Unraveling

by Owen Thomas

  “I do not, Hollis. I…”

  “Do you consider for one moment that Tilly is even partly responsible for abandoning this family? No, you don’t. It’s all my fault. It’s always been my fault.”

  “That is your fault, Hollis. You know it.”

  “Yes! I drove her out! I cast her out amongst the wolves!” Hollis stuck his finger in the air dramatically, pointing out across the backyard.

  “Yes. You drove her out.”

  “That’s ridiculous! You’re proving my point, Susan.”

  “You asked her to leave.”

  “I did not ask her to leave.”

  “You pointed to the door.”

  “What…you mean in high school?”

  “That was the first time she left, Hollis.”

  “That’s the biggest load of …”

  “And after that it got easier and easier. I tried to intervene. But you shut me up. You always just shut me up. The Academy? The Vanguard Academy? I always thought the Vanguard Academy was a crappy idea. Did that count for anything? No. You just shut me up and did what you damn well wanted to do. And look how that turned out. A complete waste of money and David was scarred in the process.”

  “He’s not scarred. Jesus. David’s fine.”

  “He’s not fine, Hollis. Open your eyes. We practically have to bribe him to come over for dinner. He sneaks his brother out of the back window to keep from seeing us. He’s still not married. He’s been suspended at work. There’s something wrong there.”

  “You want to pin all of that on me? On the Vanguard Academy?”

  “It all starts somewhere, Hollis. It was a tragically bad idea. The only person that came out of that fiasco intact was your buddy Charlie Compson. Certainly not your son.”

  “You’re still blaming Charles Compson?”

  “And you’re still sticking up for him.”

  “It wasn’t his fault David screwed his underage daughter.”

  “David denied it, Hollis. We should have backed him up. I tried, but no. You shut me up. As usual. I got packed off upstairs with Tilly like a good little woman.”

  “Oh please. Don’t give me the whole feminist…”

  “You backed the money man, rather than your own son. You took up for Charlie Compson. You protected your own ego, Hollis. Your own reputation. You sided with him against your own son.”

  Hollis shook his head in disbelief. In disgust. He tried to shut out her opinion with the simple gesture of crossing his arms but his angry muscles thwarted the effort. So he shook his head as dismissively as he could and received the punch.

  There was truth packed in that punch and Hollis knew it. He had taken Compson’s side. Compson his benefactor and client. Gravy train, career making, Charles Compson. He had chosen to disbelieve David. But was that wrong? If David was lying was that wrong? Should he have supported the lie? Should he have simply not cared about young Katie Compson? Should he have shown Charles Compson righteous indignation? Poked a finger in his chest? Threatened litigation? Even knowing, as they both knew, that David had crossed an uncrossable line and was lucky to avoid prosecution? No. He had not been wrong. That was just responsible parenting. Did it matter that now, all these years later, Charles Compson himself had forgiven David? That apparently he had had some ulterior motive for expelling David? That he had come to regret David’s expulsion as a mistake? Did that change anything at all? No. He had not been wrong. And, in any event, Susan knew nothing of Charles Compson’s epiphany. She certainly had no basis to judge him harshly. And yet…

  “Ultimately, Hollis, it always seems to come down to whether you can get that stamp of approval. You know? You wanted Charlie Compson to like you. You let all of that tuition money go and you let David twist in the wind all so that Charlie Compson could count you as his man.”

  “David’s fine.” Hollis forcibly crossed his arms, pain be damned. “David got what he wanted, which was a public school education.”

  “What David really wanted was to please his father.”

  “Then maybe he should have thought twice before…why are we even into this again, Susan? What is the goddamned point? Except maybe to prove that you are ready to suspect me of anything and blame me for everything.”

  “I don’t blame you for everything, Hollis. I don’t. But you don’t take responsibility, not even partial responsibility, for anything. Anything. You don’t take responsibility for subscribing to Playboy Magazine – which I could not care less about. It’s not about Playboy or about a man your age drooling over these eighteen-year old children. It’s not about that. You live in your own little world, down in your dark little den where you drink your wine and listen to your music and read your books and rewrite history to conform to your own little rules, and one of those rules is that Hollis Johns is never wrong. Hollis Johns is flawless. Beyond reproach. Susan is so flawed, so old, so unsophisticated about the world, about business and politics and money and…”

  “Oh, that is…”

  “…and philosophy and spirituality and all the things that really matter, Susan is so miscalculating, so lacking as a person and a wife and a mother, that she almost has no value at all. But Hollis? No. Hollis is perfect. Hollis doesn’t touch junk food. Hollis doesn’t touch television. Hollis doesn’t touch Hollywood.”

  “That’s the dumbest thing I have ever heard.”

  …Wolf, I have tremendous respect for our armed services and…

  Then why are you opposing them? Why do you insist on undercutting…

  “Oh, the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard? Really. Yes, I’m frequently dumb and stupid in this relationship. You’d think I’d be used to that by now, but that one never really ceases to wound me. Well, if I’m so dumb tell me this. When was the last time you admitted that you had made a mistake?”

  “Susan…”

  He had made mistakes, of course. Everyone made mistakes. But now, in the heat of battle, none came readily to mind. Or, at least, the mistakes that came to mind and to which he could confess were not the kind of mistakes that, he felt, would contribute to a constructive dialogue. It had been a mistake, for instance, for him to insist that he did not know anything about the Playboy. He should have simply told her the truth, or even told her that it was none of her goddamned business. It had been a mistake to tell her that he had been to the athletic club since now she would pressure him to make working out a joint activity. An opportunity for togetherness. It was not a joint activity. It was his activity. His initiative. His body fitness.

  … I remember Viet Nam. You’re much too young to remember Viet Nam. But I do remember. I served in that conflict, Ms. Donnelly. I have friends who served in that war. Many of them died. And perhaps you can’t understand …

  But Senator that’s what we’re trying to prevent…

  “When was the last time you apologized for something you did wrong, Hollis? When was the last time you said, Susan, I’m sorry I said that; I’m sorry I did that; Boy was I wrong. Forget me. When was the last time you admitted it to yourself? The fantasy world you live in does not permit you to commune with the rest of us sinners.”

  It had also been a mistake to piss all over her little retreat into the woods. He knew that. If working out at the club was his, then playing antiwar protester was hers. He knew that. Even if it was childish and even if it had more to do with escaping him than stopping a war. He knew that. But to actually tell her that, to confess, to concede that he was wrong to have denigrated her experience, would only fan the flames; would only embolden her to come back at him with a fresh lust for new vindication. She would punish him for his honesty. For his fairness.

  “When, Hollis?”

  “I make mistakes just like everyone else.”

  “I’m waiting.”

  “This whole conversation was a mistake. I should never have set foot into this kitchen. Okay? You’re right. My mistake. Well, laugh if you want to…”

  “But you’re…you’re…”

  “You ask
ed, Susan. So you can just stand there and listen for a minute. I am flawed. I do not have the patience to deal with irrational, emotional, baseless accusations and blame-laying. If I were a better person, I suppose I could handle all of this with a little more equanimity. I could take it all in stride and not let it bother me and not be so upset at you and maybe you would then feel better than you do now and we could go about our day. But I can’t do that. I just can’t. The accusations and the suspicions and the ingratitude for my efforts to support you and this family for all of these years are difficult to just accept. And for that, yes, I apologize. I am sorry. I know you hate Charles Compson. You always have. Fine. How convenient for you to hate him as you do the laundry and the dishes and raise our children in a nice home.”

  “I… was… a… teacher!”

  “That was a long time ago. We both made our choices.”

  “No. You made choices, Hollis. You did.”

  “My choice was to make money, a lot of money, and to make everything in the last forty years possible. And that, like it or not, takes people like Charles Compson. Charles Compson made me a legend. I made more money for that goddamned bank than they knew what to do with. He put a lot of food on that table and he put our children through college. He funded my retirement. Does that mean he’s right even when he’s wrong? Of course not. But he wasn’t wrong. David was wrong. Unlike you, I don’t accuse people simply to feel better about myself. I have an inconvenient allegiance to the truth. And if you think that makes me disloyal to my own son, then maybe it does and I’m sorry for that too. But I’m not that kind of person. I’m sorry you think I banished our glamorous train wreck of a daughter. I did no such thing. She did it all to herself and I think you know that but if you don’t – if you are really laboring under the delusion that I banished Tilly from the family, then I will own the mistake of not taking greater care to explain to you all of those fights and all of that turmoil that was making us pull our hair out by the roots. I’m sorry. It must have been very confusing and upsetting. And I’m sorry you have misunderstood me for being judgmental of your… your… preferences. You’re right. I don’t like movies or television or junk food or gossip magazines or a lot of the things that you like. That doesn’t make either one of us wrong, or bad, or unsophisticated or undeserving, Susan. It just makes us different. You do what you do and that’s fine. I accept that whether you believe it or not. But I do what I do, I like what I like, I don’t like what I don’t like. I’m sorry you feel rejected by my choices.”

  “Are you about done?”

  “I’m… Susan… I’m just trying to tell you that I’m not…”

  “Are… you… done?”

  “Fine. Yes. What. Christ.”

  “That was the most insulting, degrading…”

  “You asked me…”

  “I asked you for the last time you had admitted to being wrong and all you could do was pretend to apologize for not being able to put up with me.”

  “I was not pretending. I am sincerely sorry for…”

  “Hollis! Enough. I can’t take another minute of this. Go to your den. Go back to the club. Go take your goddamned magazine behind the sofa and play with yourself. I don’t care. Just… this is pointless. I’m going to pick up Ben.”

  She busied herself straightening the other stack of mail, sweeping fallen lilac petals from around the vase into her hands and then dropping them into a pile on top of the blue notebook. She swept the entire table with her hands, again and again, collecting invisible dust into invisible piles. She fluttered around the table like a bird trapped in a room, needing a way out but not knowing how to escape.

  … the sort of thing you people are doing … the kind of nonsense that Cindy Sheehan is out there doing … is devastating to morale and it costs American lives. If you people are so upset with this country, if you are so unhappy here, then leave. But do not stand in the way of the mission.

  Senator, that is outrageous. I am every bit the American that you are and …

  Hollis watched her from the doorway. He had not wanted this. He had not meant to be unfair. They had problems; sure they did. What marriage didn’t have problems? And he was sure that he probably had some role in those problems. It wasn’t all Susan. Of course not. But certainly there was a better way to deal with those problems than what had just transpired. She had caught him by surprise. He had been in a completely different frame of mind – (Wild Thing!) – before she had lashed out at him. The Playboy accusation had been a signal flare. I’m unhappy, it said. We need to talk, it said. I’m lonely, it said. I don’t know how to reach you, it said. He knew all of that. Now it was so clear. Why had he been so clumsy? So defensive? Why had he reacted like a child? This was all so beneath him. He took in a slow calming breath, preparing himself for an entirely different tone. It did not have to be like this.

  …You have a funny way of showing your patriotism, Ms. Donnelly. If the protesters with whom you associate are not careful, they will find out just how determined the American people can be about protecting this country.

  What does that mean? Was that a threat? Wolf, that sounded like a threat…

  Hollis watched his wife and waited for the next act that, stubbornly, would not come. He watched her indignant, tearless flurry. Where were the tears? Hadn’t that always been the way? The tears were his invitation to console. To apologize. They granted permission to approach; to touch. Wasn’t it always her tears that softened the ground for reconciliation? Rage was always just a pit stop to something more constructive. Where were the tears?

  … protesters like Ms. Donnelly and Ms. Sheehan and others – particularly those in the 1960’s drug culture – have failed to appreciate that when you stir up a hornets nest, people, unfortunately, will get stung.

  Susan stopped and turned her back on him and stood looking out over the back yard. She crossed her arms, her shoulders bowing away from him. At last, he thought, she had reached the end of her control. He detected a spasm of muscle, what he was sure were the first tremors of the end. Now they could begin to heal.

  “Susan,” he said, his voice softer, calmer, carried a tonal thread of conciliation. The voice of the husband. The voice in the dark. He took a slow step forward. “Susan, I know that you’re…”

  “Just go! Goddamnit Hollis! Just get out!”

  The words came like a slap, hard and with no hesitation, drawing him up short in his tracks. He felt another slow, warm trickle in his hair. His head was throbbing and his cheek burned. His blood thickened with rage. With shame.

  …drug culture? You’ve hit a new low in this conversation, Senator. It’s one thing to accuse me of…

  “Fine,” Hollis snapped. He bent to pick up his bag off the floor. The muscles in his arms and his back, now even shorter than when he had first walked in, howled in protest. He ignored the howling and tried to think what he would do next. Leave is what he would do next. Go somewhere. Anywhere. Maybe just drive. He tried to turn the music back on in his head so that he might exit the kitchen with the same youthful confidence with which he had entered. But the songs came in garbled and mixed, yowling without any defining rhythm. (Wild thing! Whooooo are you? Who-who? Who-who? Something, something garbage!) He turned to leave, taking a last demonstrably frustrated breath of kitchen air.

  …but I can assure you that I am not some pot fiend, Senator…

  And then it hit him. The smell. The memory of the smell. It hit him like hammer between the eyes. He whirled back around, stepping back into the threshold between kitchen and dining room. He inhaled deeply.

  “Pot!” he exclaimed at the back of her head with a certain incredulous triumph. “You’ve been smoking dope! I knew I smelled something. I knew it!”

  He could detect a slight stiffening in her shoulders, although that was all. She did not turn. She did not respond. She did not deny. He let the accusation hang for a moment.

  “You’ve been using drugs in this house. I… I can’t believe it. Have you even thou
ght about Ben? Have you even…”

  “That’s horseshit, Hollis,” she said quietly, but without any calm in her voice. “Don’t make this about Ben. You’re not concerned about Ben.”

  “I am concerned about Ben, Susan. You bet I’m concerned.”

  Susan turned to face him. Her face was like granite; her expression chiseled.

  “It’s pot, Hollis. Okay? A little marijuana. One joint. Ben’s not even here. You’d think we were doing a little mother-son freebasing. It’s just me and it’s just pot.”

  “And it’s just illegal, Susan. How good are you to Ben if you’re locked up?”

  “No one’s going to lock me up. You’re really over-reacting.”

  “I’m not over-reacting. This is a law-abiding family. Well, I can’t speak for Tilly, … and David has had his unfortunate episodes of bad judgment… but the rest of us, you and me… don’t violate the law. Okay, I don’t violate the law. And Ben. He doesn’t violate the law. Any law. Maybe Tilly likes those sixteen-point headlines, hell, Tilly seems to live for them, but I don’t and I know you don’t. I don’t want to read about my wife in the Dispatch. Where did you get it?”

  “That’s none of your business. I’m not tell…”

  “Never mind. I know where you got it. I knew that dyke was trouble. Where do you keep it? How much more do you have squirreled away? How long…”

  “It was just one stupid…you know how much weed I’ve smoked in my life?”

  …You said “unfortunate episodes,” Senator. I think Ms. Donnelly is just looking to find out what episodes you’re referring to.

  Well, Wolf, Kent State comes to mind. There was a situation in which …