safe with him. All that waits beyond

  this world you’ve made—well, let it come.

  Journal Entry #2168

  News from Jan: Joe just left on some big trip to Brazil, so the Adoption Support Group won’t meet again until next month. She sounded surprisingly disappointed. Here Jade and I practically had to drag her to that first meeting, and now she’s bummed she can’t go. Maybe she’s disappointed because Jade is?

  BUT: at the last meeting, a woman talked about how she found her birth mother. One of the first things she did was look up her birth record at the New York Public Library. She said they keep records of everyone born in Manhattan!

  Got to get to the NYPL soon. Asked Jan if she and Jade would come down and go with me. “We’re there,” Jan said. I want them to meet Rhett, too, but Jan didn’t say anything when I mentioned that—just asked about trains, about where we should meet. Looks like Saturday works for all three of us.

  In some ways, Jade’s friendship is like this city—some neighborhoods I know as well as I know my own home town, and yet there are others I’m just starting to explore. What I like best about her is how she seems to know ways to make Jan smile when no one else can. That Jan—she can be one rough neighborhood. But if I drew a map of it, in its center would be one HUGE heart.

  If Rhett wonders why I don’t invite her on my “mission” to the library—well, I need to explain before I go about my being adopted, how I have that in com
mon with Jan and Jade. I need to explain about my search. Why is it always—still—so hard to talk about this stuff with people who don’t know, people outside my family and closest friends? Maybe I should just give Rhett copies of the two manuscripts of poems I’ve written, The Secret of Me and The Girl in the Mirror. Those will explain everything. And speaking of secrets, I already sense that Rhett can keep one. She’ll understand that I need to be the one to tell my story to people, my way, if I tell it at all.

  The Hamster in My Family

  Adoption’s no longer the proverbial elephant

  in the room, which everyone pretends isn’t

  there. We’ve come that far. Still, my search

  is like a hamster in a cage no one cares for

  but me. Brown and beige and kind of sad,

  it runs endlessly on its little wheel. Once

  in a while, Mom or Bob pad by and whisper,

  “Good hamster!” Kate, at least, stops to ask,

  “How’s hamster feel today?” Maybe it’s my

  fate, but I’m the only one who feeds it, makes

  sure it has water, reaches in through the steel

  bars to pet its head. Everyone seems content

  with this but me. They want hamster to stay

  where it is, not let it out. They want our lives

  to remain the same. What will they do when

  I open that cage, when I give that hamster—

  when I can give my first mother—a name?

  In the Laundry Room:

  I Meet Rhett’s Nemesis

  Rhett thought noon on Sunday

  was the perfect time to catch

  the laundry room empty, but

  turns out she was wrong. All

  the washers are taken except

  two, not counting one that’s

  broken. “What else is new?”

  says Rhett about the Out

  of Order sign. We’re sorting

  which clothes really need

  cleaning while I tell her more

  about Tim—how we haven’t

  gone out super long, but I’m

  crazy about him, how he golfs

  and plays guitar, how he likes

  poetry and goes to school so far

  away at UM, how we agreed

  we’re free to date other people,

  but neither of us wants to. Rhett

  looks relieved as I blabber on,

  and then stops, touches my arm.

  “I bet that’s why you like Ms. R’s

  playing so much—it makes you

  think of Tim.” Why didn’t I think

  of that before? “I’ll tell him—”

  I start to say, but Rhett’s smile

  has turned into a thin, straight line.

  Behind us is a girl I didn’t see

  come in—she’s short like Rhett,

  but has long red hair instead of

  short brown. Tension rises

  like hair on a dog’s back. We

  watch as she opens every dryer

  then spins around. “Oh, hi,”

  she pants as if she’s out of breath.

  “Rhett, Sam told me you got

  a roommate—someone from north

  of here, a country girl,” she says,

  slowly twirling to face me. Since

  when did the word “country” sound

  like “manure”? Or, more like it,

  “shit”? “Liz,” I say, offering my hand.

  There’s a trace of surprise in her eyes

  as we shake. I give her hand a firm

  squeeze—just like my dad taught me.

  In case she forgets my name, she’ll

  remember this. Turns out her name’s

  Louise. She empties all the just-finished

  washers; proceeds to hog all the dryers.

  In the Lounge, Waiting for Dryers

  “What’s with her?” I whisper as Rhett flicks off

  the TV that no one’s watching.

  “Where does that witch get off?

  She doesn’t even know me!” I’m so mad

  I could spit. “Welcome to my world,”

  says Rhett, “But I’m just glad

  you’re on my team. I needed an ally

  with a mean, country-girl handshake.”

  That makes us laugh, but I’m

  still wondering why a perfect stranger

  (who thinks she owns the laundry room)

  would be so rude. “For her

  to assume she knows anything about

  me, that I’m some country cow-tipper—”

  “Calm down,” Rhett says. “No doubt

  she hasn’t a clue who she’s dealing with.”

  Rhett’s looking through the books people

  can take or leave. “Edith

  Wharton!” Rhett holds up the book like a trophy

  over her head. “Don’t you just love her?

  She’s not my century—

  my focus is nineteenth—but you must read

  her since you love New York.”

  I say I will, but I need

  to read some stories by Alice Munro

  and poems by Billy Collins

  first. We see Louise go

  by, carrying an empty basket. Her

  extensive wardrobe must be dry

  by now, but to be sure

  we follow her, watch her open then slam

  each dryer, then she’s gone at last.

  “So Rhett,” I ask. “Who’s Sam?”

  Journal Entry #2169

  Scene: Back in our room

  Still PEEVED after the laundry room incident with Louise, I’m leaning on Rhett’s desk. She’s on her bed.

  Me: I should have told her I was born right here in Greenwich Village. Just a few blocks away!

  Rhett: Louise? Forget her. She has no manners unless there’s a cute guy nearby. Oh, wait—she has no manners then, either. She just hides it better. Guys are clueless.

  Me: I should have said I’ve been coming to the city all my life. My sister lives here! She and Bob and I were all born at St. Vincent’s Hospital!

  Rhett: Really? Cool! Too bad they tore it down. But they left its shell—you can kind of tell what it looked like.

  Me: That’s so sad I can’t even walk by it right now. But I bet I know Manhattan as well as she does, even if she did grow up here. I should have said—

  Rhett (taking a photo of me with her phone): “Liz McLane, ‘bursting with the belated eloquence of the inarticulate.’”

  Me: Huh?

  Rhett: Edith Wharton. Age of Innocence.

  [Note: when I asked about this Sam person, Rhett said, “Just a friend.” He seems to come up in an awful lot of conversations. Almost as often as his roommate, Calvin.]

  Pigeons in Winter

  Brown, white, filthy birds

  in the park: where does snow end

  and pigeon begin?

  Journal Entry #2170

  After reading it at the library, I just had to buy Professor R’s book Redemption Arcade. My favorite poems are “Sugar on Toast” and “Making Love with You for the First Time”—which is so freakin’ funny I had to read it to Tim.

  The first three stanzas:

  It’s like returning home after being away

  a long time: first, all that anticipation—

  and once there, everything both familiar

  and new. We make do on my old twin bed—

  I cry YES! You cry MORE! Then

  my mother knocks loudly on the door.

  At that point, Tim let out a belly laugh and didn’t stop laughing until the poem was over.

  The poem’s in couplets. Maybe to insinuate how usually it “takes two to tango”? Maybe. Using just everyday language, Prof. R is able to take any subject and make it hysterically funny. And human. He makes it possible for us to laugh at ourselves. His poem “Sperm Count” made us both laugh—I could barely get through it.


  Tim asked to hear the “Making Love” poem again. Then he said—I could tell he had this sly smile on his face—“Guess we’ll have to avoid your mom’s house the first time, too.”

  . . . I opened my mouth, but no words came out. I was glad then that we weren’t using FaceTime. My cheeks could have glowed in the dark.

  “Guess so . . . I have to go,” I stammered. Real smooth.

  But now I’m thinking, Maybe this summer. . . ?

  _______

  I sent Cathy a copy of “Sperm Count.” Cathy always refers to her birth father as “the sperm.” Like, that’s all he was good for. I wonder. My non-identifying information letter from The Foundling said my b.m. had already broken up with my b.f. before she realized she was pregnant, and so she decided not to tell him. He probably doesn’t know about me. If I find her, WHEN I find her, maybe I’ll learn more. Maybe she even changed her mind, and is back with him now. That happened to that “Mad Girl” in group—when she found her birth parents were married, I think she wanted to hug and then kill them. But she did find two for the price of one!

  Anyway, it was my b.m. I spent the first part of my life with—those nine months, those visits during the five months I was in foster care. She and I have the connection, not him. Whoever, wherever he is. My blood remembers her.

  Ms. R in the Park

  The first time I get a good look

  at her, first time I sit

  across from her

  on a wood bench just opposite

  so I can get a good view

  without being

  obvious, she’s playing “You’ve Got

  a Friend.” A black wool hat covers

  her ears and hair.

  Not one strand, not a curl peeks from

  that hat. When she gazes

  up at the trees

  as I often do, I’m startled

  by her eyes, large and dark

  as my dad’s were.

  Larger, even, so I can’t help