The Cat's Pajamas

by Soraya May

  But what do I say to Cat? I didn’t have an answer, and I needed one, now. My phone rang again as I got to the coast road, and I realized with a guilty start it was Mom. I’d promised her I’d be back at the bar by now, but my work at the library had robbed me of all idea of what time it was.

  “Mom? Can you hear me?”

  “Yes, sweetheart, no problem.” It was quieter here on the coast road, and there was almost no traffic, the only sound the noise of seagulls over the water, and the waves on the long shore. “I’m at the home with your father.”

  “How are things?”

  “Oh, fine.” ‘Fine’ was code for ‘bad day’. “We’ve been looking at photographs today.”

  “Okay, good. Just keep trying, Mom, okay?”

  “I know, sweetheart. Would you like to talk to your father?”

  “Of course. Put him on now.” I took a deep breath, and stopped walking for a minute. And again. Frustration, and sadness, and anger came up in my throat, like it always did at this point.

  And, I did what I always did. I wrapped all three in something cool and soft, and put them in a box deep down in my chest. Time to be sad and angry later. Sad and angry is understandable, but it doesn’t help anyone. Now, just patience and kindness. Looking out at the sea, I took another breath. The sea helped a little bit.

  There was a shuffling sound, and a voice. “Who—what?” It was my father’s voice, the same newsreader bass I remembered from my childhood, but querulous now, cracked and wavering.

  My mother’s voice this time. “Philip. Philip, listen. It’s your son, Ryan. On the phone. Here, take the phone and talk to him.” I waited.

  “Phone? Where?”

  “Here. This is a phone now. Looks like a packet of cigarettes, doesn’t it? Yes, they’re all different, I know, very confusing, lots of buttons. Take the phone and talk to Ryan.” I waited.

  “Hello? Who is this?”

  “Hi Dad, it’s Ryan. How has your day been?”

  “Ryan? Where do I know you from?”

  “I’m your son, Dad. I came to see you last week. We had lunch in the garden, and I showed you some photographs of us together. Do you remember?”

  “Did you? No. No, I’d remember that if it happened. I’m not losing my marbles, for God’s sake. Although they treat you as if you are in this bloody place. Have you ever been here?”

  “Yes, Dad. I’ve been there many times. It’s not so bad, you know.”

  His voice took on an annoyed tone. “That’s fine for you to say, young man. They put something in the food to keep us quiet, you know. Docile.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, Dad.” There wasn’t really any answer when the conspiracy theories popped up, although they usually went away pretty quickly. “Did you have a nice lunch with Mom?”

  “What? Oh, yes. Yes, very nice. Is she your mother?”

  I clenched and unclenched my fist, watching, idly, my knuckles going white against the blue of the sky. “Yes, she is. Last time I came, we talked about the excavation I’m doing. Do you remember that? The archaeological excavation?”

  “Oh? Oh. Yes!” A noise of satisfaction, and a delighted chuckle, the same one he used to make when we’d finished the cryptic crossword together, or come up with a particularly clever phrase for a lecture. “I do remember that. Cable Bay, wasn’t it? Interesting place, geologically speaking.”

  Tears pricked my eyes and I fought to keep my voice steady. You do remember, Dad. “Yes, yes, that’s right, Dad. Cable Bay. I’m there now, working on the dig site.”

  “How interesting. I would never have expected there’d be anything of interest there, because of course the standard hypothesis states that region was submerged until only quite recent prehistory. But you know that, I’m sure.”

  “Exactly, Dad. That’s why this is so unexpected.”

  “Hah! Cable Bay, eh? Great stuff. This sounds like a pretty big revision for the textbooks, I’d say. I look forward to hearing more about it. Are you one of my students, then?”

  Just when you think things are going well, they have a habit of turning sour on you. “No, Dad. I’m your son. I’m an archaeologist too. I became one because—” I stopped myself. “Never mind. Let’s talk about what I’ve found next week, okay? Can you put Mom back on the phone, please?”

  More shuffling, and I heard my mother’s voice. “Hold on, and I’ll say goodbye to your father, and we’ll talk.” I waited for a few minutes, and she came back on the line. “Okay, I’m out in the foyer. Thank you for doing that, sweetheart.”

  I shook my head. “Sure. Anything significant on the medical front?”

  “No. A persistent cough, according to the nurses, but nothing we should be worried about. Let’s talk about something else for a while. Please.” I could tell Mom was under stress, although she always did a good job of hiding it from everyone else. “What’s happened with the excavation?”

  My rueful smile was probably evident in my voice. “Well, that’s the thing, Mom. It turns out things have gotten a bit more complicated.”

  “How so?”

  “Okay.” I needed to explain this to someone, and Mom was a reasonable place to start. “You remember I said the fossils were found underneath a building, right? This bar where I’m staying?”

  “Sure.” Her voice was level, expectant.

  “Well, it turns out the building has been on this site for a long time; more than a hundred years, in fact. And, according to the photos I’ve found in the council records, it’s almost completely unaltered. So, that means—”

  “That means it’s a historic building, right?” Mom had picked up a lot from putting up with my father for all these years. “It should be certified and ruled on itself. And protected.”

  “Exactly right. And that gives us a problem, because—”

  “You can’t demolish it to excavate the fossils, can you? Not if it’s a protected building.”

  “Right again. You should have been an archaeologist, Mom.”

  “Huh. No, thank you.” I could hear her sitting down in a chair. “So, what are you going to do? Can you preserve the building and excavate the fossils at the same time?”

  “Maybe. And that’s what I’m going to propose. But it would take years, and cost a heck of a lot, so I don’t know if the Heritage Committee will accept it. They have a limited budget, and I’m going to have to convince them that both the building and the site underneath it are worth saving. They want me back tomorrow to give a presentation.”

  “Well, if anyone can convince them, it’s you. You’re the golden boy now, remember? The bright star in the research firmament, and all that.”

  “Yeah. I don’t know, Mom. Dad could have done it. I watched him when I was growing up, remember? He could wrap an audience around his little finger. All I ever wanted to do was be half as good as him.”

  She snorted. “I watched you both. You are every bit as good as your father was. He would say the same thing if—if he—”

  I started talking quickly to cover her silence. “Maybe. I hope so. Anyway, I’ve got to get myself on a plane today, like now, and then come up with a convincing argument.”

  “What about Cat?”

  Oof. I wasn’t ready for that. “I don’t know, Mom. I like her a lot, I really do. But right now, the most important thing is this project. I’ll do the best I can for her, but—”

  “Ryan, listen to me.” She didn’t use her ‘insistent’ voice very often. “I know you care about what you’re doing. But you need to be thinking about the rest of your life as well.”

  I started walking, trying to wind up the conversation. “Sure. I understand.” I didn’t really want to talk about this right now, not while my head was rapidly filling up with trying to construct a proposal for the Heritage Committee.

  “Don’t use that ‘I understand’ tone with me. Not about this.”

  “Okay, okay. I know it’s important, and I promise I’m not trying to brush you off. But I have to get this proposal
right; if I don’t make it convincing enough, then I’ll never forgive myself. We need to preserve this—”

  She cut me off. “Ryan, as much as you want to be saving memories from the past, I want you to be thinking about creating some new ones of your own. If you think you could have a future with this girl Cat, don’t let it slip away. Find a solution.”

  I was silent for a minute. Mom was right, as she always was, but knowing that it was important didn’t magically give me the ability to know what to do. “Okay, Mom. I hear you.”

  “Good. I should let you go. I love you, sweetheart.”

  I hung up, and then rang Cat’s number, wanting to tell her what had happened, but she didn’t pick up. I’d be back at the bar soon anyway, and I could explain everything then.

  32

  Cat

  Ryan was ringing my phone, and I stared at it, numb. If he’d already made a decision, how long had he been keeping it from me?

  He rang twice more, and I didn’t pick up. Walking down the narrow stairs, I looked around the empty bar, chairs and tables neatly arranged, bar clean and wiped-down, all ready for the evening. The little wooden cat figurine stood on the bar, next to the till; I picked it up, pushed the front door open, and sat down on the step staring dully at it, with my heart sinking with every passing moment.

  Maybe this was a mistake. Please let this be a mistake. My mother, in a rare flash of tolerance and acceptance, always said that you should assume the best of people until they prove you otherwise.

  A figure appeared at the end of the road. Wunderbar was stood quite a distance from the last building, and you could see people coming for quite a while before they arrived, whether they were walking down the road, or coming up from the beach. Even from this distance, I could see it was Ryan, walking fast, half-breaking into a jog for a few steps, then slowing again. I watched him approach, not really seeing him, then looked along the beach out to the sea, and back to the figurine in my hands.

  “Cat!” He called when he was at least twenty feet away, out of breath. I looked at him, expressionless. “Cat, something’s come up with the investigation. I need to leave tomorrow.”

  The cold, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach came back, and started to grow. “Where are you going?”

  “Back to the city. I need to talk about what I’ve found here.” He stopped in front of me, breathing hard. “Look, let’s go inside, and I’ll explain—”

  “And what, exactly, have you found here?” I took hold of the banister, and got to my feet, standing directly in front of him, barring his way into the bar. My heart was starting to beat faster, and I tried to keep my eyes fixed on him, as hard as it was.

  He looked surprised, and reached out a hand. I stayed where I was, both hands on the banister, staring at him. “Well, it’s complicated. I’ve found something really surprising, and that’s why I have to go back at such short notice. I need to pack, but we should—”

  I interrupted him again. “How long have you known, Ryan? How long have you known that the fossils were important, and this site was significant?” Please, please, let this be a mistake. Over his shoulder, out on the long, golden beach, the surf rolled in, and I turned the figurine over and over in my fingers as I waited.

  He closed his eyes for a minute, and opened them again. “Cat, let me explain. If we could just go inside and talk—”

  I moved to stand in front of the door, arms folded. “How long have you known?” The more he didn’t answer, the more the cold sick feeling inside me roiled and churned.

  “I—look, I’ve suspected it for a while, but—” He was struggling for words.

  “Ryan, I read your notebook. In your room. It says the site was significant. When did you know?”

  His expression grew dark as realization dawned on him. “Wait, you went and looked through my things? How could you do that?”

  “I didn’t look through your things.” I was curt, not budging as we eyed each other in front of the door. “I saw what you’d written, that’s all. Answer my question. When did you know?”

  “Cat, I—” The kindly look in Ryan’s eyes I’d grown used to was gone. The look one I’d woken up to, seen as he worked, the look I’d fallen for, was gone. In its place was defensiveness, and my frustration and fear boiled over.

  “Tell me the truth, Ryan.”

  He put a hand to the back of his head, and stared down the road for a moment. When he spoke, he didn’t meet my eyes. “The first day I started work.”

  The wind felt suddenly cold on my skin, and I realized my shirt was sticking to me uncomfortably, clammy with sweat. The first day. Before all this happened. Before—I swallowed—before we made love. My horror must have showed on my face, because Ryan stepped toward me, his hands outstretched.

  “Please, Cat. I can explain. Just let me—”

  I backed away from him, hard up against the door. This can’t be happening. “Don’t touch me. Don’t come near me.” I fumbled for the door-handle and pushed on it, almost tripping on the step as the door gave way behind me. “You’ve been lying to me all this time, haven’t you? Haven’t you?” In the sick haze I was trying to swim through, I heard someone agitated, their voice almost rising to a shriek, and I realized it was me.

  Ryan followed me inside, still trying to take my hands. I backed away from him further, until I came up against the bar. My bar. I clung to it like a drowning sailor clings to a life-preserver, willing it to support my weight if my legs wouldn’t.

  “Cat, I—it was a mistake, and I’m sorry. Please listen to me.” He put one hand to his forehead, and I could see he was shaking. “I should have told you earlier in the process, but—”

  “Process? Is that what you call this? A process?” I spat at him, halfway between tears and rage. “What about when we slept together? Was that a process?”

  “Dammit, Cat, stop twisting my words.” He turned away, and then back, and then away, and then back again. I hung on to the bar, so hard the knots in the wood pressed white into my hands, my heart pounding in my chest. Please let this be a bad dream. “Do you really think I meant to lie to you?”

  I stared at him coldly. “How can I know? Were you ever honest with me about what we had—have?” I corrected myself, but right now I wasn’t sure. “Was this all just fun for you? Something to pass the time while you were away?”

  He shook his head, angry now too. “Goddammit, Cat, you must know that’s not true. But right now I’m wondering what I was—” He stopped, but it was too late.

  “I see,” I breathed. Every ounce of hurt was in my voice, but inside me the sick feeling was condensing into a cold fury. “I was right in the beginning, wasn’t I? You care more about your damned memories than you do about people.”

  “That’s not fair. Everything I’ve done here, I’ve done—”

  I carried on, remorselessly. “That’s why you don’t belong anywhere. None of this means anything to you beyond your desire to preserve things, does it?” I jabbed a finger at him, shaking. “You’ve been stringing me along this whole time, just to make things easier for yourself, so you could get your job done. Then you were going to move on, and this would all just be another one of your memories.”

  He slapped both hands hard on his thighs, and the noise echoed in the empty bar. “That isn’t fair, Cat. I was going to ask you—I was going—”. His face was anguished, but I didn’t care.

  “Whatever you were going to ask me,” My voice was level now, “it doesn’t matter any more. “Do you remember what you said the first night we met? That it’s better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission?” He was silent, staring at me. “Don’t waste your time begging for forgiveness. I want you out of here, now, completely, permanently. I want to,”

  I paused, and in my distraught anger, I sharpened up the one word I knew would hurt him above all other, the one way I could hurt him the way he’d hurt me. I turned it over in my mind, regarding it carefully. A small part of me screamed not to do it, to ins
tead break down in front of him and beg him not to hurt me any more, this man who I’d come to care for so much, and for whom this had all been a lie.

  But most of me just regarded the word, and admired the way its edges glittered in the light.

  “I want to forget you.”

  He stopped moving, one hand in the air, his mouth half-open, and the hurt in his eyes was so immediate and so raw that the small part of me screamed again why are you doing this? But I’d done it now, and I couldn’t take it back.

  Ryan blinked, once, twice, and for a moment I thought he was going to drop to his knees. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

  I spoke again, my voice getting stronger, even though I couldn’t believe what I was doing. “I want to forget this ever happened, Ryan. That we ever happened. You took my bar from me, the only thing I felt was ever mine; you will do me this favor. I am going now, and it’s probably best if you are out of here by the time I’m back. You can leave the key inside.”

  I walked past him, put the little wooden cat he’d carved for me on the end of the bar, then turned and walked out.

  33

  Ryan

  I looked at the straps on my cases, and tightened them one more time, then stared up the road. Hurry up, Jack Collis. Get here with your taxi, and get me out of here.

  Someone once said that insomnia was like having the volume turned down on everything; what a pity they hadn’t thought to extend it to this situation. I couldn’t hardly hear the wind, even though it was blowing enough to move the thick green leaves in the red-flowered trees along the beach-front. I ran my fingers over the rough hessian of my cases, and couldn’t feel a thing.

  I’d heard what Cat said, and I saw the look in her eyes when she said it. She knew what she was saying, and she knew what it meant. As much as I wanted to pretend it meant something different, to pretend it hadn’t happened like that, it had.