Courting Mrs. McCarthy

by Ian Thomas Malone

  He supposed it was possible the two had used each other in a meeting of two emotionally unavailable minds who were each seeking a quick fix for their own loneliness. His time with Jackie made him forget that he was coming off his break-up with Sarah when he’d first met her. That put him in an unusual place on vulnerability, but he wouldn’t say that it was the predominant reason why he’d been attracted to her in the first place.

  The images of the opening ceremony, where he’d first seen Jackie that summer, entered his mind. What had happened a little over a month ago felt like so much longer, but he couldn’t forget the feeling that had overpowered him when he first saw her smile. That feeling was genuine regardless of the outside circumstances that affected him that morning. He was also stoned, but he opted not to remember that point.

  There was a magazine on the night table that caught Nathan’s glance. It was a dated edition of Vogue, which featured musician Lana Del Rey on the cover. The magazine wasn’t really what caught his attention, but rather the experience that it made him recollect.

  He thought back to his conversation with Mrs. Buchanan where she told him about the ways you could learn to read people. He had operated under the assumption that he’d had such an experience with Jackie the first time they’d met, and there was nothing about her that he’d learned so far which proved otherwise.

  Jackie always carried with her a sense of innocence in her expressions and demeanor that Nathan was always attracted to even though he knew that was far from the truth. Her youthful features complemented the way she was always marveling at whatever it was he told her. He believed in what Mrs. Buchanan had told him because he could see it with his own eyes every time he looked at Jackie.

  That became centered as the root of the depression he was feeling over her departure. He hadn’t gotten past the part of the relationship where he didn’t relish every opportunity to gaze into her eyes and see all her beauty. They hadn’t even defined the relationship before it had been taken from them.

  He had pursued her with the notion that he could go with the flow and take each step as it came. The flow had been interrupted, and then a picture changed everything.

  Nathan tried not to let himself get worked up with the prospect that something might have grown out of their little fling. He wasn’t even confident that he really wanted that in the first place. But it was only July and he’d have had at least another full month with her before people started going on vacation, and then she’d carry on with her life. That month brought with it so many possibilities that he couldn’t help but sit for hours thinking about what might have been.

  His analysis was put to an end finally by Victoria, who came to offer her sympathies and to tell him that Megan was back with dinner. Nathan hadn’t eaten anything since Griffin’s mediocre sandwich, but he could smell Chinese food, a favorite of his. He thought that maybe some General Gau’s chicken might make him feel better.

  There was a cold beer waiting for him at his spot at the dinner table. Nathan laughed as he sat down, happy that the Rousseau family had been making an effort to make him feel better. He noticed there was a large bag next to the Chinese food on the table that didn’t look like a normal take-out receptacle.

  Megan spoke before he could comment. “I stopped by your aunt and uncle’s house before I picked up the food to get you some clothes. I know Griffin prides himself on his fashion sense but I wanted to make sure you had some of your own things.”

  “Thanks,” Nathan said, who paused for a minute while he thought about asking a question he’d been pondering intermediately throughout the day. “How’s Aunt Cassidy doing?”

  Megan sighed. “That woman is really the one who could use a beer. You’d think she’d suffered the loss of a firstborn child by the way she was acting.” Victoria made a not so discrete kick under the table at Megan, whose comment was insensitive though Nathan was not bothered.

  “Did she say anything?” he asked, unsure as to whether or not he wanted to know. His aunt wasn’t likely to badmouth him to the mother of his best friend.

  Megan looked down at her food. “She asked how you were doing. I suspect she feels a certain level of guilt for the way she acted, though she didn’t ask you to come back either. She did mention one piece of information I don’t think you’re going to like, though.”

  A small spark of panic shot through Nathan’s veins as he wondered what his aunt might know that he didn’t already. He couldn’t fathom that there was much more damage to be had, but he didn’t need to speak for her to elaborate.

  “Your father is flying in tomorrow,” she said with a slight cringe that showed how reluctant she was to deliver the news.

  “Oh.” He took a long swig of his beer, a telling action of how he felt at the moment. It wasn’t good news, but it didn’t come as a huge surprise. His aunt had mentioned that possibility earlier that day. Jerome was not known to get involved with his affairs though, and he hadn’t thought that it was a forgone conclusion that his father would show up to cast judgment on him for his transgressions.

  Griffin chimed in to support Nathan. “Don’t worry. You don’t have to face him alone. If there’s someone who knows a little something about civil rights violations, it’s my mothers. We can handle your father together.” He made it sound like this was all some great adventure.

  “Thanks. But I think it’s best if I face him alone.” His father was intimidating, but there was nothing the Rousseaus could do to change that.

  A question came to Nathan that he felt hesitant to ask, but it slipped out of his mouth anyway. He turned to face Victoria and Megan. “What do you guys think of all of this?”

  The purpose of the question was unclear, but the feelings it evoked were not. Both of the Rousseau women were clearly uncomfortable with that line of questioning. He expected Megan, a professional talking head, to speak first. Instead, it was Victoria.

  “I think what happened to you and Jacqueline was a horrid display of immaturity from adults our age who caused great destruction by gossiping. I’m not so sure that it’s a case of civil rights, as Griffin so eloquently put it, but you should be entitled to your own privacy as long as you’re not hurting anyone.” She kept her gaze focused on her chopsticks.

  Megan offered her thoughts. “It was certainly a shock to us, but the damage that’s been done was not your doing. You don’t deserve this kind of attention, and what your aunt did was not what I’d consider an appropriate response to the situation.”

  Nathan felt an urge to defend his aunt, possibly out of what family loyalty he still felt to a woman who had served a maternal role toward him for the past year. Despite what she’d done, he found it had to harbor feelings of resentment toward her. He had lied to her on multiple occasions and the overreaction was unfortunate but not unforgivable.

  Griffin, who tried everything he could to keep his friend’s mind off the issues at hand, dominated the rest of the dinner conversation. Nathan could hardly blame his spacing out on his friend’s fashion talk, but his thoughts were predominated by images of his father. Wondering what Jerome would say to him provided an escape from thoughts about Jackie, but that wasn’t a great tradeoff.

  He declined Griffin’s offer to get stoned in the backyard after dinner. The feeling of being watched had not gone away and he wasn’t quite ready to numb his emotions just yet. This made him think of some pot he’d kept in a drawer that he figured his aunt had found by now in an effort to dig up more information on Jackie.

  It was only nine-thirty when Nathan retired to the guest bedroom. He had left his phone off for most of the day so he wouldn’t be distracted by text messages or Facebook notifications by his peers, who offered notes of praise for his action. He turned it back on as it was his only way of reaching Jackie.

  The texts and messages were fairly predictable. His friend Ralph had sent him a simple thumbs up, while another message read:

  U da man playa.

  He shuddered at the thought that so many people
now knew about his private business, but summer gossip wasn’t usually this juicy.

  There was one text that bothered him greatly. He hadn’t thought much about Sarah over the past day, but she had taken time to contact him to share an opinion on the matter, one that was far more developed than the rest he’d received.

  Now I see who you’ve been with Nathan. You are a sick human being. I hope the cougar was worth the demise of your reputation.

  Sarah’s mean message would not have normally affected him, but Nathan felt uneasy by her cruelty, especially since it was very expensive to send a text all the way from Prague. He pulled the covers over his head while wondering when people would figure out something else to do with their lives. He didn’t respond to a single one of his peers’ efforts to contact him.

  He was upset, but not surprised that Jackie hadn’t texted or called him. If a voicemail from Steve put her in such an upset state, he could only imagine the pain she was suffering. Despite Griffin’s efforts to explain that this wasn’t his fault, he still felt guilty. Though there was a certain sense of guilt that stemmed from his inability to comfort her with eighties’ comedies and Earl Grey tea.

  Jackie was in pain, so Nathan allowed himself the night to wallow in his sorrow over the loss of his woman and his inability to ease her suffering. Nathan wasn’t much for self-pity, but it felt like the only logical reaction to his what he was currently going through. Knowing the next day would bring on suffering of his own, he slowly drifted off to sleep.

  Chapter 24

  The five seconds after he woke up were the most blissful he’d experienced since his time with Jackie—not a slight on his sexual inexperience. Because he was half-asleep, his mind still foggy, he wasn’t thinking of the fact the entire town saw him as some sort of teenage Casanova. He was brought back to reality with the knowledge that he’d soon be facing his father.

  He had a voicemail from him that said he’d be waiting for him at the local coffee shop when Nathan was ready. It ended with Jerome asking that he not be later than ten, which showed his father’s usual cold heartedness that had come to define his shallow personality. Nathan buried himself in his pillow to try and forget what he needed to do.

  Griffin was the only one home when he went downstairs to make himself some coffee. He was dressed up as he usually looked when he was going to work. Though Griffin didn’t drink coffee, he’d put a cup for his friend in his family’s Keurig maker and pressed the button as soon as he heard Nathan’s footsteps.

  “Good morning, buddy, would you like me to make you some breakfast?” he asked with a forced smile on his face. “I can make waffles or Pop Tarts.”

  Nathan grabbed the coffee. “No, I’m meeting Jerome soon.” Holding up the cup, he said, “I appreciate the caffeine boost, though.”

  “You sure you don’t want me to go with you? Or we could smoke a little joint before you face him. I don’t think that would affect me too much at work,” he said in a rapid-fire stream of consciousness effort that came across more comical than helpful. Which wasn’t the worst thing for Nathan who was trying hard not to be nervous.

  “No, no that’s fine. Go to work and I’ll deal with Jerome. I don’t think he’d look too kindly on me bringing along a friend anyway. Wouldn’t exactly help the situation.” He took a long sip of his scalding black coffee. The bitterness and the heat were a fine precursor to what was to come.

  Griffin looked somewhat relieved. He was not exactly the biggest fan of Jerome either. “In that case, I’d better be off to work then. Let me know how it goes if you survive. Good luck.” He departed.

  Nathan gulped down the rest of his coffee and went back upstairs to brush his teeth. His father was likely doing work in the coffee shop, which gave Nathan the opportunity to face his fate as soon as he liked. When he was as ready as he could’ve possibly been, he headed for his car.

  The last time he’d crossed paths with Jerome had been fairly uneventful. It was the previous Christmas, when Jerome exhibited social behavior similar to his uncle Martin and sat on the couch watching TV and drinking scotch. If Nathan didn’t know that Cassidy was Jerome’s sister, he might have suspected Martin was the true blood relative of his father. While the behavior had not become the norm for the Thompson household at the time, Nathan might not have even noticed Jerome’s presence if his aunt hadn’t made some foolish attempts to spark conversation.

  The two hadn’t spent much time together over the years. Nathan had continued to sleep at the Thompsons’ home rather than Jerome’s for he had not invited his son to sleep over. The true fault for this could be placed on Aunt Cassidy, who had not suggested the idea as neither Jerome nor Nathan could be expected to make such an effort to spend time with one another. He had only stayed for two days, most of which was spent either on the phone with clients, or in front of the TV.

  The thing that really bothered Nathan was the gift that his father had given him for Christmas. In addition to an exorbitant check for three thousand dollars, Jerome gave him a Manchester United t-shirt that not only didn’t fit, but also looked like it came straight from the airport gift shop. He didn’t really consider himself in much of a position to complain after receiving such a large check, but Nathan didn’t feel like a little sincerity was too much to ask.

  As he parked his car in the lot behind the coffee shop, he stopped for a minute to consider the possible routes the conversation could take. The options were seemingly endless, mostly because Nathan had never found himself in such a situation with his old man. He could not think of a single time when he’d been disciplined by Jerome, and the more he thought about it, he couldn’t think of a time when Jerome had exerted any sort of opinion about a choice he’d made.

  Now, the teen angst was natural. His father had made plenty of decisions that impacted Nathan’s life. He couldn’t think of a time where he’d offered justification for these choices. Jerome always spoke with a firm voice that one tended not to argue with.

  Nathan had been placed in private school at an early age, and hadn’t been given much of a choice for living arrangements when his father moved to London. Jerome hadn’t ever even asked him where he’d like to go for vacation.

  He found himself unsure of what to think about his father’s arrival. He had obviously come because his aunt had demanded it in a presumably manic state over the phone. Nathan didn’t want to write his father off as completely uncaring about his circumstances, but he thought he would’ve been able to fix all of this with a simple phone call.

  The ground felt extra firm as Nathan stepped out of his car determined not to let Jerome get to him. Nathan’s number one concern was making sure that his father didn’t make any drastic decisions on his behalf.

  He walked into the coffee shop with determination that soon left him once he saw his father sitting in the back corner with his face buried in his laptop. Nathan ordered an Americano and headed to face him, who had not noticed his presence. The rather loud, swift footsteps apparently did not attract his attention.

  Jerome was a tall man with thinning jet-black hair. Both his manner and looks spoke to the powerful confidence that he radiated wherever he went. The psyche made it easy for him to attract Nathan’s mother, Hilary, though his stoic behavior was likely why she took off with a less powerful, drug-addicted musician.

  “Hello, Father,” Nathan said as he approached. He tried his best to emulate his father’s demeanor, who would never have admitted he was wrong in a scenario like this. Nathan knew he was in the right, but he needed a strong showing to convince him.

  Jerome took a sip of his cappuccino. “You’ve certainly done a number on your aunt,” he said, as he closed his laptop.

  The two found themselves in something of a standoff. Their expressions were both cold and collected. Nathan saw right through his callous approach, but he couldn’t get a read on what Jerome was after.

  “I’ll make no apologies for what I did with Jackie. I displayed some dishonesty to Aunt Cassidy, which was
a mistake, but she never would have understood why I did what I did,” he replied, believing he’d made a strong first showing. His figurative pawn had been moved.

  “You have made a tremendous mess, Nathan.” His father was not going to let him dictate the vibe of the conversation. “You have put me in an awkward position as to what to do with you. Your reputation will take a big hit over this. You’ll be lucky to not be thrown out of school for what you’ve done.”

  Jerome was starting to get to Nathan. The part about school was a low blow and not exactly accurate. He couldn’t get in trouble for something like this and even if he could, it wasn’t something that a check from his father couldn’t fix.

  But Nathan didn’t want to argue the small parts of his father’s claim. “I haven’t put you in any position. I didn’t say you needed to come, and you could’ve easily said no to Aunt Cassidy. It’s not like I’m currently living with her.” Nathan was struggling to keep his emotions in check. This was harder than he’d thought it would be. He wanted to scream at his father, but instead all he could do was smile, knowing that his father had picked a public setting for that very reason.

  Jerome spoke again, this time with a condescending tone. “I thought that leaving you behind when I went to London would work out fine. Clearly, I have made a mistake. I looked at some schools on the way over. You’ll come to England with me and we can get your life back on track.”

  This was Aunt Cassidy’s threat magnified by ten. Nathan tried harder than ever to keep his emotions in check, but inside he was freaking out. He regretted not having the Rousseaus come along for support. Jerome was too big a foe to handle by himself.