Beaver At His Parents' [1]

by Norman Crane

  Fucking door? I stop chewing my potatoes. Rosie never swears. In the entire time I’ve known her, I’ve heard her say the word “fuck” in a non-sexual context less than ten times. “Is everything OK?” I ask.

  “Everything is all right,” she answers.

  But I can see that it’s not. Behind her forced smile, something’s wrong. Her knuckles are white from holding the silverware too firmly. Under the table, her leg is bouncing up and down, bringing the end of the tablecloth up and down with it. Details are off. Rosie is usually still. I’m the anxious one. As she holds her smile, the creases and wrinkles on her skin catch shadows, making her look aged.

  I stretch my hand toward her. “Did you have a bad day at the office, honey?”

  She recoils.

  “Nothing extraordinary.”

  Several thoughts burst from the gates and race through my mind. The first is that Rosie is repulsed by me as a bad, whiny lawyer. That can’t be true, however. I’m about to ask if she’d still love me if I wasn’t one, but backtrack once I realise the word itself—love—has never been exchanged between us. Rosie, who is proud of her sharp, stinging candour, has not once told me she loves me and I’ve not had the bravery to tell the same to her.

  “I’m so sorry,” she says without explanation.

  “For what?”

  The tiny space between her nose and upper lip twitches. I love that space. I want to use the word aloud in any context. “Rosie, I—”

  “For ruining your birthday plans for me. Your mood. This dinner.”

  “I love doing stuff for you.” This time it’s my turn to force a smile, not because I don’t mean it but because I’m ashamed of the juvenile way I just phrased my adult feeling for her. My smile is a cover-up. “And you didn’t ruin anything. I want your advice, your true opinions and feelings. It’s one of the things I love most about you.”

  I grip her hand.

  It feels cold, and tears well in her eyes.

  She rips free of me, pushes her chair neatly back under the table and whispering another apology makes for the bathroom.

  I stay where I am. “Rosie?”

  “One second, please.” I hear the bathroom tap turn on, water splash. She must be washing her face. She must be composing herself in front of the mirror. I wonder suddenly how many times she’s done this before, not with another man but because of work, which I refuse to believe is not to blame for our spoiled mood. I feel guilty for not asking more often about her day. In hindsight, I’ve been selfish, self-centred. I vow to change—

  Rosie exits the bathroom holding my bouquet of two dozen tulips.

  Water drips from their severed stems to the floor.

  “For me?” she asks.

  “Of course they’re for you,” I say, already striding across the dining room to wrap my arms around her.

  The hug I give her is as loving as it is romantic, and I don’t stop giving it until she covers my cheeks awkwardly with kisses. The tulips smell good, but as usual Rosie smells better.

  When I finally let her go, she backs away clutching the tulips to her chest. “I apologise for my behaviour,” she says.

  I shake my head. “You’ve no reason. I adore you. Don’t hide yourself from me.”

  “And you’re right that it is work. I’ve been working so hard lately, trying so desperately to stand out and make a good impression. My career is important to me, Charlie. I need you to know that.”

  I take her hand and absentmindedly play with a ring on one of her fingers. “Of course I know that. You’re a great lawyer and you deserve the best.”

  “Thank you, Charlie.”

  “For the tulips?”

  “For the compliment. For the flowers. For understanding, most of all.”

  I don’t have any Finnish soaps and I messed up the giving of the flowers, but if I could make her happy tonight, I might be able to forgive myself. “If I ever quit being a lawyer, maybe I’ll go into the understanding business,” I say to try to lighten the mood.

  She responds with: “Let’s drink.”

  Soon I hear the clinking of glass bottles, a sound both familiar and distant, drift toward me from the the kitchen cabinet where Rosie and I keep our alcohol. The cabinet is seldom opened. I rarely drink with Rosie and she rarely drinks at all, but she returns holding two glasses filled with what looks like rum and coke and an unopened bottle of brandy.

  I take the glass she holds out to me, bring it to my lips—and hesitate.

  Rosie takes a sip of her drink. “Let me correct myself,” she says. “Let’s not just drink. Let’s get drunk.”

  A reality hits me. I’ve never seen Rosie drunk.

  I down half of my drink at once.

  I want to see her drunk. I want to steal her inhibitions, force her to let loose, help her do whatever it is people do when they let themselves get carried away on a tidal wave of booze. But as Rosie takes merely another sip, another reality hits me. This one’s a sucker punch. She’s never seen me drunk either. I finish my drink to stop the flashbacks of my first year of university that I’m about to have, but the shame’s already creeping up on me. I vaguely remember pool parties, dopey sex, awful sing-alongs on public transportation and my own awkward goofiness.

  Rosie refills my glass. “Give me your phone,” she says.

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to remember you like this.”

  I fish my phone out of my pocket and toss it to her. She makes the one handed catch with no problem, flicks the screen a few times and points the phone’s camera at me. I raise my glass and smile. “Pour yourself some brandy,” I say.

  She ignores me. “Smile.”

  I smile, and she snaps a photo.

  “Now pout.” I pout. “And drink.” I drink. “And now a monkey face.” Pretending to be a chimpanzee, I am in awe of Rosie’s voice pronouncing the words “monkey face”.

  “Brandy,” I remind her.

  She pours one but gives it to me instead of drinking it herself. Or maybe that’s hindsight. “Now Chinese,” she says.

  “What?”

  “Make a Chinese face.”

  I put down my glass, thin out my lips and use my fingers to slant my eyes.

  I drink brandy.

  “Dance.” I dance. “Take off your belt.” I take off my belt. “My turn,” I say, already feeling a gentle slur, reaching for Rosie and the phone she pulls playfully away from my grabbing hand. “Not yet. Get more alcohol in you first.” I crawl toward her. She takes a swig of brandy straight from the bottle, lets me kiss her and spits the brandy into my mouth. It burns. Rosie burns. Rosie is hot. “Call me a nigger,” she says. “What?” She responds by sliding a tulip into my mouth. The phone is between me and Rosie. “Call me a bitch.” I call her a bitch. Lights keep flashing. “Now drink this.” She gives me a bottle that I take in both hands, raise above my head and whose contents I let flow down my throat, into my gut. It’s not brandy. It’s rum. I cough at the sweet, leathery taste and knock the bottle over trying to find the floor with its bottom. My eyes fog up from the inside. I can’t find the switch to turn on my windshield wipers. Dummy, I think. Windshield wipers only go back and forth on the outside. I no longer remember how long any of this has been going on. “What do you want to do to me?” Rosie asks. “Fuck you,” I say automatically. We’re in the bedroom. We’re almost naked. I have an erection and the aftertaste of beer on my tongue. The ticking of the clock is driving me mad with its irregularity. And those lights. Faulty mechanism. Faulty mechanism. Faulty. “Monkey face again,” Rosie says. “Now Chinese again.” Slanted, enchanted. I burst out laughing. Rosie and I fuck. I think. There, that fixed the clocks. Rosie wipes her face. Rosie sounds funny, like a furry frying pan bouncing on a glass stove top and when I give her a hug she feels like it too, and under her eyes I lick at drops of brandy that taste not like brandy but like salt and I fall soundlessly asleep.

  It’s dark when I wake up. The blinds are closed. My first instinct is that I napped,
but one shake of the head dissuades me of that silly notion. My head hurts. I’m hungover. I’m also naked and alone. I put on a pair of boxers, slide across the bed, noting the warmth on the mattress beside me, and rubbing my temples stagger out of the bedroom.

  Rosie’s sitting in the kitchen. She doesn’t look hungover but she doesn’t look good either. “Good morning,” I say.

  “Good Saturday afternoon.”

  I open the fridge, take out a bottle of water, crack open the top and drink all of it in one gulp. If it’s Saturday afternoon that means I slept for a long time.

  Rosie’s already dressed. “How long have you been up?” I ask. I barely remember anything that happened.

  “A while.”

  “Is everything OK?” I ask.

  “Every is all right, but I have to go into the office for the evening.”

  She’s being formal. I run my hands through my hair. Perhaps I should be concerned but I’m not. Rosie is just being Rosie, after all. I can’t expect her to change because of one wild night. Still, watching her, I’m certain whatever we did last night was a good step in the direction of being OK with being embarrassed with each other. We opened up. We let loose.

  “I have to run now,” she says. “I was just waiting for you to get up.”

  “When will you be back?”

  “In a few hours. I don’t know precisely.” And, heading through the door, “I left your phone on the desk by the computer,” she says.

  When she’s gone, I dress myself in jeans and a t-shirt and flop down on the couch, trying to decide if I’m hungry or not. I decide I’m not. I stand by the living room window instead. I look at the city, then slide open the window and breathe the city in. Fresh air is what I need. I grab my wallet and my phone, which is indeed by the computer, and take the elevator down to the main floor of the apartment building. My head is throbbing by the time I take my first step outside but I ignore the suggestion to stay inside and bum around. I’ve been drunk enough times to know that exercise, air and coffee is what I need. Leaving my car behind, I take off down the sidewalk. There’s a coffee place nearby but it’s posh and I don’t want to go to it. I want to go somewhere else, somewhere cheaper, somewhere where normal people go.

  The farther I walk, the better I’m able to form coherent thoughts. Boozy cobwebs crumble away from my brain. When I feel satisfactorily sharp, I duck into the first Tim Horton’s I see.

  The place is almost empty.

  I’m glad.

  I order black coffee and a bran muffin and sit by myself at one of the tables pressed against a wall of windows looking out on a sidewalk along which nobody passes. By most standards, it’s a beautiful summer day but the streets are devoid of humans. Only cars stream by, streaks of colour smeared by the unclean glass. My coffee is hot and double cupped. I let it steam. Because no one’s ready to order, the guy behind the counter steps out and starts mopping the floor. He adjusts a bright yellow “Caution: Wet Floor” sign. I bite into my muffin, which tastes fine, and consider the benefits of non-carpeted floors. It’s not a sincere topic. It’s a roundabout way of imagining the house Rosie and I will have.

  A bell dings, announcing the arrival of a new customer.

  The guy with the mop leans it against the sign and scurries behind the counter, fixing his cap. I place silent bets on what the order will be. What kind of person comes here on a Saturday afternoon: lost, friendless, poor?

  “One large coffee, double double. And give me one of those chocolate peanut butter chip cookies. They look good today,” the customer says.

  I don’t recognise the voice right away, but when Mrs. Johnson turns it’s too late for me to look away:

  “Charlie!”

  I take a deep breath. “Mrs. Johnson.”

  “Can I join you?”

  I smile in lieu of an answer, hoping to twist my mouth into an expression of sarcasm, but it either doesn’t work or Mrs. Johnson is wilfully oblivious because she wastes no time dropping into the chair opposite mine.

  “I sure as heck didn’t expect to see you here,” she says.

  “A pleasant surprise.”

  She eyes my plate. “I see you got yourself a bran muffin there. I don’t like those myself. I prefer something with a little more flavour that satisfies my sweet tooth.”

  Considering her mood when I saw her on Friday, Mrs Johnson is oddly chipper. I therefore proceed with caution. “I’m watching my waistline. Can’t afford to buy a new suit,” I say.

  It must dawn on her I’m not wearing one. “I knew there was something different about you.”

  I look like you, I think. I say, “Casual Saturday.”

  “You look…” She pushes her cookie into her mouth and chews. “You look like you could be the one going to see a lawyer today, not the one being one.”

  “A real person with real problems?”

  She scratches her head through her green hat. “Yeah, just like that,” she says, and her subsequent smile is the opposite of sarcasm. “I’m not here to take up your time, though. Don’t worry about that. I just wanted the company.” She pauses, before saying in a single breath, “Jack and I decided to mortgage the house to have enough money to keep suing the hospital.”

  I want to tell her that’s a rash decision. I want to tell her the law moves slower than a tortoise through condensed milk and she has plenty of time to make up her mind. I want to tell her not to mortgage the house! But I’m no longer drunk, which means I’m back in control of my honesty, which means I’m no longer honest unless it suits me, so I bite my tongue, then scald it by drinking hot coffee, and nod stupidly, repeating to myself Winterson’s legal mantra: advise your clients but don’t make decisions for them.

  “I’m really not here today as a lawyer, Mrs. Johnson,” I say, borrowing some of Rosie’s formality. “But if you want to proceed with the case, we’ll proceed with the case.”

  We finish our pathetic meal in silence.

  I bid Mrs. Johnston goodbye at the door, weaving out of the way to let a group of Goth teenagers amble by, and turn my back on her. I’m far from home and don’t feel like walking anymore, but somehow calling a cab is even less appealing. I might catch a glimpse of my face in its rear-view mirror. Plus, it’s still a beautiful summer day and the sidewalks are still empty. Making use of them will be my act of rebellion for the day. Tiny and insignificant, it’s all the independence I can handle. Any more and I might just break my back. Because although I’m not spineless yet, I’m getting there. One of these days I’ll have to learn to slither home.

  I don’t realise just how sour my mood is until I re-enter the apartment. Rosie’s not back yet and the entire place reeks of sweat and alcohol. I turn off the air conditioner and open all the windows. When that doesn’t immediately help, I take a shower. Then I change the bedsheets and bring the dirty ones down to the laundry room. Waiting for the laundry, I hop upstairs, intentionally ignoring the elevator, and end up taking out my aggression on the sofa cushions while trying to rearrange them. I retrieve the wash, wondering what it is I’m angry about. Maybe Rosie was right. Maybe I don’t have what it takes to be a lawyer. What if I lack the mental toughness? Rosie would tell me to leave work at the door. Mrs. Johnson’s life is not mine and beyond this line only my life enters. But Rosie’s at work. I pass a miserable Saturday evening binge-streaming The Good Wife and when Rosie finally gets back, we eat a reheated dinner and go to sleep with our backs facing toward each other and our attentions elsewhere.

  Sunday morning dawns. Rosie and I take turns showering, brushing our teeth and making food. I brew tea, Rosie fries eggs. The breakfast smells overtake the lingering odour of drunkenness and when I finish eating, wiping my plate with my last piece of bread, I feel at ease again. I shouldn’t get so emotional, I conclude. Rosie flips virtual pages of the New York Times on her tablet and when she speaks it’s with her eyes cast down. She responds to everything I say but doesn’t say anything on her own. Despite the lack of attention, which I still as
cribe to Friday night, I desire more than anything to make her laugh. I’m unsuccessful, so I wash the dishes instead. She keeps reading. I ask her what’s happening in the world. She pronounces the words of a headline. I ask her if anything’s the matter. She pronounces the word “no”. “Do you regret what happened?” I ask. She reminds me that I’m supposed to meet with Boris and Oliver. I didn’t even know she knew about that. “Call me on your way back from the pool party,” she says, pointing at my phone, “and I’ll make dinner.” I dress in an old pair of dress pants and a shirt, and take a pair of swimming trunks just in case. Looking outside, I see the sun burning its way through the atmosphere, changing the world to jelly. Boris was right. It’s going to be another hot day.

  Oliver’s father’s house sits in the hills on the outskirts of the city, where the snaking streets make it easy to lose one’s self, so I drive slowly, passing between sprawling green lawns and their imposing houses, set comfortably away from each other and well back from the street, keeping one eye on the fresh asphalt and the other, squinting, on the numbers and surnames written on gates, boulders and ornate mailboxes.

  I honk as I pull in to what I believe is the correct driveway, but the gate is already open. I sense the gaze of cameras.

  My tires roll.

  A mansion approaches into view: crimson brick, white trim, black roof. I stop in front of the garage beside three other cars, all more expensive than mine, and get out. I don’t know if I should knock on the front door or not. My phone buzzes. The message from Boris tells me to come round the back. I suppose there are more cameras here. Their hidden but theoretically necessary existence disconcerts me, like dark matter. I put my swimming trunks under my arm and stroll along the edge of the house on a path of patio stones. The stones are perfectly placed. Not one blade of grass grows between them. Weeds are almost extinct in the hills above the city.

  “Charlie!” Boris yells.

  He and Oliver are sitting by the pool, whose still water shares the same vivid green as the grass, drinking beer. Oliver smiles and tosses a can to me. I drop my swimming trunks to catch it. Approaching, I scan the area for more people, but see no one. Not that I mind. Boris picks up a chair, snaps it open and places it beside his own. I snap open my beer, sit and take a sip. The taste stings with memories of Rosie’s face. One day, we, too, will have a place like this, I hope. Then I use my lawyerly confidence to transmutate that hope into a certainty. Although as Canadians we like to consider ourselves different from Americans, if there are two things we’ve picked up from our southern neighbours it’s an addiction to suing people and a sincere belief in the power of positive thinking. I think positively about owning a big piece of land with a big brick mansion on it. The beer stings a little less.