Perfect Pitch

by Amy Lapwing

  He was going to go anyway, she could see that. “Sure. Go discuss her son the criminal.”

  “So already he’s guilty, to you?” he jabbed.

  “All right,” she said, holding up her hands in a parry, “whatever, okay?”

  He pivoted forward at the waist, his arms on the fat rolled arms of the chair. “You have condemned him already. Do you stop to think perhaps Grace has set him up?”

  Justina screwed up her face at him.

  “You know the kind of boy she goes with. They are not all fine people. Probably she was offended by one of them and she takes it out of Derek because he is one of their fraternity brothers.”

  “Like, I’m sure that accomplishes a lot, framing a newcomer.”

  “She knows he will do nothing in retaliation. Whereas those other boys—”

  “What do you know about those boys?” She sat up on the sofa, trying to look bigger. “How do you know so much about her private life?”

  “She doesn’t hide anything. She doesn’t care who knows she’s a slut.”

  That was it, then, nothing has changed. You’re either a virgin or a slut. “If she’s a slut, then so was I.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Don’t be such a prick. Only a prick would say that.”

  He stood up and took a step toward her and stopped. He pointed a finger at her and labored to keep his voice down. “All right, I’m going now. We talk about this later, when you are reasonable.”

  He actually slammed the door. We haven’t fought like this since, I don’t know. We don’t fight, hardly ever. Is that bad? Should we fight more? Are we being too go along, for the sake of peace, sacrificing our ideals? Bullshit. We don’t have to fight to prove anything. He’s got Grace made out as the villain here. Why? He knows Grace better than this Derek guy. ‘But he’s Teresa’s son! He’s wonderful!’ Like Teresa, no doubt.

  She went to the window and looked out, as though trying to see the other woman’s house over the apple treetops. If he’s not back in an hour. She turned away and went back to the sofa, back to her work, keeping abreast of current events in the French Republic. Screw this.

  She finished the article on reggae français and picked up the Proust that she was giving a second chance to. She had thought of diagramming his sentences to help her make sense of them, but she tried instead to organize them in her brain. She liked to work fast, Proust would not let her. She read ten pages and went back and had achieved comprehension of four of them when Michael came in the front door.

  He came in smaller than when he had left, his shoulders sloped, and darted a look at her. She sat up and tried not to look irritated. He sat on the sofa with her, waiting for her to release him from something. From his silence?

  “What’s wrong?” she said softly.

  His worried look slipped away, he seemed now to have the answer he was trying to think of. “He’s my son.”

  Who? Her brain rumbled with the inane question. Someone else, not Derek. Who? Who else?

  “Derek?” she said.

  “He’s my son,” he repeated, spellbound by the sound of the words. My son.

  Arithmetic. He’s nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. Michael is fifty. He knew her when he was twenty. Thirty years ago.

  “How?”

  “What do you mean, ‘how?’”

  “Don’t yell at me! You don’t see me dropping kids all over the place like I don’t know what I’m doing.”

  “She never told me!” he shouted. “She disappeared! I didn’t know where she was! How do I know she has a baby? We. Had a baby.” He looked like he would cry.

  She sucked her alveolar ridge, “tsih,” and he scooted into her arms. “I don’t know what to do,” he said.

  She smoothed his curls and rubbed his back. “Are you sure? He’s yours?”

  “She was with me in New York. It was just a week, but—”

  “There’s tests, Michael.”

  “We did not use birth control. She always used it with her husband.”

  “She was married?”

  He moved his head up and down against her shoulder. “Oh, Michael,” she said. “Why didn’t she tell you before?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she didn’t think she needed to.”

  “But now that he’s in trouble.”

  “I need to help him.” He sat up and looked to see if she agreed.

  He looked so much older when cares weighed down his features. “You cut yourself?” She dragged her finger over a spot of red on his jaw, rubbed her thumb against her finger: waxy.

  He dabbed the spot and saw the lipstick.

  She stood up and looked at the knots in the floor. “Okay, lookit, I can’t deal with this anymore tonight, okay? You figure out what the hell you’re doing with those people. But just leave me out of it, okay, because I can’t handle it. Okay? I can handle your family, women in the kitchen and men in the dining room with your smokes and your drinks, okay? And I can handle schmoozing with your summer music buddies, and I can handle seeing Helena everyday, knowing she wouldn’t mind having a piece of you again, okay? I can handle that stuff. But I can’t handle this. Not an old ‘girlfriend’ who wants you to play father to her kid and be her husband, all right? It’s too much. I shouldn’t have to handle that.”

  Upstairs she got undressed and brushed her teeth while he stood watching her. “I can’t ignore him,” he said. “I don’t want this to happen either.” She stayed silent and got into bed and turned off the light.

  He got undressed and slipped into bed with her. He got up on his elbow to face her, his knees drawn up, his feet pressed one atop the other. “I don’t ask you to do anything.”

  “Good,” she said, her back to him.

  “Just, can we stop being angry?”

  She turned onto her back and looked at him. “Will you take the test?”

  “All right.”

  She knew it would be false and the woman would go away, her claim on him vanished. “That’s more like it,” she said and she lifted her head and his lips met hers. “I take it back,” she said.

  He crinkled his eyes at her.

  “You’re not a prick anymore.”

  “But you’re not sorry you said it.”

  “All right, I’m sorry.”

  “I do not get a deep feeling of sincerity from you.”

  “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t call you names when I’m mad at you.”

  “Only when you like me?”

  “Yes.”

  “You like me now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you may say it.”

  “Prick.”

  “Bitch.”

  “Smile when you say that,” she said.

  “I do. See?”

  She put her lips up for another kiss. He kissed her, humming low, and tested her breasts: still firm, still round, still so good.

  She said, “No.”

  “Please?”

  “No.”

  “But I need to.”

  She blew out a soft laugh. “Why?”

  “I just do.”

  She turned her head and looked at the clock. “It’s after eleven. And I have an eight-thirty.”

  “It won’t take long.”

  She smiled and he scooped her under him and pulled open the drawer. He shook out a condom and tore it open and put it on. He kissed her and entered her. She did not mind it, being a passive partner. She liked it, when she was tired, like tonight. She was a consumable, breasts, then a narrowing, then a widening, then the opening; the mere presentation of her features excited him, gave him this tender pleasure. And her pleasing him intensified the susurrous joy of him inside her. She beat away the guilty feelings that deep sensuality inspires by pointing out to the judge in her head all of their accomplishments, alone and together, and their ability to talk to each other, still, after five years of marriage. But at moments like these, with his happy moans in her ear, the tiny yelp when she squeezed him with some unnamed muscle that sh
e had been unaware of before she knew him, at such moments, their value as citizens was simply a license to a sensual life. There was no valuable end-product of her French studies, just as there was no cherishable result of this careful, sterile love-making. The good in both was in the doing. She loved doing it with him. “Prick,” she whispered.

  He blew out a smile, his breath was warm on her neck. He whispered, “Dios!” and came and stayed on top of her. “Justina!” He dabbed her neck and shoulders with kisses, manically channeling Seurat. “I love you.”

  She declined his offer to diddle her, she was blissful with pride in her femininity. The exalted woman wanted only to sleep.

  He pulled off the condom and dropped it on the floor, another cohort of their single-strand children left to slowly die after writhing away all the pabulum they carried on their backs, a legion of legitimate children that God had lined up in heaven just a moment before, waiting to slap the bottom of the chosen one who would sit in Justina’s womb. Millions of them, most of them perfect. Millions more, just as perfect were forming in Michael for the next time. The cause was not urgent, he had a son now. His son had a mother who was not his wife, a wrong note that resounded unbearably throughout this new composition he had happened upon, sustained by a pedal leaned upon by the idiotic player, himself.

  Chapter Nine

  Gift of Him

  It was difficult to concentrate on what the lawyer was saying, and he knew he should, it was his duty, he was the father. After Teresa had introduced him, the lawyer had congratulated him— what a nerve, really, but it made Michael feel proud— for coming to the aid of his son. Swiftly followed the memory of Justina’s voice: “You going to get tested?” He would talk to Teresa about it, later. Teresa must have told the man she was divorced from her husband, whom the lawyer took to be Michael. The man must have wondered that Derek’s name was not Calderón, like his father’s. But he never said anything; perhaps he thought it had something to do with Spanish matronymics.

  The lawyer was talking about strategy, which witnesses he would call first, how much Derek should answer. And how much Michael should say, since he would be called as a witness. “So you never saw Derek with Ms. Hardy?”

  “Only at the concert. Not at the orchard. That was hours later. She could have found—”

  “Someone else, absolutely. So, as far as you know, no one can put Derek in the orchard at that timeframe?”

  They could not think of anyone. “Except Justina, perhaps,” said Michael and they all looked at him as though he was talking about his cat. “She says she saw the car. I don’t know if she can really say it was Derek’s.”

  “Justina—?” asked the lawyer, flipping through the plaintiff’s statement.

  “Trimble. My wife. She saw more than I did, she was looking out the window.”

  “Hold on,” said Derek. “I’m not denying I was with her at the orchard.”

  “Of course you are, Derek,” said Teresa, smiling at the other men, “you weren’t with her then.”

  “Yes, I was.”

  “All right,” said the lawyer, “so what kind of defense do you want me to do?”

  “I didn’t do it, you just show that. I didn’t try to rape her.”

  “Derek—” The lawyer sunk his head into his shoulders and looked at the young man over the top of his glasses. “In cases like this, it’s her word against yours. She can’t even prove she was with you. She was just half a mile from her house, she could have been out for a walk when the Calderóns found her. She was probably drunk and incoherent. The prosecution has to prove that you were there and that you broke a law. They won’t be able to do that.”

  “Right. But I don’t have to lie,” said Derek. He looked at his mother who lowered her eyes and peeked at Michael.

  Michael felt his heart begin to pound. He was going to say something laudable, he hoped he would sound sure of himself. “He’s not going to lie. He’ll tell the truth. And he’ll go free.”

  The lawyer shrugged and began again. His eyes popped and his voice climbed the scale with enthusiasm as he instructed everyone to tell the truth, betray no emotion, especially no anger or resentment, there was nothing to be angry or resentful about, right? And let the facts speak for themselves. They all got up to leave and as Michael shook the lawyer’s hand, he felt he had just received an award. Father of the Year. He wondered what was coming over him, he was giddy with pride. He wanted to put a hand on Derek’s shoulder as they walked out. Instead he said to him, “I think it will last one day, no more,” and put his hand on Teresa’s waist as they walked out.

  The pretty fall sunshine had subsided into twilight. Teresa invited Michael to dine with them at home. “Let’s go out,” he offered. “There’s a nice place in Brookhurst.”

  “All right,” said Teresa, trying to keep her smile no more than gracious. “We can stop at my house and call your wife.”

  “Yes,” he remembered.

  They had three cars to find in the parking lot, they had all arrived separately from their various places of business. Teresa called “See you at home,” to Derek as he got into his silver Z. Michael held the door of Teresa’s new forest green Saab for her once she unlocked it. “It’s so good of Justina to support us, Miguel,” she said as she got in. “I hope you don’t take that kind of loyalty for granted.” Loyalty. Yes, wives owe loyalty to their husbands, he thought. He said nothing.

  Teresa showed Michael into the sitting room to make his phone call while she and Derek changed for dinner. He did not find Justina at home. She answered at her office. She asked him how the meeting had gone.

  “Fine.”

  “Did you decide on strategy?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “But you’re not going to tell me?”

  “Of course I will say what I can about it, but, look, Justina, we’ll discuss it later, all right?”

  “Want me to get Chinese on my way home?”

  “I was going to take them out. Do you like to come?”

  Not, 'will you please come, Justina.' “I’ve got a test to make up for tomorrow. Sorry.”

  “I’m sorry, too.”

  No, you’re not. “Will you be late?”

  “We’re going to Brookhurst, so—”

  “Brookhurst! To Danny’s?”

  “Yeah, they’ve never been there.”

  “Well, they’ll certainly like that. You must feel like you’ve won already.”

  “You sure you don’t want to come?” He was starting to feel guilty. He had not been there with Justina since their anniversary last year.

  “No, really, some other time.”

  He hung up and wanted to be in the car with his son and his old lover and on their way instantly, before his guilty feelings untangled themselves enough to articulate to him just what exactly it was he was doing wrong.

  Teresa gasped over the view of the brook that their table afforded, a superior spot he helped the hostess find after she failed to please with the first one. She waited for him to tell them which dishes he had tried and recommended. He mentioned the most costly one, and she realized it would please him to spend a lot of money on their meals. She chose a dish in the more expensive but not most expensive range, and tried to get Derek to choose something other than the chicken parmesan, but he could not be tempted with steak or seafood. After letting Derek rant about a dull physics professor that was taking all the wonder out of the study of astronomy for him, Teresa steered the conversation to Michael’s career, mostly for Derek’s benefit, but also because she wanted him to know she remembered how promising he had once been.

  “You remember that voice teacher you had?” she asked Michael. “Always carried his donut cushion around with him? What was his name?”

  Michael squinted at the wall sconces, trying to remember.

  “Gini? Giotto?” tried Teresa.

  “Giottini!” cried Michael. “Oh, he was funny.”

  “What did he use to call you?”

  Mich
ael smiled sadly. “I don’t remember.”

  “Yes, you do. ‘Little Caruso?’”

  “‘Caruso Minor,’” said Michael without a pause.

  “That good, huh?” said Derek, a smile of admiration bending his tense lips.

  “Oh, your father had such a voice!” Teresa’s face lit up with her memory of the tenorino. “You should have seen him as Rodolfo in Bohème. Oh!” She put a hand to her breast. “All the girls were crazy for him.”

  Derek smiled at his old dad.

  “Really!” Teresa went on. “Girls were all the time coming up to him to chat, you know, even though they knew we were going together. Had been, for a whole year.”

  Michael took a sip of his wine. “Two years,” he corrected. “We did Bohème in our fourth year, remember?”

  “Oh, yes, I thought we did it in the third year.”

  “So, how long did you guys go out?”

  They looked at each other. “We met when we started at university,” said Michael.

  “But we didn’t date until the third year. So, two years.”

  “And then what, you split?” Derek asked.

  Michael took another drink of his wine, letting Teresa answer. “Well, we graduated, and it was time to look for jobs.”

  “You were too young to get married?” asked Derek.

  Teresa said, “Marriage wasn’t the right thing, then.” Michael was eyeing her closely; was he going to challenge her on this now, in front of Derek?

  “We talked about it,” he said to Derek, “but we couldn’t agree.”

  “On what?” Derek asked, oblivious of the darting glances in front of him.

  Michael looked again at Teresa; she appeared at a loss for words. “I don’t remember, exactly,” he hedged.

  “So you split and you both left the country?”

  “Mm-hm,” nodded Michael.

  “Did you keep in touch?”

  “No,” said Michael, while Teresa said, “I knew where he was.” Michael watched her as she said, “I found out through mutual friends where he had gone.”

  “But, you weren’t in touch with each other, you didn’t call or write letters or anything?”