Drift

by Victoria Patterson

  Jules and Jim trotted past me, their fur swiping my calves, to the front door, nails clicking against the marble. When I opened the door, Lobo was stooped there, as I remembered him, his chin pressed into his shirt, but he looked skinnier. Also, there were bruises all over the insides of his arms, congregating in an alarming pattern near the crooks of his elbows. The dogs sniffed at his ankles, but he didn’t appear to notice them.

  “Hello, Kat,” he said. I had forgotten how he stared at my shoulder when he talked, instead of into my eyes. “Long time no see,” he said.

  Jules yipped, an uncontrollable outburst from the excitement and tension. His head ping-ponged from Lobo to me, and Lobo’s leg moved, just a little, to shake off Jim.

  “You have to leave,” I said, handing him the hundred-dollar bills. He took the money quickly and smoothly, without hesitation, without acknowledgment, as if the transaction hadn’t even taken place. He didn’t even check to see how much it was, and a disappointed look came over his face, as though I’d inconvenienced him, but I knew he was covering for his own disgrace. Then he turned and walked out the front walkway, into the dark street.

  At the end of the street, he turned to see if I was still there, and we stared at each other for a long second. He looked like a phantom, his face dark and bewildered, and as I shut the front door, I worried what he thought of me. Something about the way he’d stared at me in recognition—he knew that I’d sold Melody out, and that like him, I was ashamed.

  Two significant events happened within the next year. Lobo entered a treatment facility and tried to sober up. Although he continued to relapse, he stopped pursuing Melody. When Henry was out of town for more than a week, and Lobo was in a sober period, living with his mother in Santa Ana, Melody let him come over and use the pool. I discovered for myself that he was a voracious reader, with a wide-ranging interest in the world, and his dark sense of humor was far more appealing than Henry’s corny jokes.

  Lobo enjoyed Henry’s house as much as I had, I supposed, because when Melody tried to flirt with him, he flirted back halfheartedly, saying he didn’t want her to screw up a good thing. Or maybe he hoped that Melody would find security with Henry, since he knew about her past as well. Most likely, it was a combination.

  Also, more importantly, Henry decided that he didn’t want me to come over as much—or Cindy. The night he told us, the sky was dense with fog and we could hear a foghorn in the distance. We sat in the living room near the thick curtains and mahogany side table I had loved, but which I didn’t love so much anymore. The girls were in Melody’s bedroom, painting their toenails.

  Henry sat in a formidable armchair. He bent his head for a moment, his hands clasped before him, as if in prayer. When he looked up, there was a surety in his eyes, which suggested that despite seeming naive, he knew more than we expected.

  “Mondays and Wednesdays will be your days,” he said, because those were the days he was gone. “Melody and I have come to an agreement, a compromise, since I know she feels differently about this than me.”

  Melody was unusually quiet, sitting on the small love seat across from Cindy and me. She appeared afraid. Jules and Jim sat to the left of the love seat. I had noticed that Melody had been more submissive around Henry lately—in a doting way—kissing him on the lips in public and smiling a false little smile.

  “But why?” Cindy asked. “Excuse me,” she said, chuckling a little, “it just seems silly. Since we’re family, and all.” She looked at Melody, then at me, wanting us to back her, but we were quiet. The ends of her hip scars trailed out from her shorts.

  Henry leaned back, crossing one leg over the other. Then he uncrossed his legs and leaned forward. He grimaced, turning his head so that first he looked at Melody, and then at Cindy and me sitting on the couch, as if reprimanding us.

  “She’s my wife,” he said angrily.

  When I saw Cindy’s expression, I felt scared for her far more than for myself because she looked as if she’d been punched in the face with a fist, but was trying her best not to appear that she’d been hit. Her face convulsed, slightly, and her lips trembled. She wore a tank top, and a flush rose across her neck. “Of course,” she said, her voice shaky, eyes wide open. “That’s how it should be.”

  Melody walked me to my station wagon (my daughter was spending the night there), and even outside, away from Henry, with the stars and moon above us, I could sense the tension, as if Henry followed, lurking in a bush. She kissed me on the cheek, pressed her lips there, reminding me of when she’d kissed me after her wedding ceremony. When she pulled away, she looked around us, almost imperceptibly—to be sure Henry wasn’t there, imagined or real. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “He’s such an asshole.”

  Whenever I talked to her after that night, she acted as if she wasn’t unhappy, as she had told me almost a year ago, when we’d washed dishes together, and because I wanted to believe her, and because this time she wanted me to believe her as well, I tried, but I couldn’t shake the impression that she was protecting me. It was as if power had been transferred from Cindy to Henry that night; and Cindy must have thought so, too, because she sulked whenever she came over; she complained about everything, including men, even in front of Henry.

  When I tried to get Melody to confide in me, she acted resigned, saying that she’d changed; she’d matured; she no longer wanted to have affairs, understanding the consequences on a deeper level. But something had been squashed inside her, even if her behavior was more acceptable, less self-destructive. Once in a while she alluded to Henry’s terrible temper.

  Melody and Henry began taking trips to Aspen to ski, even though Melody had always disliked skiing. I watched their home and fed Jules and Jim, but the thrill had gone, and I saw the home, pool, and view in an ambiguous light, not so easily enjoyed, always laced with a corruptive shame and guilt. Jules and Jim were lethargic and ate little when Melody was away, and I’d let them lie on the furniture, something that Henry prohibited. “I’m sorry,” I’d whisper, stroking their little bodies, always firmer than I expected. “Mommy will be home soon.” My daughter loved these times, not just because of the home and its luxuries, but because Melody’s daughter stayed with us, since Henry wanted Melody to himself.

  Maybe that was why Melody was most despondent on these trips. She left phone messages when she couldn’t reach me, on my cell phone where she knew the girls wouldn’t hear, and these messages were my only real hint at what might be happening inside her.

  I saved one of her rambling phone messages, replaying it over and over. I had laughed when I first heard it, but each subsequent listen made my heart crack further. She was driving to town in a rented Lexus, ostensibly to pick up some tampons at a market, but I imagined her real reason was to get away from Henry, and she’d pulled the car over beside a snowy bank.

  “Hey,” she said, and I heard in her voice that she’d been crying. “I drove past a truck, and there were these teenagers inside it making out, completely, and I made a U-turn and drove back around. I just had to pull over and I’ve been sitting here, for about ten minutes, watching them, not knowing what to do with myself, and I decided to call. I don’t know why.” Here she coughed, and it sounded as if she was choking back a sob.

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said, regaining her composure. “I’m going to check my medication dosage, maybe Doctor Frankel fucked it up, you know. And I’ve been seeing that therapist like he told me to—Anne Whateverherlastnameis, because Henry can afford it; she’s okay. I like her, I guess, but so far, it’s not working.

  “The thing is, I understand that’s not how we are as adults, not like those teenagers. We can’t expect to have that anymore. I’ve grown up in so many ways.” She was quiet for a minute, and at first I thought she’d hung up, but then her voice came back, livelier than before: “Well, what can I expect?” She paused again, as if in thought.

  “I wish you could’ve seen them,” she said. “They were so into each other
, the way they couldn’t keep their hands off each other, the way it is when you’re in love. They finally drove away, but I’m still here.” She sighed, but it wasn’t a self-pitying sigh, more as if she was considering how things happen, the way we make sacrifices.

  “You know what?” she said, her voice lightening, reminding me of the Melody I’d lived with and worked with; the Melody who slept with women and men, and who would let pass through her lips things that shouldn’t be said aloud; the Melody I hadn’t appreciated until it was too late, until I’d already done wrong by her. “Between you and me—and you can’t tell anyone this, I swear to God. Henry would be so mad and really, I can’t complain. He gives me everything I want. You know how it is. I say, ‘I want this, I want that.’ And he goes out and gets it.” She paused, breathing into the phone, possibly deciding whether after her buildup what she had to say was worthwhile.

  “Let me tell you,” she said, and it seemed she was trying to cheer herself up or cheer me, the way she spoke confidentially, but theatrically, as if she’d pressed her mouth closer to the phone. “I don’t mean to complain, but Henry’s breath—” She made a noise, hoo-weee.

  “The thing is,” she continued, “he’s a really, really, really awful kisser.” She laughed before hanging up, and listening each time, I felt a beautiful aching sadness, because her laugh sounded wonderfully free.

  John Wayne Loves Grandma Dot

  JOHN WAYNE WANDERED Newport Beach at night. An observer watching him drift through the streets might think his wanderings were random and thoughtless, but John Wayne had his own logic and pattern. He believed in things unseen. He walked slowly past certain homes, skateboard at his side, sensing possibilities, as though the homes were showing him: see, this is how it can be.

  He saw the glow from inside a window, sensed the way the kids felt toward the parents, or how the parents loved each other, or even how the dog liked the way he got fed every night and rubbed on his belly. John Wayne lingered, careful not to be noticed. He didn’t want to scare anyone; he just wanted to feel.

  Most homes reminded him of basements or art galleries: coldness hung around them, a hint of darkness, maybe even abuse. He set his skateboard down and flew past, noticing the flickering lights of a television. His gut reaction might be wrong, but he didn’t want to find out. He wanted no part. The gravelly sound of his wheels on the sidewalk calmed him.

  His skateboard jumped curbs, flipped down cement steps. Darkness, shadows, moonlight, stars, the constant noise of the ocean, and no one to tell him what to do. He fell, but that was part of the adventure: scrapes and bruises, once a broken arm. A stranger drove him to the hospital. The nurse injected him and told him to count backwards from ten. He tried, but he couldn’t remember what came next—ten, nine—that was it. The nurse gave him a troubled look, and he wanted to explain, “Don’t worry. I had a drug overdose. I hurt my head,” but his mouth wouldn’t open. He went under the anesthesia, and he died for a little while. When he woke up, there was a cast on his arm and his head hurt. The dying wasn’t so bad. He knew that it was a different kind of sleep, another type of waking.

  After the drug overdose, his mother continued to do his laundry and set the baskets by the back door of their house, along with bags of food, but otherwise his family fired him like a bad employee. His brother and sister avoided him. His mom looked at him and sobbed. They called it tough love, but it wasn’t about love: John Wayne was an embarrassment.

  Although people pitied him (he could see pity in their faces), he didn’t think the way he lived was such a bad way to go. He smoked marijuana, even when he took showers, his head far enough from the spray to keep it lit, and an ashtray on the toilet seat for when he washed his hair. He no longer used cocaine and heroin, and although he somehow knew that this was connected to his brain damage, it was a relief. Money was a problem insofar as he had to do things to get it. The men took him in their cars, but it was over fast, not so bad when it was quick, and sometimes tender. Unless they got angry and violent and pushed him down. He knew how to fight back, but he hated to hurt anyone; that’s why he left home the first time. Once, he stabbed his stepfather’s arm with scissors, but it was in self-defense. He had cried for a week. He let the men do what they needed just so long as he could get his money and keep floating through the streets.

  Sometimes he slept at the Newport Inn, a run-down hotel on the fringe of Costa Mesa near the freeway. Henry Wilson paid his bill each month in full. John Wayne met him every Wednesday at midnight, Wilson’s black Mercedes idling in the dark, the back door ajar. The hotel sign was lit up with blinking red and blue palm trees. He didn’t like the loud, drunken fights and the cop cars.

  Otherwise, he slept under a bridge. He dug a burrow in the dirt and covered it with cardboard. The sounds of the trucks and cars driving over the bridge was better than the screams, loud music, and sirens at the hotel, but it was cold and there was no bathroom. He used the liquor store bathroom on the other side of Pacific Coast Highway, but the owner hated him ever since he’d caught him stealing a twelve-pack of Coors. John Wayne ran across the highway, twelve-pack under his arm, and ducked under the bridge, the man yelling, “You little fucker! Try that again and I’ll shoot your fucking head off!”

  John Wayne went to AA and NA meetings. He sat on the raggedy couch, bummed cigarettes, and listened to the people talk. There were free doughnuts, cookies, cakes, and coffee. Once in awhile, he raised his hand, made everyone in the room laugh, announcing, “Hello, my name is John Wayne, and I’m a drug addict.” That was all he ever said. The people welcomed him, patted his back, and treated him kindly, and he went for the company, safety, food, coffee, and cigarettes—not to stop using drugs.

  He was sorry for his parents and his twin siblings, with their tight faces and tight hearts. They didn’t know what it was like to let the ocean come inside you. He felt it course through his veins, a charging through his heart, letting him know that he was nothing but it didn’t matter, it was okay to be nothing, because nothing was everywhere: wind, palm trees, even the expensive cars and clothes. How could he explain that it was okay to be nothing? His stepfather called him weak and stupid. When his stepfather yelled at him, he let the words hang over his head like butterflies.

  He missed his mom. Sometimes he imagined it was her hot breath whispering in his ear, “You’re so beautiful,” not Henry Wilson.

  John Wayne knew that Rosie watched him from her bedroom deck. His life changed when she gave him the key to Uncle Stan’s apartment over the garage of her grandparents’ house, where no one went upstairs, except for her.

  She didn’t make John Wayne do anything. Sometimes, she looked at him like she was sorry for him, but most of the time she just looked at him. People liked to look at him, and he learned not to talk, since that was when people got upset, their eyes changing from pleased to disturbed.

  He took long hot showers and left the red light on. There was grace in the walls, the clothes left in the closet and dresser, and the blue bong. It was as if the clothes and bong were waiting for him. The clothes fit him and he liked the tie-dyed shirts and frayed Levi’s. He wore Uncle Stan’s necklace with the tooth pendant, stroking it for comfort. It was like a slender bone.

  From the apartment window, he watched Rosie’s grandparents engrossed in their rituals in the house below. There’s Grandpa and Grandma, he thought. Watching them made him feel safe, he didn’t know why. They sat on their barstools, eating their meals, a dependability. Grandma Dot had silvery white hair. Grandpa was tanned and there was a patch of white hair on either side of his head in a U shape. The skin between the hair reminded him of a bull’s-eye. Their meals were poked and prodded, they took small bites. Grandpa drank vodka martinis with speared olives while Grandma Dot drank Schlitz straight from the can. She was petite, always dressed with care, so the sight of her tipping a can to her coral lips was dramatic. She sat on the barstool with her legs crossed like an aged movie star.

  Grandma Dot sensed a p
resence in her son’s apartment above the garage. At first she believed it was poor, troubled, eccentric Rosie. She began leaving two crisp twenty-dollar bills every week (and sometimes three twenty-dollar bills) in one of Grandpa’s martini glasses with Spending Money written on a piece of paper and taped to it. She left the glass at the foot of the stairs, and whoever the person was accepted the money, leaving the empty glass for her. She became convinced that it wasn’t Rosie. When her Schlitz started disappearing from the garage refrigerator, she bought twelve-packs of Coors and left a note explaining that Schlitz was rather difficult to come by.

  John Wayne continued to sneak into the garage and steal the Coors, and although he didn’t read a note that was left there, crumpling it into a ball and chucking it in the trash, he understood that he should not touch Grandma Dot’s stash.

  Grandma Dot was a serious insomniac, her large booze intake also an attempt to lose consciousness. Secretly, when her mind was inebriated enough, she pretended that her son still lived upstairs, that he hadn’t left her, and this allowed her to avoid the reality. She saw a red glow from the apartment every night, and the light didn’t go off until she herself had abandoned the barstool for bed. She liked the attention.

  John Wayne watched Grandma Dot through the kitchen window below while she played Solitaire, sitting on a barstool in the kitchen, on the counter beside her cards, her beer sweating on a napkin, her ashtray stockpiled with stubs, her pack of Merits, and her lighter. Once, late at night, she slipped fluidly off the barstool. He was ready to run down the steps and save her, so sure that she had hurt herself, but she picked herself up and sat herself right back on the barstool. Then she slowly, dramatically, drunkenly lit herself another cigarette.

  He saw the hallway light through a bulbous plastic window in the ceiling of the house. It looked like a lit-up blister. He began waiting for the light to go off, and then he would go downstairs; she would leave the front door open for him.